NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2023 #1: Reviews of Consecration (UK/US 2023), Breaking Infinity (UK 2023), Wolf Garden (UK 2023), Ripper's Revenge (UK 2023), The Bystanders (UK 2023) and Little Bone Lodge (UK 2023)

Consecration (UK 2023: Dir Christopher Smith) US actor Jenna Malone, adopting a 'proper' English accent, plays Grace, a successful ophthalmologist, whose life in thrown into disarray when she receives news that her brother, ensconced in a religious order in deepest Scotland, has killed a fellow priest and taken his own life.

Travelling to the convent where her brother met his end, she's confronted with a strict order, complete with a vaguely batty Mother Superior (Janet Suzman) and a visiting priest sent from the Vatican to find out what's been happening (Danny Huston). A series of incidents leads to Grace, now clad in the vestments of the order, having an enforced stay in the convent, and gradually learning more about the its history (something about being the keeper of relics dating back to the Crusades) and the circumstance leading to her brother's murder/suicide. And of course the more she learns, the more Grace comes to understand her role in the dark history of the order.

Smith's return to Fantastic Film after the not bad 2020 movie The Banishing is nunsploitation lite, with a big hitter cast and a story that tries oh so very hard to have meaning but which descends into silliness after offering up every cloister bound cliché in the book. Malone plays Grace as a somnambulant, one note character, and although there's a reason for that it doesn't make for very enjoyable watching. As Father Romero (geddit?) Danny Huston brings the usual quietly menacing gravitas to his part (I still maintain that his performance as the vampire Marlow in 2007's 30 Days of Night was one of the most frightening in a recent fright flick) but the rest of the cast, including a wasted Janet Suzman, are just making up the numbers. As Consecration gradually unveils its narrative layers it becomes difficult to give a toss about what's happening, and any atmosphere created in the first half is blown away by a silly ending. Not very good then, although the Isle of Skye locations are impressive.

Breaking Infinity (UK 2023: Dir Marianna Dean) Low budget time travel sci fi movies can be a tricky beast. Directors have the dual problems of encouraging audiences to suspend disbelief with little funds to spare, and telling stories that by their very nature can have the capacity to confuse and alienate if not handled well. Luckily Marianna Dean’s feature debut Breaking Infinity (whose title admittedly does sound a little like an oft quoted line from Buzz Lightyear) handles both these hurdles with aplomb.

When we first meet Liam (Neil Bishop) he’s all bandaged up in an otherwise empty medical facility with little idea who he is or how he got there. But soon we’ve been introduced to Liam in a number of different scenarios and timelines, encountering Emma (Zoe Cunningham) along the way, who may be just a nurse, or something more intrinsic to the story.

As the film unfolds we learn that Liam is involved in a complex scientific experiment to achieve time travel (with the usual added pressure of the top brass demanding results, and lots of timey wimey explanations, as per with this sort of thing), which has somehow gone awry, trapping him in some kind of quantum loop, the end result of which, as evidenced by glimpses into the future, could trigger the end of the world.

Using a script by David Trotti, whose CV lists over 30 years of credits in various capacities, Breaking Infinity unveils its core story slowly but carefully, echoing the loops of time described in the narrative. Bishop and Cunningham make for a watchable and increasingly believable pair, convincingly building their roles as the audience understand more and more of what’s really going on. This is a smart first feature from Dean and a great addition to the British Fantastic Film canon.

Wolf Garden (UK 2023: Dir Wayne David) Wolf Garden’s writer, director and lead actor originally had another movie planned for his first feature, but a certain Pandemic scuppered that project in favour of a more self contained, one location movie.

The result, described by David in a recent interview as a ‘werewolf love story’, puts us in the tortured mind of William, played by the director. William has moved to a cottage in the country, ostensibly to get his head together but also, we eventually discover, to lay low following an unspecified incident.

The forced relocation has been suggested by his supportive and ever-present girlfriend Chantelle (Sian Altman), the house belonging to one of William’s friends. But all is perhaps not as it should be: William is plagued by dreams of howling wolves, and of a certain something living in a shed attached to the house, a something which William is compelled to feed raw meat.

Told in a series of fractured scenes, don’t expect Wolf Garden to coalesce into a tidy conclusion or to be a straightforward werewolf flick; it’s all a bit confused in the telling, which was undoubtedly David’s intention. It’s really a one person piece, not too unlike an extended showreel, and I suspect that a lot was resolved in post-production; apart from David, Altman is adequate but doesn’t have much to do, and there are bit parts for a couple of other actors (including a – literally – phoned in performance from Jake Eastenders Wood).

There’s some lovely moody photography here and some impressive soundtrack work by Rupert Uzzell, but overall it’s a little too slight and perhaps overambitious given the material on display. The final credits feature a rather inappropriate power ballad entitled 'I'm Sorry', written by one Paul Griggs, who also Executive produced. Griggs has a long history in British pop music, being a founder member of 1960s band 'Octopus' (fellow band members later joining the New Zealand group 'Split Enz') and, the following decade, 'Guys n' Dolls'.

Ripper's Revenge (UK 2023: Dir Steve Lawson) Lawson's last five movies have seen him extensively raiding the dress up box in a series of period features mixing horror and adventure. After 2021's Ripper Untold, Lawson clearly feels there's more to tell about the UK's most notorious serial killer, so offers us Ripper's Revenge (and there's a gag in that title for fans of Hammer movies thinking that it might refer to a diminutive member of their stock cast finally getting his own back).

Picking up where his last Ripper movie left off, we're reintroduced to Sebastian Stubb (Chris Bell), the enterprising journalist from Ripper Untold, not beyond manipulating the facts to get the story. But now the Ripper's reign of terror is over and Stubb, shacked up with prostitute-with-with-a-heart-of lead Iris (Rachel Warren), is finding it hard to make ends meet now that he's not earning front page news bonuses.

