Film Reviews by NP

This solemn Norwegian gem features Anna (Noomi Rapace) who has been relocated to a flat following an incident with her abusive husband and father of eight year old Anders (Vetle Qvenild Werring). She exists in a constant state of neurosis and is monitored by two Child Welfare Officers. To relieve her worry that somehow her husband will find them and inflict further harm, she buys a baby monitor so she can listen to her son even when he is in another room. Sometimes, she hears the sounds of a child being beaten on the monitor, but Anders is sleeping soundly … so where do these sounds come from?

She befriends shy Helge (Kristoffer Joner), whose mother is on a life-support machine in hospital, and they begin a fragile relationship. And yet the disturbing incidents continue; the male welfare officer Ole takes an unprofessional interest in Anna, and the woman she believes she has heard on the monitor appears to drown her son at the picturesque nearby lake Anna often visits to relax. Anna dives into the water to rescue the boy. The next thing she knows, she is in hospital.

Anders invites a friend round, but we don’t get to know his name. The two lads share a kinship, and it appears the friend has been beaten by his mother. Whilst joining Anna for supper one evening, Helge meets the nameless boy and assumes it to be Anders, whom he hasn’t met. He sees bruises on the boy’s arm and assumes Anna has been beating him.

The final straw in Anna’s punishing ordeal is when Ole tells her that Anders’ father has gained custody of the youngster. She stabs Ole with the kitchen scissors, takes Anders and leads him to the open window, high above ground level. Helge bursts into the flat, past the bloody body of what actually turns out to be the caretaker, and gets to the bedroom just in time to see Anna and her son plummet to the ground below.

Only Anna’s body is found. It transpires Anders died two years ago, and so did his abusive father. Everything else we have seen was a mixture of the truth and the product of Anna’s ruined mind.

Poor Helge. An honest, decent man who witnesses it all, and loses first his mother, and then Anna. As he reads a final child’s poem to Anna by her death bed, we see visions of her and Anders strolling through a summer’s forest and sitting by the lake, happier than we’ve ever seen them. This is either a flashback to glad times, or a snapshot of where the tragic blighters are now; somewhere better.

This is a tremendous, bleak, intimate film that packs a punch with some very intense acting and a haunting incidental score.

‘The truth will set you free. Shame the devil’.

A disembodied, distorted voice ingeniously fits various torture devices to its victims and then encourages them to tell the truth and ‘shame the devil’. If they tell a lie, something messy happens to them. This is most successfully employed at the very beginning of the film, when a hapless grocery store manager manages to scrape through the test unscathed by admitting to an affair. When his wife arrives on the scene and finds him strapped to chair with a rifle pointing at his face, and a lie detector strapped to it, she vows to get help. “I love you,” she says. “I love you,” he replies. BANG! The store manager no longer has a face. It’s a gruesome and darkly hilarious moment. It’s also the most horrific scene in the film – something Director and Writer Paul Tanter seems aware of, as there are interminable flashbacks to that scene throughout.

The rest of the film is more of a detective thriller, with London Detective James (Simon Phillips) intrigued by the case, and then obsessed by it, as events seem to be trailing him around, eventually ending up in New York and the lovely Sarah (Juliette Bennett).

This is a decent film, which could have done with some more gruesome moments. It starts off very much as a ‘Saw’ type of film, and then becomes something less horrific, but still interesting, with a good twist at the end. It is interesting in a film concerned with making people tell the truth, how the finale sees James defeated by a lie.

In a year awash with horror films comes this oddity, built around the familiarity and fondness cinema-goers had for the leading ladies. When Beryl Reid’s Ellie potters over the hillside, or Flora Robson’s Joyce is introduced sternly cleaning the house, it is the actresses we are being treated to, with the characters of Ellie and Joyce yet to be introduced to us.

The production is more reminiscent of a heartfelt Ealing drama interspersed with briefly glimpsed moments of graphic horror than usual Tigon fare.

Apparently, the flashes of gore – and a brief scene of underwear removal during a kiss-and-cuddle scene to ‘spice it up’ – were added after filming was over, at the insistence of Producer and Distributor Tony Tenser who felt, understandably, that this was a very tame presentation.

‘The Beast in the Cellar’ could have been lifted from a stage production, as much of the focus is inside the farmhouse, and there is a tendency for the leading players (Ellie, Joyce and soldier Alan, played by John Hamill) to indulge in lengthy preamble, telling each other and the audience what they already know.

