Written by Richard Cantillio and Simon Cox

Directed by Simon Cox

A century ago a series of horrific murders rocked the city. Now, as the end of the millennium approaches, a copycat killer stalks seven victims, praying on the unwary – repaying a pact with the devil which will plunge the world into chaos.(IMDB)

Written in Blood was a pleasant surprise. You are never sure what you are going to get with a low budget, unrated thriller from the late 90s, especially one that doesn’t seem to be readily available to watch anywhere.

Until now!

Director Simon Cox has made the movie available online for small fee as part of his fundraising efforts for his latest sci-fi epic, Of Infinite Worlds, the anticipated follow-up to Invasion Planet Earth, so I thought I would give it a shot!

Simon is a highly dedicated (possibly crazy) director who impressed me with his ambition in Invasion Planet Earth. That film took years (decades?) to make between rounds of crowd-funding and shoestring-budget production. IPE gets a rough ride in reviews. It is clearly low budget and this shows in the final product but, to me, Simon’s ambition for the plot is missed by many who were expecting a straight forward alien invasion movie. IPE holds loftier ambitions than its lowly budget and I fear that was lost on a lot of viewers, distracted by the low-budget. It’s by no means a perfect film, but shows Simon’s ambition and talent and hints at the potential in Of Infinite Worlds.

So I was intrigued to travel back in time 25 years and see what Simon gave us in Written in Blood (AKA Driven) which ranks above IPE on IMDB and has an impressive cast made up of some familiar acting talent, including the legendary Doug Bradley in an extended cameo.

WIB follows Martin (Grant Masters) author of gory pulp fiction novels that are growing in popularity as quickly as they grow in controversy. Violent and gory, they follow the work of a serial killer, plugging the reader right into the twisted mind of a psycopath. As his latest book is published, Martin begins having disturbing dreams and visions of murders similar to those in his book. When the dreams start coming true, the police begin a search for a copycat killer with Martin as the number one suspect. They don’t seem to want to listen to Martin’s claim that a devil worshipping dead man is hell-bent on claiming 7 victims before midnight on New Year’s Eve to usher in a new era of darkness and evil.

It’s a great plot, but also WIB’s greatest weakness as it isn’t anything new, although I recognise the irony in saying that about a 25 year old film. We’ve all seen examples of the troubled writer and life imitating art, and many since WIB was made, diminishing the originality of Simon’s movie. It’s a problem, but it doesn’t ruin the movie. While it’s another movie that wears it’s budget on its sleeve and a few scenes and special effects make this very clear, the cast all do a great job, and there are plenty of twists and turns to keep the viewer interested and unsure as to whether Martin is innocent in all this.

The film looks good for an older, low-budget production and the direction and cinematrography do a nice job of conveying the creepy atmosphere as Martin slowly decends into his own personal hell. The image is a little soft in places with some visible grain but nothing that will detract from the overall experience. I have no idea how low the budget was for this movie, but the team did a good job with what they had. While there are elements to the plot that crumble under a bit of scrutiny and the resolution felt a little ‘easy’ to me, they aren’t issues serious enough to ruin the movie.

WIB has it’s flaws, but rates at a fairly solid 5.8 on IMDB which can seem like a low score, but it’s still a good score as far as I am concerned and it is definitely worth a look even if just to explore the work of Simon Cox and support his efforts to bring Of Infinite Worlds to the screen. Its very easy to criticise low budget film-making, without understanding just how much blood, sweat and tears are shed to make those movies. WIB is a cracking effort that sits alongside IPE as a great advert for what is coming next from Simon. I for one am looking forward to Of Infinite Worlds.

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