Undying Love
Directed by Stanley Ray
Reviewer: Brandon Ennals

Undying Love is a short film submitted to Shriekfest. It is shot through the eyes of a visitor that has been invited to a house by a woman trying to reconcile their relationship. It is suggested that both of the participants in this movie are immortal. The woman invites the visitor into the house and leads the person to a table. She tries to make conversation but is not successful. She becomes irate and mentions that they haven’t talked in years. She angrily pours a glass of what looks to be blood. Shortly after that the character you are viewing through passes out.

When the character awakens, the woman is hovering over top and is removing her counterpart’s shirt. She puts the person in a bathtub while she locates some sleeping pills. Shortly thereafter, she comes to the tub with a knife and slashes her guest.

When the guest wakes up again it appears you are viewing a ceiling from the bottom of a trash can. You can see a severed hand above you and she mentions she would give the person more sleeping pills if she hadn’t already fed it to the dog. Then she grabs another severed hand, pulls a ring off of it, and tosses it into the trash bin. Roll credits.

Admittedly, I am not very familiar with short films. I haven’t seen that many in the past, so I’m not sure if I’m going to be critical of this film because of my ignorance. That being said, I just wasn’t into it. It left me with a lot of questions, which isn’t always a bad thing, but I needed a little more out of this. The film is just over 8 minutes long so there really wasn’t much time to dig into more plot lines. I really wish there had been at least another 5 minutes of content to help flesh out the characters a little more.

If you want to check out this short film, you can access it on YouTube at the following address http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2g3dRVEsKbo .

My rating 5 out of 10

Under My Skin
Stanley Ray
Reviewer: Brandon Ennals

Under My Skin is the second short film I watched that was directed by Stanley Ray. The first film I watched was Undying Love, which wasn’t my type of film. Under My Skin is more in line with what I enjoy watching.

It begins with a maintenance man named Jeff as he is called to an apartment to fix a clogged sink and garbage disposal. The man that answers the door was not expecting him, but allows him to enter anyway. The apartment is bare, with the exception of some garbage that is strewn throughout the apartment. The apartment resembles the resident, as he looks dirty, with ratty clothes and a hood that helps disguise his face.

Jeff looks into the sink and it is disgusting. It is filled with dark murky water with Cheerios floating in it. He reaches into the disposal and he can feel little round things that he cannot grip. Suddenly, he jerks his hand out of the sink and the disposal roars back to life. The man asks him if he is fine, but Jeff seems to think he will be okay. Later, Jeff shows his boss the cut and she tells him he needs to have it checked out since it looks like he has an infection.

I don’t want to give any spoilers away since I think most horror fans would enjoy this short film. Let’s just say he goes to see a doctor and things look worse than he could’ve imagined. Treatments that would normally work in a case like his do not go well, and he resorts to more drastic measures.

I really like the tone of the movie. It’s all very ominous and dark. There are some make up effects in this film that are pretty good for a short film. So, I would recommend people check this short film out, and to do so, just go to http://www.crackle.com/c/Create_Your_Story/Under_My_Skin/2102475 .

My Rating 7.5 out of 10