Six friends gather for a constellation watching party. What ensues is the story of Wait til Dawn. Mic (Timothy Yo) and Val (Evelyn Carvera) have their friends Charlie (Tyler Clarke), Luke (Killian Lock), and Ryan (Zach Herman) over for an evening sky watch party with Ryan’s telescope. Charlie also brings her new girlfriend Lydia (Heather Michelle) to meet everyone and take part of the evenings festivities. These six millennial adults are about to experience a horrifying night of body possession and cannibalism.
BeforeWait til Dawn kicks off, a strange text message hits everyone’s cellphone. They are cautioned not to look at the moon, and not to keep any doors open to the outside. They must ‘wait until dawn’ before attempting to interact with the outside world. Hell breaks loose when it’s discovered Mic has left the door to the roof open. And thus the mysterious force which powers the cannibalism and body possession invades Mic and Val’s apartment.
This is a single location film. Strictly limited to the events within Mic and Val’s place. The decor tells me this is Brooklyn, New York. Apart from those bits of interior decoration, Wait til Dawn could take place anywhere in America. It’s one of those universally creepy red moon stories, dear reader. It is also a fascinating exercise in creeping pace. For some viewers a creeping pace will feel remarkably long. I, however, found the 93 minutes of Wait til Dawn effective in its pacing. It gave me time to process the horrors that were unfolding in sparring mots – short cuts – of terrifying visual violation.
“… a horrifying night of body possession and cannibalism …”
Wait til Dawn is director Lauren Robyn’s and writer Killian Lock’s first feature film. Horror, dear reader, is a very safe genre to shoot as your first film. Horror, after all, requires very little in the way of visual effects or even sets. Horror’s virtue is it’s principally a psychological genre of story telling. Thus, if the actors convey the sense of creeping dread, and even abject terror successfully, you need to show very little in a low budget horror film. I’m here to tell you, dear reader, that Wait til Dawn worked for me. It is a distressing and grotesque exercise in scaring your proverbial pants off.
All six members of the ensemble were quite good at what they brought to Wait til Dawn. The ever changing dynamics between they who are possessed, and they who will be food was taut and harrowing. The team behind Wait til Dawn are not shy with the cannibalistic violence, and by its end there is much blood splatter and corpses all over the place. In a way, it calls to mind 1981, the year in New York where you could find a dead body lying practically anywhere. Such was the danger of that city in those days.
If you like claustrophobic, nerve wracking tales of bloody mayhem, Wait til Dawn is for you. This budget indie horror is sure to terrify anyone who finds it on streaming. It’s simply goretastic.
"…simply goretastic"
