I’ll be honest–I’ve got a sincere hunger for anything that involves buildings, homes, and other public and private spaces being inhabited by something dreadful, something otherworldly, or some kind of ghost.  The Rogers Theater in Wausau, Wisconsin is one of the many perfect examples of this–lots of mystery, lots of bad feelings and suspicions from the general public, and a crazy-ass basement filled with dust, decrepit bricks, and hope for a possible haunting.  

Filmmaker Ben Wydeven used the Rogers as a basis for his film The Medium concerning, as you guessed it, a person who communicates with dead, unresting spirits.    Raven Jones, a character that Wydeven and his film company Makeshift Productions plan to develop further in a possible prequel, sees and hears what horrors have plagued the Rogers Theater in this 20 minute film.  As a character, Jones is relatively well developed as is his counterpart, Tom Geideman, the theater’s owner–a character prone to rage and anger, especially with Jones who is curious about the spirits haunting the theater and how they relate to Mr. Geideman.  As the story progresses more facts come out of Mr. Geideman about the occurrences at the theater and reveal themselves slowly through  the course of the movie to end abruptly and with an astonishing finality.  

In my estimation, Wydeven’s film is successful because of this slow revelation of facts and occurrences that build up to a conclusion because he follows historical precedence in film making and the ideas of narrative.  The movie (again, only 20 minutes long) is suspenseful, concise, and scary as shit.  Wydeven limited his use of "scary" shots and used them in the right places to make them more effective than most independent horror films I see.  Even with the perfect location of the theater it still takes a trained eye to capture the creepiest and most disturbing shots and Wydeven succeeds in this as well.  With the perfect setting, a decent story, and a few basic special effects Wydeven has made his mark in the low-fi thriller/horror genre.

Available on DVD.
Trailer and website: http://themediummovie.com/Home_Page.html