Born in an asylum, Alejandro Jodorowsky’s unforgettable third film (after El Topo and Holy Mountain—and years trying to get Dune made) is a cavalcade of burning images, a carnival of phantasmagorical fireworks, a circus of strange… Mexican trapeze artist Concha discovers her husband the knife thrower in flagrante with the tattooed lady and pours acid on his assets. He responds by cutting off her arms. Crazed, she ropes in their understandably perturbed son to, literally, fill her sleeves.
We’ll say no more about the story except to note that if you are of the kind to be offended by graphic depictions of all that is unholy, liberally sprinkled with Catholic iconography, well, this is definitely not the movie for you. Yet for all its transgressions and impieties, Santa Sangre is a work of the poetic realm. It’s an apologia for a serial killer, expressed with grace and pity.
A movie like none other I have seen before… a film in which the inner chambers of the soul are laid bare…. I am reminded by Alejandro Jodorowsky that true psychic horror is possible on the screen – horror, poetry, surrealism, psychological pain, and wicked humor, all at once.
Roger Ebert
One of the great hallucinatory experiences in cinema, a visually intoxicating horror trip. A perfect introduction for those eager to travel down more rarely explored routes of international film.
Nathaniel Thompson, Mondo Digital
Superbly bizarre… a freaky-erotic cult item… An extraordinary film: creepy, humid, unwholesome – touched with moments of crazed inspiration.
Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
Media Partner
Alejandro Jodorowsky
Axel Jodorowsky, Blanca Guerra, Guy Stockwell, Thelma Tixou, Adan Jodorowsky
Italy/Mexico
1989
In English and Italian with English subtitles
Indigenous & Community Access
Credits
Screenwriter
Alejandro Jodorowsky, Roberto Leoni, Claudio Argento
Cinematography
Daniele Nannuzzi
Editor
Mauro Bonanni
Original Music
Simon Boswell
Production Design
Alejandro Luna
Also in This Series
Amelie
One of the most popular French films of the past 25 years, Amelie is a delightfully whimsical confection from the ever-inventive Jean-Pierre Jeunet. Audrey Tautou stars as a young Parisienne who resolves to make the world a happier place...
The Conversation
Gene Hackman is Harry Caul, 'the best bugger on the West Coast', a surveillance expert whose jealously guarded anonymity is threatened when he happens across what seems to be a murder plot.
The Fall (4K Restoration)
Shot over four years across 24 countries, cowritten by a six year old girl, and entirely self-financed by commercials director Tarsem, The Fall is such a mind- (and eye) boggling movie it's hard to believe it actually exists. Yet here it is!