Films from 2020 Digital FrightFest Part 2: Reviews of They're Outside (UK 2020) NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM, Skull: The Mask (Brazil 2020), Hail to the Deadites (Canada 2020) and Hall (Canada 2020)

They're Outside (UK 2020: Dir Airell Anthony Hayles, Sam Casserly) Welcome to spooky Hastings! Along with Playhouse Hayles and Casserly's movie forms the 'new directors to watch' strand of FrightFest, indicating that while these filmmakers might have a way to go in terms of finished product, they're talents to watch.

They're Outside, as a found footage movie, feels more assembled than directed, which is in keeping with the faux reality subject matter that makes up its running time. We get some pompous footage about folklore in Hastings, courtesy of Richard (Nicholas Hellraiser Vince) and, in the main part of the movie, YouTube psychologist Max (Tom Wheatley) who, in the latest edition of his online show, encourages an acute agoraphobic, Californian Sarah (played by actual Californian Chrissy Randall), to take a few steps outside of her front door. Sarah had a daughter, thought to have died in a car crash, although she maintains that she was actually abducted by a regional mythical creature called 'green eyes.'

Max proves himself to be a thoroughly unlikable cove, exploiting Sarah's pain for his own egotistical ends and tearing into his own film crew as well. Much of the movie takes place, perhaps unsurprisingly, in Sarah's home, and feels cramped and claustrophobic as a result. Sarah's friend Penny turns up (Emily Booth), and some meta fun is had in that Penny, like Booth, was a presenter in the 1990s. Of course Sarah's suspicions about the fate of her daughter turn out to be true: They're Outside mixes fact with fiction - incorporating the annual Jack in the Green event which takes place in Hastings, a real slice of folk horror in among the supernatural goings on. It's a passable film, clearly filmed on a minuscule budget, but captures well the scrappy and immediate feel of social media recordings.

Skull: The Mask (Brazil 2020: Dir Armando Fonseca, Kapel Furman) Well it wouldn't be FrightFest without at least one batshit crazy movie, and right on cue it arrives.

Back in 1944 a bad guy tracks down and secures the horned Mask of Anhangá, the executioner of Tahawantinsupay, a Pre-Columbian God. When activated via an incantation the mask gives the wearer considerable power; it also has the capacity to make the wearer's head explode if the ritual to enable its powers goes wrong. Which is what happens.

Flash forward to 2019, and the mask turns up in the depths of the Amazon jungle, where it's crated up and shipped to Sao Paolo, destined to be a museum exhibit. The person organising the shipment, archaeologist Galvani Volta (Guta Ruiz), is in the pay of dodgy Tack Waelder (Ivo Muller) who secretly wants the mask for himself. Volta's girlfriend Lilah (Greta Antoine), can't wait for a look see when the shipment arrives, and sets up the invocation ritual, which goes wrong, killing both Lilah and Galvani.

Put upon cop Beatriz Obdias (Natalie Rodrigues) takes a break from investigating the kidnap of some schoolchildren to look into the deaths of the women. Two murder site clean up guys arrive to, er clean up, but the mask, which briefly took itself into hiding, reappears and attaches itself to one of the guys, causing him to go on a murderous rampage, ripping the hearts out of unsuspecting victims. Meanwhile Manco (Wilton Andrade), a descendant of a guy committed to suppressing the mask, fetches his temperamental flamethrower out of a vault in the local church, and prepares to do battle.

Arguably there are way too many plot strands and ideas for this film to work, but Fonseca and Furman's latest feature just throws the elements together and launches the movie at break neck speed; the gamble pays off as it's a hugely enjoyable ride, gory as hell and loopy as you like, and is over before you can catch your breath. But there's a lot of talent here too. It's superbly edited, and Andre Sigwalt's photography catapults the camera through the San Paolo streets with wild abandon. The cast play it straight and the mask, which is an ingenious creation, should have the opportunity to become a franchise. Excellent stuff.


Hail to the Deadites (Canada 2020: Dir Steve Villeneuve) I originally felt slightly duped as I was expecting this to be more of a celebration of The Evil Dead than its actual subject, an examination of the fandom surrounding the movie. Villeneuve, clearly a massive fan of the flick, wanted to find out what it is about the film that drives so many fans to be obsessive about it, and journeys across Canada and the USA to find out (there's little Brit input apart from a couple of UK fans interviewed at a US convention, which is a shame because, on home video at least, the movie was initially more commercially successful here than in the States).

So what we get here are a lot of young men (and occasionally women) who were largely unborn when The Evil Dead was theatrically released, but who discovered the movie via video rental courtesy of progressive or uncaring parents. Villeneuve doesn't really ask the question 'why?' in terms of the extent of the fans' obsessions, and it's this approach which makes the documentary rather more palatable than a 'come and look at the freaks' direction it could have taken in another director's hands. But it's pretty obvious that for some the completist approach to collecting items of memorabilia answers some inner question about the best way to cope with the rigours of real life (Bruce Campbell, who contributes a number of observations on fandom - and looks like a million dollars next to some of the pastier individuals in the film - commented that he couldn't understand the logic of people who would stand in line for hours for an autograph and then not make eye contact with him).

But the pleasure of this film is entirely in the stories of the fans: a couple who got married based on their joint love of the movie (they were divorced a year later - I think there might be a lesson in there somewhere); a Bruce Campbell cosplay lookalike whose crowdfunding campaign to visit his hero was considerably assisted by a generous donation from someone called 'the chin'; and a guy with a story of personal heartbreak over the loss of a baby boy he'd named Ash. The rest of the cast of the movie sequence, who regularly turn up to conventions and meet and greets, seem genuinely delighted to be surrounded by continued deification, and it's fitting that a movie made by horror fans should be kept alive by exactly the same type of people, nearly 40 years on.

Hall (Canada 2020: Dir Francesco Giannini) Hall feels like the ultimate concept movie: how can you make a horror feature whose setting is almost entirely restricted to a hotel corridor?

Naomi (Yumiko Shaku), a heavily pregnant woman, has checked into a hotel after leaving her husband back in Vietnam; it was brave journey at the best of times, more so because of an epidemic spreading through the US.

In the same hotel Val (Carolina Bartczak), her husband Branden (Mark Gibsen) and their 8 year old daughter Kelly (Bailey Thain) are also holed up. There is an undercurrent of domestic discord between Kelly's parents which materialises into a pattern of abusive behaviour towards Val. We learn that from a phone call with her mother that, unlike Naomi who has already made the break, Val is planning to take Kelly and leave her husband. Finding bruises on her daughter's body seals the deal, but as she goes to leave Branden, who is showing symptoms of infection, he attacks her, biting her ankle.

Elsewhere on the same floor of the hotel, a man closes a box full of vials of liquid. The lid is marked with a 'virus' logo: "it's started," he says. Naomi is also showing advanced signs of infection, and leaves her room for help, crawling along the hotel's corridor past other residents and staff who have already succumbed. Val and Kelly must also try to make their escape.

Filmed in the Santa Clarita area and completed during lockdown, Hall is slow (as another critic has mentioned, it's like Rec at 10% of the speed). Very little happens in the movie but Giannini creates a real sense of dread in such a limited setup. Here the insidious contagion of abuse is linked to the spread of the virus and the Ballardian payoff - a group of wealthy people are partying on the ground floor with no concept of what is unfolding on the upper levels of the hotel - makes the politics of the film clear. It's an intriguing piece that feels a little unfinished (it was completed during lockdown), but I rather liked its strangeness. Unfortunately there's an end coda to the movie which provides context to what we've seen before, and I could really have done without that.

