Flowers

Flowers 2015

Writer & Director Phil Stevens has created something eerily beautiful here. A strange silent story of 6 dead girls who awaken under the floor of their killers home. Nothing here but a dream state. No dialogue just beauty.

The films visuals are outstanding. Violent imagery and gore aplenty but its not there for shock value. Its all part of a bigger picture. The 6 beautiful women have been slaughtered, cut open, beaten and abused but not only is that reflected on their bodies but also in the entire house. There really is a feeling of dread and pain here and you see this as these dead women walk around their surroundings trying to figure out why. This film looks dirty thanks to the cinematography and set design but its classy and very professional.

I can see a lot of people are going to find this film hard at over an hour long with no dialogue but it really is worth it and I've never seen anything like this before. The musical score is absolutely fantastic and probably my favourite score in a long time.

This is pretty much the best looking indie film since pieces of talent.

Find a copy. You really should experience this

8 and a half outta 10

I feel as though I just awoke from a dream. A nightmare. How is one to review a film that has no dialogue and relies on sound and visuals alone? I'm not sure myself. This will be the first time I review a film that relies solely on sound and visuals to tell its story. And what a story it was! I have a plethora of thoughts at the moment, mostly one or two word descriptions. I will list a few that jumped off the screen at me...

Dark and brutal. Disgustingly perverse. Disturbing. Sick and twisted. Mesmerizing. Terrifyingly traumatic. Death and decay. Chilling. A harrowing journey into the depths of a mind insane. While to some those words are discouraging, to me they are exactly what I want in a horror film. I don't care that there was no dialogue. There was no need for any. This dreamlike, nightmarish story was told in such a way that the absolute best way I can describe it as a whole is beautifully haunting. Throughout all the madness, there were moments of lucidity and it all came together in the end.

This is a film that must be experienced. The special effects were believably gruesome. I congratulate these girls, these Flowers, for what they put themselves through in order to help writer/director Phil Stevens tell his story. It is truly remarkable. I must watch it again...

Various tortured women crawling through intestines, body parts and body sludge in a killer(s) crawlspaces. Gore films are not my thing, but this had a pretty good concept and was a bit surreal. Could have done without the shot of the killer's bulbous naked body and micro-penis.

Pretty vile, but has it's moments. And way more disgusting than the Nekromantik films.

Phil Stevens Flowers is not your typical horror film. And for good measure this is a refreshing new breath into the genre. It is a disturbing journey through the perspectives of the six female victims who exist in a nightmare world caught between memory and death. I have not been as impressed by a film with such symbolism and attention to visual detail as I have since E. Elias Merhige's Begotten. Flowers is not a movie that everyone can stomach, it hits you deep beneath the surface with the subject matter, and will last long after your viewing. To that extent it may be (and wrongfully so) associated to the August Underground series, however it represents so much more than the ugly nature of man and the violent imagery it conveys - which adds further weight to the stories of each of the characters. This is also not your conventional horror, the lack of dialogue only adds to the tension and further terror that one relives through the haunting display throughout. Not to be missed. If you're a fan of abstract work such as Lodge Kerrigan's Clean, Shaven, David Lynch's Eraserhead or Takashi Miike's Gozu you will appreciate this movie. I look forward to more of Stevens' work, he is a filmmaker to keep your eye on.

Flowers is a 2015 surreal horror film, written and directed by Phil Stevens. Phil's freshman feature film is highly experimental in nature, centering around six dead girls who seem to have awoken in the crawlspace below the house of the serial killer responsible for taking their lives. Oh, and it's told without any dialogue at all.

The film takes its time, exploring the characters intimately. It feels very voyeuristic in nature, getting to know "the flowers", as they are called, by observing how they react in silence and alone as they begin to wake and travel through the house. Every one of their actions is an appeal to your emotions, propelling the dialogue without words.

Through morbidly beautiful and intricately detailed sets, you also get a sense of who their murderer is as a person. The picture that's painted is not one of a serial killer you're familiar with, but a profoundly original and well thought out type of disgusting psychopath who will inspire pure visceral revulsion.

The plot of the film lacking dialogue causes an openness for interpretation that allows you to derive any meaning you wish from the plight of the girls and the motivations of their murderer. The visuals assure that your mind is driven into its darkest recesses, causing the perception of guttural fear and discomfort.

Flowers is an inspiringly original piece that will haunt you while your eyes are open. There simply exists nothing to compare it to — an increasingly rare phenomenon in the modern era of the genre.