Freaks of Nature

Freaks of Nature

The town of Dillford is quite the diverse town. It has a population made up of humans, zombies, and vampires. But they all live in peace and go about their daily lives without problems. The peace is disrupted however when an alien invasion throws the balance out of whack and it is left to 3 teens, (a human, a zombie, and a vampire), to team up and try to restore the order of the town!

I'll start by saying this about 2015: it really was a great year for horror-comedies. This is what made a lot of horror in the '80s so memorable, it infused humor into the formula and the laughter served as a release from the horror. Maybe it's a backlash to the rise of “torture porn” in the 2000's? Who knows. Anyway, movies like House, Ghostbusters, and Gremlins were just so damn fun and had just enough of a horror element to appease all the horror fans amongst all the comedy. It's a winning combination and it's nice to see that it's found it's footing again, especially on the VOD platform with such films as Cooties, The Final Girls, and now Freaks of Nature.

Freaks of Nature is a lot of fun, plain and simple. It has a great plot that let's us see humans, zombies, and vampires all walking around living amongst each other so right away I was interested and wanted to see this. Luckily it doesn't just rely on this gimmick and actually gives us a movie that is bright, loaded with eccentric characters, and is pretty damn funny! Amidst all this we get zombies eating flesh, vampires attacking people, and people killing both as well. I totally dug the way the vampires die in this!

The comedy is more of the perfectly delivered line or funny quip or deadpan absurdity variety but the actors all do such wonderful jobs at this that I was laughing a lot throughout the film! There are some characters who stand out in their performances and they are Dennis Leary who is his usual fast talking, slightly crazed, insult throwing self and Keegan Michael-Key who plays a short tempered vampire teacher and that guy had me seriously cracking up, he his hilarious!

The look of the zombies and vampires were also very compelling in Freaks of Nature as they recalled the look of some classic 1980's films. The zombies reminded me of Return of the Living Dead and one vampire in particular had a Lost Boys look. Even the tentacled aliens with bright green blood from a ship surrounded by fog with neon spinning lights had '80's written all over it. Pretty unique alien design, too.

Freaks of Nature seems to thrive on nostalgia, as these types of films often to do. I personally don't have a problem with that because the comedy elements seem to be updated to fit the modern era. There's no corny sight gags or on-the-nose puns here, it's modern humor fused with the big feeling of the films of the 1980's and it works great. There's an inspired zombie sub-title scene, by the way, that is truly original!

Freaks of Nature isn't without it's faults, however. The later half of the second act seems to slow down and drag just a bit and the film seems to meander to get to where it needs to be to start the final act. The good news is the final scene is layered with wrap ups and twists and I wasn't sure exactly how this movie was going to wrap up, and I was pleased the way it did.

This is essentially the zombies/vampires John Hughes film that never was. It has classic teen comedy written all over it. Except with aliens, zombies, and vampires and blood and death and Vanessa Hudgens. And that sounds like a party.

Honeymoon

Honeymoon

Honeymoon tells the story of a newlywed couple, Paul and Bea, and their romantic lake house honeymoon in the woods. Except for that night Paul finds Bea wandering and disoriented and a slow building chaos takes over the romance.

Honeymoon starts with the couple explaining how their first date went and the story of the proposal in a When Harry Met Sally... like sequence as the opening credits play. It's apparent very quickly that the two leads, Harry Treadaway and Rose Leslie, have a great on screen chemistry. It's as if these two have known each other for years and that comfortable and familiar feeling rubs off on the viewer in a way that makes us see them as our friends. This aspect really enhances the believability and stakes of the relationship as the story progresses and I applaud the casting choices as both actors give fantastic performances and are great fits for their characters.

The setting of the lake and surrounding woods doesn't give off the overdone secluded 'cabin in the woods' feel. It instead is populated with dozens of other cabins that line the lake giving it a popular and almost touristy feel. This safe feeling ambiance makes the escalation of terror and paranoia more effective and feel more intrusive when the introduction of Will, an old friend of Beas, kicks off a series of events that force the honeymoon toward a slow descent into chaos for the newlywed couple.

What made Honeymoon work so well for me was the tightness of the script and the fleshed out characters it introduced combined with the great performances from the lead actors. The script sets up the story to let the viewer know the situation that the characters find themselves in is in complete contrast to their personalities and they are unequipped to properly handle it, Paul in particular. Comments and scenes and character traits from early on come full circle to strengthen the already smart script that lead to a startling ending. There are no stupid decisions being made by the characters or 'why would you do that?' moments, just reasonable actions taken by a man who loves his new bride and I respected the hell out of that aspect of the film.

The filmmaking here is masterful storytelling as the mystery and suspense build and it was a horrific joy watching the actors play this scenario out. One climactic scene towards the end has no music playing over it, it simply uses the panic of the characters and editing to brilliantly carry the moment. Honeymoon holds its cards close to its vest and maintains the mystery behind the happenings throughout the film. It's the best of Stephen King meets the The Twilight Zone in a good 'ol fashioned suspense thriller that will leave you wondering how it's all going to end. There's not much more I could ask for from a movie!

