Available at Amazon.com
Cast:
Jesse Haddock …. Johnny
Lori Petty …. Judith
Lindsay Pulsipher …. Tara
William Samples …. Anton
Walter Phelan …. Thing
When you read the cover for the latest Masters of Horror entry, “Fair Hair Child”, the tag line states “From the Director of House on Haunted Hill and Fear Dot Com“. Is this really supposed to entice you to buy this DVD? No offense to Director William Malone, but are his credits worthy of standing shoulder to shoulder with the men that directed Halloween and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Is this really a Master of Horror? Surprisingly, aside from some obvious and silly flashback sequences, the answer is “yes”,as Malone’s “Fair Hair Child” turns out to be as clever and scary as most of the episodes of this series have been.
We get a terrific introduction and abduction for the story’s main character, Tara (Lindsay Pulsipher). Kidnapped on the way home from school, she’s taken to some sort of institute and locked in the basement of the building. While scrambling to try and find an escape route, she finds that another boy (Jesse Haddock) has been strung up and is choking to death. Helping the boy, she learns his name is Johnny and that the basement may end up their tomb; as signs written around the room warn of a sleeping beast, and their impending doom.
It’s surprising to see how well Malone sets this scenario up. Tara’s kidnappers, Anton and Judith (William Samples and Lori Petty), seem to have an unknown motive, and both tend to make cryptic comments that don’t quite make any sense. Malone confuses you further with a flashback, which comes off as weird, but silly. Thankfully, Malone is patient enough to leave you to figure out the story yourself for quite a long time before the entire plot is spelled out for you. The revelations are not completely successful, but the story still keeps your attention.
The best thing about this story is the movie’s monster, which is reminiscent of the figure in Edvard Munch’s masterpiece The Scream. Designed by Malone himself, the creature is a frightening vision, with its bald held and dead twigs growing from it. The director also shoots in a way that makes its movements quite alien, much like the ghosts in The Grudge. The technique is enough to really put you on edge, and gives the horror sequences enough tension to make this episode a real winner.
Also, Cinematographer Brian Pearson and Production Designer David Fischer deserve much of the credit for the episode’s success, as “Fair Hair Child”is one of the best looking Masters of Horror entries yet. While it’s an interesting story with good direction, it is because of these two that the episode is really able to successfully hide its low budget shortcomings. While not quite measuring up to Takashi Miike’s epic “Imprint”,there’s no denying that the installment has a great look and mood, which very much helps carry it.
Last but not least, lightening the load are some quality performances. William Samples and Lori Petty are blissfully over the top, with Samples doing terrific work as a man barely holding it together. As the lead characters, Lindsay Pulsipher and Jesse Haddock are also surprisingly good, totally avoiding the usual tendency in these types of roles to become annoying. Each is good enough that you hardly realize these are really the only people on screen for most of the episode.
Despite some hokey moments, “Fair Hair Child”contains some decent scares and is entertaining throughout. William Malone may not be the auteur that some of his contemporaries are on this series, but his episode is also free of pretension. Malone has always simply tried to make films that were entertaining, and here he does so again.
The Video
Just as with the rest of the series, there’s a fantastic print on this disc. Anchor Bay has once again pulled out all the stops and done a terrific job. The film is presented in Anamorphic Widescreen with an aspect ratio of 1.77:1
The Audio
The Dolby Digital 5.1 is also very nice. When the big moments do come, there’s no problems still hearing any dialogue, even as a storm kicks up and a monster tries to eat you.
SPECIAL FEATURES: Commentary, Featurettes, Interviews, and Trailers.
Commentary by Director William Malone and Writer Matt Greenberg – This is a nice commentary from these two. Greenberg really dominates a lot of the track and goes into a lot of detail about how he conceived the story. He also acknowledges how Malone really helped to flesh out these characters, especially Judith and Anton, who were very plain in Greenberg’s original story.
The Face of Fear: An Interview with William Malone – Out of the 25 minutes of this Featurette, the first 8 are dedicated to Malone’s early life and career and its fun to watch some of his older stuff. This actually makes me want to watch Creature, an Alien rip-off he did when he was younger. He also talks at length about this episode and how proud he was of it.
Working With A Master: William Malone – Featurette has a lot people that have worked on Malone’s various projects, from Short films to House of Haunted Hill. The best part has Jeffrey Combs, star of Re-Animator, who worked with Malone on House of Haunted Hill, telling a story involving Malone as a younger man sneaking around back stage at a Beatles concert and actually getting to meet John Lennon.
Behind The Scenes: The Making of Fair Haired Child – This goes about 8 minutes and is a “fly on the wall”type Behind the scenes look at the episode.
On Set: An Interview with Jesse Haddock – Haddock spends a lot of time talking about his love for Horror movies and simply seems happy to get the opportunity to work on this series.
On Set: An Interview with Lori Petty – Petty talks about the little things she did to get into this character, like cutting her hair and losing more weight. She also talks about how she doesn’t really like Horror movies, but she does like weird stories (No surprise from the star of Tank Girl), so she decided to star in this. She also talks about some of the difficulties of one of the stunts.
On Set: An Interview with Lindsay Pulsipher – Much like Haddock, Pulsipher just seems happy to be working on this series. She talks a lot about her character and what makes her tick.
On Set: An Interview with William Samples – Samples also talks a lot about his character’s motivations and how he came to get just the right character on screen.
Scene from William Malone’s first short film – You get two silent minutes of an adaptation of Dr. Jekyll and Mister Hyde.
Trailers – You get a ton of trailers here, most for other Masters of Horror entries, as well as other Anchor Bay releases.
Still Gallery
William Malone Bio
