The Corridor   Starring: Stephen Chambers, James Gilbert and David Patrick Flemming Signature Entertainment RRP: £12.99 Certificate: 18 Available 25 February 2013

When Tyler discovered his mother dead from an overdose of pills, he flipped-out, suffering a nervous breakdown. When his friends visited the house they found him in the cupboard, and when they opened the door he attacked them in a frenzy, stabbing one through the hand and injuring another, before they managed to overpower him. Now, sometime later, Tyler invites the group to his dead mother’s remote country cabin house in an attempt to build bridges and regain their confidence. They are soon enjoying themselves on snowmobiles and boozing in the cabin. However, when Tyler walks through an invisible wall into a long corridor where reality has very different properties, he initially believes he is experiencing a vision caused by the lessening effects of his anti-psychotic drugs. He shows the discovery to his doubting friends, and pretty soon the corridor begins to have an intense effect on their personas. The quieter individuals come out of themselves, and the extroverts become even more wayward. But it’s when they start to delve into each others minds that the conflict really takes off...

It seems that the corridor is simply present as a means to an end. There is no explanation for it (the video clip wherein someone says they witnessed something fall from the sky does not suffice), where it came from, why it is here, or exactly what it intends to achieve. I hugely enjoyed the original The Cube (not the gameshow!), which steadfastly refused to offer any background to the situation. In this instance, however, it would be nice to be given a hint. The purpose is to create a catalyst for the mind games. In essence, within the blink of an eye, the plot genre turns into a psychological thriller. The characters violently turn against one another, and... well, that’s it really.

This is an example of an average low budget horror movie. The characters are solid enough, but there’s very little meat on the bone in terms of plot or sustainability. It would have been better, I think, to have set the rest of the film in or around the same house as the opening sequence. The downside to this, of course, would be we’d have missed out on the stunning snow-covered scenery - surely the out-and-out hero of this film.

5

Ty Power