John Carpenter, one of the architects of contemporary American horror, returns with this chilling, atmospheric yarn about a group of institutionalized young women haunted by the ghost of a former patient.

Our recipient of this year’s Phantasmagoria Award, director John Carpenter makes a triumphant return to the big screen after an absence of almost a decade, with his new film The Ward. Displaying the assured approach of a true “master of horror,” Carpenter’s movie shares the same subtly creepy tone of dread as his earlier classics The Fog and Halloween (and like the latter landmark, The Ward also centers on a group of resourceful young women combating a mysterious force), yet it also finds Carpenter embracing newer developments within the genre and delivering an accomplished contemporary chiller. Current rising scream queen Amber Heard is Kristen, thrown into a mental hospital after an act of arson in the Pacific Northwest of the 1960s. Speaking with the other girls in her ward, Kristen discovers that no one is ever discharged from the institution, and her desperate escape attempts don’t help Kristen either. Dr. Stringer (Jared Harris) is there for his patients, but that doesn’t stop the presence that roams the corridors and causes the girls to meet some nasty ends. While the KNB effects crew provides the necessary moments of gory mayhem, The Ward relies more on eerie atmosphere, and it definitely finds Carpenter evoking the spirit of 1970s horror cinema. Carpenter is back, and Danger After Dark has got him. -- Travis Crawford