The Shed

The Shed has got an original take on the creature in the shed genre and by and large it does look pretty good.

The film opens with Bane (Frank Whaley) being chased down and bitten by a creature, which he survives. However as the sun starts to rise he starts to react adversely but luckily he finds a shed to shelter in.

Switch to Stan (Jay Jay Warren) and his parents with whom appears to have the ideal life with mum and dad with goofy exchanges, orange juice for breakfast etc etc. Only it’s all a dream as Stan wakes up to a miserable existence out of reform school and staying with his abusive grandfather Ellis (Timothy Bottoms) on whose property the shed is on.

School is no better, his best friend Dommer (Cody Kostro) is subjected to bullying and he’s still got feelings for his ex, Roxy (Sofia Happonen). His reputation is of a delinquent with the teachers and the police keeping an eye on him too.

Back home while taking the dog for a walk he hears a noise in the shed and when he unleashes the dog to deal with the intruder, he gets the dog’s head thrown back at him. Grandpa Ellis is called but goes the way of the dog.

It soon becomes clear to Stan what he is dealing with and that the sensible way to deal with a creature that can’t stand daylight is to drill holes in the roof of what looks like a fragile building that could be demolished with much less effort.

Dommer turns up at the house after being badly beaten by Marble (Chris Petrovski0 and his gang and when Stan tells him about the occupant in the shed Dommer sees this as the opportunity to finally get his revenge on Marble and his gang. Into this we get police visits and recurring dreams culminating in a showdown of tepid proportions.

The Shed looks like a training film, the sort which allows cast and crew to make their mistakes hopefully learn from them and then move on. Which is odd as there is a lot of experience behind and in front of the camera. Writer/director Frank Sabatella is not a novice neither are Bottoms, Whaley and Siobhan Fallon Hogan playing the Sheriff. The rest of the cast are in inflexible stereotypical teenage roles that grate. There are some nasty bits and tense moments once the film breaks out of the shed but by then it’s running on the vapours of the tropes of the genre and it’s a slog to the end.