‘Every town has secrets’
Braxton Butcher – aka The Butchering – is a 2015 British serial killer thriller written and directed by Leo McGuigan (The Morrigan), making his feature debut. The What’s Next Films production stars Shaun Blaney, Jenna Byrne and Vicky Allen.
Every town has a devil. For the small community of Braxton, that devil is Tommy Miller. A bullied and tormented teen who finally snapped, killing his friends and family at the annual Braxton town hall party, Miller escaped into the woods, never to be seen or heard from again.
Ten years later, a group of fresh-faced teens finds themselves targeted by a masked man in a hooded cloak. It’s up to Detective Ryan Fenton and his fish-out-of-water partner to protect the town from Miller’s clutches; there’s just one issue – Ryan himself is a survivor of the original massacre. Is Miller opening up a new chapter, or has he returned to attend to some unfinished business?
Braxton Butcher is released on DVD in the UK by Left Films in 2018. In the United States, Wild Eye Releasing issued the film on DVD as The Butchering on March 27, 2018.
Buy DVD: Amazon.com
Reviews:
“The script is clever in taking the viewer deeper into the living legend that is Tommy Miller. The issue lies mostly with the pacing of the entire film. It does drag a bit at times, which does cause some disinterest in the characters designated as prey. Looking for a lot of blood? This is not the film to see. High body count? Then absolutely. Some of the fight scenes have something to be desired.” Sarah Salvaggio, Cryptic Rock
“Belfast filmmaker McGuigan, making his feature debut, shows directorial promise with a couple of effectively suspenseful set-ups, making evocative use of tight spaces, open spaces, faces at the window and misdirection. He also, sadly, loses much goodwill with an endless climax aping the tediously contrived Scooby-Doo finales of the Scream films, killing any tension stone-dead.” Steven West, Horrorscreams Videovault
Main cast:
- Shaun Blaney – The Frankenstein Chronicles TV series
- Jenna Byrne
- Vicky Allen
- Diona Doherty
- Andrew Stanford
- Ciaran McCourt
- Joshua Colquhoun
- Rachel Morton
- Philip Rafferty
- Odhran McNulty
- Brandon McCaffrey
- Natalie Curran
- Stephen Foster
- Larry Cowan
- Stephanie Donaghue
Filming locations:
Belfast, County Antrim, Northern Ireland, UK
Film Facts:
The film’s original title was simply Braxton
