Fun Size Horror: Volume One is the final step of a terrific idea. For Halloween 2014, Zeke Pinheiro rallied his friends and fellow directors into creating a series of horror shorts and releasing them onto the web via select sites that cater to fans of the genre. Now, they’ve been brought together and released via iTunes and VOD as a complete package.
The result is just what the title promises – bite-sized scares that rival more heralded anthologies of late including The ABCs of Death and V/H/S series. It’s a perfect fun pack for pre-gaming your next costume party. Volume Two is reportedly underway for release this fall.
In the meantime, enjoy a rundown from worst-to-first of the 21 offerings:
Voice: The only true turkey in the bunch. This short is a painfully amateurish, nearly incomprehensible story of three friends, two of whom hear the disembodied voice of the third when they’re in the same camera shot with her. Amazing amount of bad packed into a few moments: bad acting, bad directing, bad special effects – but mostly, bad idea.
Bad Egg: Hey, more bad! Hand puppets and horror don’t mix, most especially when the hands serve as the puppets. This one should never have made it off YouTube.
Entity: A clumsy, uneven attempt that starts with some promise after the discovery of a disturbing doll locked away in an attic during move-in day. Still, it’s good for a jolt or two and does not wear out its welcome.
Evil Voices Lie: We can probably all agree with the title of this one, that in fact, one feature that evil voices possess is the tendency to bend the truth. How that jibes with this V/H/S wannabe is not clear as we watch a watcher watching a tape of an interview with a willing abductee.
When They Say You’re Alone: A young woman falls asleep in her bed, only to be joined by a coven and a demon – kind of like Rosemary’s Baby as an after school special. A technically competent piece that fails in finding a story to match the capabilities of the production team.
A Dog and His Boy: A Boy and His Dog (1975) with Don Johnson and Jason Robards was much better. Skip this, see that. Redoing Psycho with man’s best friend replacing Norman Bates’s mother doesn’t really work.
The Creepy Fucking Kid in Apartment B: Okay, first off, you have to love the title. Screw subtlety. The problem is not the creepy kid, but the script that steps all over the punch line by tipping its hand and taking the surprise out of the twist.
The Collection: The model (Allie Gonino) is an amazing dish and the photographer is none other than Lance Reddick, but it’s not enough to save this story of trapping souls in pictures.
The Lover: That whole “Hell hath no fury” thing? Yeah, right here. Mali Elfman is a full-on Fatal Attraction psycho in this short, that could have used a bit more work to even out some rough patches.
Trust: Two young men engage in a game of chicken using whatever’s handy: blow torches, chain saws, cross bows. This flick has a superior set up, but fails to pull off a satisfying ending.
The Screaming: As good as you will find a short film to be in its first 15 seconds. Unfortunately, the total running time is 16 seconds, leaving only one question in its wake: what the hell was that?
Knock, Knock: Well done, well worn standard about the monster in the closet every young child must stare down. Or not.
Paramnesia: What do a marriage proposal, a nurse in a gas mask, a Nazi doctor in a failed experiment, and a young woman waking in the backyard have in common? Not a damn thing, except they are all part of this truly unique little masterpiece of a mess. It’s a gigantic swing-and-a-miss, but well worth the effort.
Somebody’s Watching You: This is what reality shows would be if they could be: Battle Royale meets Big Brother. Enjoyable, if predictable story of what happens in a houseful of young women with an agenda. Hint – it ain’t pillow fights.
Mother: One minute of terror perfectly realized when a sonogram turns out to be someone’s worst nightmare – and it’s not the mom-to-be.
Let Me Go: 50’s film noir meets 60’s French New Wave in a brief black-and-white glimpse of endless grief. Well done.
Bitter: This little gem answers the question of what life is like for Hogwart dropouts who end up living together in bitchy semi-squalor. It’s a bit of wizardry for slackers.
Mr. Hendrix: What happens when your childhood fears track you down as an adult? It turns out to be even worse than you remember.
Persephone: A complete story that artfully takes a phobia – being buried alive – and artfully expands it to show there are things worse than your worse nightmare.
Quad: A split screen deconstruction of the 1980’s slasher genre, compressing 90 minutes of narrative into three minutes of highlights. And it boasts a better ending than almost any of the old flicks had.
Happy Birthday: It’s a picture perfect birthday party for the cutest little girl in the world, surrounded by her equally adorable friends and all their loving parents. And a new puppy can only make it better. Right? Right? A wonderfully sick, twisted tale of suburban madness.
Meet Mr. Karma 