Painted in Blood

A spoiler-free review.

A sympathetic main character with practical hopes and regular-person problems provides 100% of this movie's charm. Our starving artist isn't struggling to afford his trendy loft apartment, he's struggling to afford a room in regular suburban house of some crappy subletting dude. We see him adding up his freelance income, including paintings in gift shops and his Etsy store.

The story is compelling and the source of antagonism is interesting. Deiondre Teagle's Malik oscillates between believable and furniturish in solo scenes.

You can detect hints of Candyman, Michael Medaglia's Deep Dark, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Everything else is terrible.

Where this movie really suffers is in dialogue. The script, direction, and line delivery are awkward to the point of embarrassing in any scene with two or more actors. The video quality gives it a distinct indie film vibe, but shoddy editing, blocking and camera work don't help this movie outperform the limited budget.

This is the kind of movie there would be 1 copy of on the New Releases wall or in the "I've never heard of this" RedBox folder. It is quite appropriately placed in the Free-with-Ads type of streaming service. Painted in Blood is one of the best films in the "shot with my friend's adult film camera" genre of horror movies. Go in with that level of expectation, and you might have a kind-of-good time if you're in the right mood.

--Josh from Loathsome Things: A Horror Movie Podcast.