Dread (2009)
Anthony DiBlasi adapted Dread from Clive Barker's short story to the big screen by writing the screenplay and directing it. While this is the first movie that DiBlasi has written or directed (and managed to tackle both) he is clearly no stranger to Clive Barker's work and is obviously a fan as he produced The Plague, Book of Blood, The Midnight Meat Train as well as is working on the new Hellraiser, and another untitled Barker project. With so much experience with Clive you know he's got a taste for what makes Barker's writing work and this film is no exception. If anything now that he has had a more direct hand in the creation of a Barker film it's only ended up even better.
Having not read the short story I cannot give you any commentary on how it holds up against the subject material. What I can tell you though from having read a lot of Clive Barker novels and short stories is that it feels like something Clive Barker would have written if it were properly caught on screen. There are two leads in this story Stephen Grace (Jackson Rathbone) and Quaid (Shaun Evans.) Grace is a film student who is attempting figure out what he wants to do for his final project and ends up becoming friends with Quaid who pushes him towards making a documentary about what people dread and how this is build upon fear. They recruit an editor who Grace slowly ends up falling in love with and who is the one who finally gives them an idea of dread they can run with instead of the normal run of the mill fears people suffer from.
We slowly learn as the film progresses that Quaid has his own dread. He is trying to use this documentary as a way to understand what is wrong with him and find a way to cure it. What we don't know until it is almost too late that Quaid's dread is actually that he insane and is feeding off of the fears and dreads of others to further the mind games that is has begun to play with Grace, their editor, and another one of Grace's friends. The mind games turn real though as in the later half of the film Quaid starts to force people to suffer through what they truly dread. The film really does start slow and there isn't quite a bit on the payoff for horror fans until later in the film but when it starts to kick in the buildup just keeps going through the end and pays off.
The film itself has a very disturbing end as the 'fears' of having to be stuck with this insanity really does prove to give way to dread in the way the finale is portrayed. DiBlasi may not have a lot of previous writing or directing credits to his name but this is another director to keep your eye on and I for one can't wait to see what he's going to be working on next.
