NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2021 #21 SCI FI SPECIAL! Reviews of Star Warrior: The Legend of Aciris (UK 2021), Creatures (UK 2021), Phase (UK 2021), Settlers (UK/South Africa 2021), White Sky (UK 2021) and How to Survive the End of the World (UK 2021)

Star Warrior: The Legend of Aciris (UK 2021: Dir Mark Dowie) In a 2020 podcast Gateshead based director Dowie listed the two actors he'd most like to work with; Daniel Day Lewis and Arnold Schwarzenegger. It will surprise hardly anybody that neither actor features in Mark's debut feature.

In fact most of the cast of Dowie's green screen sci fi saga seem to have been recruited for their ability to a) make the shooting dates and b) work for biscuits; clearly most of the film's £10K shooting budget was spent on special effects and costumes.

A slightly confusing story has the Aciris of the title (Philip Moon) abducted as a boy and delivered to a far away planet as a mining slave. He is eventually recruited into a gang of renegades keen to rescue their home planet from a group of power hungry aliens.

Dowie is clearly in thrall to the 'Star Wars' franchise; SW: THoA started off as a story which turned into a book, and it shows; the film's meagre running time is chock full of characters, all standing around talking and pointing at things they can't see. Despite the inventiveness on show in terms of the micro budget visuals, spending 70 or so minutes in the company of a group of actors who - sorry - generally can't act gets a bit wearing. This looks like it was a real labour of love to put together and, while it's not a one man show, Dowie features heavily in the end credits. The director has since branched out into the world of documentaries, covering subjects as diverse as witches, cats, Bigfoot and Jesus. Sadly not all in the same film.

Creatures (UK 2021: Dir Tony Jopia) Throughout the second decade of the 21st Century, Jopia carved himself a career as a director of low budget fright flicks like Deadtime (2012), Crying Wolf 3D (2015), Cute Little Buggers and Dawning of the Dead (both 2017). Creatures marked an end to that string of movies; a film described by the director as a “Gremlins meets Kill Bill meets Shaun of the Dead” mashup. A film described by me as... well read on.

A group of rather long in the tooth, boisterous (and casually racist) university students, headed by their Astronomy teacher Mr Serling (Romain Barbey) have taken a coach trip out into the countryside to track a comet. They get more than they bargained for when a flying sheep's head hits the vehicle's window, and the group discover what looks like a crashed spacecraft. They also come across a small, furry creature who they name 'Mumpy'. But Mumpy isn't alone. A group of aliens, looking like they've strayed out of a Charles Band movie, are keen to retrieve the beast. They also have the power to kill and enslave humans, turning them into mindless zombies. What's left of the student party, following the alien attack, make it to a country house where, together with its occupants, they defend themselves against the attacking creatures from another world, and Japanese student Akane Ito (Rina Saito) saves the day.

Creatures improves significantly in its second half, although that's a relative term. Although competently filmed, this is an overlong movie which takes a thin premise and stretches it agonisingly. It's hard to know who Jopia was pitching this to; the cutesy Gremlins stuff is cut with various effing and jeffing, feeble class comedy and an uneasy mix of practical and CGI gore. Worse is the racism. Akane's bursts of action are accompanied by, I kid you not, an 'oriental' musical theme as she throws martial arts shapes at the invaders. Things aren't helped by a puerile script with killer lines like "Excuse me, this isn't Brexit" when two characters argue and "your family has come to collect you", remarked to a Mexican student as the aliens appear. Pretty atrocious all round really.

Phase (UK 2021: Dir Richard Sandling) Writer and TV actor Sandling's only feature (if indeed you could call it that) is only nominally a 'Fantastic' film. Actually made in 2020 at the height of the Coronavirus pandemic, his Zoom comedy takes us back the heady days of lockdown when most people went slightly gaga and social connection took a nose dive.

Richie (Sandling) talks to his bemused parents (dad is comedian Steven Frost) who haven't quite got the hang of the whole isolation thing. He has regular chats with an actor girlfriend who, as a self confessed 'Furlough Merlot' fan currently on Universal Credit, seems quite content to do naff all while living at her parents' house. Richie also has a rather messy on off relationship with his real girlfriend; oh and in his online therapy sessions he fesses up that there is a parallel Richie in his bedroom. Things turn weird when a conspiracy theory mate starts to make a bit of sense; are the aliens taking over?

Phase is saved from tedium - it's nearly 90 minutes of Zoom windows with little happening - by some very funny performances, including a social media person who makes the Nathan Barley character tolerable, and some terrible on line poetry - plus you get a (rather good) song from Sandling in his dark wave Synthemesc guise. 

Settlers (UK/South Africa 2021: Dir Wyatt Rockefeller) Not to be confused with the famous antacid tablet (that's ‘Setlers’ anyway), this is the first feature from the impressively named Wyatt Rockefeller, whose other claims to fame is that he worked on President Obama’s first Presidential campaign; oh and he's descended from those Rockefellas.

Reza (Jonny Lee Miller), his wife Ilsa (Sofia Boutella) and their daughter Remy (Brooklynn Prince, later Nell Tiger Free), together with a squat robot named ‘Steve’ and a litter of pigs, live on a farmstead in a remote part of Mars – actually it’s all pretty remote. There’s a suggestion that Earth has declined at some point in the past, forcing its population to leave the planet. Things are pretty hard and Remy is fiercely protected from the outside by her parents; a position justified when the family wake up one morning to find a single word 'Leave' painted on their windows in what could be blood.

The arrival of an armed stranger called Jerry (Ismael Cruz Cordova) on the scene rapidly disrupts the family setup; Reza is killed, and the interloper claims that the site in which mother and daughter are living once belonged to him, demanding ownership. An uneasy alliance develops between the three of them, which eventually turns into tragedy.

