If there’s anything the 2023 Panic Fest has set out to do it’s showcase some truly strange and original work designed to leave you puzzling. From the uncanny valley of ABRUPTIO to the folk-horror tinged THE BANALITY to the unrelenting shock of TENEBRA, this year’s fest has something for every kind of genre lover.
On the more endearing side of genre twisters is Daniel Bowhers’ BLUE HOUR. It may not sound like it at first, but this found footage-framed-as-true-crime-investigative-documentary is full of surprises. Twenty five years ago, Olivia Brandreth’s father went missing, presumed, eventually, to be a suicide in the woods. No one who knew her father believed that report as the truth, however, and now she has returned to uncover the real story.
There are seeds planted throughout this film that cultivate not just a bend toward the otherworldly but a nod to generations of horror in the land of the fantastic that came before it. Granted, of course, that I am more often than not more than happy to suspend my disbelief and go all in on a found footage premise, when BLUE HOUR works, it works affectionately in the direction of a TWIN PEAKS found footage arc. If you had given David Lynch’s Special Agent Dale Cooper a video camera and told him to record his interactions with the inhabitants of his new favorite small town, it might have gone a little something like this.
While some of the acting comes across as maybe a bit too stilted and unusual, the story itself has enough heart and supernatural oddity to keep any genre fan in for the ride. The casual namedrops, from the Haddonfield woods in which Olivia’s father disappeared to the private investigator Arbaghast, were fun crumbs along an otherwise dark premise. The presentation of what really happened to Olivia’s father that night 25 years ago seems like it could fit comfortably somewhere between the Black Lodge of TWIN PEAKS and the lore of Slender Man when it comes to depth of belief and likelihood to generate conspiracy theories. Nick Brandreth dug too deep into history some people believed he had no business knowing, or he got too tired of holding a mask up to his life. Olivia says in the film that he considered his career in photography a career in manipulation of light. Did the light he spent his life manipulating show him one too many peeks behind the curtain?
BLUE HOUR takes some big swings and, I think, has an endearing note of hope at its center despite its rocky, strange world. We always want to believe there’s more out there than just what we can see in the daylight. That the last time we see a loved one is not quite truly the last time. Bowhers’ film posits not just that this is possible, but also asks us how we would handle it if it were; if there was a chance we could reconnect across moments of time, what would it be like? What would we do with it? Who would protect it?
Despite the occasional stilted performances, BLUE HOUR has a lot to offer when it comes to originality and atmosphere, and it makes for an eerily comforting watch even when you become aware that you’re watching a movie rather than experiencing the otherworldly. If you’re like me you might even take a peek behind the door for longer than you might expect. If there’s one thing we need right now in a world full of what seems like a constant barrage of tragedy, it’s hope for the light. And in it’s own way, that’s just what BLUE HOUR tries to offer.
Tags: Blue Hour, Crime, Cults, Daniel Bowhers, David Lynch, Found-Footage, Panic Fest, Panic Fest 2023, supernatural, Twin Peaks
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