Jasper is a young, opportunistic filmmaker yearning to climb the Hollywood ladder. Working as a lowly production assistant, he seizes his chance to be a ‘real’ director when he suggests to his cantankerous boss that the crew and actors from their upcoming horror film attend an actual séance in an old haunted house for research. They chose an abandoned children’s shelter closed for 70 years since the mysterious murders of five children in 1942, apparently discovered scared to death. Once the séance begins, the motley crew find themselves trapped and haunted by the children … and something possibly worse.
Scared to Death is SO much fun! When I saw Lin Shaye and Bill Moseley in the cast list, I immediately moved Scared to Death to the top of my FrightFest Glasgow watchlist.
This film is everything I wanted it to be. It was fun, silly and gory and I loved it. I was so pleased that Auntie Lin and Bill’s roles were far bigger than I expected. I feared they would be token cameos, but they both have really meaty roles and are fantastic, as always. The rest of the cast are great too – I enjoyed the character of The Grog, who I’m sure was inspired by Kane Hodder. It felt like a lovely little hat tip. The story was pretty predictable, but I feel like that’s the beauty of a fun horror like this. You’re know exactly what you’re getting and sometimes that’s just what you need. Blood, horror icons, some snacks and (ideally!) cats and a good time.
I can’t wait to see Scared to Death again and I’m sure it’ll be on Shudder or Prime soon 🤞🏻
UK, 1 hour 20 minutes, Directed by Jack Lawrence McHenry
It’s 1940 and war rages across Europe. Britain prepares for the coming invasion. But the war is a dull affair for Arthur Roundtree, a young man serving in the Home Guard. He dreams of action and adventure, but he remains stuck in a small, sleepy English village miles away from war due to a medical condition. However, when an extra-terrestrial creature crashes on the outskirts of the village, a training exercise suddenly turns into a deadly game of cat and mouse. Soon, Arthur and his companions realise they are fighting for their lives and to save the entire Galaxy!
Keep calm and kill aliens! England, 1940. The Home Guard are protecting the country and Nazis aren’t the only threat we need saving from. The Doom Busters is a super fun sci-fi comedy – think Dad’s Army meets Attack the Block.
I REALLY enjoyed this movie – the cast are brilliant, the script is funny and I found myself really rooting for the likeable characters. The costuming feels authentic and the beautiful countryside feels untouched by time. It’s nice to see how well a period piece can be done, with a really modest budget and a small cast and crew.
While Frightfest is most known for horror movies, it is a genre festival and showcases lots of great movies that don’t strictly fall into the horror genre. Saying that, The Doom Busters still features plenty of blood, on-screen deaths and monsters – human and otherwise!
I had great fun with this movie and would absolutely watch it again. I’ll pick up a physical copy, for sure!
UK, 1 hour 18 minutes, Directed by David Luke Rees
Trying to get over a profoundly distressing attack that ended in fatality, Lizzy Roberts agrees to act as a carer-cum-housekeeper for Amy and Alex Cummings at their remote country home. But with Alex on a business trip and Amy still clearly traumatised by the accidental death of their only child, Lizzy finds her new job not quite as straightforward as she’d hoped. Yet Amy seems to be improving under Lizzy’s watchful eye, and normality seems to be returning to the Cummings household until Lizzy starts having nightmares and hallucinations and finds evil outside forces are twisting that normality.
By the Throat is a slow burn psychological horror, with a lovely addition of another sub-genre (that I won’t mention, it case it’s too spoilery!). The tension throughout is agonising and the depiction of anxiety and altered states through some fantastic sound design, made me really uncomfortable. As someone who has had anxiety most of my life, I’m really never sure why I continue to watch tension-fuelled movies like By the Throat. And even more so, why I enjoy them so much!
