Blood Creek

I hadn't heard anything about this movie prior to today, but checking IMDb to see what the local cheap theater had to offer came up with this. Having no desire to see anything else that was playing, my wife and I decided to drop a couple bucks on it and we were not disappointed.

In general, I am not a fan of WW2, Holocaust, or Nazi related films simply due to the obvious nature of nearly every plot line related to them. Even Inglorious Basterds irritated me because of this. Thankfully, Blood Creek takes itself not very seriously and throws in lots of other random plot devices (Viking runes, zombies, the occult, the war in Iraq, etc.) that make little to no sense but serve the film well.

If you like crappy modern B style horror films (I saw another commenter mention Drag Me To Hell, which I also enjoyed more than just about any other "big" release I've seen this year), then you can't really go wrong here. Iffy acting, senseless plot, and bad CGI are not enough to defeat the high entertainment value of this fast-paced flick. If I had expectations for this, or had I paid $10 to see it, I would probably be pretty irritated. But if you can catch it at your cheapo second run theater, I can think of far worse ways to spend an hour and a half.

Blood Creek is a solid if unspectacular genre effort from Joel Schumacher, of all people. Touting a great premise and intriguing cast, the film moves at a breakneck pace after a short prologue that takes place just before WWII. Henry Cavill (Stardust, Tristan + Isolde) and Dominic Purcell (Gravedancers, Blade Trinity) are fine as brothers forced to battle some serious evil in an undead Nazi occult agent played by the always great Michael Fassbender (Eden Lake, Inglorious Basterds). In addition, Emma Booth (The Boys Are Back, Clubland) and Shea Wigham (Splinter, Tigerland) both do well enough in supporting roles. The only major problem with the movie is that it ends up being not as awesome as you would think it'd be. Granted, it's still pretty fun, but the setup leads you to believe something much more intense and epic is about to take place. The possibility of a sequel is set up without coming off as crass and the ending doesn't make you feel like you've wasted your time, like a lot of other horror movies succeed in doing. All the effects work and blood/gore are well done and there's a memorable scene involving Fassbender controlling zombie horses. Yeah, you read that right. Zombie horses. Anyway, with every decent film Schumacher makes, the bad taste of his Batman whoopsies seem further and further away. Almost...

This is a horror movie about a Nazi necromancer, that means he can raise dead things to do his bidding. The actor interpreting the Nazi is Michael Fassbender. The director is Joel Schumacher. Now, with a premise like that, I expected a great movie, especially since I've read a review describing it in very positive words. Instead, I get a slight twist of a typical zombie/monster movie. I was disappointed.

What was amazing was how the movie started. Fassbender coming from Germany to the US, doing his nice guy voice (but with a German accent) explaining to a little girl how he can raise the dead, now that he had found a runic stone. Then a lot of detailed action and scenes explaining the story of the paramedic brother of a soldier lost in Iraq. Then suddenly the brother returns, all rags and long hair, asking for help to get guns and shoot people.

Then the film turns into the typical "group trapped with a monster and they have to kill him before it kills them" thing. The dichotomy between to two parts of the movie was shocking, like someone did two different films and then spliced them together, and therefore I can't really recommend the movie, except as a well done monster flick. Go in with low expectations and you might enjoy it fully.

Who knew Joel Schumacher had a horror movie in him? Let alone a good one? Blood Creek takes the Nazi fascination with the occult and uses it as the springboard to an exciting, suspenseful scarefest. The absolutely brilliant cast--including Michael Fassbender, Dominic Purcell, and Henry Cavill--does a stalwart job all round, and where some other directors and their performers would have allowed a picture like Blood Creek to succumb to low camp, everyone involved with the film plays it razor straight. The atmosphere is dark and malevolent, and the limited setting--primarily an isolated farm somewhere in West Virginia--used to great effect. This is a gory film, and while some of the on screen mayhem should have probably been left to the imagination, the copious bloodletting is realistic and certainly holds viewer attention. The only reason this isn't a minor classic is because of the numerous plot holes--lots of things happen that even within the context of the very bizarre plot don't make a lot of sense, and other plot threads are left frustratingly unexplained. Otherwise, if you can take the graphic carnage in stride, this is a superior horror film that would see several of its stars go on to bigger and better things.

A Joel Schumacher helmed horror flick starring Michael Fassbender as a deranged, occult obsessed Nazi zombie vampire, hunted by Lincoln Burrows from Prison Break. Sounds like a flick from an alternate dimension that doesn't exist, right? Well it's out there, tough to find as it was somehow buried around it's 2009 release, and relegated to a relic before it was even a decade old. Shame, because it's a ton of warped, bloody fun. Officially titled 'Blood Creek' on iTunes, it can also be found as 'Town Creek' or simply 'Runes' elsewhere, but like they say, a rose by any other name. Fassbender is all kinds of scary in a black and white prologue as a Nazi occult agent who shows up at a rural American farm to study ancient Nordic runes which may hold the key to resurrection of the dead. His chilling work initially is nothing compared to the balls-out, gory makeup covered incarnation he gets to prance around in later though. In present day, two brothers race into the foggy backwaters to stamp out this evil, and they're played by an intense Dominic Purcell, as well as Superman himself, Henry Cavill. Not a whole lot of time is spent on character development for all involved, the film choosing instead to jump headlong into a notably gory free for all, banding together with the poor German family who has had to deal with this psycho for almost a generation on their farm. At a crisp ninety minutes, there ain't much time for anything but action and gore, with a few scarcely scattered, breathless moments of exposition that were already made clear in that prologue, the one interlude of the film that isn't soaked in adrenaline. Hats off to Fassbender under all that chatty, gooey makeup, his physicality is really menacing, and who else gets to play a Nazi vampire zombie who pounds a metal stake into his own forehead to make room for an emerging third eye? Truly a villain for the ages, had the film been allowed to gain any notoriety. And what other film can boast a sequence in which Purcell eagerly blasts zombified, rabid horses with a shotgun, chunks flying all over the barn? Such are the levels of disturbed imagination on parade. Poor Schumacher though, really. This would've been his first good film in awhile back then, and the studio goes in for the kill on every single marketing front, not even giving it decent room to breathe on DVD. At least it's still floating about on iTunes, where any horror fan would be rewarded with a rental.