Supernatural fantasies aren’t dying anytime soon, and the Spanish Netflix movie Hollyblood, released on September 7, 2022, pokes fun at the genre’s reduction to a stereotypical attraction for pale vampires whenever teens are involved. The movie was directed by Jesus Font and introduces us to the fun-loving cast including Isa Montalban, Oscar Casas, Jordi Sanchez, Piero Mendez, Carlos Suarez, and more.
Its official Netflix synopsis reads:
“New to his school and desperate to win the affection of his crush, shy teen Javi masquerades as a vampire, unaware that a real immortal is lurking in the background”.
-Hollyblood Review Contains Mild Spoilers-
Hollyblood fuses a lot of genres together, which further spoofs up the parody it hopes to be. Most of the tropes don’t work when looked at individually. However, that’s what makes it a close-to-interesting watch. It doesn’t subvert any barriers or act as a breakthrough in the genre, it’s just there as one of the latest additions to the Netflix catalogue.
Despite that, you want to finish the movie just to find out how laughable it gets. One of the similar English spoofs of the Twilight series, Vampires Suck, has already tried to switch the narrative around the ostensibly good-looking blood-sucking creatures. Hollyblood too, just exists in the same category. All the lore surrounding vampires, which has now turned into stereotypes, comes along with the parody – garlic acting as a repellent, holy water being the only sound weapon against them, a wooden stake to the heart as the final resort, etc.
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We have the ‘nerdy’ vampire slayer, the lovely delusional damsel in distress who aspires to be transformed into a vampire; the main guy with a hero complex who just wants his crush to love him (even if it calls for catfishing her); the forever tailing best friend; the mysterious vampire; a posse of wannabe bullies and of course the big bad who started it all, hiding in plain sight. It gives you every archetypical character the original supernatural genre painfully develops into its counterparts. Coincidentally, a movie within the movie mirrors the actual plot of the film, as in both cases, there are three boys chasing the same girl.
The comical subplot of the film is all about the most anticipated fantastical release of Hollyblood, whose premiere is trickling with teenagers, especially girls waiting to watch shirtless actors on screen. Diego, our vampire slayer, also attends the premiere, on the lookout for the infamous vampire legend Azrael, and in the process, also demystifies the alluring charm of vampires. “Vampires are murderous beasts …. Vampires are dead, which means you’re into necrophilia… they’re hundreds of years old, so technically you’re in love with old dudes”, comes the short, eye-opening speech from Diego, but again the young girls are taken over by “the romantic Hollyblood sh*t”, so their only takeaway is that necrophilia is “stamp collecting”.
The ongoing joke weaved into the movie’s presentation is that it really attempts to establish the dark and mysterious aura around the story with the help of the accompanying soundtrack that plays through its runtime of 1 hr 28 min. The colour palette maintained throughout the entire movie’s direction corresponds to that of a quintessential teen movie.
Netflix Hollyblood: Worth the Watch?
Being as straightforward as possible, the movie does help you let out a chuckle here and there, so it’s nothing more than a one-time watch. It will help you pass the time when you don’t have anything else to watch and are mindlessly scrolling through the various OTT platforms. Since it’s a parody, it attains a mildly entertaining level in terms of ranking, but it sure isn’t something one would recommend to a friend.
If you did, in fact, come across this movie, then chances are that you stumbled upon it yourself. Even the official synopsis doesn’t necessarily capture your attention as it already lays down an unoriginal path. However, certain elements do support the comical take on vampires, one of them being the movie within a movie trope. If nothing else helps you recognize that the film is a spoof, then the youngsters sitting in the theatre, watching the fictional alter ego of Hollyblood will hopefully testify for the same.
Hollyblood is now streaming on Netflix with English and other subtitles. Dubbed versions of the movie are also available on the platform.
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