Penny Dreadful

source: Penny Dreadful

I've seen this film twice now and for me it was just as good, if not even better, the second time around. I thought it was really creepy both times, even knowing what was going to happen did not spoil it for me! The acting by Rachel Miner is so good. For those of you here who have said things like" I wanted to see her die" etc., I think that comment says more about you than this film. Her character is a damaged person from having witnessed as a little girl both of her parents die horrible deaths. The hitch hiker preys upon this fact very sadistically throughout the film and I felt nothing but sympathy for her and for what she was being subjected to. I felt like I was sitting right there beside her experiencing the same thing. To make me feel such sympathy and fear throughout the film, even a second time around, says a lot about how effective this film really is. For those of you who haven't seen it, all I can say is you should check it out, especially if you like truly scary stories with good acting that doesn't rely on over the top blood and gore. The theater I saw it in was packed and the audience seemed to be enjoying it too.

Penny Deerborn(Rachel Miner, in a great performance)suffers from a deep, penetrating fear of cars stemming from a devastating wreck which took the lives of her parents. To tackle this fear head on, her therapist Orianna(Mimi Rogers)wishes to take Penny to the location of which the wreck occurred. But, along the way, they pick up a hitchhiker who is actually an escaped lunatic who murdered several people at a diner. Releasing the hitcher at a closed campsite for the winter, Orianna wishes to get the hell out of dodge, but her tire is torn by a large pin..the hitcher has them where he/she wants them. With it getting colder and colder and a storm a brewing, Orianna walks away from the car hoping to get a signal on her cell phone, but the hitcher has other plans. Penny suffered a twisted ankle when Orianna was teaching her a lesson(Penny would not return to the car so Orianna pretended to leave her which had the frightened young phobic running for it with the end result being a twisted ankle)and when trying to get away from the killer hits her head on a stone. Awakening inside her car, Penny finds the recording of Orianna's murder on a camcorder in her lap and even worse the car pinned between large trees with no escape route possible! So Penny is at the mercy of a psychopath bent on toying with her inner fear of cars. There are various characters in the flick merely fodder for the hitcher to sneak up behind with his/her knife such as two camp groundskeepers pulling night shift duty, Eddie(Mickey Jones)and Alvin(Chad Todhunter). Also, Alvin's adulterous lover, Mary(Tammy Filor)is another addition to the hitcher's death list. Cliché ridden horror flick is surprisingly intense thanks to the effective multiple dilemmas facing our heroine Penny. Miner's virtuoso performance as the tormented Penny helps anchor this exercise somewhat. Having Mimi Rogers' corpse in the car with Penny ratchets up the macabre situation not to mention the blood scattered all over the car windows bringing a vibrant color red splashed on Miner's face as she constantly looks for the appearance of her captor or possible help from somebody outside. The knowledge of a sicko killer somewhere out of the car as we watch poor Penny inside adds dimension to the thriller. But, when we are introduced to the killer in all his/her glory..the screeching, hammy, over-the-top villainy is laughable instead of frightening and ruins the sharp build-up of suspense from director Richard Brandes. And, the cliché-ridden script is also hard to overcome considering this is still a hitch-hiker psycho-thriller that has been done before. This flick's damn lucky Miner is as good as she is and that her mental plight is so interesting because it almost makes this little creeper a success. I will say Brandes is quite talented with a keen ability to squeeze every bit of tension out of this rather-predictable flick. It's also quite attractive visually..good production values, it's most certainly a good-looking film even if it's rather derivative. Horror icon Michael Berryman has a cameo as a Gas Station Attendant.

I did like this film quite a lot (even though I have only given it 6/10). It's very tense and does send chills up your spine. The acting is very good, the storyline is imaginative but somehow I have this feeling, that it could've been so much better. It's basically about a young girl who has a phobia of riding in cars (known as Amaxophobia) ever since her parents died tragically in a car accident when she was very young. Now, older, she must go back to where it happened with her psychiatrist to overcome her fears...this is her last step in her "program". On route to this place, they hit a hitch-hiker and her psychiatrist feels so bad about this she decides to give them a lift, much to Penny's disapproval. They introduce themselves and Penny soon tells the hitch-hiker why they are travelling to the mountains (to overcome her fear of riding in cars). When the hitch-hiker gets to their destination...thats when things start to go really bad. It's a tense and chilling roller-coaster from this point on and the acting from Penny is brilliant! However, there are times when you think to yourself "get on with it"...but in Penny's situation...you will understand why she doesn't! I would recommend seeing this as it is a good movie. But don't expect much gore, or horror. It's more of a thriller. Always remember never tell a stranger ANYTHING about yourself ;)

The first time I saw this movie I didn't really care for it at all. I re-watched it a second time and I absolutely loved it. This movie has great suspense, terror and kills. Penny is a likable character, she is traumatized from a car accident, and is trying to get over her fears and is trying to be a regular person. Her therapist, Orianna, is taking Penny on a road-trip. It's to "Complete the Circle" and have Penny end her fears where they first began. The Hitchhiker is really creepy. He then traumatizes Penny even more throughout the film. The reason I liked this film is because first of all, it's a really good movie - if you're into this kind of film. And second because it shows how you don't a HUGE budget and big name stars in a movie for it to be good.

