THE EPITAPH VOL. 8
PATIENT ZERO (2018) - WELCOME THE STRANGER (2018) - BONEHILL ROAD (2018)
A loosely connected trio of capsule reviews this week, we have an infected-film from Sony, sibling strangeness from Via Vision and a lycanthropic indie film with some serious bite - all on DVD, but Patient Zero is alaso available on Blu-ray.
First up, from Sony and Vertical Entertainment comes the pandemic-infected film PATIENT ZERO (2018), a movie that answers the question what if 28 Days Later and Day of the Dead were mashed-up into a low-budget thriller? Set in a underground military bunker we have a mixed group of scientist and military looking for a cure or and end to he adrenaline-fueled infected that have seemingly overrun the world, and of course they don't see eye to eye. If you can look beyond the obvious influences this one does offer a bit of a new variation on long-running zombie/infected tropes. For starters one of the scientist who was bitten and infected has not turned full-on infected, though he is now able to communicate with the infected who have their own language, and then they capture one of the infected who seem a bit more thoughtful than your average rabid-killer infected, played by big name star Stanley Tucci (The Devil Wears Prada) who for reasons unknown is slumming it in this low-budget infected film, which is sort of cool I guess. I didn't think it was great but it was a decent one and done for me. If it peaks your curiosity it's streaming on Amazon and available on DVD & Blu-ray.
From Via Vision in Australia comes a region-free DVD of WELCOME HOME STRANGER (2018), an arthouse indie film starring Abbey Lee (The Neon Demon) and Caleb Landry Jones (Get Out) as a pair of estranged sibling reunited after the death of their mother, each carrying around baggage and weirdness in abundance. The film posits could-be witchery or maybe even alien-abduction into the proceeding, but if you're not a fan of ambiguous strangeness and art house leaning this might be a bit of a slog. There's a lot of atmosphere and tension, a bit too much sibling dialogue, and the occasional dispersion of supernatural or sci-fi imagery. It has promise but it ends up more arthouse precious than atmospheric thriller, but I would be lying if I said that the arthouse ambiguity doesn't appeal to me a little bit, but this won't be everyone's bag, but if you like arthouse weirdness and ambiguity it might be worth a watch.
Last but certainly not least comes low-budget werewolf film BONEHILL ROAD (2018) on DVD from Wild Eye Releasing. The film features mother Emily (Eli DeGeer) and her daughter Eden (Ana Rojas-Plumberg) fleeing an abusive home in their car in the dead of night, the mom swerves to avoid hatting something in the road only to discover that whatever it was it a hairy beast out for blood. They escape their initial encounter but end up on taking refuge in a house owned by a serial killer, making this a night that goes from bad to worse to downright fucking awful. For a low-budget film this one has some pretty great special effects, beginning with a werewolf/werewolves that look like they're inspired by The Howling or Dog Soldiers, bi-pedal beasts with long snouts and wicked-long claws, I loved the design of these werewolves, very impressive all the way around. You can feel the budget constraints at times but I dig the film quite a bit, this is a little film with a lot of heart and tons of blood, a definite recommend for those looking for an indie werewolf film that isn't a bunch of shit-looking digital FX, this is the real deal. I have not seen any of director Todd Sheets films, but this is a film that certainly will inspire me to track down a few more of his films. This is my pick of the week, you can pick it up for under $10 on Amazon, go get it!
From Via Vision in Australia comes a region-free DVD of WELCOME HOME STRANGER (2018), an arthouse indie film starring Abbey Lee (The Neon Demon) and Caleb Landry Jones (Get Out) as a pair of estranged sibling reunited after the death of their mother, each carrying around baggage and weirdness in abundance. The film posits could-be witchery or maybe even alien-abduction into the proceeding, but if you're not a fan of ambiguous strangeness and art house leaning this might be a bit of a slog. There's a lot of atmosphere and tension, a bit too much sibling dialogue, and the occasional dispersion of supernatural or sci-fi imagery. It has promise but it ends up more arthouse precious than atmospheric thriller, but I would be lying if I said that the arthouse ambiguity doesn't appeal to me a little bit, but this won't be everyone's bag, but if you like arthouse weirdness and ambiguity it might be worth a watch. 