User reviews

After the chilling Bride of the Night (2023-also reviewed), I decided to continue watching the bundle of short films at the online part of the Soho Horror Film Festival, and got set to see ten swords drawn.

Note: Review contains some plot details.

View on the film:

Waking up as a worker drone zombie to discover that everything promised turned out to be a lie, writer/ director Faye Jackson displays an impressive inventiveness of capturing the failure to communicate between humans and zombies, via the audio of the human dialogue being played backwards, and the perspective from humans of the talking zombies, being that of grunts and bellowing.

Tearing them out of their yellow worker jumpsuits, Jackson unleashes a ripe Horror Comedy atmosphere of glossy tracking shots following the zombies fleeing the workplace, spinning to jagged push-ins on the dripping red gore.

Slaves to the grind, the screenplay by Jackson gives the terrific ensemble cast playful one-liners discussing their frustrations at the workplace, which highlights the biting social commentary of them all being treated as worker drones, who if they dare to speak up, are threatened with being put in the zombie meat grinder.

The main virtue is the high realism of story. It is a social parable, well crafted, detail by detail, proposing other perspective about becoming zombie and other manner to define the greed and cruelty of others.

The inspired portrait of Jay , proposed by Theo Solomon, like the image of poor victim illustrated by venerable zombie lady are the pillars of this remarkable short horror who use the rules of genre only as pretext for powerful , convincing social critic about injustice in different forms . About people as tools or objects for other people, about power and about revenge.

So, not great but profound useful- especially for knives in back.