Rent Blood Widow (2014)

Spoilers follow ... - Blood Widow review by NP

Why is it seemingly often necessary to make the characters in slasher films so collectively objectionable? Laurie (Danielle Lilley) is pouting because drippy new husband Hugh (Brandon Kyle Peters) has invited their idiotic friends to their new house when ‘she hasn’t finished unpacking yet.’ This follows a promising pre-credit scene where an unknown photographer is exploring the grounds of the neighbouring abandoned boarding school and finds a sinister face-mask in the basement and instantly gets garrotted. The hope is that the same thing happens to this current gaggle of pearly-toothed airheads. This isn’t anything to do with the acting, it seems a deliberate policy to make these characters precocious cyphers it is impossible to care about.

Happily, it isn’t long before these fey wannabe hooligans find the boarding school and casually trash it, not for any particular reason. After all, why would they need to justify their actions? The communal view is that they’ll be able to take some impressive photographs there.

Less happily, it isn’t long before the house-warming party gives even more of these imbeciles an excuse to shock us by talking about drugs and finally letting lose those hormones. It is annoying that so much time is spent with these people, with Laurie and Hugh’s tedious arguing, with the Harmony (Kelly Kilgore – what a fitting surname the actress has) the hippie girl’s LSD induced chantings in the abandoned house, when within that house is The Blood Widow herself. We never see her true face, never really know her motives, but she is a wonderful creation, and instantly more interesting than the rest of the characters put together.

As the killings begin and prove to be impressive, and the Blood Widow of the title even more so, it is amusing to hear Hugh promise that he’s ‘going to get my cross-bow and get my f*****g girl back’, with all the venom of a cream horn.

We don’t learn a huge amount about the Widow (Gabrielle Ann Henry), other than she’s a wronged pupil at the boarding house, which is a shame as she looks great, in the mask and leather costume. She even has the good grace to relieve Laurie of her jeans for the final scenes. She either lives a normal life (which we know nothing of) outside the mask, or merely exists in this ramshackle building, hiding in shadows to wait for any wary passer-by. {SPOILER} Despite a plucky effort, last survivor Laurie is despatched during the pacy finale in a protracted death scene, after the film genuinely leads us to believe Laurie has destroyed her. Blood Widow Lives, a sequel, is in development, and I hope next time she has – Laurie’s last minute resolve aside - more inspiring company.