The 1990s were barren times for horror cinema in Britain. Features were being produced, but at a lower rate than any time since the war, and even those that did lurch into cinemas or on to the shelves of video rental outlets received scant critical attention. It's an era that is unlikely to be 'rediscovered' and reappraised by a future generation of film scholars, and even if someone were to make the attempt, they'd have a job convincing many about the merits of BEYOND BEDLAM, SPLIT SECOND, or THE REVENGE OF BILLY THE KID.
As ever, though, there's an alternative history to be written. Delve between the cracks, and you'll find a thriving, industrious, imaginative hive of activity on the UK genre scene of the post-HELLRAISER, pre-millennial years. If it couldn't emerge from poorly-funded, ill-thought-out full-length production, then the grand tradition of our country's film talent scaring/shocking/surprising unsuspecting viewers would instead be sustained by a swarm of young, independent, often amateur or semi-pro moviemakers dabbling in the world of the 'short'. Most of the best British horrors of the 90s ran under 35 minutes, kick-started by Alex Chandon's untamed gorefests BAD KARMA and DRILLBIT, with Paul Cotgrove's GREEN FINGERS neatly rounding off this flurry of exciting mini-mayhem at the decade's end with a classy old-fashioned frightener based on an R.C. Cook short story.
Darren Perry has produced a number of lively and always highly watchable shorts over the years, and has recently made available an expanded half-hour version of his 1996 offering REFLECTED VISIONS. Though it may appear technically deficient to modern eyes, swayed by 4K and HD and all the rest, REFLECTED VISIONS is in fact fairly typical of the nature of British horror at the time, in terms of its look and general ambience. Darren knows his vintage horror better than most, and via his canny use of that dependably eerie location Black Park in Buckinghamshire (so familiar from Hammer vampire pictures and much more) he offers a link to past glories. His plot too harks back to a previous age - that of the 'supporting short', required by the cinema chains to bolster cinema programmes, with micro-shockers running between 20 and 40 minutes often propping up the latest Clint Eastwood or John Travolta vehicle forty years ago. Many of these now sadly neglected items compensated for rather slender plots with lashings of atmosphere, weird experimental soundtracks and camerawork, non-linear structures, and what is perhaps best termed simply as 'the unexplained'; and REFLECTED VISIONS, erm, reflects every last drop of that unique essence.
It offers what appears, deceptively, to be a standard and minimalist set-up pitching a young couple against one another, as attempts to patch up a failing relationship on a day in the countryside seem doomed. So far so soap opera. But Perry and co-writer Jason Pyke begin to mess around with the fabric of time and the inside of people's heads (on screen and off), and before we know it, those 'visions' promised by the title loom into view as new characters - one unknown to us, the other familiar - enter the drama, possibly from a temporal distance despite occupying the same physical space.
All-the-rage gore effects come into play via a rough-and-ready fight scene and a jagged broken bottle, but this seeming concession to the Fangoria crowd (especially in this longer 30-minute cut) is very much in keeping with the manner of violence you might have experienced in a cinema-exhibited horror short of the slasher heyday. Darren is sufficiently aware not to overstep the bounds, but to offer just enough of a bloody spurt or two for the sake of effect; the subsequent use of a classic macabre image, a hooded supernatural apparition looming from the greenery, balances everything neatly and indicates that the filmmakers here have feet comfortably planted in the gothic as well as the savage.
Does confusion reign from this point in? Well, this type and form of horror never set out to make it easy for an audience, and again Darren and team recognise that. Expertly mixing the psychotic, the psychological, and the supernatural, they leave you to make up your own mind about 'what happens' during the finale, and are so very confident that they even propose the possibility that 'it was all a dream' before pulling that well-trodden rug out from under us. The informed viewer, who understands and appreciates this particular area of British genre cinema, knows that they are expected to put in a bit of work and that there are no definitive answers or explanations in this brand of fractured terror. I wish that I could toy with time myself and head back to a period where, impossibly, I could somehow watch this on an Odeon Screen 3 billing supporting a cheesy American or Canadian imported slasher flick circa 1980.
As ever, though, there's an alternative history to be written. Delve between the cracks, and you'll find a thriving, industrious, imaginative hive of activity on the UK genre scene of the post-HELLRAISER, pre-millennial years. If it couldn't emerge from poorly-funded, ill-thought-out full-length production, then the grand tradition of our country's film talent scaring/shocking/surprising unsuspecting viewers would instead be sustained by a swarm of young, independent, often amateur or semi-pro moviemakers dabbling in the world of the 'short'. Most of the best British horrors of the 90s ran under 35 minutes, kick-started by Alex Chandon's untamed gorefests BAD KARMA and DRILLBIT, with Paul Cotgrove's GREEN FINGERS neatly rounding off this flurry of exciting mini-mayhem at the decade's end with a classy old-fashioned frightener based on an R.C. Cook short story.
Darren Perry has produced a number of lively and always highly watchable shorts over the years, and has recently made available an expanded half-hour version of his 1996 offering REFLECTED VISIONS. Though it may appear technically deficient to modern eyes, swayed by 4K and HD and all the rest, REFLECTED VISIONS is in fact fairly typical of the nature of British horror at the time, in terms of its look and general ambience. Darren knows his vintage horror better than most, and via his canny use of that dependably eerie location Black Park in Buckinghamshire (so familiar from Hammer vampire pictures and much more) he offers a link to past glories. His plot too harks back to a previous age - that of the 'supporting short', required by the cinema chains to bolster cinema programmes, with micro-shockers running between 20 and 40 minutes often propping up the latest Clint Eastwood or John Travolta vehicle forty years ago. Many of these now sadly neglected items compensated for rather slender plots with lashings of atmosphere, weird experimental soundtracks and camerawork, non-linear structures, and what is perhaps best termed simply as 'the unexplained'; and REFLECTED VISIONS, erm, reflects every last drop of that unique essence.
It offers what appears, deceptively, to be a standard and minimalist set-up pitching a young couple against one another, as attempts to patch up a failing relationship on a day in the countryside seem doomed. So far so soap opera. But Perry and co-writer Jason Pyke begin to mess around with the fabric of time and the inside of people's heads (on screen and off), and before we know it, those 'visions' promised by the title loom into view as new characters - one unknown to us, the other familiar - enter the drama, possibly from a temporal distance despite occupying the same physical space.
All-the-rage gore effects come into play via a rough-and-ready fight scene and a jagged broken bottle, but this seeming concession to the Fangoria crowd (especially in this longer 30-minute cut) is very much in keeping with the manner of violence you might have experienced in a cinema-exhibited horror short of the slasher heyday. Darren is sufficiently aware not to overstep the bounds, but to offer just enough of a bloody spurt or two for the sake of effect; the subsequent use of a classic macabre image, a hooded supernatural apparition looming from the greenery, balances everything neatly and indicates that the filmmakers here have feet comfortably planted in the gothic as well as the savage.
Does confusion reign from this point in? Well, this type and form of horror never set out to make it easy for an audience, and again Darren and team recognise that. Expertly mixing the psychotic, the psychological, and the supernatural, they leave you to make up your own mind about 'what happens' during the finale, and are so very confident that they even propose the possibility that 'it was all a dream' before pulling that well-trodden rug out from under us. The informed viewer, who understands and appreciates this particular area of British genre cinema, knows that they are expected to put in a bit of work and that there are no definitive answers or explanations in this brand of fractured terror. I wish that I could toy with time myself and head back to a period where, impossibly, I could somehow watch this on an Odeon Screen 3 billing supporting a cheesy American or Canadian imported slasher flick circa 1980.
