Bad Idea Podcast #7: Canadian Like Me

373) Jennifer's Body (2009) Dir: Karyn Kusama Date Released: September 18, 2009 Date Seen: September 19, 2011 Rating: 1.75/5

379) loudQUIETloud: A Film About the Pixies (2006) Dir: Steven Cantor and Matthew Galkin Date Released: September 29, 2006 Date Seen: September 24, 2011 Rating: 4/5

380) A Hole in My Heart (2004) Dir: Lukas Moodysson Date Released: April 8, 2005 Date Seen: September 25, 2011 Rating: 2/5

381) The Devil's Chair (2007) Dir: Adam Mason Date Released: ??? Date Seen: September 25, 2011 Rating: 1.25/5

382) Shadowboxer (2005) Dir: Lee Daniels Date Released: July 21, 2006 Date Seen: September 25, 2011 Rating: 1.25/5

I liked...one of these films, at least. Listen to the seventh episode of the Bad Idea Podcast, dedicated to films that were recently received like the bubonic plague at the Toronto International Film Festival.

356) Blood River (2009)

356) Blood River (2009) Dir: Adam Mason Not Yet Released Date Seen: October 22, 2009 Rating: 2/5

It'd be painfully easy to dismiss Blood Lake for its spineless tendency to preach at and judge its characters safe in the knowledge that its villain is a messenger of Gawd. Director Adam Mason and co-writer Simon Boyes's script is flagrantly obnoxious in the way that its killer, an Evangelist's wet dream of a vengeful God's messenger, has come down to Earth to punish the unrepentantly wicked. They may think that they're good people but they're not so they have to be struck down hard. Forgiveness, compassion, love...nah, fuck 'em.

What kept me watching in spite myself is the modicum of tension and the dingy atmosphere that clings to the film's main three protagonists like a film of sweat. The omnipresent crackle of the radio, which spurs on the voice of some evangelist preacher telling tales about sinners of all shapes and sizes, is especially mesmerizing as is the cemetery riddled with crosses that the film ends up at. Scuzzy is as scuzzy does but for such a modest, albeit idiotic, indie, it looks pretty good while doing it.