Settlers is, on the surface, a homesteading Western in space (well specifically on Mars). It’s at times a tough watch; the claustrophobic atmosphere and small cast keep things frighteningly self-contained. There are no Planet of the Apes type reveals or M. Night Shyamalan twists, and the only explanation offered in the movie is around people’s ability to breathe freely on the planet.

The film is perhaps too tonally one dimensional to fully engage, and slightly overlong too (the middle section drags a bit). However it’s sumptuously filmed, with the South African desert standing in for the Red Planet, and both actors playing Remy are terrific in their roles. 

White Sky (UK 2021: Dir Adam Wilson) Wilson's second feature, after 2020's Crawl to Me Darling, is a sci-fi movie which follows the tried and tested formula of a lot of genre TV; frontload all your effects  - the good stuff - and then fill the rest with human drama.

Sisters Sienna (Makenna Guyler) and Hailey (Natalie Martins) leave on a camping weekend with Hailey's boyfriend Josh (Jordan Mcfarlane); Sienna is a drug addict in recovery, and her sister hopes that the break will be good for her rehab.

Pretty much as soon as they arrive they witness a large spacecraft hovering over the city they have just left, which deposits large amounts of some form of white powder on the population. The trio are set upon by zombie like humans - called The Altered -  their state due to to the white powder which surrounds them as they attack. Sienna and friends are also overcome by an unknown force and wake up, confused, some time later.

Keen to remain safe, they run into Liam (Ade Dimberline), a resourceful chap who has some knowledge of the aliens' activity, if not their overall goal. But Liam shows a different side when it transpires that he's involved in drugs, reigniting Sienna's addiction; and then Josh starts showing signs of infection.

Although overlong - at nearly one hour and three quarters - and jettisoning most of the sci fi elements pretty quickly, this four hander is certainly not without interest. Nothing is explained, leaving the quartet of survivors rather purposeless, and their gradual breakdown feels genuine. Strongly acted and filmed against a stunning forest backdrop, White Sky is a different beast to his former movie, but Wilson's depiction of humans at war with each other remains a constant in his films. 

How to Survive the End of the World (UK 2021: Dir James Wilsher) Every so often a film critic gets their dream; to discover and write about a movie which no one else seems to have latched onto, and is worthy of praise. HoStEofW is such a film.

Max (Jake William Francis) and Liz (Lily Streames) are a couple having one of those awkward 'is it over?' relationship conversations in a Lincoln cafe when Max is distracted by the sight of people running for their life on the street outside.

Yes, as the film's title suggests, it's the end of the world; an alien invasion has laid waste to cities across the world. Not that you see any of this of course; this is low budget filmmaking.

One week later and Max and Liz, now handily armed with machine guns, are thrown together as survivors, and have decided to venture to Max's uncle George (John Newell), a resourceful scientist turned farmer. The problem is that he lives in St. Ives in Cornwall; a trip of around 340 miles. Along the route they encounter a few survivors, in the form of the rather stoned Irish Rick (Elliot Bigden) who lives in Bristol, and later three members of a branch of the British army, led by the increasingly insecure Captain Thomas (Martin Caroll). But when they finally make it to Uncle George's they find that he has captured one of the invaders and is giving his scientific curiosity full rein.

Wilsher's film tells us a couple of things; firstly, just because the world as we know it has come to an end, it doesn't mean that your relationship problems are suddenly over. Max and Liz continue to bicker; it's clear that she's still in love, whereas Max is avoiding the issue. This rather bizarre setup continues until the director shows his hand with the arrival of the army guys; in a tense stand off Max decides that the only way to have them confirm their true military credentials is by them singing the seldom heard second verse of the National Anthem, a task only achieved by the soldiers pooling their collective recall. This is the second lesson of the film; that there can be comedy in tragedy. Wisher doesn't play his movie completely for laughs, although a chance meeting en route with Max's ditzy first girlfriend, Becca (Rebecca Ward) takes us pretty near. In fact it's this uneasy mix of tones which really makes HtStEofW stand out. 

At nearly an hour and three quarters, with a small cast and very little going on for the most part (although congratulations to Stewart Cope for some nifty final reel F/X), this movie shouldn't work; but I loved it. It's mournful, occasionally tragic and ultimately uplifting. Francis and Streames are a great (non) couple, and the intelligent script, great support cast and sympathetic soundtrack made this a real find.

You can watch How to Survive the End of the World here. Please do.

Time Travel is Dangerous! (UK 2024: Dir Chris Reading)

Reading's first feature was the ambitious 2017 movie sci-fi adventure Somnus; eight years later he's returned to the genre with something very different.

Ruth and Megan jointly own 'Cha Cha Cha', a vintage shop in the north London suburb of Muswell Hill. They have significantly improved the quality of stock for sale by coming across a discarded time machine (a sort of fairground bumper car with extra wires attached) which they use to visit - and plunder from - various periods of history, from Neolithic Britain to the Napoleonic battles and the American Civil War.

Their activities draw the attention of Martin Onions (Guy Henry), chairman of the local science society (a sort of gathering of failed inventors), who forbids them from using the machine because of its potential space/time side effects. It was originally developed by two other members of the society, Ralph Sheldrake (Brian Bovell) and Valerie Lancaster (Sophie Thompson) who, with their cantankerous computer assistant 'Botty' (Johnny Vegas), co-hosted a popular TV science show back in the 1980s, 'The Future Today'. But the machine malfunctioned, and Ralph inexpertly disposed of it; which is where Ruth and Megan came in. 

Short of money, pressurised for rent by their horrible landlord (Simon Killick) and contrary to Martin's direction, the shop owners resume their time travelling activities. But things go wrong during one of the trips and Megan is thrown into another dimension; it's left for the science society and Ruth to work together to retrieve the shop owner.

The reason for recounting some of the plot of the movie so blandly is to explain the context. For Ruth Syratt and Megan Stevenson both lead the movie. But they're actually the owners of 'Cha Cha Cha', which is a real shop in Muswell Hill. That the pair, as non actors, make such engaging and funny leads is amazing in itself. That the film in which they act is a hilarious, inventive sci fi comedy makes TTiD! a real find.

