GUTS
It is frustrating to be denied something to which you aspire and are qualified for, the hurt magnified when it is apparent that the reason given for being turned down is a lie because the truth is indefensible prejudice, that it is not that you are incapable of fulfilling the expectation but simply because there is a gatekeeper who does not want to be around you.
For Horace, interviewing for promotion with Mister Browns, it is not an unfamiliar situation, one that has dented his confidence even though he has taken steps to ensure his disability has little impact on his work, his co-workers in general supportive or at least accepting of the man in their midst who is noticeably different, at least until the arrival of new recruit Brody, determined to establish dominance via the path of least resistance.
Written and directed by We Summoned a Demon’s Chris McInroy and reuniting him with two of the cast of that messy horror short for another drenching, GUTS stars Kirk C Johnson as overly self-conscious Horace, Mike Carreon as his best friend Ronald, David E McMahon as Mister Browns, Sydney Huddleston as soft-spoken finance assistant Janet and Jeremy King as Brody, his mouth as wide as his shoulders.
One misinterpreted look away from a testosterone rage which is not covered by HR guidelines, GUTS is a reinvention of cubicle culture as bloody gladiatorial arena as Brody’s unwarranted challenge is first avoided then finally met by Horace, physically unprepared but carried forward by the determination to assert himself having dealt with a lifetime of being pigeonholed, underestimated and excluded, perhaps expecting to lose but knowing that he will at least go down fighting.
GUTS will be streaming on the Arrow platform from Friday 8th November