Films from 2020 Digital FrightFest Part 1: Reviews of There's No Such Thing as Vampires (USA 2020), 12 Hour Shift (USA 2020), The Honeymoon Phase (USA 2020), The Horror Crowd (USA 2020) and Playhouse (UK 2020) NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2020

There's No Such Thing as Vampires (USA 2020: Dir Logan Thomas) We are by now quite used to films that fetishise movies of the 1980s in look, feel and soundtrack choices. But Thomas's latest feature goes one step further and gives you a movie that literally feels it was pulled down from the video shelves of a 1986 rental establishment.

It's the day before Halloween, and Joshua (Josh Plasse) is on the run from something shadowy and evil. He bumps into a girl, Ariel (Emma Holzer) and before you know it, they're driving away in her car, pursued by a huge truck. Stopping off to get gas and directions at a church (occupied by 80s doyenne Meg Foster who, as Sister Frank, tells them about the "dark wind" which has "drained all life from this valley") they eventually arrive at Ariel's friend David's place (Will Haden), who lives with his friend Peter (Scott Lindley). David is a movie obsessive with familial links to Hollywood, who feels that he's seen Joshua before. He screens some footage of an old silent movie featuring a magician character called Maximilian. And sure enough also in the footage is a guy who looks just like Joshua! This is the jumping off point for the explanation of how the vampire, Joshua and Ariel are connected, but I'll leave you to discover that. Anyhow, it's not long before the vampire has caught up with them, despite their appeal to the cops for help: "there's no such thing as vampires!" says the policeman on duty, just before the lights go out, and all PG hell lets loose.

The only thing missing from Thomas's faithful recreation of cheesy 80s horror flicks is the VHS tracking marks on the print; everything else is present and correct. Throbbing Carpenter like soundtrack interspersed with anaemic FM soft rock tracks? Check. Ridiculous exposition that tries to make a chase movie more grand than it is? Double check. On point discussion about movies with Hollywood Dave, with dumb Peter thinking, in a discussion about Carpenter's Halloween, that they're referring to the Rob Zombie remake? Triple check! It perhaps goes without mentioning that There's No Such Thing as Vampires - which if there was any justice would be the title of Grady Hendrix's next book - is hugely fun, if you like that kind of thing. And if you do you'll be pleased to know that there's a sequel on the way, which Thomas promises will be "bloodier" than the first film.

12 Hour Shift (USA 2020: Dir Brea Grant) Grant, a renaissance woman de nos jours - she acts, writes and illustrates comic books, produces and directs - has given us an American class war parody perfect for these Trumpean times.

It's 1999, and Mandy (an astonishing performance by Angela Bettis) is a nurse at an Arkansas hospital, just starting her shift. But she's far from the 'angel' we come to expect from members of the profession; she's drug dependent, and runs an organ farming business - selling various bits of human offal to shady buyers after despatching the donors with bleach - with fellow nurse Karen (Nikea Gamby-Turner), in return for cold hard cash.

But on this particular night things are about to go very wrong. Mandy sells a kidney to her strung out cousin Regina (Chloe Farnsworth) for her horrible boss. But Regina promptly misplaces it, which enrages the boss man, and a replacement must be found. Into this already Coen brothers style farce is added David Arquette as a thug who ends up in the same hospital, Mandy's brother Andy, admitted after an overdose, and a whole load of eccentric side characters whose inclusion seems aimed at frustrating Mandy's ability to get though her shift. Oh and there's a couple of musical interludes too.

Grant's script (yep, she wrote this one too) is smart but not in itself overly humorous; the dark comedy of the film is achieved via its wayward characters and a rising sense of panic. I wasn't quite as excited as some other reviewers about this film, but there's an overall atmosphere of sleaze and anarchy which is tightly controlled by Grant's assured direction, And Bettis is uncomfortably watchable as the nurse struggling to keep it all together.

The Honeymoon Phase (USA 2020: Dir Phillip G Carroll Jr) A young couple, Tom (Jim Shubin) and Eve (Chloe Caroll, trying on and not being very successful at adopting a British accent) apply to join a project, which invites married couples to stay locked up in a secure facility for 30 days under intense and constant CCTV scrutiny, with $50,000 offered to any couple who complete their stay. There's one snag: Tom and Eve aren't married. So they fake it, and get the gig. After their round table induction with the other couples (all men/women partnerships; no same sex marrieds here), the pair are whisked off, sedated, and when they wake up, Tom and Eve find themselves in a luxury apartment, complete with writer's room for the man of the house (Tom is a budding playwright) and a kitchen complete with dispenser that mysteriously produces anything desired by the couple; a device that remains unexplored in the movie. Oh and there's a holographic help assistant, who will later help with the division between the couple.

Almost from the start (with Tom aggressively having sex with Eve) the cracks start to show; the real problems start when Eve tempts Tom with some LSD laced cookies that she's managed to smuggle in - bad girlfriend! Tom becomes more withdrawn and faces writer's block, while Eve wonders what's happened to her boyfriend and becomes more afraid of him: if it sounds like a lift from The Shining's setup, you'd be dead right, and there's even an 'all work and no play' style scene later in the movie when Eve finds out what Tom has been working on. Oh yes, and Eve falls pregnant (resulting in a rapidly developing foetus that's just one more unexplained aspect of the movie).

The Cabin in the Woods style curtain whisking in the third act, which discloses the real nature of the experiment, sets the scene for a denouement which is both offensive and narratively stupid. But is it more offensive than the scene where pregnant Eve tries to self abort using a heated hair roller? Difficult to decide. The problem with The Honeymoon Phase is that it wants to pretend that it's throwing up moral condundrums when in reality it's just a well photographed but ham fisted sci fi drama which leaves a nasty taste in the mouth, and where women are depicted as victims or mothers. In the credits the director puts 'God' at the top of his 'thanks' list. So maybe this is really about punishment for Tom and Eve lying about not being married? Yeah, you're right. I didn't like it.

The Horror Crowd (USA 2020: Dir Ruben Pla) Pla's documentary is an overview of the contemporary US horror scene which, as the title suggests, its participants view as much as a community as an industry, helping each other along the way to keep the spirit of fright flicks alive and well.

Pla, an actor with a fair few credits in modern horror movies, is an amiable, passionate and appealing soul, low on sycophancy, whose doc was driven by the need to find out why the various filmmakers, writers and producers interviewed chose to work in the horror field. What seems to be almost universal factors are 'outsider' childhoods and liberal (or irresponsible, depending on how you look at it) parents who exposed the 'crowd' to life changing horror experiences at very young ages (The Exorcist at 6 years old, anyone?) which both scarred them mentally and set them on the path to a career in fright. 'Career' is probably the wrong word here as most of the movie making partnerships seemed to be a combination of happy accidents and random dream realisation, which kind of plays down the logistical nightmares associated with even the most modest independent feature.

The participants vary in age, with the veteran wing being represented by Russell Mulcahy (Highlander), Lin Shaye (Insidious) and Ernest R. Dickerson (The Walking Dead), and a range of voices including Chelsea Stardust (Satanic Panic), Mike Mendez (Tales of Halloween) and Brea Grant (12 Hour Shift, reviewed elsewhere here). What's apparent from the testimonies is that most came of age in the 1980s, so the films they were initially exposed to emanated from the local video store via said liberal parents; this may have something to do with the 80s leanings of much of their output. It's also notable that few movies older than the 1960s are mentioned (contrast this with interviews with people like Joe Dante and John Landis from the previous generation, who often cite the prevalence of older black and white movies screened in regular 'Creature Feature' slots on TV as their primary influences).

