A cosmic fireball crashes into remote woodland, awakening a terrifying creature hidden in the depths. 1976: James Wheeler enters a cave determined to uncover the truth – and is never seen again. All that’s found is a single frame of Super 8 film, capturing the silhouette of a horrifying creature. Now Wheeler’s granddaughter, along with five explorers, set out to investigate the legend of the ‘Bone Keeper’. But deep in the caves, they realise they are being hunted, and the line between hunter and prey blurs. Will they uncover the truth and escape the creature – or become the next missing souls?
Howard J. Ford (Dark Game, Escape) is the director and writer of Bone Keeper, which stars Tiffany Hannam-Daniels (River of Blood), Sarah Alexandra Marks (Escape, Punch, Bogieville), Louis James (Help, Manor of Darkness), and the legendary Rhys-Davies (Lord of the Rings, Raiders of the Lost Ark). The film had its world premiere at FrightFest in Glasgow and is soon to be released on digital platforms…and this is a very, very important thing. Please, allow me to elucidate.
We are at a threshold, a crossroad in the world of digital media where a new, powerful protagonist, backed by countless corporations, is trying to break (or more likely force) its way into the world of cinema. This new protagonist’s name is AI Slop and I just watched a Facebook video where a Chinese woman was painting murals with her hair, whipping it around in motions that defy physics and creating beautiful works of art that would likely take days in reality. Yesterday, it was a cat doing Kung Fu in full garb and tomorrow it’s probably going to be Garfield marrying Ellen Ripley aboard the Starship Enterprise. Every one of these videos—unfortunately—had the same star protagonist: AI Slop. I can also unequivocally inform you, dear reader, that the vast majority of film-watchers and art-enjoyers want little to no AI in their evening entertainment. Most people do not want what others believe is inevitable.
And Bone Keeper is absolutely kowtowing to the AI trend. From the film’s opening scenes, we are introduced to the creature in its natural habitat. The uncanny valley hits instantly as our already-trained eyes catch those inconsistencies that AI simply misses. It’s alien, but not in a good way. Many of us are also trained to be on the lookout for AI clues in media, social or otherwise, and the appearance of it in film is also going to instantly take me out of that suspension of disbelief as my mind shifts to trying to identify the patterns.
I understand that it took us a while to get used to the blue crackling energy of 80s SFX and the janky polygons of the 90s. We’ve all had a good laugh at the B-grade budget effects of indie productions, but we also marvelled at the ingenious ways that creatives used practical effects, light and angle trickery, ingenious sound effects, and creative camera tricks used to get the perfect shot…we could sit here all evening and discuss the miraculous milestones movie pioneers invented in ways to make film magical. It’s an art form. And we need to protect our art forms.
Notice how the creature here…
Revealing the creature in the opening scenes is commonly considered a faux pas in creature features. This is generally because of budgets, but also for the sake of building tension and the excitement of the eventual reveal in our film’s big monster moment. We do not get those usual steps with Bone Keeper for two main reasons. The first is that we are just generating our monster, so it’s really not that expensive. The second is because the monster looks like absolute shit. It truly feels like someone used a Midjourney prompt with the words “scary tentacle monster made of human flesh and bone that never settles on a consistent form,” and that’s pretty much it. It’s not memorable because…well, because it’s not anything really. It’s just goop. And that’s fine if you’re remaking “The Blob,” but this thing is sometimes spiny, sometimes slimy, sometimes hairy, but always rocking that ‘too many fingers, too many teeth’ vibe that we still get from generative AI.
…Looks nothing like the creature here?
The rest of the film is fine. It’s not great. The actors tried their best with what was ultimately a very unambiguous, unambitious script. The story felt very repetitive for this particular genre—missing person, group of friends, travel to a small town, urban legend mystery, creepy locals, don’t listen to the lore, nom nom nom. You get the picture. The score is barely worth mentioning, and the editing was a tad unusual, especially with the cuts mid-kill going back to another group and with other scenes ending abruptly. There wasn’t really anyone or anything to root for, and with no stakes in the game, it’s hard to care.
This isn’t it. This isn’t where we want genre film, and horror film in particular, to be headed. There is an entire industry that relies on the passions of individuals with very different and particular skill sets that all work hand-in-hand to create movie magic. Sometimes it succeeds, sometimes it fails, and sometimes we get to experience a true masterpiece. And that’s the point, friends.
AI is never going to give you the next masterpiece. It’s never going to create something that will blow your mind. Right now, its purpose is to do exactly what we ask it to do, and that’s usually to make the most palatable, generic, universally appealing, agreeable swill. If you want to give this a go yourself and make up your own mind—by all means—go ahead. Bone Keeper will be released on April 6th and is available for preorder here if you feel like you, too, need to kowtow to the inevitable AI overlords. Thanks for reading, and as always, stay sordid. Trailer and artwork below.
