Mrs Wiltshire

d./w. Neil Morris, Gary Smart; p. Neil Morris, Gary Smart, Christopher Griffiths, Stuart Conran; cast: Doris MF Bohnam, Bruce Jones, Stanley Rawlings, Simon Bamford, Ray Skeemer

In 2017 Gary Smart, creator of books and documentaries on various 1980s horror classics, began making narrative films under the banner ‘Dark Ditties’. The Offer, a 48-minute sub-feature reuniting several Hellraiser cast including Bamford and Jones, was followed by this extraordinarily powerful social/supernatural horror. It’s essentially an extended monologue by an old lady, clearly suffering from dementia so that we’re never certain how much of what she experiences is real. Over the course of 65 expertly-judged minutes, we learn about her husband and what he did to her, and to their two children. Her son pleads with her to leave the house full of bad memories while her husband’s angry ghost bullies her into staying. Northern lower middle class pride melds with twisted supernatural fear in a superb production that feels like John Carpenter directing an Alan Bennett script. Terrific prosthetics by make-up legend Conran are the finishing touch on what is actually an important film about domestic abuse. Sit through the credits for a surprise. Finders Keepers will be next.

• Cult Screenings website

The Howling

d./w. Steven M Smith; p. Steven M Smith, Paul G Andrews; cast: Maria Austin, Jon-Paul Gates, Tiffany-Ellen Robinson, Hans Hernke, Tony Fadil, Eirik Knutsvik, Elizabeth Saint, Jeremy Hill

Though it still has faults (not least the ridiculous, distributor-mandated title), this Universal homage is easily Smith’s best feature to date with moments that are genuinely impressive. Three friends searching for legendary mad scientist Rathbone and his rumoured coterie of monsters find what they’re looking for and soon regret it. Though promoted as a Frankenstein/werewolf mash-up this owes more to Dr Moreau. Its biggest strength is Alex Harrison’s corking monochrome photography (with occasional well-judged colour moments), evoking the post-Universal, pre-Hammer Euro-style of Freda or Franju. A superb sequence of Rathbone re-animating his disfigured wife then dancing with an idealised fantasy version of her leads into a brief but beautiful Bava-esque nightmare as an accidental witness (Robinson, who is just fantastic) runs past caged experiments. On the downside, the script is full of narrative gaps and unexplained motivations, and Gates’ accent provokes unintended giggles, wobbling between Bela Lugosi and Colonel Klink. End theme by Dr and the Medics, with a cameo by lead singer Clive Jackson.

• Greenway Entertainment

Home Videos

d./w./p. various; cast: Jason Impey, Jessica Hunt, Martynna Madej, Martin W Payne, Donna Hamblin, Luc Bernier, Kieran Johnston, Daiane Azura, Dean Allem, Clare Crumpton, Simon London, Suzy Weatherall, Adam Jones

This found footage flatpack anthology from Trash Arts is distinguished by Jason Impey’s contribution ‘Case 019684’ which takes up most of the first half-hour. Stock footage of Impey as his ‘Jack Hess’ snuff film-maker character is combined with clips from his parents’ home movies, documenting Jason/Jack’s life from baby to boy to accomplished and busy indie horror film-maker/psychopath. The result is an extraordinary quasi-auto-biopic, structurally somewhere between Boyhood and The Sin of Harold Diddlebock, which deserves to be extended to feature length. The remaining 60 minutes is the usual mishmash, the highlights being Sam Mason Bell’s ‘Scratchy Eyes’ (which uniquely manages to misspell its own title!), an effective silent, fake super-8 film of an 8th birthday with a creepy supernatural clown lurking at the back of shot; Stephen Longhurst’s ‘The Watcher’, a short, rural take on The Last Horror Movie; and Adam Jones’ vampire sketch ’The Interview’. Other contributions either drag on far too long or are barely there at all.

