CFUV @ VFF: The Girl in the Photographs

There always seems to be a little extra excitement when you watch a movie filmed in your hometown. You notice all these little places you have been or walked on a daily basis. That is the case with Nick Simon’s The Girl In The Photographs, the lone horror movie that played this year at Victoria Film Fest. It also has the onus of being the last film Wes Craven was involved with as Executive Producer. The movie plays along the lines of an 80’s slasher film but with some art house sensibilities. The lead actress Claudia Lee puts in a great performance in one of her few lead roles of her career. Kal Penn plays against the type of character he normally gets cast in when cast as a self centred famous photographer returning to his small hometown. The premise of this film is that our main protagonist Colleen (Lee) keeps discovering photographs of murdered women at various places in her daily life. They are sent only to her and the police show little interest. The cinematography fits this style of slasher film perfectly and this may be because Dean Cundey was behind the camera (Halloween, Escape From New York, etc) The interposed images of photos during capture of some of the girls who would be in the photographs are spectacular and set an early tone of what to expect creatively from this film. The film goes to a small release in early April as well as online so keep an eye out for it if you enjoy slasher films.

-Troy Lemberg