The discovery of a batch of alien eggs prompts more thoughtful discussion from the crew. Their mission is to retrieve a ‘specimen’ from the alien ship at any cost to bring back to earth for scientific research. As highlighted in the plight of the crew member who must remain behind on the alien vessel as there isn’t enough room for him on the vessel making the return trip to his own ship (!), the crew, much like the crew of the Nostromo, are completely indispensible. Of course when our intrepid scientists ‘rescue’ the alien creature and bring her back to their own ship, she begins to prey on the crew and devour them one by one. The tale of a small research crew answering the distress call of an alien ship, only to find the dead body of an alien life-form but managing to bring one surviving alien creature back to their own ship, is uncannily similar. Queen of Blood, much like Mario Bava’s Planet of the Vampires bears an uncanny resemblance to Ridley Scott’s Alien and appears to have had no small influence on that particular classic. The screenplay at times suggests that scientific advancements such as space exploration can be dangerous – and unfolds as a cautionary tale of Frankensteinian human ambition that could result in dire consequences. The rational discussions that pepper the screenplay are really quite refreshing in a lesser film the humans would no doubt decide that the alien was nothing but a killer and blast her out of the nearest airlock.
The alien is clearly only reacting to her instinct to feed. He goes on to say that this doesn’t mean that they are any better or worse than humans: just different. Allan and Laura claim that the alien is a murderer, however Anders argues that the others shouldn’t impose their moral codes on her as she is not human – her kind may very well have different moral standards. After the alien gorges herself on Paul’s blood, the reactions of the other astronauts are most interesting. The script, also penned by Harrington, displays surprising intelligence and features a number of provocative debates on issues such as morality and logic. These scenes provide a number of the film’s highlights, as much of Harrington’s footage, particularly in the early scenes, with their kitschy ideas about how the future (1990) would look, are pretty dated. Queen of Blood is one such film and reuses footage from Russian sci-fi epics Niebo Zowiet and Meshte Nastreshu. In the 60s Roger Corman’s production company AIP bought the rights to quite a few Russian sci-fi films and wrote new stories around the various special effects sequences reusing the expensive footage in new low budget films. Back on board their own ship, the scientists discover that their guest has an insatiable appetite for blood and it isn’t long before she begins to pick off the crew, one by one… Only one survivor is found, a strange woman with lurid green skin. A small rescue team made up of scientists and astronauts are dispatched to rescue the alien crew. Scientists on Earth receive a distress call from an alien ship that has crash landed on Mars.
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