Director David Luke Rees says “By the Throat was born out of a desire to examine grief through the lens of horror—not in grand, sweeping gestures, but in the intimate, quiet spaces where it festers. This is not a film about ghosts in the traditional sense. Instead, it is about the way loss lingers, how it embeds itself in the walls, the air, the fabric of our existence.” You can absolutely feel this throughout the film – the characters are haunted by different circumstances and you can see this in everything they do.
Patricia Allison, who I loved as Ola in Sex Education, was a brilliant lead. I really empathised with Lizzy and was genuinely rooting for her throughout the film. Jenny Spark and Rupert Young played couple Amy and Alex really well too, leaning into the unpredictable nature of their characters.
I will be honest – I would have enjoyed a bit more of an explosive ending, for my own catharsis, after being hunched in a tense little ball for an hour. But I did really like the film overall and would absolutely give it a second watch. A gem of a British thriller.
Did you know the real-life 1945 witchcraft killing of Charles Walton was the terrifying event that inspired the classic shocker The Wicker Man? From filmmaker Rupert Russell comes an incredible documentary looking into the dark heart of Britain and finding a country in a deep and frightening identity crisis – with an almost national descent into madness reflected in the strand of cinema it produces. A brave, new exploration of how events within society can become mirrors of the times they occur in, this unsettling true-crime interrogation probes into the eerie, enigmatic cultural undercurrents that shaped the 1970s folk horror genre.
How are the Teletubbies and The Wicker Man linked? That’s a question I never thought I’d ask and definitely never thought I’d get an answer to! But brilliant new documentary, The Last Sacrifice, gave me a new favourite fun fact.
I love documentaries, especially when they talk about iconic horror movies. Throw in some occult mystery, true crime and incredible visuals and I’m absolutely sold. Director Rupert Russell has created a fascinating and gripping film about a part of British history and film history, that I had no idea about. We are such a strange little island, with (often) bizarre customs and I definitely want to learn more about the history of the occult in Britain.
I really appreciate how this documentary isn’t just static interviews. The opening vintage TV spot is both delightful and creepy. A mix of real, historical footage and film clips support the interviews and narration and the use of black and red, throughout, is just beautiful. The interviews are really interesting and are impressively lit and staged. It is exquisitely edited and features a fantastic original score from Mike Lindsay of the British folktronica band Tunng. This documentary is just so STYLISH. Can you tell I loved it?
I can’t recommend this documentary more. If you love The Wicker Man, true crime, folk horror, or are just interested in weird British history, I think you’ll really enjoy this film. I don’t have any information on a release date, as this was the UK premiere, but I’ll be definitely keeping my eyes peeled as I’m hoping for a physical release. I’ll keep you posted!
Director Rupert Russell and Clout PR have kindly shared this exclusive interview where Rupert reflects on the making of The Last Sacrifice. Thank you, Greg and Rupert!
Your film is having its UK premiere at this year’s FrightFest Glasgow event. Excited or what?
Indeed, suitably close to Summerisle, the fictional island in The Wicker Man.
What initially drew you to the project?
Embarrassingly, I had only watched The Wicker Man for the first time in 2022. I did not see it as a horror film. To me, it was a documentary of what living in Britain was like over the past several years. The madness of Summerisle was indistinguishable from the madness of the British Isles. That climatic scene on the mountaintop, where Srgt. Howie pleads for his life, begging them to see that ‘killing me won’t save your apples’, only to be met by the collective shrug his Lordship gives, ‘I know it will’, for me has been an almost daily experience.
I was telling a close friend all this when he stopped me and said, ‘well, you know there was a real murder this was all based on?’
It’s centered around the unsolved murder of Charles Walton in 1945, giving the documentary the feel of a true-crime investigation.
What is the background to the case?
Charles Walton was a 74-year-old farm labourer who, on Valentine Day, 1945, was discovered in a field in the Cotswolds with a pitchfork in his face and a bellhook buried in his throat. The scene was so grizzly that the Warwickshire police called Scotland Yard requesting help, and they sent none other than Britain’s most famous detective: Robert Fabian of the Yard. When he arrived, he described the murder as a ‘slaughterhouse horror’. But despite his own investigation, and years and years of further attempts by the local police, no one was ever charged with the crime.
