Founders Day

Founders Day (2023) is a political satire horror movie that is directed by Erik Bloomquist and co-written with his brother Carson Bloomquist. It is set in Fairwood, a quaint New England town which is full of mystery and chaos. It tells the story of an intense mayoral race set in a town steeped in mystery. A series of murders take place leading up the ornate celebrations that mark the town’s 300th birthday. A judge’s mask and robe shrouded killer mercilessly slashes the suspects, selected from within the candidates’ families and closes friends, fueling the suspicion and paranoia of the town.

🎥 Trailer Vibes

Festivities are featured in the beginning, of the town preppig for the celebration of their biggest tricentennial event and putting together the lavish Founders Day celebrations. But the mood is lifted when the masked killer comes into town and chaos breaks out. Along with snippets of frantic town hall meetings and intense antagonistic debates between candidates for the town’s mayor, the mood changes. With rapid transitions of chase scenes where people conceal their faces, a feeling of distrust spreads among the town. Townsfolk are left in suspense as they seek to discover the motives and identity behind the intended slasher while receiving snippets of the town’s politics and culture from the trailer itself slasher elements are mixed with small town ridicule.

🌟 Cast Highlights

A stubborn local journalist fighting against the odds for the truth behind the murders is played by Naomi Grace as Allison Chambers.

Devin Druid as Adam Faulkner – A political aspirant who finds himself in the murky waters of political violence as a young campaign aide.

William Russ as Mr. Jackson – An elder town official whose secrets may be linked to the ongoing murders.

Amy Hargreaves as Blair Gladwell – The current mayor desperately holding on to her office during the pandemonium.

Catherine Curtin as Commissioner Judith Peterson – The town’s police commissioner who tries to bring some semblance of order as fear grips the town.

Emilia McCarthy as Lilly Gladwell – The daughter of the mayor whose life gets complicated as a result of the unfolding events.

📖 Synopsis

In Fairwood, tensions simmer between current Mayor Blair Gladwell and challenger Harold Faulkner as the town gears up for its long-awaited Founders Day celebration. The situation escalates into one of brutality when members on both sides of the campaign are discovered murdered, with each crime scene publically defended by a masked “judge.” With the trust in authorities eroded and the body count growing, journalist Allison Chambers and aide Adam Faulkner are forced to take a deeper look into town’s past… only to unveil secrets that appear to be even more robustly entrenched than the motives of the killer. They face a race against time in a pursuit that needs them to untangle all the pieces as new murders are anticipated, all while navigating the dangerously shallow depths of small-town diplomacy and injustices.

Founders Day had its first appearance at the Popcorn Frights Film Festival on August 18, 2023 and had a limited theatrical release in the US on January 19, 2024, distributed by Dark Sky Films. The film is receiving mixed to average reviews because some notable journalist wrote and published that Founders Day balances the slasher genre with political manipulation, while others claim that it does not escape using mainstream genre tropes. Although most critics have split opinions on the film, it is undeniable that the film attempts to show an horror inversion of the political forces acting on small America towns, and for that, it will be recognized.