The brilliance of Santa Sangre lays in its nightmare violence and mystical overtones
Santa Sangre (meaning Holy Blood) is a cult psychedelic horror film directed by Alejandro Jodorowsky and was originally released in 1989. Santa Sangre was recently re-released into cinemas so new generations can enjoy this weird, strange, and visually stunning film in a digitally remastered version.
It's symbolistic narrative
Fenix is confined to a mental hospital. To find out why he is there, the film flashbacks to his childhood as a performer in a circus. He performed in the circus with his mother and father who were a trapeze artist and a knife-thrower. As well as being a circus performer, Fenix’s father is also a leader in a religious cult, until everything goes awry. When Fenix’s father is unfaithful, his mother goes about taking revenge but his father retaliates and chops off her arms before killing himself. Traumatised by witnessing this terrible act, Fenix goes insane leading to him being sent to the mental hospital we see him in at the start of the film. Fenix escapes and rejoins his surviving mother and against his will becomes “her arms” leading to the two of them to embark a crusade of murder.
why should you watch santa sangre...
Director Jodorowsky is best known for films like El Topo, The Holy Mountain and the un-made Dune— which all feature the same bizarre and dreamlike imagery that Santa Sangre possess. Jodordowsky pulls off a film that delivers his staple in imagery blended together with mysticism and provocation. This is a film that has a nightmare-esque feel running continuously throughout but seemingly feels very liberating at the same time. Jodorowsky mixes together the religious overtones and nightmare violence beautifully without them ever feeling contrived.
This film will mainly appeal to horror fans and drive-in movie fans, but Santa Sangre should hopefully be enjoyed by a curious movie goer. It’s films like this, that can ignite a love and appreciation for film in the casual fan.
