Queen Of Blood

Queen Of Blood is a 1966 horror/science fiction film also known as Planet of Vampires (not to be confused with Bava's 1965 Italian horror film Planet of the Vampires, see comments below). It stars John Saxon, Basil Rathbone, Dennis Hopper and Forrest J. Ackerman. You can never go wrong with John Saxon, but you can certainly not go wrong if you add the rest of that cast!

The background art for the opening credits is a striking display of period artwork. The credits say the titles are from the paintings of John Cline, and there's an example of the work at the bottom of this post. It sounds like there's a theremin in the score, which adds to my joy.

Moria explains:

In the 1960s, American International Pictures and producer Roger Corman gave us the practice of buying up Russian science-fiction films and writing new films around the special effects footage from them (the Soviet films of the era often having special effects far superior to those in most American films). Roger Corman pioneered the process with the Francis Ford Coppola-directed Battle Beyond the Sun (1963), which took its footage from the same source as this... 

Queen of Blood is the best out of these re-edited Russian films. This probably due to the fact that, more than the other films, it largely creates its own film and uses the Russian film footage for only occasional special effects shots in the background.

DVD Talk says

With some talented actors including Basil Rathbone, John Saxon, and a very young Dennis Hopper, the film overcomes its low-budget origins and ends up being an entertaining film.

Rotten Tomatoes gives it a score of 20%, which just proves they don't know anything.

(the picture above is from the Monster Movie Music blog)

The film begins with the dreaded voice-over:

"The year: 1990. The problem of traveling to the moon has been solved for many years. Space stations have been built there, and authorized personnel come and go as they wish. But the moon is a dead world. And the great question about space still remains: Does life exist on another planet? To seek an answer to this question the major powers of the world have been actively preparing at the international institute of space technology to explore the planets Venus and Mars.