James Kelley’s creeping direction often makes the most of the evocative location but wastes too much time on mundanities; there is a scene where Ellie discovers the Beast has escaped, which has her scuttling through the house, down some stairs, into the garden, by the side of some sheds, into the barn – and then back again - which seems to drag on forever. Soldier Alan visits the ladies to make sure they are alright, to tell them of the frightening events and killings occurring all around them, and then to assure them not to worry. His cheerful visits are relentless, and surprisingly nothing is made of the friendship between him and wholesome local nurse Joanne Sutherland (Tessa Wyatt).

The ‘beast’, when revealed, is … a wide-eyed bearded old man. Hardly a thing of nightmares – indicative of the film as a whole, in fact. Well played by all concerned, the story is too thin (indeed, everything you need to know is summed up in the title) and sedate to satisfy. And yet some elements remain unexplained - just why does Joyce take to dressing in her late father’s army coat and cap when she thinks no-one is watching? The reason for brother Steven’s incarceration is murky at best. These things would have been more effective had the audience furnished with some reasoning or motivation. What could have been truly frightening results in an inoffensive, even quaint, pot-boiler.

“It’s alive!” So gasps Peter Cushing as Baron Frankenstein, as he infuses the spark of life into a creature previously dead. On this occasion, it is a puppy used as an experiment. Cushing, taking over from Melvyn Hayes (as the younger Baron), makes the part instantly his own. Every flicker of the eye, every movement, every sideward glance is meticulously measured – a trait of Cushing’s acting, and one of the reasons he has been admired over the years by fans and fellow cast and crew members. As ‘Curse of Frankenstein’ starts, its credits intoned over swirling red smoke, Frankenstein is dishevelled and desperate, imprisoned for his foul deeds and a cert for the guillotine – his story is told in flashback.

This was Hammer’s first major success, the Mary Shelley novel condensed by writer Jimmy Sangster (but not as much as Dracula was the following year). Robert Urquhart, who played Paul Krempe, Frankenstein’s tutor, walked out of the premiere, and in disgust gave an interview slating its horrific nature; needless to say, he never appeared in another cinematic film for Hammer. He was not alone – ‘revolting, degrading, pathetic and depressing’ are four words amongst many scathing reviews of ‘Curse of Frankenstein’ upon its release, usually from the prissy pens of the British critics. Happily, the film made seventy times the money that was needed to make it, which tells its own story.

Goat’s eyes, severed hands and heads, and Cushing’s blood spattered lapels certainly brought ‘Curse’ a huge level of notoriety upon its release which fuelled its popularity and put Hammer forever on the map – as well as making stars out of both Cushing, and his ‘creature’ Christopher Lee (a role for which Bernard Bresslaw was also considered). Lee was chosen mainly for his height and smothered in car-crash make-up and an obvious wig, which provides an effective scare but is hardly memorable in the way that Jack Pierce’s make-up had been for the Universal original. It is unfair to compare the two films however – they were made in a different age for a different audience - and that is the last time I shall do so.

The few wisps of humour in this doom-laden story are provided by The Baron’s affair with maid Justine, who naively believes his lies and tried to blackmail him, and another scene which involves The Baron politely asking for the marmalade during a genteel breakfast directly after the scene in which he locks Justine into his filthy laboratory with his reborn creature.

The Creature has a magnificent introduction. Left in an emptying water tank, with its chest heaving, there is a crash which leads Frankenstein to scurry into his deserted laboratory. There stands his creation, uncoordinated arms and hands reaching to rip away the bandages covering his face. Phil Leakey’s make-up is revealed, and the creature (or rather the late Professor Bernstein, whose brain is in the monster’s head) immediately recognises the man who originally killed him and reaches out to strangle him. No mild-mannered monster, he still invites a kind of sympathy – in the way a rabid dog would invite sympathy for its plight, if not for its temperament.

At the finale, we return to The Baron’s incarceration, with Frankenstein facing the guillotine after his last hope, Paul Krempe, has wilfully failed to save him. Krempe is hardly as virtuous as he seems, I think. For all his gallant protection of Frankenstein’s intended Elizabeth (Hazel Court), it is clear he has designs on her – by the film’s end, he happily places an arm around her as he escorts her out of Frankenstein’s cell. The cad.

