The Transfiguration

Genre: Drama / Horror- Release date: 21 April 2017 Cert: 15 A young boy Milo (Eric Ruffin) lives on a housing complex in NY, where he is bullied by his peers. His taste for blood and love of horror movies presents a lost soul. What is unclear is how, if at all he became a vampire. Milo finds the equally lost Sophie (Chloe Levine) and they form a relationship which is threatened when she discovers his dark secret. Sophie's character gives the lonely Milo someone to talk between plotting his next kill. There is the mention of an absent mother, subtlety hinting this may be the root of his "abnormality" and question if he is a vampire not just a deeply troubled boy who needs help. Director Michael O'Shea leaves you to make up your own mind. Ruffin's acting convinces us that there is some substance to this story. Stars Eric Ruffin and Chloe Levine. Director: Michael O'Shea. Written by Editor alt-Africa.com @alt_africa

although this is categorised as horror on IMDb and Netflix, i would argue that this film debut by writer/director Michael O'Shea is really more of a psychological thriller. it's a very slow-paced, but highly compelling, philosophical character study

Eric Ruffin gives a great performance as the leading character, who appears to be autistic: he has a special interest in vampires, aversion to eye contact, reduced affect display, selective mutism and a seemingly limited understanding of social norms, though there's clearly something else at play, driving the strange compulsions which are one of the primary focuses and key mysteries of the film

Larry Fessenden, actor and director of Habit (one of my favourite vampire movies), makes a cameo appearance. the script and dialogue are well-written and inspire analysis and meditation. i enjoyed this quite a bit and look forward to seeing what else O'Shea comes up with in or has in store for the future

I think if I hadn't read a few reviews (even if they were not marked as containing spoilers!) I would have enjoyed the movie more. I think it tries to play with the uncertainty of not knowing who or what Milo is in reality, but reading everyone's specific comments about it kind of spoiled it for me. I guess is too late to warn anyone, anyway... Still, it's quite a simple story, a serial killer boy and his motives and obsessions. Good acting, somehow interesting characters to certain point, but very little development on them and the story itself. On the downside, the very slow pace makes it feel longer than it is. Also, (on the technical side) the shaky hand-held camera got me annoyed 15 minutes into the movie, it literally NEVER stops shaking in ANY shoot of the movie, which I think is definitely not a good thing, cinematography style should look for a balance and use different styles for different situations. Still, not a bad movie or confusing like many were saying in their reviews (what's confusing here?), but definitely NOT A HORROR movie! It's a violent drama, but there's no horror here, so if that's why you're after, look somewhere else.

Watch Martin (1977). It's a far superior movie and it's pretty obvious The Transfiguration borrowed very heavily from it. The transfiguration is very very slow and I'm someone who doesn't mind a slow burn, but it needs to burn. Worth watching, but definitely see Martin before this.

Seen at he IMAGINE film festival 2017 in Amsterdam. The story flows all the time and keeps your interest, but overall the dramatic developments are minimal, and the atmosphere embedding the two main topics, violence and social commentary, does not provide for anything new that we haven't seen already in many other movies.

The only novel element is that Milo is a vampire, this time not someone who has to avoid daylight, and he also does not sleep in a coffin. Milo lives a more or less normal life with his older brother, who has apparently nothing more to do than watching TV all day long. Milo marks days on a calendar that he has to go "hunting". We saw a handwritten book with rules of engagement, e.g. that the victim must come instead of chasing him, but that was only a small fragment of a heavy stack of paper. We also see him several times bite randomly chosen victims, after which he is always somewhat nauseas, seemingly inherent in the process. How he became a vampire, is left in the dark (no pun intended), and what we see of his brother does suggest that is not something that runs in the family.

We see less of Sophie, not even her house from the inside, when she e.g. lets Milo wait for her door when she has to pick up something, very different from her having access to Milo's house and even stays in his room for a few days. Not clear what it all means, if anything. Both walk outside the house like a couple, e.g. holding hands, but there is no sex involved as far as we see, despite of sleeping in the same bed and kissing each other frequently.

All in all, if it really was the intention of the film makers to leave us confused, just as confused as both main protagonists are with respect to the world around them, this movie is a success however without a silver lining. It does not make us any wiser through the added elements of social commentary nor does it about violence or NYC's atmosphere, being important topics as suggested by the movie's website but I missed all of it.