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| CLIVE BARKER'S BOOK OF BLOOD |
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| Actors: Jonas Armstrong, Sophie Ward, Clive Russell, Paul Blair, Simon Bamford, Romana Abercromby |
| Directors: John Harrison |
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Studio: Lions Gate |
| DVD release: 22 September 2009 |
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Runtime: 100 minutes (1 disc) |
| Format: AC-3, Color, Dolby, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC |
| DVD features: Audio tracks (English - Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround, Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo), Subtitles (English, Spanish), Behind the scenes, Trailers |
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Unlike Stephen King, there has yet to be a great film adaptation of horror master Clive Barker's work. The strongest film from one of his works is still the original Hellraiser . Perhaps his work just does not translate well to the screen (too gruesome, too despairing, perhaps a bit too pretentious as well). Book of Blood is not an exception. Though it has some strong moments, the film is yet another disappointing Barker translation.
The film combines two of his short stories, "The Book of Blood" and "On Jerusalem Street," into one narrative. The plot: a professor specializing in the paranormal obtains the assistance of a clairvoyant student (one she also conveniently has the hots for) in an effort to contact the spirits in a haunted mansion where the horrific and gruesome supernatural murder of a young woman took place a few years before. The young man does indeed make contact, but at a horrible price. The professor must then decide how far she is willing to go to maintain this breakthrough.
The film has a haunting, disturbing start (particularly the murder of the young woman), slows down to a talky crawl in the middle, has some genuinely creepy and disturbingly painful moments near the end, but goes off the rails in the final act and becomes more ridiculous than frightening (one death near the end makes no sense at all).
Fans of Barker's work might enjoy this interpretation, but they - as well as most horror fans - may be disappointed by the slow middle and poorly done ending. Maybe one day a great horror film will emerge from Barker's darkly brilliant and twisted work, but Book of Blood is not it.
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