Star Vehicle Returns

Bleading Lady (2010)

Director: Ryan Nicholson

Review Written By: Horse
Mondo Film & Video Guide Reviewer
IMDb.com Link

Today I feel slow, slow because it took me through the opening act to figure out the title pun of this new Breaking Glass offering. It does have a nicer ring than “Star Vehicle”, which was the original title. Once again I’m going into the film blind with no knowledge of anything, and it starts out on the wrong foot. It has that low budget feel dripping off the opening reels and we are suddenly in a van with four unpleasant people and a driver who is the target of all their hate and rage. Insults fly, I wonder why, I hope they die. Turns out they are all young asshole actors and the driver is a chauffeur for film productions. He’s the guy who gets he cast and crew from the hotel to the set everyday. While they continue to insult his techno music and job, he suddenly stops in the middle of nowhere and silently orders them all out at gunpoint and huddles them on the ground. Then he whips out a huge machete and hacks them all to pieces. Cue happy after-school-special sounding music and opening credits, we’re rolling!

An after credit encounter between the driver Don (Dan Ellis from Gutterballs) and a young man working at the lodge where the actors and crew stay, shows Don to be out of his fucking mind. First off, nobody sits in front in his fucking van! “You’re a monkey in a fucking suit, I’m in the movies. You watch ‘em, I make ‘em!” Just a tad bit delusional. His nobody sits up front policy is instantly shattered by Riversa Red (Sindy Faraguna), a scream queen whom Don obsesses over and even opens the door for. Her presence is also a pleasant surprise since she’s not on Don’s list. The director of the film within the film says he is making “his love letter to the horror genre”. Don warns him “there is a big difference between giving a friendly nod to the masterpieces of horror and just ripping them off outright”. I feel ya Don! Preach on!

Don displays an un-natural amount of knowledge about Riversa and we soon find out she is staying and working under an alias because she has been having stalker issues. They might as well put up arrows pointing at Don. Too obvious methinks, but we’ll have to see how it plays out. They arrive at the location, in the middle of the woods with no trailers or anything to make you think a movie is being made here. Oh but one is, and from the looks of Sienna’s (Erindera Farga) line delivery, it’s going to be a shitfest. This gag of a horrid actress within a horrid movie within a real movie just never gets old for me. It’s like fart jokes, they always get at least a smile.

So after a long day shooting, Don drives Red back alone. He’s getting himself worked up about “whores” who sleep themselves into movies; Riversa seems more understanding and accepting. He’s practically calling her a whore for doing full frontal nudity in her last film, “Thong Massacre: Flossed to Death”. During the next day’s shoot, Don sits in his van sniffing Red’s panties. That night he drives her back to the lodge, but she won’t wake up. The lodge boy offers a hand, but Don wants her room number. Guess he breaks down as Don carries her to her room. The movie is really hitting a lull here, just starting to drag, when all of the sudden…

The screen goes black and we hear Don, talking through the 4th wall to us: “Now you’re probably wondering… when in the hell are we going to see some killing? Well don’t ruffle your feathers, all in due time. All I wanted to do was make a movie – some titties, a bit of blood.” All right, let’s do it!

A dude who says he is Riversa’s boyfriend shows up and is met by Don. Don whips out a knife, calls him stalker and proceeds to chase him. It’s pretty amusing to see Don say shit like “you’re a deranged psychopathic stalker” while wielding the knife. He references a gory scene from another of Red’s films, “Barndoor to Hell” and blood spraying like a firehose, wondering if that shit could really happen. He eventually catches up with the boyfriend and tests out his hypothesis.

At lunch, Don springs a script he wrote on Red; “Piledriver: An Erotic Thriller”. I’m starting to love the made-up film titles. I also love the campiness and badness of the film within the film they are making. We see the dude on the ground without any legs, Sienna’s character poking at his exposed guts with a stick, and he says “so this is what it’s like to have your whole world ripped in two!” His character is an even worse actor than Sienna, and the exchange is priceless. “You’re not going to die!” she says. Riversa blows her line though, mixing it with “Pildriver” and sending the director into a rage and fight with Don. Don is fired but it sounds like he has plans to start production on his own film right away.

First he kills the other driver, Frank, with a crowbar. He then “recruits” the lodge boy to be his cameraman. The two actresses, actor, make-up girl and director all climb in. He then removes them all at gunpoint. “Is this a joke?” asks Red, “Oh no Miss Red, this is no joke. It’s the real deal, no more make believe bullshit!” While Red pleads with him and he lowers the gun, the actor rushes him and ends up shot. He then forces the remaining people to his location, a set of graves dug for them all. I won’t spoil any more, just say that Don has a sick game and master-plan set-up. It also brings new meaning to the phrase “tortured genius”. Oh yeah, Red’s stalker is revealed in the final act as well, all that, a bag of chips and a mule!

I have to say that this is quite an entertaining little film. It started out looking so bad, but it came together nicely. Dan Ellis does a great job with his meaty role, only losing it to over-doing it a couple times. Most of his psychotic breakdowns are very believable. Sindy Faraguna is also quite strong and likable. She reminds me a lot of Jennifer Tilley, not only in look but her voice as well. A fine young talent and potential real scream queen in her own right. Competent direction and story-telling, and they even made a tried and nearly tired formula work again with just enough of a twist to make it feel new. Some decent blood and gore effects (not pictured, those are the “inner movie’s” supposed to look fake effects), a couple new pairs of breasts (au natural even). The film is a winner. Get past the very cheap feeling opening and you will be sucked in, just like I was. Well worth at least a rent, probably worth a blind buy!

Share this:

This work, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.