FrightFest 2023: ‘Here for Blood’ upends home invasion expectations

Filmmaker Daniel Turres guides you into your typical home invasion thriller. What begins as your standard fare soon morphs into another creature altogether. With obvious roots in films like You’re Next, Here for Blood manages to upend expectations mid-way through and zig-zag between genres for the rest of the runtime. What you think you know is shattered – leaving you questioning what exactly the film is supposed to be. But that’s its charm. It’s messy and unexpected, making it quite a thrilling, midnight treat.

The story follows body-building wrestler Tom (Shawn Roberts), who takes a babysitting job when his girlfriend Phoebe (Joelle Farrow) has to cram for a final exam. He’s down on his luck after scoring a measly $20 for a recent fighting match. He’s all muscles but has a big, loveable heart. Perhaps on the outside, he doesn’t look like your typical babysitter, but his warmth and smile are infectious. So, he heads out the door to hopefully earn a few bucks.

The family, your typical rich, white suburbanites, are taken aback as they’ve never seen a man babysitter before. But Barb (Tara Spencer-Nairn) and Gill (Michael Therriault) are quick to take Phoebe’s recommendation and leave their daughter Grace (Maya Misaljevic) in Tom’s care. The evening progresses as you might expect; Tom and Grace order pizza and play video games, enjoying each other’s company. When masked intruders slip into the home via the attic, all bets are off, and Tom must protect Grace at all costs.

Muscle-rippling and provocative, Here for Blood riffs on such bonkers films as The Return of the Living Dead and The Cabin in the Woods, while making sure such creative touchstones never cloud the story. Turres injects the film with a generous dose of camp for good measure with oversized gore and flashes of blinding violence. There’s so much blood that it puts Saw to shame.

If a popcorn-eating good time is what you’re after, Here for Blood should satisfy that hunger. It’s fantastic in all the right ways, from the practical effects to the cinematography (credit to Renato Villas for crafting some exquisite shots). With limitless creativity, you can’t say the filmmakers didn’t swing for the fences – and they scored nothing but home runs.

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