Worse still, the paper has taken on a new journalist, Lenny (Rafe Bird) whose ambition threatens Stubbs's economic future further. So when Stubbs receives an anonymous letter, purportedly from Jack the Ripper, telling the journalist that he's back to his old tricks and leading him to a new body, it looks like the beleaguered journo has been given a reprieve. But things are about to get a lot darker.

If Ripper Untold was only nominally a horror movie, Ripper's Revenge is even less so; basically it's a costume drama with a few dead bodies chucked in. Lawson has some interesting things to say about the power of the press - which are as relevant now - and he assembles a small but capable cast to tell a story that is, at its heart, one of greed and self involvement. His cast may look rather too clean for the era in which the movie is set, and the film drags in places, but Lawson is a solid director of low budget features, and his trend for costume dramas filmed for just a few quid sees him ploughing a unique furrow.

The Bystanders (UK 2022: Dir Gabriel Foster Prior) More borderline material here: only nominally a 'fantastic' film, this breezy sci fi/comedy is very much in the spirit of the TV show Misfits. Former chess champion Peter Weir (Scott Haran) is mysteriously recruited into a new pan dimensional role; he will be inducted to the ranks of the Bystanders. It's a job in which, ghost like and unseen, he must safeguard (and quietly assist in improving the life of) a person who he is chosen to shadow. His inductor is Frank Barron (Seann Walsh) who is bystander to luckless Luke (Andi Jashy), a games fanatic living off junk food and leading a hermit like existence.

Peter's allotted person is Sarah (Georgia Mabel Clarke), living out an equally dull life working as a marketing assistant at a 'happening' record company run by a cringeworthy boss ("come in for a flatty and a chatty!" he says at one point - yeah, that kind of person). Sensing he stands more of a chance of winning the coveted 'Bystander of the Year' award if he had better raw material with which to work, he suggests to the considerably less driven Frank that they swap subjects; once achieved Peter begins his campaign of assisting in changing Luke's life, but he soon finds that any plans he had in mind are jeapordised by others' ambitions.

As a debut feature from writer/director/co-producer Prior The Bystanders runs into the usual problems associated with something TV literate and expanding it to full movie length ie pacing. But there are some great comic touches here: I particularly liked the instructional induction video shown to all new Bystanders, and the fact that, while technically the Bystanders can zap around the dimensions freely, they choose instead to go to an after hours pub in their spare time. Oh and because they aren't human any more, alcohol no longer has the devised effect; instead they get drunk on oven cleaning fluid and turpentine. 

I'd have liked the characters of Peter and Frank to have been a little more fleshed out, but their spiky working relationship carries the film and there are loads of incidental characters introduced to keep the thing going. It all rather runs out of steam towards then end, but it's good fun for most of its running time, aided by a fine score from Prior's musician father Foz (also guitarist with the band 'David Devant & His Spirit Wife').

Little Bone Lodge (UK 2023: Dir Matthias Hoene) As a fledgling director Hoene was responsible for  2008's Beyond the Rave (the movie that relaunched Hammer Films) and, four years later, the Brit veteran stuffed Cockneys Vs Zombies. Ten years later and Hoene returns with a much more sombre downbeat effort.

Mama (Joely Richardson, given a meaty role for a change) lives on a farm with her young daughter Maisy (Sadie Soverall) and a disabled, voiceless and also nameless Pa (Roger Ajogbe). From the outset there is something rather odd about the family setup, but any viewer concerns are put on the back burner following the arrival of two men in the middle of a raging storm, young Matty (Harry Cadby) and his older brother Jack (screenwriter Neil Linpow); the latter has been injured in a car crash. 

Mama shows that as well as being a self sufficient farmer she also has a range of nursing skills, managing to patch up Jack and apply her bedside manner to the troubled, bipolar Matty. But as one would expect, nothing is as it seems; the brothers have left a dead body and a stash of cash behind in the car, and some gangsters are hot on their trail. And of course Mama has her own secrets, starting with Pa who is subject to a rigorous medication regime; is that to help or render him docile? The two men will soon regret their choice of victims.

Little Bone Lodge is a pretty well executed but hardly original movie that hinges on a mid point plot twist to allow the viewer to understand what's going on. Home invasion/revenge movies like 2011's You're Next and Julius Berg's 2020 flick The Owners are useful thematic jumping off points; the movie's title suggests it's more exploitative than it actually is, but for the most point Hoene's film keeps the grand guignol to a minimum and concentrates on some good performances which cover up some WTFery in the plot, particularly Richardson as the not-all-she-seems farmer's wife.

A Kind of Kidnapping (UK 2023: Dir Dan Clark)

In Clark's frequently funny, dark Brexit comedy thriller (yeah I know, as if the real thing didn't have enough mordant humour) two novice kidnappers exploit the opportunity to hold a Tory MP to ransom to get themselves out of their own economic downturn.

In the north east of England, down on his luck cabbie Brian (Jack Parry-Jones) lives with his girlfriend, aspiring actress Maggie (Kelly Wenham). He's trying to get into IT, she's hoping for a decent part but can't even break into commercials, while struggling to alleviate the more extreme aspects of her character via anti depressants. Together they're not exactly feeling the post referendum mantra of 'taking back control', their woes exacerbated by an eviction notice.

But the chance taxi pick up of a very pissed and passed out Conservative politician Richard Hardy (Patrick Baladi) places an idea for quick cash in Brian's head. Hardy, a politician on the left of his party (dubbed 'Tory Blair' by the media) is in the area to exploit the 'benefits' of Brexit for his own ends, and Maggie and Brian see their opportunity for some exploitation of their own. Trussed up and gaffer taped to a chair, the pair upload a viral ransom demand (in Bitcoin, natch) with which they hope Hardy's wife Lyndsey (Olivia Poulet) will comply, in exchange for his safe return. But there's a snag; Mrs H doesn't want the philandering MP back. And when Hardy sees the amount of views that his ransom footage has generated on social media, the politician decides to turn matters to his advantage.

