Movies
SXSW ’11 REVIEW: Tense and Disturbing ‘Little Deaths’
David Harley has reported back with the first review of the SXSW Film Festival, which is now ongoing in Austin, Texas.
First up is Little Deaths, a new anthology featuring horrific tales from three of England’s edgiest filmmakers: Simon Rumley (Red White & Blue, Living and the Dead), Andrew Parkinson (I, Zombie, Venus Drowning) and Sean Hogan (Isle of Dogs, Summer’s Blood):
“ ‘Little Deaths’ is a tense and disturbing exploration of the darker side of sexuality – more specifically, sexual humiliation – whose success varies over the course of its three vignettes due to how wildly the stories shift tone without a proper framing device.”
You’ll find the full review by clicking the link above. Click here for all SXSW news and reviews.
House & Home: Written and Directed by Sean Hogan
“A well-to-do yuppie couple, Richard and Victoria, pose as concerned religious do-gooders in order to lure homeless girls back to their home for perverted sex games. Deciding upon their latest target, a mysterious young woman named Sorrow; they drug and imprison her before subjecting her to a series of assaults and humiliations. However, the captive girl is not as helpless as she first appears and the couple soon find the rules of the game have changed…”
Mutant Tool: Written and Directed by Andrew Parkinson
“Jen, a former prostitute and recovering drug addict, is undergoing therapy in a bid to turn her life around. Her new therapist, Dr Reece, comes as a recommendation via her boyfriend Frank. But unbeknownst to Jen, Frank and Dr Reece have a shadowy criminal relationship. The therapist is involved with a bizarre black market narcotics trade, in which the semen from human mutations created during WWII Nazi experiments is harvested and processed for its psychic effects on the human brain. And now the last known mutant is dying and a suitable replacement must be found…”
Bitch: Written and Directed by Simon Rumley
“Stuck in a destructive relationship which isn’t going anywhere and lousy dead-end jobs which have no future, Claire and Pete live in a council flat and are united only in their love of rock music. The flame of passion having long since died, the couple derives a strange sexual pleasure from an unspoken sadomasochistic role-playing game where Claire finds new and inventive ways of mistreating Pete – and Pete, ever the devoted lap dog, takes what she dishes out time and again. But in an unspoken game the boundaries are hazy, and when Claire unwittingly takes things one step too far Pete devises a way to teach the bitch to heel, once and for all.”
A contemporary reimagining of H.P. Lovecraft’s short story Herbert West: Reanimator is on the way, and Deadline has unveiled the first look at the new Herbert West and the pathologist drawn to his orbit.
Adam Simon (The Haunting in Connecticut, “Salem”) and Tim Metcalfe (The Haunting in Connecticut, Kalifornia) penned the script. The original screenplay and storyline come from Jade Sandberg Wallace.
Michael Grossman (“The Originals”, “Pretty Little Liars”) directs.
The new images introduce star Joseph Morgan (“Vampire Diaries“), who plays “brilliant surgeon and scientist Herbert West, who is obsessed with creating a serum to reanimate the dead.” Katie Cassidy (Speed Demon) stars opposite as the pathologist with a troubled past who joins his efforts.
Together, they prove that conquering death may be the ultimate sin against life itself.
The film’s official synopsis: “As a child, Herbert West watches his father Peter reanimate his dead mother Judith in a secret basement lab — only for Judith to mortally wound Peter and nearly kill Herbert before Peter shoots her. The trauma leaves its mark on Herbert, but so does one final image: his mother’s finger, twitching after death. Thirty years later, Herbert West is a brilliant, secretive surgeon still chasing his father’s obsession.
“Pathologist Kate Locke arrives in town and is drawn into his orbit — first through a spark at a hospital fundraiser, then through his secret lab, where he reveals a serum capable of reanimating severed tissue. Kate, hiding a dark past of her own, is thrilled rather than horrified, and moves into West’s mansion to work alongside him. Their early experiments on a cadaver succeed only briefly. West concludes that dead tissue is the problem — they need something fresher.”
Supporting cast includes Scott Aiello, Ira J Amyx, Randall Newsome, Emma Reinagal, James D. Bryce, Kathryn A Bentley, Jack Lancaster, Amy Holland Pennell, John Pierson, Mindy Shaw, Eric Dean White, Tristan Wilder Hallet, Adrienne Lamping, Aaron Crippen, and Drew Patterson.
Makeup artist Jeff Lewis (“Star Trek: Voyager,” “Star Trek: Enterprise”) and cousin Roger Lewis are heading the production via their newly established Woodlake Entertainment.
Lovecraft’s short story, first serialized in Home Brew magazine in 1922, is the first among his works to mention the fictional Miskatonic University. It was most famously adapted into a 1985 horror movie from Stuart Gordon, starring Jeffrey Combs as Herbert West.
Herbert West: Reanimator is set in Alton, Illinois, where production is now underway.
Herbert West: Reanimator. Photo credit: Matt Lief Anderson
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