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The Shadow of Bigfoot

d./w./p. Philip Mearns; cast: Ben Shockley, Joe Simmonds, Keith Eyles, Hugo Myatt, John Rackham, James Payton, Kirsty Cox, Maria Thomas, Lindsay Groves

True to the title, this micro-budget chiller sensibly restricts the eponymous cryptid to ominous shadows and the occasional glimpse of fur. Two believers and one sceptic head into the forests of North Carolina where the most obsessive of the trio shoots a sasquatch, determined to claim its carcass as proof, after which the humans are prey to a tribe of vengeful hominids. Although the forest exteriors could be anywhere, the opening scenes in an ‘American’ university are so obviously UK-set as to be borderline surreal. A brief glimpse of a US police car is the only clue (apart from some distinctly variable accents!) that we’re supposed to be in the States. The film’s strength lies in the performances as personal bonds break down in the face of imminent brutal death. Ostensibly intended as ‘tongue in cheek’ – which doesn’t really come across – you’ll either enjoy this as a solid cryptozoology adventure or mock its cheapness, although there are many far, far worse bigfoot movies than this. Shot in Kent in 2012. You can watch it for free on YouTube.

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Fear2000 Powerpoint and handout

A few weeks ago I delivered a presentation at the Fear2000 academic horror conference at Sheffield Hallam University.

My paper, 'Horror Beyond Measure: The Exponential Rise of British Horror Cinema', was a statistical analysis of UK horror cinema production and release since January 2000. I can't deny: I was very pleased with how well it was received, especially as everyone there were clever academics and I'm just a marketing dweeb/ex-journalist.

I have recorded an audio version of the Powerpoint, which is now available to download from Scribd, along with a PDF of the handout I produced.

Dark Matter

d./w./p. Mol Smith; cast: Dominic O’Flynn, Gina Purcell, Jamie-Jodie Shanks, Sharon Lawrence, Mel Mills

This creepy, trippy sci-fi horror was the promising directorial debut of the writer-producer behind Tainted Love. Scientist James, taking time out to recover from losing his wife in a car crash, finds a meteorite in his garden and receives strange downloads on his PC. Using these – and a bathtub of hot water – he somehow creates a mysterious young woman who must be taught from scratch like an infant but learns very quickly. His friend and former colleague Valerie has some secrets of her own, including a teenage abortion. A blue guy later appears from the same bathtub while James experiences horrifying visions of his wife’s death and frequent ‘timeslips’ to other realities, including one where he and Valerie are married with kids. There are CGI spaceships in orbit because ‘dark matter’ has destroyed their home galaxy, or something. Frankly, if you can figure out the mind-scrambling third act you’re doing better than me. Smith acknowledged his debt to A for Andromeda, which is more than the makers of Species ever did.

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Ghost Stories

d./w. Jeremy Dyson, Andy Nyman; p. Claire Jones, Robin Gutch; cast: Andy Nyman, Martin Freeman, Paul Whitehouse, Alex Lawther, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith

Ghost Stories was a popular success based on a name cast, the reputation of Dyson and Nyman’s West End play, and a massive marketing budget. When finally watched however, it’s an embarrassing disappointment: a swirling morass of clichés and jump scares belaboured with a staggeringly terrible score and topped by the most underwhelming, unimaginative ‘twist’ since The Others. Touted as an Amicus-style anthology, it’s nothing of the sort. Nyman (co-writer of much of Derren Brown’s work) plays Goodman, a professional sceptic challenged to solve three ‘unexplainable’ cases (by a heavily made up actor we’re not supposed to recognise). He interviews three people and we see their stories as flashback vignettes, but since there’s no material evidence to any of them there’s nothing unexplainable. The last act goes off on a tangent about Goodman’s own childhood traumas before ‘explaining’ everything (or rather, showing nothing needs explaining) with a revelation that is at least 98 years old. Shot in Yorkshire, it premiered at the London Film Festival in October 2017. Sigh.