Canadian made horror/comedy Here For Blood sees Shawn Roberts (Resident Evil/Land Of The Dead/Diary Of The Dead) as Tom, a wrestler who helps his girlfriend Phoebe (Joelle Farrow) out by taking on her babysitting gig for a night whilst she studies for exams. What would appear to be a normal night of playing video games and eating pizza with Grace (Maya Misaljevic) turns into a terrifying night of violence as masked invaders break into the house. Luckily for Grace the one night she needs a wrestler for a babysitter is this particular night.
Here For Blood starts off as a typical slasher/home invasion movie, with an opening scene of two young women meeting a sticky end at the hands of a very large, bare chested, masked assailant, before the introduction to the main cast. Early on we get what we need to know about Tom, Phoebe and their friends. Then Grace and her family. The seemingly plain, conservative couple of mum, Barb (Tara Spencer-Nairn) and her new husband, Graces stepdad, Gill (Michael Therriault) before finally introducing a disinterested Grace. Everything has been ticking along okay with some funny lines but not a lot of action since the murders at the start. Once Tom and Grace have spent a little time together things start to pick up. The opening sequence leads you to believe there is just the one masked attacker. To push this notion, the next kill from our very ripped muderer is a humourous slightly drawn out slasher-esque style wonder off into the mist from the friendly pizza delivery guy to investigate a "noise". In that typical "don't go into the creepy shed, idiot" style, the tone of the movie is still leading you down the slasher troupe garden path. However, about the time the poor pizza guy buys the farm, you figure out that more masked assailants are actually in the house now and about to kidnap Grace. These masked attackers are all dressed in black and look like a Slipknot tribute act. Tom is quick to dub them "sex perverts" and soon puts his wrestling skills to the test and goes about disabling them in various gory ways.
In short, this normal run of the mill slasher come home invasion movie morphs into a highly entertaining amalgamation of Evil Dead meets Home Alone with a bit of Little Shop Of Horrors thrown in for the hell of it (minus the musical numbers!). After beating up the first wave of home invaders Tom goes up to the attic and discovers a gruesome looking shrine with an ancient decapitated human head and begins to wonder if something more supernatural is a foot. This is about when things start to get silly and the gore starts splashing. The practical FX are a great tribute to the late 80s/early 90s with household appliances playing a big part and an interesting scene with a meat hook. As more is revealed about the masked attackers, the violence ramps up in the form of frenzied knife attacks, fist fights and chain saws. The super natural element kicks in when a portal is opened allowing one of Phoebes friends to come back from the dead as a zombie (which I will always appreciate!) which as well seems to reanimate the head in the attic. Voiced by none other than Dee Snider of Twisted Sister fame, the hilarious half rotten decapitated head plays an integral role even though his vocabulary is limited.
Here For Blood does not take itself seriously at all and is a lot of fun to watch. It's pretty action packed and the gore and FX are very enjoyable. I really like the look of the masked attackers despite the fact that they look like the ghosts of Slipknot past the masks are very detailed. Each one is a different character and they are pretty scary looking. Looks wise Spinhead and Slackjaw are the most creepy but the added comedy element of Jesse Buck as the unfortunate, Bernie, will have you howling with laughter. Shawn Roberts fulfilled the role of main protagonist well whilst Maya Misaljevic as young Grace was really good and not even the slightest bit annoying with her acting being pretty natural. The rest of the cast played their parts well but it wouldn't have been half as entertaining if it were not for the masked antagonists antics or Dee Sniders rambling. I also liked how it started off as one type of movie yet switched to different territory halfway through.
Being a movie that features wrestling and fighting the soundtrack is a pretty meaty selection of rock from Slash Puppet, Bobnoxious and Wild August. Also if you weren't sure where the movie originated from you may get a hint as the bands featured are mostly Canadian, this not only keeps things local but also adds to the 80s/90s vibe nicely.
I have recently noticed that quite a few horror streaming channels are showing a lot of low budget horror that I have really struggled to watch or just plain given up on and although Here For Blood is not a low end B movie I was initially a little dubious, however I am happy to report that I very much enjoyed Here For Blood for its humour, gore and nostalgia value. Here For Blood hits theaters and Screambox on Feb 9th .
