Nicole's boyfriend has just asked her to marry him and things couldn't be any better. But shortly after the proposal Nicole's dad gets himself in trouble with Nicole having to carry half the burden as well, and if that wasn't bad enough, her boyfriend Lee gave her a cursed wedding ring and she soon discovers that a ghostly bride from hell is stalking her and her loved ones.
British films are for most of the time a pleasure to watch, at least when they have humor attached to them and Hellbride is no exception. Well at least that goes for the humorous parts and while some of the horror is all right, some of it is also questionable. The intro itself sets the movie up in a very good way with a narrator giving us some background while we're shown cool drawings in B&W, and this little segment provides a great feeling of what is to come.
We're soon introduced to Lee Parker who's buying a ring and immediately sees exactly what he wants. So he picks the ring up, proposes to his girlfriend Nicole and from that moment on everything seems nice and dandy. Too bad for Lee and his bride-to-be the ring is cursed and it doesn't take long before poor Nicole starts to suffer from horrible visions. If things weren't bad enough, she catches her dad right after he has just killed a guy, but since she really cares for him and wants nothing to ruin her future wedding she helps her dad out and so is willing to live with this dark secret. As the visions becomes worse, Nicole and her best friend pays a visit to a cousin in London who is more than knowledgeable when it comes to black magic and supernatural elements. He explains that the ring belongs to an ancient bride that was stood up at her wedding, who then snapped and has since then haunted those poor souls who have come upon the ring. Luckily this smart cousin has a "cure" for their problem but as we all know, big problems never go away very easily.
 
Hellbride is a pretty fun ride mixing comedy and horror with characters that for most of the time are very down to earth and so it makes it easier for the viewer to follow them and relate to some of what they're doing. All the main characters provide the viewer with a good feel because of the fact that they seem very natural. In other words, we're not dealing with any clueless moronic teens here so thank you Pat Higgins for that. As for the comedy, you find it here and there, popping up every now and then the film throughout and provides the viewer with a good laugh to keep things going. The humor is truly an important element here and is in the end what saves this film.
As for the story, while it didn't make me go whoa! it played out just fine and the overall film was very easy to sit through. Now since we're dealing with an indie feature here some of the effects tend to be a bit tacky and the bad is sometimes too noticeable, but this is all a minor issue though and is nothing that couldn't be fixed with a higher budget, and if you're used to watching indie flicks you'll see that this one is above average, at least when it comes down to what it looks like. My only real problem was that the whole wedding scene towards the very end was a bit too long and was lacking the humor the film carried earlier which left one with some uninteresting horror scenes. Still though, the overall film has a whole bunch of cool things to offer including believable acting and a few good laughs.
Pat Higgins' Hellbride is a well-working indie film with a story that is easy to get into and characters that do deliver the goods. Best of all is the humor and whenever its present, Hellbride is a joy to watch. On the horror front it doesn't work wonders and while it's a humorous film that's not supposed to scare the crap out of you some of the horror scenes could use some improvement. I think it's safe to say to that we should keep an eye out for Higgins in the future.
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ALTERNATIVE TITLE:
MOVIE YEAR: 2007
DIRECTOR: Pat Higgins
WRITING CREDITS: Pat Higgins
GENRE: Horror, Comedy
CAST: James Fisher, Eleanor James, Rebecca Herod
COUNTRY: UK
RUNTIME: 75 min
RATING: 6/10
Hellbride Website/IMDB Click here
Hellbride Trailer Click here
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