There’s something in the trees. It’s big and it’s shaggy and could possibly be a Yowie, a kind of Bigfoot-type. Only glimpsed sporadically and often partially obscured by rampant foliage, this familiar trick by Director (and writer) Travis Bain is used to tease us as to the specifics of the creature’s appearance, and also to obfuscate any short-comings of the man-in-a-suit costume. No CGI here.

Kent and Jack (Anthony Ring and Shawn Brack, soon joined by Melanie Serrafin as Rhiannon) are such good fun that despite the former’s continual misdeeds, it is a shame when he dies – partly because, because he has proven to be such a louse, he deserved a more prolonged send-off. The dialogue contains many moments of humour, but this is never allowed to dispel the carefully built up scenes with the Yowie, which rarely transcends its man-in-a-suit origins, sadly.

Some of the set pieces last just a little too long – there is a scene with a Detective McNabb that could have done with some judicial trimming. The creature has no end of bullets fired into it without apparent effect, and yet the human protagnonists still believe a bullet will stop it.

This is a good, solid story, full of surprises and twists that belies the very small budget. A couple of the gore effects are very convincing, and the scenery of misty, remote Queensland jungles are very well shot. From start to finish, this is really enjoyable, with a very satisfying ending.

A small town in the grip of winter. Four seasoned gentlemen delighting/torturing themselves by telling ghost stories by the fire-side, under the aegis of The Chowder Society. A mysterious young woman whose face is a blur in any photograph. And then the mysterious deaths begin …

This film is based on the novel by Peter Straub and has a glittering cast of veteran entertainers – Fred Astaire (as Ricky), Melvyn Douglas (John), John Houseman (Sears), Douglas Fairbanks Jr (Edward), and comparative youngster Craig Wasson as both David (who dies early on after the girl he’s sleeping with turns into a rotting corpse) and Don Wanderley, Edward’s two sons. Wasson is excellent throughout and makes a real impression, not easy in the company of such great performers.

To join the ranks of the Chowder Society, Don tells a ghost story of his own. He talks of a girl, Alma, whom he was seduced by. This girl, played with brilliant eccentricity by Alice Krige, displays increasingly erratic behaviour until Don tells her he wants to end their relationship. A month later, Alma strikes up a relationship with his brother David. Shortly after, David is dead.

This story seems to resonate with the old men, and they have their own tale to tell. 50 years earlier, the four of them got together with an upper crust ‘good time girl’ Eva. Petty jealousies, alcohol and general immaturity turn events nasty one drunken evening, and Eva’s toying with their collective affections and egos seals her fate. By accident she is murdered, and in panic, they bundle her into a car and drive it into a river. As the car slides beneath the water, she moves, her hand scrambling to find an escape from her inevitable doom.

This is what the Chowder Society have been living with all these years, and it becomes apparent that Alma is somehow a physical manifestation of Eva as she was back then. Why she has waited 50 years to exact her revenge is unknown. As the car is at last dredged from the water, her putrefying corpse lumbers out and collapses, dead one final time: very effective but after all the build-up, rather too brief.

The film is too long. Some pruning would have helped, especially an unexplored sub-plot concerning two low-life red herrings who serve no purpose, other than to look conspicuous in the modern setting. And yet the effects, used very sparingly, are excellent and there are moments of real tension. Equally, the town in the icy grip of winter is extremely well achieved and makes the closed off community look particularly inescapable.

This begins with a full-throated argument between Jay and Shell (Neil Maskell and MyAnna Buring), who live the kind of life documented by the likes of EastEnders. Gal and his new partner Fiona (Michael Smiley and Emma Fryer) come around for a dinner party typically punctuated by further profanity lead disagreements – and then Fiona visits the restroom, lifts the mirror off the wall, and scratches a symbol on the back. When she leaves, she takes a tissue with a sample of Jay’s blood. The next day, she and Gal have split up.

Gal and Jay are contract killers. Their new job is with A Client (Struan Roger) who insists on sealing the deal by cutting hands and exchanging blood. After a series of violent exchanges that threaten to tip the drama into a graphic crime caper, Jay sees Fiona from his hotel window, inexplicably standing outside in the night, waving. Equally odd, a number of the men they have been assigned to kill make a point of ‘thanking’ Jay shortly before he kills them.

