Blood Vessel (at MONSTER FEST ’19) ★★

AUSTRALIAN horror films are very much a hit and miss affair.

Perhaps we notice the weaker ones more because few are made here in comparison to most other film-making countries.

The period vampire film Blood Vessel is, unfortunately, one of the misses.

Set in 1945 near the end of World War I, a group of survivors from an Allied medical ship are floating in a life-raft in the North Atlantic when they suddenly see a German warship coming out of the darkness towards them.

In unbelievably easy fashion, the survivors (American, Russian, English and Australian) manage to get aboard the vessel which initially appears deserted. As they inspect further they find some dead crewmen whose bodies have also been burned.

They also come across a couple of survivors and slowly discover the ship is home to a couple of powerful vampires that are able to control human minds.

The set is quite impressive for the interiors filmed in an actual Australian war ship berthed in Williamstown, Victoria. Unfortunately the couple of wider shots with a model of the ship in the water look amateurish (maybe it’s not a model, but it looks like one).

Worse still, however, is the vampire make-up which looks like the undead have been crossed with pigs. On several occasions you can see part of a human nostril beneath the face make-up which is frankly unforgivable – one star off just for that.

The cast is ok with nobody standing out – note, Robert Taylor gets top billing but is barely in the film – but while they are taking things seriously all the scenes with the vampires are mis-timed in the editing and consequently lack tension apart from one good jump scare.

Due to the poor make-up, at times some of these scenes are even laughable and I gather weren’t supposed to be.

There a stash of Nazi gold thrown in to the proceedings but, like the vampires’ motivations, it’s hard to determine why.

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