The Blood Lands (aka 'White Settlers')

(2014) **1/2

Yuppie city slickers Ed and Sarah are tired of the London rat race and on impulse purchase a large country home in Castle Farm, Scotland to capitalize on the cheap property taxes. Their real estate agent informs them that the home is historical because it was built on a site where a bloody battle between the English and the Scots took place centuries earlier (it’s true, I looked it up). At first all is well as the happy couple enjoys the tranquility the Scottish countryside has to offer. However their quietude is disrupted by a group of pig-mask wearing locals who are none too happy to have the English couple invade their territory. 

 
Woefully ignorant about English/Scottish history (don’t ever team up with me in Trivial Pursuit because I get every history question wrong although I knock the TV questions out of the park – the answer is always ‘Fonzie’), The Blood Lands ends up being an independence referendum-themed horror movie. However the political subtext is fairly pointless as the film devolves into a straight up home invasion tale. While the third reel is filled with tension/violence as the couple attempts to elude their home invaders, the set-up is simply too slow. This is the kind of film where a character wakes up in the middle of the night and declares, “I heard a noise coming from downstairs” and then the viewer is forced to watch the character explore the entire house in real time with no payoff. Some judicious editing would have moved the story along at a more rewarding pace. Like the nihilistic ‘The Strangers’ (2008) the entire exercise seems to be utterly pointless.