FrightFest: I have a bad feeling about this

The 27th FrightFest is underway in London over the August long weekend, as always, bringing scary movies to audiences that love to be terrified. I'm only dipping my toes into the array of movies this year, and here are notes on films from the first three days...

Starsuckers
dir-scr Brett Butler, Jason Butler; with James Alex, Manon Ens-Lapointe 26/Can **
With over-saturated colours, this satirical horror comedy is flat-out ridiculous, populated with hilariously deadpan characters who are oblivious in their self-involvement or sentimentality. The Butler Brothers write and direct with a lot of witty style, although the plot is so absurd that it begins to wear thin early on. And while there are some strong points along the way, any message gets lost in the unhinged silliness.

Colony
dir Yeon Sang-ho; with Jun Ji-hyun, Koo Kyo-hwan 26/Kor ***.
A decade after his Train to Busan reinvented the genre, Korean filmmaker Yeon Sang-ho comes up with another new take on the zombie movie with this tense action thriller largely set within an infected Seoul high-rise. With its soapy plot threads, the script pulls the audience into the melodrama as chaos spirals out of control around enjoyably messy characters. And genre fans will enjoy the particularly yucky gore... FULL REVIEW >

Big Baby
dir-scr Spider One; with Brandon Scott, Krsy Fox 25/US ***.
Writer-director Spider One has some fun with the horror genre here, playfully juggling stalker movie cliches as well as the quirks of a creative person's imagination. Along with colourful production design and a self-aware script, there are also some deeper ideas in intriguing discussions relating to bullying and retribution. But of course the main point of the movie is to freak out the audience and some already frazzled characters.

Blood Secret
dir-scr Cameron Francis; with Katherine Lozon, Tiana Akers 26/US ***.
Cranking up the tension with a creepy sound mix and jarring editing, writer-director Cameron Francis makes the most of this offbeat thriller, which centres around a dinner between two women. But there are continual hints that there's also some ghostly nastiness happening around them. And both the actors and filmmakers have a lot of fun playing with various elements to keep the tension high before pushing everything over the top.

Electric Meat
dir-scr Dan Schaffer; with Caspian Faye, Emily Booth 26/UK **.
Shot in moody black and white, this experimental movie establishes its freak-out tone from the opening scene, which is disorientingly twisty and violent. Writer-director Dan Schaffer uses flickering edits, a dense sound mix and inventive camera trickery to create all manner of bonkers nuttiness. And because the scenes play out without dialog, it's a challenge to find narrative nuances that might allow us to get involved.

Full reviews will be posted on SHADOWS' FRIGHTFEST PAGE >

Critical Week: This little piggy

It's been a very busy week for me movie-wise, watching 12 films. But then, this is one of those weeks when distributors dump lots of surprise releases in between blockbusters (namely The Odyssey and Spider-Man). There are also two animated movies, due to the start of UK school holidays. Director Andy Serkis and writer Nicholas Stoller adapt George Orwell's classic allegory Animal Farm into a wacky barnyard adventure, but they also maintain the novel's deeper themes. And from Belgium, the animated romp Chickenhare and the Secret of the Groundhog is as nutty as the title suggests (it's actual Chickenhare's second movie, but sadly I never saw him face the Hamster of Darkness). 

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
Hadestown: The Musical
On the Sea • Ask E Jean
Tomorrow's Too Late
PERHAPS AVOID:
Sour Party
Brunello: The Gracious Visionary
ALL REVIEWS >

Fresh from Cannes, Gillian Anderson and Hannah Einbinder deliver fabulous performances in Jane Schoenbrun's astonishing Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, a yearning Lynchian drama with meta layers of horror movie lore. I caught an early screening of the sequel Fall 2, starring the up-for-it Harriet Slater and Arsema Thomas. Can't say any more about that at the moment. From Korea, Colony is the latest re-invention of the zombie genre by Yeon Sang-ho (Train to Busan), and fans will love the expertly orchestrated nonstop action suspense. Corey Feldman makes a cameo in the uneven comedy Sour Party, which has a goofy charm but never comes into focus. I caught up with two superb films that premiered at SXSW London: Test is a riveting drama about a bodybuilder (played by writer Brock Yurich) who can't face who he is, while Alex Kahuam's inventive The Remedy is a surprisingly involving and very grisly dramatic horror film.

And there were four documentaries that are well worth seeing: Ask E Jean is a lively, engaging look at the woman who beat Trump in court twice. Alex Gibney's expertly assembled Knife: The Attempted Murder of Salman Rushdie is disturbing and also very deeply personal. Likeable pop star Dylan Holloway chronicles his transition in the honest, important Tomorrow's Too Late. And the hugely entertaining Wham! 10 Days in China unearths superb never-seen footage to follow the band on a groundbreaking tour in 1985. 

At the moment, this next week looks a bit less intense. I'll be watching Tom Holland in Spider-Man: Brand New Day, Canadian comedy Middle Life, French comedy Just an Illusion. animated adventure Paw Patrol: The Dino Movie and the autobiographical doc Bouchra.