In the same way that Ruth and Megan plunder history, Chris Reading borrows influences to give his feature a familiar feel. An explanatory voice over by Stephen Fry is reminiscent of Peter Jones's narration in the TV version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and Event Horizon gets a look in too. Ruth and Megan are complemented by a host of British comedy stalwarts; as well as the aforementioned Henry, Bovell, Thompson and Vegas, other familiar faces include Kiell Smith-Bynoe, Jane Horrocks, Mark Heap and Brian Blessed as the voice of a plant creature called Gavin the Octopus.

The special effects, although sparsely used, are incredibly effective for a film of, I'm assuming, slender budget, which remarkably also contains a number of lavish 'scenes from history'. There's a sumptuous score by Simon Porter which sneaks in several cinematic nods, including Alien, within its themes. While the pace can occasionally lag a little, and there's arguably too much quirk for it to be completely satisfying, TTiD! is a fabulous romp and I guarantee the first time you'll see owners of a second hand shop fronting a mainstream  - or indeed any - movie.

Time Travel is Dangerous! opens in UK cinemas on 28 March 2025.

New Films Round Up #15: Reviews of From the Shadows (USA 2022), The North Witch (USA 2024), The Baby in the Basket (UK 2025), Heretics (USA 2024), Its Name Was Mormo (Cyprus 2024) and The Hangman (USA 2024)

It's been five years since I last did one of these new film round up things, and I'm grateful to the kind folks at High Fliers films for providing the screeners for the movies below.

From the Shadows (USA 2022: Dir Mike Sargent) A lot's happened in the world since Sargent's first feature, Personals, was released back in 1999. The key influencer for the setup of his sophomore movie was clearly the pandemic, which forced film directors to be increasingly resourceful when putting projects together.

Sargent had clearly been taking notes from Rob Savage's 2020 Zoom horror flick Host when considering From the Shadows, and four years on from the filming strictures of COVID, his multi screen approach looks rather quaint now that the movie has finally got a UK release. But hold off lest ye dismiss this one; there's some good stuff to come. 

In the aftermath of a massive explosion at the mansion base of the mysterious Hidden Wisdom cult - a group of people purportedly involved with ancient worship, witchcraft and Satanism - only five of the cult members manage to escape, with their leader Dr Joseph Cawl (Bruce Davison, Suitable Flesh) apparently perishing in the flames. Cawl's sidekick, Dr Leonard Bertram (Keith David, The Thing, They Live) had previously disappeared under mysterious circumstances.

Along comes celebrity sceptic and debunker Dr Amara Rowan (Selena Anduze, Doctor Sleep) whose many books have established her as an expert on demystifying the supernatural. Rowan has decided to group the cult survivors together online to try to get to the bottom of Hidden Wisdom and find out how and why they managed to make it out alive, while the Dr's appointed sidekick, Peter (Jim Thalman) provides tech support and visual documentation services.

The five all had a history of some form of anxiety which Cawl successfully treated: there's Tina (Claire Mack), 'comedian' Keith (Max MacKenzie); gothy Denise (Ester Jiron); Henry (Ian Whitt); and star pupil Zoe (Briana Femia) who was Cawl's research coordinator. As the interviews progress they provide more information about the work of the cult and how Cawl, who formerly ran an 'Alternative Archeology' course, discovered ancient symbols on old artefacts, their application being the key to unlocking powerful alpha waves that, in isolation, could alter reality.

Doubtful as ever, Dr Rowan gets a powerful little online demonstration from the five, still in tune with their developed powers, which effectively re-arranges her bookshelves; it also more worryingly, projects something into her world, a force that Peter recognises, courtesy of his Choctaw grandmother, as the 'soul eater' of legend.

On the face of it, From the Shadows is a by the numbers tech supernatural feature which shouldn't have much going for it, the majority of the movie comprising Rowan and the Hidden Wisdom five all appearing on separate screens...talking. But, there's a kind of Nigel Kneale thing going on here, with the gradual amassing of knowledge making things stranger and stranger, as the incredulous Dr's scepticism is increasingly tested. 

Sargent's movie doesn't stint on the bloodshed  - and practical FX - but is wise enough to build up some tension before those scenes are unleashed, and (again like Savage's movie) each of the five has enough time to build their story so you get to care about them more than most films of this ilk. Add to this a brooding electronic score by Alan Howarth and you have a movie which, on the surface, looks like a Syfy channel programmer, but is in reality a well scripted and tense movie with some ingenious twists and turns.

The North Witch (USA 2024: Dir Bruce Wemple) The first of two Wemple directed films in this round up, here we have Madison (Anna Shields, who also wrote this), who's just been kicked out of her houseshare. She calls her friend Gemma (Jessy Holtermann) who can't help as she's about to go on a four day hiking trip with some girlfriends in the Canadian woods. 

Madison tags along, not knowing that the group have a purpose for their jaunt; to track down a missing house in the Barren Lands (an actual Canadian location). Said house vanished in 1963 and has only re-appeared, Brigadoon like, on a handful of occasions. People entering the house have emerged unrecognisable; and crazy.

The girls arrive at the site matching the co-ordinates provided by witnesses, but no house. They decide to camp overnight; a bad idea as a massive storm rips up their tents and causes untold human damage. Seemingly the only survivor, and with her leg badly injured, Madison makes it to a nearby abandoned house. The following day she finds the head of the party Alice (Ameerah Briggs) lying almost dead, her limbs at unnatural angles. Frightened and starving, there's relief when another of the girls, Talia (Kaitlyn Lunardi) also turns up, unscathed. But if Madison thought her troubles were over, they're just beginning.

Most of the rest of the movie becomes a series or self-harm/torture sequences where the viewer becomes increasingly unsure as to what's real and what's in Madison's head. They're disturbing to watch (Wemple goes in for that trick of building noise in a scene and cutting to silence - a lot) but there's a law of diminishing returns when you realise that the whole thing goes nowhere fast and starts to become, well, a bit silly, despite some very committed performances from Shields and Lunardi.

