I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

In London, a serial-killer drains the blood of females and the Detective Superintendent Bellaver (Alfred Marks) and his team are hunting down the so-called Vampire Killer. Meanwhile in an undefined country that lives a military dictatorship, the cruel Konratz (Marshall Jones) is climbing positions killing The Power that Be. When the Vampire Killer flees from the police, he seeks refugee at the real estate of scientist Dr. Browning (Vincent Price) and jumps into a tank of acid. Dr. David Sorel (Christopher Matthews) is intrigued with the powerful acid and decides to get a sample. He finds the truth about the research of Dr. Browning. Many years ago, during the Cold War, the dictatorships in South America, James Bond, Flint and The Man from U.N.C.L.E., "Scream and Scream Again" was a cult movie supported by the names of Vincent Price, Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee. The story entwines mad scientist with vampire, dictatorship and spy ring with a terrible music score. However, in the present days it is a dated mess despite the great cast. My vote is three.Title (Brazil): "Grite, Grite Outra Vez!" ("Scream, Scream Again")

A jogger goes for his daily run , suffers chest pains and is rushed to hospital only to find that his leg has been amputatedThe above sequence takes up the title sequence and is a good opening hook . Alas however it seems mainly to function only as a hook to draw the audience in because we never find out the name of the jogger . The scenario also collapses when it's given any thought such as how lucky it is for the villains ( Or how unlucky it is for the victim ) that someone conveniently falls unconscious and needs hospital treatment in order for the plot to progress As the story continues the more ideas are thrown in to the plot and unfortunately there's far too much plotting going on . We find ourselves in a totalitarian regime where a militarist is eliminating party rivals who stand in his way and it's never actually revealed as to whether it's a communist or fascist dictatorship . It's left ambiguous but is also unconvincing and whilst all this taking place there's a series of murders taking place in England which the press have dubbed " The vampire killings "By the end of the movie you can just about get your head around the ideas being explored - one of a new breed of humans being created but the experiment is too premature hence replicant humans running amok but the plotting is never cohesive enough to make the premise convincing in any way . The film also suffers from scenes that are completely disposable and a lack of internal continuity . For example when a nameless character such as the jogger from the opening scene is at the mercy of the villains he is operated on without any explanation where as when it's the girlfriend of the hero the operation is delayed so the villain can explain his plan and motives to the hero TThere is an element of cheating where the marketing is concerned . You can understand that this was hyped at the time as " the movie starring Vincent Price , Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing - three legends of horror coming together in one movie " The reality is however that Cushing appears in one very short scene while Price and Lee are sidelined for most of the movie . Instead it's Alfred Marks police detective who carries the first half of the movie only for him to abruptly be written out and replaced by his sidekick SCREAM AND SCREAM AGAIN isn't nearly as impressive as the sizable minority view paints it as . It's a film that does have some good ideas but unfortunately it has too many ideas none of which are meshed in to a great plot and all of them are woefully underdeveloped

A secret military organization is working in concert with a mad scientist conducting experiments using victims kidnapped from London streets, their limbs removed, tendons strenghtened with synthetic technology. There's a series of "vampire murders" where females, frequenting a psychedelic club, are strangled by a madman, with superior power, their blood completely drained. The psychopath just so happens to be a "composite", a created "super-human", thanks in part to the secret experiments..he's in fact a flaw that must be corrected, because his extraordinary condition would draw unneeded attention to the experiments, such as police investigation. Meanwhile, a spy is captured, and used as a bargaining chip in order to retrieve specific information that pertains to the whole investigation regarding the murderer.Christopher Lee is Fremont, a major form of power within the London Police who must surrender the investigative material(..the entireties of the case)to a sadistic military type, Konratz(Marshall Jones)who took control of his fiendish Nazi-type organization after "subduing" his boss, Benedek(Peter Cushing, positively wasted in a nothing role). Meanwhile, Dr. Browning(Vincent Price), the British scientist who must evade constant police activity that threatens his work, will eventually have to contend with a coroner who snoops around his grounds, attempting to understand why the psycho committed suicide by jumping in the doctor's strategically placed acid tank in the barn nearby his mansion.Price fares best of the three horror icons in Gordon Hessler's needlessly over-complicated plot which still is essentially a mad scientist, "supersoldiers" plot reflecting the designs of Hitler, instead relocating the mad plot to England. There's a lengthly chase scene where Superintendent Bellaver(Alfred Marks)and his men pursue serial killer Keith(Michael Gothard)throughout England, often injured in the process. I'm not sure why the composites needed blood as a constant source. The film spends a lot more time with grumpy, acid-tongued Bellaver than with the headlining stars, and a great deal of focus is concerned with the London youth scene of the time.My favorite sequences concerns the reactions of a poor captured victim as every time he awakens from forced inoculations, he finds a new limb missing..it's morbid humor at it's best. The ways Keith constantly gets away from London Police is rather amusing, including how he escapes being handcuffed to a car. This is my first Hessler film, and I think he has a nice style with exciting camera-work, but the material itself is rather uninspired and too convoluted for it's own good..it seems that while dealing with a typical mad scientist plot, the filmmakers try to elaborate the scenario with extended sub-plots.

My video copy isn't the original cinema version, unfortunately, but as Scream and Scream Again's not available on DVD in the UK yet, it'll have to do. The music sound track is not the original one - rights issues with Amen Corner's performances sometimes result in the lead singer giving it his all only for nothing to heard on the sound track! Well, enough of my dodgy videos!This is a bizarre and at the same time entertaining horror flick, with almost totally unrelated story threads being forced together at the climax to make some kind of sense. The main section concerns the hunt for "The Vampire Killer", although why Michael Gothard's character needs blood is never made clear. This is by far the best part of the movie though, and includes a long chase sequence between Gothard and the boys in blue when they finally catch on to him (in what must be the stupidest honey-trap in cinema history). One horror book I own describes Gothard's character as a sort of "bionic Mick Jagger." which is so accurate a term I couldn't improve on it.And we also have Vincent Price, Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee turning up at various points. Those cinemas goers of the time who went expecting a triple-teaming of three great horror stars were probably sorely disappointed. Cushing has one scene - not with the other masters of menace - and Price and Lee have only a couple more, sharing a brief bit at the end of the film. A great shame.The real star of the film is Alfred Marks as the dead-pan police inspector, dropping laconic quips by the minute, he gives full value for his screen time.We also have a Nazi-type dictatorship sub-plot, and a collapsed jogger who keeps waking up minus another limb. MI6 getting involved. And a downed spy-plane plot. This lot really shouldn't work at all, but somehow it does, holding both narrative interest and the odd surprise. It's all good fun. All it needed was Steve Austin and a few slow-mo fights to really make an evening of it!