Rosso sangue

Plot synopsis:
Mikos Stenopolis (George Eastman) is a man who was experimented on in a church-sanctioned scientific experiment that gave him a healing factor, but inadvertently drove him insane. The Vatican priest (Edmund Purdom) who helped create him pursues the homicidal Mikos to a small American town, attempting to kill him by impaling him on a set of railings which disembowel him, but he is revived later in a local hospital. The madman escapes after brutally murdering a nurse, and goes on a killing spree. The priest informs the hospital and authorities that the only way to kill Mikos is to 'destroy the cerebral mass'.
While attacking a motorcyclist after escaping from the hospital, Mikos is struck by a hit-and-run driver. The driver of the car, Mr. Bennett, and his wife are going to a friend's house to watch a football game, leaving their two children at home with a babysitter. Their daughter Katia is confined to her bed because of a problem with her spine, while her younger brother believes that the 'Bogeyman' is coming to get him.
Mikos makes his way to the Bennetts' home, and begins to murder everyone there. Peggy, a family friend, is stabbed in the head with a pickaxe, and the babysitter has her head forced into a lit oven and is stabbed in the throat with a pair of scissors, but not before sending the brother off to get help. Katia struggles from her bed to take on the killer herself. Mikos breaks into Katia's bedroom and attacks her, but she manages to stab him in the eyes with a set of drawing compasses. She then stumbles down the hallway as the blinded killer staggers after her. He stalks her through the house, but Katia manages to elude him. The priest arrives and struggles with Mikos, and Katia grabs an axe from a decorative suit of armor and decapitates Mikos with it. The police and the rest of the family arrive to discover Katia standing in the doorway, covered in blood holding Mikos's severed head.

Tags: violence, revenge, cruelty, murder, sadist

Review:
Joe D'Amato and George Eastman's follow-up to the notorious "The Grim Reaper" (Antropophagus) is sick, twisted and  oh yes  deliciously absurd!
Whenever George isn't barbarically killing someone using band saws, surgical devices or axes, "Absurd" is rather dull, slow-moving and borrowing story ideas as well as direct quotes from John Carpenter's landmark slasher Halloween.
Also he was left dead on a Greek island and he turns up in Absurd suddenly in normal clothes and in the U.S. There is no recalls whatsoever from the first movie the priest who is chasing him just says he is a killing machine.
Those two facts alone will give many fans of cult horror reason enough to see it, and I'm pleased to say that the rest of the film isn't bad either; and while it's not quite as great as D'Amato's earlier film, Absurd plays out well as an overly gory slasher flick.
It's not long before the monster awakes and, naturally, goes on a killing spree.George Eastman takes the lead role again and just as it did in Antropophagus; his imposing presence provides the film's main standout, despite him basically marauding around rather than actually acting.
A priest is pursuing a madman who,the victim of a genetic experiment,has become a homicidal killer with blood that coagulates very quickly,making him virtually indestructible.The killer goes on the rampage in a small town.This ultra-gory sequel to Joe D'Amato's "Antropophagus" is very slow and boring at times but has also some creepy moments plus plenty of very strong violence and gore.The bandsaw killing is ten times nastier than the similar drill scene in Lucio Fulci's "City of the Living Dead".The gore flows freely resulting in a film that is simultaneously repellent and extremely funny.Highly recommended..
However, apart from the same director and having the looming George Eastman once again wandering around killing people, there is very little similarity save the fact they are both poor filmswith 'Absurd' definitely trumping its predecessor in the low quality stakes.
In doing this, 'Absurd' is clearly going for a 'Halloween' nightmare-in-suburbia vibebut in lacking any of the character development, script, or technical craft of Carpenter's flick, 'Absurd' flails about limply with a lame premise, zero suspense, and only manages to glimpse redemption (albeit unattained) with the make-up effects on the killswhich is no doubt why is got on the DPP's list of Video Nasties.The plot (as some would have it) is that Eastman has undergone a scientific procedure which has enabled his body to regenerate itself quickly (a la Wolverine) and consequently can only be killed with a shot to the head.
