Review: The Leech

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2022
Images from the Internet

The Leech
Directed by Eric Pennycoff
Doomcroak Pictures; Arrow Video
82 minutes, 2022
www.arrow-player.com.

This is a Holiday film (in this case Christmas) that will not make it to the Hallmark Channel. Supposedly, the holiday represents love and profits, but the New Testament is built on the Old Testament, which is filled with fire, brimstone, and a whole lot of violence. This release dips into the themes of both books.

The film also delves into other motifs, such as the power of charity for both good and evil, and (in my opinion), the absence of reality in faith-belief. If you are still reading, let us start this rolling.

Graham Skipper

The church run by Father David (Graham Skipper, who was also in 2019’s Aliens, Clowns and Geeks), is struggling to find parishioners, which in the real world is actually becoming a problem for local houses of worship outside of the mega churches and their fear mongering diatribes (yes, and profits). The “lack” is shown brilliantly in the opening shot of the church steps, with its snow unbroken by feet entering the building, while the good father is sermonizing.

This sermon actually is important because it sets up the whole concept of charity, and what it means to the priest. I will also note that it is interesting that the few parishioners are faceless in the dim light, and we see only their backs as they silently glide, ghost-like, out of the church without even acknowledging David. Holiday cheer is certainly not present. Less than four minutes in, and I am already impressed.

Jeremy Gardner

When he meets ramshackle Terry (Jeremy Gardner), David is put into a situation where he needs to live up to what he literally preaches, and tries to help Terry out, but they find out that Terry’s girlfriend, Lexi (dimpley Taylor Zaudtke) has thrown him out, leaving his clothes out on the lawn. David offers him to stay the night with him at his deceased mom’s home. Terry, with a bit of a Southern drawl, has absolutely no filters on what he says, and starts to take advantage of David right from the start (“Mind if I smoke?” Terry states as he lights up in the car, not waiting for a response, as an example). The visit is intended for one night, for him to reconnect with Lexi the next day. But the film’s title says otherwise.

Ironically, Terry’s long hair and beard are reminiscent of the classic Jesus image, but he is more inclined to cause some ruckus overturning tables in the temple than healing the sick. He is definitely a house pest more than a house guest, chain smoking (after being asked not to do so) and blasting his boom box in the middle of the night. You know the type. And when his equally repulsive ex-, Lexi, who has been evicted (surprise surprise) shows up, David is in quite the quandary, allowing these two losers and abusers to stay with him for the Holidays, out of charity. In this case, he probably should have called for back-up (Bishop? social services? police?) in some form.

Watching this unfolding is the church pianist, Rigo (Rigo Garay), who seems a bit overwhelmed by the two, which is understandable, especially after some racist comments by our good ole boy. If this couple even thought about voting, you know which side of the aisle they would choose.

Taylor Zaudtke

At some point, I was a bit pissed at David. He concedes too often and too easily. For example, he lets himself get involved in a drinking game, when he is not interested. Screw that. I have been to plenty of parties where they wanted me to drink (academics and wine are nearly synonymous), and as I do not drink (uninterested), I did not. David should have had that will of character.

There are so many (purposefully, I am assuming) cringy moments throughout the whole film, but especially by the things done and said by the couple from hell (pun intended). And yet, I have definitely met people who were like this, I just did not invite them into my life, or on the rare occasion, had to get them out of my spectrum.

There is a lot of sermonizing at the beginning as David struggles with the lack of funds due to lack of attendance at the church (the Catholic church is the richest religious organization in the world, but treats its poorer churches as dead weight and closes them; this is not a screed against the Catholic church, just a statement of fact; I am opposed to all religious financial organizations), and a good-hearted leaning toward helping his fellow humans especially during Yuletide, but that just makes what happens all the more intense. The sermonizing is less a proselytizing point, but a device to show David’s state of mind, and how far he will travel in his own path.

