Red Mist
Red Mist (titled Freakdog in the US) is a 2008 horror film directed by Paddy Breathnach (who also directed Shrooms).
The film centres around a group of young medical students who, while out partying one night, spike the drink of a loner colleague, the severely disturbed Kenneth (cruelly nicknamed 'Freakdog' by most of the group). The cocktail of drugs and alcohol unfortunately turns out to be a very powerful sedative that, combined with a severe epileptic fit, puts Kenneth into a coma. The students, not wanting to be involved or else risk their futures for their crime, abandon his body on a road and drive off as fast as they can, hoping someone will come across his body and help him. When they later learn that Kenneth's life support is to be turned off, one of the students, Catherine (who was very much against the whole thing in the first place), attempts to set things right and revive him using an experimental drug. The result has horrible and unintended consequences which leads to Kenneth's brainwaves going berserk, leading to out-of-body experiences - enabling Kenneth to possess others in order to exact bloody revenge...
Not to be confused with the character from Kick-Ass, or the trope Pink Mist.
- Alpha Bitch: Harriet has shades of this.
- Arc Words: "Freakdog".
- Asshole Victim: From the moment he appears on screen, you just know that Sean's going to meet a sticky end before the credits roll.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Kenneth. True, he was a little creepy but ultimately pretty harmless prior to his coma.
- Body Surf: What Kenneth does to several characters. Afterwards, they have no memory of the possession, which is particularly distressing for the security guard, who ends up imprisoned for a murder he doesn't remember - and technically didn't commit.
- Break the Cutie: Catherine, Catherine, Catherine.
- The Bully: Pretty much all of the main characters with the exception of Catherine, but Sean takes the cake.
- California Doubling: Set in the USA, filmed in Northern Ireland.
- Cassandra Truth: And how. Poor Catherine...
- Covert Pervert: Kenneth.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: The deaths of Sean (who suffers arguably the most horrific death in the entire film) and Harriet.
- Death by Sex: Sean is killed after one of his regular meet-ups for sex with Shelby. Unfortunately for him, on this occasion, Shelby isn't quite herself...
- Disproportionate Retribution: The ways in which Kenneth offs his victims are rather... extreme, to say the least.
- Downer Ending: After killing Kenneth and apparently stopping his murder spree, Catherine is arrested and charged with Kenneth's out-of-body crimes, and ends up in an institution. If that wasn't bad enough, it turns out that Kenneth isn't quite dead after all, and lives on through her.
- Embarrassing Nickname: Freakdog.
- Facial Horror: Off-screen, but still deserves a mention: After Sean's corpse is discovered, it is mentioned that half of his face had practically melted off. Unsurprising, given that he'd been force-fed industrial strength acid.
- Flatline
- Freudian Excuse: The reason Kenneth is so messed up is explained in a flashback, revealing that, as a child, he witnessed his mother, who was a prostitute, being beaten to death by a client after she refused to have sex with him.
- Hospital Hottie: All of the main characters, and Shelby.
- Gorn
- Gory Discretion Shot: There isn't much gory detail during Sean's death - all the viewer gets to see is a sudden surge of blood gurgling up into the funnel. Of course, the viewer doesn't really need to see the detail, as the scene is still utterly horrifying. Sean's terrified screams as he lies helpless just make it worse.
- Jerkass: Sean. All of the other students (with the exception of Catherine) qualify, too, but not nearly to the same extent as Sean.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Catherine unwittingly makes everything worse by giving Kenneth the experimental drugs in an attempt to help him.
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge
- Stalker with a Crush: Kenneth towards Catherine.