[Fantasia 2025] FILM REVIEW: Hold the Fort

Hold the Fort - Fantasia World Premiere Review

Director: William Bagley

Starring: Chris Mayers, Haley Leary, Ryan Monolopolus, Levi Burdick

Written by: William Bagley, Scott Hawkins

Produced by: Matt Dodd, Tim Reis, Julian Smith, Luke Michael Williams, William Bagley

Cinematography by: Alex Allgood

Original Score by: Team Lovett

Synopsis:

After moving to the suburbs, a young couple find themselves trapped in an epic battle between their new HOA and an onslaught of monsters from hell.

Thoughts:

A hilarious horror comedy with snappy dialogue and over the top gore is always a good time and 'Hold the Fort' delivers everything it advertises.

Lucas and Jenny are a young married couple who have decided to leave the big lights of city life to move to the peaceful suburbs and become home owners for the first time. Sadly for them, their first home is part of a housing community that resides close to the gates of Hell, and moving day just happens to fall on the Equinox, the one day a year that all the monsters from the dark underground rise to the surface to cause havoc.

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Don't worry though, they've been invited to a party by the leader of their HOA and along with their neighbours, they get the full rundown of what to expect. Lucas and Jenny clearly think this is a joke of some kind, maybe an initiation ceremony or something, but their smiles soon turn to screams when later that evening they are set upon by deadly witches, raging zombies, a giant werewolf and a "Nazgul looking motherfucker".

William Bagley knows how to write comedy. This is his second feature film and although the humour is a little slow at the beginning, by the thirty minute mark I was hooked. The acting is over the top but it's supposed to be. This is kind of a parody of a survival horror film and heavily inspired by the likes of Sam Raimi's 'Evil Dead'. It doesn't take itself too seriously and I didn't really care which characters lived or died, but we're really just here for the journey, which is insane and chaotic and unpredictable.

"Did somebody order...broom service?" - McScruffy

Although the characters are paper thin, they are all pretty funny in their own way. Lucas is like a younger, skinnier, Temu Ryan Reynolds. Then there's the older couple Ted and Annette, played by Levi Burdick and Michelle Lamb. They've seen it all before and can go from zero to 100 in the space of a few seconds. Burdick really grew on me as the film progressed. And there's the drug addict Leslie, who seems to think all she needs to survive the night is a bunch of cocaine.

McScruffy, played by stunt performer Hamid-Reza Benjamin Thompson, is the "action hero" of the group. He's fully armoured up with a selection of guns and bad attitude. He's got some great one-liners. In fact the entire script is full of one-liners and hilarious throwaway dialogue.

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It's low budget so it doesn't quite have that cinematic look. It looks and feels a little bit like a network sitcom like 'Schitt's Creek'. But when it needs to deliver the blood and gore and absurdity of the monster attacks, it does so in spades and at 74 minutes runtime it never outstays it's welcome.

Verdict: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

-Gavin Logan

'Hold the Fort' received its World Premiere at Fantasia '25 on July 16th