FrightFest: London freaks out

Each year at FrightFest, it's fun to see how many different kinds of films can be made under the genre banner, from wildly supernatural nuttiness to darkly emotional thrillers. Here's another cross-section of highlights for Sunday, including three world premieres...

UK PREMIERE
7 Keys
dir-scr Joy Wilkinson; with Emma McDonald, Billy Postlethwaite 24/UK ****
Skilfully shot and edited, this British dramatic thriller is vividly centred around a young couple who behave transgressively as they travel around London. Writer-director Joy Wilkinson beautifully captures the inner lives of two strangers as they get to know each other in other people's homes. And along the way, several superbly orchestrated set-pieces inventively mix romance and suspense. Although it's increasingly difficult to hope for a happy ever after... FULL REVIEW >

WORLD PREMIERE
Derelict
dir Jonathan Zaurin; with Suzanne Fulton, Mike Coombes 24/UK ***.
Flickering between black and white and colour, this moody British thriller builds a strong sense of violent tension, even if the splintered filmmaking style prevents us from getting involved in the story or characters. But while it feels over-serious and overlong, director-cinematographer Jonathan Zaurin gives the film a striking visual style, skilfully shot and sharply augmented by a beefy piano-based score and powerfully internalised performances from a solid cast.

WORLD PREMIERE
Fright
dir-scr Warren Dudley; with Gwyneth Evans, Jill Priest 24/UK ***.
Designed like a 1930s melodrama, this British thriller features striking black-and-white cinematography, a florid orchestral score and accents that could cut glass. In other words, it looks and sounds fabulous. It also builds a strongly involving tension through the internalised feelings of the feisty young central character. Writer-director Warren Dudley is essentially making a pastiche here, but this is also an engaging mood piece that's thoughtful, emotionally engaging and even cathartic.

WORLD PREMIERE
Ladybug
dir Tim Cruz; with Anthony Del Negro, Scout Taylor-Compton 24/US ***
Packed with creepy and insinuating touches, this thriller builds a sense of impending nastiness right from the opening scene. Filmmaker Tim Cruz creates a haunting atmosphere that takes its time revealing the story's complex web of secrets. So while the script moves in fits and starts, peppered with moments that perhaps don't quite ring true, there's more than enough going on here to hold the attention. So the ghostly goings on become involving and, yes, haunting.

For info, FRIGHTFEST >

Critical Week: It's the end of the world (again)

Awards season continues to accelerate, this week with the Bafta nominations giving predictions a good spin. I'm the chair of the London Film Critics' Circle, and our awards are announced on Sunday night, so I've been preparing for that all week. And Oscar nominations come next week. 

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
The Worst Person in the World
The Eyes of Tammy Faye • Azor
Belle • The Souvenir Part II
ALL REVIEWS >

Meanwhile, I had: my first experience in the outrageously all-encompassing rollercoaster of 4DX cinema with Moonfall, Roland Emmerich's latest ridiculous disaster epic, this time pitting Halle Berry, Patrick Wilson and John Bradley against melodramatic family issues as they try to stop the moon from smashing into Earth. More than a decade after the last movie, Johnny Knoxville is back for Jackass Forever, in which the original crew get up to their usual limb-jeopardising antics, although they leave the most violent stuff to some newcomers.

Set in Britain and Mexico, the romantic comedy Book of Love starring Sam Claflin and Veronica Echegui feels fresh and engaging, even as it plays on the usual formula. The horror thriller The Long Night has lots of atmospherics and some slick filmmaking touches, but is oddly disjointed. From Argentina, Azor is a proper stunner, a slow-burn thriller about a man's journey into pure evil. From Spain, Bringing Him Back is a contained, intriguing drama about four people and the shifting dynamic between them. And the documentary The Tinder Swindler is a riveting account of a dating app con man whose scam was mind-bogglingly huge.

This next week I'll be watching Kenneth Branagh's the all-star sequel Death on the Nile, Tom Holland in Uncharted, Jennifer Lopez in Marry Me, Johnny Depp in Minimata, the Cape Cod drama Give or Take and the Italian drama Small Body.