Of course, there comes a tipping point (after all, it is the third act of a psychological horror film), and David has been wrestling with the Angel (Jesus and Rigo) on one shoulder, and the Devil (Terry and Lexi) on the other. The escalation is obvious, and wonderous, making this a magical time of year, especially during a psychotic break from reality

My one complaint is that – and it is not very often – the image is really dark and hard to make out, such as after the “Never Have I Ever” game. I realize it symbolizes the darkness and toxicity that is brought on by Terry and Lexi on David’s spirit and belief system, but it nulls out because it is visually unclear.

The cast is small at four speaking parts, which is not surprising considering it was shot during the height of the Covid pandemic (you heard me), in Fort Wayne, Indiana. We do not get to see much of the town, as nearly everything takes place either in the church or David’s home, but the film is a spirited experience of psychological Holiday horror and breakdowns.

IMDB listing HERE

Review: The Mare

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2022
Images from the Internet

The Mare (aka Mare)
Directed by René Bjerregaard
Broadstone;
74 minutes, 2020 / 2022

This Norwegian film (with subtitles), shot in Sogn og Fjordane, nearly 230 miles northeast of Oslo, is moody and gloomy, as is often the case of releases from Scandinavia in general, where summers are beautiful and bright, but the winters are long and dark. And like many others from this part of the world, it is a touch on the arty side, but I will get into that later.

Meanwhile, we are introduced to the protagonist, a dimply young man named Liam (Alv Fossum). He is quite troubled. He has violent images in the form of nightmares (hence the film’s title). His father (Jonny Bjørkhaug) is naturally worried about the dude: waking up screaming and in a cold sweat. Of course, we get to share in Liam’s night landscape dominated by a black handed demon (Kim Kvamme), family members, and his own fears. Trying to help, he takes Liam to his grandparent’s house in a small town in the remote fjord-infjused east coast.

Alv Fossum

Liam’s Grandma (Grethe Mikaelsen) is sharp. She is taking care of Grampa Tom (Tom Larsen), who is an invalid, except when he roams the tiny and dusty house. Liam’s room is miniscule and threadbare, but finds a diary from this late mother, (Karoline Stemre), which also contain some photos of her.

In his delusional state due to lack of sleep and whatever else his past has brought to him, Liam is suspicious of Grannie, as her eyes dart around and she almost seems to keep Tom in his place. Or is it all in Liam’s mind? The haunting music leads us towards his perspective.

A nice touch is when Liam is watching a small black and white television in the remote location, and the image is of somnambulist Cesare (Conrad Veidt) in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) is on the screen. Which bring me to the style of the film. As I said, the story is dark and dreary, and the visuals reflect it, often in shadow or extremely muted colors, especially within the musty abode, where much of this was filmed.

Grethe Mikaelsen

Like any good story based on night-terrors, such as the A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise, the main character has dreams within dreams, and he has trouble distinguishing between his sleep world and his reality. I have always liked this premise, and this does a good job of it. And thanks to the deep shadows of the house, there is the opportunity for a number of effective jump scares.

Is this a family curse? Is it all in his head (well his sleeping one)? Or is there something more sinister abound? Liam (and the viewer) tries to figure it all out, fighting through fear, insecurity, and isolation in his cell of a room.

The acting here is excellent, with Fossum clearly being the star, but as far as I am concerned, this is clearly Mikaelsen’s film, stealing every scene in which Grandma occurs.

Tom Larsen

It is also worth noting the scenery. Man, the fjord districts of Norway are beautiful. I had the chance to see it myself a few years ago (around Bodǿ and drive through a bit north of the city) and it is stunning territory. The use of drones gives a better perspective of territory and catches its exquisiteness well.

I have been informed by the director that this was self-produced and shot in four weeks. I find that  it looks so good. The house interior sets the perfect mood. It proves that so much can be done with a microbudget ($12,000), dedication, and a good story.

So pull out some lefsa and krumkake (avoid the lutefisk, in my opinion), and crank this up.

IMDB listing HERE

Review: 6:45

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2022
Images from the Internet

6:45
Directed by Craig Singer
Storyboard Media; Cascrater Film and Media; Well Go USA Entertainment
96 minutes, 2021
www.645movie.com/
www.facebook.com/645movie/

Wow, there are a lot of films in the past few years where the day repeats over and over, each time with different results, such as one I recently reviewed from Serbia called Incarnation. 

