Dark Visions Short Films Review – Blood in the Snow Film Festival 2024

Posted on by Jim Cox

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It’s that time of year again! Blood in the Snow Film Festival is back for 2024 with a whole host of short, medium, and feature-length films for horror fans to sink their teeth into. To kick off the festivities, we take a look at their first block of short films – Dark Visions.

Shiva

Shiva is a 2024 short horror written and directed by John Saltzman. A recently widowed woman breaks a long-held Jewish mourning ritual in hopes of connecting with her deceased Husband.

Exploring the Jewish tradition of Shiva, the seven days of mourning, and the practices upheld during this period, director John Saltzman certainly throws a new spin on this sorrowful event with the addition of supernatural horror. While this practice traditionally focuses on allowing those closest to the deceased to come to terms with their passing, Saltzman interjects a realistic breaking of these traditions as a means of exploring the devastation of losing a loved one and the willingness to have even one more moment with them.

How to Stay Awake

How to Stay Awake is a 2024 horror short written and directed by Vanessa Magic. A woman fights to stay awake, to avoid battling the terrifying realm of sleep paralysis, but as she risks everything to break free, will she be released from the grip of her nocturnal tormentor?

Being an enclosed story with a minuscule cast, How to Stay Awake is certainly driven by these two characters. Our protagonist, played by Preeti Torul, delivers a realistic trepidation when it comes to sleep paralysis, understandably doing everything under her control to avoid falling asleep. Additionally, the film’s protagonist, played by Hannan Younis, provides an uncomfortable, unnatural performance as the hypnopompic hallucination–imbuing a range of inhuman movements and a disturbing uncanny valley effect on the character. Furthermore, the use of black & white footage, and the fantastic use of shadow aid in distorting the lines between reality and fantasy perfectly.

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Pocket Princess

Pocket Princess is a 2024 stop-motion animation written and directed by Olivia Loccisano. A young girl must take part in a dangerous task to complete her doll collection in this miniature fairytale.

Displaying an impressive example of stop-motion animation, Pocket Princess imbues all the darkness prevalent in old fairytales before their palatable gentrification in modern times. Full of hardship and suffering, the story creates a foreboding sense of tension that only seems to grow as the story expands. Though the film states that “This is a film for children… probably”, the implications of sexual assault certainly wouldn’t be suitable for them. However, outside of this, the short would indeed be a fantastic introduction to horror with its fairytale qualities and cartoony aesthetics.

For Rent

For Rent is a 2024 horror short, written by Jonathan Davies and Andy Love, and directed by Michèle Kaye. In her new home, Donna unravels a sinister truth—her landlord is a demon with a dark appetite. As her family mysteriously vanishes, Donna confronts the demonic landlord, only to plunge into a shadowy game where the house hungers for more than just occupants. An ominous cycle begins, shrouded in mystery.

Exploring the real-life horrors of scumbag landlords (also known as landlords), For Rent takes a more physical representation of these parasitic entities rather than the metaphorical one we are more than aware of. While the short has undertones of black comedy, the featured score and cinematography present an atmospheric sense of dread throughout. Furthermore, the visuals relay the uncanny sense of a new apartment, the bare emptiness of a domicile without a personality feeling alien to a new occupant.

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Lucy’s Birthday

Lucy’s Birthday is a 2024 horror drama written and directed by Peter Sreckovic. A father attempts to enjoy his young daughter’s birthday party despite a series of increasingly surreal and sinister interruptions.

A surprisingly powerful piece of short cinema, Lucy’s Birthday manages to deliver a preternatural undertone to a seemingly normal situation. As the birthday festivities continue, it’s made all the clearer that the situation isn’t all that it seems, yet still maintains an enigmatic aura surrounding the reasoning behind such a feeling–keeping the audience in a similar ignorance to the short’s main protagonist. That is until the devastating twist is delivered like a gut punch finally puts everything in perspective as instantaneous as it is shocking.

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Naualli

Naualli is a 2024 horror short written and directed by Adrian G. de la Peña. After the sudden death of his son, a grieving father inadvertently unleashes the ancestral Nagual power of a young Latin woman whom he has done wrong by.

A unique blend of revenge and Mesoamerican folklore, Naualli delivers a blunt example of the “an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind” idiom with its narrative. While a physical effect in the beginning represents this folklore entity, the quality of additional CGI effects certainly detracts from this metamorphic creature’s overall impact. While it’s obvious a short film would lack the budget to employ Hollywood levels of visual effects, a focus on obscuration through camerawork rather than visible CGI would have been a better fit overall.

The Saint and the Bear

The Saint and the Bear is a 2024 short thriller written and directed by Dallas Soonias. Two strangers cross paths at an ominous park bench.

Taking the dangers of a lone woman on the streets at night and flipping the scenario, The Saint and the Bear certainly leads viewers down a predictable road only to throw a sudden right-hand turn at the audience in a shocking reveal. Though the short is only 6 minutes long, its runtime is the perfect length to impart just the right level of impact without overstaying its welcome.

The Sorrow

The Sorrow is a 2023 horror drama short written and directed by Thomas Affolter. A retired army General and his live-in nurse find they are not alone in a house filled with dark secrets.

A fantastic blend of supernatural horror and the evils of humanity, The Sorrow is a stark reminder that our pasts are inescapable and will come back to haunt us eventually. The incredible use of cinematography creates an imminent sense of dread from the very beginning, utilising shadows to create a large environment in which shadowy entities lurk unseen. Additionally, with stunning performances from the short’s two leads, played by Nhi Do and Mel Tuck, the film has an unexpected yet powerful end scene that’s sure to leave the audience dumbstruck.

Cadabra

Cadabra is a 2024 horror comedy short written and directed by Tiffany Wice with additional writing from J.P. Hart. An ambitious amateur magician receives more than he anticipated when he purchases a cursed hat from the estate of his deceased hero.

Imparting a more playful tone than the rest of the shorts featured, Cadabra, while light-hearted, still maintains an effective level of mystery and tension. While the acting can feel slightly wooden at times, both leads, played by William Longley and David Widder-Varhegyi, do a great job of progressing the short forward toward its unexpected conclusion.

We watched the Dark Visions block of shorts at Blood in the Snow Film Festival 2024

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