Films from Grimmfest 2020 Part 1: Reviews of Anonymous Animals (France 2020), Stray (Russia 2019) , Alone (USA 2020), The Special (USA 2020), Unearth (USA 2020), They Reach (USA 2020), Ropes (Spain 2019) and H P Lovecraft's The Deep Ones (USA 2020)

Over the course of two epic posts, I'll be bringing you 15 films from this year's Grimmfest film festival, all the way from sunny Manchester. Except of course like most fests Grimmfest have gone online this year, giving us landlocked southern types a taste of how they do things up north. So here's the first eight: 

Anonymous Animals (France 2020: Dir Baptiste Rouvere) At its heart Rouvere's extraordinary debut feature uses the 'Planet of the Apes' movies as its jumping off point, reverse evolving humans and animals so that people are the hunted and farmed, and animals are in control.

In a forest in rural France a man, shirtless and with his back covered in welts, is chained to a tree, before a passing van collects him, to be taken back to a holding area in the middle of an otherwise abandoned farm. Elsewhere a group of people are rounded up while in the wild, and taken back to another part of the same farm where they are held in cattle pens. In each case the 'farmers' are human in form but with the heads of stags, dogs and bulls.

The lone man is fed like an animal, clearly being trained up for some forthcoming event (the reveal of that event is the awful climax of the film). The others wait in their pens, docile and frightened; one attempts escape which does not end well. 

There is of course no happy end to this movie, mercifully short at just over an hour. Scenes are short and abruptly cut, and the contrast between the cruelty meted out to the humans and the film's beautiful and mournful French countryside setting, as well as its dialogue free approach (the 'manimals' grunt but the humans remain silent throughout) further unseats the viewer; Damien Maurel's soundtrack, a mixture of drones and sympathetic strings, is also superbly eerie. Anonymous Animals's point is made pretty bluntly and relentlessly (like if PETA were to make a feature film) and although modestly budgeted it's one of the most uncomfortable movies I've seen this year.

Stray aka Tvar (Russia 2019: Dir Olga Gorodetskaya) Gorodetskaya's debut feature nods in the direction of 'moppet from hell' movies like 'The Omen' (1976) and the previous year's 'Demon Witch Child' but this tale of grief and loss has a bigger emotional heft than both. 

Polina (Elena Lyadova) and her husband Igor (Vladimir Vdovichenkov) are a broken couple; their eight year old son Vanya went missing, presumed dead, and Igor blames himself. Traumatised by the loss in their lives, made worse by the apparent lack of a body, the pair make the rather hasty decision of attempting to adopt a child at the local orphanage. Once there Polina finds the selection process too upsetting; but wandering in the grounds she spies an almost feral kid, whose keeper has just shot himself. Polina has taught traumatised children in the past and Igor is a doctor, so between them they have the coping skills. Their initial request to adopt is refused, but later they see the child walking alone along a road and take him home; they’re aware that they are breaking the law, but the need to care is too strong for them to resist.

But despite his feral ways - eating meat raw from the fridge, growling at his protectors - Polina develops affection for him, and through her grief comes to believe that this is in fact her returned child; she even names him Vanya, after her little boy, and they seem to be about the same ages. Igor is less impressed and feels that the replacement Vanya is actually trying to copy their son to fit in (which is odd as the two boys have never met).

But when Polina discovers she's pregnant (something she was sure would never happen again), her interest in Vanya wanes; in return Vanya becomes jealous; and that jealousy turns his mind to murder and revenge.

I really liked this rather convoluted and atmospheric film: it offered up way more than the standard evil child setup I was expecting, although its glacial pace won't be for everyone. I won't give the game away but the explanation behind the child's behaviour is both tragic and intriguing. As 'Vanya' Sevastian Bugaev turns in a performance of incredible ferocity for one so young, his nightmarish outrages only marred by a couple of scenes of ropey CGI. Lyadova and Vdovichenkov are also superb as parents consumed by grief who have lost the art of consoling each other, and the Russian winter, which provides the backdrop to the events, is impressively chilly, reflecting the strange twists and turns of the narrative.

Alone (USA 2020: Dir John Hyams) Whoa, nelly! Hyams's precise, unwavering exercise in haute tension thrills is the story of Jessica (Jules Willcox), a woman recovering from the shock of her husband's suicide, still deeply in grief, and who decides to get the jump on her parents' offer of assistance with moving, packing all her stuff into a rented trailer. She's heading north, final destination unknown, although her long trip takes her from the city to the beautiful Oregon forests. Clearly raw and vulnerable, she's in no state to deal with a bit of white line fever action, one of those intentionally slowpoke drivers who only speed up when you try and overtake them. What she isn't expecting, the following morning, is that the driver of that car would track her down to the motel she stayed in overnight and try and apologise for his behaviour. Later on she runs into him again when he asks for roadside assistance for his supposedly broken down car. She wisely swerves the option to offer help, which results in him catching up with her again that night in a trucking lot; she drives away, runs her vehicle into a ditch, after which he finds her again, breaks into her car, assaults and sedates her.

What follows, when she wakes up alone in a room, realises his (initial) sexual intentions and finally effects an escape, is a sustained chase movie utilising the anonymity and isolation of the dense Oregon forest to enhance the seemingly impossible task of outrunning her pursuer.

A remake of the 2011 Swedish film Försvunnen aka Gone, with a script provided by Mattias Olsson, one of the directors of the original movie, Alone breaks its narrative into five 'acts': The Road, The River, The Rain, The Night and The Clearing, but the division of scenes is for our benefit only: Jessica's ordeal is relentless.

Jessica's unnamed attacker (Marc Menchaca) defies the normal backwoods killer stereotype; he looks pretty harmless, but his ability to get under her skin shows the level of his accomplishment, clearly realised through practice: "Do you think this is the first time someone has asked that?" he questions when Jessica pleads for release. He's a family man too: a fact that will eventually lead to his undoing.

For the most part this is a formulaic thriller which ticks all the genre boxes: mobile phones that offer faint hope; Jessica sustaining 'first blood' (a branch embedded in her foot) thus giving her an immediate disadvantage; a passing hunter, who we know will either be an accomplice or an early victim, appears too early in the movie to be her salvation. But Jessica's backstory makes her interesting, and as the film progresses we see not so much a 'final girl' figure but a woman reconciling her emotional grief laden ennui with the need to stay alive.

Alone is tightly shot and edited, and the tension is at times agonising, assisted by a very organic sounding score by Nima Fakhara. I'm not sure whether in 2020 I wanted to see a vulnerable woman being stalked for 90 plus minutes but there's no denying the quality of the film, and Hyams's ability to make the Oregon countryside look both beautiful and hostile is to be applauded.

The Special (USA 2020: Dir B. Harrison Smith) Smith's rather clever movie takes a fairly preosterous central conceit and makes a very watchable movie around it.

Jerry (Davy Raphaely) is persuaded by his friend and work colleague Mike (Dave Sheridan) into going to a brothel as revenge for Jerry's wife Lisa (Sarah French) cheating on him. Mike has clearly used the place before and makes Jerry put a bag over his head to keep the location secret. A sign outside the joint reads 'psychic': the place is run by Madame Zhora (Susan Moses). Mike suggests that Jerry should ask for 'the special' and Jerry is surprised that when he's alone in the room 'the special' turns out to be a large box with a glory hole and a written instruction 'stick it in here' (we've already seen the box lovingly constructed by unknown hands in the credits sequence). Jerry obliges and the experience causes such ecstasy that he immediately wants more, despite Mike telling him that "once is enough." 

Jerry's guilt in finding out a) that Lisa was not unfaithful, she was organising a surprise present with a local salesman and b) that she's pregnant does not stop him wanting more of 'the special.' His desire for experience leads to murder and increasing deception as he gives himself over to pleasure at any cost.

The Special feels like early Henenlotter (specifically 1988's Brain Damage and to some extent his 2008 sleaze fest Bad Biology) and it's good to see a return to 1980s style body horror and practical effects. Raphaely gives a great and very physical performance as the increasingly unhinged Jerry. You can probably work out the ending, but it's fun (and more than a little wince inducing) getting there; Smith should be congratulated for pulling off (ahem) a film as potentially silly as this but doing it totally straight faced. Excellent work!

