Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Bloodthirsty’ on VOD, a Moody Horror Outing About a Pop Star Who Fears She’s a Werewolf

Another week, another dozen or so horror movies, although new VOD offering Bloodthirsty is a hair or three better than most, being a Canadian werewolf movie that simmers the soup of suspense nicely for 84 minutes. It’s the second collaboration between director Amelia Moses and star Lauren Beatty, and may point toward a bigger idea and a bigger budget for them next time.

BLOODTHIRSTY: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: ONE PIANO CHORD. Then, some UNEASY STRINGS. This is JUST THE OPENING CREDITS. But wait’ll you see the first image! It’s of Grey (Lauren Beatty) on her knees in the dark in the woods ravenously slurping and crunching raw guts. But — it’s OAD. You know. Only A Dream. She awakes, walks to the bathroom, swears she sees gnarly claws emerging from her fingers, her eyes big and, y’know, poochie in the mirror. Cut to her physician’s office, where the doc expresses exasperation; they’ve tried everything, and maybe she shouldn’t cut back on the ol’ meds.

Then, to a studio where Grey endures a slightly less demonic Neon Demon photo shoot. Wigs, ridiculous fashion, dumb poses, all that. She’s a pop star, see, one who’s due for a second album to follow up the successful first. Pressure’s on. She goes home to her surprisingly humble apartment for a pop star, where her supportive and loving girlfriend Charlie (Katharine King So) smooches her and hands her a plateful of vegan takeout. Yep, vegan. Notably not raw guts. Grey shares her news: she’s found a producer for the album, Vaughn (Greg Bryk). Charlie Googles him, and finds an article on how he once faced a murder charge and was acquitted. Is that enough to pull the plug? No, because the justice system is supposed to be functional right, except this is a horror movie, so the flag is more red than usual. But Charlie and Grey don’t know they’re in a horror movie, which has them at a disadvantage.

They pack their suitcases and drive out to Vaughn’s place for recording sessions. He lives way out there, down a snow-covered road in an old mansion that’s not extremely gothy, but still, check out the candelabras and shit. His housekeeper greets them, and she has all the charm of a stone gargoyle. Vaughn is softspoken, kind, accommodating, maybe a little chilly. They eat dinner, and he has steak but knows Grey is vegan, so she gets veggies. The fridge is stocked with stuff that isn’t meat. He knows everything about her, he says — her manager told him. Ha ha? This is his sense of humor! He is funny! What an enjoyable conversation.

Charlie stays in their room and paints paintings while Grey and Vaughn get to work tackling songwriting as a psychoanalytic process. “Go deeper” and “get out of your head” is Vaughn’s advice, and is it sort of weird that his in-home recording studio has no engineers or other people there ever? Just them and Grimtessa the housekeeper? Anyway, the writing and recording is going quite well, and then there are signs that they should probably GTFO — Grey’s crazy dreams, the disturbing manner in which Vaughn addresses the murder charge — but the writing and recording is going OH so very well. Grey plays a snippet of music on the piano and Vaughn says he likes it and he sits next to her and leans in and sniffs her and says, “I can smell… something primal.” Must be a pretty good song then!

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Bloodthirsty mucks about in a Black Swan-ish woman-goes-dark transformative headspace, although it’s not even remotely close to being on Aronofsky’s trauma-inducing level. And the mansion-in-the-middle-of-nowhere-where-nasty-shit-happens component gave me some Tusk vibes. Remember Tusk? You probably tried to forget, but I’m happy to remind you it exists!

Performance Worth Watching: Bryk appears to be having fun in the dark-weirdo role, toeing the edge of camp with his nicely modulated line-readings — and lord help me if he doesn’t look like Jason Sudeikis’ evil twin.

Memorable Dialogue: Charlie expresses concern about Grey:

Charlie: “He’s a psycho!”

Grey: “He’s eccentric.”

Sex and Skin: Toplessness as Charlie and Grey straddle each other in bed.

Our Take: And so the album became a big hit and everyone lived happily ever after. THE END. No! Bloodthirsty isn’t a movie about the pain and obsession of artistic creation, it’s a movie about the pain and obsession of artistic creation by people who are werewolves. That’s not a spoiler — we know going into the movie that it promises a little shapeshifty body-horror fun, and it’s more about where director Amelia Moses goes with it. There’s a great scene where Grey gets up in the middle of the night with a hankerin’ for a snack, opens the fridge and realizes the pickled asparagus just ain’t gonna cut it, so she drinks the juice off a plate of raw beef that was just sitting there uncovered like bait, or maybe Vaughn just doesn’t believe in cling wrap.

The film’s psychological-thriller fodder isn’t all that deep, but remember, under the right conditions a person can drown in a couple inches of water. That’s a way of saying Bloodthirsty is pretty effective for a while, steadily building suspense as Grey’s album takes shape under Vaughn’s glowering intensity. You’ll wish it was maybe a little more fun and a little less brooding, or no fun whatsoever and really twisted the damn screws, like Moses needs to guide the tone out of the middle of the road and go for broke.

But the conservative approach works for the most part, skimming some moody morsels from the idea of letting go of yourself and letting the art flow, even if it means transforming into an apex predator and letting your carnal self feed. Moses and screenwriters Wendy Hill-Tout and pop songwriter Lowell nearly fumble the ball down the stretch with a fizzling third-act payoff, complete with disappointing makeup effects that are a little too Buffy the Vampire Slayer for their own good.

Our Call: STREAM IT. There’s enough good stuff in Bloodthirsty — slyly funny bits, squishy-squelchy gore, an idea or two — to recommend it, just don’t expect it to be Darren Aronosky’s The Howling or something.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com or follow him on Twitter: @johnserba.