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SHELLTER
89 minutes Drama / Horror / Sci-Fi & Fantasy / Thrillers
A young woman awakens in fallout shelter and finds she must do unspeakable acts to others in order to stay alive.
Intended Audience: Mature
Zoey, (Cari Sanders) awakens in the medical facility of an underground fallout shelter. The Doctor, (Will Tulin) explains that an infection has killed most of the population. The only people left are either a few lone survivors like her and the infected: The living dead.
The Doctor is assisted by a Nurse, (Maria Olsen) who it seems has gone completely insane. They “treat” a steady stream of survivors/patients. The only way of “curing” the infection is by surgically removing the affected area, which leads to gruesome results.
The Doctor wants Zoey to replace the unstable Nurse and become his new assistant. Zoey is very hesitant to join the Doctor who is willing to do whatever it takes to survive, no matter how questionable or terrible the acts.
But after a patient offers to trade places with Zoey and do “anything” the Doctor wants, Zoey realizes that if she doesn’t do terrible things, someone else will do these terrible things to her.
Zoey has to decide what she is willing to do to survive, and the viewer has to make that same decision: How far would you go to survive?
SHELLTER is a horror film in the vein of SAW and HOSTEL. But SHELLTER goes beyond horror and demonstrates how an average person can be turned into a killer.
The key scene of SHELLTER is the “Shocking” scene that is loosely based on the Milgram experiment conducted at Yale in the 1960’s. In this study, Stanley Milgram tried to determine how the Nazis were able to get ordinary people to do horrific things during the holocaust.
Test subjects volunteered for a psychology experiment about memory, were paired up, and then randomly chosen to be either the Teacher or the Learner. In actuality, the choice was rigged and the Learner was one of the experimenters, who was then wired to a box that delivered electric shocks.
The Teacher, the real test subject, was instructed to increasingly shock the Learner for every wrong answer. The shocking machine was labeled from 1 to 10, mild to lethal.
It was postulated that maybe 1% of the population was sadistic enough to torture and kill another person but the results surprised everyone. Not only did most of these ordinary people shock the Learner to levels of screaming pain, but a full two-thirds of the test subjects shocked the Learner all the way to the lethal end.
While many people were ‘shocked’ with the results of the experiment, it helped explain the behavior of both the German prison guards and the Sondercommandos, the Jewish workers in the concentration camps.
It’s too easy to condemn their actions and say you would never do such terrible things. It’s very different to actually be in that situation and have to choose between your morals or death.
That is the choice that Zoey and you have to make: How far would you go to stay alive?
Don’t kid yourself. You’d do anything.
- Directed by: Dan Donley
- Written by: Dan Donley
- Produced by: Michelle Merker
- Run Time: 89 minutes
- Release Date: 2010
-
Country:
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
- Intended Audience: mature
- Website SHELLTER
Written by Dan Donley
Produced by Michelle Merker
Cast
Sophie King: Emily
Christine Little: Janet
Beth Hettig: Betty
Erin Rae Miller: Amy
Alex Petrovitch: Bob
Adam Fleck: Fearless
Kurshila Martini: Sassy
Maria Olsen: The Nurse
Will Tulin: The Doctor
Cari Sanders: Zoey
Michelle Blum: Lucy
Vinnie Bilancio: Joe
Elizabeth Carlisle: Tina
Leah Grimssom: Stacey
Kelsie Stevens: Little Girl
Ashlee Collins: Make Up
Leah Amaro: Lead Make Up
Richard Sedota: Art Director
Michael Harrington: Editor
Larry Smith: Additional Camera
Justin Nielsen: Chief Lighting Technician
"It'll stick in your mind when Saw VI has long been forgotten. " - Chris and Jim Mclennan - Trash City
It's SO good but SO dark. After watching it, you feel defeated, abused and ill. Cannibal Corpse songs are more cheery then this film. GO SEE IT!" - Eerie Horror Fest
The film has true nasty edges to it (a good thing for a horror film with this subject matter) and doesn’t shrink from showing it, pulling the audience along with the main character to illustrate how someone could wind up in a very dark place from where they began." - Tony Tilton, Festival Director, Fargo Fantastic Film Fest
"Shellter was the festival's one entry in the extreme horror genre. It is also one of the most terrifying films I have ever seen. The film, inspired by the Milgram experiments, is about a woman trapped in a bomb shelter after a biological attack with a sadistic doctor who tortures and eventually brainwashes her. Writer-Director Dan Donley holds an MA in psychology, and he used his expertise to great effect in crafting the film. The doctor uses status, fear, and his patients' survival instincts in order to manipulate them into becoming killers. The extreme horror elements go much further than anything that has been done in the Saw or Hostel movies. It is also much more intelligent than anything in either of these film franchises. Shellter had me squirming uncomfortably in my seat, and I loved every second of it". -Jonathan Weichsel, Valley Scene Magazine, writing about Shriekfest
Phoenix Fear Film Festival -- Best Feature (Won)
Shockerfest, Riverbank, California
Dark Carnival Film Festival -- Best Feature (Nominated)
Eerie Horror Film Festival -- Best Feature (Nominated)
Fright Night Film Festival in Louisville, KY
Atlanta Horror Film Festival
Oklahoma Horror Film Festival
Bare Bones Film Festival
Killer Film Fest
Excellent Film! I was lucky enough to see Shellter at the Phoenix Fear Festival and I have been waiting for its release ever since to add to my collection. Shellter combines suspense, horror, and a bit of dark humor into a cringe worthy film that will leave you thinking about humanity for days. Buy this movie you won't regret it.