Unearth (USA 2020: Dir John C. Lyons, Dorota Swies) Films depicting blue collar communities in the USA cannot help but be refracted through the joint prisms of US politics and its attendant economic policies. The two families at the centre of Unearth both own farms which have seen better days (the movie was filmed in north-western Pennsylvania, giving it a great sense of place). George Lomack (Marc Blucas) has parcelled some of his for sale and also diversified into the auto repair business, his economic situation worsened by a recent divorce; one of his daughters, Kim (Brooke Sorenson) has had a baby while still a student, and the extra mouth to feed is an additional burden, while Kim's elder sister Heather (Rachel McKeon) dreams of leaving, and her self harming shows her levels of anguish. George has a tendency to drink and also to ramp up the costs of his auto services, which unsurprisingly loses him customers.

Across the way the Dolan family don't have it any easier, having recently sold off their dairy business. Presided over by Kathryn (Adrienne Barbeau getting a rare opportunity to sink her teeth into a dramatic role) whose husband recently passed, and who lives with son Tom (P.J.Marshall), wife Aubrey (Monica Wyche) and Tom's sister Christina (Allison McAttee) who has designs on arts school, and is also having a fling with George.

It's a white working class community with options closed off, so when a company called Patriot Exploration turn up on their doorsteps with an offer of money in return for fracking rights, the Lomacks seem to have found the answer to their problems.

One year later, and the fracking process has destroyed what little dignity the families had, rendering their homesteads filthy and with incessant drilling shredding their nerves. George has apparently sobered up and has a job in a cafe, but there's no apparent increase in wealth. To add insult to injury the company have been less than honest about how much money will be seen by the family and the fracking has triggered an unspecified environmental disturbance. It seems a breaking point has been reached.

The eco horror of the piece, which waits patiently until almost the last reel, therefore feels less like an attack and more like the delivery of some kind of divine judgment. Be warned, there are some shocking moments here, made more so by the fact that the characters have been so well - if subtly - rendered: their fate feels doubly tragic. Unearth is by no means a perfect film; it feels like two movies grafted onto one at times. But it's an angry piece; and if it fails to offer any easy answers, it's politically powerful as well.

  

They Reach (USA 2020: Dir Sylas Dall) The inspiration of Stranger Things, which fetishised a period of time - the 1980s - before most of its target audience were born, is all over Dall's debut feature. But the director, born in 1986, has decided to set his film even further back. 

It's 1979 (although a brief prologue covers events ten years earlier) and the Daniels family are recovering from the shock of the death of their teenage son. While mum and dad are separately traumatised, daughter Jessica (Mary Madaline Roe) is left to cope on her own, her only friends being social outcasts overweight Sam (Morgan Chandler) who - of course - has a crush on Jess, and food obsessed Cheddar (Eden Campbell). When Jess visits a local junk shop, she comes away with a load of rubbish which she hopes will aid her school science project. Among the stuff is an old reel to reel tape recorder, which we've already seen in the 1969 prologue where it was involved in the exorcism of a young boy. Fiddling around with the machine, Jess cuts her hand, and her blood drips on to the recorder. This sets off a train of events including a resurrected demon, a series of deaths and the need for a sacrificial victim.

Dall's film is almost entirely centred on the trio of young people; any adults present are mainly two dimensional authority figures, with the exception of stern librarian by day and white witch by night Marybeth Moonstar (a superb turn from Steffanie Foster Gustafson) who aids the trio in understanding what they're dealing with. The problem is that I'm not really the target audience for this kind of thing, where the thrill is less about the story - it's pretty paper thin - than identifying with the geeky friends. Although as a teen movie the F-bombs are let off with surprising frequency and the gore is occasionally a little on the heavy side.

But where the movie scores is its look: Dall chucks everything into the mix to get that 70s vibe. Chopper-style bikes, gas guzzling autos, Polaroid cameras; they're all present and correct, and the time stands still town of Enumclaw, Washington is used as a location. Even the soundtrack is pastiche; instead of using original sounds from the period (for which rights would probably have been cost prohibitive) the director has used faux retro 70s bands like 'Smokey Brights', 'Hobosexual' and 'Prom Queen.' Don't get me wrong, it works, but I could have done with more horror and less attention to detail. 

Ropes aka Prey (Spain 2019: Dir José Luis Montesinos) It's been a festival of debut features this year; and here's another one. Elena (Paula del Rio) is a young woman, disabled following a car accident in which her sister Vera, a promising gymnast, died, with Elena at the wheel. As a result she is in a world of emotional pain, even going so far as to try to end her own life. Her suicide attempt was prevented by her father Miguel (Miguel Angel Jenner) whom Elena despises, citing his drunkenness and failure to prevent the death of her mother.

Miguel, not a well man himself, has brought quadriplegic Elena home to live with him, and is in the process of modifying the house for her needs. He's also acquired a dog, Athos, to assist her. But when Miguel collapses and dies of a heart attack in the grounds, with Athos outside too, Elena is left trapped within. But it gets worse: before you can say 'Cujo' the dog turns rabid as the result of a bite from an infected bat, and tries to break into the house. Without the use of hands or feet, wheelchair bound Elena must summon what resources she can to ward off the frothy hound, while all the time battling with the guilt over her sister's death.

There is no doubt that Ropes (the title refers both to the aids that her father has attached to the house's drawer handles, and the emotional ties that hold Elena down) is a well mounted feature. Obviously low budget, and with a small cast dominated by an impressive turn from del Rio as Elena and, in some scenes, her sister Vera, it manages to do quite a lot within its fairly basic setup. Sadly its soap opera elements gradually drown out the tension established by the initial beast vs human setup, to the point where the second half of the movie largely concentrates on Elena dealing with her own demons. Ropes is just a little too neatly obvious in its placing of elements within the story that will be returned to later on, and the mechanical feel of the narrative robs the movie of the atmosphere it initially establishes. What a shame.

H P Lovecraft's The Deep Ones (USA 2020: Dir Chad Ferrin) Ferrin's movie - and note the inclusion of the author in the title, just so you know - finds a middle aged couple, Alex (Gina La Piana) and Finnish Petri (Johann Urb) travelling to the California coast for a week in a beachside Airbnb; the couple are getting over Alex's recent miscarriage, and are here to get re-connected again. Apartment owners Russel (Robert Miano) and pregnant Ingrid (Silvia Spross) welcome the pair and explain about the Solar Beach community that grow their own food and make their own wine. When they're left on their own Alex and Petri do a little re-connecting, but their lovemaking is spied on courtesy of a hidden camera. 

The following day, with Alex feeling unwell, Russel and Ingrid invite Petri onto their boat, and after plying him with marijuana and hypnotising him, Alex participates in a weird ritual that involves sucking on a tentacle that appears from Ingrid's lady parts. After this a more docile Petri becomes 'one of them': a rift gradually opens up between Alex and her husband, and the arrival of Alex's sarcastic friend Deb (Jackie Debatin) only serves to highlight the weirdness of the community, who they encounter at a party. But the Solar Beach residents answer to a higher fishy power, and Alex begins to fear for her life.

In Lovecraft lore, the 'Deep Ones' are an ocean-dwelling race, with an affinity for mating with humans. Sounds familiar? Well readers may have seen the 1980 movie Humanoids from the Deep, which covered pretty much the same ground, although without the Lovecraft context. And honestly, despite the credit of Hengi Hawk as the 'R'Lyehian Dialogue Coach' - which does at least show commitment to the cause - throwing in random references to Dagon and Cthulhu don't really make this one a major contribution to the writer's cinematic canon.

The Deep Ones scores higher in its quirky cast of characters. Russel has an oily, slightly creepy quality (like a more over the top Terence Stamp) and visiting doctor, the trans Dr Gene Rayburn (Timothy Muskatell) has an overbearing bedside manner which is the opposite of comforting. I liked Alex's friend Deb too, although her withering assessment of the community ensures that she's bound to be an early showers character. "I've been to Burning Man twice, but these people go way beyond.." she concludes.

