Psychedelic folk horror features The Other Side of the Forest and Beyond the Speed of Life are being released on physical media and streaming this summer.
“The Other Side of the Forest” is a fantasy Pop-Art Fairytale directed by Grant McPhee and starring Lori Stott (BBC’s The Demon Headmaster) and Ashley Sutherland (Night Kaleidoscope).
It is the story of a shy young woman seeking her fame in the dark world of the 1960s folk-music underground. Lori’s journey to stardom takes her on an adventure far beyond the music world she is trying to break into, and instead she travels far beyond her reality to a forgotten past of rural landscapes, magic, myth, dead Gods and mysterious fallen angels.
In this fantastical world, Lori meets a mysterious time-travelling guide (Ashley Sutherland) who helps her navigate the malevolent threat of the Swine-Folk, dead Pop-Stars and ultimately; uncovering the mystery of what lies on the other side of the forest.
The Other Side of the Forest is also known as ‘Lori and the Six Six Sixties’.
“Beyond the Speed of Life” is a sister film to The Other Side of the Forest. Also directed by Grant McPhee, it stars Miss Scotland finalist, Bethany Stevenson and Ashley Sutherland (Night Kaleidoscope).
The film is experimental in narrative and attempts to argue that snippets of popular culture can be presented as having value as film art as those which prescribes to traditional art-house tropes.
It is ultimately an exploration of 1960s music promo aesthetics, B-Movies, amateur filmmaking and the Underground – Warhol, Brakhage, Deren, Mekas and Anger, shot entirely with 1960s vintage sound, 16mm cameras and lenses.
The themes toy with perceptions of the evolution of Folk-Horror from a true meaning of the term to a current and more simplistic box-ticking exercise of genre interpretation. The film is heavily indebted to 1970’s Occult paperbacks, The Velvet Underground, 1960’s German communes and early 70’s British and Italian horror.
Watch the trailers for The Other Side of the Forest and Beyond the Speed of Life below –
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