Clark's CV as a comic writer for shorts and TV work ensures that, for the most part, his script for A Kind of Kidnapping is fast, funny and politically on point. As director of the piece, he's very good at establishing first the relationship between Brian - all round nice guy - and the go getting, ambitious and increasingly wayward Maggie; it probably won't surprise that dramatically much use is made of the personality disparity between the pair. The time shift technique to backtrack on the action - a bit of an overdone technique - is here deployed satisfyingly. Baladi's manipulative, smarmy Hardy is of course what's needed to add an additional dimension and play the kidnappers off against each other (it's been over twenty years since his stint as manager Neil from The Office and Baladi still convinces even though Hardy is just a nastier version of that character); although the story takes a bit of a dip in the second half with the introduction of some rather inconclusive Shallow Grave style business and a decidedly unnecessary sex tape subplot, I applaud Clark's ability to keep focus in what in other hands could be a rather limited one set three character setup.

A Kind of Kidnapping is full of great one liners (such as a comment from an audition director to an over emoting Maggie that her performance was perhaps "a bit much for a yoghurt commercial") and Coen-esque, unlikeable characters that you can't help rooting for. I liked it a lot.

A Kind of Kidnapping will be coming to select cinemas from 13th July for a series of special Cast & Crew Q&A screenings, followed by a digital download release on 24th July.

NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2021 #14: Reviews of Sacrifice (UK 2021), The Cursed (UK/France/USA 2021), There's Something in the Shadows (UK 2021), Box (UK 2021), Ghost Hosts (UK 2021) and Hatched (UK 2021)

Sacrifice (UK 2021: Dir Andy Collier, Tor Mian) Inspired both by the short story 'Men of the Cloth' by Paul Kane and by the works of HP Lovecraft (according to the opening credits), Sacrifice isn't immediately apparent as a British film, with its largely American cast and Nordic setting. 

Isaac (Ludovic Hughes) returns to his childhood Norwegian island home - inherited following the death of his father - with his pregnant wife Emma (Sophie Stevens). Their reception isn't that friendly until people find out that Isaac was born locally; but Emma is keen to point out that they have no intention of sticking around, seeing the house as an asset to be disposed of before their baby is born.

The arrival of a haughty local cop, Renate Nygard (Barbara Crampton, excellent) throws things out of kilter when it is revealed that Isaac's father was murdered, the crime remaining an open case, with his mother being the prime suspect. Soon enough the couple are introduced to Renate's daughter, the ethereal and largely silent Astrid (Johanna Adde Dahl) and become acquainted with the myth of 'The Slumbering One' and the island's belief systems. Isaac starts to become distant from his wife and his former life as the lure of his homeland exerts its influence.

There isn't much here that we haven't seen before. Collier and Mian build good atmosphere but the characters of Isaac and Emma are one dimensional. There are way too many 'oh it was all a dream' scares, the Lovecraft influence is discharged via lots of scenes involving water and tentacles, and many of the plot points remain unresolved. Pretty looking though. 

The Cursed aka Eight for Silver (UK/France/USA: 2021 Dir Sean Ellis) There's been a tendency for modern werewolf movies to use humour to navigate the issue that a tall guy running around in a shaggy suit doth not necessarily a great movie make. Ellis's first foray into creature feature horror eschews even the faintest of titters in favour of a morose tale of revenge which often feels more like a French shot western than anything else; it's also rather questionable that the beast in question is a werewolf, despite what the movie's publicity suggests.

The Cursed covers three separate time spans: 1917 (with a trench based prologue set in the Somme which only makes sense towards the end of the movie); a period 35 years earlier, where most of the action happens; and an unspecified future to those events. Seamus Laurent, steely played by Alistair Petrie, is a landowner with two cutesy children and a wife (Kelly Reilly) over whom he rules belligerently, and who is prepared to go to any lengths to defend his estate. When a group of gypsies turn up exercising what they see is a prior claim to the land, Laurent orders their slaughter - Soldier Blue style and including a horrific crucifixion - triggering a curse delivered courtesy of an old woman from the community, and a set of silver teeth which she buries. This ghastly curse is visited on Laurent's son Edward (Max Mackintosh) and then other members of the household as revenge for the slaughter; only the summoning of McBridge the werewolf hunter (Boyd Holbrook), a man with a score to settle, suggests a resolution to the carnage.

Sumptuously shot, and veering between sections of almost tableaux vivant intensity and limb ripping violence, with a background of the multi continent cholera epidemic, The Cursed is a werewolf movie that almost isn't (at times the monster is closer to the creature in John Carpenter's 1982 version of The Thing) and one which foregrounds the curse rather than the cast. This does make the film more one to admire than be truly invested in, but with its time sweeping narrative, impressive detail and a revenge plot that evokes audience sympathy, The Cursed is an excellent movie from a director formerly best known for the sexist nonsense of his 2004 short Cashback.

There's Something in the Shadows (UK 2021: Dir John Williams) 'On the 16th of September 2020, amatuer (sic) Paranormal investigation team 'Theres Something in the shadows' set off into the Scottish highlands to record the third episode of the popular Youtube series.' This rather shoddily written onscreen message sets the tone for an equally unimpressive journey to found footage land, with the by now overfamiliar (almost nostalgic) setup of camera footage from a missing expedition being discovered and reviewed for clues.

The group in this case is headed by Jon Farmer (John Solomonides), who has dragged his team - comprising Kurt (Pete Big Brother Bennett), Fred (Williams), Daz (Darren McAree) and Steve (Steve Wood) - up to Loch Ness. In true Fortean style Jon, never one to let a theory remain unbelieved, is here to investigate the possibility that the bottom of the loch may contain a dimensional portal for the passage of bigfoot (bigfeet - is that plural?), werewolves and ghosts. So the plan is to camp in the forests behind the loch and see what pops up.

