Fright

Part spoof, part diligent exercise in nostalgia filmmaking, Warren Dudley’s contribution to the 2024 Frightfest line-up announces itself with its font. The elegantly curling letters, white on black, are followed by a shot of a lonely manor house. We then cut back and forth between images of an open fire burning in a hearth – traditionally used to reference the heart of the home, but in this case with a skull beside it – and pages from a children’s book which will remind viewers of everybody’s favourite Pride mascot, The Babadook. Therein we are warned about the perils of going outside – about the man with the black hand, a threat all the more terrifying for its obscurity, lurking out there to snatch away unwary little girls.

There is only one girl in the house now, and she isn’t little anymore. This is Emily (Gwyneth Evans), who lives alone apart from black-clad Mother (Jill Priest). Having long ago sold off their various valuables, Mother takes care of all their day to day needs, intermittently going into the village for supplies, but she is in poor health, and her temper seems to be getting worse. Emily is caught in a difficult situation, intimidated by her and yet feeling obliged to care for her, hating her but loving her at the same time. She can’t escape because, to her, the black hand is very real, and she suffers from terrible agoraphobia. Could it be real – or is there, in fact, some other danger to her out there?

Dudley has a deep understanding of the visual language of the genre, and viewers who know the period well will be delighted by some of the images he presents: shadows dwarfing figures on the staircase, shot from below; primly staged dinners; Emily’s face pressed against a window as we pull back from the house, watching birds careen overhead. The actors are just as fluent, capturing the atmosphere of a world still adjusting to the talkies, in which gestures and expressions had still not been wound in very much from the silent days. Within the limitations of this style, Evens does a fine job of conveying fear, and these will be the easiest scenes for most present day viewers to engage with. Despite the element of parody, they can be genuinely unsettling.

You won’t need to know anything about film history to engage with the mystery behind Emily’s situation, and the film functions a bit like a puzzle-based computer game, providing not only a trickle of clues but also a limited number of possible actions that Emily, whilst remaining true to form, can undertake in order to solve them. That said, although its running time is also in keeping with the films of the Thirties, it may overstay its welcome with audiences used to much more decisive heroines and less mannered storytelling. Its very faithfulness threatens to undermine its success, leaving one wondering quite what this exercise was for. It’s a superb calling card, emphasising the knowledge and skills of those involved, but seems unlikely to achieve much beyond that. its natural home is at festivals, where it can be appreciated as a piece of art for art’s sake.