This Side of Nightmare
Starring: Haylee Nelson, Amy Baklini
Written & Directed By: Peter Grendle
Grade: B

This Side of Nightmare begins with a young lesbian couple, Piper and Ashley, driving through largely vacant roads in New Mexico. When they hit a rabbit in the road they get out of the care to check it out. A care drives by offering to help, but the girls avoid them and try to get out of there as fast as possible as they can tell there is something not right with these women. However, they aren’t able to get rid of them that easily. The women in this car go after them with the intentions for murder.

Piper and Ashley were one of the high points of the short. I was very relieved that they weren’t just played/written as “the lesbian couple”. They were actually given depth and they felt like real people rather than the stereotype they easily could have become. Also, these girls were smart characters and made it a lot easier to actually care whether they died or not. When danger is clear, our main girl doesn’t hesitate. The first chance she gets she acts on it, defending herself and fighting back. She doesn’t just ast quick, but she has enough sense to make sure that the job is really done. In a lot of slasher movies in particular, the victim has their chance and either doesn’t make sure to actually kill them or doesn’t get out of there fast enough when they think they do. This Side of Nightmare presents trauma, but doesn’t let intelligent, likeable characters take what’s happening to them lying down. The action is over pretty quickly since the problem is quickly solved and there is nowhere else to go with the movie. Still, as this is a short it works. The characters and situation are introduced, tension is raised, and we are given a great chase.

While the protagonists were developed well the two killers could have been gone in to a lot more. The story follows these strict Christian sisters who witnessed the lesbian couple and therefore decided that they had to teach them a lesson. The violence centers around a hate crime, which gives the villains justification through their religious beliefs. This is very briefly shown, but this clearly showed potential depth in these characters that could have been gone in to much more to make them seem more real and effective. The blood is pretty minimal here, but there are only a few characters and a limited amount of time for bloodshed. The pacing is perfect, taking enough time on majority of the elements. While it could have expanded in a few areas, This Side of Nightmare is still a thrilling, and fairly realistic fast paced horror short.