Horror Recommendation: Last Shift (2014)
Posted: by Sean Gonzalez
Last Shift (2014): Directed by Anthony DiBlasi
In One Sentence: A newly recruited police officer’s first shift is overseeing the last shift of an older, haunted police station full of deceptively grotesque, nightmare inducing, blood thirsty cult members.
Why You Should Watch: Last Shift offers a mind bending scare that uses older ideas in the horror genre to make a new, and surprisingly good film. A cop whose father was involved in breaking a grotesque cult case (yes the father of the main character was a cop) begins to unravel a plot within the building that causes the precinct to move.
In comes the rookie! She’s ready to handle the final shift, right? After all it is an outfitted police station, nothing should really happen, right? It’s just an abandoned building with a bunch of crazies out for a hole in the back of your head cult ghosts that surely won’t mistake her for Sharon Tate, right?
You’ll be fine.
Well that’s where this movie begins to get very interesting. Aforementioned ghosts haunt the building, chairs and doors move themselves, it sounds cheesy to write about because a plethora of awful films have utilized this same strategy before, but what’s haunting about Last Shift is the claustrophobic atmosphere coupled with visually unsettling shots. The apparitions are dismembered or ‘Charles Manson’ crazy, offering their own hysteria into the pot of unknown.
But you just have to survive, right? 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. then it is all over and your career as a cop can move on.
But there’s a ghastly group of individuals in need of a sacrifice, and the first character that you meet named Cohen knows about the so called ‘mausoleum’ and all of its offerings. But why would he want to help? There’s a homeless man parading through the office but is he a figment of imagination or part of the adamant of shot to head cult members trying to take control? There’s a lady who is in need of help and wants to commit suicide but there’s no way that can be real, right? Your calls for help will totally be answered in time for someone to save you from yourself, right?
It’s riding the thine line between paranormal and illusiveness that it leaves the viewer a little confused as to what just happened, what to believe and most of all, who the hell is real.
Favorite Line: “I’m going to come back for you and all your worth. Mark my words.”
