10 Unique Genre-Bending Indie Films Of 2020

10. The Pale Door

Genres: Western-Horror

The good old Western and horror go together like peanut butter and jam. That’s partly because the Western genre is often about the unknown dangers lurking in the wide and vast prairie, and on the edges of what was at the time the American frontier. It’s one see popping up every now and then with movies such as “Ravenous”, “Dead Birds”, “The Wind”, “Bone Tomahawk” - my personal favourite - or “The Pale Rider”. Sadly most people shy away from the good olde wild west movie, due to it’s nostalgia maybe, or because it has simply become niche.

THE PALE DOOR from writer/director Aaron B Koontz and his co-writers Keith Lansdale and Cameron Burns, definitely deserves a nod. This nail biting gem is a perfect mash up of the two genres, and also pays enough attention to it’s characters and quite a bit of heart. I’d like to compare it to JJ Abram's “Overlord” which also starts with both feet planted firmly in the grounded Western genre, with a gang of outlaws preforming a train robbery before slowly immersing itself in the strange and frightening world of a town full of witches … It also brings a vibe of folk horror with it, and that is what makes this movie so enjoyable.

Instead of zombies and cannibals these cowboys encounter something more settled in the old lore, much like “Apostle” or even “The Kill List”. Spooky! Yeah!