The director does a good job of getting the talking heads to open up although much of what is said is a little 'horror 101' (horror is cathartic; contemporary special effects allow more to be achieved these days, that sort of thing). This makes the piece overall feel a little conservative; where did those outsider kids go? But maybe that's a bit harsh. Although horror is much more mainstream these days, (and to echo good old Lord Shawcross, "the so-called new morality has too often the old immorality condoned") there are still many that would consider the product of these filmmakers rather twisted, and the comment from one about finding themselves typecast as a director of fright flicks by companies looking down on their product suggests these guys and gals are going to have to continue supporting each other a bit longer.

Playhouse (UK 2020: Dir Toby Watts, Fionn Watts) New Wave of the British Fantastic Film Horror writer Jack Travis (in a performance by William Hosltead that occasionally reaches Ken Russell levels of histrionics) has relocated both he and his daughter Bee (Grace Courtney) to a remote castle in Scotland, to plan his new venture: an immersive theatre experience which will draw the crowds. He has been researching the recent history of the castle; the story will be drawn from the real life incident where the onetime Laird of the place, an evil fellow, bedded his maid who became pregnant and subsequently fell downstairs to her death, and then bricked up his son in the cellar because said offspring, Alistair, knew the truth. Alistair however made a pact with the devil for revenge on his father. Jack is helped to realise the project by finding a painting of the laird, his son and the maid which he proudly displays in his study.

Meanwhile his nearest neighbour, Jenny (Helen Mackay) has moved back into a house left to her by his dead grandmother. Together with her useless boyfriend Callum (James Rottger) she's trying to decide whether to stay or go, but something seems to be holding her there. Back at the castle, as Jack develops his project, he becomes more and more obsessed with the dead laird. Or maybe the laird is possessing him? And slowly (very slowly in this case) the past begins to repeat, and revenge from beyond the grave can't be far away.

The genesis of this movie is a good example of art imitating life. As children the directors, who are brothers, lived in the film's Scottish castle location (Fenwick) and their father was a writer. Playhouse feels like a labour of love, which has clearly taken some time to develop. As such narratively it's often inconsistent, but it has a wealth of atmosphere. Despite its languid pace it builds up a number of creepy moments, and its gothic story harmonises well with the location. This won't be for everyone, but I really liked it.

Solitary (UK 2020: Dir Luke Armstrong) NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2020

When Isaac Havelock (Johnny Sachon) wakes up he's in a small, self contained chamber. The only other occupant is Alana Skill (Lottie Tolhurst) and he has no idea where he is. The room's single porthole gives a clue; they're both 150 miles above earth in a space capsule.

It's the year 2044 and both Isaac and Alana are prisoners, sentenced by the court not to a prison sentence, but transportation; a form of punishment originally discontinued in the UK in the 1850s, but reintroduced to deal with a population explosion and a dying planet. They are both part of the Samsara project, which uses prisoners to colonise and populate other worlds, easing the pressure on earth's resources. But there's a problem: the ship with which they were due to dock and continue their journey has exploded, and their capsule, along with a number of others, is currently drifting loose with no way for central control to bring it back to earth.

This is the core premise which Armstrong uses to build his movie, essentially a character study of two different people, thrown together and dependent on each other for survival. Of course the fact that they're both criminals means that the co-operative process isn't smooth sailing (although Isaac's past reveals him to be a man more sinned against than sinning). The craft's only other occupant is an invisible one: Eva, the onboard computer, with a voice that sounds like every automated banking service you've ever used (and cursed). External contacts are restricted to ground control, who intermittently messages them, a media company who want the skinny on what's really going on and who was responsible for the ship exploding, and the occasional call to Isaac's ex.

London in 2044: just on of the impressive effects in Solitary

Solitary, which started off life as a short film, is a sedate piece. In his debut feature Armstrong chooses slow story development over a flashier quick edit approach - often a fallback for directors working with limited set resources - and most of the movie comprises Isaac and Alana bickering within the constraints of their small capsule, and exploring various moral dilemmas and their own culpability; in fact the sci fi element is little more than a macguffin to create the background for their interactions. But Armstrong, whose background is in sfx, creates a very convincing London skyline twenty four years in the future, and also a backdrop of space and the IT within the capsule, which distract nicely from the limits of the small set.

While there are other cast members, largely included to flesh out Isaac and Alana's backstories, this is essentially a two hander (three if you count Kathryn Vinclaire, the voice of Eva) and Sachon and Tolhurst both do well with a script that is serviceable but never remarkable. Solitary isn't overly flashy, and its human concerns, favoured over spectacle and bombast, make it ideal for a small screen watch. It's to the director's credit that he managed to complete the thing during lockdown too.

Inspired Pictures will be releasing Solitary across multi-platforms and in all major retailers on Monday 31 August.

She Dies Tomorrow (USA 2020: Dir Amy Seimetz)

Actor/writer/producer/director Seimetz doesn't take the easy route in the films with which she's involved, whichever side of the camera she's on. Her directorial feature debut was 2012's Sun Don't Shine, a dark American road trip, and her acting choices have sometimes favoured complex or challenging pieces such as quasi sci fi pics Upstream Colour (2013) and The Reconstruction of William Zero (2014). And with Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, the directors of 2017 brain scrambler The Endless as producers, it's perhaps no wonder that Seimetz's second feature should be so elliptical, opaque and intense.

Amy (Kate Lyn Sheil) is a woman dealing with the joint trauma of a relationship breakup and the process of recovering from alcoholism. She has become obsessed with the idea that she will die the following day, and has already started to research funeral urns and, even more problematically, leather jackets (she's hoping that her skin can be turned into one so something of her can live on after she passes). She talks to her best friend Jane (Jane Adams) who does her best to convince Amy that she's mistaken, a difficult situation not helped by Amy drinking again. But later that evening a strange form of transference occurs and Jane too believes that she will also die the day after. In her pyjamas, and in a severely distracted state, Jane drives to her brother Jason's house (Chris Messina) where there's a party going on for his wife Susan (Katie Aselton), also attended by friends Brian (Tunde Adebimpe) and Tilly (Jennifer Kim). Looking very out of place among the smart couples, dressed in her nightwear, Jane tries to convince Jason of her conviction that she will die the following day. And while the others politely ignore her or, in Susan's case castigate her for wanting to be the centre of attention, it's not long before the partygoers also succumb to thanatophobic thoughts.

Seimetz could not possibly have predicted the recent worldwide Pandemic, but many of the themes of She Dies Tomorrow resonate with the feelings of isolation and confusion which most have experienced at some point over the last few months. Her editorial choices, chopping up and reinserting pieces of the story into various points of the movie, also play into a rising feeling of disorientation, as the viewer struggles with what is presented to them.

The first shot in the film, showing Amy's boyfriend Craig (Kentucker Audley) glimpsed through a half open door, angrily smashing things and repeating the words "It's over" and "there's no tomorrow," signify someone coping with a breakup. But a later scene puts the opening into perspective: it is Craig who first seems to contract the 'sickness'. So when we first meet Amy she has returned from being with him back to her own home, where the feelings have already passed to her from Craig. Later on, Amy is seen with other men; Jane also looks bound to have sex with her doctor, but any contact is brief and unfulfilled, and none of these scenes provide anything conclusive. Among some of the 'infected' is the desire to speak the truth and make peace with their lives before their departure; others just continue to remain confused.

What She Dies Tomorrow lacks in story it makes up for in atmosphere. Snatches of classical music records play and are abruptly shut off: Amy awakens from a series of nightmares, seemingly not knowing where she is; and Jane, who makes art from micro organisms trapped under glass, wanders through the film, lost and petrified. The more I think about She Dies Tomorrow, the more I see it as a hyper-unreal extension of normal thoughts and fears, and perhaps the ultimate plea for understanding and an acceptance that it's OK not to be OK. It's a bewildering piece; frustrating and mesmerising at the same time: so just like life then.


