By Nia Edwards-Behi
FrightFest is the place to see the largest array of horror and genre films on the big screen in the UK. Any film festival can be a marathon feat of endurance, but it’s always even more painful when you’re trying to decide between films and squeezing as much as you can between the schedules of various screens. Whether you’ve already got your pass or just planning on buying the odd ticket, a bit of help is at hand.
I’ve picked out my recommendations for the fest (based on those films I have seen) and picked the films I personally most anticipate (that is, those films I have not seen). I’ve only picked out new films, as frankly I would go watch any of the classic films, so take that as a given! Naturally the following selection is just based on my own taste, so do make sure you have a thorough trawl of the full festival line-up to make up your own mind! I’ve kept this to a total of six films, so consider these are only the very tip of my personal iceberg.
Top Recommendations
There are clear three top films for me that I would recommend out of the FrightFest line-up (again, this is of those films that I have seen for myself). My personal top three are Miike Takashi’s Over Your Dead Body, Bruce McDonald’s Hellions and Steven Oram’s Aaaaaaaah! – and it might be testament to my often contrary taste that these films will undoubtedly be crowd-splitters.
I know from last year’s Abertoir that Over Your Dead Body, a film I absolute adored, was one of the least popular with our audience (still, a healthy 3/5 score ain’t bad either). It’s a slow burn of a film, part-domestic drama, part-traditional kabuki play and part-vengeful splatterfest. The powerful central performances from Ko Shibasaki and Ebizô Ichikawa drive the human drama of the film, while Miike’s obviously adept hand drives the creeping dread that builds throughout. The film’s irresistibly gorgeous visuals beg to be seen on a big screen, from the play-within-the-film’s set design to the suitably unnerving sequences of bloodshed. (See Karolina’s review.)
Bruce McDonald’s Hellions is another one which I know others haven’t enjoyed all that much, but despite a certain level of incoherency and pacing issues, I really loved it. I’ve seen it more than once now and I still really enjoy the central drive of the film: teenager Dora Vogel (Chloe Rose) has to survive Halloween night while being terrorised by demonic trick-or-treaters. There’s a dream-like quality to the film that I really enjoyed, and the sense of unreality to proceedings really appealed to me. This nightmarish quality is there both in the stark cinematography and in the interesting sound design (and the main theme music still gets stuck in my head). The whole film is a fairly obvious metaphor, but the way in which it unfolds impressed me. It’s an atmospheric exploration of its subject matter, and it features an effective performance (and necessarily so for it to work) at its core.
Steve Oram’s directorial debut Aaaaaaaah! is a film which is honestly unlike anything else I’ve ever seen. It’s an avant-garde film in the mode of British absurdity at its most, well, absurd. The lives and loves of an average family play out on screen in a relatively kitchen-sinky way, except for the fact that they communicate, behave and interact in the manner of apes. If you think it sounds weird on paper, wait until you see it, but Oram’s crafted a genuinely original, compelling, funny and bizarrely moving film. It’s one you’ve really got to see for yourself.
Most Anticipated
The three films I most want to see from the FrightFest line-up are again a broad bunch, which is testament to the wide variety of films on offer. Turbo Kid, Tales of Halloween and Remake, Remix, Rip-Off are my top three most anticipated films of the fest, and I’ve good faith they’ll all be ones that will go down a treat.
Turbo Kid’s been a film I’ve been following for a while now. Borne of the Froniteres genre market at Fantasia, the film follows a boy called The Kid and a girl called Apple in a post-apocalyptic wasteland as they fight for survival against the sadistic Zeus. The film promises to be a bloody, anarchic throw-back to 80s action flicks, almost an ideal companion piece to the rather more slick and modern Mad Max: Fury Road. It’s had rave reviews from its festival screenings so far, so I think by far Turbo Kid is a film not to miss.
I’ve had a small glimpse at Tales of Halloween when Axelle Carolyn presented her segment and the film’s trailer at this year’s BIFFF. This is a huge anthology picture, and it’s testament to the talent involved that it stands out from countless other anthology or portmanteau projects as the format falls back into fashion. Carolyn’s produced the film, as well as directing a segment, and the other directors involved are an impressive bunch: Darren Lynn Bousman, Mike Mendez, Neil Marshall, Lucky McKee, Adam Geirasch, Andrew Kasch, Dave Parker, Ryan Schifrin, John Skipp and Paul Solet. No mumblegore nonsense here! There’s good pedigree here, and I do so hope that Tales of Halloween turns out to be a modern seasonal favourite. Carolyn’s segment, Grim Grinning Ghost, is a wonderfully traditional scare, and is simplicity at its finest – you bet I jumped right out of my seat. What’s particularly exciting is that with filmmakers like Lucky McKee on-board, you can almost guarantee that there’ll be some really stand-out weird segments to this film too.
The final film I would most like to see from the line-up is a documentary, another format which seems to be experiencing something of a heyday in the field of genre filmmaking at the moment. Remix, Remake, Rip-off takes us on a trip through the golden era of Turkish cinema, wherein a group of relatively amateur filmmakers were persistently and successfully ripping-off big-budget or better known films – anything from Star Wars to Straw Dogs goes! The subject of this documentary covers many of my interests – non-English language filmmaking, god-awful rip-offs, the concept of remaking…so I’ve no doubt that I’m going to have a real blast with this one when I finally see it.
Are you off to FrightFest this August bank holiday? What are you most looking forward to seeing? With a film selection that big, you can almost guarantee that there’s something for everyone there. BaH’s Steph will be attending, so expect much more on the gems of the fest next month!