Father of Flies

Daddy got's a new girlfriend and the kiddies don't approve. She stiff, boring and robotic. Addictive to wearing a UV beauty mask, poshly lounges all day, giving dagger eyes to his unruly teenage punk rock daughter & younger deaf brother who's haveing separation anxiety for his biological mother since the move and divorce. Even for the dull moments I was growing more invested with the appearance of a witchy looking next door neighbor, some smooth edited transition scenes, nice cinematographe with saturation In color definitely helps with a #creepy but modern haunting feel for the film. And the sneaky cleverly (been done) jump scares we're entertaining.. part of it felt jumbled like some scenes where out of order or missing not sure. But the finale was so worth sitting though the chaos having you question a rewind watch to see if you missed a clue to that twisted end.

Father of Flies (2021) is a movie that I recently watched on Prime. The storyline follows a couple going through a divorce and their children moving in with the dad and his new girlfriend while the mother manages a mental breakdown. As the children and father deal with the divorce and the mental rollercoaster that goes with it, dad's new girlfriend starts to go insane....

This movie is directed by Ben Charles Edwards (Set the Thames of Fire) and stars Camilla Rutherford (Gosford Park), Nicholas Tucci (You're Next), Page Ruth (Shameless), Sandra Andreis (The Girl with the Drahon Tattoo) and Davi Santos (Good Sam).

This movie had some potential based on the authentic storyline, solid acting and good set up of horror elements. The mask, dancing and music created a creepy feel over the villain and what her actions may be. Unfortunately, the potential for the villain never comes to fruition and the attack/kill scenes are poorly executed with nothing to get excited about - no worthwhile kills, gore or attacks that raise your blood pressure. The movie ends up being fairly straightforward and frustrating.

Overall, this is a below average addition to the horror genre that I would recommend skipping. I would score this a 3/10.

Fairly well made movie. As far as indies go it was above average in technical stuff and acting. Couldn't understand anything about characters or story.

I have to admit that like others viewers I was wondering what I was getting into here because this is a movie in which not much happens for a very long time. It seemed like a lot of atmosphere, some nice cinematography but very little in the way of horror, suspense or great dialogue. Too many movies nowadays , advertised as horror, are nothing but atmosphere. The thing is, this movie , which isn't very long to begin with, redeems itself nicely in the last 15 minutes. It's a shame that the lead up to those 15 minutes was not all that interesting, but what it really needed was a better script. It's worth watching once if you like your horror dark and moody.

After finding For Roger (2021-also reviewed) to be a disappointing opening title at the online GRIMM Film Festival,I decided to get ready to catch the second movie in the line-up,by following the flies.

View on the film:

Standing outside the family home with the forced out mother, co-writer (with Nadia Doherty) / director Ben Charles Edwards & cinematographer John Bretherton unveil the troubled roots of the family tree with a surrealist mood piece atmosphere, which fleetingly shines in all too brief glimpses, as a masked woman dressed in ghostly white dances in the family home to The Cure song Lullaby.

Placing all the importance on weaving a mood to wash over the viewer as the screenplay remains in a hazy, dreamy state, Edwards takes the fleeting moments of getting into a surrealist Horror groove, and drives them all into the ground, via grinding,repetitive panning shots and zoom-ins which run over each sequence again and again until all mystique has faded with the father.