A ChucksConnection Film Review

 

Jay Jay Warren wears black high top Converse “Chuck Taylor” All Stars in the film.

The Shed

 

by Hal Peterson

Stan must fight against a strange vampire man who has taken refuge in his shed.

 

The Shed is an old-fashioned vampire horror film set in a rural American town. It starts with a man named Bane (Frank Whaley) running through a forest trying to escape from a pursuing vampire. Eventually the vampire catches up to him and bites him, causing him to become a vampire. The vampire then totally possesses Bane’s body while its old body turns to ashes in the early morning light. Needing to escape the deadly sunlight, Bane takes refuge in a shed on the property where Stan (Jay Jay Warren) lives with his abusive grandfather, Ellis (Timothy Bottoms). Stan has been forced to live with Ellis since his parents died. Besides his troubles at home, Stan also faces them at school where the school bully Marble (Chris Petrovski) and his two followers Ozzy (Uly Schlesinger) and Pitt (Francisco Burgos) harass him whenever they get a chance. Stan’s best friend at school Dommer (Cody Kostro) is also a target of Marble. Not a very perceptive or pleasant person, Dommer expects Stan to stand up and fight for him whenever Marble goes after him, even though Stan is already on probation for fighting. The only other seemingly normal person besides Stan is Roxy (Sofia Happonen), a girl he was once close to but who now hangs with Marble’s crew to avoid trouble. Even when he is sleeping Stan has a tough life, with regular nightmares about the things that have happened in his life.

 

Stan drags his grandfather out of the shed.

The vampire story gets going when Ellis orders Stan to go outside and mow the grass around the house. Stan notices that there seems to be someone in the shed, and his dog confirms this by growling and getting its hackles up. Stan believes whoever is in there is just an ordinary drifter and orders him to come out or else. When Bane refuses, Stan lets the dog go after him, but the poor dog is pulled inside and killed. When Stan tells Ellis what has happened he insists on going to the shed to remove and punish the intruder, but he is also attacked and killed. Now in shock by the events that have just occurred, Stan is able fight off Bane and lock him inside the shed by chaining the door and hammering a covering over a big hole in the door created during their struggles. Not sure what to do next, Stan pretends that things are normal and decides to go back to school the next day.

 

At the high school Stan and Roxy rekindle their romance.

 

While riding his bike on the way to school, Stan literally runs into the sheriff (Siobhan Fallon Hogan). She becomes involved in the case when she goes to pick up Ellis for a meeting at school that the principal wants but then discovers the shed when there is no answer at the door. Meanwhile at school, Stan sits alone outside pondering what he should do. Roxy sees him, and sits down beside him. They talk and soon rekindle their romance with Stan saying that they can work out any differences they might have. Their intimate discussion is rudely interrupted by Dommer. When he hears about the vampire in the shed, Dommer becomes excited. At last there is a way to get even with Marble and his cronies. He wants to lure them to the shed and let the vampire kill them but Stan refuses, not wanting to create even more trouble. But Dommer, filled with rage against Marble, decides to go it alone. Things spiral out of control and become chaotic, igniting a vampire war. Eventually Roxy comes to check on Stan, and the two of them become trapped in Stan’s house, fighting for their lives against the vampires.

 

Stan fights back against the vampire who has grabbed him.

 

The Shed is the debut film of writer and director Frank Sabatella. The storyline emphasizes typical teenaged problems like bullying and fighting at school and problems Stan faces at home dealing with his grandfather and the loss of his parents. Finally Stan gets a break in his life when his relationship with Roxy is rekindled and she ends up being his partner in their final struggles. Against this is a classic type of vampire story that gradually takes over the film. A lot of things are cleverly introduced like when Stan is watching an old vampire film on tv to remind viewers of the several possible ways to defeat a vampire. There is also a certain timelessness to the story; it could occur in modern times or even in the late decades of the twentieth century due to the way the teenagers dress and no cell phones or modern digital devices present. Jay Jay Warren and Sofia Happonen are comforting in their rolls as the protagonists facing bullies, hostile authorities, and vicious vampires. This is a modern day version of a classic vampire film, and if you like this genre you will find it entertaining.

Best Chucks Scene

 

The camera focuses on Stan’s chucks as he struggles with the vampire.

 

Jay Jay Warren (Stan) wears black high top Converse All Stars throughout the film. Stan has the look of a typical working class teenager sporting black and white tee shirts — sometimes plain other times with cultural logos like Dying Agnes — unbuttoned flannel shirts, torn jeans and his ever present black high top chucks. Many of the background actors also wear black high top chucks (you can see an example of that in the closeup of Stan and Roxy). Cinematographer Matthias Schubert gives us a very chucks friendly set of scenes with a number of closeups along with their appearance in all of Stan’s panorama scenes. Besides the two stills pictured here, there are overhead shots showing Stan’s chucks as blood seeps under them, when he is looking at a sheet covered body, and a scene of him getting out of bed, picking them up, and lacing them.

 

As Stan walks outside in the dark, the camera focuses on his black high top chucks.

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