I feel like I find myself constantly praising Severin Films for releasing my favorite type of film, Italian and European exploitation and horror in the best possible editions, and look here I am doing it again. More normal people than myself are constantly decrying the end of physical media, but before Blu-ray happened, I was able to easily access maybe 4 Joe D’Amato films, now because of Severin and companies like them I am able to FEAST at a buffet of well-restored D’Amato cinema, and stick it on my shelf for safe-keeping.

This month’s D’Amato restoration is his Sharksploitationer (take that spellcheck!) “Deep Blood”. Until this film was announced I had ZERO idea that D’Amato had ever made a killer shark film, but as soon as I had found out I was totally on board. After years of waiting to see Bruno Mattei’s Cruel Jaws I found out it was absolutely worth the wait, so I was hoping D’Amato would bring a similar crazy to his own shark epic.

So Deep Blood involves 4 friends who meet a native shaman who warns them that one day in the future, they will confront the evil spirit Wakan. The shaman presents them with a talisman, which they promptly bury in the sand, because of course what else would you do with a charm that you will one day need in a battle against EVIL? We then cut to the young men as college students back home in their coastal town, and a shark is menacing the waters, the shark is apparently Wakan, so the boys need to take the talisman, and the fight to the waters to stop the shark from killing the townsfolk.

HOLY CRAP I LOVED THIS MOVIE…

…What did you expect anything less?

This movie started weird, and was just strange throughout. It didn’t reach the epic heights of Cruel Jaws or the Last Shark, but it was an wonderfully trashy fun time. The film was shot along the beaches of Mississippi and Florida, and also the bathtubs and swimming pools of Italy. The film is a genre mashup that takes the nature gone amok/killer shark film, and blends it with teen comedy, weirdo native films, and more to create something wild and unique.

Severin presents Deep Blood in a very solid 1:33:1 1080p transfer that probably looks better than any other presentation of the film EVER. Everything looks natural and filmlike, colors are well-reproduced, and detail is quite solid. There is some minor speckling and other assorted damage from the source, but this does not detract from the transfer as a whole. Audio is handled by English and Italian 2.0 tracks both sound fine, but I believe the English audio tracks come across clearer and are more present. The only extra is a trailer.

Obviously, this crazy piece of sharksploitation goodness comes HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. Got your D’Amato on, and get this now!