Ultimately, The Deep Ones sets itself up well but then doesn't really know where to go with it. The threat from the community is pretty much announced in the first twenty minutes, and with a small budget there was never going to be a final reel set piece. It's a watchable enough film, but not much more. 

Incoming! Heads up for new Brit horror feature The Invoked directed by David Cave

At DEoL we're always keen to promote exciting new projects. Newcastle-on-Tyne based David Cave, who describes himself on his website as a writer, filmmaker and poet, is putting together his first feature The Invoked, following on from a series of well received short films, including the recent Girl and a Scar, which picked up a slew of awards when it did the rounds of festivals.

I asked David about The Invoked, and this is what he had to say:

DEoL: I think I'm right that this is your first feature. What influenced your decision to make your next film a full length one?

DC: Yes, you’re correct, this will be my first feature film project. In terms of what influenced me to make the move from shorts to features, well, I think it’s the next obvious step for me as a filmmaker. I’ve been making shorts for twenty years or so, my first short (as writer/director) being 1999’s Redemption, an experimental drama made in my final year of university and my last short, Girl and a Scar, shot in 2013 but not released until 2017. So with these films book-ending another nine shorts in between I think it’s fair to say that turning towards developing a feature was the necessary evolutionary path to tread on a personal level.

Yet, The Invoked was not the first long form project that I contemplated as my debut feature. Initially Girl and a Scar was written as a feature screenplay and developed (initially by myself and local writer Max Gillespie) by Thomas Craig (producer on The Invoked). The feature version of Girl and a Scar was somewhat problematic as a first feature because it was a full blown experimental/fantasy film, which would have required a large budget to produce, budgeted approximately at £10m, and certainly not attractive to potential investors as the debut film of a director with no track record in features. So, Tom and I spoke about other ideas I had and The Invoked appeared to fit the bill nicely as a micro-budget feature with few locations and only a handful of central characters.

DEoL: What's the inspiration for The Invoked?

DC: Akin to many other film fanatics I’ve always been a lover of 1960's/70's British horror movies produced by the likes of Tigon, Amicus and Hammer, to name but a few of the companies who thrived commercially in the output of horror genre filmmaking in the UK during that period. What a wonderful time it must have been to be involved in the industry back then too! Growing up during this boom of weird and wonderful visual artistry obviously affected me hugely so it was inevitable that when I decided to study and move into making movies myself, my inspirations as a filmmaker would be born from memories and nightmares of experiencing these low budget gems all those years ago. I particularly remember being affected in equal measures by Norman J. Warren’s 1976 movie Satan’s Slave and Piers Haggard’s Blood on Satan’s Claw (1971). These two films stuck in my mind for years after watching them for the first time and even after revisiting them in the 80’s I found that they had lost none of their cinematic appeal in terms of mood and dark storytelling despite being made on modest budgets for the time.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, when I was developing the first draft of The Invoked, my central concern was to firstly show my appreciation to the movies that I grew up with and inspired me to move into the arts industry in the first place and secondly, not only reference my love for this period in low budget British horror production, but update it by implementing contemporary characters with contemporary issues brought about by the possible dangers of the naïve use of current day technologies. Essentially within The Invoked my aim is to attempt to create a mood motivated (specifically) by those movies mentioned above but set within today’s technology addicted youth society. Of course much of this is dependent on what budget we can raise to shoot the feature. The idea of shooting the short teaser (included at the bottom of this post. Ed) was both to allow ourselves to experiment with some of the visual elements of the screenplay and also to give prospective investors a little feel of the dark mood of what the feature will encompass, given a healthy budget allowing us to do this, and of course show the commercial viability within the current independent horror market. 

David Cave (right) with one of his inspirations,
the great Norman J. Warren

DEoL: On your website you've described yourself as "an independent artist, tackling sensitive subject matters in a reflective and creative way." To what extent will that be fulfilled in The Invoked, or does this represent a new departure for you?

DC: Not at all, much of my past work has its origins deeply embedded within the human condition, specifically narratives brought about by or leading on from the (often misguided) internal workings of both the unconscious and conscious mind. The Invoked is no different in that sense because it explores the actions of a small group of characters who (because of possessing damaged or addictive personalities) either have been left to cope with abhorrent scenarios through no central fault of their own, have touched elements of madness due to the disintegration of their personal mental wellbeing or lost control of moments within their lives that would go on to shape their futures in a negative way. I always try to base my stories on or around the examination of humanity gone wrong in some small sense. Often, in my case as an artist, this tends to lend itself to a more experimental form of expression (as in much of my short film work) but with The Invoked I’ve tried my hardest to rein this in somewhat. Having said that, there’s still many relevant modern issues and moral ambiguities explored within the story but I would like to think that in developing the idea, we’ve given both sides of the argument a creatively just and fair representation.

DEoL: Although the phrase 'folk horror' is rather overused these days, is that term in any way applicable to The Invoked?

DC: Yes, without a doubt. The Invoked has many narrative and stylistic nuances applicable to that of folk horror, all of which were deliberate choices. The second and third acts of the story take place, almost exclusively, in, around or beneath the home of one of our central protagonists and can be recognised, in itself, as a major character within story development of the mise-en-scene. This building has been the site of the second coming of a cult group who call themselves The Children of Resurgence, their mark being the symbol you see within the teaser. This group, as is so often the case in real life examples, indoctrinate their followers with ideals and goals filled to the brim with good intentions, frequently associated to the renewal of life and the wellbeing of mother earth, but as the narrative unfolds and narcissistic power exerts itself, actions and experiences become somewhat unhealthy rejections of family, normality and morality, eventually resulting in inevitable death and decay but with a few unexpected surprises thrown in at the end! 

Teaser still for The Invoked

DEoL: Can you tell us where you've got to in terms of planning, casting, script etc?

DC: So, at the minute we’re in the process of raising investment interest in the project. We have already attached Lynn Lowry (of Score, I Drink Your Blood, The Crazies and Shivers fame) to the project. Lynn has been cast in the role of Olivia, the mother of the young protagonist’s love interest, Livvy, the character that essentially gets the dark narrative ball rolling. Some of the other supporting roles have also been cast on a preliminary basis, again dependent on budget. We have various budgets in mind given that (ideally) we are aiming to shoot the feature next year. It goes without saying that the ideal scenario is to raise the preferred budget, enabling us to afford to do everything I want to do within the current draft of the screenplay. If that’s not possible we have a minimum budget in mind which we believe we are able to complete the film to a high standard with, albeit with some changes in the ending which is where a large chunk of the budget would go in terms of production design, practical FX and post production costs.

We are also looking into the possibility of having a co-producer on board in order to both fine tune the current draft of the script and help us raise the finance we need to produce the film. As most filmmakers will tell you, you have to be prepared to be flexible with independent projects. Sometimes, just in order to get the idea off the ground you have to learn to compromise in certain departments and that’s fine. As a first feature I do believe that The Invoked has a lot of promise and I’m a great believer in collaboration. With the right people on board and with an achievable shooting schedule I feel that it is the right time for this project to happen. We’ve been lucky to have worked some amazing talent and crew on the teaser so we just have to hope that our luck holds out in order to reach both our financial and artistic goals for the feature also.

DEoL: And when do you think we can see the finished thing?

(Answered by producer Thomas Craig)

If things stay on track we would hope that The Invoked would be ready for release in 2022.

DEoL: Anything else you feel would be useful to tell us about the project?

DC: Cast and crew enquiries to contact through our official Facebook page at;

https://www.facebook.com/TheInvoked

Potential investors should contact producer Thomas Craig at;

https://www.theinvokedfilm.com/contact

DEoL: Thanks very much David (and Thomas) and good luck with the film!

The prepared investor teaser trailer for the film is here.

The Dare (Bulgaria/UK/USA 2019: Dir Giles Alderson)

Jay (Bart Edwards) is spending some rare home time away from his demanding job with his kids and his wife. But late that evening a mysterious figure breaks into their house and before he knows it Jay has woken up in a dirty room, handcuffed to the wall. Also with him are three others who have also been mysteriously abducted: partygoing Kat (Alexandra Evans), security guard and failed cop Adam (Richard Short) and a very badly beaten and cut guy with his mouth stitched together who the others call 'Paul' (Daniel Schutzman).