What fascinated you about the case?
The fascination for me wasn’t who did it, but who do we believe did it, and why? Mysteries are mirrors, they are reflections of ourselves. In the case of an unsolved murder, we project our paranoid fears and fantasies onto the face of the imagined killer. The theories that griped Britain were, therefore, really theories about the British themselves. And the theories that emerged contained many novel features we hadn’t seen before in fact or fiction. In particular, the theory that the source of danger was not the perennial outsider – the Nosferatu figure invading the city walls – but rather the otherwise ‘normal’ insider. The enemy within.
The rural setting and superstitious fears surrounding Walton’s death mirror the isolation and community rituals in films like The Wicker Man. How did these parallels shape your storytelling?
The parallels between fact and fiction was what excited me creatively about the film. I began the project by watching documentaries made of real witches in the 1960s, filled with a Mondo-esque mixture of exploitation and theatrics. On talking to real witches, some of whom appeared in the films, I discovered that despite the ‘hype’ they were in fact accurate portrayals of what was happening at the time. And, on the face of it, more outrageous and shocking than the Hammer and Tigon witchcraft films at the time. This spoke to the heat of the story, how fact and fantasy had become intertwined and often indistinguishable.
Furthermore, the conspiracies around the Walton murder informed the tropes of the folk horror films that were made at the time, and we now just take them for granted as the staple beats of the genre. But these did not come from the imaginations of screenwriters, but rather policeman and sleuth academics trying to make sense of a bizarre ‘ritual’ murder in rural Britain.
The role of the tabloid media seemed to play a big part in fueling the public’s fascination with ritual sacrifice and the occult in post-war Britain. Do you think this impeded the murder investigation?
No. There was a delayed reaction, mostly spurned on by the chief inspector of the case, Robert Fabian of the Yard, whose memories, after he retired, brought the occult aspects to the public’s attention. In his 1945 police report, Fabian is quite explicit that the hinderance to the investigation were the local villagers themselves. He complained about their ‘secretive’ nature and refusal to fully cooperate with the police investigation. Fabian was convened that in a town of less than 500 people, the killer’s identity would have been widely known. Nobody seemed to care that there might be a demented killer terrorising the vulnerable. Unless, of course, they knew who the murderer was – and why the murder was committed.
What do you think is the enduring legacy of the Charles Walton murder, both in real-life folklore and its continuing influence on the horror film genre?
The folk horror movies of the late ‘60s and early ‘70s are the result of a collision of cultural forces. They’re an incoherent mishmash of all sorts of weird and wonderful things that were happening in Britain at the time. Authors, screenwriters and director joined the dots between the Walton murder, the rise of Wicca, the counterculture, the hippie movement, women’s liberation, the sexual revolution, class war and so much more. They all kind of swirled together in a technicolor vortex around the figure of the witch. This figure became a kind of organising metaphor for all that was being torn up and a warning of the new world that might be around the corner.
How would you compare the British folk horror films of the ‘60s and early ‘70s to the American ones that came later?
The British films all feature a member of the new professional class – a teacher, doctor, or policeman – who goes to a strange English village. They’re the victim of a conspiracy between the peasantry and an aristocrat who commands their loyalty through pagan gods or voodoo magic. They are paranoid tales of a reactionary counter-revolution, where Atlee’s new social democracy will be rolled back to a feudal time.
In contrast, the American films are about going somewhere foreign and are led by naive tourists, such as An American Werewolf in London or Midsommar. They encounter not a class conflict, but a cult: an ideology taken to a dangerous extreme. When you consider that the Americas are the place we dumped our own religious nutters in the 17th and 18th centuries, their fears may well be quite rational.
What is your favourite folk horror movie?
I was ignorant of the genre when I started making the film and it was a true joy to take a compressed crash course. My favourites would be Panda’s Fen, The Plague of the Zombies, Twins of Evil, and Demons of the Mind.
