A Bucket of Blood (1959) is an American black‑comedy horror film directed by Roger Corman and written by Charles B. Griffith. It stars Dick Miller in one of his most iconic roles as Walter Paisley, a socially awkward busboy working at a beatnik café who accidentally becomes an artistic sensation — through murder.
After mistakenly killing his landlady’s cat and covering the body in clay, Walter is praised as a genius sculptor. Desperate to maintain his newfound fame, he begins creating more “art,” each piece hiding a corpse beneath the plaster. The film satirizes the 1950s beatnik art scene, pretentious counterculture, and the idea of the tortured artist, all while delivering Corman’s signature mix of dark humor and low‑budget ingenuity.
Shot in just five days on reused sets (later used again for The Little Shop of Horrors), the film has become a beloved cult classic.
Film Details
Title: A Bucket of Blood
Year: 1959
Genre: Horror / Black Comedy / Satire
Director: Roger Corman
Writer: Charles B. Griffith
Producer: Roger Corman
Starring: Dick Miller, Barboura Morris, Antony Carbone, Julian Burton
Cinematography: Floyd Crosby
Editing: Anthony Carras
Music: Fred Katz
Production Company: Alta Vista Productions
Distributed by: American International Pictures
Release Date: October 21, 1959
Runtime: 66 minutes
Country: United States
Language: English
Budget: Approximately $50,000
Legacy
Considered one of Corman’s sharpest satirical comedies.
Dick Miller’s character name, Walter Paisley, became an in‑joke he reused in several later films.
Frequently paired with The Little Shop of Horrors as a cult double feature.
A 1995 remake starring Anthony Michael Hall revived interest in the original.
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