Sunday, 4 July 2021

VOD: Fear Street 1994 (aka Fear Street Part 1 - 1994) (dir: Leigh Janiak, 2021)

"Have a nice night!"

The first of a linked trilogy of movies set in three different time periods based on the popular R.L. Stine novels, Fear Street 1994 sets up a wealth of backstory very efficiently, as a persecuted witch from centuries past returns again to wreak murderous havoc in the doomed 'murder town' of Shadyside.  The Scream-worthy opening gets straight to the action in a well-executed sequence in a shopping mall at night, and the film mostly maintains a brisk pace and plenty of ideas and action that moves the story forward.  Although very much aimed at the teenage market, the film does not hold back on violence and gore, including one spectacularly creative death in a supermarket bakery department! Fear Street 1994 is a surprisingly strong opener to the trilogy, deliberately but strongly and lovingly generic yet presented with enough energy to be enjoyable for genre fans and its target audience age group in particular.

 

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