Set in a Nineties Arkansas hospital, 12 Hour Shift focuses on Mandy, a foul-mouthed, drug-abusing nurse. In need of a little extra cash (as most nurses unfortunately are), Mandy also has a side job – prepping patients to have their organs ‘donated’ to the black market by subtly murdering them.
Things are going pretty well for Mandy – despite the long hours at the hospital, there are a couple of patients who she begrudgingly likes or who are easy targets for theft/murder. That is until her cousin (by marriage, as we’re told many many times), Regina turns up, explaining that she is working as a courier for the black market organ business and has messed up her first assignment. That means she needs Mandy’s help to find a replacement kidney… or else Regina will be losing hers.
12 Hour Shift is hard to pin down, it is both a hilariously macabre farce and an intense heist movie. One thing that is clear is that this is for genre fans. Bursting with archetypal hyper-real, beautifully over-saturated characters and dripping with gloriously bloody murder, the movie features an outstanding central performance from Angela Bettis as Mandy who shoulders the entire tone of the of movies with every exasperated shrug she takes.
Brea Grant’s direction oozes style; the washed-out look of the drab hospital is enough to depress anyone and serves as an explosive counterpoint to the claret covered cadavers that Mandy and Regina leave in their wake.
12 Hour Shift is a deliciously dark, comic horror, elevated by its perfectly crafted aesthetic and killer performances to deliver a knowingly fun B-Movie genre delight.
FrightFest and Signature Entertainment present 12 Hour Shift in 2021.