Blood Moon Rising


Title: Blood Moon Rising
Rating: 2.5/5
Genre: Horror/Comedy
Starring: Laurie Love, Neal Trout
Director: Brian Skiba

It certainly seems like Grindhouse flicks are becoming all the rage; first Planet Terror and then Machete, but this hints at something that Rodriguez' offerings didn't: the complete and utter absence of a respectable budget. Mimicking the film reels used in the old 70s offerings, the time period this is also set in comes complete with all the drug abuse, random sex scenes and fake blood exploding everywhere. This should have been something glorious; a film not as much mocking the past but re-creating it in all its nonsensical glory. Vampires, Demons, Werewolves and Zombies coalescing in a whirlwind plot that somehow involves a cursed book that opens the gates of Hell so the Devil – a vampires father, who in turn happens to be the great great grandmother of our female protagonist – desperately trying to use a oddly shaped pendant to prevent hell on earth.

Our first time director (at least this is his first full-length release) has clearly a decent understanding of the style and admirably avoids CGI unless absolutely necessary, being impractical on the given budget to do it any other way, and despite looking out of place maintains an intentionally cheap feel that doesn't betray the cheesy vision he's created. The problems largely stem from the fact he takes it all a little too far, not differentiating between the tasteful and the annoying; the editing looks hacked with with a butchers knife, complete with reels getting lost and spinning out of sync, cutting all too abruptly and jarringly away from the sleazy rock and roll soundtrack. The volume levels are painfully mastered with entire sections of dialogue lost, and any attempt to adjust the volume yourself are met with a sudden transition to loudness ensuring that certain pieces of the already nonsensical puzzle are forever lost.

Fortunately the piece is brought back from the brink by the large cast capable of lending a touch of humour to the proceedings; from the geek with his guns and comic book obsession, trying to act the macho hero but often letting his female companion do the lions share of exploding heads, a cameo appearance from Ron Jeremy along side bike riding vampires, Jamaican stoners and bike gangs that are really just out to have fun; the fact that nothing seems to make any sense can quickly be forgiven given the fact that it all allows for these amusing scenario's to emerge. At times it is certainly annoying in how indiscriminately he pieced the product together, but at no point does this ever feel slow or without its idea's to toss about.

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