The title of this film refers to a digital (flip) bedside clock that announces the time to re-awaken, at 6:45 AM. This particular clock is in a Bed and Breakfast on an island accessible only by ferry, where a lusty couple, Jules (Augie Duke, who has a Deborah Walley/Donna Pescow vibe) and Bobby (Michael Reed), have come for a long weekend getaway. Bobby has a history on the island, but does not remember much.

The island setting for the film is actually the Jersey Shore, including Ocean Grove, Asbury Park, and Seaside Heights. Thanks to some creative filmmaking, it feels like an island, with the Atlantic Ocean filling in for the body of water supposedly surrounding the locale. There is, however, a nice nod to the location when one of the characters smokes a brand called “Jersey.”

The owner of the place is the smarmy and disturbing Gene (Armen Garo), who creepily listens at the couple’s door while they, well, knock boots. This is a beautiful house among many others packed in together, rather than a middle-of-nowhere cabin, which is refreshing, relatively speaking (isolated cabins are more of a worn tale than repeating days).

Despite all the woo-hooing between them, this is a couple with some issues. Bobby is a bit of a hothead and lothario, and Jules has a deep resentment of him due to a past indiscretion. This causes them to intermittently have tension and being loving.

But the tagline for the film is “Vacation. Die. Repeat,” so it should come to no surprise that at the end of the day, there is no good coming. After a tour of the town, including a stop at a bar where they exchange words with a drunken woman, Brooklyn (Sasha K. Gordon), our intrepid couple meet a grisly demise at the hands of a cowled assassin (Joshua Matthew Smith). That is until it is suddenly 6:45 AM the same day (you saw that coming, I am assuming).

In Final Destination mode, Bobby remembers what happened as a possible dream, and events aren’t exactly the same as things are worded differently in conversations (e.g., in the first, Bobby complains about the bathroom, in the second, Gene mentions the bathroom first). Jules, on the other hand, does not remember anything, which is a bit confusing. Gene tells of a similar murder to the one Bobby and Jules experienced in the first incarnation a couple of years before (during the second 6:45 around). To me, this set up some ideas of the direction of the film and where it may go. I hope I’m wrong since I’m only 30 minutes in, and have lots more 6:45’s to go.

As is the case, each iteration gives more clues, more details to help Bobby possibly avoid a horrible fate for him and Jules. Is it a dream within a dream? A memory before death, as in “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”? Ghosts like The Others? Fan mail from some flounder? Or perhaps it is something totally different. It has me curious. Especially why he knows, and she does not, since they are both involved.

One of the aspects of the film that I find intriguing is each 6:45 has shadows of the previous ones, but the more times it repeats, the further in the outfield it goes, with some actors playing different people at some point.

While Bobby is trying to figure out the mystery and Jules is annoyed at his behavior as he does, there seem to be others who have some idea what is going on, both giving clues and making it more confusing for everyone watching. Oh, and Bobby, too. Not even halfway through, and I am really curious for some solutions I am guessing will start coming and making more of an impact in the third act. One thing I can definitively say is that each time is bloodier. In fact, by some of the last scenes, the film has moments that are nothing less than gruesome in the context of the story.

Most films with the time repeating theme have subtle supernatural elements (like Groundhog Day), but this one has both feet in the psychological genre as we explore the relationship between Bobby and Jules. I figured out the ending a bit late in the game, and it was well worth the wait.

The two leads are incredibly solid in the acting department. I have been a fan of Reed since The Disco Exorcist (2011), and this role is reminiscent of Normal (2013). He can be an intense actor, as he is here, with Bobby taking the viewer down a road of angst and alcoholism. Duke more than holds her own as they have fine chemistry, and are a believable couple, even with the other dynamics that are swirling around them. There are also a couple of interesting cameos by rappers/actors Remy Ma and The 45 King

The Jersey scenery is beautiful, and with events occurring numerous times, we get to see some detail surrounding the area. But man, it looked cold (I’m guessing early spring before tourist season) as the wind whips around them on the beaches and in other open spaces. While the camerawork by Lucas Pitassi is fluid and occasionally imaginative, it’s the editing by Sam Adelman that caught my attention. This includes some interesting split screen shots that are peppered through a few of the incarnations, perhaps indicating the fracturing of the relationship, or of a personality.