As found footage enters its third decade (or fifth if you subscribe to 1980's Cannibal Holocaust being the first such movie rather than 1999's The Blair Witch Project) one wonders what there is left to offer by adding one more entry in the (sub) genre. TSitW is amiable stuff; its best (and only) scares are generated from the 'disembodied sounds in the woods at night' variety - unoriginal but still effective. But the rest suggests that this shouldn't be taken very seriously, from the Poundshop ribcage wedged in the trees - all that's left of one of the group - to exchanges like: Q: "It's bigfoot. What else could it be?" A: "People". Apparently the Sasquatch sounds in the movie are courtesy of  Al Barry and Ron Morehead's early 1970s recordings in the Sierra Nevada mountains, which are not bogus at all. Just like the film.

Box (UK 2021: Dir Matt Shaw) Shaw's last two features  - Next Door and They Came from the Sky, I Saw Them! from 2020 - were both inventive and funny, but the Pandemic has been no laughing matter, and Shaw's need to keep making films during this period has resulted in the stripped down and significantly gloomier Box, adapted, Like Next Door, from his own writings.

Shaw plays Frank, a man who wakes up in a room - or cell - with barely enough room to stand. That's a surprise in itself, as Frank is convinced he was a prisoner sentenced to die by lethal injection for the crime of murder. He should be dead; so is this hell?

A disembodied, distorted voice (Pete Eglitis) questions Frank about the reason for his incarceration; he killed a man for sleeping with his wife (Maria Lee Metherington, Bite Night). The voice also controls Frank's cramped environment almost sadistically (like providing cupcakes to the starving man which have laxatives in them - there's no toilet in the small cubicle). Frank works out that the voice may be related to Darrell, the guy he killed, and as such the continued persecution is personal.

There's a moral centre to this story and a reason behind the voice's gradual wearing down of his subject. Along the way there's all kinds of unpleasantness, including Frank having to drink his own urine and inhabiting a space containing the prisoner's faeces. Shaw is convincing as the troubled Frank; it's a small production that would suit itself to a stage play, if a particularly gruelling one.

Ouija Hosts aka Ghost Hosts (UK 2021: Dir Steven A. Smith) As well as his fictional film output, prolific director Smith also makes quasi documentary films about the supernatural. In this one he combines the two, sadly picking the worst elements of each. 

'Ghost Hosts' is an afternoon children's paranormal (!) show hosted by seasoned professionals Sarah (Louisa Warren) and Duncan (Jake Taviner); they're joined by new co-host Jenny (Chelsea Greenwood) who, unlike her more well-worn colleagues, fancies herself a bit. The place chosen for the episode is the "extremely haunted" Carruthers estate, formerly a children's hospital; in reality it's Smith's favourite location, the Tudor ruin of Poltimore House in Devon, which loses its impressiveness somewhat by its overfamiliarity. Anyway, for the purposes of this movie it's where the spirits of 17th century landowner Jackson Carruthers, and a young girl, Rose Wells, are said to roam.

Ouija Hosts relies heavily on the mechanics of reality TV to build up its atmosphere. The team lark - and wander (natch) - about, while an irritating voice over (Reece Putinas in the style of Dave Lamb from Come Dine With Me) offers up sarcastic asides, while ominously declaring that the footage we're about to see will depict the decline of the episode from kid friendly TV to something much darker.

Said decline takes the best part of an hour in an agonisingly long near 90 minute romp that overall is pretty painful to endure. We get an extended ouija session (perhaps unsurprising in that it's one of the film's titles) courtesy of Dan, a paranormal expert (Daniel Jones), and the slow realisation that one of the spirits may be a five year old girl, occasions much inane chat and the appearance of a ghostly teddy bear ("move towards the teddy!").

Things slightly hot up in the last 15 minutes when Jenny goes missing and gets possessed, and the hitherto bashful ghost deigns to appear, but by this time it's too little too late. If you hadn't worked it out yet, this is dismal stuff, and while it's good to see Warren on the other side of the camera for a change, sadly that can't be said for the rest of the cast.

Hatched (UK 2021: Dir Scott Jeffrey, Rebecca Matthews) It's rare to have a round up of UK Fantastic Films and only include one Scott Jeffrey/Rebecca Matthews movie; but here it is, albeit one of 9 Jeffrey genre directorial credits in 2021, four of which were with Rebecca Matthews.

Of course such quantity is bound to result in some hits as well as misses; Hatched is definitely in the second category, although as always there's something to like with these productions. In the by now de rigeur prologue, Simon (Thomas Loone) has been carrying out some experiments at home, messing about with synthetic DNA. He's had some success in producing a replica of his young son Mark (Marshall Hawkes) after the little boy died and, grief stricken, dad wanted him back. But he's bitten off more than he can chew in the shape of a raptor who, once created, has been kept in the shed. The raptor hasn't bitten off more than it can chew in the shape of Mark's mum Christine (Amanda-Jade Tyler) who stumbles across the beast and becomes dinner.

Puzzled at Simon's radio silence, his dad Bernard (Richard Kovacs), mum Rebecca (Nicola Wright) and sisters Caitlyn (Megan Purvis) and Jocelyn (Georgie Banks) travel to their scientist relative's pad in the country. Bernard looks a bit like a bearded "Wolfie" from sitcom Citizen Smith, but is marginally less useful in a crisis; which this is, with the raptor running around and even outsmarting the army (all four of them) when they turn up. Made up Mark manages to survive but can't outrun a downbeat ending.

The decision to avoid a redemptive finale, and some passable CGI raptor scenes (on the directors' budget anyhow), as well as the usual good quality photography, are all in Hatched's favour. Everything else is pretty much business as usual; it's all sluggishly edited, the characters are paper thin and unconvincing (why force actors to adopt totally unconvincing American accents?) and - perhaps in keeping with its low budget sci fi roots - most of the action is held back until the last 15 minutes. It has been suggested that this acts well as a prequel to Jack Munday's Dinosaur Hotel from the same year. but that movie at least had a good gameshow hook to its storyline.

NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2022 #4: Reviews of The Lair (UK 2022), Demonic Christmas Tree (UK 2022), Hayfever (UK 2022), Blank (UK 2022), Mandrake (UK 2022) and Wrath of Van Helsing (UK 2022)

If you're looking for the third bumper round up of 2022 films, you can find it in the third hard copy edition of DEoL the fanzine - see my last post. 

The Lair (UK 2022: Dir Neil Marshall) Marshall's movies can be hit or miss affairs, and even after his last, 2020's decidedly poor The Reckoning, this is really no improvement.

Makeup perfect Lt Kate Sinclair (Charlotte Kirk, the film's co-writer and Marshall's partner - and it's worth you looking up that story when you have a moment) is shot down while flying over Afghanistan. After crash landing, she's chased, ending up in an underground bunker where she unwittingly lets loose some caged creatures, who she manages to outwit. Sinclair runs into a bunch of soldiers (featuring some terrible British regional accents) who are initially disbelieving of her monster tales. But when the monsters turn up, it's soldier v. beast.

Marshall admitted in a Q&A accompanying the screening I attended that he wanted to make a movie where he basically got "to blow shit up", and when you're starting from that premise, it's perhaps not really fair to look for hidden meanings. While horror fans might look to his past for influences - The Lair has something of the ramshackle feel of Marshall's 2002 debut feature Dog Soldiers, with its dissolute gang of anti establishment military, and also some of the claustrophobic fear of his The Descent (although that movie's in a different league) - this is more recognisable as something from the hand of the director of 2019's Hellboy. The Lair also reminded me of Renny Harlin's 2013 monsters and science romp The Dyatlov Pass Incident, although that's not much of a recommendation; this movie's a bit of a mess and rather forgettable, and acts best as a calling card for Kirk, although my advice to her is not to add The Reckoning to her show reel. 

Demonic Christmas Tree aka The Killing Tree (UK 2022: Dir Rhys Frake-Waterfield) My initial thought when faced with the premise of Demonic Christmas Tree was 'what terrible nonsense is this?' Also that it must be an affectionate nod to one of my favourite trash flicks of the 1950s, the possessed tree movie From Hell It Came (with a little bit of Child's Play thrown in).

The actual movie is something else; a parody which takes the often ridiculous premise of many indie Brit fright flicks, and then takes things two - ok four - steps further. It's no coincidence that many of the films I had in mind as the basis for Frake-Waterfield's send up had been directed or produced by Scott Jeffrey. And readers, guess who produced this one?

So we have a old lady, Morrigan (Judy Tcherniak). She was one half of a serial killer duo, whose partner in crime, Clayton Slayter, was caught, tried and executed. Morrigan attempts a spell to bring him back to life, but it backfires, trapping his returning soul in...a Christmas tree. Yep, with baubles and lights; and the ability to move. 

Slayter, in tree form, escapes (via a nifty bit of CGI) and sets off on a mission; to seek revenge on Faith (Sarah Alexandra Marks, also in Wrath of Van Helsing, covered below), a young woman whose parents were his last victims and who was responsible for his arrest and eventual death. Handily Faith is having a party in the family house in which she still lives, with a bunch of friends, who predictably get picked off one by one until it's just Faith and the tree.

Once you get over the movie's ridiculous premise there really is a lot to like about Demonic Christmas Tree. In flashbacks to his life on earth, Slayter is a shades wearing, Alice Cooper-alike (Marcus Massey); as a resurrected tree, he's basically a mumbling, bauble dangling shambles, who kills by means of branches/tentacles which can skewer, rend and pull his victims apart like a Christmas cracker (again via rather clever  - for the budget - effects). To be fair there's not much that's particularly Christmassy about the film beyond the tree (or trees - there's a rather bizarre MCU type climax), and the last half hour gives itself over to the inevitable running about. But as a further subversion of the titles helmed by Jeffrey and his clan it's a hoot, and there are some beautiful shot night scenes as well. Silly but more fun than expected.

Hayfever (UK 2022: Dir Henry Richardson) After 2021's rather good The Secluded, Richardson brings us two further features for 2022; Lurking and this one, Hayfever. Hayfever is "a micro budget, 70s style splatter horror movie made for £2000"; you better believe it! Filtered in blissed out Kodachrome tones, three youths - Shawn (Richardson) and his two slacker mates, Scotty (Oren Kemsley-Roberts) and vape addicted Paddy (Ryan Skates) - set off for a camping trip into the countryside while the nation suffers as the result of a fearfully high pollen count. 

But the pollen carries spores that can infect the living, as we've already seen in a prologue where a hapless photographer falls foul of it. The morning after the guys' first night under the stars they first find the camera and then the infected guy. Chaos ensures.

Hayfever, by the director's own end credits admission, was inspired by Eli Roth's Cabin Fever and Sam Raimi's The Evil Dead. For a movie a little over an hour long with a 'three guys messing around in the woods' set up, it's actually pretty good. Our leads are authentically matey and the descent into pollen induced mayhem is handled well, with some great editing work and an atmospheric woodlands location. Richardson's liberal plundering of recorded TV news and incidental music (I'm sure Ray Davies gave him permission to use the Kinks track 'Hayfever' over the end credits) ensures that the film probably won't screen any wider than its current YouTube location, but it's a valiant effort and there's some talent at work here.

You can watch Hayfever here.

Blank (UK 2022: Dir Natalie Kennedy) Successful writer Claire Rivers (Rachel Shelley) has a problem; writer's block. She's overdue on her next book, and both her agent and her creditors are getting restless. The solution? An author's retreat, and a chance for Claire to recharge her batteries and knuckle down to meet her deadline. But this is a getaway with a difference; the facility is run by AI in the form of a virtual manager who Claire names 'Henry' (Wayne Brady) and a rather old school robotic factotum called Rita (Heida Reed), who exists to serve her guest's needs and dispense largely unwanted lifestyle advice.

