by Spencer Hawken

Created on: August 12, 2011   Last Updated: August 17, 2011

Made back in 1978, Grapes Of Death is without a doubt the best achievement of director Jean Rollin, this incredibly dark horror movie mixes a heady fusion of sex and death to cater for the horror movie audiences of the late 1970s.

Elizabeth is travelling to a remote vineyard to spend time with her boyfriend, when she arrives however she finds an almost apocalyptic landscape, with chiefly those that work the vineyard effected by a pesticides used to protect the grapes. In unfamiliar territory, Elizabeth must fight for her life in order to survive the continual flood of zombie like infected workers.

Grapes Of Death is an interesting movie that will always be one of the more successful French horror movies of that period of time, the 70s were not particularly kind to any French movie, and to have a movie stand out in the same way this did was an achievement. While watching Grapes Of Death you cannot help but draw comparison to David Cronenberg's Rabid and Shivers (AKA The Parasite Murders), and George Romero’s classic Night Of The Living Dead; Rollin’s movie seems to steal something from each of the movies.

The general feeling of Grapes Of Death will be the one thing that all will remember of this gritty horror tale, you cannot help but feel right from the offset that Elizabeth should really give up, her attempts to survive seem doomed from the first second. This is something that Rollin was only ever able to pull off once, this feeling of gut wrenching dread bleeds out of every shot of the movie.

Sadly, despite the promise, and that aforementioned feeling of dread, the movie does have its failings, the effects are the biggest failing of the movie, they are at times diabolical. While the second failing is the over use of sex, too much sexual reference, too much nudity that essentially overpowers all other aspects of the movie.

The story is very well put together, the story itself very well thought out, although it does borrow heavily from the aforementioned features. The pace is good throughout, from Elizabeth’s hair-raising walk from the train, to the overall feeling of chase throughout the film. The dialogue is a little sketchy, although this is said to be down to bad translations.

The movies score by Phillippe Sissman is without a doubt the greatest achievement. Mixed with Claude Becognee’s misty cinematography, this is a bloody stab through the heart and it's equally as doomed as Rollin’s delivery. An incredibly gloomy score, it really brings about 50% of the movie's power and chills to the picture. 

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