Pontypool

Atmosphere is important, especially in a horror film. Creating dread, fear, anxiety is the hardest job a director has, and Pontypool manages to make those feelings real. The story follows Grant Mazzy, his producer, and tech girl at a small town radio station in the snowy Canadian city of Pontypool. Over the course of the day, reports come in about a riot, some massive uprising in the townspeople, a madness spreading over the city. Director Bruce McDonald confines the events of the day in the radio station hidden in the basement of a local church, leaving the audience to fear the unknown, experience the anxiety of the characters, who are forced to report on this chilling story without any actual evidence. Tony Burgess, the writer of both the screenplay and the novel it is based upon, handles the first two-thirds of the story expertly, keeping most of the action out of the radio station, thus distancing it from his characters. The final third is the far more convoluted, when too much exposition is employed to explain the madness changing the town into cannibals. None of this would have worked, however, if the main cast wasn't able to sell it. Stephen McHattie, as Grant Mazzy, really makes his character believable, not knowing if the trouble rising in Pontypool is real, or just some elaborate hoax being played on the once star radio host. Pontypool is a clever twist of the horror genre.

Genre - Horror (3)

Screenplay (3)
Acting (3)
Production (3)
Directing (3)