Blood Trails
Blood Trails is a German movie that has already done the rounds at many festivals around the world and managed to garner the audience award at the Dead by Dawn Horror Festival. The film is finally making its way to DVD in March. It will be a welcome addition to the horror genre as the film has some originality and skill.
The plot is simple; a couple goes into the woods where they are stalked by a crazy guy on a bike. It’s almost too simple.
The story unfolds in a lush wilderness that is intercut with a few flashbacks to a gritty cityscape full of neon lights and crisp imagery. I applaud the director and the cinematographer for the luxuriant visuals they provide. In the wilderness, I could almost feel the cold isolation of the surroundings. The film manages to feel as if it was made in the middle of nowhere, something few films of the same kind rarely manage to do. The scenes that take place in the city pop with menacing visuals and an even more desolate tone than the wilderness.
The acting in this movie is a mixed bag. Rebecca Palmer plays the protagonist, Anne. Palmer is not beautiful in any way, shape, or form and her lips look like she’s been sucking on a hot curling iron for an hour. Palmer’s homeliness only seems to add to the realness of the movie, and after the first 15 minutes I stopped noticing she wasn’t attractive and became submerged in the vagueness of the movie.
The mysterious nature of the film is directly attributable to the fantastic performance of Tom Frederic, a black-clad psychopath on a bike. Frederic has few lines throughout the movie, but the looks he provides make it seem as if he was supplying dialogue throughout the whole film. I hope to see more of him as he furnishes a genuinely spooky feeling to the movie and his eyes always seemed to be hinting at some sort of hidden meaning.
Despite one good actor and some remarkable visuals, the movie does have its drawbacks. The premise and the plot are simple, as I’ve mentioned before. This means that much of the middle of the movie seems forced. Anne continually stumbles on hapless people that inhabit the forest, but who mainly seem to be there to fall victim to Frederic’s ominous character. I can’t help but feel the movie would have been nothing short of great if they had only cut a good half an hour out of the film.
The music was also sickening as well. The score is your typical European techno garbage, which is unfortunate, because the rest of the sound design is rich and lush. The music, rather than heighten the tension, only managed to pull me out of the movie and distract me with its cheesy badness.
The real gem of this movie is its ending. It is both satisfying and unexpected. If the rest of the movie is generic with regards to plot, then the ending is this movie’s salvation.
Final Synopsis: Blood Trails is a fun, original horror movie that manages to capture tension and ambience in equal portions, something that seems to be lacking from most horror movies these days. It is definitely worth a look. I’ll probably buy this when it comes out on DVD. If you’re looking for a mindless slasher film, then go somewhere else. You may have to put a little work into this one to enjoy it, because there is delightfully little exposition.
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