BLOOD VESSEL

Stars: Nathan Phillips, Alyssa Sutherland, Alex Cooke, Robert Taylor, Christopher Kirby, John Lloyd Fillingham, Mark Diaco, Vivienne Perry, Troy Larkin and Steve Young.
Writers: Justin Dix and Jordan Prosser.
Director: Justin Dix

Screening at FANGORIA x MONSTER FEST 2019 from October 31-November 4. Check the official website for session details.

Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★

Blood Vessel plays like the movie equivalent of the best cover band you’ve ever seen. Grab-bagging iconic moments from classic genre films and pumping them full of fresh energy, director Justin Dix and his ensemble of committed players offer a ripping high-seas yarn that plays as both a joyous homage to beloved horror tropes and a bloody nightmarish adventure in its own right.

The sophomore feature for effects guru Dix (his 2012 calling-card debut, Crawlspace, earned praise and profit on the genre circuit) is set during the final months of the Second World War. The Axis forces are settling scores by defying wartime convention and have torpedoed a hospital ship; the survivors, a potpourri of international characters representing the combined Allied effort, have been set adrift in a life raft.

Manliest and most level-headed amongst them are the Aussie, Sinclair (Nathan Philips) and Russian, Teplov (Alex Cooke); U.S. military might coms in the form of square-jawed Malone (Robert Taylor), upright African-American hero Jackson (a terrific Christopher Kirby) and whiny New Yorker Bigelow (Mark Diaco); flying the English flag are a nurse, Jane Prescott (Alyssa Sutherland) and cowardly code-breaker, Faraday (John Lloyd Fillingham). There is a twinkle in the eye of every performer, each recognizing that the quality dialogue and opportunity for impactful drama does not often exist in these types of old-school horror romps.

Suffering from starvation and exposure, the group are happier than they should be when a lumbering German minesweeper emerges eerily from the fog. Weighing their fatalistic odds – die slowly at sea or quickly at the hands of a crew bearing the Nazi flag – they decide to board, affording Dix the opportunity to stage an exciting action set piece to kick off proceedings. The already frayed racial tension amongst the group must soon cope with such developments as a ship devoid of crew, bar the occasional gruesome discovery, and a secured section deep below-deck that carries ancient Romanian types best left undisturbed.

Dix and co-writer Jordan Prosser clearly know and love their B-movie inspirations, and they treat that knowledge with respect in crafting the character dynamics and narrative beats of Blood Vessel. The ‘haunted/mysterious ship’ sub-genre is a rich one; Alvin Rakoff’s Death Ship (1980) and Steve Beck’s Ghost Ship (1980), most notably, but also Bruce Kessler’s 1978 TV movie Cruise into Terror and Amando de Ossorio’s 1974 Spanish shlockbuster, The Ghost Galleon, both of which exhibit elements used to great effect in this new Australian entrant.

They provide a framework, but ‘haunted boat’ movies are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the films to which Dix tips his hat. The German crew’s method of ensuring the horror doesn’t spread (and the lighting and camera angles adopted by DOP Sky Davies to depict the result) visually echoes the discovery of the Norwegian base in John Carpenter’s The Thing; Nurse Prescott’s relationship with a little girl they find on board (played by Ruby Hall, her appearance mirroring that of Lina Leandersson in Let The Right One In) recalls the bond between Ripley and Newt in Aliens; the whole ‘Nazis and the Occult’ angle was the spine of Spielberg’s Raiders of The Lost Ark (remember, “Hitler's a nut on the subject”).

Dix returns that which he has borrowed with interest; while horror buffs will spot the references, attention is never drawn away from the on-screen action. Bathing his supernatural thriller in rich blues, deep blacks and primal reds, Dix crafts a closed-quarters, claustrophobic nail-biter that belies its mid-range budget through the use of skillful set design, expertly rendered miniatures and icky gore effects. Genre festival berths and a long life servicing genre fans hunting for legitimate frights are assured.