Of course anyone who has seen any sci fi movies in which the AI has control knows that there will soon be trouble in paradise. Claire learns quickly that while most of her wishes can be catered for, the one to leave the hermetic facility is constantly denied until she finishes writing the book (there's a great scene early on where she submits her first draft for approval only to have it rejected for plagiarism by Rita; Claire has basically recycled Dumas' 'The Count of Monte Christo' to get the job done). Adding insult to injury, a power outage within the building glitches up the setup. An increasingly wayward Rita holds Claire prisoner, and the author's only way out is to break her block and complete her novel.

The story behind how this is achieved, mixed wuth Claire's efforts to outwit the AI and escape her cyber captors, makes for the heart of this rather arid but well executed film. The key elements - single set, small cast - render the whole thing rather stagey, and there's a mid point sag which tests the patience a little. Shelley is serviceable but decidedly one note as the imprisoned Claire, and the drama of the piece is rather stretched with a too long running time. But Blank looks very good and its time unspecific setting adds to the film's mystery, although the sci fi elements feel a little tacked on; it finally finds its heart towards the end but that feels like a rather drawn out journey, if not without some intrigue.

Mandrake (UK 2022: Dir Lynne Davison) Cathy Madden (Deirdre Mullins) is a probation officer in Northern Ireland, who volunteers for a job that no-one else in her team wants: the rehabilitation of a notorious killer, 'Bloody' Mary Laidlaw (Derbhle Crotty), following a 20 year prison sentence for the murder of her husband. 'Bloody' Mary's reputation has passed into local legend, a reputation which ensures that she's not going to have an easy time on release.

Mary's provided new home is a couple of steps up from a squat; Cathy promises to get 'human resources' to look into it and Mary's disgusted repetition of the phrase suggests a woman out of tune with the modern world. Cathy and Mary, for entirely different reasons, are outsider characters, and Cathy's humanity and willingness to give her the benefit of the doubt makes us see Mary in a different light. But when two local children go missing near to Mary's new home, and the worst happens, Cathy realises that she has completely underestimated her charge. 

Mandrake is a film that never seems to see daylight. It's oppressive, inconclusive and very, very murky. I wasn't as enamoured with the movie as some other critics although as a first feature Lynne Davison conjures up great atmosphere, even if it remains rather inconclusive. But Mullins and Crotty are both excellent in their roles, the economy of characterisation drawing from the director's experience on short films and TV.

Wrath of Van Helsing aka Van Helsing aka Van Helsing, Hunter of the Damned (UK 2022: Dir Soner Metin) Researches show that this is Soner Metin's first feature as sole director, but IMDb and the credits list strongly suggest  - ok, spell out - that one Scott Jeffrey is behind this one. And having seen a LOT of SJ movies, this is definitely one of his lesser ones, even if he's clearly aiming for a franchise.

Four ill dressed Urbexers (ill dressed unless they were heading to the local disco, that is) named Ellie (Antonia Whillans), Shauna (Sarah Alexandra Marks), Bryn (Elspeth Foster) and Alex (Beatrice Fletcher), head off for some scouting in the woods; their destination, a desolate area previously used for nuclear dumping which is the site of a number of underground, reputedly haunted tunnels. All four actresses are now veterans of fantastic micro budget movies, and look like they could do this sort of thing in their sleep.

No sooner have the explorers reached their destination, than they are attacked by demons and vampires. Or mutants. Or Cenobites. Or something. The parents of Ellie call on the services of Van Helsing (Michael Hoad, Blood in the Water, Exorcist Vengeance etc) who, with his trusty sidekick Igor (Darrell Griggs, Reign of Terror, Pterodactyl etc) does battle with the creatures for the return of Ellie, the only one of the four who looks like they're going to make it out alive - or at least not undead.

I'm guessing, in true exploitation movie style, that someone happened upon the rather useful tunnel location and then worried about scripting a movie to make use of it. Perhaps that's why writer Tom Jolliffe, contributing his sixth (!) script of 2022, has eschewed the usual domestic drama character back story associated with these things in favour of running around, screaming and emoting. The Van Helsing character is clearly being set up for sequels as most of the time is spent developing his story arc; Hoad plays Van Helsing as a man, unable to age, who has a thirst for the drink, a depressive personality and a penchant for speaking with. Shatnerseque. Pauses. 

Of course we're not supposed to take any of this seriously, particularly with exchanges like "Are you trained in combat?" "You should meet the mother-in-law". But really this is pretty poor stuff; here's hoping that Van Helsing gets something meatier to deal with than a couple of guys in masks for the next one.

You can watch Wrath of Van Helsing here. 

Dark Eyes of London - the Magazine #3!

I have been remiss in letting everyone here know that the third edition of my hard copy fanzine version of this blog is now available to buy, price £3 inc P&P within the UK (a bit more for anywhere outside). 32 pages of reviews, director interviews and coverage of  'fantastic' films and music. If you want a copy, email me at darkeyesoflondon666@gmail.com for details of how to order. And don't forget, no content from the hard copy goes into this blog, so if you're looking to keep up with my coverage of British Fantastic Film this decade you're gonna need to buy it!

NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2023: Enys Men (UK 2022: Dir Mark Jenkin)

I'm one of the few reviewers who didn't ladle praise on Jenkin's first feature, 2019's Bait. Impressive though his debut was, there was something lacking for me, a well made if minor film that had somehow been remastered to make it palatable for a wider viewing public. For his second directorial outing Jenkin eschews the more or less linear narrative of his first movie for something which comes across like a meditation on time and trauma, framed, similar to Bait, like a horror movie, using many of that genre's touchpoints but shying away from being in any way a straightforward fright flick.

An unnamed woman, credited as 'the volunteer' (Jenkin's partner Mary Woodvine, returning from Bait) lives on a remote island carrying out a series of environmental tests; her precise job is unclear, although Jenkin has suggested that she's a Wildlife Trust voluntary worker. The woman's isolated daily routine, shown in a succession of repetitive shots, involves her taking soil temperature samples, assessing water levels by throwing stones down a well, and observing the behaviour of a group of seven strange plants which grow, also in isolation, on the island's barren terrain (the number seven will become a recurring motif in the film).

