Earlier this week, I received the screener for Dominic Perez’s debut Evil Things, a participant in this year’s Long Island International Film Expo. The movie came sealed in a government-issued evidence bag and government-issued letterhead detailing the missing persons of five 20-somethings in upstate New York. Immediately, that hooked me. Then there’s the film. Shot with a handheld camera, in very much the same manner as Cloverfield and The Blair Witch Project, the film details five friends leaving the cozy confines of Manhattan, battling an incoming Nor’easter, wandering aimlessly down the backroads of the Hudson River Valley looking for one of the character’s aunt’s cabin, and their sudden terror when they are stalked by a mysterious blue van, that for all intents and purposes is following their every move. When a walk in the woods gets them lost and turned around, the five adolescents begin to get scared, and that fear only builds when knocks at the door ensue and the blue van re-appears.
Though on paper, it all sounds so predictable, formulaic and banal, truth be told, the eeriness is substantial, the no-name cast is first-rate and the pacing is top-notch. Perez, a former Wall Street guy, has an inherent ability to weave the film around his characters, never allowing them to say too much or do too little. Instead, they come across as human, realistic, believable and incredibly charismatic. As a viewer, you want to root for these guys/girls, because they remind you of people you know, and the situations are far too familiar, far too realistic and far too likely. It’s this sense of suspense and desperation that powers this film home. One hopes that the Long Island International Film Expo is the start of many festivals, and that Perez, a 40-year-old with a lifelong dream of making a film, can get this film out to bigger audiences, line up a good distributor and hopefully Evil Things can enjoy the success of both Cloverfield and The Blair Witch Project. One thing is for certain, this film is good enough to get that far, the rest is up to fate.
