By Ed Sum (The Vintage Tempest)
Victoria Film Festival 2016
Fri, Feb 12th 8:45pm
The Vic Theatre
808 Douglas St,
Victoria, BC
The movie The Girl in the Photographs fondly recalls films like Halloween in it’s no holds barred approach to possibly reigniting the slasher genre. This detail makes this film worth noting. It’s directed by Nick Simon, a relative newcomer to the scene and it was the last movie that Wes Craven (Last House on the Left, A Nightmare on Elm Street) had his hands on as an executive producer. Most of his films have a trademark style to them and while it’s sad he’s passed on, the lessons Simon learned will most likely carry on in the next project he works on within the horror film genre.
In this movie, Colleen (Claudia Lee) is a clerk at a small town grocery store being targeted by strange bed-fellows. Just what kind of lust or love they have for her becomes part of a surreal murder mystery. There’s two killers on the loose, and their relationship with each other is just as strange as the images she’s discovering. She’s finding pictures of victims splashed out in centerfold fashion, and although the local police do not take her request to investigate seriously, fortunately a high fashion photographer, Peter Hemmings (Kal Penn) does. He believes his shtick is being stolen.
In what he discovers about them are not totally revealing. The mystery is only deepened when he becomes a target. Both performers sell the intrigue well, and the background music is what creates the most tension. The identities and motives behind the kills are never certain and that’s the best way to present this style of genre film.
3½ Stars out of 5
