Nightsiren (2022)

Writer-Director Tereza Nvotová's powerful and visually arresting new provincial horror drama gets a limited edition Blu-ray release from Arrow Films.

When Sarlota (Natalia Germani) was a little girl she witnessed (and may have been responsible for) her younger sister falling from a cliff. Years later she is summoned back to the tiny provincial village of her birth to discuss an inheritance from her late mother.

She finds the house next door burned out and her own empty, the villagers unfriendly, and too long in the city has made her forgetful of the misogynistic practices of the menfolk and the passive acquiescence of the women. There are accusations of witchcraft, both of old and currently, and some of these are levelled at Sarlota herself. With the help of Mira (Eva Mores) Sarlota finally discovers the truth behind her family's history while having to deal with the shocking attitudes and presumptions the villagers still harbour.

NIGHTSIREN is beautifully filmed, with some jaw-dropping compositions against a background of the lush Czech landscape where the movie was filmed. It's also not afraid to venture into arthouse territory with some scenes of strangeness, while all the time pushing its grim, bitter and extremely vital message regarding the abuse of women in an extreme patriarchal society. Consequently some of NIGHTSIREN isn't easy viewing, but then it shouldn't be. It's a moving film, skilfully put together and if you like your European art house cinema grim and confrontational then this one's definitely for you.

Arrow's limited edition Blu-ray comes with a commentary track from Kat Ellinger, and there's a video essay from Alexandra Heller-Nicholas on the idea of witches and 'sisterhood', as well as another video essay from Justine Smith that addresses the issues raised in the film directly.

Finally you get a trailer, a reversible sleeve, a double-sided foldout poster, and a collector's booklet featuring new writing on the film from Anton Bitel, Cerise Howard and Alexandra West.

Tereza Nvotová's NIGHTSIREN is out on limited edition Blu-ray from Arrow Films on Monday 3rd June 2024

Climate of the Hunter (2021)

"A Peter Greenaway-Style Vampire Movie"

        Well, a bit, anyway. The new feature from Oklahoma-based film-maker Mickey Reece, known as 'the Soderbergh of the Sticks' or so it says here, gets a cinema and digital release from Bulldog Distribution.

Two middle-aged sisters, Alma (Ginger Gilmartin) and Elizabeth (Mary Buss) await the arrival of Wesley (Ben Hall with his Stephen McHattie voice) at their remote cabin hideaway. Once he's there the conversation turns to events of the past over a succession of 1970s-themed meals that look as if they've come straight from Vincent Price's actual cookbook. As the days pass it seems that Wesley may be a vampire. We also learn he has placed his wife in an asylum. But is she still there?

Described as a cross between Harry Kumel's DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS and the films of Jean Rollin, fans of the work of those directors may find themselves scratching their heads at the comparison. With its measured pacing and accent on dinner table conversation between the three leads CLIMATE OF THE HUNTER feels more like a cross between DROWNING BY NUMBERS and a 1970s AIP picture, as if Peter Greenaway had directed COUNT YORGA, VAMPIRE. 

It's well shot and acted and obviously not the work of a hack, but certain viewers should be warned that in terms of horror we're very much in IT COMES AT NIGHT territory here in terms of slow pacing and if that's not your kind of thing you may find the 82 minute running time feels rather longer than it actually is. That said Reece obviously has talent and is definitely a director to be watched and I very much suspect his best work in the art house horror genre is yet to come. Anyway, here's the trailer for CLIMATE OF THE HUNTER:

Mickey Reece's CLIMATE OF THE HUNTER is out in cinemas from Bulldog Distribution on Friday 13th August 2021 and on Digital rent and download-to-own on Monday 23rd August 2021

The Bloodhound (2020)

 

"Eerie Poe-Inspired Art House Horror"

Arrow are releasing writer-director Patrick Picard's singular take on Edgar Allan Poe's The Fall of the House of Usher on Blu-ray after its UK premiere on the Arrow channel.

Francis (Liam Aiken) destitute to the point of near homelessness and with his few belongings in storage, receives an invitation from his wealthy childhood friend Jean Paul (JP) Luret (Joe Adler) whom he hasn't seen in years. 

As soon as Francis arrives at Luret's house things are strange. Luret's sister Vivian (Annalise Basso from Mike Flanagan's OCULUS and OUIJA 2) keeps herself locked in a downstairs room and refuses to come out, while JP himself admits it is years since he has left the building, instead having food and other supplies delivered. 

