Running Time: 95 Minutes
Starring: Caspian Faye, Emily Booth, Nina Courson, Sylvia Soska
Time and time again, FrightFest has proven that it has wonderful working relationships with many creatives. Take Dan Schaffer, the writer behind Danny Dyer starrer Doghouse who also has written for previous FrightFest works, The Scribbler, and Peripheral. At the same festival, Schaffer now makes his directorial debut with Electric Meat, a work which the poster describes as "an expressionist nightmare."
This experimental tale follows a failed artist turned butcher (Caspian Faye), who keeps trying to fulfil his photography dreams despite constant rejections. After discovering one of his models (Nina Courson) has been murdered, the butcher decides to keep her body. It turns out that the model does not want to stay dead, which may serve as a newfound inspiration for The Butcher. Meanwhile, his ex-model landlady (Emily Booth) grows eager to reconnect with her past career by becoming The Butcher's new subject.
What has been crafted is a surreal psycho-sexual work, utilising dizzying imagery within a black-and-white palette for this largely wordless feature. Perhaps this is meant to be an insight into the protagonist's creative process, and what lengths he will take to realise his vision. Central to this is the Butcher, whose daily work with meat has left him comfortable with corpses, leaving the lines to blur for him. Just in case you did not get that, his models are photographed in t-shirts with the word MEAT on it.
But it seems all for naught, as he receives constant rejections regarding his art. He lives in the hope that a new inspiration will change his fortunes, with the spark coming courtesy of his deceased muse. The Butcher also has an obsession with an adult film star, as seen by the many magazine covers that adorn his walls. It all hopes to capture an insight into this unsettled mind, but instead of generating interest, this hollow feeling work just tests the patience.
The intended moments of expressionism quickly grow tiresome, feeling like a thin excuse to replace substance with increased scenes of naked women in suggestive poses. It feels like a fracturing mental state sponsored by Babestation. The result comes off as a student film made by someone who wanted to emulate David Lynch, but got distracted by a noughties lads mag. When the story requires women fighting over the bland male protagonist, it just hammers home what a slog this truly is. Electric Meat does not live up to its name, as it is neither electrifying nor meaty.
Electric Meat made its World Premiere at FrightFest 2026
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