The Reckoning

Horror shorts are difficult to pull off. There isn't time to allow fear to poison disbelief.

Chris Barfoot, Robert Clother and Mark Hill have done a chilling job in 12 minutes. They even leave space for a surprise ending.

After a row in a restaurant, David is run over in the street, saving Rachel's life. She suffers guilt withdrawals for months, finally resorting to a medium, who, during a seance, makes contact and David's voice echoes through her mouth.

The experience opens a portal to another place where a vampiric power lurks in the dusty dark. There is nothing relative to hell, or death, about the razor-toothed being in the flowing leather coat. Rachel sleeps fitfully, unaware of the creature's hunger, until she hears a voice announcing, "Time to close the circle", and someone turns the handle of her bedroom door.

The images are familiar and the paranormal incomprehension is shorthand for a sixth sensibility where the language of evil is coded into a pulse rate. Don't expect to know; expect to feel... afraid.