Parenthood is sacrifice, and that is the message behind the latest horror film from filmmaker Michael Cummings, aka Spider One of Powerman 5000, aka Rob Zombie's brother. As he puts it in his director's statement:
"In the film, Mindy’s relationship with her monster, Agyar, is clearly my allegory for parenthood. His bites are her pain. His words are her insecurities. His intentions are to prove Mindy’s failure as a parent. We are in solidarity with Mindy, even if, at times we are frustrated and baffled by her actions. And that is exactly the point. She doesn’t know what to do. None of us do. Framing this movie in horror was a natural choice."
LITTLE BITES tells the story of Mindy Vogel (Krsy Fox, TERRIFIER 3), who is inexplicably saddled with a demon, Agyar (Jon Skarloff, CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER) that demands to feast upon her daughter, Alice. Unwilling to acquiesce, Mindy sends Alice to stay with her mother (Bonnie Arons, THE NUN) while she placates the monster with bites of her own flesh, spinning a plan to rid of her the burden once and for all.
I had the opportunity to speak with writer/director Spider One and lead actress Krsy Fox, neither of whom I felt comfortable addressing by name because I didn't feel entirely sure if Krsy was just pronounced "Krissy" and I couldn't rightly look a man in the face and call him "Spider".
I really wanted to like this feature when I sat down to watch it, and a lot about it is quite good. It's gorgeously shot, capturing the colors and themes of its period setting and exquisite set pieces. Krsy Fox does serviceable work as beleaguered mother Mindy, wearing her exhaustion on her face. As a character hounded by her insecurities, imposter syndrom, and fears of maternal failings, her hangdog expressions speak to countless parents with metaphorical demons making the process of raising a child that much more difficult. Skarloff's Agyar is menacing and oddly philosphic, prowling Mindy's basement like some physical manifesation of her anxieties. Crampton is always a delight, and Chaz Bono's extended appearance is a comedic and awkward highlight of the film. Langenkamp is, frankly, shoehorned in the picture in an inexplicable cameo.
Its shortcomings are just an overall lack of narrative focus. Coming in at 105 minutes, there's plenty of time for the film to fill in some nagging questions and give the proceedings a bit more gravity than they have with their bare bones, but chooses not to. Long sequences of Mindy's isolation are drawn out to decent effect, ostensibly allowing us to sit in her unease, but some of that time could've been put to better use expanding the lore of Agyar. As a monster film, most of us are tuning in for the monster, so give us more. The ending(s) are questionable: the first one is suprising but not entirely sensible and the second one is seemingly purposeless. The creature effects and tension are good but once the credits start rolling the viewer doesn't feel quite complete. There's a lot of room in LITTLE BITES that isn't adequately filled. It is apparent that Spider One is a director with vision and talent but I personally feel like he needs a guiding hand to reach his full potential. Watching the credits, one can see that there was very little in the way of a larger community making this film happen - it was mostly Spider One and Krsy Fox and there weren't a lot of checks and balances along the way of their making a decision and putting it on screen. However, I think if there were a few other heads in the room, this film might've benefited from a few outside ideas.
That said, LITTLE BITES shows great potential and is a fun little midnight monster movie. I feel confident that the next picture from this writer and director will be more ambitious and have a great deal more flesh on its bones.
LITTLE BITES is releasing on physical media Tuesday, February 18th and will begin streaming on SHUDDER on Friday, February 21st.
Until next time, take care of yourselves.
-McEric, aka Eric McClanahan-
