Sorrel Brae’s atmospheric creeper A Film by Vera Vaughn has spent the last year making the festival rounds and now it’s finally available online for all to see—it’s this wonderful psycho-haunter that delves into a trippy, almost Twilight Zone-esque, realm of horror. I love what Brae has done here, stirring his ghost story with slow-burning precision that fills the screen with tension and mystery. Because there’s so little time, many short films rely on jump scares to carry the narrative—some of the best shorts are basically a jump scare highlight reel.

That isn’t the case with A Film by Vera Vaughn, instead it creates this nightmarish landscape that’s entirely earned through tension as the story unfolds slowly, piece by piece. There is a method to Brae’s madness, however, because the film leads its audience down a dark and twisted path that ends in a holy shit moment you’ll never see coming.

In this ghost story for the digital age, filmmaker Vera Vaughn works late into the night, editing her psychological thriller about a woman jeopardized by a mysterious home intruder. But when she’s interrupted by a knock at the door, Vera’s world takes a frightening turn toward the surreal as life threatens to imitate art – or is it the other way around…?

It stars Marin Ireland and was written by both Sorrel Brae and Zeke Farrow. Check it out below and find more short films like A Film by Vera Vaughn by visiting the Short Round!