The Cult Horror Legend was Nicknamed the “Godfather of Gore”
Herschell Gordon Lewis, director of such films as Blood Feast and Two Thousand Maniacs! has passed away at age 87 according to Something Weird Video’s Facebook site. Lewis’ 1963 release Blood Feast is considered to be the first in the splatter film genre.
Lewis first started as a soft-core director with films titled The Adventures of Lucky Lewis and Nature’s Playmates. It wasn’t till 1963 that Lewis tried his hand at horror with the release of Blood Feast. The film is considered to be the first in the splatter film genre.
Lewis left filmmaking to work in advertising, writing several books on copywriting. He eventually returned to filmmaking in 2002 with his film Blood Feast 2: All You Can Eat with a cameo from fan John Waters and again in 2009 with The Uh-oh Show starring Troma founder, Lloyd Kaufman.
In John McCarty’s book The Sleaze Merchants: Adventures in Exploitation Filmmaking from the ’50s to the ’90s, Lewis was asked what he wanted his epitaph to read. He responded, “He seen somethin’ different. And he done it.”
He certainly had.
