Crew
Director – Michael James McDonald, Screenplay – Brendan Broderick & Michael James McDonald, Based on the Film A Bucket of Blood (1959) Written by Charles B. Griffith, Producer – Mike Elliott, Photography – Christopher Baffa, Music – David Wurst & Eric Wurst, Production Design – Nava. Production Company – Concorde-New Horizons.
Cast
Anthony Michael Hall (Walter Paisley), Sam Lloyd (Leonard), Justine Bateman (Carla), Shadoe Stevens (Maxwell), Victor Wilson (Cuff), Patrick Bristow (Link), Julianna McCarthy (Mrs Swicker), Darcy DeMoss (Alice), Kin Shriner (Lou), Jesse D. Goins (Art), Sheila Traviss (Mayolia), David Cross (Charlie), Paul Bartel (Older Man), Mink Stole (Older Woman)
Plot
Walter Paisley is a busboy at the trendy Jabberjaw club and is in envy of the poets, musician and performers there. He is struggling to create his own sculptures when one evening he hears his landlady’s cat meowing as it is trapped in the wall. In trying to free it, he accidentally stabs it with a knife. The next day he premieres a new piece at the club he calls Dead Cat – the cat encased in plaster. This receives great acclaim. When a detective tries to arrest him, Walter kills him and then presents the body as a sculpture called Murdered Man. With the success he receives, Walter is forced to kill to provide further bodies.
A Bucket of Blood (1959) was one of the key films in the cult of director Roger Corman. It was one the ultra-low budget films that Corman was making around the period. For some reason, the black comedy story about a murderous artist and its parody of The Beat Generation caught on with audiences and the film has gained a certain following.
Roger Corman Presents was a series of films that Corman presided over for the Showtime network between 1995 and 1997. 44 films were produced on a budget of about $1 million apiece. While many of these were original works that included Black Scorpion (1995), Burial of the Rats (1995) and Vampirella (1996), a number of the films were remakes of earlier Corman directed or produced properties including Not of This Earth (1995), Piranha (1995) and The Wasp Woman (1995).
The remake is extremely faithful to Charles B. Griffith’s script for the original in just about every aspect. Every plot beat, every character and each of the murders is there exactly as it was in the original. There is very little that had changed, even right down to Shadoe Stevens reciting Beat-styled poetry at the cafe. About the only notable differences is that this version has updated the story slightly – there is now some fun poked at modern cafe culture and ridiculous coffee orders. Plus there is more nudity and blood (which now comes in colour as opposed to the original, which was in black-and-white).
The role of Walter Paisley is inherited by former 80s Brat Packer Anthony Michael Hall. As played by Dick Miller in the 1959 film, Walter Paisley became a cult figure with Miller appearing under that or similar names in numerous other films right up until his death in 2019 sixty years later. Hall cuts quite a different figure to Miller. The 5’5” Miller had something cute and cuddly to his weirdness even as he was bumping people off. Hall is much taller (over six feet) and does weird okay. However, once he starts killing people, he becomes just another movie psycho and this Walter Paisley lacks the quirky charms of the original.
A Bucket of Blood has an interestingly eclectic supporting cast. There is Justine Bateman playing with a German accent for some reason as the love interest. Famous radio dj Shadoe Stevens plays an acclaimed poet. Corman regular Paul Bartel, director of Corman’s Death Race 2000 (1975), turns up along with John Waters ingénue Mink Stole as snobby art dealers. A then unknown David Cross and Will Ferrell also appear in the film somewhere, although I wasn’t able to identify where.
Michael James McDonald is better known as a comedy actor. A Bucket of Blood was his second film as director and he has gone on since to work as a regular tv director.
Trailer here