Jane finds a note one day from the unseen and unheard 'Master of Games', daring her to complete increasingly more drastic challenges for money as she gets drawn further into the perverse world of the game.
USA
Source: IMDB (Chicago International Film Festival)
USA
WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS!!! An unreleased, seemingly almost totally forgotten SOV horror-thriller. A deceptively innocuous opening slowly (slowly) accelerates into absolute lunacy. Engrossing and seriously fucking SINISTER. Find the guy selling unlabeled DVD-R's of this on ebay, you may never get another chance!
(Okay, so you can also watch it on youtube, but trust me, getting a sketchy disk in the mail is much more thematically appropriate.)
chicago excellence ... wheels-within-wheels proto-saw thriller that prominently uses off-screen footage of silent hill as a motif :-) blows the terrible book clean out of the water, v similar to cop in that way (& no other haha)
kim garrett is great 🖤
Textures of boredom stuck to B&W SOV grain like a cinematic popcorn ceiling. Lining up pencils for fun level library monotony creating the perfect headspace to submit to the master if not only to fill the void of lonely apartment and days lost to the echoes of ps1 on CRT TV Silent Hill footsteps.
The sinister nature of quiet building from library shush to loungewear audio vacuousness to the return-to-womb-of-boredom silence of hearing nothing from the master. A silence that layers up until the cemetery dog snarls sound deafening in growled tones of pick up truck terror, left almost helpless as the pulling of the trigger makes not a sound when the magazine is empty. Switchblade defense and dog bite…
![[radio edit]](https://a.ltrbxd.com/resized/avatar/upload/2/8/6/1/4/0/shard/avtr-0-80-0-80-crop.jpg?v=2fa8ac5991){kind=small}
liveatthedeathfactory.libsyn.com/10-you-cant-kill-me-cause-im-already-inside-you
Hard to think of all the middling shite that gets a boutique rerelease with tie-in Mondo nft yet a banger like this can only either be stumbled upon on youtube or procured on a DVR from grindhouse dave on ebay. A work of quiet power rattling around the dead end of a failed system.
(edit: avoid any reviews on here that just list what happens. A good policy anyway but especially in this case. Go in blind and then stop by the death factory)
A confident Mini-DV adaptation of the schlockmeister Richard Laymon's book that makes some excellent changes to the source material which improve things immensely. Should be used as a textbook example in how a great lead and a controlled use of style can make a no-budget production incredibly engrossing.
A grungy, creepy, and static wavering, SOV horror. Tonally raw, bleak, amateurishly real, this rare indie effort evokes a texture that feels naturally tense in a disturbing way, like waiting for a community college film project to turn into a full blown snuff film. The main character is a refreshingly anti-manic pixie girl and a realized, committed one-time performance by Kim Garrett. While some of the more action heavy scenes are a bit clumsy in execution--the film makes up for it in quiet and unnervingly clever ways. A recurring sequence in which Jane plays Silent Hill and endlessly runs the main character to nowhere, is brilliant. Another tragic example of independent, no-budget film making that's genuinely more exciting than most any big budget glossy indie pic nowadays.
Major SO to Astrid and her amazing podcast that brought this to my attention: liveatthedeathfactory.libsyn.com/10-you-cant-kill-me-cause-im-already-inside-you
Bit of a lost treasure here, a film adaption of the novel In the Dark by the late schlock horror whiz Richard Laymon, clearly an earnest tribute to the source material and a faithful indie-SOV low-budget counterculture auteur project reworking of a very frightening and well-conceived story. Way artsier, and therefore better, than I expected, Laymon's groaner dialogue thankfully improved, the acting is better than you'd expect and the ending is a million times better, eschewing the original happy ending that seemed an inconsistent wrap to the relentlessly morbid adventure. Like the book, many genuinely unsettling moments and nerve-racking suspense, the night-vision optics fitting the episodic jaunts of nightly surreptitiousness. Prime freak vibes: mainly quiet with ambient sounds and occasional hyoshigi beats of noise or tribal drumming. One scene in particular really got me good. Scary, scary stuff!
In the Dark is about desire, control, and personal apocalypse.
EAGER/BEAVER
I started out thinking OoOo a steamy ~sex is dangerous~ thriller. Like a literotica story come to life. I was surprised when it became absolutely depraved. At least 3 moments in this movie are impossibly high on my WHAT THE FUCK scale. But there are also well-executed subtleties. Out of all the ways to communicate violation and helplessness, her waking up to writing on her body felt more violent than I would have guessed. The droning repetition of the video game as well...
In the Dark works around its budget limitations by having a tight grasp on the basics of visual storytelling. Caveats about resolution, sound mixing, amateur acting…
31 Days of Horror 2022: #25/31
I’ve seen my fair share of American SOV films but I struggle to think of any as filmic as this literally buried gem. Literal because In The Dark was never officially released, only existing as shady gray market discs or the version that can be found in the depths of YouTube.
By all accounts, this no-budget adaptation of Richard Laymon’s proto-SAW/proto-Nerve novel hones trashy schlocky literature into an increasingly twisted and always unnerving horror-thriller. Often, SOV works can feel adrift or messy, spinning their wheels until the next part where the creators pour all their passion into, but In The Dark’s narrative sprawl boasts a novelistic momentum. An innocent first act of mysterious letters…
In the Dark is not only a marvel of amateur filmmaking, but it's incredible we can even watch it. This was made well after the SOV wave came and went and has to this date never seen an official release, not even on VHS. The only reason anyone can experience it is due to an unofficial copy of it being leaked onto YouTube and obviously being far too obscure for anyone to care about flagging it.
This title, adapted from a Richard Laymon novel of the same name, is reminiscent of The Game as well as a bit of a prototype for films like SAW, coincidentally falling between the two release wise. The big difference these films how effective Clifton…
Super endearing no-budget Richard Laymon adaptation by DePaul University (??) students that thankfully surpasses the source material, rewriting much of the original dialogue and changing the ending for something less upbeat and more ambiguous. I'll readily admit to harboring a soft spot for any kind of broke SOV trash, but in spite of technically fitting the bill by its means, In the Dark is its own beast: inventive and creepy like a Kiyoshi Kurosawa picture yet unafraid to embrace its gross side in a uniquely unsettling manner unlike any other SOV film. Probably the only time I've really been scared by an SOV movie like this? Also stands right alongside Chloe Sevigny in Demonlover for best gamer girl representation in film.
Wonderfully structured and brilliantly conceived no-budget SOV that takes a Blue Velvet style setup and situates it within a late Gen X/ early Millennial ennui. It anticipates the web of vague, conspiratorial messes that will define the 21st century thus far. Holmes continuously finds great compositions and images even with his video camera and limited resources. Uses the inevitable poor contrast of his equipment to make a uniquely haunting atmosphere with the distorted shadows. Really believe Garret could have done some damage in some early aught indies if given half a chance.
