Blood Feast - Significance

Significance

Blood Feast immediately became notorious for its explicit gore and violence. It is the oldest film to have appeared on the UK video nasty list. It is also often cited erroneously as one of the first films to show people dying with their eyes open (earlier examples include D. W. Griffith's 1909 film The Country Doctor, the 1931 film The Public Enemy and the 1960 film Psycho).

Fuad Ramses was described by author Christopher Wayne Curry in his book A Taste of Blood: The Films of Herschell Gordon Lewis as "the original machete-wielding madman" and the forerunner to similar characters in Friday the 13th and Halloween. Lewis said of the film, "I've often referred to Blood Feast as a Walt Whitman poem. It's no good, but it was the first of its type."

Blood Feast is the first part of what the director's fans have dubbed "The Blood Trilogy". Rounding out the trilogy are the films Two Thousand Maniacs! (1964) and Color Me Blood Red (1965). After the third film, producer David F. Friedman said, "I think that for now we're going to abandon making any more 'super blood and gore' movies, since so many of our contemporaries are launching similar productions, causing a risk that the market will quickly reach a saturation point."