BALLAD IN BLOOD

After a night of various excesses there’s a rude awakening for Lenka a Czech Erasmus-student: Her British friend Elisabeth is dead and no one knows what exactly happened, neither her friend James, nor their acquaintance Duke. Videos on the victim’s mobile phone tell the story of the previous night, a story of crossing borders and breaking taboos, of sex and violence, of madness and of their consequences. The legendary Italian director Ruggero Deodato hasn’t made a movie in 23 years: “Ballad in Blood” was made in typical manner of an Italian filmmaker: with a tiny budget and a tremendous amount of passion. When it comes to neo-realism, the latest work of Roberto Rosselini’s former assistant director is a mere stone’s throw away from his older masterpieces such as “Cannibal Holocaust” and “The House at the Edge of the Park”, that have made audiences tremble with fear. Lively and light-footed Deodato minces his way through sociopolitical battlegrounds and provides them with bold elements of exploitation, leaving the spectator to grasp for air, not least because “Ballad in Blood” shoves our own moral values and principles onto thin ice. Even more than thirty years after his heyday, Deodato hasn’t lost his bite and shows his young colleagues how a brave little genre film is supposed to look.

In attendance of Ruggero Deodato.