Review: ‘The Dead Place’ taps into micro-budget excellence

High school trauma lies at the focus of writer/director Michael Pickle’s debut feature, The Dead Place. The micro-budget film works its magic through a strong lead performance by Idris Veliu and a truly deranged outing from David Howard Thornton, most known for playing Art the Clown in the Terrifier films. With a character-driven script, it explores the chaotic journey of a young teen attempting to balance bullying at school and his ability to see dead people. Pickle weighs the film down with heavy thematic material about death, the afterlife, and unfinished business.

Isaac (Veliu) possesses a very special gift (or curse?) of seeing dead people walking the earth. It’s like they don’t know they’re dead. In an early scene, Isaac’s dead grandmother wanders into her funeral and sees her memorial photograph. It comes as a shock, but she returns to meandering through the crowd anyway. As he’s gotten older, the hallucinations have only gotten worse. His parents, Ruth (Suziey Block) and John (Aaron Lyons), struggle to understand what’s going on. Ruth believes they should take their ailing son to a psychiatrist, but John thinks all that phooey won’t do any good. Isaac simply wants the dead people to go away.

Isaac’s friend Katharine (Lexi Graves) uses her obsession with the paranormal to figure out what exactly is going on. She even gets an Ouija board! And, well, you know where this is headed. Thornton plays a “new kid” in a red hoodie with a bloody terrifying grin plastered on his face. He tries to convince Isaac that he should welcome the demonic entity (Bill Oberst Jr) and let him take over his body, ala 2025’s Silent Night, Deadly Night. Throughout the film, Pickle toys with the searing question: does he or doesn’t he? With Veliu digging his teeth into the material, The Dead Place harbors a surprising amount of heart.

When it comes to micro-budget horror, you head into the experience expecting that budgetary constraints will significantly limit certain parts of the production. It comes down to whether there’s a clear vision onscreen and how well the creative team handles the material with what they’re given. Michael Pickle excels with The Dead Place in not only exploring the themes of trauma and death, but also in entertaining the audience. From the performances to solid camera choices, the film works overtime to expose the raw nerve endings of self-isolating misery and how psychological scars can manifest in harrowing ways.

Michael Pickle shows real promise as a horror storyteller. His knack for creating characters that leave a mark and developing a sense of dread through dialogue positions him as one to watch in the rising tide of indie filmmakers. There’s something to be said about a writer/director who can craft something so compelling out of so little. Imagine him with a studio budget?! When that comes, I’ll be ready.

The Dead Place debuts on BloodStreamTV today (June 1).