Review: Boys from County Hell (2021)

Directed by: Chris Baugh
Starring: Jack Rowan, Nigel O’Neill, Louisa Harland
Written by: Chris Baugh
Music by: Steve Lynch
Country: Northern Ireland
Not available on Blu-ray or DVD
IMDb

We’ve got ourselves a wee bit of a vampire resurgence, innit? (Do the Irish use “innit”?) The last couple of years have wrought a few different attempts to spin the bloodsucker subgenre in different directions, such as The Shed (2020), Bliss (2019), The Transfiguration (2016), Bit (2019), and Jakob’s Wife (2021). And now we’ve got this Irish flick, which fucks around some with vampire lore, leaning into the theory that Bram Stoker’s infamous literary creation was based on Abhartach, an evil, magical Irish dwarf with a sanguinous thirst. Abhartach isn’t a romantic namby-pamby like his Transylvanian counterpart, and laughs off the well-known methods of vamp execution.

Boys from County Hell follows a blue-collar group of Irish boys and their dads, all who frequent the local tavern, The Stoker. The only reason anyone knows the tiny, rural town of Six Mile Hill is because of its connection to the Dracula author. There’s a bypass set to be built through the town, and directly in its path is the cairn of ol’ Abhartach. Of course, the cairn gets knocked over, the vampire is set free, and there’s some spilling of the red stuff.

Despite the folklore, its beautiful countryside setting, and adorable little linguistic idiosyncrasies like all the guys calling their fathers “Da,” the film moves away from any sort of distinct national flavor pretty quickly and settles into the usual story beats of a vampire movie. Sure, sunlight, beheadings, and stakes through the heart are all useless here, vampirism can also be transferred through bloodletting contact with the stones of the cairn, and Abhartach can telekinetically suck blood. But beyond a few scenes illustrating those things, this is mostly just a bunch of dudes chasing and then being chased by a creature out of 30 Days of Night (2007).

Writer/director Chris Baugh attempts to insert some familial drama about the strained connections between Irish men and their sons, but it’s all very rote, taking up screen time without adding substance. The acting is all fine, but no one and nothing stands out here. There are some half-assed attempts at comedy that at best elicit passive bemusement, the horror is lukewarm, and the emotional core is hollow. Boys from County Hell could have been, and initially seemed to set out to be, an interesting regional take on a global legend. But alas, it’s just another vampire movie, but set in Ireland.

Overall rating: 5 out of 10