Stars: John-Paul Howard, Kevin Bigley, Gabriela Quezada Bloomgarden, Piper Curda, Jamison Jones, Azie Tesfai, Zarah Mahler, Richard Ellis, Blane Crockarell, Judah Abner Paul, Ja’layah Washington, Amy Waller | Written and Directed by Brett Pierce, Drew T. Pierce
A film by the brothers Pierce (Bret and Drew), The Wretched is a horror flick about a teenage kid named Ben who goes to battle with an ancient witch who is living beneath the skin of the woman next door. That’s the summary, the plot synopsis, the nut-shell on the back of the VHS cover (well erm… the press release) but there’s much more to The Wretched than that.
Ben (John-Paul Howard) is struggling with dealing with his parents’ divorce, and is staying with his Dad in a seaside town for the summer. Their relationship is strained and Ben is doing his best to mingle with the locals in order to get...
A film by the brothers Pierce (Bret and Drew), The Wretched is a horror flick about a teenage kid named Ben who goes to battle with an ancient witch who is living beneath the skin of the woman next door. That’s the summary, the plot synopsis, the nut-shell on the back of the VHS cover (well erm… the press release) but there’s much more to The Wretched than that.
Ben (John-Paul Howard) is struggling with dealing with his parents’ divorce, and is staying with his Dad in a seaside town for the summer. Their relationship is strained and Ben is doing his best to mingle with the locals in order to get...
- 5/19/2020
- by Chris Cummings
- Nerdly
While his parents work out their divorce, Ben (John-Paul Howard) is spending the summer with his dad (Jamison Jones). When Dillon (Blane Crockarell), the kid next door who he’s been looking out for at his Dad’s marina, disappears and nobody else seems to remember him, Ben becomes convinced that Dillon’s mother Abbie (Zarah Mahler) is a witch.
Writing and directing team The Pierce Brothers throw plenty of ideas and sub-genres into The Wretched. There are folk horror elements and iconography at play, suggestions of possession, a marina set teen movie with Ben connecting with local girl Mallory (Piper Curda) and even a Rear Window/Disturbia influence as Ben spies on his neighbours after becoming suspicious of them. Unfortunately, the film often ends up playing as bitty as that list of influences reads.
The individual elements are mostly well done as far as they go. The folk horror...
Writing and directing team The Pierce Brothers throw plenty of ideas and sub-genres into The Wretched. There are folk horror elements and iconography at play, suggestions of possession, a marina set teen movie with Ben connecting with local girl Mallory (Piper Curda) and even a Rear Window/Disturbia influence as Ben spies on his neighbours after becoming suspicious of them. Unfortunately, the film often ends up playing as bitty as that list of influences reads.
The individual elements are mostly well done as far as they go. The folk horror...
- 5/11/2020
- by Sam Inglis
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
C’mon film fans. let’s shake off the stuck-at-home isolation blues with this week’s new release. Yup, it’s not an “indie” full of despair and drama. So, it’s a rollicking comedy? Well..uh uh. A toe-tappin’ musical, perhaps?, Nah…it’s a horror flick. Well. at least you can feel good that all the weirdness isn’t directed at you as you stare out the window. And this is indeed an independent film, another in the subgenre of “art-house” horror led by The Witch, The Babadook, and the very recent The Other Lamb, though, in spirit, it may be closest to the retro thrills of It Follows. This one owes a lot to that 70s homage, though it has more of the 1980’s thriller vibe of the Netflix hit “Stranger Things”. So with all the real-world scares outside can The Wretched deliver the shivers?
Speaking of that past decade,...
Speaking of that past decade,...
- 5/1/2020
- by Jim Batts
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
"Listen to mommy!" IFC Midnight has debuted an official trailer for a frightening indie horror thriller titled The Wretched, which is arriving on VOD at the start of May in just a few more weeks. This premiered at Fantasia and FrightFest last year, and played at a bunch of other fests including Monsterfest Melbourne and Toronto After Dark. Chilling and suspenseful, The Wretched offers a "modern update to the retro young hero’s mission like that of The Goonies," and promises to make all viewers wary of every dark corner they encounter after witnessing its terrifying tale. A defiant teenage boy, struggling with his parent's imminent divorce, faces off with a thousand year-old witch, who is living beneath the skin of and posing as the woman next door. Starring John-Paul Howard, Piper Curda, Jamison Jones, Zarah Mahler, Kevin Bigley, and Blane Crockarell. Uhhh this looks seriously scary as hell! This witch ain't messing around.