There's an end coda where the filmmakers issue come kind of written apology that anything which has appeared out of focus or glitchy was due to forces unknown, which seems like a rather feeble cover up if you ask me. Ultimately a rather pointless and unnecessarily nasty exercise.

The Baby in the Basket (UK 2024: Dir Andy Crane, Nathan Shepka) British offerings to the altar of the 'Nunsploitation' movie are few and far between. 2023's ok Consecration and Scott Jeffreys' Bad Nun movies are recent examples, not to mention Aislinn Clarke's excellent 2018 movie The Devil's Doorway, but now along comes Crane and Shepka to give us a good old four-to-the-floor convent based horror flick.

Set in a Scottish nunnery, St Augustine's, in 1944, a small group of novices, presided over by the eccentric Mother Superior (Maryam d’Abo), quietly go about their business (apart from the threat of a local wolf). They comprise sisters Valerie (Elle O’Hara), prone to the bottle, Eleanor (Michaela Longden), Lucy (Lisa Riesner) and Agnes (Amber Doig-Thorne). Their practical needs are supported by two caretakers, war scarred Amos (Paul Barber) and lusty Daniel (co-director and writer Shepka), a young man for whom employment among a group of young women yields constant temptation. 

Their devotions are disturbed by the arrival of, as the title explains, a baby left at the door of the nunnery in a basket. But this is no innocent foundling; rather it's the devil himself in childlike form. The Mother Superior forms a protective bond around the infant, while Agnes divines its demonic nature and is incarcerated for her beliefs. As the evil one casts its net within the nunnery, no-one is safe.

TBitB takes a little time to get going, but when at full steam it's a great low budget exploitation movie, with a cast giving it their all. There's naked nuns dancing in the moonlight (ok just one, but still...), a rather fetching demonic baby rendered, pleasingly, without CGI, and a superb location in which to film the devilish shenanigans (St. Conan's Kirk in Loch Awe, Scotland). I could have done without the relentless soundtrack - honestly sometimes silence is equally effective - but this is very entertaining stuff. Also interesting to know that both 'Flickering Myth' and 'Nerdly' film sites were involved in the production. 

Heretics (USA 2024: Dir Jose Prendes) Amazingly although The Asylum - the bargain basement company behind this found footage feature - have been banging them out for nearly thirty years now, this is only their second FF movie.

A group of rather generic people who claim to be students but are far older head out to the woods for an end of term beer and frolics bash. They all get to announce themselves on camera but despite this they quickly become forgettable, perhaps with the exception of religious Eva (Neeley Dayan), whose pastor father John (Eric Roberts) is seen in an opening shot giving a present to his daughter; so we already have a challenge to the FF format in that we don't know who is filming this sequence.

Anyway, manipulative Mary (Anna DeRusso), who has already engineered some gossip suggesting that group member Gregg (Scott Mazzapica) is cheating on his girlfriend Sarah (Sara Kamine) with Jessica (Shelby Wright), suggests lightening the mood she created by the whole bunch spending the night in the reputedly haunted Simmons House. Various stories of murder and mayhem are attached to the now empty residence, and previous attempts at overnight occupation have resulted in, well, death.

After accessing the house there's the usual amount of walking around (of course now everybody has smart phones which means that there is multiple filming happening) before the 'teens' gradually get offed by shadowy figures who reveal themselves as cultists in thrall to an ancient demon called Lilith.

Unlike many of the found footage offerings in recent years, Heretics is slightly different in that a) the threat is seen and explained and b) there is no context to the footage we see, apart from a snowy screen at the start and end and written messages about praising Lilith. It might be a load of old hokum, but Heretics does at least deliver on its mayhem, even if you can guess the 'why' almost from the outset.

Its Name Was Mormo (Cyprus 2024: Dir Mark Andrew Bowers) Bowers sort of plays himself in this 'family affair' found footage movie. Along with his real life Colombian partner Marcela Cardenas (as Marcela) and their daughter Mia, also playing herself (not forgetting their puppy Romeo), the family are shown in their Cyprus villa going about their business (things kick off with Marcela discovering she's pregnant). 

A visit to a local abandoned building seems to be the start of the bad things, when they discover what looks like a mass of human bones and a box containing skulls, which they rather unwisely bring back home. This is tied in with the Greek legend of Mormo, who exacts revenge on the family for stealing the artifacts (something not explained in the film).

Both parents start to feel watched around the home, to the extent that they fit a series of cameras around the villa to record anything that happens. Marcela's paranoia increases in line with the changing feel of their gaff, particularly in that little Mia seems to be a focus for all the weirdness.

Of course we know that the whole thing doesn't end well as the footage we're seeing has been obtained following the family's disappearance. And on the face of it, ITWM is found footage by the numbers, a sub genre that many thought had bitten the dust years ago. But Bowers' movie, featuring his own family, as opposed to a party of annoying twenty somethings, adds a frisson of terror that most examples of this sort of thing just don't have. All the usual FF WTF moments are present and correct, but the terrorised family kind of make you forget that.

Bowers has dressed this one up with a whole backstory, perhaps in homage to the movie that started it all in 1999, and which you can read about here. There's even a book. Well a guy's got to eat.

The Hangman (USA 2024: Dir Bruce Wemple) Wemple's second feature in this round up proves no better than the first. It's a wordy, confusing movie about an ancient, regenerating demon which spends a lot of time going absolutely nowhere (the film, not the demon, although...).

"There are at least seven known gateways to hell across the world. One of them is in the mountains of West Virginia," states the movie's opening blurb. (sidebar: reader, I've been to the mountains of West Virginia and I can attest to this.) Into this gateway arrives Leon (LeJon Woods) and his son Jesse (Mar Cellus, no really) on a camping trip, a bonding exercise to resolve tensions between the two regarding the murder of Jesse's mum and Leon's inability to have prevented it. But the morning after setting up their tents, Jesse has disappeared and dad's car has been tampered with.

