Martyn Conterio
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FrightFest 2021: Demonic review
★★★☆☆ Neill Blomkamp’s Demonic sees the South African director switch things up a little bit. His brand of urban socio-political sci-fi takes a back seat, as he dips his toe into the horror genre proper. The result intrigues as much as disappoints. Made during the early months of the global pandemic, with a $1.5 million budget and…
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FrightFest 2021: Programme highlights
Horror is back! While football never did manage to make it home, after a 2020 edition of Arrow Video FrightFest rolled out entirely online, 2021’s event returns for an in-cinema event at the Cineworld Empire Theatre, Leicester Square. Five days of world horror cinema awaits. The past 18 months have been hell for us all. And if…
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Film Review: Censor
★★★★★ David Cronenberg once said: “Censors tend to do what psychotics only do: they confuse reality with illusion.” Censor takes Dave Deprave’s theory for a creative spin, in doing so sending its lead, a female film examiner with a tragic past, down a rabbit hole of madness. If you’re expecting a retro pastiche akin to Grindhouse, with…
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Film Review: Deerskin
★★★★☆ Absurdity and surrealism played with a straight face is Quentin Dupieux’s stock in trade. His latest gonzo reverie Deerskin finds the filmmaker working with major stars Jean Dujardin and Adèle Haenel. The result is predictably crackpot and enigmatic. We meet Georges (Dujardin) driving down the motorway in a corduroy blazer. At a service station, he…
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Film Review: Carmilla
★★☆☆☆ Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla is among the most influential horror stories ever written. Director Emily Harris’ de-fanged adaptation follows plenty of other versions of the novella, zeroing in on the ‘lesbian vampire’ aspect, but the result is deathly dull. Teenager Lara (Hannah Rae) is isolated and lonely. Living with father (Greg Wise) and mean…
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FrightFest 2020: Av: The Hunt review
★★★★☆ Emre Akay’s powerful social thriller pits a woman against not only her immediate family, but an entire country’s cultural attitudes, its conservative values, and misogynistic impulses. Av (The Hunt) is a depiction of modern Turkey likely to rile those who adore the nation’s incumbent dictator. ‘This is honour! There is no escape!’ a relative tells Ayse (Billur Melis…
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FrightFest 2020: Don’t Click review
★★★★☆ In Kim G-hey’s debut, two college students who access an extreme BDSM/snuff site are tormented by the spirit of a dead woman, an avenging conscience intent on teaching them a lesson. Don’t Click will prove to be divisive, but it has serious points to make. “Take a long hard look at yourselves.” This plea…
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FrightFest 2020: The Swerve review
★★★★☆ In Dean Kapsalis’ impressive psychological drama The Swerve a suburbanite loses her grip on reality, the catalyst for the descent into madness is a bite from a rodent and a recurring nightmare involving a car crash, which may or may not have happened in waking life. On the surface, Holly (Azura Skye) has a nice…
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FrightFest 2020: Dark Place review
★★★☆☆ Anthologies are typically a mixed bag, and so it goes with this Australian collection of horror yarns directed and mostly starring indigenous filmmakers and actors. Dark Place’s mix of post-colonialist commentary and genre storytelling lends a fascinating perspective to a people outcast in their own land. Commissioned to promote First Australian talent, Dark Place is an anthology…
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FrightFest 2020: Aquaslash review
★★☆☆☆ Slashers have used all manner of holiday celebrations and location gimmicks in their bid to deliver greater chills and spills. Aquaslash, which unfortunately isn’t Canadian slang for peeing in the pool, unfolds in a water park with a suitably tragic heritage. This French-Canadian production is so committed to being retrograde, so much an unreconstructed…