JP wants to rekindle his and Francis' childhood friendship - he cooks Francis' favourite food (if buttered toast really is) and the two play fight inside sleeping bags. But JP has a cruel streak, exhibited when Francis goes to a vault beneath the house for champagne and ends up locked in. So what's really going on? And who is the masked figure that's crawling around JP's house (the Bloodhound of the title)?

Well, it's going to be up to you to decide because THE BLOODHOUND offers more questions than answers. If you're familiar with the Poe story that won't help as it's just the jumping off point for Picard's examination of friendships lost and how we change, both physically and mentally, to the point where old friends become unrecognisable. Is JP even rich? His house looks like the corridors and bedrooms of a university hall of residence, admittedly one with boxes of money stashed everywhere in keeping with JP's eccentricity.

Arrow's disc comes with four Picard short projects, which are very short indeed (about a minute) and are experimental abstracts rather than narrative in nature. There's also a commentary track from the director and his editor David Scorca as well as a 45 minute making of.  The first pressing of the disc also comes with a booklet with new writing on the film from Anton Bitel.

Patrick Picard's THE BLOODHOUND is out on Blu-ray from Arrow on Monday 22nd March 2021

Bliss (2019)

"A Nightmarish Visual & Aural Assault on the Senses"

I mean that as a good thing, by the way. In fact quite possibly a brilliant thing. Joe Begos' exhausting, exhilarating, cathartic take on art, drug addiction, vampirism and so much more gets a UK Blu-Ray release from Eureka.

Blocked artist Dezzy Donahue (Dora Madison) is going through a bad patch. Struggling with her latest work, dumped by her agent and behind on the rent, instead of sorting out her life she spends her nights in a haze of drunken drug and sex-fuelled debauchery. Somewhere along the way, she's given something that might (or might not) turn her into a vampire.

Whether it's the drugs, the blood, or something else, suddenly Dezzy can paint again and she starts work on what she is convinced will become her masterwork, even if everyone she knows is going to end up as bloody casualties of her newfound addiction as a result.

With a pounding soundtrack (which sounds great on Eureka's 5.1 mix), enough camera craziness to make Gasper Noé jealous and a tremendously assured visual sense of the artsy sleazy world Dezzy operates in, BLISS only lasts 80 minutes but that's quite long enough to spend with your breath held and every muscle tensed. It's such an assault on the senses that anyone despondent about the lack of colour and intensity of experience offered by the SUSPIRIA remake would be well advised to check this one out. 

        Reminiscent of the work of Abel Ferrara and early Penelope Spheeris, BLISS has the original EVIL DEAD's sense of ferociousness in its no-holds-barred take-no-prisoners approach to its storytelling. Dezzy's artwork, once complete, is a hellish joy all its own to behold, like something from Lovecraft filtered through the lens of MANDY. 

Eureka's Blu-ray offers three commentary tracks. Samm Deighan and Kat Ellinger offer a detailed contextualisation of the film both in terms of vampire cinema and modern horror film. Joe Begos and Dora Madison provide a laid back but information commentary on the making of the film, backed up by the third commentary track which features Begos, producer Josh Ethier and the FX team. There's also a deleted scene and a trailer.

Finally, if you get the limited edition (1000 copies) there's also an O Card slipcase with laminated finish and a booklet featuring new writing on the film from Alexandra Heller-Nichols & an interview with Joe Begos. 

Joe Begos' BLISS is out on Blu-ray from Eureka on Monday 10th February 2020

The Transfiguration (2017)

“21st Century MARTIN”

A film that is as much social commentary as it is a movie about vampires (and vampire movies), Michael O’Shea’s THE TRANSFIGURATION is getting a Blu-ray and DVD release in the UK courtesy of Thunderbird Pictures.

In a rough area of New York, fourteen year old Milo (Eric Ruffin) is an outsider, small for his age and bullied by the gang members who patrol the estate where he lives. His mother has committed suicide and he lives with his older brother. Coping with his situation by sinking himself deep into vampire lore, his shelves are filled with VHS cassettes of everything from Murnau’s NOSFERATU to THE LOST BOYS, with his favourites are the one he considers ‘real’ - George A Romero’s MARTIN, Elias Merhige’s SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE and Tomas Alfredson’s LET THE RIGHT ONE IN.

