Theatrical Poster
An investigative journalist, her assistant and their photographer fly to a remote countryside village in Poland to follow up on a report of a missing American tourist. Upon arriving and snooping, they encounter a foreboding column of smoke in the middle of a forest, within it stands a terrifying statue of a grinning demon holding a human heart.
When a young village girl offers to show them where the missing tourist is, they eagerly accept and are lead into a cave filled with coffins containing bodies dressed in white robes, their skulls adorned with strange metal masks. Why is there a statue in the forest? Why are the corpses dressed in the robes and what’s the meaning of the masks? Instead of answering their questions though, the child abandons them in the cave and hands them over to a murderous cult connected to the statue!
Will they live long enough to uncover the secrets of the shrine or will they end up like the missing tourists, wearing robes and masks?
When Jon Knautz’s Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer was released, Brookstreet Pictures made quite the impression on genre fans but many, including myself, couldn’t help but wonder where they were a “one hit wonder,” so to speak. Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer had everything a good horror comedy should have but could they reproduce that success with their follow-up? Well, I’m happy to say that filmmaker Jon Knautz and producer/actor Trevor Matthews have indeed succeeded in making a second entertaining film with The Shrine.
When you combine an interesting and original concept containing elements reminiscent of the Bava masterpiece Black Sunday with solid cinematography, beautiful locations, grotesque FX and heart-pounding action, your film is bound to turn heads. As The Shrine begins reaching genre fans, I’m certain they’re going to find it greatly entertainment, adequately gruesome and thrilling! Without giving too much away, compared to other low-budget films that focus on demonic entities such as Exorcismus, Legion: The Final Exorcism and Anneliese: The Exorcist Tapes, The Shrine actually delivers an original story and a genuinely shocking (and cool) final quarter; it’s balls-to-the-wall horror.
Good acting, buckets of blood and fantastic creature FX by David Scott, what more could you ask for? You simply cannot go wrong with The Shrine. I look forward to Brookstreet’s next genre offering.
Looks good to me!!
Sounds great, I’m really looking forward to this and The Wild Hunt now.