'Last House on the Left' (1972), 'Black Christmas' (1974), 'Halloween' (1978)) but the pacing of 'Absurd' is so slow and the acting so bad on all counts that none of the suspense and tension which is so abundantly present in these other movies even threatens to show its headlet alone eviscerate you.Okay, putting on my positive cap: some of the kills are pretty cool e.g. the buzzsaw-in-the-head scene as well as the oven scene, and the soundtrack has its momentsbut even in a 90 minute film with competent acting and a decent story this wouldn't cut it, let alone a movie as deplorable as this.
I've seen hundreds of horror/gore/splatter/slasher films, but the infamous 'oven scene' (which I won't spoil) had me literally covering my mouth to keep from making too much noise.The rampage of the second act works well because the horror comes from the THOUGHT of what is happening, rather than the more visceral deaths of the first half.
There is blood and gore, to be sure, but Joe D'Amato shows a modicum of restraint, letting the suspense build in a way it was unable to in the first act.So, if you decide to give this film a try, and I hope you will, stick with it.
I just managed to sit through "Rosso Sangue" aka "Absurd" aka "Antropophagus II" aka "Horrible" (add to those about 10 other aka-titles -- surely this should already tell you we're not dealing with an excellent picture here).So D'Amato delivers a straight-up horror movie this time.
Because between the handful moments of gore, you'll have plenty of time to doze off & catch a nap since there's hardly anything going on.The mighty George Eastman wrote the script and I'm sure it must have read a little something like this when he handed it over to his buddy D'Amato: "I say nothing in this film, I'm indestructible and I kill everybody".
Just because Eastman looses his intestines again in this film, doesn't make it a sequel.D'Amato pretty much turned it into a plain slasher flick.
The film's main qualities are the great score, the extreme gore, and George Eastman.
As is the case with many low-budget horror films released numerous times with different cuts and ratings in various different continents, Joe D'Amato's Absurd is known under a wealth of alternative titles.
The most bizarre title to make its way onto its VHS cover is Anthropophagus 2, although the film has little in common with D/Amato's Anthropopogus: The Grim Reaper apart from the lead casting of George Eastman as yet another impossibly strong man-mountain with a fondness for gruesome murder.The film begins with Mikos (Eastman), a beast of a man with an unnaturally fast healing factor, fleeing a priest.
The family soon finds themselves under attack from Mikos, while police officer Sgt. Engleman (Charles Borromel) and the priest (Edmund Purdom) attempt to hunt down the rampaging savage.Apart from a couple of entertainingly gory murders (a buzzsaw to the temple and a head in the oven are particular 'highlights'), Absurd suffers from some serious pacing issues.
A monster (read - Homicidal Man) with regenerative powers that are 'absurd' - IE stab him and it won't stop him, you have to completely mash his brain to do that - goes on a minor rampage in a small American town.This film almost sent me to sleep at times.
Next thing you know he's in hospital confusing surgeons while healing up at a rapid rate.A local cop gets involved, finding Purdom wandering about, and gets the low down: Big George is an almost indestructible killing machine in an experiment gone wrong, and Purdom is the priest/scientist sent to kill him.
Only a blow to the head will suffice, which will prove difficult as by the time they all figure out what's happening George has already killed a nurse and is heading for the house he was found wounded in (perhaps he'd left some of his guts there, or something).In this house is a small, tantrum having kid, and crippled teenager, a babysitter, and a husband and wife who depart before George turns up, although the husband did do a hit and run on George earlier in the film (while George is in the process of killing actor/director Michelle Soavi!).
If like me you admire films with a coherant script ( I don`t even know why the killer ran about killing those people ) good acting etc then you won`t want to watch this.
As Mikos terrorises a small community, a determined priest (Edmund Purdom) and local cop Sgt. Ben Engleman (Charles Borromel) attempt to track him down and deal him the only way they know how: by destroying his brain.Despite its alternate moniker 'Anthropophagus 2', and the presence of the hulking George Eastman as a bloodthirsty monster, this film really has little in common with director Joe D'amato's other infamous nasty 'Anthropophagus', apart from the fact that it too earned itself a place on the official DPP list of films thanks to a whole heap of cheap and nasty gore.If anything, Absurd (AKA Horrible) bears more similarities to (ie., it rips off) John Carpenter's classic 'Halloween' stealing liberally from that film's plot and emulating its characters: Nikos is D'amato's Michael Myers (he is even referred to by a child as 'The Bogeyman'); Purdom's priest is this film's Dr. Loomis; and nurse Emily (Annie Belle) is Laurie Strode.
