Sentence:  It may have been effective at conveying the confusion of the situation, but it didn't make for terribly thrilling scenes. The blurry camerawork (quite literally at times) and rapid-fire editing meant that exchanges of blows that should have been viscerally thrilling were often <WSD>muddied</WSD>, good for capturing the mood but not much fun to watch. 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  To make a mess of, or create confusion with regard to; to muddle.