Blood Relic (DVD)

When the director is the best actor in a movie, you know you’re in trouble. And when that man is a better actor than he is a director, you’re in deep DVD voodoo doo-doo.

The story of Blood Relic unfurls as follows: In 1983, not long after finding an ancient voodoo talisman, Navy pilot Hank Campbell goes on a murder spree at his air station. Before being captured, he hides the green monkey-shaped pendant in the hangar.

The film cuts to 22 years later, and the hangar is being prepared to open as an air and space museum by a young staff overseen by a wild-eyed, spittle-spewing Billy Drago. The young staff are — naturally — constantly in the mood for sex, strip poker, beer, and séances. Cut to a menacing Hank, who has just been released from the psychiatric institute, and he knows where his first stop will be. Unfortunately, one of the young employees has beaten him to the punch and found the long-hidden talisman just moments before his arrival.

The actors’ talents vary from school-play savvy, to dinner-theater theatrics, to making Al Pacino in Scarface look like a simpering schoolgirl (I think Drago brought his very own vaulting pole to the set so he could go waaaaay over the top). The silent but deadly killer, who wears a rather uncomfortable and hot-looking fighter pilot mask, doesn’t look or seem very scary but he does wield a wicked weapon that can apparently slice, dice, filet and julienne. He doesn’t have a personality per se, but he does once rip out a victim’s heart (not beating, since it’s obviously plastic) and show it to him.

After watching Blood Relic, I was more than a little surprised to see that the director, J. Christian Ingvordsen, actually has years of experience in film. Surprised, because he doesn’t seem to know anything but wide masters and tight close-ups. Two-shots are seemingly just by chance, and there are no over-the-shoulder shots whatsoever (“OTS?” I can almost hear Ingvordsen muttering, “I thought that stood for Ogling Tit Shots.”). Perhaps worst (and best) of all are the reaction shots from the actors, which are all over the place. You can actually see their eyes darting around searching for direction, having no idea what they’re reacting to or where their eye-leads are supposed to go.

While the boobs are all surprisingly real, everything else is fake. The bright red blood, the prop knives and the plastic innards are a hoot — and so is my favorite scene, which I like to call “Now you spew it, now you don’t”. What’s left of the soon-to-be kid-kabobs happen upon a gruesome murdered body, and one of them throws up, hurling right at the camera lens. Cut to a long shot of her, heaving open-mouthed towards the cement floor, and there is absolutely nothing on the ground. Another terrific scene takes place during the séance, when one of the ouija-wigglers says, “Is someone there?” and is met with dead slience. Had this movie been released in theaters, there wouldn’t have been anyone there for sure (that bit of unfortunate dialogue is almost as good as naming a certain bad movie “Alone in the Dark”).

Thankfully, Blood Relic is a good bad movie and there’s never a dull moment. While there is plenty of unintentional humor, I think the video might actually have worked on more levels had it been done in a comedic way (think: Student Bodies from 1981). The filmmakers did have sense of humor enough to put outtakes in during the end credits, and lest you think the movie is just one big outtake, these are even better and make sitting through the movie worthwhile.

Additional release material on the DVD includes audio commentary and a surprisingly fun and entertaining video diary by one of the actors, Debbie Rochon. Her video diary is better than most — it even tops the one Sarah Michelle Gellar did for The Grudge.

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Reviewed by Staci Layne Wilson