Blue Finch Film Releasing presents She Dies Tomorrow on Curzon Home Cinema and Digital Download from 28 August

NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2020 #7: Reviews of Tribal Get Out Alive (UK 2020), Ghosts of War (UK 2020), Killerhertz (UK 2020), The Complex: Lockdown (UK 2020), Killer Tattooist aka Skinned (UK 2020) and Coven of Evil (UK 2020)

Tribal Get Out Alive (UK 2020: Dir Matt Routledge) While I admit that the title of Routledge's debut feature sounds like a jungle based game show, and the poster suggests it's bare knuckle fighting all the way, the reality is, well a little bit of both, but also a very strong movie in its own right; inventive, wittily scripted and with believable characters that elevate it above a simple punchbag flick.

Caitlyn (action movie regular Zara Phythian) and Brad (Ross O'Hennessy, also often cast in fists and fury roles) are two ex soldiers who have opted for the easy life and are now employed as bailiffs, although being the film's leads they have an uncompromising way of dealing with their clients.

Carpeted for taking out a ring of drug dealers - it was supposed to be a simple eviction - without involving the police, Caitlyn and Brad are assigned to something hopefully less risky: clearing a site of squatters. The site, Kenning Farm, has transferred within the family from old man Kenning, who happily accommodated various waifs and strays who needed a roof over their head, to his son Richard (Thomas Dodd) who wants the site cleared. When they arrive at the farm they're greeted by a small but vocal group refusing to leave and chanting slogans like "pizza and hugs, not police thugs!" Brad and Caitlyn are joined by three security newbies, Tony (Connor Kinsley), Lawrence (Scott Knighton) and Jen (Charlene Aldridge), and collectively their job is to work their way through the farm buildings, securing the site and ridding it of any remaining squatters, while police clear the protesters.

But as always there's more going on than first appears. Richard is clearly searching for something left behind by his father, who he's described as a bit of a git, and as the team explore the farm they find a maze of underground tunnels (in reality the Williamson Tunnels beneath the City of Liverpool) and an abandoned lab. It turns out that the homeless people have been encouraged to hang out at the farm for a reason: Kenning pere has been experimenting on them with a green tinged serum (very Re-animator), designed to make them better, stronger people, but instead turning them into bloodthirsty cannibals (who either named themselves or are named 'The Tribe'): before long the team are up against the subterranean dwellers in a fight to the death.

OK there's not much to this movie and after the plot mcguffin is discarded it's just a series of fight scenes. But they're well staged, and Phythian and O'Hennessy give us some great chop socky action sequences. Tribal Get Out Alive isn't high on gore (although a knife through arm scene was pretty effective) but it's undemanding and occasionally tense. Better than it probably has the right to be then.

Ghosts of War (UK 2020: Dir Eric Bress) It's been sixteen years since Bress impressed with his 2004 movie The Butterfly Effect, but he's back with this head-scratchy-it-ain't-what-you-think-it-is war/horror film.

It's 1944, and a posse of US Airborne soldiers are making their way across Nazi occupied France, headed for a mansion/castle previously occupied by the Germans, where they've been ordered to relieve one battalion and wait until they too can be replaced. On their way they encounter and blow up a German tank, and their casual approach to despatching any survivors of the blast makes it clear that war has made them brutal and remorseless. The group are led by the rather green around the gills Chris (Brenton Thwaites) and include war torn Tappert (Kyle Gallner), psychotic Butchie (Alan Ritchson) and all round egghead Eugene (Skylar Austin).

On arrival at their point of destination, they are both amused and slightly alarmed to find that the departing soldiers can't get out of the gaff quick enough; one even leaves his backpack behind. On first inspection the place appears palatial, and they can't understand why the previous battalion had resorted to sleeping on the floor rather than using the beds: on the first night they find out. A series of strange noises alarms the men, convincing them that the house must already be occupied. But a search of all the rooms reveals nothing, although everyone separately sees visions out of the corner of their eyes; when they compare notes, it seems that the soldiers have been seeing members of a family - the house's original occupants - who were killed by the Nazis as part of their takeover of the house. And it seems as if that family now want revenge from beyond the grave.

There's a massive final reel twist to this film which I can't possibly reveal (and which critics seem to have been pretty good at keeping shtum about) which explains the temporal glitches encountered by the soldiers (including the old no-matter-where-we-go-we-end-up-back-here routine and one or two references to things that happened after 1944). But if Bress thinks that his rug pulling denouement makes the whole movie satisfying, I'm here to offer a contrary opinion. Certainly he fills it with lots of set pieces to keep things moving, and the cast are convincing enough in their roles (a wise choice to recruit Americans rather than Brits struggling with Yank accents); the house setting is also rather stunning (apparently the Vrana Royal Palace in Bulgaria) allowing the camera lots of room to move. And yet despite its busyness and stylish production, it still felt like a small film wearing big film clothes, and I remained unconvinced for much of the production.

Killerhertz (UK 2020: Dir Colin Bishop) Kyle (James Calloway) is a young American electronics genius, under pressure from his corporate dad to come up with an impressive idea. Kyle has relocated to England because the IT resources are preferable to the US. He's accompanied by his girlfriend Casey (Hayley Osborne) who's been having a bit of a tough time since her mother died six months previously. She also suffers from PTSD in the shape of hydrophobia; a fear of water occasioned by her hearing of her mother's death while surfing at the beach.

Kyle and Hayley rent a room in the flat owned by City boy Ed (Luke Hefferman) and an uneasy living relationship commences, with Hayley peripherally attracted to the young high flyer, and Kyle resenting the landlord's success. Kyle hasn't actually got much time for anything except trying to develop his concept of utilising radio frequencies to send high voltage power via WiFi; no, me neither, and the rest of the company to whom he pitches his idea feel similarly lukewarm about the idea. But while watching a programme about EVP late one night, and getting hold of Casey's phone, which includes photos and footage of her mother, Kyle arrives at the perfect application for the technology; he will create a portal to the other side, and bring back Casey's mum as proof.

The test is a success, although Kyle hasn't reckoned on Casey's distress at seeing her dead mother trapped in the confines of a device screen, seemingly in pain."It's just a bit freakopalooza for my dial" she says. Her concerns bring Ed to the rescue; he and Kyle fight, causing Casey's BF to fall on his own equipment; he dies after being electrocuted. Ed scarpers, fearful that although innocent any police investigation might harm his prospects for promotion, so it's left for Casey to face the music. Under police custody, it looks like an open and shut case, but there's a twist: Kyle is now the ghost in the machine (possibly even the National Grid), an omnipotent entity out for revenge.

Bishop's first feature since 2007's Death & Rejection sees the 47 year old director presenting a movie that's like a story out of that brilliant 60s US TV series The Outer Limits, but its effectively languid analogue score by Lars Hakansson also suggests movies like 1981's Evilspeak and the 1993 flick Ghost in the Machine. There are a lot of ideas in the movie which don't all come off, as the result of both budget limitations and running time; but Bishop mostly does an excellent job of keeping the pace up, as the action moves from Reading to London. There is, however, a lot of yakking which on occasion makes the movie sag, even if the director is to be congratulated for doing a lot with scarce resources, and even throwing in some photographic effects which were new to this reviewer. Not bad at all, and great title too, borrowed from Bishop's 1992 short of the same name (this guy's been around a while!) which was also scored by Hakansson who doubled up in the cast in that movie as a killer.

