Short Film Review: ‘Friends Forever’ (2023)
★★★★
Horror (20 minutes)
dir. Thomas Angeletti
Starring: Ashlee Lawhorn, Colleen O'Morrow, Mark Murtha, and Paige Hoover
“On a fall day in October 1987, a group of college friends find an abandoned house and throw a party they'll never forget.”
— Official Synopsis
We have somewhat of a track record for publishing indie horror pieces at the beginning of each new year. I don’t think that I could pinpoint exactly why January is among the most desirable times for these pictures, outside of the potential end-of-summer or early fall shooting schedule, but I am certainly not complaining. Thomas Angeletti’s Friends Forever lands among the best of the bunch, handedly. Angeletti and his crew manage to capture the essence of what makes genre films special.
There’s always something tangible, certainly frightening, about rotten crops or creepy farmsteads in the middle of nowhere. Maybe that’s because we happen to reside in the midwest (for now). Pair that with a potential generational haunting and terror’s purest recipe flourishes. Opening in 1957 with soft, black and white cinematography from Angeletti and Tyler Ronk, the film exudes a foreboding darkness that lies between the four walls of the soon-abandoned house left to be discovered.
During the transition into 1987, the frame is flooded with color—casting brightness to the darkest crevices of the set. Not only does this entice the characters within Friends Forever to wander off the beaten path towards death’s door, but it encourages the audience to follow along inside. The journey to the inevitable tragedy is layered with an 80s aesthetic that promises plenty of alcohol and fun to be had; did we mention lots of blood, too? Let’s hope these college pals can deliver a killer party.