Jay, although warned against it by the others, tries his best to escape, but his reward comes in the shape of a hugely muscular man, wearing a mask that looks like stitched together human skin, who metes out cruel punishment on the others: Paul is cut further and Kat has a tube inserted into her mouth, followed by a live cockroach. Any attempt to kick up a fuss results in pain and torture for the four.

What is all this about? A side story tells of a young boy, Dominic (Mitchell Norman, excellent) who because of a prank played on him by a group of youths, ends up trapped in the house of a pig butcher, Credence (Richard Brake), who brings up the boy as his own and subjects him to the most ferocious mental and physical cruelty. Over the course of the movie we learn of the connection between Dominic and the four trapped adults.

The Dare is the feature directing debut of Brit Giles Alderson, better known for bit part acting in UK TV shows and films. The movie returns us to the murky world of 'tort*re porn,' a genre that, for me, outstayed its welcome some years ago. The film is relentless in its depiction of violence and threat: at one point an eyeball is cut and a worm placed into the slit; people are hosed down with blood and force fed raw meat; and the torturer of Jay and the others is a silent, remorseless sadist. It's terrifyingly well done (if you manage not to turn away at least once you'll be doing better than I), but like the genre it apes, it's all about the violence, and is perilously thin on characterisation; the movie also rarely strays outside of the confines of the farm, except for a few shots of creepy woodland, which adds to the claustrophobia.

Occasionally the relentless grimness is leavened by equally mordant humour, such as a brief attempt at escape by Jay which lands him right back where he started, and the odd line which raises a wry smile: refusing the offer of meat, Jay mentions that he's a vegan: "By vegan, you mean fucked" replies Adam.

The Dare isn't a bad film by any means. I struggled to see the point though, and more than anything it felt like an exercise in mood and a chance to shoehorn in some very nasty effects. I wouldn't write Alderson off though - the movie is competent and well put together - but some more involving subject matter next time wouldn't go amiss.

The Dare is on digital download from 5th October and on DVD from 12th October from Lionsgate UK.

Supermarket Sweep #17 - Reviews of Patient Z The Infected (USA 2012), The Last Experiment (USA 2014), Awoken (Australia 2019), Island Zero (USA 2018), High Moon (USA 2019) and The Assent (Israel/USA/UK 2019)

Patient Z The Infected aka After Effect (USA 2012: Dir David McElroy) A glance at McElroy's imdb entry shows that he has struggled to make another feature after this, his debut, back in 2012, and after watching it, unfortunately I'm not surprised. Originally called After Effect, this was repackaged as Patient Z The Infected in 2016, possibly to confuse people into thinking that it may have been connected with 2013's World War Z, and recently added to the supermarket bargain bin. That movie had a big star in it - Brad Pitt - and so does this one: Daniel Baldwin.

Actually Baldwin's in it for about five minutes. But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Lacie Donovan (Tuckie White) is one of a group of university students in need of some quick cash. She signs up for a 3 day programme which, in return for her volunteering, will net her $1000. After a medical examination she's accepted for the trial, the details of which are kept secret right up to the point where she meets her fellow guinea pigs. They include 'get a room' loved up couple Amanda (Lily Hex) and Carter (Jeremy Kahn), wisecracking oddball Jake (Jake Hames) and Killian (Matthew Lucki) who immediately forms a friendship with Lacie.

After they all surrender their electronic devices for the period of their stay, the group learn from the programme manager Sanders (brick outhouse shaped actor John Turk) that the research with which they're involved relates to an anxiety reducing medicine to be administered to soldiers - yeah, right! So one by one the group members are taken into a room for administration of the medicine, but they don't come back; predictably Lacie is last, and we follow her into a chamber where she's exposed to a gas which makes her pass out. Of course the trial is much more sinister than explained. The group locate each other and, fearing for their lives, plan their escape. But Amanda and Carter are first to show the symptoms following their exposure, and before long Lacie is having to fight for her life as her colleagues gradually become infected.

If all this sounds generic and pedestrian, that's because it is. Half of the movie devotes itself to setting up the characters, who are a dreary and unremarkable bunch, and the rest involves the cast navigating their way through corridors and, yes, air ducts, and being trapped in rooms. The reality of the setup is that the gas is a bio weapon intended for easy slaughter of the enemy; nobody was ever in line to pick up their grand. The bigger picture suggestion is that this is the latest lab created epidemic by a team whose previous successes had included the AIDS virus; yes, seriously. Baldwin is the brains behind the project and has a hotline to the Vice President, who has presumably authorised the experiments, previous rounds of which have failed dismally; he gets to say lines like "I expect a full report on my desk by the end of the week" although looking at the staff that surround him it's a toss up whether any of them have to capacity to produce said document.  Dismal stuff.

The Last Experiment aka Bloodwork (USA/Canada 2014: Dir Eric Wostenberg) What are the supermarkets doing to us? A movie that is not only identical in plot to Patient Z The Infected, it's also a 2014 recycling of a 2012 film called Bloodwork, packaged by distribution company High Fliers to capitalise on the then trend for 'infected' films, and restocked by supermarkets this year to tie in with the Pandemic.

The difference between Wostenberg's movie and McElroy's is that this one is really rather good, demonstrating how to take a similar premise but make it scarier, pacier and, well, funnier; not bad for a feature debut.

Two young and horny male students, Greg (the superbly named Travis Van Winkle) and Rob (John Bregar) sign up for clinical trials to test a new anti-histamine, RXZ-19, in return for a fee of $3000, which they plan to use to visit the Red Light district of Amsterdam. Once admitted to the facility where they will be staying for the next few weeks, they meet the rest of the volunteers, most of whom are regular guinea pigs, and project manager Dr Wilcox (Tricia Helfer). Among the group is nervy Brit Nigel (Rik Young), a former drug addict who shows them round the facility but seems to be a totally unsuitable subject for experiments. They also meet two girls, Stacey (Mircia Munroe) and Linnea (Tamara Feldman) and immediately start making moves on them.

Things start well, but this is the first time that the drug will have been tested on humans, so there's a certain amount of nervousness about the proposal. And that nervousness is justified, as predictably things start getting weird pretty quickly. It starts with scratch tests where the subjects are given skin scrapes from needles dipped in a variety of disgusting containers. And then there's worms in the pasta at dinner that evening. Yes, real worms. What's going on? Ok so the real story behind the drug is that it's actually a revolutionary serum that encourages cellular regeneration, and it turns out that Wilcox is, behind her professional demeanour, a stereotypically mad scientist. She's been experimenting on animals deep in the lab, and one particularly scrawny kitty is the result of being grown from, well, bits of kitty. But there's a side effect; disgust levels reduce so that subjects are more likely to do, and eat, things that would have grossed them out before: so the worms in the meal were a test. And as if to prove that the side effects are kicking in, Rob and Linnea get it on in the stock cupboard, which is overrun by cockroaches (released by Wilson who watches the whole thing on CCTV) but the lovers ignore the infestation and carry on making out. The net result of this is the degeneration of the subjects. Only Greg, who wants out but can't leave because to do so would invalidate everyone's payments, rejects the drug and waits it out until the end of the three weeks, while all around him things seriously deteriorate.

Wostenberg's movie seems indebted to the early films of David Cronenberg, with its cell regeneration and moral breakdown of society themes, and has a distinctly Stuart Gordon feel with a strong vein of dark humour running through it. It succeeds mainly because of some solid performances; Van Winkle and Bregar in particular convincing as the two hapless students trying to make sense of what's going on. Rik Young turns in a performance which starts off at 100 mph and then ramps up as the serum takes hold, and as all round good girl Stacey Munroe degenerates very creepily. There's also a terrific scene where one of the volunteers with life threatening injuries undergoes surgery, but the incisions heal before the procedure can begin.

