“Growing Pains” Shorts Block
Directors Iker Arce and Miriam Ortega Dominguez’s “¿Quieres Que Hoy Te Bese?” is a nearly half hour short film that resonated deeply with me when it was all over. What we assume is a short horror drama about a teenage girl coming in to adulthood in the most sinister fashion, we soon discover is a very brilliantly constructed, disturbing non-linear horror tale.
A young woman seeks shelter from a convent after getting pregnant, hoping to find caring help and understanding souls, but finding anything but in the house.
A woman and a man wake up in what seems to be a hospital and in the care of someone who seems to be a doctor. That is until things take a turn for the odd and frightening and they are faced with their true identities and who this man really is.
After reaching new heights in her internet fame, a college student looking for more is kidnapped and her roommate is once again reluctantly roped into helping as she seems to be the only one available.
“Social Horror” Shorts Block
Director Heidi Lee Douglas’s “Devil Woman” is kind of a jumbled mess of a horror movie that has a ton of potential. On one side of the coin it tries to be a horror movie about feral monsters spreading their virus through a bite. On the other side of the coin it tries to an environmentally conscious tale about Tasmanian Devils suffering from hideous cancer destroying the population. It’s tough to get sucked in to a horror movie about feral monsters when the movie bookends the tale with an actual picture of a disfigured Tasmanian Devil suffering from cancer.
“Midnight Movies” Shorts Block
I can’t say that I would recommend Stepanka Cervinkova’s dystopian horror film per se, but I appreciated the message behind it, and I liked its energy. I also loved the special effects as they garnered the right amount of yuck factor. The big problem with “The Body Corporate” is its sheer confused tone, but otherwise director Cervinkova is at least a good director with a neat concept.
“Flesh and Blood” Shorts Block
This South Korean horror film by Jiwoon Moon is not a movie about ghosts or goblins, but about the absolute perverse horrors of greed and the evil money can foster. Director-writer Moon tells the tale of a small family living in a sheltered home. After Ji-hyo has a horrible nightmare with her father scaring her without any eyes, her mother Hyeon-woo half heartedly assures her that it was all a nightmare.