PopHorror Let's Get Scared
I knew absolutely nothing about Tom Paton’s (Pandorica 2016) new sci fi/horror hybrid, Black Site, going in. It had some really great poster art that any VHS box would be proud to wear, and that alone makes it eye-catching. What I ended up getting, however, was a great film that did a surprising amount of world building in a lean run time of a little over 80 minutes. I thought it was longer, not for any unpleasantness from sitting through it, but because there were so many things going on. The fluidity of funneling the character development, the mythos, and the action sequences into the plot make it an automatic recommend.
I had just recently watched Shazam, so lesser gods and mortal vessels with strange eye pupils were fresh on my mind. That made me appreciate the unintended similarities between two completely unrelated films. Shazam and Black Site aren’t even remotely the same type of film, but this film pulled the curtain away to reveal a strange dichotomy of how a premise with some highly imaginative writing can end up going in just about any direction.
The title of the film refers to a secret facility where elder gods are deported back to the dimension where they are less likely to cause havoc on humanity. If herding high maintenance gods back into their natural habit doesn’t sound difficult enough on its own, science and technology isn’t enough. The facility has a security system with the conventional guard shack, cameras and even some electric force fields.
What really holds everything in check are symbols and spells that keep the gods contained in human vessels for transport. One such particularly nasty elder god named Erebus comes through for processing wrapped in an equally nasty human convict. Kris Johnson (Who Needs Enemies 2013) shines with sharp acerbic banter in an English accent that makes anything sound eloquent. He tells the humans how futile it is try to contain him. When his worshipers infiltrate the facility to free him, he may be right.
Black Site is a mash up of diverse elements such as Supernatural and Assault on Precinct 13. In one ingenious plot point, the facility is protected by a spell that doesn’t allow combustion, so guns won’t work inside. An Into the Badlands twist merits that some hand to hand combat and sword play are inevitably bound to ensue. What’s not to like? Black Site is being released by Dread Central Presents and Epic Pictures and is available on demand across most major platforms, including in the ad below.
The cast includes: Samantha Schnitzler (Into The Stream 2018), stunt woman Phoebe Robinson-Galvin, Fredi ‘Kruga’ Nwaka (Brotherhood 2016), Henry Douthwaite (Dead Fred 2019), Angela Dixon (Adventure Boyz 2019), Bentley Kalu (Edge Of Tomorrow 2014) and Simon Pegg’s brother, Mike Beckingham (Subconscious 2015).
Have you seen Black Site? What did you think? Let us know in the comments!