Why does anyone like this movie? The heroine, Penny, is so pathetic and stupid that I was hoping that the hitchhiker would just kill her to make the movie decent. There are sooooo many things wrong with this movie! 1)Oh, we picked up a creepy hitchhiker in the middle of NOWHERE and he wants to be dropped off deep in the woods? SURE! We'll give you a ride! While we're driving you there, you won't speak a word to us but we'll volunteer our life history to you, including our deepest fear, just because why?!?! 2)We've just discovered that creepy hitchhiker pierced our tire and it is RAPIDLY losing air and we have a time limit to get back to the highway but Penny decides to be afraid of the car for that time. HMMM, a scary car that can CARRY YOU TO SAFETY or being stuck in the woods with some freak who just got you to drive into the middle of the woods and pierced your tire so that you would be stuck there? Did I mention that NOBODY KNOWS WHERE YOU ARE to come help you?!?!?! (Penny should have been punched in the face in this scene. I started hating her at this moment and she only got STUPIDER!!!!) 3)If you've been honking the horn of your car and screaming out the windows for help to no avail, but you suddenly hear the honking of another car,why do you only produce minimal efforts to get help NOW? Why do you scream only a couple times and then try to honk the horn and then sob in defeat? I had to watch you scream and pound the windows for five minutes for nothing, but when help is near your attempts to get help are meager? And why did the horn work SOOO well when your therapist's face fell on it, but all of a sudden you can't make it work at all? 4)When that guy came to help you, why did you guys try to unwedge the car instead of asking him to get a rock a break your windshield so you could get out?!?! AHHHHHHH! 5)I'm going to keep taking these pills because they "help" me, yet every time I take them, I pass out and when I wake up SOMETHING REALLY BAD ALWAYS HAPPENS TO ME, Hmmm....I think I'll take more pills. These are the biggest issues I had, and they're are not tiny details that I nitpicked, these are big scenes that are obvious to anyone watching. I should have left after the scene where Penny wouldn't get back in the car. The acting was good, but overall this was a stupid, stupid movie. See it at your own risk!

From After Dark Films, a simple little story of terror. Penny(Rachel Miner)has been traumatized severely by witnessing her parents die in an auto accident. Her therapist Orianna Volkes(Mimi Rogers) takes her on a road trip as part of her therapy to overcome the fear of cars. It is pretty rough going; and gets rougher when they almost rundown a hitchhiker(Liz Davies)on a long lonesome mountain highway. Of course at the expense of knowing a hell of a lot better, Orianna decides to give the shaken hitchhiker a ride down a dirt road not much better than a hiking trail. Letting their passenger out, it is discovered a knife is stuck in one of the tires rendering a flat. Cell phones are useless; so the therapist takes a walk looking for help. Is there not a killer lurking in the woods in a flick like this? A dreadful detour for sure. Also in the cast: Chad Todhunter, Mickey Jones, Tammy Filor and Michael Berryman.

"Penny Dreadful" (another one of the eight horror films in the After Dark Horror Film Festival that took place in November 2006) is a surprisingly spooky and enjoyable horror film. The story follows Penny Deerborn (Rachel Miner, "The Black Dahlia"), a college-aged woman who is petrified of cars, her fear rooting to a grisly childhood car wreck that killed her parents. Her therapist and friend Orianna (Mimi Rogers) decides it is time for Penny to confront her fear of automobiles, and takes her on a road trip up into the mountains. When night falls, Orianna accidentally hits a hitchhiker, who ends up surviving just fine, and offers him a ride. An already panicked Penny is even more nervous, and the mysterious hooded hitchhiker ends up poking a skewer into their tires after they drop him off. Trying to get a cell phone signal, Orianna ends up dead, and Penny awakens in the car with Orianna's lifeless body in the driver's seat. The hitchhiker has pinned the car in between a row of trees, making it impossible for Penny to escape, as he taunts her and plays numerous games. Now, the place that Penny feared most is the only safe place for her to keep away from the maniac. Another worthy indie-horror movie, "Penny Dreadful" is fairly original story wise. Take some elements from "Cujo" (mainly the idea of being trapped inside of a car), throw in a maniacal hitchhiker with murderous intent, and a girl who is petrified of cars, and you get a nice little horror film. The entire film essentially takes place within a two-door car, so one would think that it would be difficult to make an exciting horror flick when the setting is so limited, but this film made it work. The script is well written and it still manages to be interesting and entertaining without ever coming off as yawn-some - I was interested with the film the entire time and was curious to see what would happen next, never a bad thing. I will say that the film does begin to drag a little bit in the middle, mainly with Penny's endless hysteria, but it made sense with her character (correlating with her extreme fear of cars and her panicky personality), and it begins to pick up with the hitchhiker's antics to terrorize poor Penny. There are some neat shots used in the film as well, and the forest setting is made use of, with plenty of spooky shots of the trees looming over the car. Most of the film also has an almost blue tint to it (which later turns red), and is a nice touch. Acting wise, the film is decent. Rachel Miner's performance was wonderful. She played the character very well, as a likable and innocent girl with an extreme phobia. You can't help but feel sorry for her, and she pulls off that sympathy. Mimi Rogers plays her therapist (and almost a motherly figure), and I have to admit I wasn't too impressed with her. Her lines were a little flat and she wasn't believable enough - I'm not sure if it was just me, but that's how a felt about it. Not that it matters a whole lot anyway, because her character spends the majority of the film dead in the back seat of the car. There was also a neat cameo from Michael Berryman (most noted for playing one of the main cannibals in Wes Craven's 1977 horror film "The Hills Have Eyes") as a gas station attendant, which was nice to see. I was a bit confused with the film as it neared the end, and I thought the resolution could have been improved on (especially in relation to the hitchhikers identity). Like I said though, this film does have it's problems. Overall, "Penny Dreadful" is definitely worth a rental if you like claustrophobic horror films. As far as the story goes, the movie is pretty original and has a decent amount of shocks and spooky moments, and Miner's performance was really good. It needs some work in a few places, but considering the budget, this is a pretty high-quality movie. Out of the four films from the After Dark Horrorfest that I've seen so far, this one is near the top of the list. All in all, I liked it. 7/10.