This is the kind of movie that it may be a good idea to watch twice, to see all the missed clues that possibly went over the audience’s heads the first time. Luckily, the film holds up under multiple views.

IMBD Listing HERE 

Review: Her Name Was Christa

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2022
from the Internet

Her Name Was Christa
Directed by James L. Edwards
Buffalora Entertainment Group; RoseRed Lane Films; Flowtac Entertainment
120 minutes; 2020
www.facebook.com/HERNAMEWASCHRISTA/

In our lives, we have all met people like Steven (director James L. Edwards), who are lonely and middle aged, building a wall around themselves and acquiesces at work while living a shallow life. If I hadn’t met my wife, that could have been me. Bald headed with a “janitor’s” moustache and a bit of pudge, Steven is a telemarketer, making sales in a room full of others doing the same. He takes pride in his work, but is abused by his unappreciative boss. Mainly, Steven is lonelier than he will let on, perhaps more than he realizes, even joining an online dating service.

Steven meets the new guy at work, fast-talking Nick (Drew Fortier), a narcissistic and crude dude who is there for the moment because it was the only job at the time that would hire him. He’s young, attractive, and has latched on to Steven, convinced it is his job to get Steven laid. I have known guys like this at work, too, especially in the 1980s, but I digress…

Following Nick’s suggestion, Steven visits a girl of the night, Raven (Kaylee Williams) in a both humorous and cringingly unhappy experience with which I can sympathize. This leads to another idea by Nick: “the girlfriend experience,” where the paid party pretends to be a girlfriend to loosen things up a bit.

By a coincidence and a moment of kismet, he meets the future Christa, a corner hooker named Candy (Shianne Daye), whose favorite band is “The Velvet Underground with Nico.” Good start I would say. They set up the ground rules, and they start hanging out together. As the relationship progresses, they are sort of in a yin and yang situation. For Steven, he’s happy just to have someone to cuddle with, not necessarily looking for more, but for Candy, this confuses her since her entire life revolves around men using her for sex, and here is someone who is into something a bit emotionally deeper though he is aware of its parameters, and that is an experience she has never dealt with before, that someone would be interested in her as a companion rather than an object.

Over time, their bond becomes stronger until a series of tragic events unfold, taking the film into another level that might classify it into a horror (perhaps a psychological one). By this point, it comes out as a study of a mental breakdown that is reminiscent of a more romanticized version thematically of Decay (2015) or, if you want to stretch it a bit, Nekromantic (1987), without the “real-life” intensity, thanks of Steven’s mindset (such as it is). Oh, those crazy Akronites.

The film’s gore level picks up a notch or five, as we see the differences between what’s going on in the mind, flipping back and forth with the reality of the situation, most effectively displayed when a split screen is used. Another interesting way to approach the film, especially on a second viewing, is to realize that some conversations between two people are actually happening in one head, and the talk and motives reflect that. And this film is particularly dialogue-heavy, and while it keeps the interest in its long two hours (more on that after), it is important to remember that this is the director’s first feature, and he would show some of his humor more in upcoming releases.

The only two real complaints I have, as it were, is that it really didn’t need to be a full two hours, and could easily have about 20-30 minutes honed from it (just add it to the Deleted Scenes folder on the Blu-ray). The other is the main musical synth theme on the soundtrack, which sounds like he was trying to emulate Goblin in the 1980s, but I found it quite irritating. Loved the film, but not this aspect of it.

I am really looking forward to future films by James L. Edwards. Perhaps a nice text editorial work by a second party might be good, but he is so incredibly on the right path. His stories themselves are great, and he always seems to manage to throw in some nice twists and turns. That all makes it fun.

