Psychological Horror Short film reviews

I was given the task to research psychological horror. I had to watch two short films of this sub-genre. The two short films that I decided to watch from YouTube were 'LAST CALL Award Winning Psychological Thriller 2012' and 'Live Alone - Psychological Horror Short Film'


'Last call' review:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AqXTZzhMHgI
Last call is a very effective short psychological horror movie. The story is that two people live next door to each other at 3C and 3D. The man in 3D calls the woman in 3C and the woman has no idea who this man is but he asks her for help to stop him from killing himself even though he says it’s inevitable. The woman has no idea where this man is or who he is. He says there is a way to stop him which is by solving a riddle and the riddle is ‘3D’. The woman has no idea what this means and does not work it out until it’s too late. The woman did not click that he lived next door to her.

This film was very suspenseful and would leave the audience on the edge of their seat desperately hoping she is able to stop him. The audience may also guess what 3D means before the woman does which gives the film more suspense and makes the audience very anxious. Conventions of psychological horror that this film includes is that it has a sense of reality within as it could happen to anybody and it uses mind games. The audience also fear that it could happen to them and makes them think what they would do if they were in that situation. Another convention is that it builds a lot of tension for the audience and leaves then biting their nails in suspense.
I would highly recommend this short film and it greatly reflects a psychological horror.


'Live Alone' review:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDbbT-mzsJg

Live alone is a short psychological horror movie that is about a young girl who moves out to live alone and she starts to feel like she’s being followed and someone leaves notes for her but she goes to her doctor because she thinks she might be going crazy and he gives her pills to make her feel better. She starts to feel okay but then the figure comes back and then we see them walk into the room she’s in and then the film finishes.

This film was also very suspenseful and effective as a horror movie. The whole story of it is something a lot of people can probably relate to of moving out to live on your own and being more paranoid because you’re alone and seeing things that aren’t there. So the audience are more intrigued because it’s something that could happen to them and they feel more anxious which is what makes a good horror film. The film could have been more effective if it showed the mysterious figure actually doing things to mess with her such as maybe moving things around and randomly closes doors in her house. The audience may think that it is her neighbour following her because her conversation with him portrayed him to be quite strange and weird around her then we never see him for the rest of it so the audience start to think about what he might do to her but that is left uncovered which is effective because it leaves the audience with a sense of the unknown. 

Overall this was a very good short horror film and really portrays the psychological horror sub genre