Overview: Based on Aleksey Tolstoy’s 1839 short story The Family Of The Vourdalak, A TASTE OF BLOOD tells the story of a man - who after going off to kill a vampire - returns home at the magic hour, between night and day.

His family has doubts about whether he’s still human or whether he’s been bitten by the undead. His teenage daughter is determined to defend him, but their doubts and fears grow as the darkness of the night approaches.

Will his family find out in time, or will their sentiment make them easy prey for the novice nightwalker?

Blu-ray Verdict: Santiago Fernández Calvete’s horror film A TASTE OF BLOOD, based on Aleksey Tolstoy’s 1839 short story, opens on a relatively slow burn, but if you can please hang around before deciding it is too slow, you will be rewarded, you have my word.

Around the midway point it when the film finds its mojo, but what stuck out to me the whole way through (when on screen, of course), was that this Argentinian film chose to dub the young characters into English, whilst keeping the older characters subtitled, and speaking in their native tongue.

For that alone is a rather jarring mix of verbal and visual cinematography, but it never fully removed my attention to the screen. The reason being that come the end A TASTE OF BLOOD proved itself to be well made, tense and thoroughly entertaining night in viewing choice.

As for the full storyline, Natalia (Alfonsina Carrocio) lives with her controlling father Aguirre (Germán Palacios), her older brother Manuel (Lautaro Bettoni) and his wife Eva (Naiara Awada), and their young daughter. Aguirre forbids Natalia to see anyone, have any friends, and leave the family’s rural property.

When she sneaks off one night to meet her potential boyfriend Alexis (Tomás Carullo Luzzio), she accepts a ride home from a man claiming to be a relative. Naturally, this does not turn out well, and she and Alexis flee to her home.

Aguirre goes out looking for the stranger, rifle in tow, and tells the others not to let him in the house unless he returns home in the sunlight because of the vurdalak curse — a vurdalak feeds on the blood of family members, turning them into vurdalaks, as well — no matter what he says.

He returns before sunrise, and the family members and Alexis find themselves at odds as to whether Aguirre has returned as a human or an undead monster, and what to do about the situation.

This is a Widescreen Presentation (2.35:1) enhanced for 16x9 TVs and comes with the Special Features of a Theatrical Trailer, Image Slideshow, an Original Spanish Language Audio Track, and a Bonus Audio CD of the music from the film:

Rosetta Stone - “Valiant Try”
Christian Death - “Haloes”
Big Electric Cat - “Orchid Dreaming”
Children On Stun - “Cats or Devil’s Eyes”
Corpus Delicti - “Noxious (Demos Game)”
Leather Strip - “Evil Speaks”
Electric Hellfire Club - “Baptized in Blood”
Razed In Black - “The Endless”
Witch Of The Vale - “Trust The Pain”
Jyrki 69 - “Blood Lust”
Blood Handsome - “Give”
Crying Vessel - “Breaking The Spell”
Synaesthesia - “Ambience”
Vile A Sin - “Taste The Blood”
The Sweet Kill - “Closer”

Official Trailer