But there are other aspects to Milo’s life that he doesn’t talk about, certainly not to his neighbour and prospective girlfriend Sophie (Chloe Levine). He attends sessions with the school psychiatrist who repeatedly questions him about potential psychopathic behaviour, and when he’s out on the streets alone the people Milo meets don’t always survive the encounter.

Michael O’Shea’s film does a fine job of being a gritty realist drama first, and homage to movies like Romero’s MARTIN second. Milo’s existence (and that of those around him) is pretty grim, and THE TRANSFIGURATION might be a bit too gloomy and oppressive for vampire movie fans while at the same time being a bit too gruesome for art-house audiences. 

Full marks to O’Shea, though, for achieving a thoughtful balance absolutely worth of comparison with Romero. The director is happy to wear his exploitation influences on his sleeve with guest victim appearances from both Lloyd Kaufman (in another surprise cameo after James Gunn’s GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY) and Larry Fessenden. The acting from the young leads is measured, considered and appropriately affecting, and if you’re a fan of quiet, grim, tower block horror then this will do very nicely indeed.

Thunderbird’s Blu-ray comes with director’s commentary, making of, deleted and extended scenes and a trailer. THE TRANSFIGURATION received praise at Cannes and I’m not at all surprised. It will be interesting to see what Michael O’Shea comes up with next. 

Michael O'Shea's THE TRANSFIGURATION is out on 

Blu-ray and DVD from Thunderbird Releasing on Monday 14th August 2017

The Neon Demon (2016)

“Nicolas Winding Refn's Art House Horror”

So cool this movie could chill your fingertips, so slick you might have trouble hanging onto the Blu-ray case, so ludicrous at times that the beginning of this review is nothing in comparison, one of my favourite films of the year - and what feels like Nicolas Winding Refn’s hymn to the EuroHorror exploitation masters of the 1970s -  comes to Blu-ray (which really is how this film should be seen) and DVD on the Icon label.

Ordinary-looking Elle Fanning comes to Los Angeles to pursue a modelling career. Standing out from the stick figures and CLOSE ENCOUNTERS alien wannabes she immediately gets signed by Christina Hendricks’ agency, after which Christina tells the other hopefuls they can leave in a set that could easily have been lifted from a Jess Franco film.

Jena Malone (building an impressive CV of decent genre pictures that includes this, THE RUINS and SUCKER PUNCH) is a photographer’s helper whose day job is probably the sexiest, best-dressed mortician ever (shades of Joe D’Amato, as opposed to the dollops we’re going to get in a bit). She takes Elle to the kind of disco that would have spun a young Dario Argento’s head right round. 

Elle becomes more successful, engendering enemies as she goes until things reach a horrible and bizarre climax at Jena’s isolated country mansion as things become a mixture of scenes reminiscent of movies like D’Amato’s BUIO OMEGA and Franco’s VIRGIN AMONG THE LIVING DEAD, all given a real kick by Refn’s own glorious visual style. 

I’ve mentioned some of my favourite Eurosleaze directors a lot here because if, like me, you’re a fan of their work you are going to love THE NEON DEMON. If you’re not, however, or if you’ve never heard of them, you may find yourself bewildered, offended, and possibly even a bit bored by a movie that is far stronger on style than it is on substance. Some of the camerawork and production design is evocative of other genre stylists like Peter Greenaway, especially his THE COOK THE THIEF HIS WIFE AND HER LOVER which contains an oddly similar denouement. 

Of course if you’re a Refn fan you’re going to watch this anyway. If you’re not sure, this one has the languid pacing of VALHALLA RISING coupled with the visual sumptuousness of ONLY GOD FORGIVES. Be prepared to be patient and soak up the visuals rather than expect too much in the way of plot. 

Icon’s Blu-ray comes with an audio commentary by Nicolas Winding Refn and Elle Fanning, a short piece on the score with Refn and composer Cliff Martinez, an interview with Refn and Fanning, an image gallery and a trailer.

Nicolas Winding Refn's THE NEON DEMON is out from Icon Home Entertainment on Blu-ray, DVD, Digital HD and VOD from 31st October 2016

Darling (2015)

“The New American TENANT”

Writer-director Mickey Keating’s follow up to POD (2015 - premiered at Frightfest last year) gets a DVD release in the UK courtesy of Soda Pictures.

