To know, known, know your genre is to love, love, love your genre.
It’s 2010, do we really need an 80′s horror film? Normally, I would answer no, but after tonight, I’d change my answer, on one condition: Drew Rosas has to make it.
Blood Junkie does not deviate from the traditional partying-teens preyed upon by a psychopath storyline. This time-tested narrative supplies a great backbone for a series of tightly woven scares and laughs that perfectly emulate low-budget, home-spun 80′s horror.
Soaked in a wonderful synth soundtrack, hilariously dumb characters, and just the right amount of gore Blood Junkie looks and feels just like a lost artifact from the end of the 80′s. Best of all, it never once blinks. You’ll find no tongue-in-cheek, self-knowing humor. This is a retro film done in the footsteps and spirits of those that built the genre, not just another homage or send-up. Blood Junkie does not flaunt its time period, it in habits it. This is no easy accomplishment, especially in an era where almost every staple of 80′s horror is being revamped for modern audiences. Rosas and crew* do not seem to care about modernizing or pumping up the action and gore for today’s crowds.
Now, I am normally not one for nostalgia, but watching Blood Junkie on a Saturday night was just like staying up late watching some film on Joe Bob Brigg’s Drive-In Theater. Actually, it was even better because I was watching Blood Junkie with a rabidly enthusiastic crowd cheering on a local filmmaker, his cast, and crew. Of all the Milwaukee films I’ve seen this might be the most well put together film I’ve seen. Honestly, it is shocking to think that an homage to do-it-yourself 80′s horror films could feel like the most fully realized local film I’ve seen, but then again there is something to be said about loving your work and knowing what it is you love about a certain style of filmmaking.
*I think a special shout out should go to the comically gifted lead actor Nick Sommers and to cinematographer Michael Kubaszak, who really understand the genre along with Rosas.