Unnerved, the two men try to end their contract with The Client, who promises their families will all die if they renege. So, they continue to their next kill. This involves a group of cultists, who they see commit a human sacrifice. It is at this point that it is suddenly obvious that Gal and Jay, so cocksure and secure in their violence, are wholly out of their depth and dealing with forces they cannot understand. It is also at this point that the domestic drama cum crime caper has entered its true nature of fully fledged horror.

(Spoilers) In the final ‘chapter’, entitled The Hunchback, Jay is forced to combat a hunchbacked, masked character as the cultists surround them. He wins the contest by killing his assailant with multiple stab wounds. On removing the robes, he sees it is Shell, with their son strapped to her back, who he has killed. He is the victor, and is applauded by the cult, who embrace him as their own. As the other cultists remove their cowls, The Client, Jay’s doctor and Fiona are revealed to be among their number.

Like Director Ben Wheatley’s later ‘A Field in England (2013)’ this is almost impossible to categorise, and leaves the viewer wondering if everything that has occurred during the last 95 minutes actually comes together to make sense. The imagery stays in the mind, and, like in a dream, it is a challenge to put some of the pieces together. It is unsettling, graphic, convincing and compelling and the acting from all is exemplary.

Very much in the spirit of early team-ups that begun with ‘Frankenstein meets the Wolfman (1942)’ (with Jason as the lumbering Monster and Freddy Krueger as the more lithe, even sinewy Wolfman – and it maybe coincidental, but their fiery ‘demise’ on a boardwalk is reminiscent of the Monster’s final death in the Universal films, namely 1948’s ‘Abbott and Costello meet Frankenstein’) ‘Freddy vs Jason’ is enjoyable very much as a ‘romp’, which makes it surprising to me that we are reminded quite graphically of Freddy’s penchant for juveniles. (“Freddie’s coming. He loves children, especially little girls.”)

Firstly however, we are introduced to the usual array of teens, vile in every way except cosmetic – after all, this is a ‘celebration’ of Freddy/Jason films, so it wouldn’t do to miss out on this particular staple. Some have returned from a previous entry, others are a new breed of laconic vacuousness; more ghastly than either of the titular monsters, it isn’t long before they are despatched, one by one, to the relief of much of the viewers.

Considering Freddy had assumed increasingly jocular and bizarre brief alter-egoes over the many sequels, he is, if anything, comparatively restrained here; apart from outsized shadows, he appears as a drug induced caterpillar, but that is the only concession to his wilder, younger days.

Of course, we really want to see the two Big Names fight. And fight they do, in a series of terrific set-pieces. Krueger is frustrated by Jason killing Freddy’s victims before Freddy does, and violence erupts between them, first in the dream world where Freddy resides, and then in reality. The self-mocking tone of earlier scenes is replaced with good old fashioned (or new fashioned, as there are plenty of CGI enhancements) fisticuffs. After many scripts were rejected for this, it seems the producers were more than happy with a thin, straight-forward knock-about instead of the more spectacular, intricate ideas originally discussed.

Neither Jason nor Freddy are victors, and yet perversely they both are – however, this is their last throw of the dice to date. It would be seven years before another Freddy film was attempted, but this was a spineless remake of the 1984 original and offered nothing new.

The word ‘exploitation’ has been linked with Pete Walker films, but he has questioned its meaning. After all, as he reasons, just about every film made now is exploitation-al in that nudity, sex and violence – often far stronger than in Walker’s films – feature as a matter of course and without much comment.

Pete Walker retired from directing films after 1979’s under-age sex drama ‘Home Before Midnight’, but was tempted back to direct his last, ‘House of Long Shadows’ in 1983. His films were frequently lambasted by critics; indeed, he sought to provoke controversy (‘rubbing them up the wrong way,’ as he called it) by deliberately featuring salacious themes throughout. And yet, as with many things, there is a new appreciation for his work now. He was independently releasing British horror films at a time when Hammer, Tigon and Amicus had long since given up on the genre and for that alone, deserves a great deal of merit.

We join this film with Jenny Welsh (Susan Penhaligon) enduring severely testing times. Regularly jilted by her live-in boyfriend, she has no-one to talk to of her woes and enters into a confessional at her local Church. The vicar Father Xavier Meldrum (a tremendous Anthony Sharp, who made a career playing vicars and librarians for many years) turns out to be somewhat perverse, so she flees, only to find she left her keys in the confessional booth. Breaking into the shop where she works with her friend Robert, she leaves him alone momentarily to buy some cigarettes, and when she comes back, she finds he has been attacked by a ‘mysterious’ stranger.