Setting out to find the missing boy, Leon encounters backwoods racists, drug addicts and human traffickers; but that's not the meat of the story. Jesse's disappearance is linked to a cult, worshipping the ancient deity of Baal, a group dependent on human sacrifice to prolong their life via a murderous  - and barely glimpsed - entity named 'The Hangman' (I'll leave you to work out the method of killing here). As soon as Leon discovers this fact - which takes a long time - he realises that he and Jesse are in a whole heap of trouble.

The Hangman could have been a good, if generic film, but pacing and plotting are poor and Mr Woods, on whom the whole movie pivots dramatically, doesn't really have the chops to pull it off. This felt like a film that was a goer in the planning but lucked out in the execution.

The Rule of Jenny Pen (New Zealand 2024: Dir James Ashcroft)

Ashcroft's debut feature, 2021's visceral Coming Home in the Dark was a bleak thriller rooted in abuse within a boys' reform school in rural New Zealand. That movie was based on a short story written by Owen Marshall, and Ashcroft returns to Marshall's work as source material for his latest film, which also features an institution; in this case a nursing home.

Geoffrey Rush plays Stefan Mortensen, a judge who, when we first meet him, suffers a massive stroke while in court and is admitted, unable to walk, to the Royal Pine Mews Care Home. He thinks he's a paying guest just spending a few weeks until he's back on his feet (pardon the pun) but one look at his condition, and that of his fellow 'guests', strongly suggests that this is his last accommodation.

As a judge Mortensen was used to wielding power and morality (his opening sentencing of a serial paedophile extended to holding the guy's mother equally culpable). At the care home that power is removed; he's just another patient. But surveying the residents (whose number includes one - slightly cliched - woman with dementia, hoping for a visit, and rescue, from a family that haven't visited her in years) he espies an ostensibly robust figure in the shape of Dave Crealy (John Lithgow); employee turned home resident, his hand permanently attached to a dementia doll, Jenny Pen, which Crealy uses, in an ironic twist, to mete out justice within the care home.

Crealy's freedom of the establishment (he retains his all access passkey) and the seeming inability of the staff to do anything about his more outré behaviour - their reasoning being that, like all the residents he pays for his care and is thus immune from censure - recalls memories of Jimmy Sa*ile, and indeed Lithgow is so unctuous, nasty and, well, pernicious, that this comparison isn't far off the mark. Only Mortensen seems able to see through Crealy's plan for dominance via the judgements of Jenny Pen, but it's his word against the authorities.

The Rule of Jenny Pen is, make no mistake, a difficult watch. Anyone with any experience of visiting residential homes will feel that Ashcroft's created atmosphere of sadness and approaching death is perfectly captured. But beyond this the war between Crealy and Mortensen has elements of the darkest wit, with some unexpectedly surreal touches; Lithgow and Rush are, of course, perfectly cast, the former at times truly frightening. "I hope I die before I get old," sang The Who's Roger Daltrey (in his youth) and watching The Rule of Jenny Pen you'll feel the same way.  

The Rule of Jenny Pen plays in UK and Ireland cinemas 14 March 2025, from Vertigo Releasing.

Die Alone (Canada/USA 2024: Dir Lowell Dean)

The recent worldwide pandemic has provided filmmakers with an abundance of inspiration, from lockdown anxiety movies (2022's Alone Together and Sick, for example) to an appropriation of the 'walking dead' genre (Corona Zombies from 2020, anyone?). But it's the moody 2023 HBO series The Last of Us which provides Canadian filmmaker Lowell Dean with a visual template for a viral infection movie with a difference.

Ethan (Elijah Wood lookalike Douglas Smith) is an amnesiac, struggling to hold on to fractured memories of his life with girlfriend Emma (Kimberley-Sue Murray). His condition is exacerbated by the world around him, torn apart as a result of a viral epidemic, emanating not from a lab but the natural world.

In the search for his girlfriend Ethan has only a smattering of information; they may have been in a car accident and he has a plaster on his arm (applied by Emma, a doctor). Coming across a farmhouse, he is taken in by an older woman, Mae (Carrie-Anne Moss). Her motives for providing support are unclear; she is clearly wary (and prepared; the house in which she lives is booby trapped against intruders) but also seems lonely and happy to have made a friend.

But the threats they face together take two forms; human and, well something else. For the infection of the virus results in death, followed by a plant-driven animation of the body (very The Last of Us) and the need for the re-animated corpse to feed; these creatures have been dubbed 'The Reclaimed' by conspiracy theorists. Examples of both come to call at the farmhouse, while Ethan, his amnesiac bouts becoming more frequent, struggles to keep his few memories together in order to locate Emma.

Dean wisely avoids some of the potential pitfalls of this type of film by keeping the running time to a sensible 90 minutes and concentrating on the development of the characters, a challenge because of a final reel narrative turn that I'll not reveal. As well as the aforementioned HBO show the director also borrows some of the 'amnesia revealed' tactics of Christopher Nolan's breakthrough 2000 movie Memento (in which Moss also starred) but Die Alone is its own beast, largely down to convincing turns from all involved, particularly Moss as the inscrutable Mae, some deeply strange plant/human imagery, and the bleak Canadian setting of rural Saskatchewan which provides the requisite feel of isolation. 

Die Alone will be available on Home Entertainment from 10th March 2025.

NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2021 #20: Reviews of The Haunted Hotel (UK 2020), The House on the Cliff (UK 2021), Torture (UK 2021), Darkness in Mind (UK 2021), J1S (UK 2021) and Captain Callum Explores the Universe (UK 2021)

The Haunted Hotel (UK 2020: Dir Various) This portmanteau oddity, produced in 2020 but not released until a year later - presumably for Pandemic reasons - was put together by Film Suffolk, a not for profit organisation supporting local filmmakers. The hotel in question used as the film's only location was, and is, the Grade II listed Great White House in Ipswich; it's a place with a history. Dating back to 1518, the impressive hotel was mentioned in Charles Dickens's 'Pickwick Papers' (and none too favourably) and, at the time of filming, was shut down, which explains why much of the decor looks rather shabby.

