Tag: Horror

2024 Film Awards: Day One

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Saddest

Nominees

I Saw The TV Glow

A lot of TV Glow is too weird to be counted here. But there’s a scene near the end which is as bleak as it gets. The main character is at work, older, with no achievements, and he has a full-on breakdown, screaming that he’s dying. It’s not the breakdown that is sad or the fact he’s wasted his life, it’s the utter callousness of the other characters, who all just ignore him.

Inside Out 2

I remember when I came out the screening of this, and a little kid said to their parent “That didn’t make sense, why would someone’s brain be against them?”.

Oh that sweet summer child.

Joker: Folie A Deux

The film itself is not good. But there’s a scene in the court where one of his former friends is testifying about Arthur killing someone in his presence in the first movie. He’s talking about how he’s never felt as much fear as he did at that moment, how it haunts him and completely ruined his life. The fear in his voice, and Arthurs reaction to it, when he finally realises the damage he caused, it’s just….it hints at a much better film than what we got.

Civil War

Specifically for the scene where they come across the piles of dead bodies. I mentioned in my review that there was a moment where I felt I had to leave, this was the moment. It’s…..it’s harrowing.

One Life

The first of two holocaust movies in these nominations. The guilt the character feels for not being able to do more oozes off every scene. It’s helped by some pretty darn good performances. This is more personal than the other holocaust movie, and definitely has more parallels to modern life (sadly). This was the first 2024 film I saw, I probably should have gone with something a bit happier. To quote my original review (and still one of my favourite paragraphs):

“It’s a good reminder that the people being helped aren’t soldiers, politicians, or anybody who had a choice in the war or where they live. They were just children who were at constant risk of being arrested and executed just for existing in their current location or as their current ethnicity/religion. It’s impossible to comprehend something similar in modern society.

Unless you’re Ukrainian

or Palestinian”

The Zone Of Interest

Look at what the film about, that should indicate why this film was nominated. I was not a massive fan of this film, but when it worked, it REALLY worked, with one of the characters’ emotional breakdowns mirroring yours (only you’re hopefully not a nazi). But the real sadness comes from how unaffected people are. It’s harrowing how normalised genocide is to some of them, with one of them admitting he couldn’t pay attention to a speech because all he could think about was how he could gas everybody in the room. It’s callous, cruel, and far too true.

Winner

The Iron Claw

Obviously, this was going to be here. I knew the story, and I’m still unsure if that made it better or worse. I want to watch this with someone who knows nothing, to see what’s worse. Because I knew what was going to happen, I saw the set-ups and the train of sadness approach with full knowledge of what would happen. But the surprises may catch you off guard if you don’t know. You may sit there thinking “Ohhhh, one of the brothers died, this is so sad” and think that’s it, that’s the end of the sadness. Spoilers; THAT IS NOT THE END OF THE SADNESS! It just keeps going and going. Yes, it may feel a bit weird to put a film about a singular family as sadder than a holocaust movie, but I argue that’s due to the emotional connections made with the characters. Yes, the numbers are smaller (much smaller), but it hits harder. That’s not sociopathic, it’s natural. It’s why people view the funerals of a relative as sadder than earthquakes in another country. Sadness is all about emotion, and few films are better at realising that than this.

Weirdest

Nominees

Argylle

Not all weird is good. Sometimes weird is a skiing action scene taking place on a floor coated in oil, just after a smoke-filled dance scene set to a song even Waitrose customers would describe as “a bit soppy”. It’s creative, I’ll give it that. It’s not like anything else you’ll see. But it’s also kind of embarrassing to watch. With some baffling creative decisions in terms of visuals.

Boy Kills World

This leans into its oddness, with some truly jaw-dropping fight scenes alongside some “lol, the main character is deaf” scenes. Imagine if John Wick was a comedy, written by the creators of Airplane before they went all right-wing and “People holding a right-wing president to account are all terrorists!”.

