House of Black Wings Review

House of Black Wings. Sword and Cloak Productions. Reviewed by Brian Kirst

With tail tucked firmly between her legs and scars (both emotional and physical) intact, a failed rocker finds herself returning to her home state. While helping her only welcoming friend with repairs around a gothic apartment building, our Little Ms. Courtney Love soon finds herself haunted by noises within the apartment walls and mysterious manuscripts and pieces of music are soon emerging from the interiors of the building’s pipes and drains.

With Lovecraftian verve, writer and director David Schmidt parallels the hard rocking songstress’ emotional turmoil with the mysterious things she is experiencing within the complex. Nicky (the unsurprisingly stressed singer) and landlady-friend Robyn are also vividly presented by Schmidt, making for a compelling duo-and keeping one duly interested in the strange events at hand.

Said events include mysterious basement attacks, vivid finger spewing dreams and the restless wonderings of the building’s inhabitants including a sweetly damaged wannabe guitarist and a scratchily manic writer. This being a Lovecraft affair, some surprising creatures and fluttering objects also make some intriguing latter day appearances as well.

As poignant as it is oddly paranoiac and featuring fearlessly passionate performances from Leah Myette and Katherine Herrera, House of Black Wings is a sweet and silkily dreamy adventure, leaving one waiting impatiently for further travels into Schmidt’s dark and fertile mind space.

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