As if that wasn't enough, Absurd also borrows musical cues from Carpenter's menacing Halloween theme.Of course, D'amato is nowhere near as adept at film-making as Carpenter, and fails to conjure up even a fraction of Halloween's atmosphere, scares and style; this means that, when the director isn't spilling entrails and splitting skulls, the film is extremely dull, with scenes unnecessarily drawn out to mind-numbing length.
His choices for roles over those years were indeed questionable; perhaps (like myself) he found something he couldn't get enough off in the slasher genre!In the beginning, a priest (Purdom) is seen chasing Eastman (I didn't catch what they called the psycho, so I'll identify him by his real name) through a forest.
For some bizarre reason, he seems to have taken a liking to the house that he chanced upon earlier, so he heads back there, taking the time to kill off any bystanders that he runs into on the way.
The story (or lack thereof) brings back George Eastman as our favorite cannibal, this time not on a Greek island, but somewhere in the US being hunted by a priest (of all people).
A couple gory scenes (a girl holds a decapitated head, and anelectric saw goes into a janitor's scalp) were somewhat interesting I guess, but by that time, I was already hitting the scan button to get the movie over with.
Rosso sangue (1981 or 1982) is also known as Anthropophagous 2 or Absurd, as this is supposed to be a sequel to Italian director Joe D'Amato's legendary cannibalistic horror tale Anthropophagous the Beast (1980) that starred Luigi Montefiori as the title character that becomes a cannibalistic monster at an abandoned Greek island.
That definitely shows in this "sequel", Absurd.This time George Eastman (Luigi Montefiori's US alias) plays Mikos Stenopolis, a man who has gone through some kind of an experiment that has made him "immortal" which means he can be killed only by damaging the head.
The beast arrives in small American town and naturally starts to kill people, and we follow this, at times very slow, ride for about 90 minutes until the once again predictable climax comes.The film is a very traditional eighties slasher gore film with some atmosphere and genuinely creepy scenes, mostly because of the fact the Montefiori is a really scary looking and big guy!
Still, the painfully long scenes depicting the girl trying to release herself from her bed are just too much and should have been shortened dramatically in order to make the film and the ending work better.Absurd is an okay attempt in the colorful filmography of D'Amato.
People always tend to compare this one with it's predecessor "Anthropophagous the beast", almost always with an outcome of letting this one down....but back in those days it was common for directors to try and make money out of names of previous successful movies....the only similarity here is George Eastman as the killer (George, who is perhaps the best man ever to appear in films).
There is no problem for me that script anyone could crank up in 30 minutes, mediocre acting, lack of cinematography or direction etc.There are pointless scenes in this movie that drag forever or at least feel like that to drag this garbage around feature film length (you can watch poorly made surgery scene for 10 minutes and 15 minutes of some broad trying to figure out how to open a belt atc.
The story is nothing else but George Eastman killing lots of innocent people and the way he does it is often really gut-wrenching: a nurse gets killed by a drilling machine, an old man eliminated with a bandsaw...
An Italian gore fest by Director Peter Newton (AKA Joe D'Amato, AKA Aristide Massaccesi.) Originally filmed as a follow up to "Anthropophagous the Beast".
Absurd (1981) ** (out of 4) Here's yet another bizarre one from Joe D'Amato, which has George Eastman playing a psycho who due to a blood clot can rejuvenate himself.
Soon he escapes from a mental hospital and goes on a killing spree while a priest and some goofy detectives search for him.For some reason this film was often considered a sequel to ANTHROPOPHAGUS, which never made too much sense to me.
ABSURD is known under countless other titles including HORRIBLE and the end result is something slightly entertaining as long as you don't take it too serious.This here is mainly going to appeal to those Italian horror fans who enjoy seeing little plot but plenty of gore.
Eastman escapes, the priest pursues, and then we take a detour through a direct copy of Halloween before the movie ends.Absurd is often billed as a sequel to Anthropophagus but Eastman is the only real connection.