- 3/26/2020
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Stars: John-Paul Howard, Kevin Bigley, Gabriela Quezada Bloomgarden, Piper Curda, Jamison Jones, Azie Tesfai, Zarah Mahler, Richard Ellis, Blane Crockarell, Judah Abner Paul, Ja’layah Washington, Amy Waller | Written and Directed by Brett Pierce, Drew T. Pierce
A film by the brothers Pierce (Bret and Drew), The Wretched is a horror flick about a teenage kid named Ben who goes to battle with an ancient witch who is living beneath the skin of the woman next door. That’s the summary, the plot synopsis, the nut-shell on the back of the VHS cover (erm… Blu-ray case) but there’s much more to The Wretched than that.
Ben (John-Paul Howard) is struggling with dealing with his parents’ divorce, and is staying with his Dad in a seaside town for the summer. Their relationship is strained and Ben is doing his best to mingle with the locals in order to get through his time away from home.
A film by the brothers Pierce (Bret and Drew), The Wretched is a horror flick about a teenage kid named Ben who goes to battle with an ancient witch who is living beneath the skin of the woman next door. That’s the summary, the plot synopsis, the nut-shell on the back of the VHS cover (erm… Blu-ray case) but there’s much more to The Wretched than that.
Ben (John-Paul Howard) is struggling with dealing with his parents’ divorce, and is staying with his Dad in a seaside town for the summer. Their relationship is strained and Ben is doing his best to mingle with the locals in order to get through his time away from home.
- 8/26/2019
- by Chris Cummings
- Nerdly
While vampires and zombies are evergreen horror movie favorites, the motion picture arts have not been particularly kind to that bush-league cousin, the killer tree-spirit. Two of the better-known among relatively few examples are esteemed by bad movie aficionados: There was 1957’s drive-in special “From Hell It Came,” in which an actor lumbering around in a large tree-stump costume squeezed victims to death with his branches; and 1990’s “The Guardian,” a homicidal-wood-nymph thriller that flopped so badly director William Friedkin omitted any mention of it from his otherwise comprehensive career memoir.
There will, happily, be no such cringing required by either makers or viewers of “The Wretched,” an accomplished second feature by Brett and Drew T. Pierce (billed as “the Pierce Brothers”) that is good fun in a vaguely retro, “Lost Boys”-type teen horror way. The absence of marquee value in cast or franchise terms may relegate it to home formats.
There will, happily, be no such cringing required by either makers or viewers of “The Wretched,” an accomplished second feature by Brett and Drew T. Pierce (billed as “the Pierce Brothers”) that is good fun in a vaguely retro, “Lost Boys”-type teen horror way. The absence of marquee value in cast or franchise terms may relegate it to home formats.
- 7/26/2019
- by Dennis Harvey
- Variety Film + TV
A witch that feeds on forgotten children has taken hold of a sleepy lakeside village in Michigan. It’s because its victims are “forgotten,” however, that nobody ever seems to notice. Not only do the adults assist it by either providing themselves as vessel (it steps into the skin of women) or servant (men are turned to drones with a whisper), they have no reason to fight back since what they would be fighting for no longer exists to them. Maybe this “dark mother” will infiltrate a target’s home and steal away control from within or perhaps it will lure in unsuspecting bystanders who still remember and thus have become liabilities. We can never know how long it’s been happening and ultimately must assume it’s never stopped.
As a result, writers/directors Brett and Drew T. Pierce don’t have to pretend this supernatural creature isn’t real.
As a result, writers/directors Brett and Drew T. Pierce don’t have to pretend this supernatural creature isn’t real.
- 7/20/2019
- by Jared Mobarak
- The Film Stage
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