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FrightFest · 2017

FrightFest 2017

Splice Media Discovery 1

Programme

14 films · 7 reviews

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Boots On The Ground

Five British soldiers, trying to stay alive on the last night of the Afghan War, face not only the Taliban, but also supernatural powers more terrifying than anything they've encountered before.

(Country: UK; Year: 2017; Director: Louis Melville; Stars: Tom Ainsley, Ian Virgo, Ryan McParland, Valmike Rampersand, Sally Day)

Canaries

A group of friends at a New Year's Eve bash in thw Welsh Valleys are confronted by an alien invasion.

(Country: UK; Year: 2017; Director: Peter Stray; Writer: Peter Stray; Stars: Robert Pugh, Hannah Daniel, Richard Mylan, Kai Owen, Craig Russell, Robert Boulter, Sheena Bhattessa, Aled Pugh, Steve Meo, Marc Rhys, Dominique Dauwe, Richard Corgan, Tsilala Brock, Sophie Melville, Kevin McCurdy)

Devil's Gate

Review preview for Devil's Gate

For the first hour or so of its runtime, Devil's Gate smoulders with tension, piling on one horror after another as its spins out its central mystery.

Jennie Kermode · 4 out of 5
Struggling to overcome a recent professional tragedy, an FBI agent relocates to a small town to investigate the disappearance of a woman and her young son.

(Country: Canada, US; Year: 2017; Director: Clay Staub; Writer: Peter Aperlo, Clay Staub; Stars: Milo Ventimiglia, Bridget Regan, Amanda Schull, Javier Botet, Shawn Ashmore, Jonathan Frakes, Spencer Drever, Adam Hurtig, Sarah Constible, Beverly Ndukwu, Scott Johnson, Will Woytowich, Jean-François Ferland, Jan Skene)

Full review

Dhogs

The intimacy of a hotel room. The immensity of a desert. A desolate gas station. In these picturesque settings, hideous crimes occur under the cold stare of unexpected protagonists that show the dark, twisted and perverse sides of human existence.

(Country: Spain; Year: 2017; Director: Andrés Goteira; Stars: Carlos Blanco, Alejandro Carro, María Costas, Melania Cruz, Antonio Duran Morris)

Eat Locals

Review preview for Eat Locals

An ambitious film that suffers from a visibly stretched budget, Eat Locals fails to live up to the promise of its wonderful title but does have some great moments.

Jennie Kermode · 2 out of 5
Britain's vampires gather together for their once-every-50-years meeting. Others will be joining them too: an unwitting Essex boy who thinks he's on a promise with an older woman, and a detachment of Special Forces vampire killers...

(Country: UK; Year: 2016; Director: Jason Flemyng; Writer: Danny King; Stars: Freema Agyeman, Charlie Cox, Mackenzie Crook, Eve Myles, Vincent Regan)

Full review

Fanged Up

Review preview for Fanged Up

These are lashings of gore, some deliberately feeble jokes, some good character-based comedy and predictable but nonetheless entertaining twists towards the end.

Jennie Kermode · 3.5 out of 5
After a man is wrongfully arrested and sent to a high security prison he discovers the guards are vampires and the inmates their victims.

(Country: UK; Year: 2017; Director: Christian James; Writer: Nick Nevern, Daniel O'Reilly, Dan Palmer; Stars: Daniel O'Reilly, Lauren Socha, Steven Berkoff, Lucy Pinder, Vas Blackwood)

Full review

Incontrol

A group of university students discover a weird device that allows them to take control of others and experience the world through someone else’s body.

(Country: Canada; Year: 2017; Director: Kurtis David Harder; Stars: Levi Meaden, Rory J Saper, Anja Savcic, Brittany Allan, Christopher Rosamond)

Inside

A recently widowed mother-to-be living in an isolated new home receives a most unwelcome visitor: a predatory woman who will stop at nothing to snatch her unborn child.

(Country: Spain; Year: 2016; Director: Miguel Ángel Vivas; Stars: achel Nichols, Laura Harring, Stany Coppet, Ben Temple, Andrea Tivadar)

King Cohen

The true story of writer, producer, director, creator and all-around maverick, Larry Cohen.

(Country: US; Year: 2017; Director: Steve Mitchell; Stars: Martin Scorsese, JJ Abrams, John Landis, Joe Dante, Rick Baker)

Mountain Fever (Fever)

Review preview for Mountain Fever

Bleakly realistic and shorn of romance of all kinds, Mountain Fever may be set in desperate times but many of the dangers it depicts are mundane realities in harsh environments.

Jennie Kermode · 3.5 out of 5
When a fatal flu virus devastates Europe, city boy Jack takes refuge in the Alps but he’s ill-equipped to survive the harsh winter. Things only get worse when renegade Kara breaks into his house and commandeers his dwindling food supplies.

(Country: UK; Year: 2017; Director: Hendrik Faller; Writer: Hendrik Faller; Stars: Tom Miller, Anya Korzun, Julien Caplan, Julien Michel)

Full review See: Interview with Hendrik Faller about Mountain Fever

Return Of The Living Dead III

Following a motorcycle accident, Curt tries to bring his girlfriend back to life in his dad's top secret military lab.

(Country: US; Year: 1994; Director: Brian Yuzna; Stars: Kent McCord, James T. Callahan, Sarah Douglas, Melinda Clarke, Abigail Lenz)

To Hell And Back: The Kane Hodder Story

Review preview for To Hell And Back: The Kane Hodder Story

Celebrity docu-portraits like this are ten a penny; what makes this one different is the extraordinary story and the intensity with which it's delivered.

Jennie Kermode · 3.5 out of 5
Meet the man behind the Jason Voorhees and Victor Crowley masks.

(Country: US; Year: 2017; Director: Derek Dennis Herbert; Stars: Bruce Campbell, Robert Englund, Cassandra Petersen, Adam Green, Sean S Cunningham)

Full review

Voice From The Stone

Review preview for Voice From The Stone

Voice From The Stone is an accomplished piece of work.

Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
Verena is a young nurse hired to help a mute young heir in an isolated castle in 1950s Tuscany. She must persuade him that “the dead do not speak”.

(Country: US, Italy; Year: 2017; Director: Eric D Howell; Writer: Andrew Shaw, Silvio Raffo; Stars: Emilia Clarke, Marton Csokas, Caterina Murino, Remo Girone, Lisa Gastoni)

Full review

Where The Skin Lies

Review preview for Where The Skin Lies

A well-handled slice of classic horror.

Jennie Kermode · 3 out of 5
Six people bound together by a traumatic experience travel to the Scottish Lowlands for a relaxing reunion weekend. Soon a number of mysterious and horrifying events start to expose the cracks in their relationships.

(Country: UK; Year: 2017; Director: Michaël Boucherie; Writer: Michael Boucherie, David Boucherie, Nigel Gearing, Keith Temple; Stars: Tristan Beint, Amelia Bennett, Simon Rivers, Louise Williams, Georgia Winters, Nathan Wright)

Full review See: Interview with Joy Harrison about Where The Skin Lies