         Darling (Lauren Ashley Carter) is the name of the troubled (we are soon to find out) young woman who gets the job as caretaker for Sean Young’s posh New York townhouse. She (and we) get a brief info dump on how allegedly it’s the oldest house in the city, that someone once tried to conjure up the devil in one of the rooms, and that the previous caretaker killed herself by jumping from an upstairs balcony. Then Darling's left alone to get on with things and quite possibly go even more mad than she already is.

         So far, so Polanski (the black and white photography helps with this) and indeed, soon we’re in REPULSION land by way of THE TENANT with a good dollop of David Lynch’s ERASERHEAD thrown in as Darling starts to experience flashbacks (or are they?) and ends up inviting Henry (Brian Morvant) whom she meets in a bar back for brandy and horrible things. After that there’s a touch of Abel Ferrara’s MS.45 before things get even more stuttery and loony. I won’t tell you the ending because, well, you have to watch the film for that.

         Proudly wearing its influences on its sleeve (and director Keating cites some of the above as reference points in the three short featurettes that are extras on the disc) DARLING has loads of scary style, some properly disturbing imagery, and a great central performance from Lauren Ashley Carter. In fact the only criticism I would make about DARLING is that it feels like a long short film rather than a feature (if you see what I mean). The photography, the soundscape and the general sense of weirdness are all excellent, but there’s not quite enough substance there to make this entirely satisfying.

          That said, Keating comes across on the extras as extremely knowledgeable about the history of cinema in general and weird cinema in particular and a director’s commentary would have been most welcome. On the basis of POD and this he’s definitely one to watch and if you fancy a bit of late-night messing with your mind DARLING is definitely worth a watch.  

Mickey Keating's DARLING is getting a UK DVD release from Soda Pictures on 24th October 2016. Here's the trailer: 

Bite (2015)

“A different kind of REPULSION”

Chad Archibald’s squishy subtextual horror picture, which received its premiere at London Frightfest last year in front of a sell-out crowd (I know because I was there), gets a UK DVD release from Second Sight.

Casey (Elma Bergovic) is about to get married. For her bachelorette party she travels with her two best friends to a resort ‘down south’ for sun, sea and booze. While there, as well as dancing, getting trashed and managing to lose most of her stuff (including her diamond engagement ring), Casey takes a dip in a natural pool and gets bitten on the bottom by something other than one of the local boys.

It’s when she gets back to her flat where both her fiance Jared (Jordan Gray) and his domineering mother live that the problems start. Although to be honest, Casey’s personal problems are actually already in full swing. She’s getting married in a week and she’s really not sure she wants to be. Jared wants kids and she doesn’t. Jared’s mother has forbidden him to have sex with her before marriage and he’s actually complied (always a worrying sign). Then to top it all, Casey starts to turn into an egg-laying insect monster thing.

Despite how I might have just sold it, BITE is not a comedy. Reviews have likened it to a Cronenberg picture, which it is on a superficial level (body horror, Casey vomits liquid that dissolves flesh) but in actual fact the movie’s style has far more in common with early Polanski. Early on Casey ends up trapped in her flat as her transformation begins, her change quite possibly instigated not so much by a tropical insect bite but rather by the social pressures that have culminated in her no longer being able to cope with the future life she is being forced into by those around her. As those social pressures intrude on her new life, she kills them. 

For much of BITE‘s running time I was expecting the film to reveal that the gloopy, slimy, egg-covered nightmare that Casey’s flat becomes was actually all in her head. The ending scuppers that idea, but I just wonder if that’s what writer-director Chad Archibald was aiming for - a character study of a woman pressured by society to adopt the traditional roles she isn’t yet ready for and indeed may never be, and the horror that ensues when it becomes obvious that’s not going to happen. In this way, BITE is more art house than exploitation horror, and as such is definitely worthy of attention. 

Second Sight’s DVD has no extras (boo!) apart from two sound options. A director’s commentary for this one would have been very much appreciated. 

BITE is out from Second Sight on UK DVD on 
Monday 10th October 2016

Observance (2015)

“Time for Some of the Freaky Stuff”

         Receiving its UK premiere at last year’s London Film Festival, Joseph Sims-Dennett’s disturbing, challenging dissertation on madness, loss and the nature of identity gets a UK DVD release courtesy of Soda Pictures.

         Parker (Lindsay Farris) is in a bad way. Separated from his wife and still haunted by disturbing, frequently monstrous images after the death of his young son, he takes a job as a private investigator, hired to observe the comings and goings of a young blonde woman.

