There don't seem to be anymore original ideas. That’s not the fault of the creator of the idea it’s just the nature of it in the 21st Century. But we’ll settle for an idea that is improvised enough on to seem fresh. Like a jazz musician, it is not the note you play, but how you improvise that note. The same can be applied to film, especially horror films, and director Jim Mickle and screenwriter Nick Damici should be applauded for their effort.

There must be a ton of young filmmakers who grab a crew, shoot in guerrilla style, hoping to at least create a film worth watching. Mickle had just $27,000 at the start of filming so the script had to be good outside of the horror. That’s where Damici comes in. He said he had to rewrite the script numerous times. He stripped the film of a few things like elements of camp and scenes that could potential cost more than they could afford, and in turn crafted a tight, gritty, apocalyptic horror film.

When a deadly virus starts spreading in New York after the sewer rats come up and start biting people, six tenants must fight through the day in order to keep alive and protect their apartment complex. Now, I know you must think that’s a silly scenario for a film, a crossbreed of “Food for the Gods” and “28 Days Later”, but that’s one of the beauties from this film. Mickle and Damici’s script is so stripped of cheese and camp, that when the first attacks start happening somewhere in the 30 minute mark, the possibilities and execution are totally believable.

When the apartment gets seized by these rat-humans, there’s this green ambiance glow that adds to the mood of the film, creating atmosphere within the suffocating setting. The film works like a hyper John Carpenter film. Carpenter likes to start the film out where characters are brought to a location and the evil keeps getting closer and closer eventually surrounding them. He’s employed this numerous times from “Assault on Precinct 13” to “Halloween” to “The Fog” and to “The Thing”, and here we see various characters within New York bringing together in this apartment building fighting to survive. One character even comes from Iraq, after serving duty and by the end, their back-to-back, fighting these rats. It’s not a direct rip from Carpenter but an inspired low budget approach to create an intense, efficient, horror film.

The characters are thinly developed, but it never hurts the film. There’s enough to each character in which we can get the feeling of who they are, their traits and plight and by the end, we do care who has died. The gore is there as the effects and make-up are convincing enough to have these rat-humans as believable beings.

When it’s all said and done, “Mulberry Street” has enough going for it to recommend and enjoy. It’s the type of film that makes you excited again for what comes next, both in the film and in the genre. I know the After Dark Horror fest banner has become a meaning for some as crappy-to-average horror films, but they at least bring these to our attention and for every miss they have in their line-up something like “Mulberry Street” makes up for that. Give this a try and you’ll be thanking me in the morning.