Macabro ’18: Hostile

Call and raise—that is the name of the game in genre filmmaking. It is no longer sufficient to be stalked by a serial killer while trapped in confined space. However, if you make it a zombie doing the stalking, you might be in business. Basically, it is like a post-apocalyptic take on Curve and ATM, because those films were so awesome the first time around. However, there is the novelty of a few nice performances in Mathieu Turi’s Hostile (trailer here), boasting the imprimatur of Xavier Gens as executive producer, which screens during the 2018 Macabro in Mexico City.

Juliette is a survivor, but that does not necessarily mean she is one of the lucky ones. She scours the post-apocalyptic wasteland scavenging food and supplies for her unseen rag-tag colony of human remnants. The zombie-mutant thingies are out there, but she is not supposed to engage. Unfortunately, a freak accident puts her in a world of hurt. Her leg is broken and her capsized land rover is a prime target for the zomthing that comes shuffling along. Inconveniently, the undead humanoid monsters are pretty spry and fleet of foot this time around.

As Juliette digs in for the siege, the film flashes back to scenes from her earlier life when she first met and commenced a relationship with her husband Jack, a wealthy French expat gallerist. It was a rocky start, due to her heroin addiction, but he helped her through it (only to have the world end on her later). Yet, weirdly enough, it is those relationship scenes that really work in Hostile, whereas the cat-and-mouse business with the zombie feels very been-there-done-that.

Still, experienced genre viewers should always take what they can get. In this case, it is the surprisingly effective chemistry shared by Brittany Ashworth and Gregory Fitoussi. Ashworth does a nice job showing us how damaged Juliette is, as well as her strengths. Fitoussi also plays Jack cool and sophisticated, but still acutely human. Together, they both make the audience feel rather sad that the world just up and ended like it did.

Without being too spoilery, we are duty bound to warn viewers Hostile ends with a ludicrous howler. Turi does his best to lay the emotional groundwork for it, but the sheer unlikeliness of the circumstances makes it a real head-shaker. Nevertheless, the work of Ashworth and Fitoussi deserves some notice. Hostile is recommended for festival patrons who can appreciate its merits and roll with its weaknesses, when it screens this Wednesday (8/29) and Saturday (9/1), as part of this year’s Macabro.

Macabro ’18: Ruin Me

Getting hacked to pieces in the forest is bad enough. You shouldn’t have to pay for the dubious privilege. Unfortunately, that is about what happens to the ill-fated fans participating in the Slasher Sleepout role-playing game. It is all fun and games until people start losing lives and body parts in Preston DeFrancis’s Ruin Me (trailer here), which screens during this year’s Macabro in Mexico City.

Alex has never been a horror fan. She is also a bit high-strung, so it is really pushing it inviting her to come along on the Slasher Sleepout weekend. Her boyfriend Nathan ought to understand that, because he was her addiction counselor during rehab. Nevertheless, he convinces her to join him, because being stalked in the woods is super fun.

Weirdly, it is rather enjoyable for Marina and Pitch, a punky fan couple in an awkwardly open relationship. Naturally, Alex automatically picks up clues the fantasy game has ominously veered into reality. Yet, her stunningly unintuitive fellow game players remain steadfastly in denial. So, a good time is sure to be had by all.

Ruin Me takes off from the same basic premise as Vincent Masciale’s Fear, Inc., but the execution here is far superior, by a factor of at least one hundred. Whereas the earlier film drives us bonkers with constant its-just-a-game-no-its-not reversals, DeFrancis actually builds to a finale with bite. He also incorporates some funny, attitude-loaded dialogue, but never at the expense of the core slasher business.

As Alex, Marcienne Dwyer is pretty believably grounded and turns her big reveals quite nicely. However, Eva Hamilton steals scene after scene as Marina, the gothy hot mess. By the same token, John Odom is so flamboyantly obnoxious as Pitch, half the audience will want to kill him themselves, while the other half would keep him alive to stir up trouble.

DeFrancis definitely keeps things moving along at a good clip. Given the premise of the film, he has license to employ every tired slasher cliché, which he does, but he finds ways to give them sly twists. Clever and only moderately self-aware, Ruin Me is scrappily entertaining for horror fans. Already streaming on Shudder in the U.S., it screens this Thursday (8/23), Saturday (8/25), and next Tuesday (8/28) as part the 2018 Macabro International Horror Film Festival in Mexico City.