IMBD Listing HERE 

 

 

 

 

Review: The Forever Room

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2021
Images from the Internet

The Forever Room
Directed by Kevin Hicks
Chinimble Lore; Freestyle Digital Media
90 minutes, 2021
www.facebook.com/Chinimble-Lore-113167533387607

Yeah we're playing those mind games forever
Protecting our images in space and in time
– John Lennon

Much as director Kevin Hicks (and his partner, Vickie Hicks, who also wrote the screenplay and was Executive in Charge) updated the communicating through time via media (telephone in this case) with his previous feature, Dead Air (2021; reviewed HERE), they now update and mix the escape room and held captive genres with this, their new full length release.

Samantha Valletta

In this psychological thriller, it starts off with Claire (Samantha Valletta), a young woman who is chained by her ankle in a basement somewhere near Ithaca, NY, that has a cot, a chair, a table, some odd and rudimentary clown paintings, a mirror, and a bucket for, well, you know. However, there is naught to read, no music, and nothing but herself to spend the time. She is way angrier than she is scared of her captor, an older woman named Helen (Vickie Hicks). The latter accuses Claire of committing a heinous crime and states, “You have a lot of skeletons in your closet, dear,” which Claire vehemently denies. That’s just the opening (so nothing being given away).

As the film progresses, things are not always what they seem at first, and much of the story is the basis of the relationship between these two women. Claire is confused and angry, and Helen is (mostly) calm and calculating, many of their exchanges being when it is feeding time.

Each conversation builds on the previous one, with bits of information to the audience to fill them in, using small increments. Despite the claustrophobia of the small room in which Claire forcibly occupies, the story is interesting, and the viewer wants to know more and more of what put these two people in this dire situation. Claire doesn’t remember anything before being chained up, but parts of her past are telegraphed by both events that happen to Claire in the room, and the things she hears.

Meanwhile, people keep appearing when Claire is alone, such as Ethan (Kevin Hicks, this film’s director), Rebecca (Nicole Skelly), and a boy named Michael (Luca Iacovetti) who seems to be playing a game of hide and seek with Claire. Why these people are there seem obvious to me, but at 20 minutes in, I will hold off on my initial guesses. Rebecca explains how she is a figment of Claire’s imagination (“Haven’t you ever had an imaginary friend?”), but something dark brings out these three…and a couple of sock puppets. No, I’m not kidding. Possibly it is a bit like Gerald’s Game (2017) in that the imagination runs havoc, perhaps it is dreams, or is it something more sinister or supernatural than that?

Over time, the frequency of the pop-ins increases and become more intense. Sometimes it is incredibly creepy, especially with Ethan and Michael. Rebecca is sort of a Greek Chorus in that she helps with some self-questioning and pieces of exposition for the viewer. Or perhaps it is Claire’s own brain eating itself because she refuses to eat for days on end.

Despite the small, narrow space, the filming work is well staged, almost like a three-camera television shoot, keep the elbow room still tight, but not to the point of, say, an MRI-level or the sewer pipe escape of the main character in Richard Bachman’s (Stephen King) novel, The Running Man.

Vickie Hicks

As with Dead Air, Vickie proves herself to be a naturalistic actor who makes it look easy, with her cigarette smokey deep voice. Valletta manages to keep up with her, making her both empathetic and unhinged in a fearless performance.

The lighting is phenomenal, with shades of primary colors, but not to the Creepshow (1982) level, but more of a realistic tone, and with the editing gives some expansion to the space. Speaking of the basement, this could actually be a one-set play, using shadows and dark spots for characters to “pop” in and out quite easily. It almost seems Vickie wrote it that way.

Kevin Hicks

For a troupe of five (not counting the two puppets), the story stays engaging for the full run time, and even though the space is small, as is the cast, it remains compelling. The final act is full of unexpected moments and answers quite a few questions. A good watch.

The film is available On Demand from Chinimble Lore and Freestyle Digital Media.

