Blood Song — a low-budget 1982 slasher directed by Alan J. Levi and produced by Frank Avianca and Lenny Montana starring former teen-idol Frankie Avalon — escaped major U.S. notice but collided headlong with Britain’s moral panic over home video. Though the picture was never criminally prosecuted for obscenity, British authorities used Section 3 of the Obscene Publications Act 1959 to seize and confiscate copies during the early 1980s “video nasty” clampdown. Section 3 gave police sweeping powers to seize videotapes deemed obscene while decisions about prosecution were pending; it was the blunt instrument of an era shaped by tabloid outrage, campaigning pressure groups and anxious politicians who worried that unregulated rental videocassettes were spreading graphic violence into living rooms. For a small exploitation picture shot on the Oregon coast and released on VHS in the U.S. in spring 1983, that seizure arrested its already marginal commercial life and stamped the film with an infamy that outlasted its box-office prospects.
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AI concept artworkArchive Record · 1980s
How Blood Song was Swept Up in Britain’s 'Video Nasty' Panic and Seized Under the Obscene Publications Act
Blood Song (aka Dream Slayer) / 1980s
Blood Song — a low-budget 1982 slasher directed by Alan J. Levi and produced by Frank Avianca and Lenny Montana starring former teen-idol Frankie Avalon — escaped major U.S. notice but collided headlong with Britain’s moral panic over home video. Though the picture was never criminally prosecuted for obscenity, British authorities used Section 3 of the Obscene Publications Act 1959 to seize and confiscate copies during the early 1980s “video nasty” clampdown. Section 3 gave police sweeping powers to seize videotapes deemed obscene while decisions about prosecution were pending; it was the blunt instrument of an era shaped by tabloid outrage, campaigning pressure groups and anxious politicians who worried that unregulated rental videocassettes were spreading graphic violence into living rooms. For a small exploitation picture shot on the Oregon coast and released on VHS in the U.S. in spring 1983, that seizure arrested its already marginal commercial life and stamped the film with an infamy that outlasted its box-office prospects.
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