Documentarians are always keen to capture something as it happens and focus on the impact of it all. However, for one such film-maker, the prospect of recording and witnessing a serial killer’s actions as they happen has a lot of potential, as we see ourselves in the new indie horror WHEN THE SCREAMING STARTS.
A series of murders at a dinner party is reported on the news at the start of the film, but our tale focuses on Norman (Jared Rogers), a film-maker with some success (if you count a couple of awards!), who has discovered the tale of Aidan Mendel (Ed Hartland) who is a serial killer and has a girlfriend, Claire (Kaitlyn Reynell) who takes photographs and has saved some space in her album for some of Aidan’s next victims.
It transpires that Aidan has designs of becoming a latter-day Charles Manson with a view to starting his own sick family with Claire, recruiting potential members in a sort of ‘SERIAL KILLERS GOT TALENT‘ kind of way, but his recruits seem to have a lot more potential than he does. For Norman, the concept of film over reality is going to have far more consequence that he first realized when he first picked up a camera…
Darkly comic and involving tale of misplaced intent which takes us back to the indie spirit of classic serial killer cult films like HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER in terms of the logistics of what it truly takes to be one. Director Conor Boru’s film provides some intelligent perspective with a script he co-wrote with lead Hartland). Starting out with a BLAIR WITCH-esque visual style, it morphs into a home invasion yarn a la HOUSE ON THE EDGE OF THE PARK amongst others, before going off in a different direction and providing a darkly satisfying conclusion.
Graphic on occasion and with an attitude that might not be to all tastes, WHEN THE SCREAMING STARTS delivers.
The London Independent Film Festival runs from 1st – 10th April 2022.
Tickets and info:
