A babysitting wrestler grinds a satanic cult into a bloody pulp with comedic flair evoking ‘screaming is the new black’.
The thin line between professional wrestling and entertainment cum mayhem has never been drawn in the way it is in Screambox’s newest release, Here for Blood. The film shows Tom O’Bannon (played by Shawn Roberts), an indie wrestler who accepts to babysit his college student girlfriend’s 10-year-old daughter, as she often does. Ordering a pizza, watching TV, and living the dream? That’s what he thought. Not with a murderous cult loose in the barn looking for blood.
There is absolutely no doubt that the producers of ‘Here for Blood’ had a plan in mind right from the first shot. This is industrial low-budget genre fan service done right, unlike so many attempts at it in recent years. I mean, honestly, how many low-budget horror movies have been advertising themselves as the love letter to Friday the 13th and Evil Dead?
Let us all spare ourselves of this shoddily produced rubbish that all came about thanks to Stranger Things. From creatures to storylines, to matchups and confrontations, everything a horror genre fanatic would look for is served in Here for Blood, warm and fresh. Creepy masks, professional wrestling, gore gags which are comical instead of revolting, yet clever by design.
Some parts of the film reveal a certain budget, for instance, the interpretation of certain shots. Admittedly, there are quite a few sequences that allow the film to transition from one significant element of the plot to another, but these depict a real indie set-up the film had. However, from about the thirty-minute mark of the movie, it pays off hoping the audience would forget some of the budgetary limitations imposed in some scenes.
Here Blood evokes dimensions of crossbreed between Adventures in Babysitting, Evil Dead, and light doses of splatters of Peter Jackson’s early films Bad Taste and Dead Alive.
The evil cult in this film or spirit was quite interesting and involves quite an intricate arc finding who they are, what they are trying to achieve, and most importantly, that they wear some quite disturbing masks. Here for Blood is a horror comedy, but it doesn’t go all in with the actual horror of the situation, oh some of the masks that the film’s villains sport are pretty memorable.
The best part of the movie has to be the lead actor, Shawn Roberts, and the little girl he is babysitting, Maya Lisaljevic who plays Grace. It is a delight having a ten-year old girl and a bulky man as the movie’s leads along with witnessing blood sparingly thrown around the house that is being occupied by demented murderous entities.
Yes, some horror films are so bad you have to switch your brain off for the next ninety minutes, and at times, it can be boring. Here for Blood asks you to do that and rewards you for it. It has sympathetic heroes, cool villains, blood and guts, pro wrestling, and yes, pizza.
Here for Blood however does not feel like ‘nostalgia porn’ while still evoking an air of nostalgia. Seriously, just envision finding this in a mom-and-pop video rental shop in 1992. This is something you would rent with a pizza. Combining horror comedy with comfort food isn’t all that bad so grab a bit of it on Screambox this Friday.
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