Hostile Dimensions review – goofy no-budget horror opens portal to a parallel world

Made on what looks like a super dinky budget, perhaps just enough to cover some shonky visual effects and a catering table offering out-of-date Tunnock’s Teacakes and warm Irn-Bru, this Scottish horror feature at least has wit and few fun ideas. It’s apparently part of a suite of similarly micro-budgeted horror flicks that revolve around found footage made by the same cast and crew taking different roles and jobs on each movie. (Stablemates include Death of a Vlogger and the short film Katie’s Post-Apocalyptic Vlog.)

This effort, written and directed by Graham Hughes who also has a supporting role, starts with a bit of footage in which graffiti artist Emily (Josie Rogers) seemingly disappears into another dimension when she enters a door that’s standing on its own in an abandoned building. Later, low-budget film-makers Sam (Annabel Logan) and Ash (Joma West) come across the footage and somehow acquire the door itself which they set up in Ash’s flat. With trepidation, they open the portal, discovering a seemingly infinite number of worlds conjured by what the door-opener is thinking about at the time. By and by, they rope in random academic Innis (Paddy Kondracki) to provide explication dumps and eventually hold a different camera to record yet more footage. The stitching together of all this varied footage, shot on different rigs, adds some texture, as do the inventive designs for some of the other dimensions they encounter. For instance, there’s one with huge cetacean creatures swimming in the sky, another with giants, and a third that’s just your bog-standard climbing apparatus-filled kids’ play barn with a panda theme that turns sinister.

When it gets to the final act, the script feels a bit muddled and never quite comes up with a satisfying explanation for why this is all going on. That would be fine if by this point the film had created a more resonant sense of mystery, dread or uncanny weltschmerz , but instead it ends with a baffling sort of thud. It doesn’t help that while many of the cast members are clearly having fun and are generous enough to be working for little more than warm pop, their lack of acting skill is pretty apparent. Presumably, since the intended audience for this didn’t extend very far beyond the cast’s friends and family, that won’t matter that much.

• Hostile Dimensions is on digital platforms from 26 August.