WSFF08: 'Creepy' program preview
Good morning everyone! The program preview continues for the Worldwide Short Film Festival. I hope you’ve all bought your tickets, especially for anything that our lord and master Todd has programmed. Tonight we preview the second half of the Midnight Mania program, CREEPY. We’ve got drills, butterflies, psycho hillbillies and a whole lot of biting going on!
The program starts off with the very slick Desmond Coy [left] the story about a young couple out for a night on the town and it goes downhill from there. It’s got a tight script and really good production value. Top notch stuff and one of the more pleasant displays of blood splatter that you just don’t get to see that often. James Wilkes, a good old Canadian boy is responsible for this gem.
Next up is Collector, a very dark and very grim piece from Russia. A young man collects butterflies but he has his heart set on other things. Hardly a word is spoken in this fantastic short from Egor Abramenko. The music by Ivan Sokolov and the cinematography by Michail Kelim help make this one come highly recommended.
Straight out of Norway is Øystein Mamen’s The Dreamhouse. Almost so short you miss it. Sanne Goli is mesmerizing as the little girl, engulfed in manipulating her favorite doll. But how far will this manipulation go? Then, from Spain comes the stop animation Violeta. This is pretty much the most disturbing piece of animation I have ever come across. If the visuals don’t freak you out by golly the sound design will. It makes my skin crawl just thinking about it. The other animated short is X.Pression, from France. Trying to put to words what this really is about is hurting my head and we have other shorts to talk about. You’ll know what I mean when you see it.
I promised you biting and here it is. First, let’s start with Elsewhere/Utkant by Patrik Syversen, also from Norway. It raises the question, what is worse? Experiencing a zombie apocalypse, or, being stuck on a lighthouse island with your brother while the apocalypse is happening elsewhere. Few zombie movies will approach this level of humanity as this film does. Then there is the creature feature from France by director David Morley. His film Bitten/Morsure is very well crafted, very tense, and very bloody. It really is the best way to cap off the program. Biting. Blood. The French. The copy I previewed didn’t have subtitles. Not that I needed them. Biting. Blood. The French.
Saving the best for last? You bet. What else is there to say when you have a short titled Psycho Hillbilly Cabin Massacre! The title really says it all. Psychos. Hillbillies. Cabins. Massacres. Not convinced? Let me add something else. Fraternity girl, stripped down to her lingerie, bathed in blood, running with a pitchfork. Really it is a frat boy’s wet dream this is.
