Defarious (2016)

Directed by: Chase Michael Pallante | 13 minutes | short film, horror | Actors: Janet Miranda, Shanae Christine Harris, Jason Torres, Sonia Sierra

Young Amy is plagued by horrific nightmares and episodes of sleep paralysis. This cocktail of misery means that the dividing line between dream and reality is becoming increasingly thin. To make matters worse, Amy has to deal with a terrifying figure who wants only one thing: to gruesomely take her life. Alone, Amy must face her worst fears in order to escape the clutches of the merciless psychopath who is after her…

‘Defarious’ is the directorial debut of Michael Chase Pallante. It is a short film that lasts barely fifteen minutes. Despite the modest playing time, ‘Defarious’ is an intriguing print in many respects. It already starts with the wonderfully gloomy and dark atmosphere that the makers manage to create from the first second, a choice that takes shape visually in a delicate play of darkness, (scarce) light, shadow and a Lynchian-like blue glow, which looks like a hallucinatory blanket over the house where the story takes place.

The villain of the story is also a fine creation and looks like a fleshly reincarnation of pure evil. Like Halloween psychopath Michael Myers or the grubby Count Orlok (“Nosferatu”), it’s a figure who doesn’t need to say anything to be terrifying. The inscrutable and wiry face, which looks so menacing especially through the emotionless eyes, is a personification of anonymous, unscrupulous and senseless evil. Like Myers, the brood of hell in ‘Defarious’ is not driven by emotions such as revenge or self-preservation, but by an indefinable and sinister murderous appetite. It is precisely the lack of motives or the lack of any personal background that usually creates the most terrifying film monsters. Pallante understood that trick very well. Moreover, he chooses wisely enough to show only brief glimpses of the killer maneuvering between shadow and light, before showing the psychopath in full regalia.

Although the plot of ‘Defarious’ seems flimsy and unoriginal and could easily have turned out to be a short and poor imitation of iconic horror films like ‘Halloween’ or ‘Night of the Slasher’, the makers manage to avoid that trap and make this short film of a to provide for one’s own taste. In fact, ‘Defarious’ is in many ways a masterclass in building tension and creating suspense. Macabre, ominous and chilling – and without falling into cheap jump scares – the film steadily works towards the finale, where it is also not always clear to the viewer whether he is in reality or Amy’s hellish dream universe. The whole is carried by a subtle, atmospherically very strong cinematography and a soundtrack that is just as ominous as the menacing figure that creeps through the house. What is also striking is that in terms of image quality, the film can simply pass for a budgetary well-endowed Hollywood production. Very clever when you consider that the film was shot for about 25,000 dollars and within a time frame of about a week. The final climax is not particularly surprising, but it is satisfying because of its rawness and uncompromising.

‘Defarious’ is a short, but very enjoyable horror exercise. Paying homage to the slasher films of the 1980s and 1990s, the film incorporates stylistic and thematic elements that could have sprung from the combined minds of horror masters such as John Carpenter, Dario Argento, Wes Craven, Tobe Hooper, and James Wan. to be. In short, a modest masterpiece that you should definitely see as a true horror fan.