Dezzy (Dora Madison) is the lead character in the action-packed sexy, colorful, crazed-haze of vampire insanity that is BLISS (2019); and depending on the way you look at the flick she could be the protagonist, the antagonist or both.
For me, she’s definitely the hero. Don’t get me wrong, she’s a complete bitch! From moment one, she’s a brooding, angry, resentful, jealous, spiteful chick. That said, I think her and I would be friends. I like her!
She’s tough and doesn’t take shit. If you look at her the wrong way, she’s going to smash your face in. Imma love that quality!
She’s also an artist driven by her work, but suffering an awful block with a deadline for her new piece, right around the corner. As a writer, I get blocks. They suck, and Dezzy is upset about the one she has. I can’t fault the lady for that!
She goes to her jackass agent who fires her for not producing squat in 3 months. Instead of throwing in the towel, Dezzy acts quick. She reassures an art gallery owner who paid her a 10K advance that the piece will be finished in three days, and then does whatever she needs to, to get the job done.
I love Dezzy’s drive. I love her ambition and the dedication that lives in her soul. Her tunnel-vision focus and willingness to give up everything else, even her own life, to achieve her dream is as badass as it gets.
She ends up going to her dealer, Hadrian’s (Graham Skipper) house. He sets her up with a powerful mix of cocaine and DMT. As soon as she begins to feel it, her gal pal Courtney (Tru Collins) shows up. Cort is hawt in so many ways. I love her. She has this pretentious, arthouse, Cali party-girl look to her, but works it hardcore. She’s the kind of fem that’s beyond affected, but wears it so well that you don’t care.
The gorgeous goddesses start making out and snorting some lines together, when Cort’s boyfriend Ronnie (Rhys Wakefield) comes in to play. The trio have a magnificently erotic threesome. RAWR RAWR RAWR RAWR The sex scene is just perfect. For most of it, the fems ride the top as Ronnie does some marvelous work underneath. It’s passionate, raw, wild and unrestrained! That level heat will always put a smile smack dab on my face.
Dezzy is an independent, take-charge, no-nonsense fem that has true edge and no time for bullshit. After the hot-and-heavy sex session with Ronnie and Cort, things begin to change.
First, Dezzy begins having blackouts. Hallucinogenic nightmare-fuel follows her everywhere. It isn’t all bad though. Her latest piece begins to show promise and though she doesn’t recall doing the painting, the results are tremendous.
She hits the drug pretty hard and notices something disturbing is happening to her. She starts to crave blood. Now, maybe if she was on bath salts this behavior could be naturally explained, but alas it isn’t the DMT/coke mix that create this new thirst. Nope. Instead, Dezzy has turned into a full vamp.
During the wild party night, Cort got a little bite-y. RAWR RAWR RAWR! Imma like biting, very much! Unbeknownst to Dezzy, Cort’s a sexy ass vampire and then turned Dez into one too.
Maybe without all those drugs running in her system, Dezzy could have found a way to navigate her newfound addiction a little better, but she keeps taking hits and fucking her brain up even more. Poor Dez doesn’t know which way is up. As fab as she is, the gal has some issues with OCD addiction tendencies. The art, the drugs, the blood – anything that drives her and that she aches for, she can be driven to kill over. She won’t let any motherfucker stand in her way, either. I really like the dame.
She does do one thing that pisses me off. Ever since he was Norm in CHEERS (1982), I’ve loved George Wendt. He makes me happy. He portrays a grumpy, pothead named Pops and when Dezzy goes vamp-wild, he gets hit pretty hard. He didn’t deserve that! He just wanted to smoke weed and chillax. That was the one time in this flick I was like, “Dez, you went too far, babe. Pull it back a bit.”
Beyond that though, I’m totes on her side. At one point, she was in the bathroom, zoning out for 15 minutes. Some lame-ass, wannabe, freak-bitch starts banging on the door and yelling. Dez gets pissed and it’s amazing! She gets in the tool’s face and goes apeshit. I love it. Dez doesn’t take kindly to sycophantic posers, and that’s all this shit-starter is. I wanted to see a knock-out, drag-out between those two because I knew Dezzy would have killed that mofo.
Then, there’s Clive (Jeremy Gardner). I want to like him. He’s a nice dude and Dez is casually dating him, but he’s super lame. He’s fine, but he doesn’t get her art or her passion. He tries to be supportive and at one point even attempts to save her life, but he also sort-of sucks. He’s like the overzealous neighbors who invite themselves over for coffee and won’t leave, so you put on the scene from David Cronenberg’s CRASH (1996) where James Spader is fucking Holly Hunter’s leg wound, because you know that’ll scare them away. Only Dezzy seemingly doesn’t have Cronenberg’s CRASH and instead has to deal with Clive’s sanctimonious, but well-meaning ramblings.
You know how on sitcoms, sexy women with great jobs get their panties all wet for dudes who pound back 48 cans of beer while grunting over football. That’s the universe Clive would live his best life in. He needs to be zapped there because Dez can’t cope with his jibber-jabber, and I’m with her.
In the end, we see Dez fully embrace her vampiness as she finishes the touches on her painting and does an intoxicatingly rousing dance. The conclusion is a brilliant one and is a final homage to the Goddess we were just introduced to in her full glory.
I love BLISS (2019), and I’m very happy my boyfriend recommended me watch it. It’s over-the-top, gory, artistic and fun while spitting in the face of pretentious and hollow existences. Madison brings down the house with her performance and earns Dezzy a spot as a celebrated Fem Goddess of Horror.
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