Blood review (DVD) ★★

Blood is a film where only the direction of Ten Shimoyama shines. It's a shame that he had such a bad script to work with, because his creative touch is very promising indeed. If the story wasn't so predictable and the dialogue so tediously focused on the languishes of eternal life, there may have been something to salvage. Instead the finished product is an artistic vampire yarn about the lusts for blood and sexuality that the creatures of the night have, with plenty of eroticism that slightly reminded me of Les Avaleuses (Female Vampire) from 1973, except not so blatant and full-on in its depiction of aggressively horny blood-suckers.

When a detective investigating a cold murder case which is about to expire stumbles upon the identity of the killer, he discovers that a cult of vampires shadowed the incident, and soon he becomes one of them, with 'chosen blood' running through his veins which means that he can live forever.

The film opens with some nicely-lensed swordplay in the middle of a snowfall at night, a scene reminiscent of the battle between Uma Thurman and Lucy Liu at the end of Kill Bill's first half, which is definitely not a bad thing. The movie is well photographed throughout—the director's vision is impressively stylish and there's pretty decent production value, but it just can't save the film: the heavy rock soundtrack that accompanies the fight scenes is corny if anything, and those very battles are a little silly with their off-puttingly bad wire-fu. The Far East really abuses the use of wires these days and these throwaway examples like this and Bodyguards and Assassins are mounting up, eating away at me to re-watch Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. The only thing I take away from this film is the intention to check out the director's other, preferably vampire-free, work.

EXTRAS ★ Theatrical trailer, original Japanese trailer, three TV spots, and the trailers for Dororo and Geisha vs. Ninjas/Geisha Assassin.

» login or register to post comments