Blood of the Vampire is a 1958 British colour horror film directed by Henry Cass and starring Donald Wolfit, Barbara Shelley, and Vincent Ball.

The film's storyline, set in Transylvania, is about a scientist who uses the inmates of a prison for the criminally insane as sources for his gruesome blood-typing and transfusion experiments that are keeping him alive.

Six years later, Dr. John Pierre is convicted of "malpractice leading to manslaughter" after an emergency blood transfusion, which has never been done successfully, fails, killing his patient.

When John meets Callistratus, he learns that he is to help with Calistratus' blood-typing research so that transfusions can be safely done, especially for those with an unnamed "rare and serious blood condition.

"[2] At his trial, John maintained that the patient's death was unavoidable and asked the judge to write to Prof. Meinster in Geneva to vouch for him.

At the request of Madeleine and her uncle, Meinster travels to Transylvania, where they meet with Auron, a member of the Prison Commission.

Callistratus tells John that he was executed for being a vampire because of his previous work with blood, but had put himself into suspended animation.

[5] Posters for Blood of the Vampire indicate that it was considered an adults-only film in France and the UK at the time of its release.

Tempean Productions 'embraced' not only films designed to get an X cert, but also 'Eros's policy of offering co-feature programmes which could be marketed not only in Britain, but also on the American drive-in circuits'.

According to a contemporary newspaper advertisement, the Moonlite Drive-In in Smithtown, Pennsylvania, on Wednesday, 3 August 1960 ran a dawn-to-dusk triple feature with Blood of the Vampire as the first movie – nearly two years after its American release – Revenge of Frankenstein (1958) the second and The Beast of Hollow Mountain (1956) the third.

Review Digest in the January 19, 1959 issue of BoxOffice magazine showed the following ratings: Harrison's Report and Film Daily called the film "very good"; BoxOffice, The Hollywood Reporter, and Parents' Magazine rated it as "good"; and Variety called it "fair".

For example, Charles Stinson of The Los Angeles Times wrote, "it is gratifying to be able to turn in an on-the-whole good report on the film.

It ventures into gore and supernatural with a headlong grandeur", while The Monthly Film Bulletin took a dimmer view, calling it "an essay in hokum" and stating that the producers incorporated "every trick of the macabre and the horrific they can legitimately introduce".

[13] In a more modern view of the film, historian Paul Adams points out that 'Blood of the Vampire is a vampire film in name only as ... the undead creature of the title is in fact a human scientist, rather than a true nosferatu, resurrected from beyond the grave by an impromptu heart transplant and subsequently kept alive by frequent and gory Eastman Color blood transfusions courtesy of the inmates of a local insane asylum".

[14] Author Paul Meehan calls the film "packed with the blood, gore and sadism of Jimmy Sangster's script" and notes that "grafting an element of science fiction onto the traditional notion of vampirism" doesn't work all that well.

"The film's pseudoscience, such as do-it-yourself 19th century heart-transplant surgery and suspended animation, strains credulity while reaching for a scientific rationale for vampire resurrection".

[15] In Warren's view, "It's a shade better than some of its class, but the lumpy direction, muddled plot, and slow pace make it look much worse now than it did when it was new ...

[11] Taking the opposite view, Meehan says, "Director Henry Cass moves the plot along vigorously while providing effective gothic atmosphere".

[16] Warren finds some virtue in the film, though, calling the art direction by John Elphink "imaginative" and noting that "several sets seem positively cavernous", probably because of lens choice by cinematographer Geoffrey Seaholme.

But overall the result is disappointing because Wolfit "is made up to resemble Bela Lugosi, which he otherwise does not" and because "characters pop up, deliver their lines, and are quickly disposed of".

[5] Theatrical trailers from the film were used in the 1996 VHS release, Nightmare Theater's Late Night Chill-o-rama Horror Show Vol.1.