Rhyme or Die
2021 · 11m · UK
Directed by Max r Lincoln
Genres: comedy, horror, sci-fi
Tones: dark, darkly comic
Five kidnapped strangers wake up wearing high-tech explosive collars and are forced by a demented DJ villain to freestyle rap to funky beats within a time limit — or die. A satirical horror-comedy skewering the cutthroat competition and toxic hustle culture of the creative industries.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
Saw-with-rapping in a locked-down nightclub, female Jigsaw DJ, lockdown-shaped staging. This is so dumb it loops back around to interesting — I refuse to pretend otherwise.
Pandemic distancing rules shaping the staging of a freestyle-rap death game is a clever production constraint, but the Saw/Squid Game lineage and 1.2M views on ALTER place this firmly in genre fan-service rather than the curatorial conversation. I am not the audience this film is courting.
Shot in a closed nightclub during COVID lockdown where the actual distancing rules shaped the deadly staging is the kind of constraint-as-aesthetic that I love — and 1.2M views on ALTER means the freestyle-or-die mechanic is landing. Saw-as-musical is a genuinely novel collision.
Reviews
The demented Dynamo is one of the more dynamic horror villains I've ever seen as she's kind of Jigsaw, but if he were a music DJ. A very entertaining, gory and twisted short.
It has a violent streak and manic personality... The balance between genres is excellent, it blends the comedy, horror and sci-fi extremely well.
Festivals
- Screamfest LA 2021
- Atlanta Underground Film Festival 2023, Best Horror Short
- Manchester Film Festival 2023, Best Screenplay Short
- Boston Underground Film Festival
- Milwaukee Film Festival
- Tottenham Film Festival 2024, Best Horror Film