He is set up by his employer in a flat across the street, communicating with them only by telephone, and using a variety of surveillance devices (cameras, microphones) to record her every movement. As one day follows another, Parker becomes suspicious that something very strange is going on. Meanwhile his nightmarish visions are worsening, the room in which he is holed up seems to be taking on the same state of disrepair as his increasingly fragmenting sanity, and ‘something’ may be leaving ‘offerings’ of dead animals - but what?

         There are no easy answers in this one, and whether or not OBSERVANCE will be for you will depend on if that's your thing. Think of a very low-budget version of Denis Villeneuve’s ENEMY (2013) with the dream-cum-nightmare enigmatic atmosphere of  Lucile Hadzihalilovic’s EVOLUTION (2015). If you liked those then you’ll want to give OBSERVANCE a viewing. I can honestly say I didn’t really know what was going on. The film is part REAR WINDOW in reverse - a kind of extreme psychological horror version of Hitchcock’s film, while asking all kinds of questions about who we are, who is watching whom, and whether or not it is possible for some people to ever recover from the kind of devastating grief that Parker has suffered.

Soda Pictures’ DVD comes with a trailer and a tiny featurette that’s worth a look as it gives you some more insight into the movie and the director’s intentions. Don’t expect anything to be explained, though, because the main aim is quite obviously for you to have to do that yourself. 

Joseph Sims-Dennett's enigmatic and weird OBSERVANCE comes out on DVD from Soda Pictures on Monday 10th October 2016

Suture (1993)

“A movie worth thinking about”

Scott McGehee and David Siegel’s 1993 black and white crime drama with an art-house twist gets a dual format release courtesy of Arrow Films.

Construction worker Clay Arlington (Dennis Haysbert) is invited to the city to stay with his wealthy half-brother Vincent Towers (Michael Harris) after the two meet for the first time at their mutual father’s funeral. Clay has been led to believe it’s a weekend visit but actually Vincent plans to blow his brother up with a car bomb while he takes a one-way ticket out of there. 

But it goes a bit wrong when Clay survives. The twist is that he was wearing Vincent’s suit and carrying Vincent’s cards so now everybody believes him to be his brother. As Clay tries to regain his memory after plastic surgery Lt Weismann (David Graf) is busy trying to prove that Vincent killed his own father. Events culminate when the real Vincent returns.

The above plot would make a reasonable story. Indeed, the plastic-surgery-post-trauma-leading-to-confused-identity plot has been used by all kinds of movies from Douglas Hickox’s BLACKOUT (1985) to Wolfgang Petersen’s SHATTERED (1991). But SUTURE has something no other film has. You see, much is made during the opening scenes of how Clay and his brother look similar, and this is also played upon heavily after Clay’s ‘accident’. But the thing is, while the world in which Clay and Vincent live believes them to be almost identical, the actors playing the two brothers could not look less alike. 

And herein lies the genius of SUTURE, allowing it to work on levels other than a simple crime drama. In fact, if you’re expecting a straightforward treatment of the above plot you will be at best confused and at worst frustrated to the point of switching this off. Because the plot isn’t really the point. SUTURE is at least about two important things: the nature of identity and the nature of storytelling through film.

There is a significant scene towards the end where Clay says he believes himself to be Vincent because everybody keeps telling him that he is, which poses the question: what makes us who we are? Is it the internal part, the memories we have of our past, or is it the external - what everyone around keeps telling us we are?

But SUTURE also looks at how we watch film. We are told by everyone (including the two leads) that Vincent and Clay are nearly identical. Because two different-looking actors have been cast in the two roles, should that matter? If Harris has been cast because he better depicts the villainous Vincent and Haysbert because he has the warmer, more vulnerable persona, isn’t this just as artificial as having the two roles played by the same man but with one having a scar to make a distinction? Or wearing a black hat or a red shirt? As if to emphasise this, to drive that point home, SUTURE is filmed in stark black and white even though this is a film that is anything but - the ultimate in ironic screen storytelling.

Arrow’s disc also contains a commentary track from the film-makers and executive producer Steven Soderbergh, new interviews with the cast and crew, deleted scenes, a short film that’s a meditation on Hitchcock’s THE BIRDS, trailers and a reversible sleeve. Another great Arrow release that will keep you thinking long after the credits have rolled. 

Arrow are bringing out SUTURE in a dual format DVD and Blu-ray edition on Monday 4th July 2016