When it is revealed that Father Meldrum is a schizophrenic murderer caring for a disabled, housebound mother and intimidated by a bullying one-eyed housekeeper Mrs Brabazon (the incomparable Sheila Keith), it’s no great surprise. We are in familiar Pete Walker ‘Frightmare’ territory, revisiting themes of respectable establishment figures berating the young for their lapse morals, whilst turning out to be perverts and psychopaths themselves.

This is cited as Pete Walker’s favourite directorial experience, with professional actresses like Penhaligon and Stephanie Beacham needing less time-consuming guidance than some of his female protégés. ‘House of Mortal Sin’ is a typically enjoyable experience, although in common with his other projects, it is highly unlikely that his villains would get away with their burgeoning crimes for such a long time. It tends to drag in places, another of my problems with his earlier projects. Cutting 10 to 15 minutes might well have improved matters.

Calling for God’s forgiveness before strangling Beacham with rosary beads, methodically reading the last rites to his senile old mother before poisoning her (whilst Mrs Brabazon looks on with a sneer) and ending the film with the lunatic vicar still very much at large – all this may well have been deliberate provocation on behalf of Pete Walker to attract controversy. Judging by his comments in interviews ever since, that controversy never really happened, much to his disappointment.

I was sufficiently entertained by ‘Zombie Massacre 2: Reich of the Dead’ to seek out its prequel. With this debut, the filmography isn’t quite as bleak and gritty, but the characters are better defined – i.e.: there ARE some actual characters in this, not just cliché-spouting action men as there are in ZM2. Most of the acting here is fine, some isn’t. So – much like the other film, this is a bit of a mixed bag.

Zombies by their very nature are limited threats. They eat you, you turn into one of them. So wisely – or unwisely, depending on your point of view – the narrative here concentrates mostly on the human crew, a team of mercenaries contracted by the authorities to cover up an outbreak of the living dead, for which the Government (represented by General Carter played by Carl Wharton) is responsible. The remainders take time to make an impression, but after the arrival of a hillbilly and his (suspiciously young) girlfriend, the entourage prove to be pretty well-defined, especially ‘Mad Dog’ Mackellen (Mike Mitchell).

The Freddie Krueger-esque zombies themselves are more human than the full mask creatures from ‘ZM2’, which is probably budget necessitated, and there are plenty of them here. Luca Boni has a flair for these kind of pictures and succeeds mainly in the bleakness of the situation. He’s directed several other films in this genre, one of which appears to be another sequel to this, entitled ‘Eaters: Rise of the Dead.’

Sadly, a couple of the more anticipated deaths toward the end of the film actually take place off-camera. Worst offender is that of General Carter, whose death the viewer has been anticipating throughout the film and we don’t see it! There’s also a spot of unwelcome and unnecessary moral philosophising from the remaining heroes – but other than that, I really enjoyed this. There are some very enjoyable twists and turns along the way of the thinly-spread plot that keeps the audience on its toes. It isn’t flawless, but I would certainly look forward to any possible Zombie Apocalypse 3.

As a coda: there is a bizarre end scene that comes from nowhere but provides a satisfying topless bloodbath towards throughout the end credits. It proves if nothing else that, although the threat featured throughout this picture may have been curtailed, there are still plenty more of the living dead ‘out there.’

In a move Director Pete Walker describes as ‘making a rod for his own back’, ‘The Comeback’ swaps genders for the usual ‘woman in peril’ motif of many of his films by making singer/songwriter Nick Cooper (Jack Jones, very effective in a role for which power-crooner Bryan Ferry was also considered) the victim of nefarious goings-on.

Cooper secludes himself in a mansion in order to write a follow-up to his last successful album, released six years before, after which his career was put on hold because he wished to concentrate on his then new wife. Sheila Keith is sublime as the sinister house-keeper Mrs B, whose superficial old-school pleasantries seem to mask something infinitely more sinister – the kind of role that Keith excels at. Whilst this is happening, Cooper’s ex-wife has been murdered in their marital apartment and is caked in a riot of the brightest blood you ever did see – and that is where she remains for a vast chunk of the running time.

Cooper has an unfortunate ability to surround himself with unpleasant types. Or red-herrings. Apart from his selfish ex, there’s sleazy right-hand man Harry, his cross-dressing manager Webster (Charlie’s Angels’ David Doyle) as well as Mr and Mrs B. The exception to this unpleasantness is Webster's beautiful secretary Linda (comedienne, sex therapist and future Mrs Billy Connolly Pamela Stephenson), who instigates a relationship with Cooper.