The Last Experiment does rather fall apart towards the end and to be fair none of it makes much sense, but along the way it's a gory, involving treat, and a refreshing spin on the 'infected' genre.

Awoken (Australia 2019: Dir Daniel J. Phillips) “95% of people who experience sleeplessness longer than 18 days rarely survive. The ones who live past this point do not need doctors…they need priests.” This ominous wording opens Phillips' rather dour debut feature, and introduces us to Fatal Familial Insomnia - a branch of that particular illness where the awake body eventually dies after failing to be able to sleep.

Medical student Karla (Sara West) had an unhappy childhood - her parents were murder/suicide victims - and is desperate to help her brother Blake (Benson Jack Anthony) who has FFS. A cure may finally be at hand courtesy of Robert (Erik Thomson), a lecturer, who has been carrying out experiments on other subjects with FFS in the basement of the university. Karla smuggles Blake to the testing facility, where he shares a room with fellow sufferers Chris (Adam Ovadia) and Angela (Felicia Tassone). But on the first night Karla finds a journal, video recorder and some tapes entitled 'William Dawson - video log.' which document experiments carried out to cure this strain of insomnia using Dawson's wife Sarah (Melanie Munt). And before very long it's revealed that the experiments have a supernatural aspect to them, resulting in the patients showing that the illness is triggered by demonic possession. And in real time the patients in the lab start showing familiar symptoms; but there is an even bigger secret which without spoiling anything does not hold the Australian medical profession in a good light.

This is all very much by the numbers stuff, with the McGuffin of FFS simply a gateway to all the usual possession shenanigans you'd expect from such a movie, plus the complex exposition included in place of simple wonder and experience. Some points for the claustrophobic location, recalling The Possession of Jane Doe (although that was a much better film). Everyone plays it very po-faced and serious, and there are some mild pyrotechnics at the end to differentiate the last twenty minutes of the film from the previous sixty odd. All distinctly average.

Island Zero (USA 2018: Dir Josh Gerritsen) Wow, here's a neat little creature feature with bags of New England atmosphere and a real low key feel.

It's a few days before Christmas, and most of the occupants of an island off the Maine coast are packing up and heading for the mainland. Waitress Jessie (Joanna Clarke) is one of handful of island residents going nowhere fast; in fact her only excitement is a bit of love in the afternoon with visiting novelist Titus (Matthew Wilkas) who's here to soak up the atmosphere for his latest novel, a story of "love and jealousy" according to the author.

Others waiting to depart include marine biologist Sam (Adam Wade McLaughlin) who's getting worried about the absence of fish in the area, and who is still getting over the death of his wife who disappeared at sea while investigating the same issue. Sam's obsession with marine weirdness seals him off from his mainland loving girlfriend Lucy (Teri Reeves) and only his daughter Ellie (Elaine Landry), who has developed similar geeky tendencies, knows where he's coming from.

Meanwhile Jessie's former boyfriend Emmett (Thomas Campbell) has disappeared after taking a boat out, and the usually regular ferry, which arrives to take people off the island, hasn't turned up for two days. With supplies running low, Sam works out that the islanders are being threatened by something which is deliberately isolating them, but which they can't actually see.

If the script for this little number is way above average, it's no wonder: it was written by Josh's mum, Tess. Yes, the Tess Gerritsen. But it's the combination of solid acting and a real sense of place that makes Island Zero rather special. Clearly made on a small budget, the decision not to show the attacking creatures works in the movie's favour; it's often tense and eerie, and Gerritsen doesn't blow it with an over the top last reel, despite the twist which you may see coming. Very impressive, particularly as this is his first feature. 

High Moon aka Howlers (USA 2019: Dir Josh Ridgway) I was convinced through most of this dreck that I was watching a movie from the 'Full Moon' stable, and a bad one at that. 

In an 1863 prologue, werewolf hunter James Franklin Colt Jr (Chad Michael Collins) comes face to face with a group of undesirables headed by William Price (Tom Zembrod). Before you can say "shut up and comb your face" the gang have transformed into hairy handed gents; Colt, using a silver sceptre, given to him by a dimension jumping ninja who has trained Colt in werewolf hunting techniques, kills Price and his men and is sacrificed by the ninja as the completion of the ritual.

Cut to the present day, and Price and his outfit, together with Colt, have somehow travelled through time, arriving in the exact place where their climactic battle took place, but 160 years later. The gang waste no time getting back to their old wolfy ways, slaying the local biker gang and then looking for a hideout. Colt is hidden away by local girl Lucy (Chelsea Edmundson). Meanwhile the town Sherriff, Erhan Hardy (Matthew Tompkins), is not only struggling with his marriage to wife Karen (April Hartman) who's been doing the nasty on the side with the wrong 'un town Mayor (the kind of guy who has guns and showgirls sitting around at home) but also trying to understand the reason for the bodies piling up in his normally quiet little town.

If this had been made by Cannon Films in the 1980s it may have been more bearable; come to think of it, a lot of Cannon Films were awful but nostalgia has made us kinder to them, and maybe in thirty years time I'll look back at a movie like High Moon and be more forgiving. But at the moment it's 2020, and rubbish is rubbish. Inert acting, a soundtrack that largely consists of two repeated notes, odd comedy moments occasioned by Colt's attempts to understand the 21st century (older readers will remember Catweazle; yeah that sort of thing). And let's talk about the werewolves, shall we? Now I'm not sure if Ridgway was planning to enhance the pathetic makeup effects with some CGI but honestly, if the audience hadn't specifically been told that these guys were lycanthropes, I'd have been none the wiser. This is appalling stuff, to be completely avoided.

The Assent (Israel/USA/UK 2019: Dir Pearry Reginald Teo) Teo's photo on imdb shows a gothy looking figure, which isn't surprising as he makes gothy looking films aimed at, I'm guessing, a young audience of people whose parents don't understand them. Previous Teo titles have included Necromentia, Ghosthunters and The Evil Inside: you get the idea.

The Assent takes its title from the third stage of possession (the first being 'the presence' and the second 'the affliction'). Schizophrenic dad Joel (Robert Kazinsky) is barely holding it together following his wife's death in a car accident; his son Mason (Caden Dragomer) sees things that aren't there, as does dad, who uses a polaroid camera to take photos of his visions to prove that they're not real. Things get worse when his counsellor/medic Dr Maya applies pressure on him to get a job, and housekeeper babysitter Cassie (Hannah Ward) bails on them following an out of state college offer, but also freaked at the weird things going on in the house.

Cassie's friend Brother Michael (Douglas Spain) is, at the request of the local diocese, looking after Father Lambert (Peter Jason) recently released from prison for the unlawful and aborted exorcism of a young boy. But Lambert, despite his conviction, is not done with his exorcistee yet. And when Cassie asks Brother Michael and Father Lambert to come and meet Joel and Mason, Lambert swiftly reaches the conclusion that Abadon (the devil) who had possessed the young boy, may now be making moves on Mason; and this time Lambert's aiming to be more successful in driving Satan out.

The Assent has a lot going on; in fact, way too much. The rather overbearing mental health storyline (which becomes rather suspect when schizophrenia is linked to demonic possession in a last reel twist) adds to the angst of the movie if not its credibility. The spook show party tricks are all present and correct, and the final half hour exorcism is straight out of the Friedkin playbook. Teo certainly makes his film look good, but I felt overall that he was showing how clever and scary he could be (he isn't) rather than getting on with telling the story. Drogomer is excellent in his role; he just deserved a subtler movie.

The Tomb: Devil's Revenge (USA 2019: Dir Jared Cohn)

Jared Cohn specialises in quick and dirty straight to streaming movies with titles like Alien Predator, Atlantic Rim and King Arthur's Sword ie films which sound a bit like other films, intended to hook the punter in. If tonight's Cohn movie sounds a little like Tomb Raider that because it sort of is. It's way more ridiculous that any of the TR movies (yes I know, low bar) and guess what? It's a lot of fun.

Three men, headed up by John (Jason Brooks) descend into a cave in search of a lost relic. A few minutes later, after the discovery of some animal bones and the evidence of what looks like human sacrifice, and with only a brief glimpse of the out of reach treasure, one of the team is dead - mysteriously slashed to ribbons - and John hot foots it out of there back to his wife and kids: "we ran into some trouble," he understates.

