The wisecracking, loose cannon/buddy cop sub-genre has never ceased to reinvent itself as it’s such a popular format and one that’s flexible enough to cater for pretty much all your storytelling needs. Not only has it served as a springboard for deceptively simple escapist popcorn entertainment, but it’s also proven itself as a fertile breeding ground for filmmakers to pack in terrifying horror tropes amidst the thick of all the explosions, quirky comebacks, break-neck car chases and blistering shoot-outs.
Dead Heat, The Hidden and Dark Angel spring straight to this writer’s mind when recalling some of the most memorable entries in this specific realm but I’m hard-pressed to come up with anything as memorable as those films post-1990. Thankfully, that’s about to change as Alister Grierson’s (Sanctum) latest film, Bloody Hell ticks all the same boxes as the aforementioned movies whilst putting a completely new spin on this particular realm.
Best described as Die Hard meets The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Bloody Hell tells the tale of Rex (Ben O’Toole), a man with a mysterious past who ups and leaves the country to escape the living Hell he’s created for himself… As bad luck would have it, he picks a destination that is far worse. In an effort to survive his new predicament, he turns to his personified conscience to help him figure out how to free himself from a deranged family of cannibalistic psychos.
With this “finger-licking” great film opening in select theatres and On Demand this 14 January and on DVD/Blu-Ray on 19 January, we caught up with scriptwriter Robert Benjamin who revealed how the idea behind the film dawned on him when he convinced himself he was about to be kidnapped by a family of gourmet cannibals…
Words: Howard Gorman