The killings continue at a leisurely pace, by someone in a shawl and a mask, which could mean Webster. Increasingly it seems as if Mrs B might have something to do with it. As in many Pete Walker films, she represents the respectable (but frequently psychotic!) older generation disgusted with the lapsed morals of the young (if 40 – Jack Jones’ age at the time - is considered young). Equally, Cooper hears a young girl sobbing at night, and Linda could be responsible for that. He also suffers what he believes are several gruesome hallucinations.

The film comes across as a television thriller with horror overtones, and is played very well by its cast (including Bill Owen, and ‘House of Whipcord’s Penny Irving). The revelation at the end, [SPOILER] is that Mr and Mrs B had a daughter who worshipped Nick Cooper’s music, and killed herself when he got married, and it is them and their madness that were responsible for everything that had happened.

Cooper is understandably shocked, but relieved he wasn’t going mad after all, but as he leaves the mansion at the end, he turns to see the dead daughter at the window.

Five laconic young people are joined by a fifth, bland hunky monosyllable Chris (Desmond Harrington), the kind of beefy gent so beloved by genre films of this nature. Stranded in the woods of West Virginia, it isn’t long before two of their number – who make the fatal mistake of smoking weed and threaten to have sex – have been bloodily attacked and killed by unseen assailants.

‘Wrong Turn’ is a by-numbers slasher film. However, it is solid, well-made, has good performances and effects, and the location lends itself very well to the idea of inbred families hidden away from ‘normality’.

There comes a time when the group stumble upon what is clearly the home of the unlovely family, and yet, as is customary in such moments, still go in. Why? Because one of their number ‘needs to pee.’ With countless miles of wild forest all around, who wouldn’t enter a dwelling where human parts are over-flowing from pots and pans, uninvited, to answer the call of nature? And yet the illogical nature of otherwise intelligent people is essential for horror – without it, our remaining troupe wouldn’t be able to see the cannibalistic depravity in which these mutants exist, and the extent of the threat they pose.

The action moves at a fair pace as the group are picked off one by one, and each death is well-staged. The creatures know the land better than these city visitors and so this comes across as a game to them – their wheezing and shrill whoops of delight indicate they are always only seconds behind the diminishing band. Regarding the monsters – considerable restraint is shown in that we never get a really good lingering look at them. Their deformities are glimpsed through foliage, or obscured by movement, which enhances their effect. In the many sequels – five so far – the camera lingers on them a lot more, which is strange as subsequent budgetary restrictions show the make-ups become a lot less convincing.

And so ends chapter one, with a lone mutant survivor. As the enjoyable but formulaic films ends, (where inevitably, not-quite-death-metal title music rounds up the credits) the inbreed character Three Fingers makes one last holler of delight. He is the one cannibal that shows up in all subsequent films.

Evangelical reverend and showman Cotton Marcus has a plan to expose the concept of ‘exorcism’ as the farce he believes it to be. This, as you might imagine, is asking for trouble. He reveals to camera his ‘box of tricks’ (steaming crucifixes, sound effects etc) that will prove how gullible people are. Patrick Fabian is excellent as the fast-talking Cotton. The reverend is initially arrogant, cocooned in the high-energy joy he brings to his congregation despite not entirely believing his own words, but gradually becomes aware that events are bigger than he can possibly handle.

In ‘Blair Witch’ fashion, we are treated to interviews from the locals conducted by Cotton as he makes his way to where the exorcism is due to take place. Not all of them are friendly. One of the least amenable happens to be the son of the family for whom the exorcism is to be carried out. Indeed, one local’s proclamation that the house in question contains ‘the gates of hell’ is alarmingly prosaic.

When we meet the victim, Nell, allegedly under a demon’s possession, she is virginal and shy. Actress Ashley Bell overplays Nell’s wide-eyed innocence and wholesome smile … but then, we are meant to find her unnaturally good, in comparison to what comes later.

I enjoy horror films, but I only find a handful of them truly frightening. One is ‘The Exorcist’ which, as you may imagine, this shares similarities with – and this is another. Familiarity does not make the images of a young girl getting progressively more violent, unearthly and demonic any easier to watch. The look of horror on the face of her father, her (also very unnerving) brother (a brilliant performance from Caleb Landry-Jones) and Cotton himself is communicated very well to the audience.

