Amanda Fuller is dynamite in Simon Rumley's (Red, White & Blue) mind-bending gothic psychodrama about a fashion-obsessed woman whose life falls spectacularly apart. You're unlikely to see many better performances this year than Amanda Fuller's mesmerising turn as April, a 30-something whose self-image and perception of life is determined by the vintage clothes she wears and sells at a funky emporium in Austin, Texas with husband Eric (Freak Me Out favourite Ethan Embry; The Devil's Candy, SFF 2016; Cheap Thrills, SFF 2013). When Eric strays, a devastated April meets Randall, a smooth-talker with a predilection for strange sexual games. That's just the start of this dazzlingly filmed and superbly edited journey into real and imagined worlds. A killer soundtrack rounds out the best film yet by genre-mashing British ace Simon Rumley (The Living and the Dead).
Oliviero is a burned-out writer, living at his estate near Venice, his dead mother dominating his imagination. He is also a degenerate: sleeps with his maid and his ex-student, hosts Bacchanalia for local hippies, and humiliates his wife Irina in front of strangers. She lives in terror. When a young woman is murdered, police suspect Oliviero. Things get complicated when his young, beautiful, and self-confident niece, Floriana, pays an unexpected visit. A silver-haired stranger observes. More women die, and thoughts of harming Irina give Oliviero new inspiration. What's Floriana's game and who's the observant stranger? Watching all is a black cat named Satan.