Exclusives
‘Gazer’ Exclusive Clip Teases Murder and Madness in Shot on 16mm Thriller
Time distorts in unsettling ways in our exclusive new clip from Gazer, the dark neo-noir thriller in the vein of Memento centered around a potentially unreliable narrator.
Metrograph Pictures releases the film in theaters on Friday, April 4, 2025.
The neo-noir thriller follows “a young mother (co-writer Ariella Mastroianni) who, due to a unique condition that progressively affects her perception of time, is trying to save money for her daughter’s future before it’s too late. She takes a risky job from a mysterious woman with a dark past, which leads her to become entangled in a tense web of revenge, deceit, and murder.”
Marcia Debonis, Renee Gagner, Jack Alberts, and Tommy Kang also star.
Watch the clip below that introduces Mastroianni’s character, Frankie, as she weighs her options when faced with a dubious proposal for fast cash. Whether to take the risky job is the least of her problems; startling visions signal murder ahead.
Ryan J. Sloan makes his directorial feature debut.
Daniel Kurland wrote in his review for BD, “In fact, the film feels like a very post-modern deconstruction of many of Alfred Hitchcock’s films, albeit with a more horror-centric slant. However, there are also traces of other polarizing character studies like Lee Chang-dong’s Burning, Roman Polanski’s Repulsion, or Chan Wook-park’s Decision to Leave. Gazer is about making sense of madness before said madness consumes the individual, and they’re too far gone to parse out what’s real. It’s a curious study in point-of-view storytelling and how to weaponize an unreliable narrator for maximum effect.”
Sloan and Mastroianni produced the shot-on-16mm feature. From the press release, “The film was shot on a shoestring budget over weekends in the spring and fall for two years while Sloan worked as an electrician and Mastroianni in film programming in New York.” Gazer is also described as “a fresh perspective on the legendary paranoia thrillers of the 70s and 80s, but also a masterful tribute to, and bold reinvention of, the work of many great cinema artists over several generations.”
Exclusives
Katharine Isabelle Battles Cosmic Horror in Exclusive ‘Junction Row’ Teaser Trailer [Fantasia 2026]
Among Fantasia 2026‘s massive final wave of programming this morning is Raven Banner’s Lovecraftian creature feature Junction Row, starring Canadian horror icon Katharine Isabelle, and we’re exclusively unveiling the teaser trailer.
Junction Row will celebrate its World Premiere at Fantasia on July 28.
Watch a housing compound fall under siege from Lovecraftian creatures more dangerous than drug dealers in the trailer below.
Junction Row follows “Juno, a recovering addict who leaves a fringe housing compound for a better life, leaving her beloved Ruby behind. When she learns that Ruby has gone missing, Juno returns, only to find Junction Row has become a hotbed of criminal activity, but she encounters much more than menacing drug dealers on her mission to find Ruby.”
Isabelle stars as Juno, with Natalie Brown (FX’s The Strain) as Ruby.
The creature feature marks the feature debut by director Ashlea Wessel, who has directed festival-favorite shorts like 2018’s “Tick” and 2020’s “Weirdo”.
Wessel co-writes Junction Row with Clown in a Cornfield author Adam Cesare and Matt Serafini.
Katharine Isabelle is coming off a brief appearance in Kane Parsons’ Backrooms, and more recently appeared in holiday horror It’s a Wonderful Knife. The horror icon is arguably best known for her turn as the eponymous werewolf in Ginger Snaps and for her roles in American Mary and Freddy vs Jason.
Fantasia teases that Junction Row tells “a story where the fear of the unknown isn’t confined to what lies above, but what waits beneath.”
Stay tuned for more from Fantasia as the festival gets underway later this month.