Frightfest Glasgow 2023: ‘Here For Blood’ Review
Stars: Shawn Roberts, Maya Misaljevic, Joelle Farrow, Dee Snider, Tara Spencer-Nairn, Michael Therriault, Samantha Helt, Kelly Penner | Written by James Roberts | Directed by Daniel Turres
When his girlfriend is swamped with college exams, Tom O’Bannon (Shawn Roberts), a rowdy pro-wrestler struggling to make ends meet, agrees to fill in as a last-minute replacement for her well-paying babysitting job. Tom arrives at an isolated family home where he meets the precocious 10-year-old Grace (Maya Misaljevic). But what starts off as a quiet night of pizza and video games quickly spirals into bloody, violent, demonic chaos as Tom and Grace find themselves fighting for their lives when an otherworldly cult of masked intruders descend on the home.
Canadian horror strikes again! Taking inspiration from a myriad of home invasion films and occult thrillers AND capturing the heavy metal horror ethos of films like Rocktober Blood, Trick or Treat etc. Here For Blood is a film that was made for horror fans by horror fans – a crowd-pleaser that delivers on blood, gore and more importantly practical effects. The kind of gooey practical effects that independent genre films tend to substitute with CGI. And the fact this IS all practical makes the film all the better!
Completely independently funded and made by first-time writer James Roberts and director Daniel Turres, making his second feature following 2021s Terry’s Car Gets Stolen, Here For Blood is – to put it simply – one of the funnest, funniest and fantastic horror films I’ve seen in a long time. It captures the spirit of 80s genre cinema, when horror films could be fun instead of trying to “elevate” the genre and gore and special effects ruled the roost. It also does that whilst playing with genre conventions, Turing them on their head… A male babysitter anyone?
Speaking of whom, Shawn Roberts (X-Men, the Resident Evil franchise) is the most badass babysitter ever committed to celluloid – totally inspired by Ash Williams from the Evil Dead franchise and a myriad of meathead boyfriends from a number of other genre films; with a charge, Grace, that is just as charismatic. However, as per the 80s influence on the film, both are remarkably outshone by a practical effect – a rubber head that harkens back to the animatronic corpse from Return of the Living Dead, puppeted by the director’s sister(!) and voiced by metal icon Dee Snider. Now if that’s NOT a selling point for Here For Blood I don’t know what is!
***** 5/5
Here For Blood screened on Saturday, March 11th as part of this year’s Glasgow Frightfest.