Finally, what’s next for you?
I have two fiction horror films that are in development, and another film archive doc.
Imagine being jailed for an everyday occurrence beyond your control, something your body decides for you. In the USA, ‘Land of the Free, ’ this could happen to you if you have a uterus, depending on where you live. The terrifying rise of the treatment of women is the socio-political backdrop for this cautionary tale, where Mia is under house arrest but must also contend with the suspicious death of her husband. There, Mia experiences strange phenomena that could be man-made or supernatural. Or both? One thing is clear: Mia is in danger and cannot leave her home.
House of Ashes is a scary look at what life is like for many people. The real world is far scarier than anything that could be committed to screen and that’s where the true horror lies in this debut feature from director Izzy Lee.
I was immediately excited about this film, from the gorgeous poster alone. House of Ashes is as lovely as I’d hoped. It has beautiful colour grading, with the same purples and golds as the poster. The cinematography is just stunning, in particular a shot of eyes reflecting fire. It’s so beautiful. The score carries the underlying tension, even through more mundane scenes. Leads Fayna Sanchez and Vincent Stalba give great performances and I was so excited at the cameos from Joe Lynch and Mick Garris.
House of Ashes is a film I definitely want to see again and I really wish I’d been able to see it on the big screen, to appreciate all of the details in such a visually stunning film.
USA, 1 hour 11 minutes , Directed by Stephon Stewart
Trapped in limbo during a near-death experience, Mara and a vintage 1980s computer she finds buried in the sands of time ally to figure out the meaning of life from discarded memories of friends, family and fantasy. Together, they navigate through a dystopian world of surreal, broken realities, deciphering cryptic clues and puzzles before them, causing Mara to embark on a profound quest of self-discovery and mind-bending redemption. Confronting her deepest fears by facing all the traumas in her life, her journey becomes a poignant exploration of isolation, psychological tension, survival and human vulnerability.
Psyche is a gorgeous science-fiction epic. In all honesty, sci-fi isn’t my vibe, but the truly stunning cinematography and design kept my attention. The colour grading is beautiful and the score is incredible.
Lead Sarah Ritter is very good, with a compelling performance. She’s also very beautiful, which is a stark contrast to the bleak environment.
If you love sci-fi, definitely keep an eye out for release details for this beautiful film.
In typical me fashion, I’m excited by something new and have entirely cast everything else I should be doing aside. Scrolling Instagram this morning, I saw that ZooTime Productions have made their short “One Night Only” available on Vimeo.
For a whole bunch of reasons, I hadn’t actually shared my review of the short anywhere. But now is the time as I loved it and, as small as my platform is, I always want to champion indie film-makers. Especially as ZooTime Productions’ mission statement is “ZooTime is Wales on film. Welsh people and Welsh stories. We’re part of the foundation of Wales’ growing horror-based national cinema movement. Our goal is to celebrate and showcase these stories. To contribute to Sinema Cymru, and take these stories to worldwide audiences.” I’m nothing, if not an excited little gremlin who will shout from the rooftops about anything Welsh. I’m very proud of being Welsh and the history of the arts in Wales, so filmmaker Josh Harris is my people!
Anyway, enough of my rambles – here is the short! Do yourself a favour and cast it to your tv, if you can. It’s beautiful and deserves the biggest screen you can manage!
One Night Only is a brilliant short, achieving something that I find rare with shorts – really wanting more. I enjoy how stories can be told in a few minutes, creating a little world to be in for a short time. But writer and director, Josh Harris, has done such a good job with One Night Only that I wanted to spend more time with Bex and Rhian and really dig into their relationship. And that’s not a criticism – the film still feels perfectly contained.
It looks beautiful, with lovely cinematography and editing. It’s moody, dark and atmospheric and I loved it. The cast are fantastic, especially Welsh fave Steve Spiers, who I am always delighted to see.
