Fans of HOST (Rob Savage, 2020) will know that the limitations lockdown places on film making can be a boon to inventive not to mention low budget horror. Ben Wheatley has gone for the equal and opposite approach here, a film made almost entirely out of doors and with only four central characters and unlike … Continue reading Land of weather forecasts and breakfasts that set in #6: In the Earth (2021)
I’ve mentioned before that the way we consume TV/film/any other format of ‘content’ shapes expectation. Streaming services have only accelerated the osmosis between television and film, and the COVID pandemic may see the film industry and the theatrical release model irrevocably altered. This doesn’t have to be all bad news and innovative indie filmmakers can … Continue reading Land of weather forecasts and breakfasts that set in #5: HOST (2020)
The other week I read a tweet that humorously suggested Batman and Daredevil would do well to swap their names. A similar thought went through my mind after seeing Peter Strickland’s In Fabric and wondering if it shouldn't do the same with Paul Thomas Anderson's Phantom Thread (2017). Strickland's films tend to be tactile affairs, … Continue reading Land of weather forecasts and breakfasts that set in #4: In Fabric (2018)
The ultimate found footage film? The ultimate folk horror film? The ultimate documentary? There is a loose narrative that frames Paul Wright's Arcadia, that of an inherent anxiety about what lives at the heart of rural Britain, something malevolent or at least inimical, not easily defined yet ever-present, lurking. We start with a sinister, silhouette, … Continue reading Land of weather forecasts and breakfasts that set in #3: Arcadia (2017)
Early on in this blog I remarked that short form is probably the best way to tell a ghost story, it spares the need for an explanation that always seems to disappoint, but of course a short film is not so much of an attractive proposition for film distributors and cinemas. Thus the portmanteau … Continue reading Land of weather forecasts and breakfasts that set in #2: Ghost Stories (2017)
First in an occasional series looking at forthcoming British films, starting here with Francis Lee's debut feature, God's Own Country. The British farming industry's certainly going though a purple patch at the moment, although sadly only on film. There's Clio Barnard's forthcoming Dark River to look foward to and Hope Dickson Leach's superb recent feature … Continue reading Land of weather forecasts and breakfasts that set in #1: God’s Own Country (2017)
Views From A Hill 