Frightfest 2013 Review: THE DEMON'S ROOK is Trippy, Old-School-DIY Fun

On my way into last night's screening of The Demon's Rook, a friend who had seen it asked me if I was a marijuana smoker. When I said no, he told me it might help with watching the film. Within a few minutes I could see what he meant. The film is a throwback to 80s B-movie horror films where the effects were hand-made and the story, well, didn't always connect. But this is not a bad thing; far from it.  The Demon's Rook is all about having fun with homemade movies, the kind you made in your backyard on the weekend with friends, where you sort of remembered what you filmed the previous weekend and tried to keep up with the narrative, but really, you were just seeing what you could do with dry ice and fake blood.

THE DEMON'S ROOK is Trippy, Old-School-DIY Fun  

Roscoe is a little boy living somewhere in rural America. During the day, he plays hide-and-seek with his best friend Eva. At night, he's visited by a strange demon, Dimwos. One night, Dimwos take Roscoe to his secret cave, where he spends the next twenty years learning magic and how to save the world from other, more evil demons. When Roscoe emerges as an adult, he must find Eva and fight off the evil that is turning people into demons and zombies.

My understanding is that this film is very much a family affair, filmed on writer/director/star James Sizemore's family farm. And the production value is very high. In fact, it made me nostalgic for the days of handmade special effects, of using whatever was on hand to make someone look like a zombie. And you know what? The effects in this film are better, because they are handmade. They look more real than anything CGI. The monsters are better and more interesting, with such attention to detail. A combination of old-school Fulci-style Italian horror films and creature features, the film really is about the combination of effects, sound and music. I kept marvelling at it, and how filmmakers have forgotten to put this kind of effort in.