Blood Red Ox (2021) by Rodrigo Bellott

Director: Rodrigo Bellott

Year: 2021

Country: US/Bolivia

Alternate Titles: Buey rojo sangre

Genre: Psychological

Plot:

Taking a holiday trip to the rainforest together, a man and his boyfriend arrive at a nature preserve in Bolivia to help out with a friend only to find himself inundated with a series of gruesome dreams and visions that point to something coming for his soul and must try to uncover their meaning.

Review:

This one turned out to be quite an enjoyable effort. Among the films’ better features here is the influx of generally unnerving imagery to great effect throughout. Employing an artistically-stimulating style of large-scale red-tinged sequences of a giant red ox looming at the very end after encountering a slew of warped and demented figures targeting them beforehand, the sequences here are incredibly rich visually and equally disturbing tonally. Seeing how much they impact the characters and how much emotional damage brings about a series of fine shock scenes made even more explicit by the reveal of them being dreams. They’re genuinely frightening enough that the idea of them unraveling a person’s mind trying to come to terms with what’s going on as the series of revelations that come about in the final half involving the figures constantly having their reality switched out from under them and gives this it’s best feature.

There isn’t much wrong here, as this one tends to come under one general drawback. The wholly convoluted and nearly impossible-to-decipher screenplay causes this to be quite difficult to get through at points as the host of issues that crop up due to that nearly derail it at points. Foregoing any kind of linear structure by having conversations be repeated with the same characters in different locations under different circumstances, having the same scenario go through itself several times over, and featuring memory loss be the culprit for numerous miscommunications between them, it’s incredibly easy to get lost in what’s going on. That gets furthered by the highly complex subplots present with the value of rainforest preservation, mental health, and a person’s fractured identity that is brought up which make this one a mess to get any understanding about. Very little is explained and it makes this wholly frustrating not being to figure out what’s going on.

Overview: **.5/5

Engaging enough for what it is but still somewhat troubling, this one tends to fall under the idea of a great idea that’s undone by the story being way too complex for what’s going on. Those with an appreciation for arthouse-style cinema or are intrigued by the themes on display will be the most likely appreciators of this one while those looking for something straightforward and simple-minded will be turned off by the issues on display.