Logline: A group of popular kids must overcome their prejudices and preoccupations to survive when a poor, ridiculed family of blue-skinned psychos turn a neighborhood haunted house attraction into a real, live slaughterhouse.
Who are the real villains? The popular kids that make fun of the Dortches, a family suffering from a condition that makes their skin blue? Or the Dortches, who respond with horror and mayhem?
Clearly, it’s the mass-murdering family using a pop-up haunted house to exact revenge on the community that has ridiculed them their entire lives. But maybe a family of murderers is the inevitable result of modern American culture?
Will the sins of a community come crashing down on the heads of the well-behaved teens about to graduate and conquer the adult world?
The class president? The star quarterback? The dominant basketball player? The geek? The nerd? Who survives when revenge is the reason for the season?
“Beware the Dortches” starts out as a Blumhouse-style ‘slasher flick with a clever premise’, then takes it to the next level with “Splattervision.” When the action hits its peak and the violence is supposed to be its goriest, the film switches into a psychedelic animated interpretation of on-screen death that questions our interpretations of horror violence while representing the impact the story would have on real people.
“Beware the Dortches” is an inexpensive, popcorn-style horror movie that takes the genre to another level and expands what low-budget horror has to offer. It works for the midnight-showing fans AND the film school students AND you know, just a general audience looking to get a little scared and have a little fun for an hour and a half.
This spec feature was written in 2020 and last updated in 2022.
Keywords: horror, class, diverse cast, extreme violence, LGBTQ+, family