Another short by director Douglas Buck (Cutting Moments) about a screwed up family, Home depicts anything but a true home. It’s a nightmare of dysfunctional relationships and domestic violence.
Gary (Gary Betsworth) comes from a dysfunctional family, to put it lightly, where his abusive and obviously-disturbed father held a reign of terror over his household. Of course Gary comes out of this situation in no shape to have a family of his own. Gary turns to religion, becoming a devout bible thumper. Unfortunately he marries. His wife Helen (Christine Caleo) and daughter Cassandra (Jayne Deely) suffer from his thinly guised, disturbing control. Forced prayer and complete silence seem to be a normal part of their lives. In the meantime Gary differs from his father, taking out his mental problems on himself, by beating his arms with a leather strap. Eventually, after several years this situation comes to a head in a final violent and gruesome massacre.
Buck is fixated on portraying the dysfunctional side of the nuclear family, using extreme examples of self-mutilation and terrifying abuse as a means of conveying his contempt for abusive cycles. – Brian Bertoldo
