Mark Reviews Movies: BLOODTHIRSTY

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Review by Mark Dujsik | April 22, 2021

An exercise in mood that becomes an exercise in practical effects, Bloodthirsty mostly leaves its story and characters by the wayside. Director Amelia Moses makes the most of this setting—a large cabin in the middle of the woods—and the bloody carnage that eventually comes, but screenwriters Wendy Hill-Tout and Lowell haven't provided this tale with anything deeper than and within its supernatural twist.

The thin story follows Grey (Lauren Beatty), a singer/songwriter with hallucinations of transforming into an animal, as she and her girlfriend Charlie (Katharine King So) travel to the remote mansion/recording studio of Vaughn (Greg Bryk). Vaughn has agreed to produce Grey's second album. He pushes the artist, much to Charlie's frustration and concern. The guy was, after all, accused but acquitted of the murder of his wife.

The movie offers little at the start and for a while, beyond the scenes of Vaughn's tough methods (making Grey run until she's out of breathe and work through the night) and Grey repeatedly singing songs that all start to sound alike (Lowell, a recording artist, wrote most of the eerie, depressing tunes here). Grey, a vegan, starts having a taste for meat—more specifically the blood dripping from a steak. Charlie frets and scolds the producer some more.

Vaughn's attention toward Grey becomes a bit discomforting, convincing her to go off her medication. His mostly useless maid Vera (Judith Buchan) appears after long stretches of absence to give stern looks and, eventually, provide the story with its real hook, when she picks up a hitchhiker and brings the stranger for a brief, bloody visit to the junkyard in Vaughn's backyard.

The setup is moody, gloomy, and not much else. Grey has a few visions of her body gaining animalistic features and nightmares of gory feeding sessions, which eventually become a reality. Hill-Tout and Lowell's underlying theme is about hiding and, later, embracing one's true nature, but it feels mostly like an excuse for carnage and an admittedly impressive sequence in which Grey does transform into her true, secret form.

It becomes as predictable as the scenes setting up the central gimmick are repetitive. Bloodthirsty takes its time building up to the revelations of a few mysteries, while not offering much in the process. When those mysteries do come to light, Hill-Tout and Lowell forgo giving them any purpose or meaning.

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