However the short films which make up the feature compensate for the drab interiors by being, for the most part, a lot of fun; the budget was apparently £10,000, most of which, I would guess, was spent on costumes. The individual stories, which apart from using the hotel as their base - and having generally supernatural subject matter - don't have anything in common, is a plus as it's the variety of shorts on offer that makes The Haunted Hotel zip along nicely.

Travelling between the 1940s and the present day, the portmanteau highlights include: a hotel regular enjoying one last dance with the ghost of his late wife; a horror writer having a breakdown and encountering local beastly legend Black Shuck; a 'Horror Hotel' whose ghostly staff members are incompetent; and a helpful spirit who comes to the aid of a young girl about to be taken advantage of. 

As a postscript, since the film was made the hotel has re-opened, although sadly it seems that little has been spent on redecorating. If you look the place up on Trip Advisor the customer reviews are scarier than anything in The Haunted Hotel, and some of the visitors' photos show rooms in much the same state as when filming took place. 

The House on the Cliff aka Barun Rai and the House on the Cliff (UK 2021: Dir Sam Bhattacharjee) Director Bhattacharjee is also a VFX supervisor, and one look at the extraordinary THotC convinces you that he's happy to combine his skills with a 'kitchen sink' approach to his first Fantastic feature.

It's the 1970s and parapsychologist Barun Rai (Priyanshu Chatterjee) has been summoned to Corvid's Head, an American town that looks very like the UK (that's because it is). The reason for his presence is a rash of deaths, with various menfolk taking their lives by jumping off a cliff. 

Meanwhile two newlyweds have just bought a house on the same  cliff. Harmesh (Sid Makkar) and his wife Soumili (Nyra Banerjee) instantly fall in love with their impressive new home, but it's not long before Soumili finds an old book in the basement and there are signs that the house may be haunted. A visiting priest tends to agree when he's attacked by a swarm of bees (yeah I know). Rai and his investigating assistant Sukhbir (Aakash Shukal, wearing an oversized wig that has to be seen to be believed - and please forgive me Mr Shukal if that was your own hair) uncover the reason behind the haunting; a jilted fiancée (genre regular Ayvianna Snow) who swears vengeance on all men from beyond the grave. Can they exorcise the spirit before more men's lives are sacrificed?

Apparently the original running time of the movie was two and a half hours, apparently designed to be shown on Indian TV in 20 minute bursts. The resulting digest is a still overlong 120 minutes, but in its mix of loopy plot twists and batshit visuals (think a sort of Bollywood Garth Marenghi's Darkplace) you're unlikely to be bored; just confused. As Rai, Chatterjee is a laconic, cigar chewing chap with no discerning sense of humour, a quality much needed when dealing with the nonsense he encounters. The story might be hoary but you'll stay for the VFX which are over the top, often unnecessary, and quite wonderful. The end credits of the movie (and just look at the size of the technical cast, including an 'Insect developer') tell us that Barun Rai will return; quickly please, Mr Bhattacharjee!

Torture (UK 2021: Dir Jason Wright) Wright's 2019 debut feature, Dead Party, saw a bunch of ravers trapped in a warehouse and besieged by scientifically created zombies.

Two years later Wright returned with an (overly) ambitious movie, also with science out of control at its core. Deep in the country a number of disappearances are leaving the authorities, and local news channels, baffled; the discovery of bodies suggests an end to the mystery, but things are just hotting up.

A young bride to be is kidnapped on the day of her wedding. Elsewhere a single mother, alcoholic because of abuse from her father, has her baby taken from her by shadowy figures. Two male friends are having a blokey getaway, their destination a bondage festival called 'Sick Club'. Another parent becomes distraught when both her daughters go missing at a playground.

What links these characters isn't clear, but may have something to do with an old man called Doctor Jones, an operations room which is directing the action, and a historic series of experiments during the Cold War, involving children being subjected to protein modification tests.

The film is called Torture for good reason; a number of the indignities foisted on the captured people are pretty unpleasant. Sadly the word can also be used to describe some of the performances in the movie; it's a messy old film, with narrative strands all over the place and only a partial explanation offered. This may well be what Wright was aiming for (there's a definite nihilistic nod to Romero's 1973 movie The Crazies here) but it makes the whole thing very disjointed, and there wasn't enough style in the thing to create tension or, it has to be mentioned, sustain real interest.

Darkness in Mind (UK 2021: Dir Steve Jolley) there's an item in the 'Watford Observer' from November 2011 in which Jolley names this project as a feature film. At some point between then and 2021 it had shrunk down to a 46 minute featurette. I'm still trying to track down with the director the year of its release; Jolley seems to consider it unfinished (it's not on his IMDb page) but it's worth mentioning here as a genuine oddity.

Five unrelated people, each with their own traumata, sign up for a weekend retreat at the home of a Hypnotist (David France) with an excellent reputation. Triggered by a trance state induced by their host, we witness their phobias one by one. Andy (Justin Courtney) has entomophobia, a fear of insects (a particularly disturbing scene in which a large number of cockroaches - and spiders - crawl across his naked torso). Nicole (Julia Florimo) has prigophobia; a fear of choking. Wesley (Paul Law Beaumont) has agrizoophobia; a fear of teddy bears. Amy (Nansi Nsue) has masklophobia (as the word suggests, a fear of masks). And finally Mickey (Christopher Miles) has trauma stemming from being an abused child who narrowly escaped death; this is depicted via a very weird scene showing adult Mickey's head on a child's body, emoting in a crib.

