BLOOD AND ROSES (ET MOURIR DE PLAISER)

France/Italy, 1960, 87 minutes, Colour.
Mel Ferrer, Elsa Martinelli, Annette Vadim (Annette Stroyberg), Mark Allegret.
Directed by Roger Vadim.

Blood and Roses is based on a popular story by Sheridan le Fanu, the Irish novelist who also wrote Uncle Silas, which was the basis for the 1948 film with Jean Simmonds as well as a Spanish version at the same time and was the author of In a Glass Darkly, the basis for Carl Theodor Dreyer’s classic vampire film Vampyr.

His story Carmilla was much more popular and, especially during the 1970s, gave rise to a number of versions including the British thrillers, The Vampire Lovers, Lust for a Vampire, Twins of Evil as well as the Spanish, Blood Castle.

This film was directed by Roger Vadim who had emerged in the mid-1950s with dramas with sexual content, rather more explicit than usual for the period. He also was in the habit of using his wives in his various films, starting with Brigitte Bardot, moving to Annette Stroyberg. He also made films with his wife of the 1960s, Jane Fonda: La Ronde, The Game is Over, Tales of Mystery and Imagination and the most famous, Barbarella.

1. Did the title reveal the theme of the film? The French title was: To Die Of Pleasure. Does this add to the significance of the film and its tone?

2. Was this a successful vampire and horror film? What presuppositions in an audience do film like this have? Horror, vampires, blood and death, superstitions? How much does it presuppose belief in this? enjoyment of its screen presentation?

3. The film was released in the early sixties. How does it represent horror trends of the time? It was made by Roger Vadim who looked for vehicles for leading ladies and tended to exploit them. Did this seem to be the case here? Where?

4. The film had a modern setting. Did this add to the plausibility of the story? The value of the commentary at the film’s opening? Did this make the horror film more attractive? The use of widescreen colour and modern and old style settings?

5. The Karnstein family has been associated with many films about Dracula. How did the film use the Karnstein Dracula background? What was added to the film by its old-world atmosphere and the mansions still on the property?

6. Was Leopoldo an interesting hero? Mel Ferrer's performance and his lack of presence? How was he made the centre of the film?

7. How interesting a character was Carmela? How mysterious? Her fascination with the Karnstein tombs, the family crypt? why was she overtaken by the vampire identity of Millaroa? The curse of the family working? the murdered girl, the mutilated throat, Millaroa in the woods? Carmela’s performance, her cold shadow, the sun, flowers withering, horse being terrified. seductions? Jealousy? How interesting a portrayal of the character was this?

8. How did Georgia contrast with her as being normal? How attractive a heroine was Georgia?

9. The important sequence of Georgia pricking her finger on the rose thorn and Carmela’s morbid fascination with the blood? The theme of blood and roses?

10. The importance of the dream sequences and the fantasies, the nightmares?

11. Carmela’s death and its melodrama, the vampire with the stake through her heart, the accompanying explosions?

12. The irony of the ending with Georgia as the new vampire, continuing the tradition, the rose petals dying in her hand? How effective was this for the ending of the film?

13. How successfully did the film sustain its horror and Gothic atmosphere? The atmosphere of morbidity, the lesbian touches, the hot-house and unhealthy atmosphere?

14. What value are film like this in entertainment? In exploration of morbid and superstitious and mythic themes?