Blood Beat (

1983

)

Shortly after I finished graduate school, my wife (then my girlfriend), got a job in rural Wisconsin, a couple hours from the nearest big city. We had about a month to get our lives together and move there from Providence. We broke our lease, packed up two big suitcases, and left the majority of our worldly possessions in my mom's pantry, and headed West. I had no idea what to expect, having lived in a succession of big cities and quaint suburbs since my birth. I was scared, but I needn't have been, as what followed was one of the happiest times of my life. My job was good enough to let me telecommute indefinitely, an experience that frankly spoiled me for all future employment. It is hard to beat a 0 minute commute, and when things were slow (which was often, I worked for a non-profit bureaucracy at the time) I could put movies on in the background. Since I had my Boston salary coupled with Wisconsin prices, money was no concern. Going out to eat at fancy restaurants became a regular indulgence and the rent for our apartment was a third what it would have been back east. Best of all, my relationship with my girlfriend deepened, and before long we were married. Moreover, I found a warmness and kindness in the locals that had been lacking in my previous homes. Though I was from far away, I never once felt like an outsider. So to say that I have a nostalgic attachment to rural Wisconsin is something of an understatement. For that reason, I began Blood Beat with an unusual fondness. This is a film that really captures the look and feel of that particular part of the world. Indeed, the only part I don't believe is the time of year; there's no way that there's no way these people would be walking around without ear-caps and scarves in late December, to say nothing of the conspicuous absence of snow. Writer/Director Fabrice A. Zaphiratos (just what a French director was doing making indie horror movies in middle America is beyond me) has clearly taken a page out of Vittorio De Sica's playbook and gone for a naturalistic approach to casting. The characters and costumes speak to the kind of neo-realist authenticity that you can only get by hiring local amateurs (indeed, none of the cast has a single other credit to their names) and letting them dress themselves. Unfortunately Zaphiratos' other major influence seems to be Phil Tucker, the autuer behind Robot Monster (1953). This goes some way towards explaining why I found myself so annoyed by a film that initially conjured up so many warm memories.

The plot, at least as much as I can glean from the often obscure script and unintelligible dialogue, concerns a reclusive artist, Cathy, living in rural Wisconsin and her family. It's Christmastime, and her two college age children, Ted and Dolly , have come home to visit her and her live-in boyfriend Gary. Ted, has brought a surprise along with him though in the form of his new girlfriend Sarah. I've heard the stereotype of mothers and prospective daughter-in-laws not getting along but these two take it to a new, and troubling extreme. Both are weird-ed out by each other right off the bat, not so much by one another's behavior but on some unseen psychological level. It's the sort of instinctive revulsion that I can honestly say I've never really gotten from another human being. To be fair, Cathy acts a bit off in all her scenes and its plain that she's got more than a few secrets she's hiding, but Sarah seems to be mostly normal in her introduction aside from an unusual degree of timidity. It gets weirder as the film progresses. Shortly after they're introduced Sarah refuses to have sex with Ted for fear that Cathy is somehow watching them (despite the fact that the door is closed and Cathy is secluded in her studio).

It's at this point that people start to turn up dead, killed by a mysterious samurai warrior wielding a katana that sometimes glows blue (the effects that do this constitute Blood Beat's most entertaining asset given how crude and ludicrous they look). The samurai suit is surprisingly well-made given the obviously small budget that Zapiratos was working with. Going in, I expected a used Halloween costume, so I was quite surprised when this professionally made suit came trotting out. After the first victim these killings don't seem to have much in common with the main plot line, as all the victims are random rednecks we've never met before. The only common thread I can draw is that they are connected in someway to Sarah, usually coinciding with moments of heightened stress, emotion or excitement for the girl. For instance, a few of the killings take place while she is having sex with Ted, with footage of the murders being inter-spliced with the sex scenes.

So what is the connection between this young woman and the murderous samurai? What secret is Cathy hiding from the Gary? Why is there an instinctive hostility between Sarah and Cathy? Why is classical music constantly blaring in the background, often so loud that it drowns out the actors? Hell if I know. I swear I was paying attention the whole time but I still have no idea what was going on for a good 2/3 of the film.

Like Robot Monster (1953), Blood Beat has aspirations of being something more than a Z-grade exploitation film. There is a deeper message lurking somewhere in the film, only problem is its lost in all the technical and narrative shortcomings. Part of the problem is that Blood Beat is shot on video and the version I saw at least was probably pulled off a VHS and uploaded online. The audio and visual qualities of the film were probably suspect before that though, as I've found films that have undergone a similar ordeal (like Elves (1989)) to be more easy to see and hear. There are, for instance, whole scenes that are too dark to see anything that is going on and (more surprisingly) scenes where it is so bright that they are nothing more than a white blur. The audio is ruddy throughout and more often than not I had no idea what the characters were saying at any given moment. Watching the film was thus a fairy frustrating experience, not unlike trying to get an obscure channel on an old rabbit ears TV set. Obviously, money is a great concern for a micro-budget film like this, and I suspect that the only reason the monster is a ghostly samurai is because Zaphiratos knew someone that own this suit of armor was willing to let him borrow it for free (which is incidentally the same reason why the monster in Robot Monster (1953) was depicted as a giant ape). Certainly the fact that he is a samurai never seems to play into either his behavior or motivations.

Yet, Blood Beat's problems run deeper than mere technical incompetence or budgetary constraints can explain on their own. I have no doubt that the writer/director actually put a great deal of thought into his film, its just that whatever logic he's working off of is unique to him. I was not able to find out much biographical data Zaphiratos, aside from the fact that he's a Frenchman. In that case much of the deliberately obscure parts of Blood Beast could be explained away as the product of someone working outside his native language. It's also entirely possible that everything in the script makes perfect sense to Zaphiratos and the problem is that he's a nut and doesn't realize that its practically gibberish to everyone else laying eyes on it. The fact that he has access to an authentic replica of Samurai armor in 1983 (well ahead of the weeaboo phenomenon) in Wisconsin of all places suggests that this is a real possibility. I expect that people who enjoy deliberately obscure and confusion artistic movies will be more forgiving of Blood Beat's shortcomings. If your favorite films are Red Desert (1964) and Weekend (1967), then you'll doubtlessly rate Blood Beat much higher than me. As it stand though, I get invested in films mainly through characters and plotlines, and while Blood Beat has both they are slippery bastards that I can't quite get a hold of.

Still, It would be unfair of me to just unceremoniously dump on this film. Blood Beat may be a hopelessly incomprehensible mess, but it is also a work of real love and energy. It is a film that stands out, not just in the niche sub-genre of holiday horror movies but n the wider world of film. It may be boring, but at least it's not predictable.