I was more than impressed by Mike Flanagan’s The Haunting of Hill House on Netflix because beyond being wildly entertaining, it’s an exemplar on how horror can be more than what people typically expect of it, which is to say entertainment that’s well-acted, well-written and visually beautiful. And that’s not at all unusual if you’ve […]
Though to be fair that has less to do with the quality of Books Of Blood (2020) – though it is quite good – than because most of the adaptations of Barker’s extensive body of work aren’t particularly worth watching. Hellraiser (1987), Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1998) and Hellraiser: Bloodline (1996) are the best of the […]
In watching Rupert Wyatt’s (Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes) Captive State I was constantly reminded of Star Wars (1977) because both movies are relatively simple in terms of their story, yet to very different effect. Star Wars takes works well within the confides of a narrative that is no richer that the typical […]
I have never been a fan of remakes, mainly because they often serve no purpose other than money grabs, attempts to exploit the name of a property people are already familiar with. Which isn’t to say that they’re not some that manage to rise above – like Jean-François Richet’s remake of John Carpenter’s Assault On […]
I recently rewatched David Lynch’s Dune because Denis Villeneuve’s reboot is coming soon and I wanted to refresh my mind about what came before as well as to see if I still thought that a reboot was a good idea. As far as the latter goes, I definitely think it isn’t though more on that […]
Maybe at this point I’ve become a bit jaded because Brandon Christensen’s Z shouldn’t work as well as it does. The movie starts out deceptively simple, sort of like The Bad Seed (1956) or The Good Son (1993) – stories revolving around murderous, psychotic children – then with barely the blink of an eye changes […]
Netflix’s Away isn’t anything you haven’t seen before – especially if you’ve seen Another Life just a year earlier – though it relies on a stronger supporting cast to get the crew of the Atlas to Mars than that the latter movie employed to get them somewhere (it’s been awhile since I saw Another Life. […]
David Marmor’s 1BR is a really cleverly written and directed movie that I’d recommend for anyone who thinks they’ve seen it all because while that’s technically true – there’s nothing in 1BR that you haven’t seen before – it’s put together so cleverly that it might be awhile before you notice it. Though what I […]
This review contains mild spoilers for Bloodshot. Dave Wilson’s Bloodshot isn’t bad, though it doesn’t bring anything new to the table either. And that’s important because there’ve been a few stabs at creating a cinematic universe, and so far only Marvel Studios and New Line’s The Conjuring and it’s spinoffs have done so successfully (and […]
If you’ve seen any of the commercials promoting Sony’s Fantasy Island it could be understood if you mistook it for a horror movie. After all, it’s from Blumhouse Pictures, the studio that released movies like The Darkness (2016), Get Out (2017), Us (2019) and numerous others. And the adverts imply a lot of sinister goings […]
