Peur(s) Du Noir (Fear(s) Of The Dark) is an anthology of short animated horror films, from a series of directors, in a variety of different styles.
Some are broken up, and act as transitions, while others are more episodic in nature.
But most are in black and white...and revolve around the themes of dreams vs reality and the torture of nightmares.
In the first main story, a curious introvert finds an oddly humanoid looking insect, that he takes home to study.
However, it escapes...and disappears.
He eventually goes off to college, and it seems to have tagged along with him.
Because, when he gets a girlfriend...she wakes up with an odd gash on her arm.
As her personality starts to change...it becomes evident the creature has infiltrated her body.
She becomes more and more masculine...and much more dominant.
And soon enough...he's become the experiment...
The second film, takes place in Japan.
A young girl immigrates to a new town, and a new school, where she is systematically bullied by a group of her cruel classmates.
They subject her to all manner of tortures, both mental and physical...until she goes mad.
Or, is the truth, really, that she is being tortured in an asylum, by a cruel doctor, who manipulates her dreams into nightmares?
Either way...these experiences become her reality.
And it all ends in suicide...or, is it murder...?
In the third film, we watch as a boy from the great plains witnesses a series of attacks and disappearances from the sidelines.
His best friend provides the narration, until he too disappears.
But was he the next victim, or the culprit all along?
Some dark actor in the guise of a human child?
In the end, a witch hunt leads to the death of an alligator...and it becomes venerated, like a saint...to keep the evil away...
The fourth, and final, episode has us following a man (who looks Russian) as he comes home to a dark house, only to get drunk and pass out, while reading a book.
His recent experiences are reiterated in his onsetting dreamstate, where he watches a lost love slice his neck from behind...as if he were an apparition, witnessing his own death.
When he awakens, he burns the book and photograph that haunt his dreams.
But he can't escape his own thoughts.
So he investigates the house further, to check if there is an ominous ne'er-do-well lying in wait to kill him as he sleeps.
Now, his paranoia is getting the best of him in the form of pareidolia.
And it becomes obvious that he is the greatest danger to himself.
The transitionary shorts include a film about an evil old miser who is walking a pack of vicious dogs, which he let's loose to torture unsuspecting townsfolk; and an abstract film about what happens when you let your fears and anxieties take hold of your identity.
I quite enjoyed this, as the animation styles are diverse and all around excellent.
With some great storytelling to boot.
7 out of 10.
