Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
Rockstar Billy Chapman has it all – fame, fortune, and a fabulous mansion in the middle of nowhere. But there’s just one problem: his music has hit a dead end, and he’s desperate to create something original. So, he does what any brooding musician would – kicks out his manager, locks himself in his spooky mansion, and waits for inspiration. Instead, he gets an eerie voice whispering creepy nothings into his ear.
Created by Chris Baker and Matt Fitch, the short horror film Backmask takes a page from the classic “devil’s bargain” trope and delivers a crisp story about music, fame, ambition, and greed.
The short opens with a surprisingly upbeat piano tone, the kind one would hear in a “welcome to a day of my life” video by YouTube stars. The camera slowly zooms into to protagonist Billy Chapman (played by David Shields), a good-looking lad with long blonde hair, struggling to compose a new song on the piano. He throws out his manager, Angus (Charlie Rix), and groupies, for complete solitude at the mansion, only to blur the lines between reality and hallucinations while left on his own.
The camerawork in Backmask is steady and engaging, with clever transitions between scenes that evoke an eerie tone and intrigue around Billy’s struggle to create something original in a potentially haunted house. The word “cult” is thrown around once in an interaction between Billy and Angus, but at just a little over 15 minutes long, the short doesn’t answer the multiple questions bubbling in the viewer’s head about the cult angle. The house offers some hints, and Billy’s sinister experience with a strange voice is only mildly scary.
While the bulk of Backmask focuses on Billy’s attempts at trying different instruments to land a new song, it’s only towards the end that the story becomes violently unsettling. The climactic shot is stark, epic, and blood-laced, aesthetically juxtaposing a pristine white suit with splattered blood.
Backmask had greater potential to be a longer horror film with more scares, but the ending makes it a compelling one-time watch.
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