 

Review: Survival Knife

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

Survival Knife

Directed by Mike McKown

Robot Monkey Studios / Wild Eye Releasing

102 minutes, 2016

www.wildeyereleasing.com

Even before I start, this is an interesting premise, if one looks at the time framing. In most films, especially the slasher genre, it usually takes 20 minutes (not counting the ubiquitous prologue) for the action to build (Act 1), another 40 minutes for people to start up getting killed (Act 2, or, the ramp-up), and then the rest of the film is where the action is packed and the killer is exposed and sometimes done away with, usually by who is often known as the “Final Girl,” a term I believe was framed by Carol J. Clover in her amazing book, Men, Women, and Chainsaws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film, which can be found online as a .pdf.

Well, this film picks up where Act 3 starts as its Act 1 (or perhaps one could call it an extended, 8-minute prologue since the credits run over it; it’s all semantics, so I’ll leave that up to you, dear reader). Right off, you can see some nods to previous films as a homage, such as A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) where the masked killer, the Survivalist (Jesse-Lee Lafferty) runs his knife along the wall (who would do that in real life?) in an abandoned factory (that makes a great film set) like Freddy did with his glove in the furnace room, and the one-eyed, eyepatch vengeance seeking lead in the Swedish classic, Thriller: A Cruel Picture (1973).

Though the Survivalist is mort and his body fried and now fertilizer, suddenly there are more killings in the woods in his style, while our final girl Penny (Danielle Donahue) is having vivid dreams of violence. Unlike One-Eye, there is no vengeance to seek with her masked slasher gone, so the question is whether our PTSD-ridden heroine, like the lead in Ms. 45 (1981), is fulfilling a need for action triggered by past events? Needless to say, Penny is angry, and why wouldn’t she be? No longer able to work (as a stripper, natch), her fiancée and all her friends were the Survivalist victims, and the press is hounding her – well, one reporter, anyway (Kaitlin Schoeb).

She also has to deal with the likes of a too-personal psychologist (psychiatrist?), Dr. Lentz (Bruce Lentz), a empathetic police detective, Jake (Lonnie Thomas), and a less than sympathetic one, Kim (the wonderfully named Melissa Troughtzmantz), who are the procedurals on the case to find the murderer. Speaking of which, I figured out the key element of the murders just before the half-way point in the film (that is my procedural).

Overall, this release is pretty bloody and violent throughout, sometimes in the present and others in flashback, but most of the time (as in other than one time), it is without gore. There is, however, a few scenes of gratuitous nudity (all female), and even a shower scene, which at one point was practically a given in slasher films. And then there is the occurrence in the strip club, focusing a lot on the action at the poles, beyond the storyline occurring at the bar.

The film uses mostly a muted color palate early on, with dull hues tones, such as dark blue striped shirts, or pillows with black and white patterns; there are no bright colors like reds or yellows. Even the walls and plush chairs have gray tones, and the apartment rooms are sparse. The flashbacks are shot through a sepia-toned filter. Even Pittsburg, where it is filmed, looks a bit washed out in long shots in a bit of haze of smog. I was impressed with the filming within the abandoned factory, which is a mixture of bright sunlight and deep shadows. Occasionally the people in the sunny bits look a bit washed out, but overall, I was struck.

The acting is mostly passable, with some of the secondary characters being a bit wooden, but you definitely can feel Donahue’s anger through her clenched, very white teeth, which is how she talks most of the time (anger issues, remember?). The electric soundtrack sounds decent without it being overly synth-sounding (I’m not a synth fan; too 1980s even for me).

The story was written by Jim Towns, who actually did a great job with this complex plot, even without much exposition as to what life was like before the killings (other than Penny’s engagement). What makes this a good tale? Well, just as it doesn’t start where most films do, neither does it end there, as it continues beyond the point of where one would expect it to be; plus, there a few false endings, and that is decent writing for this release.

That’s not to say there were not a few weak points: for example, Penny keeps kneeling and bending on a bad knee (something I live with), getting up with relative ease. Also, there is a distracting overdubbing in one scene that is really bad, involving the name of a strip club which was obviously changed at some point after filming (for legal reasons?). I’ll chalk that up to budgeting, so I will forgive that.

Mainly, the film is a bit long, and could easily have about 10 to 15 minutes excised (that’s what the “Outtakes” feature on a disc is for). That being said, overall, I would say it’s a well done slasher and psychological thriller that has some nicely done twists and turns.

