AFTER MIDNIGHT

RELEASED OUT NOW! 2020 | 15 | Blu-ray Directors Jeremy Gardner, Christian Stella Cast Jeremy Gardner, Brea Grant, Justin Benson, Henry Zebrowski

Break-ups can make you crazy, especially if one party suddenly ups and vanishes. Hank (Jeremy Gardner, who also writes and co-directs) wakes to find his girlfriend Abby (Brea Grant) has unexpectedly left for a few days, or maybe for ever. At the same time, something nasty is scratching at his front door. At his wits’ end, Hank drinks in the day and takes pot shots at the “monster” at night.

While flashbacks paint a rosy picture of their relationship, it soon becomes clear that things were never quite as sunny as our self-absorbed and half-mad protagonist assumed. The film presents a picture of a relationship in a believably mundane crisis: nothing dramatically terrible has happened between the two characters, they’ve just grown apart. Monster movie fans may be dismayed at how little the (rather good) creature is in the film, but it does provide an effective cap to the end of this odd, funny, sad and sweet relationship drama.

Extras Disc one: director’s commentary; self-interview shot by Benson; screening Q&A; a piece on the character of Wade; behind-the-scenes featurette; footage from Fantastic Fest; outtakes; trailers; gallery. Disc two: Gardner’s debut, zombie thriller The Battery, with commentary, Making Of, score featurette, outtakes and trailer.