Carved

One often hears variants on the phrase 'turkeys wouldn't vote for Christmas', but would a pumpkin ever vote for Halloween? As John Wyndham warned us, even vegetables may have their day.

Carved is a creepy five minute treat looking at Halloween from a pumpkin's point of view. For the moment it's harvested there's something different about this one. It's bruised on one side, twisted, almost into the shape of a human face. Then there's the fact that it seems to be followed around by a loud-mouth raven (Jack, whose acting skills do not seem to be stretched very far in this role). When a young boy (Findlay James Davies) sets eyes on it, he stares in fascination like a kid who has just found two haribo stuck together at the bottom of the bag - he has to have that one. Only its sublimely mutated for will do.

Back at the boy's house, the knives come out. It's carving time, to the shriek of familiar violins. Left until last, the mutant pumpkin seems to be watching. We can imagine how it must be feeling, confronted with the slaughter and mutilation of its kin. Is there anything it can do to escape? Or might it be more focused on revenge?

Carved employs a simple conceit but delivers with relish. The scenes of violence are beautifully choreographed and edited, from the downward stabbing of the knives to the scooping out of pumpkin innards that fall in glistening heaps onto the table. Our pumpkin protagonist can afford to look on blankly; the maniacal gleam in the eyes of the humans tells us all we need to know.

You won't be able to look a Jack 'O lantern in the eyes again.