The Bridge

A youth has a terrifying experience while crossing a bridge that has a sinister history.

Jack (Wallace), a college student, is walking home through a park and chatting with his his friend David (McMillan) over the phone. The area is deserted and when Jack reaches an old bridge, his mate informs him about the structure's dark past that theorises that a woman named Marrion Brown (Sims) threw her baby of that bridge, before jumping of it herself. Now it is said that her spirit haunts the bridge and approaches people who come near it and if they upset her, they die. Jack refuses to beleive any of this and after he hangs up, a woman suddenly appears and asks him where her child is. Could she be Brown?

Filmed on location in Dumbarton, Scotland, this short horror film begins with a quote from Friedrich Nietzsche's book Beyond Good and Evil, with the apparent intention of setting up a spooky mood and it was a good idea, as this is a spooky story about a ghost encounter.

Over its four-minute duration, this short effectively reveals the bridge's sinister background, thus preparing the viewer for the encounter with the supernatural entity. Arguably, it is when Jack discovers the phantom (or maybe it discovers him) that the film reaches its high point, thanks to the ominous score by Taha Khan, the work of make-up artist Sammi Rausch, the sound of demonic laughter and Sims's performance. Sims is the one who steals the show as the spectre and there are close-ups to show her character's monstrous face in detail.

The concept is simple and contains elements that are common in horror: a character is alone and they go to a place with a bad history, where they encounter a threatening being. Nothing original, however it is an intriguing viewing with significant creativity and decent acting.

Speaking of creativity, apart from the aspects mentioned above, praise also goes Lara Sluyter's contribution regarding sounds of screaming and to the animation that involves text messaged appearing in a bubble and the stylised letters during the closing credits. Also, the inclusion of the song The Backrooms by Myuu works very well.

One might think twice about crossing a bridge after watching this. Overall, this a good horror film and a spooky one, however one might argue that it might had been spookier if the story took place during night-time.