Movie Review: Blood Vessel
An abandoned ship, arguably too many accents, and a batty prosthetic monster.
*Spoilers ahead for Blood Vessel (2019)
I subscribed to Shudder about a year ago and one of the first movies I watched really set the tone for my experience with the streaming service - Blood Vessel, a 2019 Australian horror movie directed by Justin Dix that was surprisingly good and definitely worth the watch if you’re looking for something different.
I’ve got to start with the obvious - it’s a catchy name with great cover art and I’m a sucker for vampire movies.
What’s the spoiler-free run-down?
The general idea is pretty simple, something I think is vital for a horror movie to really shine. It’s 1945 and the few survivors of a torpedoed hospital ship are drifting in their lifeboat — all seems lost as they are completely without resources, just waiting to die out on the ocean. Out of the fog drifts what they recognize as a German minesweeper; after a moment of terror, they realize it is abandoned and board the ship with renewed hope of survival.
This sets the scene for all of our most beloved horror tropes — a ragtag group of people who don’t particularly like each other (with the exception of some good old fashioned romantic tension), an isolated location with little chance of outside reinforcements, and the dark and creepy underbelly of the ship and things that hide in the shadows.
I love movies that are cut off from the rest of the world because I don’t have to yell at the characters to get the hell out of there, because they can’t. It contains the story and makes it easier to tell it well. When people get caught deep in a cave (see: The Descent) or are just doing their job in an extremely isolated area (see: Underwater) it’s far more believable that they have to deal with the horror of the situation head on. Haunting movies are fun and all, but most of the time the characters had an opportunity to leave when things started to go south and they simply didn't.
Making isolation central to your plot also removes the temptation to make your story more complicated than it should be, which I will always appreciate.
So… what happened?
We start off with the typical commentary on the horrors of World War II that very quickly gets gory and shifts the attention into an entirely different kind of terror that I absolutely loved. Our survivors are on board, with some struggle and an early death that lets the audience know that they aren’t afraid to kill off characters left and right, and all they find are Nazi corpses, gold, and — surprise— a creepy little girl that bites some people and runs off into the dark. The characters don’t seem to see anything wrong or odd about her presence on the ship — have they never seen a horror movie? Or read a horror novel I suppose (it is 1945 after all). Dracula was published in 1897, so they could have seen this coming!
The creepy little girl is part of a vampire family, being transported along with the stolen gold and other valuables by the Nazis, who woke up early and murdered all the Nazis. I really love when movies touch on just how obsessed the Nazis were with supernatural lore and supposedly magical objects. It makes for a great plot — Raider’s of the Lost Arc, anyone?
From here on out, the plot is pretty predictable. The vampire parents wake up and wreak havoc, killing most of our lifeboat survivors and ultimately turning one into a vampire as well. They die in a final battle with our final survivor Sinclair, and then the Australian character Jane (played by Alyssa Sutherland of Vikings fame) kills Sinclair and is rescued by the Allied forces and taken to safety. Do I sense the rumblings of a sequel? Probably not, but I always love a good open ending.
Thoughts?
Vampire movies are a dime a dozen and very few of them do anything new with the subgenre, but Blood Vessel really leans into the inhuman aspects with their creatures. We get massive horn-like ears, five inch clawed fingers, gray mottled and scarred skin, and bat-like noses that all come together to create a fun and new version of an old school Nosferatu.
My major criticism of the movie is also part of the charm; it has a very simple storyline and relies heavily on predictable character archetypes to set the stage. Also, I get that it’s dark and it’s a horror movie. But if I can’t see what’s going on then I can’t enjoy the creepiness and it pushes me out of the story (I’m looking at you, The Long Night).
I actually loved this movie. It’s campy and over the top, and plays a little fast and loose with actual historical events, but it was fun and I especially loved how the actors really gave it their all even when the plot was a little thin. I honestly can’t think of a way I would have done it differently once you get the bare bones of the plot down on paper. I mean… a murderous vampire family being transported by Nazis waking up and killing or turning the whole ship before being killed by a random group of Australian, American, and Russian lifeboat survivors? It’s a fantastically specific idea and I think they executed it just the way they should have.
Technical Quality
Just the Vibes
Things I enjoyed this week:
I bit the bullet and finally started watching Bridgerton — it’s Gossip Girl in fictionalized Elizabethan England and I’m here for it. I know I’m very late, don’t come for me. I’m only watching because I saw a gif of the second season when Anthony was being wonderfully flirtatious so I figured I needed context if I was going to watch season two. My dog got a bath and smells nice for once and she only hated it a little. I also love loose tea! I love little flowers floating in my glass because it helps me forget that its 17 degrees out right now. That seems to be the theme for this week, actually — I’d like for it to actually be spring, so flowery romance and clean smells and bright teas are the way to go.
Ciao ✌️
Lauren