Ashes to Ashes (1993)

Director: Paul Rinehard

Screenplay: Paul Rinehard

Cast: Christine Collard, Dan Boesch, John Whitman, Mary Reed, Joseph Greselin, Ken Nimocks

A Night of a Thousand Horror (Movies) #158

 

Must be squirrels.

From the obscurest realms of horror cinema comes another shot-on-video film, a supernatural tale where a widowed father brings his daughter and son to a new home, one cursed in a gristly past. It does dangerously veer towards stereotypes, where a band of gypsies used to live there at the turn of the century, their male leader "the Barker" indulging in child murder which, when he turned on to one of their own children, led to a bitter fall out. It is however a premise, the haunted home, we will always return to as our won architecture will, as it ages, wear the signs and marks of their pasts, and there is always that curiosity, if undisclosed, of the people who lived where we lived before you, even if it is never anything sinister and finding their possessions abandoned to time up in the attic. Here, just from the wooden panelling decorating the walls instead of wallpaper, something weird is in the air.

The father is a father. The son has a mullet. The daughter, Wendy, is the most interesting figure and worthy of more detail as she is mute and is confined in a wheelchair. This poor girl is called "bitch" a lot and tormented, but it is interesting to see a very progressive choice in lead. It is also a figure more threatened in such an environment, when the moment they get to the house in broad daylight, and no one else seeing, a random man wearing a top hat menaces her. It does bring up the sense of real world fear, that if you cannot scream, and you are limited in movement with the inability to use one's legs, you could feel more vulnerable if nocturnal noises were heard at night. If you encounter a ghost girl, as here, naturally anyone in her position would be spooked.

A true micro budget film, so obscure I doubt few know of its existence even in the SOV community, it does use its limitations to an advantage. It feels far more distinct, more eerie, rather than have monsters or cheap superimpositions effects that instead you have actors in period dress costume just appear onscreen. In any real life context, a person appearing in your house at night would terrify, and it feels close to a theatre technique to forgo any practical effect for just the visitors to be tangible and still be a threat, able to torment the living here regardless.

Contextually, Ashes to Ashes even on its miniscule budget could work. Little touches like the depiction of the ghost world as just another room in the location, with moody flickering lights, electronic noises in the soundtrack and a woman using tarot cards, are evocative enough with an open mind. It is an extreme minimalism on restrictions, not an issue if you can use it well. Even without the little splashes of gore (such as a stick to the back of the head) or odd touches like ghost voices layered over gibberish over the opening, this minimalism can still be creepy. A bloodstained clown is inherently scary, especially as it is just a guy in the basic of clown costumes, pretending here to be a ghost, popping up and suddenly having fake blood appear around his guts.

The issue is that, as with so many stories, the production just wants to tell a really generic story and refuse to stray from the template even if it is not spectacular. Our real protagonist Wendy is threatened, but beyond the innate weight of her characterisation, there is not a lot to go with that is not generic. Barring some unintentional humour, such as the brother with the mullet being possessed by his own guitar playing, Ashes to Ashes is as dry as toast, which is an insult to toast as a metaphor. Sadly, this is also an ultra obscure horror title which might not be worth investigating due to this one flaw, undermining all its best virtues.