|
Since spying his
short horror films on various websites, Patrick Rea has become one of my
favorite online filmmakers and a dead serious source for horror that's
original, morbid, occasionally funny, and can always guarantee a twist
of the knife to keep the audience wanting more. And with Rea I always
want to see more and more of what he can do with the genre. This time
Rea vies to perpetuate a more fantastical sense of horror, the kind that
borders between fantasy and horror and in twenty minutes provides a
valid argument for his skills.
|
Rae's "Mrs.
Brumett's Garden" plays off [once again] like an episode
"Twilight Zone," one that perfectly defines and develops its
characters with a hint of saccharine and occasionally dark
humor. Helen Brumett talks to her garden every chance she
gets. She sits in her garden for hours discussing her life
and engaging in chatter with what she describes as fairies. |
|
 |
And
her husband is convinced that senility has taken hold of her and has
decided to put her in a home. But one night when the final straw has
broken, Mrs. Brumett enters her garden and Mr. Brumett is served a
taste of his wife's garden's wrath once and for all. Though most of
the film is draped in the darkly mystical, there's also a thick
sense of dread injected where we know the world Mrs. Brumett is a
happy one only when the people they choose to befriend follow and
unspoken set of rules. The second half seals up what is a
bittersweet affair one where out signature characters go to extreme
lengths to protect Mrs. Brumett evoking the horror that Rea excels
at and finishes on a moment that perfectly closes up this short
little ditty.
Sad, clever,
fantastic and slightly horrific, "Mrs. Brumett's Garden" is another
slice of filmmaking gold for Patrick Rea whose growing filmography only
serves to show how much of a madman he is when given a camera and the
means to make an honest to goodness short film that makes due on its
promises of Rea's tricks and twists.
|