Funny enough it got written by George Eastman, the man who plays the killer in this movie and it's predecessor "Antropophagus".Yes, despite the many titles this movie is known under, this movie is still really being a sequel to the 1980 movie "Antropophagus", which also got directed by Joe D'Amato.
The rest of the film consists of Mikos walking around killing the odd person here and there, and he ends up in the house from the beginning trying to kill a supposedly crippled young girl Kathy (Katya Berger), her extremely annoying bratty brother Willy (Kasimir Berger) and his babysitter Emily (Annie Belle).Directed by Joe D'Amato under the name Peter Newton on the version I watched called Absurd, and you can see why he didn't wanted his name on the credits.
Along with the aforementioned carnage left in Eastman's wake, he uses a pick axe, burying it into the skull of the babysitter, forces another victim's head into an oven(..protracted, disturbing sequence as we watch her struggle to free herself as the director often shows us the flames rising, eventually seeing the girl's face starting to burn)finishing her off by slowly jabbing her in the throat with shears(..she had stabbed him multiple times in the neck, before he seized her), soon setting his sights for the kids, Kasimir Berger(..in a dreadful performance as the obnoxious boy child, Willy, who is told to get help, with the damn stupid kid not leaving, instead re-entering the house!)and Katya Berger(..as seemingly invalid Katia, neck brace, strapped in place to her bed due to a spinal condition).
A hulking and seemingly indestructible madman (brawny behemoth George Eastman, who also wrote the derivative script) embarks on a vicious killing spree in a small town.Director Joe D'Amato relates the familiar, but still entertaining story at a steady pace, delivers oodles of over-the-top disgusting gore, stages the brutal murder set pieces with considerable sadistic aplomb, and generals a good deal of tension in the harrowing last third.
And I don't mean that as an insult.Mikos Stenopolis George Eastman) starts the film as he's being chased by the Vatican priest (Edmund Purdom, of all people) who created him.
The priest arrives and struggles with Mikos, just in time for Katia to chop off the killer's head with a ceremonial axe.The police arrive late, but Katia assures her little brother that everything will be fine as the camera reveals that she is holding Mikos' bloody head.Absurd inspired the German black metal band who took their name, who eventually went from watching gore films to killing people for real as their music went further and further into far right extremism.Your enjoyment of this film will be colored by how much you like gore, how much you understand that Italian movies are often very hard to understand and how much you're willing to forgive a film.
Okay so yes, that may be an apt title for this movie but none of that matters to fans of the film, director Joe D'Amato or the film ANTHROPOPHAGOUS.
What I didn't mention is that they are releasing the sequel at the same time and in just as fantastic quality.The movie doesn't exactly tie in to the first film but with the same director, same writer, same actor playing the "monster" and a taste for gore on hand it is done in the same vein.
In the meantime, we get a few of the best kills of the film, with hulking George Eastman sort-of reprising his role as an indestructible Greek man with rather unusual healing abilities.I enjoyed the score, though it got annoying at times.
D'Amato's 1981 Rosse Sangue is a retread/rehash/remake-come-sequel to his previous year's cannibal classic Anthropophagus, again with George Eastman starring as a great, lumbering, murdering maniac, this time terrorising a small American town.
"Absurd (1981)" it's an Italian slasher movie directed by Joe D' Amato, the film its very derivative, it takes many elements from "Halloween (1978)", like its music, its setting, its plot and its characters, obviously "Absurd" its not as good as "Halloween", but manages to deliver a healthy dose of gore and some intense killings.I watched the most complete version of the film, what this means is that its a version that tries to be as complete as possible, so its quality changes drastically from time to time, but honestly, that wasn't what bothered me the most while watching the film.
I say unofficial because there's no actual continuation of the story here, it just happens to have been directed by the same guy (one man Italian movie conveyor belt Joe D'Amato), and written by the rather large George Eastman who also plays the hulking great monsters in both films.So, in Absurd, we start with big George running away from a man in a black coat.
From there i know that Russo sangue a.k.a Absurd is sequel to anthropophagus(Italian movie) which is even more brutal and grue some than this, there in this very same person was acting as Grimm reaper and was not only killing but eating its victims all due to a very mysterious disease at an island.