Red Blooded American Girl (1990)

When compared to the 70's and 80's, the 90's is often looked down upon as a slow or “down” time for genre films, particularly horror when in fact the decade saw more than its fair share of highly original horror films that followed little to no trends. One subgenre that had new life breathed into it (pun very much intended) throughout the decade was the vampire film, with many filmmakers finding different and clever ways to update the classic bloodsucker lore with 90's sensibilities. Films like The Reflecting Skin (1991), John Landis' comedic mobster vampire hybrid Innocent Blood (1992), Michael Almereyda's David Lynch backed Nadja (1994), essentially a 90's take on Dracula's Daughter (1936), Abel Ferrara's The Addiction (1995) which took a philosophical approach to vamprism as well as using the affliction as a metaphor for drug dependence, Larry Fessenden's Habit (1997) and John Carpenters' action packed neo-western tinged Vampires (1998) all bringing fresh ideas to one of the genre's most classic monsters. Over in New Zealand, master transgressor David Blyth even tried his hand at a more family friendly vampire film with My Grandpa is a Vampire (1992) starring Al Lewis of The Munsters fame but it was the film Blyth helmed two years prior, Red Blooded American Girl, that took a more series, adult and almost science fiction approach to vampires, resulting in one of the most original 90's vampyric offerings.

Owen Urban, a drug designer prone to experimenting on himself is propositioned by Dr. John Alcore (Christopher Plummer), the head of the mysterious Life Research Foundation to work for him under the guise of researching blood-born diseases. While touring the facilities, Owen meets and immediately falls for Paula, a research volunteer who soon quits and warns Owen that not all is as it seems at the clinic. Not entirely convinced, Owen takes Paula along to snoop around the clinic where Paula is bitten by a bloodthirsty patient and Owen soon discovers Alcore is in fact a vampire, searching for a cure through blood research. Paula, now infected, soon escapes the clinic forcing Owen to rush to not only find her before she infects anyone else but to find a cure for the vampyric viris.

Although Red Blooded American Girl belongs to a different subgenre than Death Warmed Up (1984), Blyth's initial claim to horror fame, the film nonetheless feels like the appropriate film Blyth would follow Death Warmed Up within the genre. Much like Death Warmed Up, there is a touch of cross subgenre pollination to Red Blooded American Girl, with both films having one foot somewhat planted in the mad scientist realm of sci-fi, with a good chuck of both films taking place inside the clinics of both films respective scientist characters and it's science gone wrong that provides the springboards for both narratives. All the scenes taking place within the Life Research Foundation in Red Blooded American Girl give the film a cold, strange, almost hermetically sealed off atmosphere just as Dr. Archer's clinic in Death Warmed Up did and it's impossible not to make comparisons to David Cronenberg, Rabid (1977) especially given the element of disease in the story. The films vampires also display symptoms of something akin to opiate withdrawal and it's important to note that the film predates Ferrara's aforementioned The Addiction by five years. Blyth directs in his typically stylistic fashion, the film at times has the aesthetic of the type of erotic thriller that was beginning to become very popular around the time and Blyth even employs some strategically placed humor by way of witty one liners delivered by Heather Thomas as Paula and there's a particularly funny scene involving Paula feeding her urges in a gym that's quite memorable.

Curiously, despite the title of “Red Blooded American Girl” and the emphasis of the American flag on most video releases, the film was actually financed and shot in Canada. While giving a career retrospective interview on the Never Repeats podcast, Blyth said of the film “It was a situation where I had a lot less control and it wasn't my script, it was a script by Allan Moyle and it was a wonderful opportunity to work with Christopher Plummer and that had a sort of real budget as in about a million.” Blyth also admitted that his originally intended ending was drastically different from the one that ended up being used in the film, a situation Blyth would once again find himself in a few years later with Hot Blooded (1997), another film Blyth shot in Canada for the same producer who for some odd reason felt should be marketed as a squeal and was even confusingly released in some territories as “Red Blooded American Girl II” or simply “Red Blooded II” despite having nothing to do with vampires. Released direct to video, Red Blooded American Girl has made it to DVD, released on its own and in multi-film set grouped together with three other films and no matter which is the preferred purchase it's a worthy one to make as the film is great example of a unique 90's take on vampires.