Review: John Cusack and Ellar Coltrane tussle in efficient white-water thriller ‘Blood Money’
The swift and efficient wilderness thriller “Blood Money,” directed by Lucky McKee and written by Jared Butler and Lars Norberg, stars Ellar Coltrane (“Boyhood”) as a well-meaning young man caught in a love triangle with Willa Fitzgerald and Jacob Artist, that becomes a violent power struggle when the trio happen upon a stash of cash while on a white-water rafting trip.
McKee’s stylistic focus on the beauty of the wilderness and the human ugliness that erupts within it brings to mind the themes of “Deliverance,” but “Blood Money” only delivers B-movie thrills that just can’t compare to John Boorman’s 1972 classic.
John Cusack plays the rumpled white-collar criminal who dumps his treasure into the river and ultimately ends up tangling with the trio for possession. He plays his character of Miller like a washed-up version of “Say Anything’s” Lloyd Dobler — irreverent, sarcastic and overly accessorized.
Coltrane displays a range he hasn’t shown before onscreen, dipping into darker realms as the romantically spurned blue collar townie Victor. But Fitzgerald runs away with “Blood Money” as femme fatale Lynn, who doesn’t just want, but needs the money, desperately, and will stop at nothing to achieve her single-minded goal. What does this money mean to her? Perhaps freedom from her two male best friends, who fought over her attention for years? She seems a bit like a psychopath, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t rooting for her just a little.
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‘Blood Money’
Not rated
Running time: 1 hour, 29 minutes
Playing: Laemmle NoHo 7, North Hollywood
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