The Complex: Lockdown (UK 2020: Dir Paul Raschid) Dr Amy Tennant (Canadian Michelle Mylett), former war doctor in south east Asia, is now Head of Biotechnology for a massive pharma/research company, the K-Corp, headed up by Nathalie Kensington (Kate Dickie). Tennant is about to unveil plans for the development of nanotechnology which can be used to carry out medical procedures internally within the human body, removing the need for bulky and expensive equipment; it's application has big implications for treating wounded soldiers.

However on a London Underground train an Asian girl falls sick and vomits blood. She is Clare Mahek (Kim Adis), one of K-Corp's interns, and she has ingested a supply of the trial nanotech for reasons that, following one complicated reveal after another, unveil plots and counterplots. Amy is teamed up with her previous field co-worker (and former romantic partner), the wisecracking Rees Wakefield (Al Weaver) and together they are assigned to convey Mahek deep underground at K-Corp's headquarters, in a secure facility, where their orders are to protect the nanotech irrespective of the fate of the intern. With the three of them sealed up together, it becomes clear that others want the technology and mount a concerted attack on the facility. Tennant and Wakefield must try to escape while protecting their charge, while Kensington and her team view the scenario from the comfort of the office.

This is the film version of Raschid's video game of the same name released earlier this year. It's one of those interactive games where the player controls the action at key points by deciding from a range of options. Unfortunately this means a) that the story is regularly punctuated by moments where a decision is required and b) that Raschid has made the decisions already for the viewer, which takes away from the fun involved in playing it.

Having mentioned that, the movie flows well as a continuous story, and there are enough twists and turns along the way to keep things interesting. But because it's primarily a game the drama is limited, despite a credible cast (with the exception Okorie Chukwu as facility architect Parker Caplani, called in to advise on the structure of the place, who is quite terrible). It's basically a game of who you can trust, which changes fairly rapidly as the movie progresses. It's borderline whether it should even be included in the NWotBHF project at all - the nanotech and its effects are a pretty thin premise for the main event, which game wise is the strategic decision making of the player. But it looks smart and Dan Teicher's musical score provides some excitement. I'm not a gamer, but if viewing The Complex: Lockdown makes you want to rush out an investigate all the other story options available, then I suppose Raschid has done his work.

Killer Tattooist aka Skinned (UK 2020: Dir Terry Lee Coker) There can't be too many serial killer movies where the murderer bases their operations in an abandoned nightclub on top of an Essex shopping centre (the Mercury centre in Romford, location spotters). But such is the case with the central character of Coker's latest movie; meet Nathan (Lewis Kirk), half Patrick Bateman, half Ed Gein, a smoothie who by day moonlights in a tattoo parlour (which he pretends to own) and by evening preys on women who have visited the shop to get inked up, and who he has subsequently hit on, murdered and flayed for their 'skin illustrations' - as Ray Bradbury once put it - after which he dines out on selective parts of their bodies.

Nathan also has a sideline in selling mystery black boxes, via the dark web, to discerning punters who like a bit of danger in their life. One of his clients, Jack (Joel Rothwell, who also contributes some AOR songs to the soundtrack which Nathan likes to listen to on an old school portable radio while he goes about his work), films the unboxing of these things for his Vlog, and is constantly horrified that the contents usually include mangled dolls heads and, latterly, bits of Nathan's victims' skin stitched together. Oh and occasionally parts of bodies, such as a human heart with a USB inserted in it, containing snuff footage.

Into all this weirdness steps Eva (Noeleen Komisky) a cop who specialises in deep cover operations. She's assigned to approach Nathan as a person of interest in connection with the abduction of nine women. Posing as a Russian - we've previously seen her as a crack fiend, so she's obviously good at this - Eva makes an appointment at Nathan's tattoo parlour customer and comes onto him. He responds and the pair eventually become lovers. Nathan doesn't kill and eat her, suggesting some rare feelings of intimacy on his part. She even undergoes a little scarification (another of his sidelines) in the name of the role. But when Nathan rootles through her bag and finds out Eva's real identity, it all starts to go wrong.

Coker's directorial CV has to date been a rather singular one: a couple of gangster movies and no less than three films with 'Auschwitz' in the title. So Killer Tattooist is somewhat of a departure for him. It's a valiant attempt at a Brit cat and mouse serial killer film, but it's neither grisly enough (despite the butcher's shop quantities of chopped meat on display) nor tense enough to sustain interest. Kirk plays Nathan in a consistently restrained performance throughout, reasonably chilling in small doses but rather monochromatic over the course of a movie; even Stanley his pet crocodile (oh did I not mention that he has a pet croc to whom he feeds bits of his victims?) shows more latent ferocity. Killer Tattooist also feels oddly paced; Nathan's method of trap and kill is pretty much loaded upfront, so after a short time the movie has nowhere to go: the entrapment by Eva takes up too much of the film, and a final moment, which left turns into something more Satanic, can't save it.

Coven of Evil (UK 2020: Dir Matthew J. Lawrence) Rookie journalist Joe Lambert (John Thacker) writes his first piece for the national press, a somewhat sensational exposé of witchcraft and covens. Coven leader Evie (Samantha Moorhouse) tracks him down and calls him out about the article's inaccuracies. She invites him to spend some time with her fellow Wiccans, to understand more about their beliefs, on their remote farm.

When they arrive the rest of the coven, particularly Evie's husband Zander (a ferocious Craig R Mellor) is suspicious of the journalist. He's invited to participate in one of their rituals as coven member Talia (Lauren Ellen Wilson) is without an opposite number; like a square dance with robes. Kissi (Tracy Grabbitas), another group member, gives Joe a crafty drag on a joint, and before you know it, lightweight Joe is out of his gourd and having his way with Talia in front of the rest of them.

Somewhat embarrassed the morning after, Joe feels that he should leave, but the second sighting of a mysterious young girl in distress, Alice (Laura Peterson) makes his investigative hackles rise, and he decides to stay. Joe befriends and falls for Alice, who is Evie's sister and has been kept out of the coven's way, supposedly because she's been sick. Sadistic Zander regularly beats Alice with a belt for reasons which are initially unclear; it's important for him to keep her in line. But as the time of a solar eclipse approaches, a clearly crucial moment for the Wiccans, it becomes apparent that the coven may be less innocent than first thought, and that Alice and Joe may be in mortal danger.

Lawrence's second feature since his 2012 movie Tied in Blood is very much a film of two halves content wise: the first a kind of Wicca in the country social drama, and the second a ramped up chase and escape romp. Both halves have their darker side. In the first Zander's mistreatment of Alice (both actors very convincing in their roles) is hard to take; the second half, in which the real story unravels, is more straightforwardly nasty. And ok while some of the supporting cast don't convince, the movie is better for taking its time in establishing the characters. There are some impressive-on-a-small-budget folk horror moments, and Steve Kilpatrick's score is both varied and powerful, harking back to Jerry Goldsmith's work on 1976's The Omen in the more devilish moments. As always with these things some trims would have been good (100 minutes seems just a little too long when your resources are limited), but there's a pre-end credit scene which (and maybe it shouldn't have) put a smile on my face. Not nearly as bad as some critics have made out.

Host (UK 2020: Dir Rob Savage) NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2020

Six friends come together for what is assumed to be a regular Zoom chat (the film lasts, more or less, the duration of a non pay Zoom call). There's host Haley (Haley Bishop), app obsessed Emma (Emma Louise Webb), whose manipulation of her image presages more frightening manifestations later, Jemma (Jemma Moore), nervous Caroline (Caroline Ward), Radina (Radina Dandrova) and token guy, fun Teddy (Edward Linard) whose rather controlling girlfriend Jinny (Jinny Lofthouse) seems to be universally disliked by the rest of his friends and finds a way to absent him from most of the call.