Nothing else in the film really matches these scenes in terms of horror; the rest is taken up with the increasingly controlling behaviour of the Hypnotist, who gradually reveals his real motive as some kind of collector of souls, while at the same time forcing the five to confront the basis for their fears. DiM is an at times very creepy extended short, claustrophobically directed and with convincing performances from all concerned.

You can watch Darkness in Mind here.

J1S (UK 2021: Dir Jay Cunningham) Cunningham's debut feature is set in a present day Liverpool, although not quite; 'a different now' in fact, where J1S aka 'Jones' (Jack Bohdi), an AI being created by Dr Novak (Carl Wharton) is being slowly integrated into real life. 

An imminent and unscheduled visit from China's emperor, who has heard of and is interested in the project, forces Novak to rush the rest of Jones's development, installing an upgrade which has an unfortunate side effect; instead of simply updating the AI's operating system it sits alongside it, creating two minds, one benevolent, one malevolent.

Elsewhere in the city's Red District - a sort of Philip K. Dick futuristic sleazepark - Suza (Jade Bulmer), another robot, is trying to give her pimp boss Ivan (Keith Hyland) the slip. It's inevitable that Jones and Suza will come into contact with each other as they navigate the Merseyside mean streets.

'No Droids Allowed' reads a sign on a cafe; not only are our robots in conflict with each other but there's a world of AI mistrust out there (seems things haven't changed then). Cunningham's movie has more than a whiff of paranoia about it. Developed from a 4 minute short film into a feature, this one so nearly didn't make completion (you can read about Cunningham's many and varied struggles here) but I'm really pleased it did. Look, J1S isn't particularly original but the sheer passion involved in creating a world which is familiar but different has paid off. There are elements of Blade Runner, The Terminator and Manga in the film, but there's a very human side to things too. Bohdi and Bulmer are both great and there's real pace to the editing. I liked this a lot.

Captain Callum Explores the Universe (UK 2021: Dir Callum Davies) Young Callum Davies may not be aware of the work of US 1960s independent director Ray Dennis Steckler, but his goofy 50 minute film harks back to Steckler's knockabout 1968 movie The Lemon Grove Kids Meet the Monsters, although here the location is the Welsh coast rather than the suburbs of Los Angeles (in truth he was probably heading more for a The Inbetweeners feel).

Anyway Callum (star of many a YouTube skit video), a listless lad who wears two pairs of glasses, has his world changed when he finds a Captain's hat in a stream, puts it on and finds renewed purpose in life as, er, Captain Callum. His slacker mate, Rifle Rob (Jay Davies), so named because he has a plastic gun, sleeps a lot.

A freak meteor storm one night zaps CC from his own world and throws him into an alternate dimension. Separated from Rob, he encounters himself, in the guise of Video Universe Callum, who has a patch over one eye, and VUC's mate Lance (Kallum Gordon). CC is keen to travel back to his own dimension, which can only be achieved with the application of magical stones, which may have been instrumental in the meteor shower. But the stones are under threat courtesy of a masked chap called The Menacer, who can only be defeated by VUC's special powers.

"Do you really have to be so self centred, dude?" CC is asked at one point. "That's kind of the point of the whole character" replies CC, and indeed a lot of CCEtU is devoted to CC worrying about himself. I really liked this funny, goofy movie, which occupies a shared universe with the daft films of Ian Austin. The word 'zany' is pretty horrible (and overused) but it's kind of appropriate here to describe this micro budget, surreal, freewheeling comedy. Excellent.

You can watch Captain Callum Explores the Universe here. 

NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2021 #19: Reviews of Override (UK 2021), Alone Together (UK 2021), Damien (UK 2021), Visions of Filth (UK 2021), Them (UK 2021) and Easter Bunny Massacre (UK 2021)

Override aka R.I.A. (Reality Interface Android) (UK 2021: Dir Richard Colton) A low budget sci fi movie starring not one but two denizens of the 1980s UK music scene; what are the chances?

'A Day With RIA' is a reality show with a twist. Every day, beamed to devices across the US, 'RIA', a sophisticated domestic android, wakes up and serves her 'husband' Jack breakfast, showers and plans her day with him. The same day, over and over again, with tweaks suggested by the viewing audience who can vote to vary her routines. The twist here is that the 'Jack' she wakes up to (and goes to be bed with, although no sex until after 9pm) is a different person every day, one of a never ending parade of contestants who make their pitch to be in the latest episode of the reality show.

So far so Groundhog Day meets The Truman Show. But then the 25th Jack (Charlie Clapham), who just happens to be the son of the US vice president (Dean Cain, yes that one), encounters and, in a break from the norm, is taken hostage by RIA who has been hacked, for reasons that become increasingly menacing.

Back to those Brit music cast members; ex Bros member Luke Goss, making quite the name for himself in low budget thrillers, is the first Jack we meet. Later on it's the turn of Sinitta to don a pair of glasses and a labcoat as Dr Tonya Smithe (trivia lovers may wish to know that her screen debut at age 18 was in Jim Sharman's 1981 follow up to The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Shock Treatment). Elsewhere RIA, played by a very game Jessica Impiazzi, is actually quite effective as the android gone wrong, alternating between sexiness, domesticity and living product promoter (the show presumably being funded by advertising). Until the conspiracy elements of the plot kick in, and it all gets way too confusing, this is an amusing enough little comment on TV culture and the perceived role of women. Bizarre but not unlikeable, then.

Alone Together (UK 2021: Dir Luke J. Couch) Bella (Meg Olssen) is an artist and a practicing Christian; her boyfriend Damien (Kamran Mohammed) has little time for her faith or indeed anything which isn't grounded in reality. Which is why he's distinctly underwhelmed when Bella tells him that, for her next art project, she's been delving into Christian demonology.

Discovering an old book, containing the name Balam, Bella's investigations trigger a series of visions in which she's visited by demons and has her faith, and her strict chastity, called into question; understandably Damien is a little concerned, particularly when Bella becomes possessed by evil forces. 

