It’s October, goblins and ghouls, and you know what that means: the sound of dry leaves crunching under your boots, that bite of crisp air as you step out with your coffee in the morning, and [enter overplayed cliché example number three here] because it’s officially fall! It also presents me with the privilege of plowing through a few reviews of scary movies eager to throw themselves out the door well before the big boys of horror barrel through the Halloween season. So sprinkle some pumpkin spice onto your popcorn, wrap a cable-knit cozy around your Icee, and settle in for a pair of scary movie releases—that’s right, a twofer!
In one corner, weighing in at far too many characters, more clichés than we care to count, and zero scares, we have Hell Fest, a Scream-style thriller that tosses a serial killer into a horror-themed amusement park.
In the other corner, weighing in at significantly more gore than expected and far too much sexual tension to ever be watched comfortably with family members, we have Lizzie, a film about the infamously independent American daughter-turned-murderer.
Our two opponents could not be further apart—one is an artsy flick that premiered at Sundance and has a killer cast (pun intended), and the other will likely fall to the bottom of the supermarket bargain bin of DVDs—they still have those, right? Anyway, ding ding! Let’s get ready to rumble.
Lizzie opens in the immediate and bloody aftermath of the murders of Andrew Borden and his wife Abby. Detectives are questioning Andrew’s daughter Lizzie, who is played superbly by Chloë Sevigny. The plot quickly jumps back to the start of the family’s most recent troubles, when they hired a new maid, played surprisingly decently by Kristen Stewart. The maid falls prey to the sexual whims of the head of the household, but soon finds comfort in Lizzie, who understands her father’s penchant for young women all too well, and who has also perhaps been told one too many times that she’s “just another girl past ripe who thinks she’s too special for this world.” Yikes.
Lizzie suggests that perhaps 19th-century American ladies fought many of the same battles that are still scarring women today. Perhaps #theytoo had an axe to grind. Literally. It’s not a comfortable film to watch, and probably deserves its own trigger warnings, but perhaps in that way, Lizzie offers its own unique brand of terror: the horrifying reality of assault, of knowing nothing can be done about it, and perhaps even worse, of watching too many women in power refuse to take action to stop it.
The film is artfully directed, delivers unapologetically on gore, and presents a creative timeline that most true crime fans would appreciate. Lizzie may not fit neatly into the horror or indie genres, and it may fall short of Sundance or Sevigny expectations, but it certainly makes for a curious little film. And if I’m being completely honest? It may be just the fix you need if you’re feeling you’ve reached your limit of scowling, angry, entitled men for one week. Just saying.
Hell Fest, on the other hand, is set in the present day, when a svelte young twenty-something named Natalie visits her childhood friend Brooke for a weekend of fun. Our protagonist is soon joined by Brooke’s buds—an appropriately-diverse and characteristically-unique set of other twenty-somethings—and dragged along on a night out at a traveling horror park. 
For unknown reasons, a hooded, masked man soon begins tracking and killing off the group, one by one, as they try to hide in the maze of haunted attractions.
There’s kind of a cute romance for a hot second and some pretty elaborate Halloween decor, but that’s about all that’s noteworthy or unique about this lazy slasher film. And truthfully, nothing can save it from being about as scary as a supermarket skeleton, or from its weak attempts at feminism, which fall well short of their mark, landing somewhere in the realm of 90s-brand “girl power.”
So there you have it, ladies and gents. After just one round, we have a winner: probably not the best of its breed, but certainly nothing like any film you’ve ever seen—Lizzie!
SpecialK Verdict: Unless you’re jonesing for fresh ideas for your Halloween-themed Pinterest board, skip Hell Fest, and see Lizzie instead—a discomforting, gory, and haunting little horror film.
Hell Fest opened September 28, and Lizzie opened widely September 14.
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