Blood Vessel, Movie Review

As World War II is nearing its end, the offensives by the Nazi U-boats is increased to demoralize the allies. After an attack on an English hospital ship, a group of mixed nationals are stranded on a lifeboat in the North Atlantic when a German minesweeper is spotted coming toward them. With no food, water, or shelter from the elements, they decide to take a chance and call out for help. No response. After almost being run over, they scramble on board before the ship passes.

The Australian movie Blood Vessel made its World Premiere at the 2019 FilmQuest Film Festival (website). It was given the honorary position of being the last film shown at the festival and was nominated for ten awards.

The survivors find some crew members who had clearly taken their own lives. When they find a girl alive on the ship, the mystery of what happened and why she survived whatever happened on board becomes a serious concern. The story of the minesweeper and its crew becomes clearer and the truth of the girl becomes more about surviving her than how she survived on the ship.

The premise developed in Blood Vessel is based on the stories of Hitler sending groups out to find artifacts of religious and paranormal power. On this boat, there are more than artifacts of power. The girl and her family were being transported from Eastern Europe. The lifeboat survivors realize they are on a ship that was transporting vampires.

The story plays out as the survivors of the lifeboat now must survive again.

There are a number of things I like about Blood Vessel.

The interplay of the nationalities of the characters, Australian, English, Russian, and American. The six actors create a believable group with their mannerisms and interactions. The fit of the actors to the roles was great and earned the movie a nomination for Best Ensemble Cast.

Individual performances were just as effective.

Nathan Phillips (IMDb page) plays Sinclair, the pseudo leader of the survivors. Along with him, John Lloyd Fillingham (IMDb page) is Faraday, an English intelligence officer. These two were recognized for their portrayals with nomination for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor. Their performances were worthy of the nominations. Each brought depth to their characters. The actors seemed to have a level of intuition with their characters that made them impressive.

There is a single female survivor, the English Nurse Jane Prescott, played by Alyssa Sutherland (IMDb page, Vikings). Sutherland plays her part to near perfection. Her portrayal of the proper English Nurse doing her duty for King and country in World War II is superb.  She builds not only on the events portrayed on screen but also is able to believably weave in the character's backstory with her performance. Sutherland won Best Supporting Actress.

The production was also honored for the work on the film. Blood Vessel is almost exclusively set on the minesweeper. The limited space of a ship creates difficulties. Along with the limited space is the limited time frame, everything happens in a single night. These boundaries were handled gracefully. The work put into the film earned it nominations for Best Sound, Best Visual Effects, and Best Makeup.  Blood Vessel also won Best Costumes and Best Production Design/Art Direction.

With all of the other nominations and awards the movie was also nominated for Best Feature Film.

Justin Dix directed and co-wrote Blood Vessel. He may not have been nominated for his part in the making of this tale, but as the director he did a wonderful job bringing the rest of the talented cast and crew together. He is better known for his special effects work, and I suspect that with the quality of Blood Vessel we may see him involved more as a director.

Overall

Blood Vessel is a well put together and enjoyable horror adventure tale. I like seeing vampires who are scary and unsettling. This movie delivers a family of them.

I strongly recommend this movie for horror fans. It might seem like a typical storyline, but the presentation of it makes it worth seeing. The setup and delivery are spot on and even if it is predictable in parts, it was fun.

Blood Vessel is currently on the film festival circuit and is worth looking for.

I give Blood Vessel 4 out of 5.

If you have a comment, suggestion, or critique please leave a comment here or send an email to guildmastergaming@gmail.com.

I have articles being published by others and I you can find most of them on Guild Master Gaming on Facebookand Twitter(@GuildMstrGmng).