There's One Inside the House
2018 · 11m · United States
Directed by D.M. Cunningham
Genres: action, comedy, horror
Tones: darkly comic, tense, theatrical
A monster hunter wakes in the middle of the night to find the monster he was tracking already inside his house, and plans with HQ to go back in and fight it.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
A monster hunter cornered by his own prey in his own home—it's a premise that flips the power dynamic entirely, and Cunningham leans into the absurdist panic of it, mixing tactical urgency with theatrical desperation in a way that makes the whole thing feel like a fever dream rather than a genre exercise.
The theatrical staging and measured pacing show a filmmaker aware of horror-comedy's formal constraints, using spatial limitation and radio communication as structural devices that recall both home-invasion thriller conventions and absurdist comedy lineage.
The decision to keep the monster largely unseen while focusing on the hunter's escalating paranoia and physical performance transforms what could be a straightforward creature feature into something lean and character-driven—it's restraint as style, making every reaction beat count.
Festivals
- Nightmares Film Festival 2018, Official Selection, Nominated Best Horror Comedy Short Film
- Shriekfest 2018, Official Selection (West Coast Premiere)
- Dead of Night Film Festival 2018, Official Selection (UK Premiere)
- Thriller Chiller 2018, Official Selection
- Women in Horror Film Festival 2018, Official Selection (East Coast Premiere)