Bigger and Badder

I was lucky enough to catch this short earlier this week. What begins as a tried and tested crime thriller quickly turns convention on it's head. An impressive tone, cast, direction and soundtrack all come together to create something special. Even if shorts aren't your cup of tea (they're not mine) 'Bigger and Badder' may go a ways to change your opinion. The production values are impressive as are the special effects. In what comes across as a less is more approach to horror the film makers manage to inject some serious tension and dread when it's required. Hunt this beast down, before it gets to you first! The only genuine complaint I had was it wasn't a feature film.

I enjoyed watching Bigger and Badder. I enjoyed Producer, Paul Banner's earlier shorts. He always had a wacky sense of story and cornball humour so this script find from Richard Wantuch is no different to his repertoire. This is an interesting Northwest film on the werewolf myths; like the classic book - Cycle of the Werewolf written by Stephen King. The main character wearing a Red hood was a nice touch. My favourite shot was the werewolf eye in the keyhole. Look for it! I felt like it could have used more werewolf but liked the story twist and it was nicely shot and paced. Great ending line as well. The editing and coverage of shots for the film were also good.

I have to declare a potential conflict of interest with this one since I sort of know the writer/director and had heard about the film while it was being made. For some reason it popped into my head the other day and I decided to see if it was around, which it was – now available on YouTube. The plot sees a young man being chased down through Digbeth by a couple of thugs, who catch him and take him for a "discussion" with their boss over a missing parcel. After some encouragement the boy comes clean, and tells a story about what happened on the night he was charged with handing over the package.

From hearing discussions about the making of prosthetics and other special effects, I already knew what was coming in this little horror thriller, but still broadly enjoyed how it did it. Broad is perhaps a good choice of words because as a film it does deal in broad strokes, with very little finer detail or development. This starts with the opening scene and the loud rock music; we are thrown into the chase, then quickly into the "discussion". The characters in these scenes are broad – the main gangster character for example; this continues in the boy's story which is made up of overly done characters and moments (did we really need the barman dropping his glass and mugging to illustrate the importance of another man being in the bar?). The key scene in the piece is nicely done though, and although you do not see much, it is the impact and unknown that makes it work – I very much liked that we didn't leave the bathroom stall for most of the event, as this produced a sense of tension and enclosure.

Performances throughout are of the so-so variety; perhaps they were not helped by the material because they do generally do the basics with their characters and delivery. That said, I did believe the fear in the young boy in the key scene of the film in the bathroom, so that worked well. Technically it mostly looks and sounds good; the "feel" to the film between locations was a bit different which gives it a little bit of a fragmented feel (specifically when cutting between two external shots at the start) but otherwise it was clearly done and I liked the use of Birmingham locations around Digbeth and the Mailbox.

There is scope to be less broad, more focused and thus more impacting in what it does, but as a quick horror thriller it does the job well enough, with a good core scene, good pace and generally a good concept.