film reviews, interviews, features | BRWC

Author: Joel Fisher

  • An Unquiet Grave: Review

    An Unquiet Grave: Review

    Jamie (Jacob A. Ware) has suffered a great loss. His wife, Jules died in a car accident and he’s had trouble going through the grieving process. So much so that he’d do anything to have her back in his life. Ava (Christine Nyland) feels the same way as she’s Jules’ identical twin sister and after Jamie does find a way to bring back his beloved wife, Ava agrees to help him.

    So, they go into the woods and start the ritual that Jamie has learnt in order to bring back the dead. However, Ava starts to get nervous when strange things start happening and she starts to think that Jamie is not telling her everything about what’s going to happen – until it’s too late.

    An Unquiet Grave is a mostly contemplative and cerebral horror on Shudder which talks about grief, the bond between those grieving and the lengths people would go to if there was a chance of getting back their loved one. Told in what is possibly the most realistic way possible, the script for An Unquiet Grave explores the topics of its story in a way that feels well thought out and real, as real as any story where somebody raises the dead at least.

    This leads the story to go through the different thought processes from Jamie’s motives for bringing back his dead wife, to Jules going through the thoughts in her head of having been brought back and what it may mean or feel like for her. An Unquiet Grave is a thoughtful drama with inflections of horror, so if you’re looking for a thrilling ride filled with jump scares then you may want to look elsewhere.

    However, if you don’t mind thinking while watching a horror movie that doesn’t require you to switch off your brain then this may come as a pleasant surprise.

    The problem is though that although director Terence Krey and co-writer Christine Nyland may have come up with a unique concept and have told it in an original way, the story doesn’t seem to know how to end.

    There are many moments which may make the audience think what they would do in Jamie and Ava’s shoes, but the actions towards the end may detach audiences from these moral dilemmas.

  • Death Alley: Review

    Death Alley: Review

    The Dalton Gang were one of the most notorious criminal gangs in the Old West. Four of the gang were brothers; Emmet (Joshua R. Outzen), Bill (Justin France), Bob (Tristan Campbell) and Grat (Jake Washburn) and over their time there were eleven members. Previously being lawmakers, they turned to crime and began specialising in robbing bank, trains and stagecoaches.

    Their reputation spread so wide that bounties were placed on each of them and the law were eager to take them down by any means possible. Death Alley tells the story of the notorious gang as they make their final bank robbery together which resulted in tragedy.

    Unfortunately, it seems that’s as far as Death Alley goes in terms of storytelling as there seems to be no attempt to flesh out the story or characters in any way. The production value may look good and the actors may look the part, but there really isn’t anything else to keep the audience invested.

    To tell a story such as this suggests that some artistic license could have been taken in order to make the story and characters more interesting. However, it seems that writer/director Nicholas Barton is only interested in telling the facts and makes little attempt at bringing The Dalton Gang to life as their story could have been much more interesting.

    The start of the film does put the gang together and with a little narration it sets up the scene, but the gang all seem to be the same besides a few lines of dialogue observed by other characters about them.

    This means that it’s very hard to get to know The Dalton Gang and therefore very difficult for the audience to support them, which is a pity because Death Alley very much wants to romanticise their exploits.

    There’s also no real attempt to make The Dalton Gang out to be anything other than small time crooks and their reputation is never really built on enough besides the occasional character showing shock and awe when they arrive. Death Alley wants to be Young Guns, but it buries itself with a deathly dull Tombstone.

  • Friend Of The World: Another Review

    Friend Of The World: Another Review

    Diane (Alexandra Slade) is one of the last survivors in an apocalyptic war and is rescued by ‘General’ Gore (Nick Young). However, Diane’s rescuer seems a little bit too caught up in the affects of the war and it has seriously altered his mind. So, Diane has to deal with her demented saviour while making their way through a bunker and hoping to find a better place to survive. Although in the dark and claustrophobic world of the post-apocalyptic war, Diane has no idea what to expect.

    Friend of The World is a sometimes surreal, wryly comic horror written and directed by Brian Patrick Butler. At a running time of around fifty minutes, Butler’s comparatively short film manages to pack in a lot and is able to set up a good premise with interesting and engaging characters and present his own filmic vision along the way.

    Shot in black and white, Friend of The World may start off rather slow for some, but as soon as Gore appears then the audience clearly understands the kind of man that he is and the danger Diane faces. Although Nick Young does give a charismatic and unhinged performance, the audience may feel strangely warm to him because despite his demeanour. After all it just feels like he’s making the best of a bad situation.

