Brotherhood of Blood

Introduction

Written and directed by the German duo Michael Roesch and Peter Scheerer, Brotherhood of Blood centres on Carrie Rieger, a vampire hunter who infiltrates a group of bloodsuckers.

With a split timeline, the film jumps from the present to the past and back again to show how Carrie came to be where she is, providing background without the need for clumsy exposition. The team she leads takes Stanis prisoner, chaining him to a table, chopping off one of his fingers, removing his elongated canines and forcing him to talk. He reveals that they are more afraid of the mythical Vlad Kossel, 'the devil himself', than they are of her. In the present she and another human, Tom, are held prisoner by King Pashek who, 800 years ago, captured and burned Kossel only to see him escape and Pashek wants Tom's brother who is changing into a vampire - possibly Kossel.

Video

The film is obviously low budget and the picture suffers from a lack of definition in the low lit scenes, of which there are many. The blacks are very grey and objects are occasionally hard to make out. In addition the vampire makeup is very unconvincing and, when you get a close up of the teeth, you can easily see where the real teeth end and the prosthetics begin, spoiling the illusion somewhat.

Audio

There are Dolby Digital 2.0 and 5.1 options and I watched it with the latter, sampling the stereo which seemed problem free. The 5.1 track is clear and provides all the atmosphere you need for this sort of film.

Extra Features

Unlike the region 1 version which comes with a commentary, interviews and a storyboard to screen feature as well as subtitles, this region 2 release only has a five minute behind the scenes featurette and a trailer. The featurette is very rough, with variable volume depending on the speaker and consists mostly of short interviews.

Conclusion

Rather than going for a full-on humans vs. vampires story, Brotherhood of Blood concentrates more on atmosphere and claustrophobia with Victoria Pratt's Carrie a prisoner of the vampire king Pashek, played by Sid Haig, and her involvement with Ken Foree's Stanis.

The Vlad Kossel character seems obviously influenced by Keyser Soze from The Usual Suspects and the reveal, when it comes, should take no one by surprise. This is a major weakness as they are talking about Vlad Kossel in hushed tones when you're practically screaming at the TV as to his identity - there is no mystery where there should be.

This isn't the most accomplished of vampire films and occasionally drags but it is interesting and the dual timeline works well. Michael Roesch and Peter Scheerer obviously have talent and the film would have benefitted from a bigger budget, but it's always good to see Haig and Foree on screen, the latter not playing a good guy for once.

If you keep your expectations low, you'll get more out of this than if you go in anticipating the greatest vampire movie of recent times. It's worth a watch but probably not a purchase.