But this call is different: the friends have agreed to carry out an online seance, brokered by an acquaintance of Haley's, Seylan (Seylan Baxter), who joins the call and sets up the terms of what they're about to do. They're all slightly nervous except sweary Teddy who suggests that they all down a shot every time the medium mentions the words 'astral plane.' As he's soon taken out of the picture courtesy of possessive Jinny, it's left to the remaining five friends to light candles and summon the spirits. Seylan encourages them to think of someone they knew who has departed; they've also been asked to bring an item to the call which they associate with that person (cue dolls and spooky musical boxes). Oh, and to be respectful to the spirits.

Things starts quietly, until Jemma feels pressure on her throat, and tells the group that she thinks the visiting spirit may be that of Jack, a kid from her school who was nice to her and who subsequently hanged himself. But Jemma confesses that she made the whole thing up, which is not only disrespectful but, the group learn a bit later, thoroughly dangerous, in that it opens the way for a trickster demon to come through from the other side. And sure enough, that is exactly what happens.

In fairness Savage's lockdown-inspired chiller doesn't put anything new on the table thematically. The horror genre has seen a few screen bound movies before, dating back to 2002's The Collingswood Story with its online psychic wreaking havoc, 2014's Open Windows, Unfriended from the same year and that movie's 2018 sequel Unfriended: Dark Web. Host also nods to the CCTV tensions of the Paranormal Activity movies, which pulled off the seemingly un-cinematic trick of inviting viewers to stare at footage of empty rooms, hoping yet not hoping to catch something moving in the shadows.

So what then makes Host, with its compact running time, one of the best fright flicks of the year? In part it's the believability of the piece; the ability to video conference has existed for many years, but the post-lockdown ubiquity of software like Zoom makes the film's setup immediately recognisable. The cast are also very capable; their ability to convey details of their characters and interrelationships with the others in a few lines of script - such as Radina's difficult relationship with her live in boyfriend and the friends' collective coolness towards Jinny - removes the need for clunky exposition which would have bogged the film down.

Equally importantly Rogers knows how to frighten. Cleverly he signposts the online trickery of the second half of the movie by having Emma messing around with FaceApp - with the the usual borderline grotesque results - and Radina creating a real time Zoom background of herself. Later, once the demon has entered the machine these tricks will be cruelly co-opted as the trickster makes its attacks. And the director manages a dazzling array of scary set pieces as the entity starts invading the girls' lives, and more importantly homes; in fact there's enough soundtrack and visual glitches to make you want to watch it all over again - if your nerves can stand it, that is. Yes, many of the ideas - lights blowing, chairs moving, bodies being thrown, a Polaroid camera's flash being used to illuminate the darkness - are not new, but Rogers manages to mount these scenes without blowing the fourth wall of the Zoom window structure; in fact the poor laptop camera quality actually enhances some of the spooky scenes. He also carefully leavens the horror with some humour: when one of the girls manages to gain entry to another's home near the end of the movie to check if her friend is still alive, when they finally find each other they move to hug, then remember the rules and elbow bump instead. And, during the seance, frantic knocking - perhaps supernatural in nature - at Seylan's house - turns out to be the Ocado driver delivering the medium's on line grocery order.

There have been a number of lockdown movies made in recent months, and doubtless there will be more, but Rob Savage has set the bar pretty high in a movie that is zeitgeisty and terrifying in equal amounts. See it, and then see it again for all the bits you missed first time round.

New Films Roundup #14: Reviews of Revenge Ride (USA 2020), The Rental (USA 2020), You Should Have Left (USA/UK 2020), Hunter's Moon (USA 2020), Aquaslash (USA 2020) and Two Heads Creek (Australia/UK 2020)

I realise that I haven't done one of these posts for well over a year. A round up of new movies (not Brit ones, that's reserved for another thread) heading for VoD, festivals and possibly physical media at some point this year.

Revenge Ride (USA 2020: Dir Melanie Aitkenhead) The all woman 'Dark Moon' gang have the phrase 'Suck My Pussy' etched into the back of their leather jackets, and manifesto wise they're definitely from the Valerie Solanas school of female/male inter-personal relationships. Entry to the gang is simple; you have to be abused by a man, and in Trump's America there's no shortage of applicants.

Headed by Trigga (Polyanna MacIntosh at her big gobbed, feral best), the gang's defacto deputy is Maggie (Serinda Swan), who has never had both feet under the table vis a vis the 'Dark Moon'ers: hell, they haven't even worked out a gang name for her. And it's this trust/mistrust deal between the two of them which drives the movie.

Into their midst comes Mary (Vannessa Dubasso), recently drugged and date raped at a party by one of her school's soccer jocks, Keegan (Jake Lockett) in cahoots with two other members of the team, and who magnifies the indignity by leaving her violated body - still in party clothes - on the school grounds. Mary wants in with the gang, and Trigga wants to wreak revenge, which the gang achieve by ambushing the jocks and branding their exposed arses with their 'Suck My Pussy' tag. Meanwhile Maggie has struck a friendship with Brian, also a member of the football team but not involved in the unpleasant stuff. And as the tension escalates between the 'Dark Moon' members and the guys, Maggie finds herself increasingly opposed to Trigga's tactics.

Guatemalan born Aitkenhead's second feature is an expanded version of her 2017 short Blood Ride, which included many of the same cast. It's an odd movie, and at just an hour and a quarter almost not quite a full film. It's a polemic piece; there's little build up to the action and although some backstory is provided by Maggie's flashbacks (she was also raped) and explanations provided by Trigga, the viewer is left in no doubt that the men are scum and the women the avengers. There are echoes of other biker movies here - the sassy 'The Maneaters' from Herschell Gordon Lewis' She Devils on  Wheels (1968) came to mind, or possibly Barbara Peeters' Bury Me an Angel (1971) but this is a very 21st century gang. At its core it's quite a moral piece, and not as lawless as it first appears. Serinda Swan makes the film, with a nuanced performance I wasn't expecting, and while the whole thing feels a little undercooked, it's certainly stylishly delivered.

The Rental (USA 2020: Dir Dave Franco) Franco's directorial debut is a return to old school hider in the house style thrillers that were old hat twenty years ago.

Four people - brothers Josh (Jeremy Allen White) and Charlie (Dan Stevens) and their respective partners Mina (Sheila Vand) and Michelle (Alison Brie) - splash out on a very expensive weekend cabin rental to celebrate Charlie and Mina's success in their joint business venture. So far so good, except Charlie and Mina are more than work buddies, a fact fairly obviously withheld from their other halves.

They're met at the property by the creepy Taylor (Toby Huss) who shows them round. Mina takes an instant dislike to him; she tried to book the rental first but her order was refused, whereas Charlie managed to book immediately, and she suspects that this may have something to do with her ethnicity (she is of Middle Eastern origin).

The four settle into the home and the audience is invited to speculate on the motives of the characters; for example, why does Michelle sit out of the first evening of recreational drug partaking even though she was the one who brought the stuff? And why, on the following morning where a big hike is planned, do Charlie and Mina cry off, both citing hangovers following their partying? Well the last one's obvious; they're planning a one time deal get it on party which can never be repeated (in further revelations we learn that Charlie has a history of this kind of thing) after canoodling in the hot tub the night before.

Later that day Mina takes a shower and notices that there's a tiny camera in the showerhead. Freaking out (as the shower was one of the locations of their lovemaking) she and Charlie reason that the creepy Taylor was responsible but opt to do nothing because of the fallout with Michelle and Josh. But when Michelle asks Taylor to come over to fix the now not working hot tub, a chain of events is set in motion which will endanger all four of them.

