AFTER MIDNIGHT (2019)
Label: Umbrella Entertainment
Region Code: Region-FREE (NTSC)
Rating: MA
Duration: 83 Minutes
Audio: English Dolby Digital 5.1
Video: Anamorphic Widescreen (2.35:1)
Director: Jeremy Gardner
Cast: Brea Grant, Jeremy Gardner, Justin Benson, Henry Zebrowski, Ashely Song, Nicole Masciotra, Taylor Zaudtke
At the start of the film our main character Hank (director Jeremy Gardner, The Battery) is living with the fact that his girlfriend of the last ten years, Abby (Brea Grant, Beyond the Gates), has seemingly left him. We find him barricaded in the front room of his dilapidated Florida home with a shotgun in hand, sitting on a couch that blocks the front door. directly behind him there's a splintered hole in the door, a remnant of him having fired his shotgun through it, supposedly at some sort of strange creature that's been trying to claw it's way inside his house at night ever since Abby left. His brother Shane (Justin Benson, The Endless) is a local cop, and he chalks it all up a bit of hysteria, dismissing the scratches on the exterior of the front door to a curious black bear, and attributing Hank's monster-talk as hysteria fueled by alcohol and loneliness. Hank is otherwise convinced that there's something strange visiting him at night, but is it all in his head, or is there actually something malevolent living in the tall grass of the everglades that seems to envelope his home?
After Midnight is an interesting hybrid of a film, on one hand it's a creature feature, on the other it's a surprisingly poignant meditation on the dissolution of a relationship. Throughout the film there are flashbacks to the earlier stages of his relationship with Abby, the happy couple settling into Hank's ancestral home, drinking wine and listening to mix tapes, but then we see the normal cracks appear in relationships. Abby seems unhappy with Hank's willingness to take their relationship to the next level, she wants kids and he doesn't seem to want that, so it's not the perfect love that hank might be remembering.
Eventually Abby is back in the picture and the pair make an effort to recover what might not be lost, and the film seemingly drifts away from creature feature it's been establishing, giving credence to the idea that the midnight monster might be a figment of a sad, broken-hearted man. Then comes a surprising heartfelt and touching karaoke performance with a group of friends... and the film returns to the former, and I loved hank's choice of hand-held weapon, it's pretty unique. It's an offbeat and not altogether seamless marriage of seemingly disparate genres but I absolutely loved it, rarely have romance and monsters been so strangely entwined.
Audio/Video: After Midnight (2019) arrives on region-free NTSC formatted DVD from Umbrella Entertainment framed in anamorphic widescreen (2.35:1). The lensing of the film looks great, with the cinematography capturing the tall grass exteriors and dilapidated interiors of the house well, colors are well-defined and blacks are acceptable for a standard-definition presentation. Audio on the disc comes by way of English Dolby Digital 5.1, and this being the sort of film that goes from quiet to loud often and I found myself having to crank up the volume and then turn it back down just as quickly. As is often the case with these film-only releases from Umbrella there are no subtitles, and this is certainly a film that would have benefited from a subtitle option. Uneven sound levels aside the music from bands The Parlors, The Hummingbirds and others sounds good, but the quiet-loud-quiet dynamic proved a bit of a chore to manage without subtitles.
There are absolutely no extras on this release, not even a trailer or static start-up menu, once you pop in the disc it begins playing immediately. The single-disc release comes housed in a standard keepcase with a singe-sided sleeve of artwork featuring a cool illustration of the creature, the same artwork is replicated on the disc.
Jeremy Gardner first popped-up on my radar by directing the indie end-of-the-world film The Battery (2012), which is still a bit of an unsung gem, he then popped-up as an actor in the several films of Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead (Spring, The Endless) and a few more Joe Begos (Mind's Eye, Bliss). He's been operating within that circle of independent filmmakers who I think are all doing great stuff, and After Midnight (2019) shows his own growth as a director. It's not a perfect film, but I do love the intermingling of a sweet love story with a creature-feature, and I am looking forward to whatever his next film ends up being. I sort of hope it's horror but based on what he accomplished with this film he could go in any direction and I would still be there for it. This comes highly recommended, I do hope that Umbrella at some point release both The Battery and After Hours as a double-feature Blu-ray the way they have Joe Begos VFW and Bliss, that would be awesome.
More Screenshots from the DVD
