A Taste of Potential, a Taste of Disappointment, A TASTE OF PHOBIA
Brand new to DVD from Philadelphia’s Artsploitation Films, horror anthology A Taste of Phobia sets out to present a series of shorts highlighting the dangers of “unchecked phobias”. Enlisting 14 international directors, the results aren’t much different than many anthology films; that is, they vary. Some of the shorts are better than others and some present some interesting potential, but others fall incredibly short.
Unfortunately, the overall quality of the short isn’t overly impressive. The high points primarily consist of moments that highlighting interesting potential in some of the directors. The low points represent barely watchable trash. However, at only 90 minutes, with each short only being a few minutes in length, even the slowest moments don’t last too long. This allows the film to move at a pretty brisk pace, even if not all too enjoyable.
Fans of extreme gore will find a few segments that tickle such a fancy. The opening segement, for example, has a couple of pretty brutal and bloody moments. In those moments, the gorehounds watching will, at the very least, get some cringeworthy gore gags that should satiate desire for some viscera. Outside of these moments, the highlights contained in this one are limited mostly to an extremely cool piece of cover art and the occasionally interesting idea or camera shot. Hopefully, the shorts in this film act mostly as starting points for potential that has yet to be fulfilled by the budding filmmakers featured here.
This all said, with a pricepoint ranging from $9-12 for the DVD, this disc remains a decent purchase for a horror fan looking for some shorts or a filmmaker looking for some inspiration (on both what works and what doesn’t work).
