Boston Underground Film Festival’s horror short film program, The Dunwich Horrors, boasted a lineup of homegrown, hair-raising tales to a sold-out theater on Friday night. Packed to the brim, The Brattle proudly showcased the ghostly, the disturbing, the surreal, and the comedic. Each harrowing short offered a uniquely twisted, chilling narrative intended to haunt and gnaw at its audience.
THE OLD GOD!
dir. Samuel Carlson
Dunwich opened with The Old God. Director Samuel Carlson’s short plays out like a Viagra infomercial—only, replace the erectile dysfunction medication with a centuries-old demon. A charming, middle-aged couple sits together lovingly in their garden. With winning smiles and bright eyes, they disclose the possible side effects of bringing a malevolent entity into your life. They assure their audience, however, that the archaic deity will bestow happiness on every marriage.
Carlson’s smooth, devilishly cunning short is raw comedy sprinkled with gore and clever monologues.
PETUNIA
dir. Miriam Olken
Following The Old God was Miriam Olken’s saturation-soaked Petunia, an unsettling glimpse into an estate tour given by the mawkish Francine. The real estate agent takes an enthusiastic young couple through a winding, vibrantly colored home adorned with sinister rabbit effigies and a blood-laden bowl with the pet name “Petunia” scrawled on it. Unnerved but still enthused about the prospect of owning such a house, the couple turns a blind eye. Francine offers to show them the “extra special” feature of the house—the large, tattered toolshed in the backyard.
Petunia is an amusing, surreal little film with rich shots and an agile script, that leaves all the horror up to the imagination of its viewer.
DEAD LANGUAGE
dir. Erica Stockwell-Alpert
Dead Language’s darkly comedic short follows an amateur crew of cultists trying to summon a demonic deity with an ancient book, but there’s one problem—they can’t speak Latin. Every apparition they conjure politely tells them that they aren’t the demon the cult is looking for, as they didn’t pronounce the incantation correctly.
Dead Language shines with its wholesome nature, whimsical repetition of, “do they not teach Latin in school these days?”, frightening SFX makeup, and creature design.
CHRISTMAS WRAPPING
dir. Mike Canale
Mike Canale’s Christmas Wrapping is an unnerving, nightmarish glimpse into a holiday gone wrong. A young man drives to his family to celebrate the holidays, stopping to search for a nutcracker in the vacant home of his grandmother. When he and his sister hear bells jingling from the basement, they discover a ghastly sight—a bloodied, threadbare Santa.
Christmas Wrapping is a disarming film that takes daring, fearless twists throughout its short runtime, punctuated by a final shot that brings a disturbing new meaning to “Jingle Bells”.
PRAY
dir. Amber Chilton
Amber Chilton’s feminist short centers on Vera, a statuesque young woman that moves to a suburban neighborhood in Maine. Flanked by a nosy but well-meaning neighbor, the enigmatic Vera preys on the men of her town.
LAST TRAIN
dir. Andrew Connelly
Last Train is a disquieting, eerie, dialogue-free short that follows a late-night commuter. It’s a dark, bitterly cold, lonely night when the commuter ambles through the New England snow to an MBTA platform. In red neon, the scrolling marquee foretells that the next train from North Scituate to Boston will arrive in five minutes. However, it’s not the marquee that catches the commuter’s attention—it’s an erratic dark figure in the shadows.
The form irregularly shuffles up the platform, then vanishes. Cautious, the commuter trudges up the concrete ramp and sits, waiting for the rail, but not before realizing the figure has dumped something in the trash. With no trace of the menacing form in sight, the commuter retrieves a black backpack from the metal bin. Upon opening the bag, a sliced-off face slides out and falls at the commuter’s feet. Aghast and repulsed, the commuter panics as the bells of the approaching train slice through the darkness. The figure reappears at the other end of the platform, running down the commuter as the rail explodes down the tracks.
Connelly’s haunting little film was a Dunwich standout. Last Train is every commuter’s nightmare, and a chilling New England ghost story that inches a little too close to reality. You’ll be thinking twice before waiting at an MBTA platform after this one.
REST STOP
dir. Eric Bielakiewicz
Rest Stop is a gritty, disturbing short that echoes 1970s grindhouse flicks, from the production company logo in its introduction to the granular aesthetic that coats every shot. Echoing the foreboding atmosphere of Damien Leone’s first Art the Clown short, The 9th Circle, Rest Stop opens with a college student drunkenly driving down a dark, lonely highway. He stops at a gas station for another drink, only to be confronted by a silent, faceless figure lurking in the dark backroom.
The low-budget, raw authenticity of this short, paired with its SFX makeup, is remarkable. Rest Stop feels like the eerie, underrated movie that’s playing at a video store late at night—a throwback to the good old days of horror.
REVERBERANCE
dir. Alex DiVincenzo and TJ Frizzi
Alex DiVincenzo and TJ Frizzi conjure up a strange, otherworldly story about a woman feeding her birds. After a cleverly placed jump scare, the woman is chased through the thickening woods by an avian entity that ejects blue sludge and appears to bend the natural world.
Reverberance is an ethereal, commendable little film accentuated by its innovative creature design.
PENNY
dir. Rachel S. Thomas-Medwid
Penny focuses on the dark impulses of a professional chef, who is striving—and failing—to connect romantically with someone. Between flashbacks of her childhood and traumatic memories of her mother, she attempts to find her potential partner… but only if they will eat the penny she serves for dessert.
THE WATCHER
dir. Nathan Sellers
Presented in a 1.33 aspect ratio with rounded corners, The Watcher begins in an uncanny homestead. The wind blows through the lush green trees. The lights within the house create an ethereal glow. A young woman, clad in a folksy frock, peeks at the rotting bodies of her fellow cultists. Enoch, the leader of her cult, speaks over a recording, describing the loyalty they have to their religion, and why it has led them to this. He speaks of a resurrection that never comes.
The Watcher will elate any film enthusiast; Sellers’ choice to shoot the short film in 1.33 aspect ratio was brilliant and creates an easy, raw tone to the film from the first shot. It pairs well with the time depicted in The Watcher, and its homegrown roots.
SKIN & BONE
dir. Eli Powers
Neck-and-neck with Last Train, Eli Powers’ Skin & Bone proved itself to be one of Dunwich’s best. Starring Amanda Seyfried and her husband Thomas Sadoski, this bewitching short follows a troubled drifter, Christian (Sadoski), who becomes employed on Serene’s (Seyfried) remote farm. Shortly after beginning work, Christian is plagued by nightmares of men—naked, bloody, and panicked—claiming to be trapped in the bodies of the animals on Serene’s farm. They plead with him to free them, but he struggles to differentiate between hallucination and reality. Christian grows suspicious when he finds a cemetery on Serene’s property where only women are buried.
Skin & Bone feels like a disturbing old fairytale, a long-forgotten parable with roots in the backcountry of the American South. Seyfried, who shines in short films (ahem, Dog Food), offers a creepy and plaintive performance. Her scenes dominate the screen—from her folk songs accompanied by an old banjo to her melancholy melodies while smoking on the porch on a chilly night.
Powers’ short is a beautifully twisted little story, with themes of old witchery and sinister symbolism.
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