Wife Susan (Jeri Star Trek: Voyager Ryan) is clearly long suffering: John's quest for the relic is an all consuming passion, and no wonder. It's tied in with a curse that's liable to fall on his whole family, as ably described by John's dad Hayes (89 year old William Shatner still chewing the scenery). John's near miss with the relic prompts a series of visions of a race of demonic figures, and a foretelling of his own suicide. John's kids, Eric (Robert Scott Wilson) and Dana (Ciara Hanna) are equally bemused when dad picks them up from school and starts beating up their respective friends; he's clearly in a bad way, and this ends up with the man crashing his car into a tree (really slowly) and being taken to hospital. Near death, all hope seems lost, when he suddenly rises from the operating table, Lazarus like, as if nothing has happened. "You've awakened it" explains Suze in a vaguely demonic voice as she drives him home. 

After a chat with dad on the phone, who helpfully reminds him of the curse and the need to obtain the relic at all costs, John resolves to return to the cave and have another go. Surprisingly his family want to come with him (also at Hayes's suggestion) and the stage is set for a battle between the creatures - or Inan as they're named in the film - John and his family.

"What's happening?" demands John at one point in the movie: the audience wishes it could help him out. Seriously, this is one confusing mess, without an ounce of subtlety. The Tomb: Devil's Revenge starts as it means to go on: accompanied by Jurgen Engler's punishing overwrought score, scenes from the rest of the movie get played under the movie's opening credits to pretty much spoil any surprises, all within the first couple of minutes. 

Characters all act irrationally; honestly, if you've emerged from a dangerous cave after your colleague has been ripped apart, would you go back with your entire family? The suicide note in John's vision contains spelling mistakes. Was that an intentional sign? Why does a passing motorist cutting up Suze and John's car suddenly develop a facial scar only for it to disappear? How is it, that en route to the cave, the family are forced to drive right through the funeral service for John's murdered colleague?

Yet strangely this twaddle becomes very entertaining, and as implausible plot points mount up and the Inan become earthbound entities, the last part of the movie acquires - shock - a degree of tension. To use that time worn phrase, The Tomb: Devil's Revenge is far more watchable than it has a right to be, but if you only see it for the Shat's pulse pounding monologue about death, revenge and family, well there are worse ways to spend your time. 

The Tomb: Devil's Revenge will be released by 4Digital on digital platforms from 14 September

NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2020 #8: Reviews of Death of a Vlogger (UK 2019), The Jonestown Haunting (UK 2020), The August Club (UK 2020), The Unfamiliar (UK 2019), Why? (UK 2012) and Lucid (UK 2018)

Death of a Vlogger (UK 2019: Dir Graham Hughes) This inventive microbudget feature, combining elements of found footage - the story is recounted retrospectively - and documentary styles, focuses on Graham (Hughes, who also wrote the piece), maker of comedy videos, into whose life the supernatural enters.

But returning home after problematic laser eye treatment, with an instruction not to remove the bandages over his eyes and with his friend Erin (Annabel Logan) assisting, Graham, whose whole life is predicated around the ability to make himself accessible to the public, sets up the equipment and starts filming. Some paranormal activity is captured on film - a mug which moves on its own, a door self-closing and the sound of whispers - which the vlogger can't fully witness because of his temporary blindness. But the footage, when played back, is sufficiently startling to attract the attention of internet psychic investigator Steve (Paddy Kondracki), a guy whose million plus followers and mission to monetise his online presence makes Graham's footage the cash cow he's looking for; a plan endorsed by Erin. Steve suggests a seance which, in the grand tradition of such films only makes things worse, resulting in the material apparition of a briefly glimpsed lank haired girl dressed in white.

Cleverly the film avoids the Paranormal Activity route of depicting endless CCTV scenes of wind rustling paper and doors slowly opening - Graham's flat is way too small to spend much cinematic time there - in favour of focusing on the mechanics and psychology of social media; the discovery via leaked video that Graham, with Erin's tacit assistance, has been faking the whole thing, and has made plans with Steve to get rich. But, and following a tried and tested narrative route that while the hoax has been unmasked - courtesy of debunking journalist Alice Harper (Joma West) - there might be something spooky going on after all, Graham learns of the history of his flat, and the young girl who lived alone there, who may indeed be the girl in white; and the haunting continues.

Hughes's third feature, following on from his 2014 movie A Practical Guide to a Spectacular Suicide, shows a similar blend of character based comedy and dark drama. This film opens with Graham telling a story about second world war pilots, who parachuted out of crashing planes onto the roofs of houses, and who would sometimes jump off, either to death or severe injury, because they had survived a 1000 foot drop and reasoned that an extra twenty feet wouldn't hurt them. It's a story which says a lot about what our mind can make us believe if the conditions are right, and underlines the theme of the presciently titled Death of a Vlogger. The film operates in the knowledge that a haunting culture - particularly J-horror - already exists on film; Graham identifies that the haunting follows a classic Japanese single lonely girl archetype and at one point exclaims "why is it always a sheet?" Previous horror movies about the YouTube generation have pitched the characters as people who've had it coming to them, but Death of a Vlogger is more nuanced than that, even while it acknowledges that people access and exploit social media for a range of reasons. A clever film which knows how to work around its limitations.

The Jonestown Haunting (UK 2020: Dir Andrew Jones) Jones has, over the course of his 27 (!) directing credits, been slowly learning his craft. Still filming on a micro budget, and scarcely leaving Wales for his location, his films have been steadily increasing in quality.

There are no classic ghosts in The Jonestown Haunting; the haunting in this case is the human mind, belonging to one Sarah Logan (Jones regular Tiffani Ceri). Logan is a survivor of the 'People's Temple' run by Jim Jones in the 1970s. Logan actually escaped prior to the infamous mass suicide of the cult in Guyana, but ten years after her last encounter with Jones she still bears deep emotional scars, and is still undergoing counselling because of it. She tells her therapist Doctor Adelman (Doug Cooper) that only a return to Guyana will help her exorcise her demons.

When she arrives, she finds the buildings erected by Jones and his followers to be largely intact. We experience, through a series of flashbacks, Sarah's integration into the temple courtesy of her friend March (Harriet Rees) and her first meetings with Jones himself (a terrific performance by American actor William Meredith). Perhaps less convincingly, cannisters of poison and syringes lie scattered in the grass around the site.

As Sarah continues her mental exorcism, we're given recreations of scenes from the Jones story: the move to Guyana following increased press attention on Jones regarding his US activities; an episode where Jones tells his closest friends that he's laced their drink with cyanide as a test of their loyalty (he hadn't); the arrival of a Congressman and his wife to observe the Guyana setup, leading to an ambush as the politician and several Temple escapees are shot (and it is at this point that Sarah makes her escape). While walking around the camp, Sarah meets Gaia (Shirley Cook Brooks), a hippy who, in a bargain basement Ken Russell moment, persuades the traumatised Logan to ingest a hallucinogenic that (literally) opens her third eye. Gaia's ministrations are the healing assistance she desperately needs, but then the movie has its Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood moment, allowing for a bit of historical revision.

Now don't get me wrong; Jones's movie never once thoroughly convinces that his country locations are anywhere else apart from deepest Wales, and the world really doesn't need another take on the Jim Jones saga (mind you that didn't stop Ti West doing the same thing with his thinly disguised Jones pic The Sacrament back in 2013). But whereas in his earlier US set movies, where there was no real attempt to persuade the viewer that they'd crossed the pond (including casting actors who were hopeless at adopting US accents and filming in rural Welsh village halls) with this and his previous movie The Utah Cabin Murders the director has worked hard to establish a mood, a credible cast and a script of greater depth. At little over an hour Jones knows not to let his content outstay its welcome, but we get a lot in that time; it's a competently made movie and I'm really pleased to see Jones developing as a director.

