Blood Relic

[Jack]

I don't know how I came across this obscure little thing, probably hanging out on too many bad movie boards, but this is a slasher from 2005.  We begin 22 years ago, as a Navy pilot (apparently flying out of an air and space museum) is waiting for his plane to be readied for action.  He's under the spell of a talisman, an evil little necklace he picked up after being shot down in combat.  So he kills a few people at the "base" and is thrown in the loony bin.  But not until after he stashes the necklace in a wall at the, um, "airbase".  In the present day, he's released and immediately sets off to the scene of his crimes.

Enter our kids - a group of college age people working at this air and space museum.  Billy Drago is the creepy old guy with horrible teeth who owns the place.  The kids really don't do any work, they stand around and talk mostly.  No wonder the place is in financial difficulty.  One of the girls of course finds the little talisman in the wall, and Drago takes it back to his office.  The kids also see somebody lurking about, which gives them the idea that the place is haunted.  So they decide to come back after dark and have a séance / party. 

Well, you can imagine how this turns out.  After a quick bit of Ouija board action, the kids wander off for a bit of another sort of action.  Actually quite a bit.  There's even an honest-to-goodness strip poker game.  I think you get all but one of the girls topless in this movie    Our mysterious killer dresses in a flight suit, concealing their identity.  After a while the Navy fighter pilot shows up.  The (remaining) kids immediately assume he's the killer, but he finally gains their trust and they work together to get out of the place.  All the doors are locked, and even though the exterior shots of the building show that its entire front facade is glass, there's no hope of escape.  They develop several plans to get out, but the killer is always one step ahead of them. 

Overall, this thing had an extremely low budget, and it shows.  However, the characters are fairly likable, some are actually marginally well developed.  The atmosphere is good, with the whole thing taking place in a darkened and vaguely scary air and space museum.  And the action moves along quite well - you're either seeing killings or boobs.  Not too much down time.  Some of the killing are fairly creative.  Production values are low, but not rock-bottom low.  I can't really complain too much considering what they had to work with.  Sound is okay, the 2.0 soundtrack converts to a fairly satisfying 5.0 track, though Billy Drago likes to talk very quietly, making him about the only character that's hard to hear.  Turn it up loud enough to hear him, and guess what you get in the next scene?  A piece of plywood being run through a table saw.  Mmm, how pleasant.  There's also a very good twist ending that took me by surprise.  Maybe most people would figure it out beforehand, but I thought it was well done.

For a really low budget cheapy, this one delivers the gratuitous nudity and the scares.  It gets perhaps a bit stupid in parts, but I'd still recommend it for a dull Wednesday night.  The film makers obviously set out to give the audience what they want, and they happily ignored the usual conventions like the annoying comedy relief character and the other usual crap that makes so many modern slashers hard to bear.

[Psycho Circus]

Ahh yes, the boobie film!

I think my ex-girlfriend had this on DVD, really bad film.

[BoyScoutKevin]

Oh, I do like strip poker games. Co-ed, of course. I might have to watch it, for that reason alone.

[indianasmith]

That one was delightfully awful!!!!!  It reminded me of some 80's flick or other.

[BoyScoutKevin]

Since Jack brought up the subject of strip poker in "Blood Relic," I guess it'd be O.K. to talk about some of my favorite film moments. But first, some definitions.

(co-ed) self-explanatory.

(mentioned) while neither the game and/nor the results are seen in the film, the subject is mentioned in passing by one of the characters in the film.

(not seen) I have not seen this film, but I've heard the subject can be seen in the film.

(underage) one or more of the actors in the scene are under 18.

Seen
"Metropolitan" (co-ed)
"The Parent Trap" (1998) (all-female) (underage)
"Party Camp" (co-ed) (underage)
"They Made Me a Criminal" (all-male) (underage)
"Tops Is the Limit" (all-male)
"The Wanderers" (co-ed)

Mentioned
"Big Trouble"
"It Happened One Night'
"Stepmonster"

There are many variations. Here are some of them.

Basketball
"House" (not seen) (co-ed)
"Love and Basketball" (not seen) (co-ed)

Battleship
"Toy Story" (all male)

Bowling
"Screwball" (not seen) (co-ed)

Charades
"Meatballs 4" (co-ed)

Chess
"What's New, p***ycat?" (mentioned)

Croquet
"Heathers" (co-ed)

Monopoly
"Captain Ron" (co-ed) (underage)
Friday the 13th (co-ed) (not seen)

Snakes 'n' Ladders
"Lair of the White Worm" (co-ed) (underage)
Technically, not a strip game, but the final results are the same, as if it were.

Spin the Bottle
"Out of Control" (co-ed) (not seen)

Spin the Grenade
"Rosebud Beach Hotel" (co-ed) (not seen)

Twister
"The Opposite Sex" (co-ed) (not seen)

And this would not include all the times the game has been played on TV.