Selfie from Hell

Selfie From Hell (2015)

**** (out of 4)

A woman (Meelah Adams) takes a selfie of herself and notices a man standing in the background. When she turns no one is there but with the next selfie he appears to be even closer.

I'm sure you can tell where SELFIE FROM HELL is going but it's certainly one of the best horror shorts from the recent era. I was late to the party on this film because it was apparently a huge hit on YouTube when it first aired and it's easy to see why. Director-writer Erdal Ceylan takes a very simple story and manages to milk the suspense out of it and so much so that I'm sure even Wes Craven would have been impressed. The set-up is simple but it shows what can happen when you're creative. At less than two-minutes this is certainly worth watching.

As a short this is brilliant.

Tight, creepy, well performed and shot. Okay, it's a single jump-scare and you know what's coming from pretty early on but that's often what makes a jump-scare effective; the anticipation.

I've discovered that it has been expanded into a feature film. What a waste of time. I haven't seen it but the reviews are universally awful and I can see why. There really was nowhere to take this. The schtick isn't going to work more than once and it doesn't have an antagonist that can be expanded upon or made scarier. The premise seems to have become that taking too many selfies is evil and leads to your death but to set that number at 13? Come on! This would be the busiest supernatural revenge killer in cinematic history.

Just conclusive proof that you should know when to leave a good thing alone.

When creating a short film the "Short" aspect can often cause some real issues. How can you tell a story in such a short space of time? Especially one like this which is literally 90 seconds in length.

Selfie from Hell doesn't suffer this issue and instead embraces it. Telling a short but concise horror tale that manages to scare, intrigue and show lashings of originality in a genre that is overwhelmed by cliches and tropes.

Starring Meelah Adams this is horror done right and is exceptional considering how little they had to work with.

Meelah and the original creators would later go onto make a feature length movie based on the same concept and in my view it's seven shades of awful. This however is fantastic and a demonstration what can be done and that some concepts benefit from minimal time.

The Good:

Genuinely creepy

Very original

Makes great use of the limited time

The Bad:

Nothing

A woman, alone, in her appartment, taking selfie. The silhouette of intruder. Her try to discover him. And the last picture , with predictible but powerful effect. A very, intense, short horror, proposing all the ordinary ingredients of genre . But the thrill remains fresh, the tension grows up and the impact of the last scene is not symbolic. Short, just nice job.