In the film Book of Blood, writer and PhD college professor Mary Florescu (Sophie Ward), investigates paranormal phenomena with her technical assistant Reg Fuller (Paul Blair). She is working on a story investigating a young girl’s gruesome bloody death - a new book project her many fans are anxiously awaiting. She is desperate to move from the realm of fiction into the role of paranormal scientist.
She sees in her student Simon McNeal (Jonas Armstrong) a new tool to be used in her quest to prove that paranormal events are real. She recognizes Simon as a clairvoyant boy that foresaw the death of his older brother in a car accident years ago. Mary hopes that by moving into the house at the site of the bloody occurrence, she can open up a communication with the beyond. The history of the house is a brief glimpse into the moments of horror as the young girl is brutally flayed alive to leave a message burned into the wall. The three investigators proceed to investigate the house with chilling results. McNeal, at first, begins to fake visions of ghosts and brutal bloody attacks that leave him carved up like a thanksgiving turkey, but then the real ghosts present themselves and they have something . They attack him and carve words in his flesh, and these words, form the rest of the stories, stories written on a literal, living Book of Blood.
The Darkened Streets of the Dead
The structure of the movie begins like many horror films, outlining the characters and introducing the nuances and relationships that will play a part in the macabre journey to come. As the story progresses, it is the house itself that becomes more of a character, jealously watching sexual trysts, interfering with the investigation and pouring out its emotions violently. The history of each of the investigators comes to light to try and provide some sympathy and background for their driven mentality. Much of the characterization of the inner working of the investigators leaves the audience without this sympathy however. and a tangled storyline towards the end of the film
The story is portrayed through dark gray scenes, limited sets and drained colors as we explore the haunted empty house they are investigating. Teddy bears, wigs, pipe cutters, portraits and other strange, small tokens from the previous occupants lie around the otherwise empty house as oddly dropped props. The music is a standard array of horror instrumentals, jumping on the high notes to enhance the moments of quick turn camera scares, and drawn out emotions of slowly plucked piano keys. The setting provides an adequate and suspense filled array of locations, the dark halls of a multi-story townhouse; the gothic and foreboding halls of an old British university; the dark pubs that breathe a history of their own and the rain soaked cloudy streets of England.
Treading Old Ground
There isn’t much untouched ground in this genre, and Book of Blood doesn’t really cover any new ground. The reason Clive Barker’s books and short stories work so well is because of the visceral feelings and emotions that his writing produces in his readers. When his books have been translated to the screen, his most successful endeavors have been those that portray the blood and raw anger of the supernatural/invisible world. Many of the movies based on his works are unable to portray the emotional content that he strives for, and Book of Blood is a prime example. In trying so hard to work within the visual confines of the horror genre, this film has sacrificed much of the novelty that would have otherwise set it apart.
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