Assisted only by supplies of food and fuel ferried over by a chap from the mainland - providing her only human contact - the volunteer's lonely but seemingly contented existence continues quietly for the first part of the film as she takes her regular island walks, navigating the island's inhospitable terrain (including a massive, terrifying central standing stone which seems to change position according to perspective). But into her ordered existence intrudes images and visitations which suggest an earlier trauma for the central character and her becoming the focal point for a haunting; figures, possibly the victims of a shipwreck which occurred a hundred years before the setting of the film - 1973 - begin to appear, as do brief glimpses of local people dancing and a priest presiding over a long ago service (John Woodvine, veteran TV actor and father of Mary). As contemporary time moves toward the anniversary of the shipwreck - 1 May - the changes on the island increasingly impact both mentally and physically on the volunteer, as the 'haunting' takes hold.

There is no denying the vision of Jenkin's work; as photographer, editor, sound designer and director he's in total control of all that we see and hear in Enys Men (the title - 'Stone Island' in Cornish - refers to the place where the volunteer lives). This intensity is compounded by being filmed on grainy 16mm film with and post synced sound. The film was also shot in the area in which Jenkin grew up, an environment rich in myth and legend, and some of the story of Enys Men draws on source material culled from local stories, references which remain fairly impenetrable unless they're explained to the viewing audience. 

And this is the heart of where the movie falls down; everything we see is too oblique to be satisfying. It's not enough for the movie to stand on a succession of beautiful shots of wild nature, random visions and Woodvine's distantly pained expressions (her performance is almost dialogue free, perhaps understandable considering her isolated position). And Jenkin's well publicised influences inspiring the film play out almost literally; there's the red coat from 1973's Don't Look Now and the f*lk horror trimmings direct from The Wicker Man, there the incongruous rural imagery from the 1974 TV drama Penda's Fen. Enys Men at times feels like a movie tailor made for the dead format obsessed Ghostbox/hauntological generation, even down to the scuffed film stock and the soundtrack's drones and local songs. I'm quite prepared to be the dissenting voice here but I'm just not convinced that Enys Men, for all its stylistic touches, is all it's cracked up to be (to use a 1970s saying). Picture me disappointed.

NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2021 #13: Reviews of The Artist (UK 2021), Dark Ditties Presents 'Dad' (UK 2021), In the Earth (UK 2021), The Secluded (UK 2021), The Ultimate Sacrifice (UK 2021) and Hellkat (UK 2021)

The Artist (UK 2021: Dir Sebastian Li) Pedro Henrique Valladao plays Peter, a struggling artist (is there any other type?) whose self portrait work is unpopular, but remains disdainful of others' efforts. His friend (Peter Seungchan No) acts as a kind of agent in the face of disinterested gallery owners. Peter's cynicism with the state of the art world extends to copying the styles of others, much to the delight of his cash strapped friend, and then sabotaging the work because it has "no soul".

Peter's world is increasingly closed off and his frustration with the lack of interest in his art is compounded by his refusal to compromise. This situation reaches a head when Peter realises that blood seeping from a mysterious wound is key to his creative, and possibly commercial success.

This 58 minute film is a strange beast, an art film in more ways than one. Various unrelated characters sustain wounds on their bodies which, suggests Li, might be their inner truth leaking out. Or something; whatever else it might mean, there are some similarities with Jo Begos's 2019 movie Bliss, which dealt with the crossover between art and blood. For a movie with a low budget it looks pretty good, and there's a fine score by William Choo to give it some class. Abstract and impenetrable it might be, but The Artist is visually arresting.

You can watch The Artist here.

Dark Ditties Present 'Dad' (UK 2021: Dir Adam Evans) The 'Dark Ditties' series is the brainchild of the Cult Screenings company, who have been turning out episodes of their web films since 2017; the fifth episode is ostensibly a zombie flick which is actually more interesting than that premise.

In the film’s prologue two opposing men of faith – one Christian, the other a follower of the late Father Tyberius Crane – argue their points on live TV before the latter transforms into one of the infected, triggering a zombie outbreak.

18 months later, after the infection has spread and the non infected have marshalled their forces, we meet David (Corin Silva) and his dementia-stricken dad Terry (Ian Gelder), to whom David is primary carer. Distracted by an approaching zombie, who David kills while sustaining a scratch, Terry is abducted by three uninfected men living in the woods, displaced and deeply suspicious of anyone they meet. They are Jerry (ex Coronation Street actor Bruce Jones), Keith (Simon Bamford, the ‘Butterball’ Cenobite from 1987’s Hellraiser) and Steve (Neil Cole).

After a forest attack David, Terry and Keith take refuge in a nearby mansion, occupied by the barnstorming pugilistic Reverend Alistair O'Brian (Mark Wingett, with on/off Irish accent) and his daughter Elizabeth (Wingett’s real life daughter Jamila, who at the age of 7 and a half appeared on an episode of This is Your Life dedicated to her dad, and told Michael Aspel that ‘she wanted to be an actress’; there's still time Jamila). They’re soon after re-joined by Jerry and Steve, and while zombies gather outside the fortress, inside things turn equally dark as Jerry begins to show how unhinged he is.

Dad has its fair share of harrowing scenes, but they’re emotionally rather than physically charged. David harbours a dark secret about his past which plays on his mind as much as his grief at losing the soul of his father; and there’s a similar tension between Jerry and Elizabeth, all of which creates an atmosphere which puts the zombie threat very much on the back burner.

This is a clever and well-acted take on the traditional ‘infected’ narrative, and it’s perhaps a shame that it’s been hidden away within the webisode format of the ‘Dark Ditties’ series; it’s worth checking out.

