The first movie of this double feature is 1981’s Mausoleum. Maulsoleum is the story of Susan Nomed. Along with inheriting the Nomed family fortune, Susan also is heiress to the family curse. At the age of 10, after watching her mother being laid to rest, Susan ran into the graveyard’s Mausoleum. What she didn’t realize that day was that she had unleashed an ancient evil power, which possessed her and stayed with her, showing itself at key times. Susan is now 30 and the evil spirit is starting to manifest itself more frequently, complete with glowing green eyes and great gory death scenes.

The Mausolem is remininscent of Beyond the Door or Demons. The gore scenes have that great 70′’s-80’s practical effects feel to them and were all creative and well executed for their time. The acting is standard B movie stock although I was thoroughly entertained by LaWanda Page as the maid. I doubt you will recognize her real name, I didn’t but I sure recognized her character. She was Aunt Esther in Sanford and Son (Fred Sanford, you old Fish Eyed Fool!!!) and has some hysterical lines in Mausoleum. Bobbie Bresee (Ghoulies and Surf Nazis Must Die!) did a good job in the lead role of Susan as well.

The second movie on the disc is the 1982 Frankie Avalon horror movie, Blood Song. Young Paul was unfortunate enough to witness a crime of passion as a young child. Unfortunately he was so scarred by this that he turned into a homicidal maniac that had to be institutionalized. Now fast forward to years later when young Marion is in a severe car accident and requires blood transfusions. In addition to being a maniac, Paul (Frankie Avalon, yes that Frankie Avalon) also was a blood doner…you see where this is headed, right? So the leg brace wearing Marion gets his blood and along with said blood, gains a psychic link to the killer. Oh and by the way, Paul has just escaped from the asylum and stolen a van, so guess where he is headed?

Another one of those hard to find early 80’s slashers, Blood Song was the weaker of the two movies on this disc. That being said, the storyline is fairly original, Frankie Avalon plays an axe weilding, flute playing homicidal maniac and althought subdued, there are some ok kills in the movie.

Presentation is worth noting on this release as it is different on each film. Mausoleum is in 1.85.1 Anamorphic Widescreen, while Bloodsong is presented in fullscreen. Now if you are expecting remastered film prints that are a vast improvement over the old VHS releases, you will be disappointed. In keeping with the Grindhouse style presentation, the prints on these are untouched. There are scratches galore, color fades and a lot of background noise on the soundtrack. Also in keeping with the grindhouse experience, there are original trailers of films such as Savage Streets and Killer Fish before each film as well as the old Coca-cola Intermission spot.

I have been looking for a DVD release of Mausoleum for awhile and was very happy to come across this 2 pack. Blood Song was a pleasant bonus as I had never seen it and it was definately worth a watch. 80’s horror junkies will love this volume of Exploitation Cinema and would probably be well served to check out the rest of the series for more cheesy horror goodness. Costing under $15 at most retailers, this is a great bargain for two previously unavailable on dvd movies and I recommend it as a cold purchase for 80s horror afficionados. Definately a good Halloween Movie Night candidate.

Special Features:
Bobbie Bresee (Susan) commentary track on Mausoleum

Recommended

Exploitation Cinema: Mausoleum and Blood Song is available courtesy of BCI/Deimos Entertainment beginning on October 14th

To switch for Exploitation Cinema:Mausoleum/Blood Song, or to purchase it from Amazon.com, click here.