The August Club (UK 2020: Dir Daniel Richardson) Here's a 42 minute short, the first of a number of planned episodes of a web series which, because they've not yet been made, must stand as a piece of work in its own right. As far as I can work out The August Club was made as an end of MA assessment piece at the University of Sunderland, and successful crowdfunding allowed it to be finished. All this happened in 2017 so it's been languishing for a few years, until finally released on YouTube in 2020.

The story is pretty simple but nevertheless entertaining. Two young boys, Noah (James Grainger) and Jack (Lucas Byrne) are classmates who don't like each other much; so you just know they're going to be buddies by the end of the thing. They run into bully boy Kyle (Ben Roberts) in the park with his sidekicks Stoogey (Jack Johnston) and more reasonable Sarah (Victoria Monaghan). After a bit of fronting up between Jack and Kyle, the latter offers the two boys a dare: creep into the old house in the forest and liberate a cross affixed to a chain covered coffin lying there. This they do but in removing it they release a vampire, Count Varias (David Lavery) from his imprisonment. It's up to Jack and Noah to deal with the Count, armed only with the purloined crucifix.

Older readers may well remember the hit kids' TV series 'Byker Grove' about a Tyneside youth club (which launched the careers of Declan Donnelly and Ant McPartlin) and speculating how unrealistic it was that kids of that age didn't swear. Well all those years afterwards Richardson rights that wrong; the Geordie characters in this are some of the pottiest mouthed I've experienced in child actors. This does lead me to question the planned audience demographic as, without the effing and jeffing, this would good Sunday TV viewing. Also, the accent will never sell to US audiences without extensive subtitles.

But with that out of the way, there's actually a lot to like about The August Club. It's well cast with Grainger and Byrne a likeable pair. The script is quite smart too and there's some great comic edits that really capture the cheekiness of the boys. Lavery is suitably scary as the vampire and the photography and lighting make the most of the vamp's creepiness; and there's a fine score combing 80s synths with more contemporary orchestration. Richardson is certainly someone to watch; this is a competent and often very funny horror comedy, and I'd like to see more from him. Fooking more, in fact.

The Unfamiliar (UK 2019: Dir Henk Pretorious) In comparison with most of the movies covered in the NWotBFF strand, Pretorious's latest movie is a big production. Just look at that credit list at the end of the film! And it also had the involvement of the British Film Institute. But as we all know a big budget doesn't necessarily guarantee a good film; sadly such is the case with The Unfamiliar.

Izzy Cormack (Jemima West) is a medic forced into combat while on a posting in Afghanistan. Hating to have to leave her new baby Lilly (Beatrice Woolrych) behind, along with her writer husband Ethan (Christopher Dane) and two stepchildren from his first marriage, Emma (Rebecca Hansen) and Tommy (Harry MacMillan-Hunt), she is relieved to be back in the bosom of the family after her spell away. But her experience has left her with scars both physical and emotional. She feels cutoff from Ethan and the kids, and there's something just not quite right. Tommy shows Izzy the results of Ethan's recent book research -  something about the myths and customs of Hawaii - which include a purloined tiki doll and a bunch of crude etchings of strange creatures. It's pretty clear that Izzy is suffering from PTSD, but in her version of events she thinks the house is haunted, rigging up CCTV to monitor the things that go bump in the night (except they're all in her head).

Ethan decides it would be a good idea for the family to take a holiday, and what better place for them to decamp to than...Hawaii! Their arrival on the islands kick starts a series of supernatural events which prove that Izzy was not going bonkers back at home; something is threatening the whole household and she has to muster all of her military training to protect them.

First off, The Unfamiliar looks very good. There's some gorgeous photography (including some beautifully realised underwater shots) and while it's obvious that there was no actual second unit filming in Hawaii, Pretorious creates a pretty convincing island paradise without leaving Blighty in the second part of the film. The main problem with the movie is its incomprehensible storyline, which admittedly throws in some great ideas but muddles them in a story of evil spirits, bodily transference and Hawaiian demonology. West does well as the tortured war doctor and is convincing in her plight, but apart from her and MacMillan-Hunt as wide eyed moppet Tommy the rest of the cast remain singularly unconvincing (and the introduction of a Hawaiian shaman is just embarrassing). And baby Lilly seems to go missing for most of the picture, only returning in the final act: this would be weird as an isolated plot issue, but in The Unfamiliar it's just one of a whole number of WTF moments. Disappointing.

Why? (UK 2012: Dir Richard James, Darren Protheroe) Hang on, what's a 2012 movie doing in the NWotBFF 2020 roundup? The second production of Protheroe's Wales based Underworld Film production company (the first was Blagger, also from 2012, which seems to have gone missing), Why? (apparently the title is an acronym for 'Welsh Horror Yarn') was supposedly made for £10.

Four students (two sets of couples) are off on a camping trip in deepest Wales. Rhodri (Ian Davies) and Nicole (Amy Staples) are the more sensible of the pairs, with Danny (Alexander Edwards) and his girlfriend Sasha (Emily Jane Waters) are a bit more wayward. But they're a fairly unappealing foursome, with Nicole and Sasha engaged in increasing amounts of bickering; things aren't helped by Danny coming on to Nicole, an incident witnessed by Sasha.

During the first night, while out gathering wood for a fire, the girls come across a woman wandering in the woods, Shelley (Charlotte Hitchman) who invites herself to join the group, who aren't happy at being made five, and ask her to leave. But all is not as it seems: one of the quartet is seeking revenge over their death of their brother, and the students have been deliberately led to their doom at the mercy of a family of backwoods cannibals intent on creating mayhem and obtaining dinner.

There are so many problems with this film, it's difficult to know where to start. The plot description I've offered above is literally all I can make out; there are other characters in the film but their roles remain confusing. That's when you can see them: we're used to horror films taking place in the dark but we're also used to them being lit in such a way that you can see more than the cast's outlines. And two thirds of the movie is shot this way. The cast are all 'non actors' and while this may have been a bold step for a director with limited resources, in a film which clocks in at just under 90 minutes the collective performances are excruciating.

However, the biggest problem I had with this is the treatment of the female cast members. Staples and Waters are cast as fairly unresourceful girls who are only on the trip because they're following their boyfriends. With no attempt to build their roles beyond incessant whining and insult trading, we then have to watch them being emotionally (and occasionally physically) tortured by the backwoods gang, in particular the head sicko called, er Sicko (Kasper Lewis) who subjects Sasha to what feels like half an hour of sexist abuse after he ties her to a tree, to a soundtrack of borrowed Vangelis tracks. I realise that the film was made nearly ten years ago, when torture porn was king, but all this stuff now seems incredibly unpleasant and, because the plot is pretty much incomprehensible, unnecessary and completely gratuitous. The whole thing left a very unpleasant taste in my mouth; one of the cast members died after filming took place and the filmmakers chose to remove his name from the movie's imdb listing. That's probably the best tribute they could have given him. Truly awful.

Lucid (UK 2018: Dir Adam Morse)  Zel (Laurie Calvert) is an awkward loner whose mum Georgina (Sadie Frost) doesn't know what to do with him. His isolated job as a car park attendant at a swanky club is made worse by an antipathetic boss Theo (Christian Solimeno), and the one bright area of his life, a girl called Jasmine (Felicity Gilbert) who lives in the same block of flats as him, is destined to remain a distant attraction because he can't pluck up the courage to talk to her.

But salvation is at hand: another neighbour, failed psychologist Elliott (Billy Zane) catches him gazing at Jasmine from afar and introduces him to the concept of lucid dreams (the type of dream where you know you're dreaming and can thus control what happens in it). Elliott teaches Zel how to use lucid dreams to practise scenarios to help him in real life: in this case how to talk to Jasmine. For the experiment to work Zel must ditch the sleeping pills he relies on, and keep a dream diary to record his night thoughts. And while Jasmine may or may not be the girl of his dreams, club worker Kat (Sophie Kennedy Clark) is also interested in him; which is difficult as she's Elliott's daughter and Theo's on-off girlfriend.

