DVD Artwork
The original Addicted to Murder chronicled events in serial killer Joel’s life before skipping several years ahead to the grand climax. This second part fills in part of the missing time from the first movie, which is an interesting way of extending the franchise.
Unfortunately, many of the strengths from the first movie are missing in part two. The compelling dialogue has become stale and clichéd. It becomes noticeable that there were zero curse words in the original when the second contains several f-bombs dropped incongruously into the script in an attempt to sharpen the edge. The first movie didn’t need the swearing, this one tries too hard. Likewise, the excellent acting from the original has been replaced with hammy overacting, and even the subtle manipulations of wicked and sly Angie (Sasha Graham) have mutated into melodramatic sneering. Additional strengths of the first Addicted were the excellent use of lighting, camera effects and the musical score. In part two, the lighting effects have regressed into amateurish over-spotlighting and odd combinations of color filters, as if the lighting designer was allowed to show off by cramming as many different lighting techniques as possible into a single movie. The simple and sparse camera effects have given way to overuse of the cut to whitescreen, negative imaging, and other headache-inducing video tricks. Whereas the musical score in the first movie was creative, this time it’s… competent. It’s not bad, but it’s not special either, and it doesn’t hold up in comparison to the original.
If you’ve read my review of the first Addicted to Murder, you’ll know that my major complaint about the film was the quality of the sound. Here, they’ve mostly corrected that problem, but as with everything else they’ve gone overboard. In Tainted Blood, every time a vampire bites someone, you hear an ear-shattering rendition of the attack which sounds like someone sloppily biting into a peach. Whether up close or in the next room, you get the same loud sound effect.
Wow, this movie really sucked, right? Well, no, not exactly. Or maybe more accurately: not completely.
Once again, writer/director Lindemuth creatively weaves an interesting tale, although there are plot holes aplenty. This movie, too, relies on jumps back and forth through time, but for the most part it’s more linear than the original. A couple of the flashbacks seem superfluous, possibly added more to pad the running length than to advance the story. I gotta tell you, considering the fact that Rachel (Laura McLauchlin) is the focus of both of these two movies, she spends less time on-screen than any main character since the title subject in Hitchcock’s The Trouble With Harry. Here, she’s limited to a few cutaway flashes, and her only spoken words are scenes lifted from part one.
To the story: Joel (Mick McCreely) decides that it’s time to leave town as he’s burying a body in the woods. I should say, most of a body, because for some reason he keeps the head, which he talks to like Tom Hanks in Cast Away. Apparently he spends a few days driving in circles around town, because he revisits the woods where he first met Rachel after picking up a hitchhiker. Eventually he heads for the Big Apple.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
The vampires in New York are getting pissed because Rachel is half-converting humans who aren’t worthy of the gift. Her pets are running around causing trouble for the rest of the vampires, and they’re not having any luck finding her to put a stop to it.
There is also a subplot about a girl, Tricia (Sarah Lippmann), who wants to become a vampire, and Angie is willing to help her join the family. This is yet another example of Lindemuth’s originality, because Tricia’s reasoning is unique and believable (assuming you buy into the whole vampire thing). I call it a subplot, but for some reason they spend a whole lot of time with what should be a minor part of the story. It was bearable only because Tricia is one of those quirky-cute types that I’m attracted to. Other than that, it feels like more filler because when the other parts of the story start to heat up again, Tricia is dropped practically mid-sentence and we never hear another word about her.
Some vampire clan infighting happens, including administering a little discipline on a vampire whippersnapper, and then Joel shows up, meets Angie, and it’s all over. Just like that.
Good thing there’s a third part to tie up the many loose ends, eh? Let me know how it comes out, because I’ve had enough of this series.
This movie was part of a double feature with the much better Addicted to Murder. The extras on the disk includes a filmography of seemingly everyone in the cast of both movies and a few very forgettable trailers.
