BITS 2019: Our Review of the ‘Dark Visions’ Shorts Program

Posted in BITS 2019, Festival Coverage, Movies, Theatrical by - November 19, 2019
BITS 2019: Our Review of the ‘Dark Visions’ Shorts Program

(I edited this piece to add info, tags, a new rating, and another review of another short that’s in the program.)

Dark Visions is actually a collection of horror shorts that the Blood in the Snow festival, or BITS, are showing. The five shorts that I happened to see from this collection have women dealing with men. And of course, most of these shorts are good and thankfully, realistically scary.

Robert Cuffley’s Romi has Danielle Sullivan playing a woman trying to live her life after her husband’s death. What’s stopping her is the titular virtual assistant making her life inconvenient. Minimalist film making that’s sure to make one paranoid about technology.

Elvis Deane’s The Thought of You brings black representation to horror. It also perfectly captures this creepy vibe of the cat and mouse chase between a survivor and the man she thought was still in prison for attacking her.

David Scott’s Abhorrent makes me grateful that I don’t have a basement. The female protagonist in this short film does, though, and there she discovers something about her husband that the audience already knows about him just by looking at him. That said, there’s some competent and crisp film making here.

Kate Felix’ Pepper is also about another basement woman. This time around, her name is Fidelma, and a man hired her to bring out his dog. This one’s raw in both the film making and the performances. And when she does find Pepper, I would do the exact same thing she did.

Jean-Marc E. Roy and Phillipe David Gagne’s Foret Noire reminds me of a grey scale Almodovar, where an investigator (Nadia Essadiqi) attend the re-enactment of a crime. There’s sinister comedy here but Pascale Montpetit’s face as she recounts her husband’s murder is why this belongs in this festival and more.

Lastly, Chris Borgo’s Lady in the Shower does not even come close to Alfred Hitchcock’s iconic bathroom scene. All this lady (Laura Woodbeck) wants to do is to cheat on her husband. She deserves better than having non-consensual baths with blood. That said, the rest of this showcase is still decent.

For more info on BITS go to https://www.bloodinthesnow.ca/.

  • Release Date: 11/24/2019
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While Paolo Kagaoan is not taking long walks in shrubbed areas, he occasionally watches movies and write about them. His credentials are as follows: he has a double major in English and Art History. This means that, for example, he will gush at the art direction in the Amityville house and will want to live there, which is a terrible idea because that house has ghosts. Follow him @paolokagaoan on Instagram but not while you're working.
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