Couch's film, shot in 2020 but not released until 2021, possibly meant a lot to the director. Unfortunately its meaning is largely lost on the viewing audience, beyond its basic themes of good vs evil, faith vs disbelief etc. There's not a lot to look at here; Bella and Damien have a series of conversations about the state of their relationship, Bella gets a bit possessed and it doesn't end happily. 

But Alone Together is a great example of the democratisation of modern filmmaking; if you have the equipment, some cast members and a lot of patience you too can make a movie. Whether it's good or not may be the point.

Damien (UK 2021: Dir Bobby Marno) In 2021 the found footage feature was, if not going strong, still 'a thing', as evidenced by this Northern Irish offering from first time director Marno.

Three curmudgeonly filmmakers have arrived to interview Damien (Damien Seed - all the actors use their real names), a "vegetarian beef farmer", in a sort of Akenfield like experiment to document what is presumably a dying way of life. The three guys, Bobby (the director), Andy (Andrew McClay) and Hammer (Robert Brown, ok not all the actors then) are interested in Damien's genealogy, which can be traced back to the Picts via William Wallace.

Damien offers to show them the cottage where he grew up; a ramshackle building covered with signs, which, after a bit of research, turn out to be repetitions of a Celtic fire symbol; red headed Damien just may have links to a flame haired god called the Dagda and his son Aed.

Anyhow before long Hammer has gone missing while the team stay overnight; only his bloody shirt remains. Then we're into the angry villager/night footage so you can't see what's going on/running and swearing part of the film. Then it ends.

Damien scores some points for its key cast members a) all looking the same (it's the beards which makes it a tad confusing) and b) not being 20 years old (although under those beards I may be mistaken). Line of the movie has to be "Have you ever seen so many ginger people in a circle?".

Visions of Filth (UK 2021: Dir Jason Impey) Lest you thought that the British Fantastic Film scene generally played it safe when it comes to content, along comes Mr Impey to do a bit of disabusing; actual in Impey's case make that 'abusing'. Along with directors like Sam Mason Bell, Impey is not afraid to luxuriate in the downward spiral of human behaviour. It's why you don't often see his films streamed in the UK, even though the guy has been making shorts and full features since 1994.

The 'visions of filth' in this movie belong to an unnamed killer, played by Martin W. Payne, an actor prepared to go there in the name of art (as anyone who has seen 2019's Lonely Hearts or the following year's Millennial Killer will attest). Payne's character is in the latter stages of what is assumed to be bowel cancer (we get a graphic display of the sickness at work; yes it's that kind of film), reflecting back on his past murders, his modus operandi a combination torture/masturbation double hander (pun intended), accompanied by a wicked laugh, a bit like a video nasty version of Tod Slaughter. He is mentally teased by one victim (Rina Julia) who reaches out from beyond the grave to exact her revenge (Impey presages his film with a Biblical quote, warning that it's God's work only to repay evil with evil).

If you do get to see Visions of Filth, beware that a cold shower will be in order after viewing. It's pretty reprehensible stuff, plot free and nihilistic in extreme (albeit with a twisted moral conclusion). It's not really my sort of thing (it's a brave person that would admit it's their sort of thing) but it's a good film to have in mind for the next pub discussion where some know-all opines that Britain doesn't do 'cinema of transgression'.

Them (UK 2021: Dir Ignacio Maiso) Maiso's last feature, 2019's Prowler, was a headscratcher of a debut; his follow up is no less of a challenge.

In an unspecified setting - it's London but it could be now or the near future - a group of beings that were once human cannot now be seen by the human race. Occasionally there is a breakthrough when an actual human 'wakes up' and can see the ancient race, like Daniel aka Keeper 1 (Sindri Swan), but mainly humans lead repetitive lives, unaware of what's happening. But there's pressure to reset things, to take the world back to where the race remain undetected but still in charge.

That's the best I can make out of this impenetrable movie. Hats off to Maiso for not conveniently explaining what's being shown; the best that can be offered is Last Year in Marienbad via The Matrix. 

In that the movie was made during the Pandemic, part of me wonders whether some of the 'great reset' conspiracy theories of the time have managed to seep into the techno neurosis of the film. It's well photographed, static, and impenetrable.

Easter Bunny Massacre (UK 2021: Dir Jack Peter Mundy) The Scott Jeffrey Jagged Edge crew are all present and correct for this one. Directed by a guy responsible for no less than 5 movies in 2021, as that number suggests his films are cheaply made, efficiently delivered, but sadly of varying quality.

EBM looks to the setup of I Know What You Did Last Summer in its story of a woodland party that goes wrong when one of their number, Heather (Anthonia Whillans, whose early exit might be explained by the sheer number of behind the scenes functions she undertakes, according to the credits) winds up dead after everyone else is so strung out that they can't remember what happened. All the college kids worry about the academic impact of being associated with a corpse, so they dump her body in the river and pretend nothing happened. What we know, and the rest of the group don't, is that Heather was killed by someone in an Easter Bunny costume.

One year on, the survivors of that evening (minus one of their number, who has taken their life in the interim because of all the stress involved in the cover up) and their plus ones are all invited to a reunion. That the person who has sent the invitations signs themselves 'Heather' doesn't put anyone off attending. As the group congregate they follow as series of clues, Easter egg hunt style, to find out what's going on; these clues include a number of tapes, seemingly recorded by Heather. As the movie progresses, the inner secrets of all are revealed in such a way as any of the attendees could have been responsible for the murder; until of course they begin to get murdered, by someone in a bunny suit, natch.

Although EBM remains resolutely cheap (the location is mainly restricted to a Somerset youth hostel, presumably keen to do an out of season deal) there's something rather good about the complexity of motives and opportunity revealed by the cast as events pan out, helped by some nifty camerawork from DOP Robin Keane. The plus ones in the group add to the red herring score, and although the upshot is rather silly it's quite fun getting there, particularly the whole Rashomon like unreliable witness stuff. Jeffrey and Mundy have both been involved with features far poorer than this one. I rather liked it.