'Pan's Labyrinth'

FrightFest review part one

'Pan's Labyrinth', 'Frostbitten' and 'Hatchet' screened at the UK's premier horror film festival last week, and The TOMB witnessed tham all.

The Zone Horror Frightfest returned to Leicester Square last rainy bank holiday weekend for a sixth go round the Summerisle Maypole, the main event after a few rather choice warm up jamborees over the last nine months in Brighton, Glasgow and the Fest’s spiritual home, the Prince Charles Cinema.

Tighter than a scream-queen’s buns, the ambitious schedule, prepared with perennial aplomb by the terrifying troika of Alan Jones, Paul McEvoy and Ian Rattray, wrapped twenty-four thrill-saturated features and seventeen Guignol-laced shorts around five blood-and-sweat-soaked August days. And what a time it was. Caveat: The TOMB was unable to indulge in the traditional midnight madness of the Fest’s three late-night slots. This sadly meant missing the appropriately chilly delights of well-received vampire romp 'Frostbitten' (which beats upcoming Steve Niles adaptation '30 Days Of Night' to the arctic undead punch) and the dubious, if neatly throwback, camp of 'Snoop Dogg's Hood Of Horror', helmed incongruously by erstwhile indie hope Stacy Title, director of the fabulous 'The Last Supper', and featuring the magnificent Lin Shaye in a supporting role – apparently a contractual obligation forced upon every low-budget horror show of the last five years.

Our late night no-show did, however, mean evading a repeat visit to Kim Chapiron’s execrable 'Sheitan', a cacophony of crudity – in both filmmaking and subject matter – that The TOMB had suffered through earlier in the year. Even the commendably putrid gore and occasional diversion of Vincent Cassell’s relentless mugging fail to enliven this deeply depressing ride through tawdry amateur theatrics. It managed to split Festival regulars though, with many wholeheartedly embracing its unsavory excesses.