Audiences will reach the end of ‘‘Crumb Catcher’’ and turn to their friends seated beside them: “How did we get here? What did we watch for an hour and 43 minutes?”
“Crumb Catcher” – a Fantastic Fest 2023 selection and Brooklyn Horror’s Golden Audience Award winner – is an eccentric take on the home invasion thriller. It is the directorial duet of Chris Skotchdopole, who wrote it along with Indie horror filmmaker Larry Fessenden and lead actor Rigo Garay.
Skotchdopole’s nail-biting comedy suspense follows newlyweds Shane (Garay) and Leah (Ella Rae Peck), whose relationship is tested when an older married couple with an entrepreneurial hunger and half-baked blackmail scheme crash the honeymoon in a remote estate in Upstate New York.
This NR-rated horror sets its sights on two couples. The first is the young, just-married Leah and Shane standing on the edge of achievement, but their future is balanced against Shane’s self-destructive behavior. On the other side of the carnival’s funhouse mirror, John (John Speredakos) and Rose (Lorraine Farris) are the washed-up reflection of the newlyweds who are overwhelmed with anger, and a absurd goal to claim success in looking for investors to fund John’s restaurant invention, which serves as the title for the film.
The film draws parallels to tropes and characters in the genre, like in how Speredakos’s performance feels a heavy influence that horror cinephiles may note and compare. In the second part of the film, when audiences are reintroduced to Speredakos again, when his persistence rubs Shane and Leah in the wrong way.
The pacing begins all happy and blissful at the wedding reception of Shane, a published author, and Leah, a powerhouse in book publishing. The first few minutes of ‘‘Crumb Catcher’’ play into the gender power dynamic between Shane and Leah, and lean into the important moments when we’re introduced to John and Rose in the second act.
“Crumb Catcher” will certainly attract a small, niche group, but the general public is not in the cards as commercial audiences will be turned off entirely by the film’s commentary.
By the end, this mind maze of suspense will call on audiences to question what they just experienced.
(‘‘Crumb Catcher’’ opens July 19, 2024, in select theaters.)
– July 15, 2024–
