Horror-on-Sea is a three-day weekend festival held in January in Southend-on-Sea. All the films are independent, low-budget horrors of varying quality and sub-genres. As well as this there is a second weekend of additional films. Over the two weekends a total of 28 features and 28 shorts were shown, giving any true horror fan a run for their money, however, there were a few hardcore fans who made it through them all. I was one of them, and the short film The Widow came up in my top three of both weekends.
Having spoken to the director of this short prior to the screening, I was a little worried about what to say if I didn't like it, however, this was totally unnecessary as this was easily one of my favourites of the festival. The realism was very perceptive and a sense of empathy was created for the widow in a very poignant opening scene. The apparent naivety of the main character when faced with two nasty con artists posing as plumbing officials helped create the alarming nature of this short. A very realistic film with a good twist.
To create a film that not only has very high production values, good acting, a good script and storyline, and an interesting twist, but also stands out when screened alongside numerous other shorts is a very impressive achievement. Add to that the fact that this is director Paul Rodriguez' first film, then personally I will be very much looking forward to whatever he comes up with next.