Fantasia Festival: “Hellcat” Makes for a Hell of a Ride
It’s courageous to decide to set the majority of your film in a confined space. The decision may often be made for budgetary reasons, but the stifling claustrophobic tension that can be manufactured in a film like this is too good for eager storytellers to pass up. In a single-setting movie, you can’t hide behind anything. It’s in the hands of the actors and the script in a way that doesn’t exist in other types of films. The Fantasia Festival-premiering Hellcat takes this concept to another level by putting the whole thing on wheels, hurtling toward an unknown destination.
Lena (Dakota Gorman) wakes up in the back of a motor home with no recollection of how she got there. As she comes to, a voice crackles over the loudspeaker. It’s the driver (Todd Terry) of this caravan. He tells her that she’s infected and it’s spreading fast. The only hope for her survival is a mysterious doctor who the driver knows. He claims over and over again that her imprisonment in the back of the trailer is for her own good and that she’s in good hands, but nothing feels right about the situation to Lena. The next hour-and-a-half unfold at high speeds while Lena fights for freedom and against the strange, spreading disease.
Courtesy of Fantasia Festival
Obviously, the truth about the infection won’t be revealed here. That’s part of the fun of Hellcat. Is the driver telling the truth? Is Lena actually in any danger? Fear not, Hellcat will not leave you hanging like other films that like to posit lofty, interesting questions and then shrug when the time comes to explain all the weirdness. While Hellcat doesn’t leave questions, its ending is a little head-scratching. No spoilers will be mentioned here, but the ending is a little too blunt, too on-the-nose for the exceptional slow burn it builds leading up to that point. There are themes of familial struggle and loss that culminate in two ways at the end of the film. One of these moments is strong, sweet, and delicate, while the other feels clunky and obvious.
Hellcat is a wild ride led by Gorman. Much of the film is Gorman alone, interacting with the objects she can find in the trailer and the voice over the speaker. Her physicality is impressive when she contorts her body as the virus begins to take hold. It is Gorman and Gorman alone who creates the world of Hellcat as we know it. We are holding on for dear life, just as she is. Her fear is palpable, and she can count herself as one of the few horror movie characters with a functioning brain. Lena’s attempts at escape are smart and won’t have the audience groaning because of their foolishness.
courtesy of Fantasia Festival
As alone as Lena is in the back of the trailer, Brock Bodell figured out an ingenious way to bring in people from her life. The driver offers to call someone for Lena, and her first thought is her best friend. The lights change to a dance club and Lena, as well as the viewer, realizes this friend probably wouldn’t be helpful in this situation. It’s a beautiful way of keeping the film contained, but also growing the world of these characters. At a later point in the film there comes a profoundly emotional voicemail, deployed at the perfect time to yank on the hearts of the audience.
Zak Engel’s score adds to the already suffocating sense of tension. It’s composed of eerie, melodic whistles that dance over low, droning sounds. Accompanying the music is the rhythmic clanking of the swaying objects in the motor home. Pots, pans, mugs, and various other items move in a metronomic fashion. Not keeping time for the score, but keeping time for Lena and the audience. One of the few things the viewer and Lena are both sure of is that time is running out.
Hellcat is fierce until it isn’t. Its teeth are sharp until they retract at the very last minute. It’s a hell of a ride, but one whose final destination leaves a little something to be desired.
support your local film critic!
~
support your local film critic! ~
Beyond the Cinerama Dome is run by one perpetually tired film critic
and her anxious emotional support chihuahua named Frankie.
Your kind donation means Frankie doesn’t need to get a job…yet.
Follow me on BlueSky, Instagram, Letterboxd, & YouTube. Check out Movies with My Dad, a new podcast recorded on the car ride home from the movies.