    The best way to describe the style of Friend of The World is that it’s a Cronenbergian inflected story partly inspired by John Carpenter with a dry sense of humour about filmmaking. It’s clear that Butler knows what he is making and knows the limitations of the budget and maybe a little of his own directorial experience and makes fun of it all.

    Diane is herself a filmmaker so Butler implants all the frustrations and cliches about sophomore filmmakers and slowly draws them out so that the audience can smile a little at the director mocking himself.

    However, Diane is never made to feel like the butt of the joke, rather somebody who is the product of her own surroundings due to her experiences and what she has learnt.

    Friend of The World is a unique film which is full of subtext and is more than just the usual horror comedy. Both Slade and Young give great performances and it may be the beginnings of a filmmaker clear idea of what he wants going forward.

  • The Five Rules Of Success: Review

    The Five Rules Of Success: Review

    Fresh out of prison, a man called X (Santiago Segura) is looking to put his life right. He’s introduced to his parole officer, Emma (Isadora Goreshter) and is told in no uncertain terms that if he does anything to break the terms of his parole that he will go back to jail, after all parole is a privilege.

    Knowing how hard it will be to get a job, X still tries and does find a job at a restaurant where his boss, Avakian (Jon Sklaroff) knows all too well the kind of power he will have over X and hires him thinking that his new employee will be easy to keep in line considering the alternative. However, over time X meets an old friend, Danny (Jonathon Howard) and after a persuasive conversation, Danny tells X about a job that may be of interest to him, but it will lead him back to his former life.

    The Five Rules of Success is a dark and tense character study about a man with the world at his feet who feels like he has nowhere to go. Writer/director Orson Oblowitz may have a couple of films under his belt already, but his particularly unique style shines in his latest as it shows how his visual eye can be transferred to something more real compared to his past work.

    Segura also gives a great performance as a man who has hope for his future, only for his hopes to be dashed away and realising that to survive, he has to change.

    A difficult watch, but one that is visually stunning and tense, The Five Rules of Success may offer up a positive future, but its script and situations that X finds himself in are something that may resonate with an audience. Particularly if those members of the audience have found themselves between a rock and a hard place.

    There may have been a temptation here to glamourise the violence or the allure of the criminal lifestyle, but thankfully that’s never shown in the subdued account of X’s life after release, only ever shown on his face as he loses faith in humanity.

    A film that may not leave the audience thinking that they have been entertained, but The Five Rules of Success reminds us that life has a way of disregarding even our best intentions.

  • Here After: Review

    Here After: Review

    Michael (Andy Karl) has never really found the one true love of his life. He’s just broken up with another girlfriend, and before he knows it, he’s killed in a traffic accident and his soul is carried over into the hereafter. That’s where he meets Scarlett (Christina Ricci), a woman tasked with helping new souls to transition into the afterlife, but there’s a catch.

    Because Michael was single when he died and he never found his soulmate, he has to spend his time looking for the one true love he never found in life so that he can cross over. However, what Michael doesn’t realise is that his time in the hereafter is limited and so just when he thought his dating life was hell, he starts to hate it when he’s dead. Good thing there’s still alcohol.

    Here After is a romantic comedy with some mixed messages about being single, finding love and what really happens when you least expect it. Michael tries to find somebody to talk to and he eventually finds Angelo (Michael Rispoli), a friend that died before he did and he finds him in death just as he did in life; single, lonely and depressed.

    This leads the men to talk about what it means to find love, how to carry on when all you feel is rejection and the perks of being single. However, this just isn’t enough for Michael and eventually he meets Honey (Nora Arnezeder), a woman who can inexplicably see the dead. Although, with her still being alive, Michael starts to realise their relationship might not take off.

    Unfortunately, although Here After does have an interesting premise, the script isn’t that well thought out and doesn’t really know what it wants to say about love. This is particularly evident when Honey’s dark secret is revealed halfway through which may lead the audience to think of the worst possible ending. An ending that they may realise that they were right about.

    There’s also never really any attempt at making Michael a likeable character either. When the script starts to talk about love, being alone and finding the one it may think it’s sounding intelligent, but the characterisations sadly give away its true feelings.

    The audience may realise that Michael is only the better man in Honey’s life is because he’s not the other guy, and as options go, that doesn’t make for a very compelling love story.