FrightFest 2023: 'Monolith', 'Cobweb', 'Pandemonium', 'Herd', 'Farang', 'Transmission'

Director: Matt Vesely.
With: Lily Sullivan, Ling Cooper Tang, Ansuya Nathan, Erik Thomson.
Australia 2022. 94 mins.

Although conveyed only through telephone calls to a journalist seemingly willing to compromise herself when desperate, the mystery is riveting. Her investigation of sinister “bricks” is bizarre enough material to be gripping. Is she falling for a conspiracy or mass-delusion? Like 'Void of Night' or 'Pontypool' for example, a film that demonstrates that spoken-word genre storytelling can still work as a dominating factor is cinema. Down-the-rabbit-hole horror with an excellent Lily Tyler where all the clues do add up, there’s a little class commentary, lots of creepiness and a conclusion that, even if it goes in the direction you anticipated, still offers a few surprises to satisfy.

Director: Samuel Bodin.
With: Lizzy Caplan, Anthony Starr, Cleopatra Coleman, Woody Norman.
USA 2023. 88 mins.

Above average studio fare, there enough feints and genre-play to make horror fans laugh with recognition (oh, home invasion masks now?). The FrightFest audience also chuckled away at the scenery-chewing of Caplin and Starr as the parents who evidently neighbour ‘The People Under the Stairs’. Thoroughly entertaining. Cannier than you might expect with a genuine underlay of fairy-tale nastiness.

Director: Quarxx.
With: Hugo Dillon, Ophelia Kolb, Arben Bajraktaraj, Manon Maindivide.
France 2023. 95 mins. 

Excellent start with two guys accepting they are ghosts now, post car crash; but then it goes into twisted fairy-tale land about a bullying preteen girl whilst still seemingly referencing the first tale … and then there’s the tale of a mother not coping with the suicide of her daughter… and although always fascinating, not initially recognising this was a portmanteau meant I was mistakenly trying to find links and continuity where there was none. This also speaks to a confused conception when gluing these tales together, a lack of clarity. The first segment has a wit and promise that the rest doesn’t follow, so however interesting it may continue to be, whatever play and despair it may have with devils and damnation, it never recaptures it and a feeling of disappointment remains.

Director: Steven Pierce.
With: Ellen Adair, Mitzi Akaha, Jeremy Holm, Corbin Bernsen.
USA 2023. 96 mins.

 A gay couple just need a zombie threat to sort their issues out. Despite interesting-enough exploration of toxic masculinity in a militia context, it lets its insistence on being a mundane romance drag it into ridiculous and then redundancy - another film that doesn’t seem to realise how selfish and stupid the protagonist is, getting people killed - as long as they’re doing it for love. And when you’re screaming out in emotional pain, the zombies passing right by don’t notice.

Director: Xavier Gens.
With: Nassim Lyes, Olivier Gourmet, Loryn Nounay, Vithaya Pansringarm.
France 2023. 96 mins.

Action movie cliches perfectly intact: when you go a new city (in this case: Bangkok), find a high building, go to the rooftop and take in the panorama. There’s not the social commentary you might have expected/hoped for, and there’s probably too much ticking of tropes, but when it finally gets to the hallway and elevator fights, that’s everything. A film like Choi Jae-hoon's 'The Killer' and even 'Extraction 2' know to get on with the fights and play cursory attention to predictable, familar set-up, but 'Farang' is happy to wallow in comfort-action.  Nassim Lyles is magnetic enough presence and the fights look visceral and painful. And then it’s just silly season.

Director: Michael J. Hurst.
With: Vernon Wells, Felissa Rose, Dave Sheridan, Sadie Katz.
USA 2023. 73 mins.

Admirably ambitious in telling its tale through channel-hopping, providing a jigsaw narrative, but the core story of a filmmaker pursuing occult fascinations for apocalyptic ends is old hat and not distinctive enough. It can be hard to distinguish between the intentionally and unintentionally bad acting and the digital sheen does not suit all formats being homaged, so despite some impressive sci-fi effects, it occasionally looks unintentionally cheap.