In the Earth (UK 2021: Dir Ben Wheatley)  The joint spectres of cult writer Nigel Kneale and the recent pandemic hover over Wheatley's bio horror sci fi pic. Shot on a low budget, this is basically a four hander concentrating on scientist Martin (Joel Fry) who ventures into some woodland hoping to reconnect with his researcher friend (and possibly lover) Olivia (Hayley Squires). The journey to find her is long and arduous, so he's accompanied by a ranger, Alma (Ellora Torchia) to help navigate the way. But en route the pair encounter danger from an unspecified, possibly floral source, finding assistance from a woodland denizen, Zach (Reece Sheersmith). The four eventually converge, discovering that an ancient entity deep in the woods is alive and well and demanding sacrifice.

In the Earth throws a lot of stuff in the mix, from mythology to deep ecology and psychedelics. Wheatley isn't too bothered about whether it means much to the viewer; he's happy to leave the elements to commingle. We're left with a group of characters stitching together their collective understanding of science and nature and struggling to apply it to the lore of the land. Some have argued that, in its harmony of ritual and chemically assisted psychosis, In the Earth is a follow up to the dirctor's earlier A Field in England, which featured a similarly bemused set of souls cast off the beaten path to battle unseen forces (or maybe just themselves). It's a slight movie that despite its occasionally comic set up takes itself seriously but resists overt interpretation.

The Secluded aka Monkton Lane (UK 2021: Dir Henry Richardson) Richardson's debut feature (although IMDb states that it isn't), made for £2,000, is a low low budget slasher movie shot on location in the Buckinghamshire woods (the aka title refers to a local area in Marlow).

A 1986 prologue, set in the radiation infested Sector 13 deep in the forest, has a killer taking out a hazmat suited guy, killing him and nicking his protective gas mask. Flash forward to the present day and we meet Michael (Richardson, who also edited, produced, wrote the movie) who has escaped from a correctional facility; he's been wrongfully implicated in a robbery and wants revenge. 

As he makes his way through the woods he bumps into a social media chappie, Miles (Malachai Hall) who's making a documentary on the radiation scarred area which used to be a nuclear test site. Both lads then encounter three authentically provincial sounding blokes whose car has conked out on the way to a music festival. But their luck is about to worsen when they meet axe wielding Michael, who has mayhem on his mind.

You have to hand it to the very young Richardson; his movie might be one step up from a school project, but he presents a stripped down slasher flick which eschews the usual girls in peril storyline in favour of a cast of blokes who all look like axe fodder. The acting is more than a little self conscious, although the lads from the car do good muttering teenager, but the woodland backdrop brings a sense of atmosphere and there's some surprisingly good camerawork on display. Richardson brought out two more mirco horrors the year after; an interesting home grown talent.

You can watch The Secluded here.

The Ultimate Sacrifice (UK 2021: Dir Leon Cole) Cole's rough and ready £100 student movie shot on iphones doesn't mess about, front and centring a clutching Frankenstein monster even before the opening credits arrive. Daniel (Cole) is a would be actor and school attendee. His class is set some history homework about ancestry. He discovers via a box in his parents' loft a family tree that shows his connection to the Frankenstein family and a document about Experiment One, including a photograph of a mangled head - Experiment One was not a success. Experiment Two was successful  - named Adam - and depicted by a photo of Boris Karloff from the eponymous 1931 movie. Troubled by dreams about his unusual family tree, Daniel decides to travel to the Transylvanian castle documented in the written accounts to trace his ancestry. 

His journey to Frankenstein's castle (shot in and around Cole's parents' house and a local theatre, to which I'm guessing the director is attached) brings him into contact with the monster who is, predictably, less than friendly, and gives chase. A friend, worried about Daniel, follows him where it's revealed that the boy has been chosen to reanimate the ghost of Dr Frankenstein's creation (Experiment Two) - which places him in a moral dilemma; to raise or not raise the (already) dead?

I'm sure it was a lot of fun making this, perhaps less so watching if you're not a friend of the small cast and crew. But there's always something to salvage from even the slightest of films; in this case some deft editing, creative makeup and effects work, a well chosen soundtrack and a perky performance from the director. Oh yes, and in its later stages it's a Christmas movie with real snow!

You can watch The Ultimate Sacrifice here.

HellKat (UK 2021: Dir Scott Jeffrey, Rebecca Matthews) Well it wouldn't be a NWotBFF roundup without a Scott Jeffrey movie, now would it? This time round he and directing partner Matthews have gone for an 80s Stateside feel and a slightly different approach to subject matter, courtesy of writer/creator Michele Pacitto.

Katrina 'HellKat' Bash (Sarah T Cohen) is the former top world middleweight fighter, now fallen on hard times, and with a personal tragedy gnawing away at her. She hitches a ride with a god fearing chap who turn out to be a demon; Bash shooting him in the head only makes him annoyed, but it's all in a day's work for our troubled heroine.

Taking a toilet cleaning job in a dive bar in return for endless tequila and smokes (which she never actually smokes), Bash is eventually pursuaded (ok tricked) into utilising her chop socky skills in the ring, against a series of half man/half beast figures.

And that's it! The usual domestic drama subplots common in the films of Mr Jeffrey and his ilk have largely been jettisoned in favour of small time Americana atmosphere and, well, fighting. I don't wish to sound snobby, and I'm sure there's a market for this sort of thing, but as a seeker of British Fantastic Films I felt rather short changed by the whole setup.

For the first half hour there is at least the pleasure of seeing Jeffrey and Matthews create a US atmosphere on a budget which is pretty convincing if you can ignore left hand drive cars with UK number plates and a clearly seen muncipal bin owned by the London Borough of Croydon. The normally reliable Cohen is a bit at sea here and more than slightly unbelievable as a powerhouse of energy (a stunt Cohen takes care of the difficult bits). It's slow, it's uneventful, but I guarantee it's the only movie you'll see this year with monsters and bare knuckle fighters slugging it out in a south London gym. Or maybe I'm just seeing the wrong movies...