1. PURGATORY HOUSE
Dodging the nasty After School Special bullet, “Purgatory House” is a charming, touching, clever and all-around brilliantly crafted film about teen suicide. The key to its success? The story was written by a 14-year-old girl.
2. ALICE’S MISADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND
This re-telling of Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland” presents its viewers with a production overflowing with talent and imagination so much so that we hold it right up there with Svankmajer’s “Alice”. With marvelous special effects and glaring heart and soul, this one stands as an excellent demonstration of talent overcoming budget. Filmmaker Robert Rugan has shown us that you can do anything with an indie.
3. HIDE AND CREEP
“Hide and Creep” has that “Shaun of the Dead” spirit about it – it’s made by people who clearly have great affection for the zombie sub-genre and they tip their hats to all of the living dead greats of the past without letting it interfere with their own story they’re trying to tell. In short, lovers of the dead won’t want to miss this one. It’s true zombie a*s kicking fun!
4. FIRECRACKER
There are a lot of people out there itching to see Mike Patton’s feature film acting debut and Steve Balderson is the filmmaker ready to give it to them in this creepy looking tale about a true-life murder in smalltown Kansas. Check out our write-up on Wamego, the making-of documentary, to get a taste of what we’ll be seeing in theaters 2005.
5. MURDER-SET-PIECES
Just may be the serial killer movie to end all serial killer movies.
Get our entire Best and Worst of 2004>>>
