Horror cinema is no stranger to the likes of cannibalism, misguided morals and tales of dark secrets that only the audience are privy to as unbeknownst characters fall into traps of gnarly gruesomeness. Yet, these common tropes are often enacted in an all too familiar way. In turn, becoming overdone and predictable. However, every now and again comes along a film that is alight with unconventionality and a raw sense of genuine horror that both startles and excites. Filmmaker Zoe Berriatúa delivers 'Free Buffet', an integrally brutal feature that sees the seedy facets of culture and treacherous humanity seep into a whirlwind story of flesh, blood and bone, all captured in a tonally claustrophobic and unforgiving urban landscape.
The film opens with a swooping point-of-view shot told through the eyes of a pigeon as it flies through a desolate indoor market before it is swatted away as a stall holder declares that the restaurant next door, owned by an East-Asian couple, is killing local aves for food - a racial sentiment that metastasises throughout the rest of the film. As Free Buffet goes on to explore, continuous quips of insular beliefs all go on to exacerbate the cruel world that the married pair, Xian (Yan Huang) and Ikki (Carlos Wu), have found themselves desperate to survive in. As their restaurant sits barren, apart from the young waitress, Bo (Jiaying Li|), who Ikki enjoys spending a little too much time with, it is evident that bankruptcy looms fatally near.
However, after an elderly man (Jack Taylor) consumes expired sushi and dies on the restaurant floor, Xian takes matters into her own hands. Soon after, a series of unfortunate happenings lead to a myriad of deaths, danger and moral disintegration, leaving the restaurant to become the ideal front for creatively disposing of the varying sins to unknowing customers hungry for the one-of-a-kind food on offer...
