After snagging 4th place in the Suspense-Thriller short category at the Indie Gathering, writer/director Eric Bair's latest short film Descensus ad Mortem is getting set for its August screening at Action on Film, one of microcinema's premiere fests. 

The film stars Carol Hannan as Delia, an elderly widow who must overcome her fear of falling in order to descend the stairs of her oceanside home in order to discover what her late husband left buried for her underneath the beach below. 

In many ways, Descensus ad Mortem is an ordinary story constructed within the realm of the suspense/thriller genre. However, in this case the real suspense is turned inward as Delia's human spirit is forced to confront the growing impact of aging and the very real and legitimate fears borne out of her life experiences. 

The film also stars, via flashbacks, James E. Clark as her late husband Harold along with Joseph Tanner Paul as her grandson. At just under 16 minutes, Descensus ad Mortem is a slice of life in which those fears presented ripple across the universal experience. Bair takes his time telling the story, which may be difficult to understand given the film's rather modest running time. However, the way that Bair constructs the story we're dealing almost exclusively with Delia's amped up anxieties and slow movements toward confronting her fears. 

Descensus ad Mortem has also been accepted into the Huntington Beach Film Festival. 

Descensus ad Mortem is, at times, hindered by the inherent difficulties of creating a solid, low-budget sound mix at such a challenging location but in most other ways the location pays off greatly. 

For more information on Descensus ad Mortem, visit the film's official website linked to in the credits. 

© Written by Richard Propes
The Independent Critic