Despite a gorgeous setup, lush coastal photography and some serious acting chops on display, The Rental never really gets going, mainly due to a lukewarm script and a third act so predictable that even though it evokes the climax of so many suburban thrillers on the 1990s still feels unwanted. The movie really has nothing to say beyond the usual moral warning about the impact of breaking the seventh Commandment (you know, the adultery one), and its pedestrian pacing and lack of any tension make this one to miss.

You Should Have Left (USA/UK 2020: Dir David Koepp) Ah, movies whose titles serve as warnings; don't you love 'em? Koepp's latest film, his first since the much derided Mortdecai back in 2015, attempts to conjure up the spookiness of his 1999 flick Stir of Echoes by bringing back that movie's star, Kevin Bacon (who doesn't seem to have aged much in the intervening 20 odd years) and sticking him in a story which is as preposterous as it is tedious.

Bacon plays a wealthy American screenwriter, Theo Conroy, who has remarried after the self inflicted death - via pills and a bathtub - of his first wife. Mrs C number 2 is a much younger version, Susanna (Amanda Seyfried), an ambitious actress. Theo is lying low following the investigation of wife number 1's death, in which he was implicated by the police; the resultant high profile case ended in a trial by public that found him guilty in their eyes even though he was officially exonerated. This puts a strain on the marriage and also on Susanna's young daughter Ella (Avery Tiiu Essex). So now Theo skulks around in splendid isolation while Susanna tries to carve out a career. In a telling scene he tries to visit her on the set of a movie she's filming, but is denied access because she forgot to obtain permission - meaning he has to wait to one side and hear her while she's involved in a noisy sex scene; it's an embarrassing moment, made more so by the fact that afterwards they have sex in the car, presumably so he can regain some self esteem.

Susanna is cast in a movie to be shot in the UK, and to relieve the tensions within the household Theo arranges to rent a house in Wales in advance of the shooting dates, to give the whole family a bit of R&R. But cast aside any thoughts of a quaint cottage in the valleys: the brutalist monstrosity they rent looks closer to Frank Lloyd Wright's Ennis House in California, the exteriors of which were utlised in the 1959 movie House on Haunted Hill. And the property continues to be imposing on the inside too, although the Conroys love it. But, as usual in these things, it's not long before the cracks in the family start to show, and before long they're all having separate nightmares, where an elderly figure called Stetler stalks their dreams. Theo, who before all this was practising meditation and keeping a journal of his thoughts - which mainly comprise his annoyance with Susanna - finds some hastily scribbled words in the book, which read "Leave you should leave go now." He also dreams of a door where there shouldn't be one, which leads to an older part of the house; it's an area he can't find when awake. The family grow to hate the place, but departure becomes tricky after Theo and Susanna have a big fight and she leaves with the car to stay in town. Theo and Ella are trapped, and the house seems to be waking up around them.

While this is undeniably a great looking film - although those oh so west coast interiors do not convince that the house is actually in Wales, despite the Welsh extras in the local shop - narratively it's fraught with problems. It starts off with a rather improbable family set up (irascible unappealing older guy with trophy wife who clearly can't be trusted) involved in a plot which gradually deconstructs time and place like a bigger budget version of a Sapphire and Steel episode. Koepp seems too in love with his setting to worry about audience identification with the characters: it's left to Avery Tiiu Essex to offer the only performance with which we can sympathise. Theo's connection with Stetler is pretty much signposted from the get go, and the movie's final reveal feels like a plot device just to end the thing. Blumhouse are still one of the most reliable companies producing modern horror films, but there's a reason this one will be going straight to VOD.

Hunter's Moon (USA 2020: Dir Michael Caissie) In terms of movies about hulking creatures stalking the woods, Bigfoot seems to win hands down subject matter wise over the humble werewolf. Caissie's first feature (and at times it does feel like it) eschews most of the standard werewolf standbys - the torment of the creature, the hunt to kill it, the human/beast dichotomy, hell even a close up look of the thing for 90% of the movie - in favour of something a little more rambling but nevertheless not without interest.

Parents Bernice and Thomas Delaney (Amanda Wyss and Jay Mohr) and their three daughters, the rather forward Juliet (Katrina Bowden) and younger siblings Lisa (India Ennenga) and Wendy (Emmalee Parker), are moving from the city to the country, a decision that remains unpopular with the three girls. Mum makes the best of things, but Thomas is rather inscrutable. When they make a convenience store stop en route, one of the staff, Bill (Will Carson) discloses that the house they're about to live in was previously occupied by a serial killer, news which doesn't provoke the gasps of horror you'd expect from the new arrivals. We already know this because we've seen the killer at work in the prologue, drugging and strangling a woman, before burying her in the woods and then getting attacked by an unknown something.

Scarcely have the family settled in to the home when Bernice and Thomas decide to take a little trip - destination unclear - leaving the girls to amuse themselves for a few days. Meanwhile it seems that Bill, whose rugged good looks had instantly attracted Juliet back at the store, is a bad 'un and is mates with the town's other hoodlums. Together the gang decide to play surprise visit on the house that the Delaney's have moved into. But if they were expecting to wreak terror on those inside, well let's just say that the surprise is on them.

Hunter's Moon is a werewolf movie that is rather afraid to play its (hairy) hand for much of the picture. But there's a lot of fun in the build up; the bad guys are cartoonish in their nastiness and most of the film sets up the expectation that they're going to get theirs. The motivations of the three girls, vaguely complicit in the boy's sexual attentions, demure but calculating, remains unclear until the last five minutes of the movie - and even at 80 minutes that feels like a long time to wait. Thomas Jane, an actor who excels in unpleasant characters, turns up as a sheriff without a name, and continues not to play against type. The movie is rather all over the place, and the werewolf reveal makes you realise why it's remained hidden, but Hunter's Moon remains watchable and a final twist at the end provides a satisfying coda and possibly a sequel.

Aquaslash (USA 2019: Dir Renaud Gauthier) Vimeo lists Aquaslash's director as 'a French Canadian guy from Montreal raised on 'The Price is Right', 'CHiP's', 'Bionic Woman', 'The Streets of San Francisco', 'The Incredible Hulk', 'Miami Vice' and 'Saturday Night Live.' His first film in the English language, Aquaslash has to be one of this year's more inspiring movie titles, even if he may be unaware that the vernacular suggests this might be a film about having a piss in a swimming pool.

It's not. But that might be preferable to this tosh, a weak, poorly imagined homage to 1980s slasher films. So we join Valley Hill school's Class of 2018, who have organised a celebratory weekend at the Wet Valley Water Park, looking forward to 48 hours of, as one character puts it, the 3 C's: "Courtesy, Control and Consent."

In a prologue a couple of the park workers are hacked up by a unseen (obviously) stranger, caught unawares in a bit of nighttime how's your father. So we know from the get go that there's a killer on the loose, much as there was 35 years previously at the same venue. And while the kids begin letting their hair down and stripping to their skimpies, we're introduced to the usual range of red herrings: there's Conrad Carter, the attraction's handyman who's worked there since 1984: Priscilla, from the Class of 1992, and who was renowned at school for popping young boys' cherries; her husband Paul, who owns the place but maybe looking to sell; and Michael, father of one of the students, who for some reason has the plans of the park in his car, and has been seeing Priscilla on the side.

Meanwhile Josh has been getting it on with his former squeeze Kim (they're not suspects, they're under 30) which angers Tommy, Kim's current boyfriend (who's also under 30 but may be a subject because of his near psychotic temper). And while the whole camp lights up with Josh's 80s tinged band 'The Blades', who do a mean cover of Corey Hart's 'Sunglasses at Night', the killer stalks the darkness, taking out a few staff and, sabotaging The Sea Snake, one of the larger water tunnels in the park, by inserting two crossed blades to slice the hapless bathers who ride the chute.

