Mia-Kate Russell’s sapphic revenge slasher Penny Lane is Dead, streaming on Shudder, gets under your skin, and at times the gruesomeness becomes overwhelming. Still, this is an Australian horror that delivers one hell of a sucker punch.
The year is 1986, and a trio of girlfriends are about to embark on a celebratory weekend away in a beach house not far from town. Toni (Tahlee Fereday) is the tough, no-nonsense gal of the group, while Amy (Alexandra Jensen) is a delicate and loving wallflower. Finally, there’s Penny Lane (Bailey Spalding), the popular girl at school, who turns heads wherever she goes.
As their celebratory end-of-summer weekend kicks off, Amy is unaware that love is blossoming between Toni and Penny, and has been for a while, or that this weekend is a chance for them to snatch some alone time away from prying eyes. However, that plan is about to go up in flames when Kat (Sophia Wright-Mendelsohn) arrives.
Kat wasn’t invited, and for all three of them, her arrival brings a mix of anger, frustration, and despair, as she immediately tries to disrupt their celebrations. You see, Kat is the kind of girl nobody likes much, due to her catty tongue, constant troublemaking, and deep-seated jealousy, especially of Penny Lane. Still, she has brought a welcome gift, a plateful of cupcakes, and so the girls welcome her in, hoping they can get rid of her a few hours later. But Kat has a plan, and one of the cupcakes, the one given to Penny Lane, carries a nasty surprise that will be followed by another as Kat’s volatile and violent ex-convict boyfriend, Angus (Ben O’Toole) and his gang of thugs arrive.
Penny Lane is Dead is both a revenge movie, as Kat attempts to get even with the girls she blames for her own ostracism, and a home-invasion horror, as the uninvited and unhinged Kat, Angus, and his subservient goons unleash hell. As the tension and the horror mount, Mia-Kate Russell explores sexual violence, control and manipulation, and there is no doubt the brutality of this picture will prove triggering for some. Russell’s multiple awards for FX Makeup, before taking to the director’s chair, create a level of realism that’s often stomach-churning, and when paired with the atmospheric cinematography and sound design, Penny Lane is Dead becomes a visceral experience.
This is a movie where the demise of Angus and the deranged Kat, who hangs onto him like Harley Quinn does her Joker, can’t come soon enough. Yet Russell draws it out, as our final girl, Toni, is put through every imaginable horror, before arriving at a showdown that proves why Russell is one of the most exciting new Australian directors on the block.
If you can stomach the violence Penny Lane is Dead dishes out, there’s a whole lot to admire in this sapphic horror, from the gritty lead performance of Tahlee Fereday to the unhinged performances of Sophia Wright-Mendelsohn and Ben O’Toole and the energetic direction of Russell. Relentless, unnerving, yet wildly entertaining, Penny Lane is Dead once again proves why Aussie horrors are among the most gruesome and creative out there.
Penny Lane is Dead is now streaming on Shudder.
Follow Us