Review: M.O.M. (Mothers of Monsters)

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

M.O.M. (Mothers of Monsters)

Directed by Tucia Lyman

Indie Rights Movies / Aha Productions

99 minutes, 2020

www.mothersofmonsters.com/

www.facebook.com/M.O.M.movie/

The following statement comes with a caveat: films like The Blair Witch Project (1999) ruined the found footage genre for me, in most cases. It has come across as a cheap way to tell a story by either letting the actors be the filmmakers, or the use of mounted cameras, which takes it away from a human touch (sort of like a scan-it-yourself aisle in a supermarket). But, every once in a while, someone still manages to make it right. Hence, this exception.

We live in a world full of reflection through a camera, be it selfies or someone trying to make some kind of record of an incident (e.g., check out public meltdown videos on YouTube). Either way it is based on ego, such as believing the event is important, a way to point a finger of blame away from oneself to another (for example, the 1983 book And I Don’t Want to Live This Life, by Nancy Spungen’s mom, Deborah), or a deep-seated fear that compels one want to make sure your story is told. This film falls into all three of these categories.

Melinda Page Hamilton

The mother in question is Abby (Melinda Page Hamilton). Her teenage son, Jacob (Bailey Edwards), has a history of acting out in violent ways that Abby refers to as “Monster Time,” such as randomly dropping bricks off high buildings without looking to see if anyone is below. With a way of charming psychoanalysts that most true psychopaths have, he has managed to skirt his way around the legal system. This worries Abby because, in part, as she states early on, “Remember what happened to the Boy who Cried Wolf; he was eaten by the fucking wolf.”

The found footage aspect is either Abby recording herself on a cell phone to tell her side of the story, videos made by others such as Jacob’s friends, or the hidden cameras Abby has placed throughout the house. We get to view them, not necessarily in chronological order, thereby giving us a bit of perspective on Jacob to show that it’s possibly not just a puberty/hormone thing.

One of the brilliant aspects of this thriller is the question of absolutes. Jacob can be an outright shit, but so can Abby. The question is left hanging for quite a while whether Jacob is insanely violent, or is his mom over-vigilant – such as lack of respect of his privacy – due to aspects such as her over-drinking wine-goggles, or Adderall pills she sneaks from Jacob (or both).

One important way of looking at this is through a modern lens, both literally and figuratively. On the literal side, the tone of the film puts it clearly in the canon alongside the likes of What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) with the mood of intra-family fear of threats of violence that keep escalating. Though in color, this is clearly a Noir piece with modern technology of cells, Skype and Spy Cams added in.

Bailey Edwards

As for the figurative, despite its gothic throwback mood, it’s placed in a modern situation, where teenagers are inundated with not just said technology, but the psychological damage of living in a post-Columbine era of increasingly frequent mass shootings, a fascination with Nazis, casual Anti-Semitism, and public spectacles of events like Charlottesville, all of which play into the story in some form or another.

Most indie films have some questionable acting, but every person here puts in a solid performance. Edwards is strong as he seems to flip back and forth between a normal kid and one that you are really not too sure about (I certainly would not want my daughter to date Jacob, but would understand why she might be attracted to him). But as the lynchpin, Hamilton’s portrayal of Abby is Class-A work, and would be deserving of Festival wins at the least. Her past experiences in the likes of numerous television series such as Messiah, How to Get Away with Murder, Mad Men and Big Love come through spectacularly. There is also a very short cameo by Ed Asner, for some added star power.

Lately, I have been feeling more and more as though those who write a film should not direct them because it helps to have a third party do some editing (Hereditary and Midsommar come to mind). However, Tucia Lyman balances the two like a champ, and makes me have second thoughts about that. Before this piece of psychological cinema, her directorial experience was a couple of documentaries and a few episodes of a television series about “real” ghosts, though you’d never know that this was her feature debut.

There are some scenes that are unexpected and downright shocking (again, figuratively and literally), with some squeamish bits, but mostly this is a psychological thriller. The game of “who is the crazy one” is played out in sharp detail, and there are lots of twists and turns to keep the viewer entertained from the first shot to the last.