But the course of true love never runs smooth, especially in a rather dour British sci fi movie, and before you can say Inception (and I did...a lot) the audience isn't sure what's real and what's a dream...and neither is Zel. It could be that Zel is able to talk to Jasmine in real life (and coat off his boss) or these may be extended dream sequences. And frankly I wasn't too bothered either way. Lucid looks good and is played trickily to keep the audience on its toes. But its central conceit is rather abstract and, well, undramatic; the poster sells it as some kind of action romp, but believe me it isn't. There's no sense of urgency or potential doom in the movie and while arguably that's not where the director (a man who sadly lost his sight back in 2009) is taking us, it's difficult to see the point he's making. I didn't dislike Lucid, I just found it a little trifling, which is a pity.

Films from 2020 Digital FrightFest Part 3: Reviews of A Ghost Waits (USA 2020), Enhanced (Canada 2019), AV The Hunt (Turkey 2019), Blinders (USA 2020) and The Swerve (USA 2018)

A Ghost Waits (USA 2020: Dir Adam Stovall) The diversity of 'fantastic' film is ably demonstrated in Stovall's odd but charming movie, lovingly shot in black and white.

Lonely handyman Jack (MacLeod Andrews) has been displaced from his apartment because of a cockroach infestation, and, because of a lack of options, is forced to stay at an apartment which he's doing up. But when he moves in he's surprised to see it full of other people's belongings. Jack finds out from his boss that the previous tenants moved out in a rush, and it's not the first time the apartment has been vacated so quickly.

There is of course a reason for all this, as he discovers by degrees; the apartment is haunted by the ghost of a woman, Muriel (Natalie Walker). But after the initial surprise Jack realises that he has more in common with this spectral agent than he thought.They both have a job to do - he fixing up and she appointed to haunt the place - and gradually develop a friendship which is in danger of blossoming into romance.

Without blowing the ending, obviously there's only one way for Jack and Muriel to be together, and Stovall engineers a climax to the movie that is both intensely sad and strangely sweet. It's hard to believe this is the director's debut feature; he's taken some difficult to navigate subject matter and made a pitch perfect sweet indie romance between the living and the dead, with superbly timed performances from both Andrews and Walker.

Enhanced (Canada 2019: Dir James Mark) Oh dear. Mark's drab and dour futuristic thriller is more SyFy than sci-fi. The 'enhanced' of the title are mutants, human in form, but who have glowing blue eyes and fantastic strength when roused. They're hunted by a Government team, armed with a form of taser and some silly little shields, who want to round them all up, and there's also a lone mutant who wants to bump off his fellow supermen. And that, my friends, is pretty much it.

Enhanced is filmed in a very snowy Canada so it has that going for it - I'm normally a sucker for films with the white stuff in them, but I drew the line at this. Basically it's well over 90 minutes of blokes getting into and out of big shiny dark cars, with some chop socky moments which fail to convince. People who know their FrightFest history will be well aware of the nightmare that was Shockwave Darkside 3D back in 2014. Well Enhanced wasn't quite as bad as that, but I'm pretty sure if FrightFest 'live' had gone ahead there would have been quite a few empty seats by the end of the movie.

AV The Hunt (Turkey 2019: Dir Emre Akay) Wow. From the awful to the emotionally explosive. AV The Hunt is set in contemporary Turkey, and the 'honour killings' problem which, the director mentions in a pre screening introduction, is even more an issue now in the country than previously.

Billur Melis Koç plays Ayse, a young woman who, when we first see her, is making love to a man who is not her husband. Both are nervous - the price they would pay if discovered does not bear thinking about - so a knock at the door spells trouble. It's the police; they shoot and kill her boyfriend, but Ayse manages to escape, jumping off the balcony and injuring herself in the process. Ayse manages to access her father's car, but she's stopped by police on the road and detained while her details are checked and her family summoned. She manages to evade the inevitable consequences by stealing a police car, which she later crashes, and continues her escape on foot; her ultimate destination is Istanbul, where she can flee the country by plane.

As the film progresses the enormity of her adultery is made very clear; members of her family disown her, and everyone in authority (and the rules they follow) seem hellbent on denying women any dignity. Meanwhile her husband Sedat (Ahmet Rifat Sungar) ropes in a posse of friends and family, and is clearly determined to kill her.

The whole movie acts as a massive anxiety trigger almost from the first frame, and Koç is amazing as a woman who refuses to back down from her own transgressions and is determined to fight to the end. it's a tough watch: there's not much light and shade to the picture but the whole thing feels like one continuous punch to the gut, and the penultimate indignity, featuring a bus driver who may or may not act on his word, is agonising.

Blinders (USA 2020: Dir Tyler Savage) Here's a buddy turned stalker film that has one foot in the 1990s and the other firmly in the 21st century.

Vincent Van Horn is Andy, a teacher recently relocated from Austin, Texas to LA following a breakup with his girlfriend; it's an area he doesn't know at all. One evening, nursing a drink in a dive bar, he meets Sam (Christine Ko), a location finder for music festivals. They're two lonely souls who hit it off immediately. After the bar Sam invites him home; she's already pre-booked a Ryde trip, the cab being driven by Roger (Michael Lee Joplin) who comes on a bit over friendly with Andy.

A couple of days later Andy, who has landed a job as a tutor to a disaffected teen inseparable from his phone, meets Roger on the street; they agree to go for drinks. But the day after, when Andy fails to return Roger's calls, the latter acts hurt. Attempting to patch things up, it becomes clear that there is something very wrong with Roger. Andy decides not to share his concerns with Sam, conscious that he wants to keep her out of it. But Roger ratchets up the craziness, Andy's life spins out of control, and Sam ends up involved anyway.

It would have been so easy for Savage's second feature, after the brooding 2017 movie Inheritance, to have played this on the surface formulaic thriller straight down the line. But if he were to do that, he'd be centring Sam, one of the only women in the piece, as the focus of aggression, rather than Andy. But Roger's subterfuge, which is made apparent pretty early on in the movie, is only one element of dissociation which Andy faces, if the most extreme. Moving from Texas's still relatively small capital city to the sprawling Los Angeles truly places him in the lion's den, and any attempt at civility on Andy's part to shopkeepers or potential employers is met with offhandedness and indifference. Only Sam's friendliness seems to be the olive branch that LA passes to him.

Blinders is frequently tense beyond belief and Andy's victimisation is often painful to behold, even when it's borderline darkly amusing; all three of the central characters are perfectly cast, adrift as they are in an inhospitable location; in particular Andy's apartment never has the chance to progress beyond 'unique fixer upper' status. This may not be a typical FrightFest offering, but it's a very good one.

The Swerve (USA 2018: Dir Dean Kapsalis) This is an incredibly powerful character study of a woman's declining mental health which reminded me a lot of Lucretia Martel's 2008 film La mujer sin cabeza aka The Headless Woman.

Teacher Holly (Azura Skye) is a woman on the edge. Her two sons are very trying (one is obnoxious to her), her husband Rob (Bryce Pinkham) is aloof and playing the field in his role as supermarket manager, and her wayward sister Claudia (Ashley Bell) is mean and pinched, constantly dredging up a story about the sisters from the past which may or not be true.

And as if this wasn't enough, Holly may, on a night drive, have swerved into and pushed off the road a car full of partying young men. And at school one of her students, Paul (Zach Rand) becomes besotted with her, using her face in a series of erotic drawings in a notebook, a book which she confiscates and takes home. Due to their closeness, Holly also suspects that her husband and Claudia might be having an affair. But when she confronts him with her suspicions, he tells her to "get your goddamn meds checked." Holly starts having sex with Paul: in one scene, while they're making out in a car outside a bowling alley where her husband has been present, she sees Rob and throws open the car door, in a desperate plea to be noticed. "Look at me!" she cries.

The Swerve is a deeply disturbing film. Watching it feels voyeuristic, like slowing down to look at the results of a car crash, and when Holly finally decides that she's had enough of life it's almost a relief, although even her chosen method of self despatch - an apple pie laced with rat poison - goes wrong. To be fair the movie would be nothing without Skye; it's a terrific performance of almost non acting. I wasn't sure what I should be taking from the film though, beyond witnessing the mental decline of a woman that you know very little about even after the end credits roll.