I cannot speak highly enough of this movie and as of this writing, Honeymoon is streaming on Netflix and I highly recommend you check it out as soon as you can!

Nina Forever

Nina Forever

Nina Forever is truly a haunted love story. When Nina dies in a car accident, she leaves behind her boyfriend Rob and he becomes a depressed mess. When he begins to see his co-worker Holly, the new relationship gets a little messy when the restless (and very dead) Nina comes back whenever the couple has sex.

When Holly and Rob first start to connect in Rob's home, the camera cuts to his bed and we see a small red circle begin to appear as the sheets begin to beat like a heart. As the two move to the bedroom and become intimate, the resurrection of Nina begins as she crawls out through the bed from below and the scene is as beautiful as it is disturbing. The scene is covered in a comforting, bluish glow from the night as the pale white and blood covered Nina rises from the sheets. And Fiona O'Shaughnessy as Nina is startlingly good here as her dead, limp body is accompanied by her expressionless face and soft, angelic voice. The whole scene demonstrates the disturbing beauty that fills Nina Forever from beginning to end. It asks the question do our former loves ever truly leave us? And the way it explores this is absolutely brilliant and it definitely brings new meaning to the phrase that when you sleep with someone, you sleep with everyone they've ever slept with.
It's a dark film, a somber film, slightly depressing and uplifting and funny. Yeah, it is all of those things. Nina Forever is love itself: every emotion and every reaction and every instinct all at the same time. It would have been easy for the sex scenes to come off as uncomfortable or distracting but the filmmakers maintain an essential and tasteful quality to the scenes that keep them necessary and integral to the story. I credit O'Shaughnessy for the premise and outcome of Nina Forever being so successful. She embodies death in a way I've never seen before, her expressionless, haunted face and big eyes and the crispness of every word she speaks is fascinating. Without her performance, I am not sure if the film would have worked as well. She's that good.
Abigail Hardingham is also superb in this. She plays the role of Holly in such an alluring and dark fashion that it's hard not to almost instantly be on her side. Her look is pouty and dark and she gives the impression with her eyes to be looking up even as she is looking straight ahead, giving her a curious and mischievous appearance and she is exactly what was needed to play opposite O'Shaughnessy to make this threesome believable. While Cian Barry as Rob has less to do than his female co-stars, he does a solid job as the guy caught in the middle, trying to move on and lost at the same time. He has many touching and painful scenes with Nina's grieving parents, a nice sub-plot that explores the difficulty of a fading relationship with a significant others parents once that significant other has died.
I honestly can't praise this film enough, it is one hell of story that demonstrates the power of creative and effective filmmaking at every level. It's deep, it's dark, it's funny and moving. If you're looking for one reason to celebrate Valentine's Day, Nina Forever is it.

The Pack

The Pack

The Pack is about a family who lives in a remote farmhouse surrounded by woods who one night get terrorized by a pack of vicious wild dogs.
The film sets up a nice dynamic early on, it shows the beauty of the land surrounding the farmhouse as the camera lingers on tree limbs or moves slowly through tall grass. It then uses the same landscape to show sheep mangled by wild dogs, being dragged bloody and lifeless across the grass by the farmer and shows the dogs emerge like shadows from the woods as they ferociously attack a human, causing blood to splatter on the same trees the camera was admiring earlier. It's this attention to the environment and atmosphere that got me hooked in the early goings of The Pack. It's an honest look at the double edged sword that is nature, showing what can be at once so beautiful and within seconds turn ugly and deadly.
The Pack is a new kind of home invasion movie, it's not human against human, it's nature against human. There's a notion here that the family in the farmhouse, even though they have clearly lived there for years, are intruding upon the territory of the wild dogs, and vice versa. It's a nice touch that plays on the ongoing and permanent disconnect between man and nature. To man, there's something inherently terrifying about a wild animal, there is no reasoning or debating with it. It has one thing in mind: survival. This is what made Jaws, Cujo, and even the Terminator so effective; take away the human element and you are left with a killing machine. It's this aspect of The Pack that I found so compelling.
The lighting and sound in the film create the feel of a haunted house movie. There are shaky, strobing flashlights and struggling, flickering fluorescents that light the woods or the old interior of the farmhouse. The lurking and low growling wild dogs combined with the distant and surrounding howls of the pack give a moaning, ghostly impression. In the end, The Pack is a haunted home invasion slasher with wild dogs and I applaud the filmmakers for sticking with their vision and taking their time allowing the suspense to slowly build scene after scene. Movies like this is the reason why I love indie horror, they can take more chances and stick with a director's vision that a studio would never allow.
The cast all give solid performances but let's be honest, this show belongs to the wild dogs and while the actors are very capable in their roles, the characters are ultimately forgettable. One disappointment I felt with The Pack was it never offered that all out, balls to the wall, oh shit moment. I was kind of looking forward to, or hoping for (or both), an all out, overwhelming wild dog invasion. I thought it would happen by the end but it never happened. The film is instead content with building a lot of tension and displaying several very cool moments and separate bloody attacks.
Overall The Pack was a very solid horror flick that I had a lot of respect for. It plays with the style and hits the beats of many sub-genres that kept me entertained from beginning to end.