And this is (one of) the main problem(s) of the movie, which only runs a shade over 70 minutes: nearly thirty of them are devoted to the build up to to the inevitable diced teens scene. To be fair it's a well staged and pretty gruesome set piece, but it really feels like the rest of the movie was constructed around it. There isn't even a Scooby Doo unmasking at the end; the killer is revealed in a slightly confusing flashback to 1984 (filmed using a scratched movie filter to emphasise that the 1980s were, like, a long time ago man). To be fair, if the movie was aiming to pay homage to the endless slasher movies of the 80s which promised so much and delivered so little, it did its job well. Add in some unwanted comedy, far too many characters for a film of this length and some decidedly long in the tooth looking students, and you have one not very good film. The Corey Hart cover stays with you much longer than anything else in the movie.

Two Heads Creek (Australia/UK 2019: Dir Jesse O'Brien) Here's an amiable, gently offensive and ultimately gory horror comedy which starts off in the sink towns of England and ends up in the Australian outback.

Norman (Jordan Waller) is a young man coping with a problem; his Polish mother Gabriella has just died and the butchers shop mum used to run faces daily racist abuse from the local tearaways. Facing an uncertain future and with no desire to take over the meat trade, two things impact on his next life choice: the arrival of his sister Anna (Kathryn Wilder) and a discovery that Gabriella wasn't their real mother (Norman and Anna don't look in the least bit Polish); they were handed over to her at some point by their real mum, Mary (Kerry Armstrong), who now lives in Australia.

Anna and Norman sell the shop and use the proceeds to travel down under - specifically Two Heads Creek, which is in a part of the continent that recalls Wolf Creek or Wake in Fright - in the heart of ocker country. Already feeling like fish out of water, they're additionally bemused when their transfer bus to the town, guided by the over the top Apple (Helen Dallimore) is full of Vietnamese people. And when they arrive it seems they're too late to see mum: they're told that Mary has recently popped her clogs, although the townsfolk are shifty about when she died and an accident at the funeral discloses that someone very un-Mary like occupies the coffin. Anna and Norman realise that something's clearly afoot when arrangements are made for them to leave the town quickly: the audience pieces together what's happening pretty quickly, not least that the folk of Two Heads Creek are partial to a particular type of meat, and that the supply of that food - the incoming Vietnamese - handily deals with one of the Oz government's biggest immigration headaches.

There's no denying that Two Heads Creek is fitfully funny and full of well observed characters: as Apple Dallimore is a treat, whether marshalling the cannibalistic troops or belting out a decent karaoke version of Skyhooks' most famous song 'Horror Movies' on the karaoke as part of the town's Australia Day celebrations; and veteran actor Don Bridges has a great turn as the sweary town elder Uncle Morris.

But Two Heads Creek's descent to Peter Jackson style comedy splatter towards the end, while showing off some nifty practical effects, is the least surprising part of the whole enterprise, and seems a long way from the wisecracking opening section, the interplay between Norman and Anna giving us the film's best lines. This is a movie probably better appreciated with a crowd than a lone watch, where the social commentary came across as not as sharp as it should have been, and the unevenness of the plot became more apparent.

Dark Eyes Retrovision #23: The Woman in Black (UK 1989: Dir Herbert Wise)

Christmas Eve, 1989: Sunday night, and at 9.30 UK viewers tuned to ITV - 'the people's channel' - for a traditional ghost story. Older TV watchers would recognise this as a return to a televisual seasonal treat once offered up by the BBC via their regular Lawrence Gordon-Clark helmed 'Ghost Stories for Christmas,' which ran between 1971 and 1978, although on original broadcast only one of those, 1972's A Warning to the Curious, had actually been broadcast on 24th December.

Herbert Wise's telefilm was an adaptation of a book of the same name written by Susan Hill and originally published in 1983. The original print of the novella (it ran to 160 pages) was presented as looking a bit like a children's book, including illustrations by John Lawrence, a noted artist whose work was used in books aimed at younger readers. Inside the text was anything but.

While the book sold well and consistently, it rose again in the greater public conscience after a stage adaptation transferred to the West End in January of 1989 (it has since gone on to be the second longest running production in London after 'The Mouse Trap'). But the play's fame was not at that time established, and so the screening of the Wise adaptation wasn't accompanied by much fanfare: it sort of crept onto TV screens, capturing many unawares.

With a screenplay by Nigel (Quatermass) Kneale (who had some experience of the seasonal ghost story in his scripting of the 1972 BBC play The Stone Tape, directed by Peter Sasdy and broadcast on the evening of Christmas Day) whose adaptation follows Hill's novella fairly closely, The Woman in Black is a what would now be referred to as a slow burn piece.

Arthur Kidd (Adrian Rawlins), a young solicitor from London, is asked by his firm to travel to Crythin Gifford in the north East of England, to settle the estate of the late Alice Drablow including her property, Eel Marsh House, which is situated at the end of a coastal causeway which becomes cutoff at high tide.

Once in the village, Kidd becomes aware that the residents of Crythin Gifford refuse to talk about Mrs Drablow or her house. At her sparsely attended funeral, he sees a gaunt woman, wearing widow's weeds, standing at the back of the church, although she disappears when he steals another look at her. The woman is again seen in the graveyard; she looks both emaciated and intensely angry.

Pauline Moran as The Woman in Black

Kidd is driven to Eel Marsh House by local driver Keckwick (William Simons) and, on his initial inspection of the property, discovers a photograph of someone who looks just like the strange woman he has seen. After returning to the house, this time armed with a protective dog, Spider, given to him by local landowner Sam Toovey (Bernard Hepton), Kidd hears the terrifying sound of a pony and trap falling into the water, and a child and woman screaming; fearful that people have been hurt, when the mist which has suddenly surrounded the house clears, he realises that they were phantom noises; it's a scene aurally - and eerily - replayed a number of times while at the house. Kidd is convinced that he's witnessing supernatural events; and so gradually, while sorting through the house's belongings (including an abandoned nursery) he pieces together the story about Mrs Drablow, her sister and a boy born out of wedlock, and the woman in black who haunts the area.

I've never regarded Nigel Kneale as a particularly strong writer of dialogue, and saw his strength in stories and concepts more than characters. But here his script gradually layers pieces of the story on top of each other and delays the sight of the supernatural entity for as long as possible. Combined with the carefully dressed sets and a handful of UK character actors who may not have much time on screen but provide important local colour to the story ("thumbnail sketches of strangeness" is how Mark Gatiss refers to them on the Blu Ray's commentary track), Wise's film is a superbly photographed exercise in tension and restraint, which closes like a vice around the unwitting solicitor Kidd.

Of course anyone who has heard of this adaptation (as opposed to the 2012 Hammer version with Daniel Radcliffe as the solicitor) will probably be aware of a certain scene listed by most horror/supernatural fans as one of the most frightening things seen on TV ever: and they're not wrong. But without giving away any details, the scene also demonstrates that the ghost is not tied to the house (a fact made clear in the film's final moments) and becomes more and more vengeful as the story progresses. But each sighting of the spectre is separately alarming, the early ones more so for being in broad daylight.

This stunning new transfer of the film, unavailable for many years as a result of a perfect storm of prosaic reasons rather than, as thought for many years, being suppressed by Hill because she didn't like it (she didn't at the time, but has warmed to it since apparently), is much better than any previous official (or unofficial) release, and certainly an improvement on seeing it on a 16" screen, my medium for the first watch in 1989. It's a remarkable piece, from a director not known for working in this genre: and, yes, it's truly terrifying.

The worldwide Blu-ray debut of The Woman in Black is available exclusively from the Network website on 10 August.