Starring Clare Langford, Andrew Mullan, Gabrielle Curtis, Tom Hall, Andrew Cunningham, Christopher Ettridge, Jackie Haliday and Ryan Wichert. Written, produced and directed by Mark Duffield.

In Victorian London a young gentleman named Lorcan (Mullan) checks into a hospital, where his rare illness is studied as he receives blood transfusions. He meets a sensitive nurse called Amy (Langford) and they fall in love, but Lorcan’s true nature will doom their relationship…  

We realise early on that Lorcan is not a normal chap when he puts his hand into a shaft of morning light and blood bubbles to the surface of his skin, and he also drinks blood from a nurse’s cut finger. Lorcan does attempt to act normally and bonds with Amy, who shows him around London but, later, after he is taken to see an illegal bareknuckle fight by a hospital worker, Lorcan is unable to stave off his darker urges any longer, killing a would-be mugger, then winching the body aloft on a rope and bathing in his victim’s blood!

Amy supplies Lorcan with a jar of blood from the hospital and, as their connection to each other intensifies, they eventually have sex, triggering a transformation in Lorcan… who becomes a sharp-toothed demon-lover equipped with large, bat-like wings! Lorcan proceeds to feed on Amy’s blood like a vampire.

As the story unfolds, Lorcan loses his hair and stalks the hospital naked (save for a top hat), sporting Nosferatu-style front-fangs and pointy ears, savagely killing Amy’s friend (and fellow nurse), Rose. This murder is witnessed by Rook, the sneaky hospital worker, who decides to make money from Lorcan’s supernatural savagery by forcing him to fight in an illegal bareknuckle boxing contest. Lorcan sucks the blood from his opponent and sprouts his great demon wings, much to the surprise of the crowd.

Amy, still in love with demon-Nosferatu-Lorcan, allows him to feed from her neck again, but, when she finds Rook’s severed head in a hat box, she realises Lorcan is out of control. Meanwhile, Dr Edward and Professor Darkwood, two professionals who have unravelled the origins of Lorcan, discuss what can be done to deal with the demon but, frustratingly, they never actually get around to doing anything. So it is left to Amy to take care of the demon by locking herself in a church belfry with Lorcan, permitting him to drain her of her blood, buying time (as in 1979’s NOSFERATU THE VAMPYRE) for the sun to rise and destroy the demon. After the sunlight causes the crestfallen Lorcan’s demon-wings to catch fire, he reverts back to human form and lies next to Amy’s body, where he expires beside her.  

Director Mark Duffield, who made the very enjoyable Thai-set horror film GHOST OF MAE NAK (2005), goes out of his way here to ensure this production is filled with lots of period detail. It’s actually quite amazing that Duffield managed to make this feature-length Victorian horror-romance for the astoundingly tiny sum of £25,000 (which included the cost of submitting it to film festivals and putting it out on DVD)!

Serving as art director, editor, cinematographer and producer, Duffield also supplied the Victorian props and costumes and, most importantly, wrote the script. Though the plot needed more narrative drive in places (due to the passivity of characters like Dr Edward and Professor Darkwood), and the nature of Lorcan’s true origins remained somewhat fuzzy (is he the cursed progeny of an incubus, or is he the direct descendent of Legion, the fallen angel?), Duffield is to be praised for choosing to focus his story on a visually interesting, winged, hairless, William Blake-style demon, rather than plump for an easier-to-do supernatural being like a vampire.

Andrew Mullen is at his best when playing Lorcan in the earlier portion of the film, when he is seeking help for his blood condition and seems vulnerable and genuinely unsure of what he truly is (he even gives Dr Edward the papyrus texts that could potentially provide information to bring about his downfall) – but after Lorcan falls in love, triggering his descent into full demonhood, Mullen struggles somewhat to exude the required moody-but-intriguing qualities to really convince us he’s a magnetic, brooding man-demon capable of captivating Amy. Clare Langford, however, is quite affecting in the role of the caring, good-natured, bookish, empathetic Amy. She does convince us that Amy is a loving character capable of falling under the spell of Lorcan. Andrew Cunningham also delivers a decent performance as the likely lad chancer Rook.

To boost the film’s production values, Duffield shoots some scenes of his lead characters visiting London locations like Tower Bridge and the Albert Memorial, and he also manages to capture several gorgeous-looking skyscapes, most notably when Lorcan climbs onto the hospital roof. Deciding not to let his tiny budget get in the way, Duffield had sets built and fills the story with such elements as a dude dressed in a bear pelt fighting in the bareknuckle ring, and street scenes featuring extras wearing Victorian costumes.

The music score by Stephen Bentley-Klein is quite sumptuous, helping to infuse the film with an old school horror movie vibe. Duffield adds to the Hammer/Amicus/Tyburn-esque nature of the production by including nods to Jack the Ripper, Dracula, Dr Jekyll and so on, eschewing the urge to go too hyper gory. Perhaps (due to the minuscule size of the budget, crew and time schedule) the lighting is merely adequate in places, but even then Duffield offsets the flatness of the lighting by making the edges of the frame in some scenes slightly blurred and out of focus. It’s an interesting touch.

Creature Effects Designer James Alexander deserves a pat on the back for sculpting the demon’s bat-like wings, which are a fine example of practical effects done well. The shots of the outstretched wings are, for me, the standout moments in the film, and it’s to Duffield’s credit that he strived to include this imagery in such a modestly-budgeted movie.

The Creature Floor Effects Supervisor, Sophie Clayton, warrants a lot of praise for helping these shots work too. She was also the Creature Effects Technician and puppeteer working the wings, as was fellow Creature Effects Technician Miriam Hammond.

As a self-funded project, DEMON is an eye-catching film that showcases Duffield’s ability to oversee an entire production almost single-handedly, and it poses the question: imagine what Duffield could achieve if he was given the opportunity to helm a bigger-budgeted genre movie? He’d surely show us what he could REALLY do then. 

Finally, one more look at the demon…