Indie
[Chattanooga Review] Bleak ‘Harpoon’ Gets *Really* Nasty
Three best friends are stuck on a boat. The engine is dead and no other boats are passing by to rescue them. There is no food or water on board. They have no tools to try and catch fish, and it hasn’t rained for days. The more time passes, the more the situation goes from bad to worse.
This is the setup for Harpoon, the latest feature from writer/director Rob Grant, currently making the festival rounds. Turbo Kid’s Munro Chambers plays Jonah, recently orphaned and whose life is a mess; Christopher Gray (of The Mist TV series) is Richard, his spoiled rich kid best friend and owner of the boat on which the trio finds themselves stranded; Emily Tyra plays Sasha, the girl who comes between them both. The black comedy thriller plays out more or less as a three-person chamber drama, with occasional wry narration (courtesy of Brett Gelman) commenting on the proceedings with a dispassionate chill. Between the vastness of the ocean and the fatalism of the universe, the problems of three people don’t amount to a hill of beans.
After getting off to a shaky start – the opening moments are crammed with ‘90s-era film student flourishes like flashback cutaways designed to look like 16mm black and white home movies – Harpoon eventually finds its footing once things begin to go wrong. The awfulness of the characters makes them hard to invest in early on, until we realize that their awfulness is the point. These aren’t people we’re meant to root for so much as ants we’re meant to observe frying under a magnifying glass, and the longer Harpoon goes on, the more it leans into this dynamic, the more writer/director Grant is able to let loose with his more sadistic tendencies and make a movie that’s really bleak and really, really nasty.
Nasty, of course, isn’t everyone’s bag, and the lack of a real moral center may put some audiences off something like Harpoon. As someone who found Munro Chambers endlessly likable as the title character in Turbo Kid, I’ll admit to having a hard time watching him suffer. But suffering is the name of the game here, and the movie’s greatest strength is in continuing to turn the screws on its trio until they can’t be unturned without spilling a good deal of blood. Like a wound that’s infected and beginning to rot, so, too, do the friendships at the center of Harpoon. Unlike most arguments, though, this isn’t going to be settled with just some heated words. The movie’s not called Harpoon for nothing.
Her House of Horrors, the horror division of Independent Production House WOMXNOGRAPHY, has launched its Bite Size Short Grant Program, ahead of its film festival Dollhouse of Horror, which will take place in March 2025 in Los Angeles, CA.
The Bite Size Short Grant Program awards $2,000 film grants to female-identifying and queer horror filmmakers. Shorts must be able to be made for $2,000, with a minimum runtime of 8 minutes. Submissions are now open on Filmfreeway, and are being judged by a panel of horror lovers and content creators.
The 2024 Bite Size Short Grant Program judge lineup is as follows:
“James H. Carter II- A documentary director, film producer, podcaster, marketing specialist, and writer. James is the founder and co-owner of Creepy Kingdom. Creepy Kingdom was founded in 2011 and is a multimedia website, and production studio specializing in creepy content. Their primary focus lies at the intersection of childlike fantasy and the macabre, covering horror films, theme parks, haunts, and much more. Beyond their extensive media coverage, Creepy Kingdom hosts events, offers original merchandise, and engages in film production under the Creepy Kingdom Studios brand producing original films like “Foolish Mortals”, exploring Disney’s “Haunted Mansion” fan culture, and “Georgie”, featuring Tony Dakota from the original “It” miniseries.
“In addition to founding Creepy Kingdom, James has won awards for his documentary work, including the award-winning “Foolish Mortals,” which has earned him recognition. He has been featured on Freeform’s 31 Nights of Halloween special.
“Ashleeta Beauchamp is the editor-in-chief of Peek-A-Boo! Magazine, a cheeky horror magazine created to uplift marginalized writers, artists, models and other creators within the horror community. She also runs The Halloween Coalition, a community group to provide support and marketing for horror and Halloween events around the Southern California area.
“Titeanya Rodríguez is a multi-hyphenate creative, and the founder and owner of HER HOUSE OF HORRORS, home of DOLLHOUSE OF HORROR and the horror division of WOMXNOGRAPHY. As a fellow storyteller and a self-proclaimed artivist, Titeanya’s mission is to create opportunities for women of color and queer women, across film, tv, sports, music, and beyond. She is also the creator of the BITE SIZE SHORT grant program.”
Winners will have a one-night theatrical screening at Regal Cinemas. Submissions Close April 8 at Midnight. Winners will be announced on May 27, 2024. Shorts must be shot and through post-production by June 30, 2024. The screening will take place on July 8, 2024, in Los Angeles, CA.
WOMXNOGRAPHY, HER HOUSE OF HORRORS, and Rodriguez are represented by Azhar PR, Granderson Des Rochers, and Kinsella Holley Iser Kump Steinsapir.
To submit your short to the Bite Size Short Grant Program, go to the FilmFreeway link here.
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