The only reason this got a 2 is because the killer's appearance IS fairly chilling when he's actually revealed, and because it actually does a semi-effective job of conveying panic. Of course, the movie itself is absolute dreck. What we have is a short film that has been extended to feature length for no discernible reason other than "hey, maybe we can make some money on this!" The main character, Penny, has a phobia of cars, something I'm sure we can all identify with. What? You can't? Well, there's your first problem. The turning point of the film, as shown in the trailer, is when her therapist runs down a hitchhiker, so they pick him up. I'm sorry, but if I ran that guy over, I'd keep driving. He's really obviously creepy looking; well, more, he looks like Emperor Palpatine while he still has the hood on. Either way, when I saw him on the road, I thought, "Wow, I'd pick up Rutger Hauer before I'd pick up this guy." This was a stupid, stupid moment where no one, no matter how dumb, how intoxicated, would possibly think to pick this guy up. Since this scene is necessary to make the movie work, the whole thing just collapses. There's a second plot thread involving other characters that exists entirely to pad running time and ultimately winds up having no discernible effect on the plot concerning Penny or even any relevance at all. Most of the blame for the film can be placed squarely on the character of Penny, who is basically a futile, sniveling lightweight that seems actively afraid to do anything to help herself. Unfortunately, she's really the fatal flaw of the film. She has a phobia you can't identify with, and she spends the entire film in this heightened state of tension, from literally frame one. You have to build your film, you can't just start up there and expect the thing to stay there, people will get tired and bored. More than that, she spends most of the film crying, screaming, and just generally being useless. From the get go she behaves like this infantile individual even though she's a young adult, quickly robbing the audience of any patience or concern they might have had for her well-being. You WANT her to die. You don't identify with her because you're not like her, because you're proactive. You'd be trying to survive. Penny is a liability to herself, to everyone around her, and to entertainment. Avoid this movie at all costs.

Penny Deerborn (Rachel Miner) and her therapist, Orianna Volkes (Mimi Rogers) take a trip to help Penny overcome her fear of cars. But as with any horror film, things go wrong and the car they are traveling in ends up becoming a prison for Penny (wedged between two trees). Oh, and there's also a serial killer loose in the woods. What is going to be the real deal-maker (or breaker) for this film is if the audience can relate to Penny's fear of cars. Roughly an hour of the film has her in the car by herself being scared. Not much of a plot, or much dialog -- just the actress and her expressions of fear. Many viewers will find this intensely boring. I, however, could relate quite well with this (as someone with anxiety, I often experience attacks in cars and can put myself in her shoes -- if I had been Penny, I would have been much less brave). Rachel Miner deserves full credit for being amazing. I was not really familiar with her before this, though her name was somewhat known. She seems to have a very solid range, if this movie is any example -- she was asked to carry a film all on her own with no characters to talk to. And in my opinion, she did it. Mimi Rogers (the former Mrs. Tom Cruise) also plays a unique role. As a corpse. I think that deserves some credit, too, as even acting dead must take some skills -- never really moving or breathing on camera. Definitely a new direction for Rogers. Secondary characters were nice, if for no other reason than to round out the film... and I loved the visuals... the colors of the dark, snowy mountains. I don't know much about cameras, but I like the way the light was filtered to give it this dark, lonely look. Very good move. I say check this one out. It may not be for you -- it might bore you to tears. So if you think you're one of those, don't watch it late at night when you're about to take a nap. If you have any sort of anxiety or claustrophobia, I think you'll get a lot more out of this one. And as long as everyone just ignores how conveniently coincidental the whole plot is, we'll be fine.