Blood Star
Directed by Lawrence Jacomelli
Written by Lawrence Jacomelli, George Kelly, Victoria Hinks Taylor
Starring Britni Camacho, John Schwab, Sydney Brumfield
Unrated
Runtime: 1 hour 37 minutes
Available digitially October 7

by Heidi Krull, Staff Writer

The “cat and mouse” chase trope is a timeless horror classic, typically featuring small casts, low budgets, and the human spirit at rock bottom. Directed by newcomer Lawrence Jacomelli, Blood Star is a relentless, torturous film that builds suspense in diabolical ways. Despite its positive qualities, though, Blood Star holds itself back from being effective.

The film opens with a young girl, Bobby (Britni Camacho) driving in the desolate New Mexico desert on her way home to her abusive boyfriend. While on her way, she gets stopped at a gas station by dirty Sheriff Bilstein (John Schwab), beginning an unfortunate and bloody series of events. Bilstein continues to stalk Bobby, pulling her over and punishing her for lousy charges just to get to her. Without a phone, license, or true destination in mind, Bobby has to gather all of her strength to fight the only badge for miles.

As a horror fan and a lover of slow building suspense, this film did not hit all of the points I was expecting it to. The beginning of Blood Star, while the scenery and situation was frightening, was halted by corny dialogue and a whole lot of telling instead of showing. The writing did not do the fairly interesting plot justice, and it took away from the mystery element that is typically present in horror films. Every time Bobby took a phone call, the conversation would give away her motivations and character flaws immediately, instead of allowing the audience to piece them together. On the other end, Bilstein’s motivations are entirely unclear until the last 20 minutes of the film, leaving me more confused than intrigued. I understand that the film wanted to hone in mainly on the chase between the two main characters, but more subtlety and finesse with the writing may have helped it reach its potential.

I also took issue with some of the gore and violence in this Blood Star. I am no stranger to these things, but sometimes the way these elements are done can make or break a horror film. Toward the end, Bobby finds herself in an impossible situation with her captor. I expected this scene to be brutal, but to me, the horrific things that happened to Bobby went a step too far. This film was seemingly making commentary on the incel mindset; Bilstein literally said during this exchange that “all women are the same” as he calls her misogynistic slurs. Oftentimes, symbolism of misogyny can be extremely effective and relevant in the horror genre, and many films explicitly condemn this behavior. This film, however, took symbolism to a gratuitous level, and I felt at times that I was watching a true, awful event rather than a fictional one. Viewers should also be warned that themes of sexual assault are present in this film.

Despite my complaints, there were some positive aspects of Blood Star. The two primary actors did what they could with the lackluster writing, even though Schwab seemed to choke through some of Bilstein’s unbearably cringey one-liners. Camacho did wonderful and terrifying work with her character as well, and I thought she portrayed desperation and panic very successfully. I also appreciated the levels of suspense in this film. Since the primary plot was the chase, I was always wondering when and how Bilstein would pop up next, and he always managed to surprise me. Some of the shining moments here were when there was alleged down time between scares. These scenes allowed me to get to know minor characters more, such as diner server Amy (Sydney Brumfield), but they also made the buildup to the next disturbing scene deliciously uncomfortable. The dead desert scenery also helped the film feel more sinister in nature.

Blood Star attempted to do something undeniably difficult: make interesting commentary on how men in power abuse women because of their status. This film is not the first to try and fail to do this, and it certainly will not be the last. There were a number of great moments that made my jaw drop, but the overly straightforward dialogue and underdeveloped commentary left me with more questions than answers. I will say, director Jacomelli did outstanding work for his first feature length film, and I do hope to see him do more in the future.