Rabid (1977)

October 23, 2022 11:23 PM

A young woman develops a taste for human blood after experimental plastic surgery, and her victims turn into blood-thirsty zombies, leading into a city-wide epidemic.

JustWatch listing - streaming on Amazon Prime, among other places.

posted by skycrashesdown (3 comments total)

Just finished this last night. I'd say pretty low on my Cronenberg list; it's not much different from a lot of B grade horror movies of the time, but it has enough of the Crone's body horror and uncanny sexuality elements to make it interesting. Putting the vampiric phallus in her armpit was an... odd choice, not obviously meaningful, but hey, I'm thinking about it, so I guess it works! The uneven acting also adds some charm, I think. Marilyn Chambers does a good job and although there's definitely a 70s porno quality to her performance, it works, and I think it was what the director wanted. Her boyfriend Hart's freakout at the end is sooo over the top melodrama, I love it. And for whatever reason, I can't help but laugh when I watch Joe Silver. Something about that guy is just hilarious to me.
posted by Saxon Kane at 9:55 AM on October 25, 2022

For some reason, the VHS cover of this movie (not the one shown here) stuck in young me's brain as the symbol or distillation of the beyond-the-pale horror movie, the kind you might well watch at an unsupervised sleepover but you really shouldn't.
posted by praemunire at 11:48 AM on October 25, 2022

I just rewatched this one last December because it's a "Christmas movie" (it takes place around Christmas, which was a good enough excuse for me) and I still love it although it tends to be understandably overshadowed by Shivers and especially The Brood.

If anyone likes the idea of this movie but doesn't want all the Cronenberg body horror stuff, check out Plague. It's another 70s Canadian movie about an out-of-control epidemic, so it has that cozy Canadian vibe but none of the, uh, armpit vampire worm things.
posted by tomorrowromance at 6:46 AM on October 26, 2022