Most of the time we get such a backlog of short films and feature length indie films that we work hard to take them all on and review them before the year is up. In what we hope will become a new feature, “Shorts Round Up of the Week” is a column where we’ll be reviewing a round up of short films of varying quality.
If you’d like to submit your short film for review consideration, submissions are always opened to filmmakers and producers.
After a teen girl befriends and is taken by a demonic entity, her parents react in wildly different ways with her mother turning to drinking and her father doing all he can to get her back. How far is he willing to go?
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This horror parody takes on the Friday the 13th franchise and other teens in the woods/camp in peril and gives it all a comedic spin. Here the campers are under threat from a copycat killer who is willing to go pretty far to get his kills, all in glorious 2D!
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Often considered one of the greatest of the horror movie boogey men, Candyman probably would have been a swing and miss were it not for the gravitas that Tony Todd exudes with every performances he takes on. “Candyman” is one of the more genuinely eerie and gruesome ghost stories of the 1990’s that also doubles as a gory slasher. It’s a great fit for a decade where horror was mostly a serious affair and audiences were looking for more novel, entertaining fare to get lost in. “Candyman” is one of the few genuine slasher icons of the nineties that was able to keep the horror genre mostly afloat. While the sequels leave a lot to be desired, it’s hard to top what sense of terror the original from Bernard Rose brings to the table.
The “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” has been a movie series that’s experienced great highs and crushing lows. While surely it’s been a long running series with a lot of sequels, it’s also a series that’s been rebooted numerous times. “The Next Generation” is basically a remake of the original Tobe Hooper film set for a nineties crowd and it is god awful. It’s deliriously bad. You could almost consider it so bad it’s good, if you’re very forgiving, but in the end of the day it’s awful. It’s so awful even stars Matthew McConaughey and Renee Zellweger have distanced themselves from it.
The only studio that’s managed to build an interesting cinematic universe beside Marvel is Warner who’s “The Conjuring” cinematic universe has been a long stretch of movies varying in quality. The interconnected movie verse takes Valak the horrific nun from “The Conjuring 2” and gives her own film. What should have been an easy scare fest lending a spotlight to one of the most memorable monsters in “The Conjuring 2” ends up as yet another miss like “Annabelle.” I don’t know why it’s so tough for the producers of the “Conjuring” cinematic universe to produce spin offs for their series’ monsters.
There really is no one on Earth that can top the combined forces of Dario Argento and Goblin’s excellent “Suspiria,” so Luca Guadagnino doesn’t even try. Instead, this new version of “Suspiria” is less a remake and more of a new tale in the same universe, or a spiritual sequel if you really want to get technical. Luca Guadagnino definitely approaches his spin on “Suspiria” with about as much ambition and enthusiasm he can muster up and what results is a wonky, surreal, bizarre, and yet overstuffed six act horror film that never quite knows when to call it quits. That said, “Suspiria” will most definitely acquire a fan base and I assume years from now fans will debate on whether this or Argento’s original is the superior film.
Despite the fact that I’m a fan of the found footage sub-genre, whenever I come across a new independent film that embraces the format, I release a small groan of worry. Granted, the format can still unleash some gems, but too many times filmmakers tend to fall in to the trappings of clichés and typical twists, not to mention building up to something and never actually delivering. Thankfully “Butterfly Kisses” is a strong horror film that skillfully implements the format while also examining the dangers of becoming obsessed with lore and the darkness of humanity.