Rather desperately, Cotton clings to the notion that – even despite bone crunching distortions (all performed without a stunt double) – the girl is not possessed by a demon but by shame. She is pregnant, and is terrified to reveal this to her God-fearing father.

It is ultimately revealed (and this is a SPOILER) that not only is Nell actually possessed (by a demon called Abalam), but (in true Wicker Man style) the entire neighbourhood is in on it also. When her new-born baby is thrown upon an open fire which apparently gives true life to Abalam, as a viewer, I am actually relieved – because up until that point, ‘The Last Exorcism’ had me just where it wanted me, figuratively watching behind my fingers, such was the power of performance and production. But the ending entered into a world of the fantastic, a revelation too far, that ripped the carefully built-up realism from the piece. Not that the climax isn’t effective – it’s just unnecessary when it serves to break the spell of what we had seen up till that point. The glimpse of an entity in the burgeoning flames is the only example of CGI in the film.

That bastion of decency, the UK Censor – who even since the 1930’s, has been a thorn in the side of horror pictures – banned the promotional poster because of its ‘offensive’ imagery. As is often the case, such reassuring suppression only helped fuel its success enough for a sequel, also starring Ashley Bell, in 2013.

This film deals with pig/men hybrids. That’s not so much a spoiler, as the face of one such unfortunate is on all packaging. Unfortunately, with this being a very low-budget project, the pig make-up isn’t really its best feature, and so the decision to highlight it on DVD covers is questionable. The creatures are much better when seen in shadows, or obscured by objects etc. And their high pitched, porcine squeal is horrifying – indeed, it has to be to rise above the shrill screams of the 6 mostly appalling young people that get caught up in the machinations.

The performances are enthusiastic, the characters’ arguments are explosive and often amusing. But that doesn’t deter the viewer wanting to see most of them despatched by the mutants. Incidentally, there are only cursory explanations as to why these creatures exist – their deformity seems limited to their faces, as their bodies and hands seem entirely human.

What makes up the story is the same as in many other films of this nature. There are no real surprises. Director Tony Swansey makes a good job of communicating the utter despair of the totally degraded crew, and the fact that Travis (Stephen Dean) in particular never, for one moment, stops reminding us how reprehensible he is makes us yearn for something unmentionable to happen to him. When such a thing does occur (in this case, having his mouth sewn up with a guitar string), I defy anyone not to feel a certain degree of relief.

I enjoy watching ‘Squeal’ for what it is. It doesn’t take itself too seriously (although it plays mainly as a straight, brutal horror), and there is a moment after the end credits that amuses, as one pig hybrid puts on a magic show for two corpses, propped up. At the end, he pulls their dead faces into grins and cheers at his own cleverness.

This shares a title with the acclaimed French film/television series ‘The Returned’, but other than that, these projects are not connected.

This picture works on many levels: it is about the lengths people will go to to protect themselves, about fear, stigma, about hopelessness – and about dead eyed zombies eating people. In a climate where Living Dead films have flooded the market, it is to be applauded when a project attempts to try something different with the genre.

In a post-zombie environment, a serum ‘The Return Protein’ has been developed which – if administered in time – will allow any infected person to live a normal existence, provided they inject the drug daily for the rest of their lives. This, of course, costs a great deal of money, which causes resentment and protest among ‘normal people’. Thus, with this film, being bitten could be a metaphor for many present day prejudices, and works very well with that in mind.

Kate (Emily Hampshire) and Alex (Kris Holden-Reid) are living with the disease, as Alex is ‘a returned’. As such, he faces stigma and hatred on a daily basis. As supplies of the protein become scarce, his life is also the subject of much envy from others. Even his best friend Jacob (an excellent tortured performance from Shawn Doyle) is so afraid of losing his partner Amber (Claudia Bassols), he is driven to take measures that not only betray his friend, but also prove to be utterly futile.

The desperation of human kind, and the control money has over peoples’ lives are the real monsters here. Actual zombies are featured so infrequently, there are times when ‘The Returned’ seems to dissolve into a series of endless, intense conversations. But the viewer is advised to stay with this, because the build-up to the finale is edge-of-the-seat stuff. Although the ending appears to provide closure of sorts, the very human desire for revenge means that the story is far from over even as the credits role.