I really can’t wait to see what Josh directs next, as I think what he can create in feature length will be incredible.
Cara is bleak, dark and fucked up. Written and directed by Hayden Hewitt, this psychological horror is available on digital download today, 17th February.
Cara’s world is spiralling out of control. Haunted by her traumatic past, she lives with a mentally unstable roommate and struggles with a failed career as an online sex worker. Her father is unable to communicate, while her well-meaning mother offers little support. But above all, Cara is consumed by a terrifying belief that there’s a conspiracy to send her back to the psychiatric hospital where she suffered horrific abuse.
Cara is brilliantly played by Elle O’Hara an unreliable narrator that I can’t decide if I’m terrified of, or rooting for. Perhaps both. The cast are great, with fantastic performances from indie horror faves Lawrence Harvey, Michaela Longden and Johnny Vivash.
I had the chance to have a quick chat with Hayden and talk about his inspiration, his process and how he relaxes after delving into such a dark and bleak world – it’s a spoiler free chat!
Cara premiered at FrightFest last year, to brilliant reviews – catch it yourself on Amazon Prime and Apple TV see why “she isn’t going back”. Huge thanks to Aim Publicity for the review and interview opportunity.
Darklands follows journalist Frazer Truick as he investigates the mysterious death of the brother of trainee journalist Rachel Morris. Delving deeper, Truick becomes convinced that the tragedy was murder, committed by a bizarre religious cult. But as the evidence unfolds, things take on a more sinister and potentially lethal significance for the reporter, as he becomes embroiled in devil worship, witchcraft and ultimately human sacrifice!
How I’d not seen Darklands before now is beyond me, but I’m so glad I finally watched it! Set in South Wales, Darklands follows Frazer Truick (played by Craig Fairbrass) who gets caught up in mystery, pagan rituals and human sacrifice, while investigating for the local paper.
Released in 1996, Darklands has had a 4K restoration ahead of its 30th anniversary. I was lucky to see the director’s cut, which hopefully means a new, shiny release this year or next! I’ve seen the poster for Darklands over the years, but had someone told me it was set in South Wales, with a recognisable cast of Welsh legends and featured the Welsh language and some cool pagan shit, I would have been straight on it! Director Julian Richards is from Newport, too – just down the road! I’m fully in my “embrace the Welsh language and culture” era, so I’m grateful I found it at just the right time.
It’s dark and grotty, with great performances, compelling characters and a really cool score and soundtrack. I was 10 when this movie was made and it was the most delightful snapshot of the valleys in the 90s (although we didn’t have ritual sacrifice in my village. I don’t think…) It’s been hailed as “the Welsh Wicker Man”, which I think is a fair comparison. I really enjoyed it and it’s definitely one I’d add to my collection and watch again.
If you like 90s horror, folk horror, Welsh horror… or a combination of all three, definitely check Darklands out and keep an eye out for screenings or a release of the restoration and director’s cut! Darklands is currently available to stream on Shudder.
USA, 1 hr 39 mins, Directed by Christopher Wesley Moore
An agoraphobic woman and her son must face their fears when the killer who traumatized them returns.
If you ask me “do you want to watch a film with a name like ‘When the Trash Man Knocks’?” the answer is always going to a very enthusiastic “yes!”. You know that’s gonna be a good time. And it was! 🥳 (Plus, just look at that goddamn poster. Perfection 😍)
The Trash Man has been terrorising a small town for decades, hacking up bodies to make a new perfect family, disposing of the dismembered bodies in trash bags. Rad! 🗑️
I love low-budget slashers and When the Trash Man Knocks has fun kills, practical sfx and all the charm of an 80s slasher. Sure, it’s no cinematic masterpiece, but it’s made with love and it cheered me up when I was feeling sad. And, sometimes, that’s all we need!
At 1 hr 39, it felt a bit long and I would have preferred a zippy little 80 minute film that focused more on the killer and his adventures. But I had fun with it and enjoyed it all the same.
Sam Munster 