I was lucky enough to have been introduced to the works of filmmaker Dennis Cahlo through The Trouble with Tessa; so when he reached out with a new short, I was fully invested. Written and directed by Cahlo is short film A Special Day, a home video style story of a family becoming unfortunate victims.
A seemingly normal family home movie is interrupted by a shocking event.
A Special Day, IMDB
I feel like horror is crossing into previously unknown territory and taking two subgenres and molding them together into something new: true crime and analog horror. A Special Day shows a family of three having fun at home, but abruptly cuts to the aftermath of a massacre. It is jarring — I’m talking about “hand-over-mouth and wide-eyed” jarring. I have seen shorts similar to this before, but A Special Day was really well executed in the jump from one extreme to the other.
It’s crazy how much you can feel for a character in less than five minutes. The family looks so happy together, making the ending harsh and despairing, hitting you in the gut so much harder. And I know that the casting has a lot to do with that, but the video style and effects surely help it along. I grew up with VHS tapes and have rewatched our old home movies from 30 years ago plenty of times, so analog horror movies feel real to me already. Pair that with blood and bodies filmed in a way that mimics crime scene walkthroughs, and A Special Day turns from a fun visual gag to horrifying.
A Special Day is indeed short, but so much story is told in that small amount of time. It proves that you don’t need to drag out a plotline or shove in extreme amounts of action to make an impact. A man holding a camera can do good while also doing bad. Dennis Cahlo is that man with the camera, committing both acts of excellent filmmaking as well as horrid crimes against the innocent.
Bravo.
For more on A Special Day, follow writer/director Dennis Cahlo on Instagram and subscribe on YouTube.