Longlegs

Maybe “weird” isn’t the word I’m looking for here. “Utterly disturbing” would be more accurate. What makes the weirdness stand out is how normal the rest of the film is. A lot of it is played like a straight detective drama, so when Cage is on-screen, or when the murders themselves are looked into, it feels even weirder than it would if it was spooky spooky woo all the way through (like Malum was)

The Beast

This is weird in a non-English movie way. I’m not even sure if “weird” is the right word, I’d say more “hypnotic”. Each scene on its own is relatively normal, but when you see how they interact with each other and tie into the overall narrative, the oddness reveals itself like a flasher on a street corner. It’s a strange watch, where you constantly have to adjust your expectations of traditional narrative structure, remembering scenes that happened in a different time, and playing the current scene alongside that in your head. Essentially, it’s the narrative version of a Mobius strip.

Winner

Poor Things

From the second the trailer came you could tell this was going to be weird. I heard Kinds Of Kindness was weirder, but I wasn’t able to go to the screening of that for health reasons. Poor Things is unique in every aspect. From the script, the story, the performances, the music, and the visuals. There are moments it’s too weird, mainly with the audio being discordant which made it difficult to focus. Emma Stone is on top of her game, you can truly believe she’s not in full control of her faculties. The visuals are also unlike anything else. Not just in the lens choices, but also wit the use of colour, particularly on the exterior shots which at times resemble paintings. You may not agree with every choice made, but it’s easy to tell that everything WAS a choice, nothing was accidental or left to chance. At the very least you have to respect that.

Sweetest

Venom: The Last Dance

Not the whole film, but there are moments which are incredibly touching. Two moments stick out. One is when Venom dances in a hotel room. That’s let down by how out of place it is, but in the moment it’s very sweet to see. The next is probably my favourite scene from the film; the family singing a David Bowie song. There’s a simple truth to the scene that rings through and makes you nostalgic for an experience you’ve never had. As I’ve said before; there are moments when the Venom series has shown just how much potential it has, but not many moments where it’s lived up to them.

Alien: Romulus

Almost entirely due to the relationship between two of the characters, Films like Alien have a problem; how do you make the characters smart enough to be in this situation but not quite smart enough to see the issues before they happen? You can’t have a film where scientists land on a planet then immediately remove their helmets and get infected. Okay, you can have that, but you shouldn’t. One way to excuse characters as making rash decisions is personal emotions. Zombie movies have nailed this down, with almost every single one having a scene where someone is infected and a loved one is hesitant to kill them, resulting in chaos. Romulus has similar moments, where the characters’ love for each other is the driving motivation for what would otherwise be questionable choices. Despite the fact one of them is an android, it’s a very human relationship

Babes

A movie like this lives and dies on the romantic relationship seeming believable. That’s difficult to do when we only meet one of the characters once and then he dies. The meet-cute is so damn believable that it actually made me jealous. Yes, one of the participants dies, but the moments they spend together? It’s fucking adorable.

Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person

Again, fucking adorable. This could be terrible and melodramatic. But the central relationship is damn cute that you can’t help but fall in love with it. HVSCSP is flawed, but without the moments (particularly the two of them just sitting there listening to music), it would be a failure. With them? It’s genuinely lovely.

Paddington In Peru

Do I even need to justify this? It’s a Paddington movie, OF COURSE, it’s going to be adorable.

Thelma

It’s difficult to not watch this and fall a little bit in love with how lovely June Squibb is. She plays her role perfectly, with a mix of defencelessness and aged smarts. I like how Thelma didn’t just do the “old lady does a rap” style of comedy. The jokes have actual heart to them, it’s why it works. What could be just a silly dumb comedy, is actually a heartwarming look at ageing, family, and the defenceless you can feel after being scammed. The relationship between her and her grandson are delightfully sweet.

Winner

Monster

I had no idea what Monster was going in, I assumed it wasn’t a biography of the drinks company or the Imagine Dragons song. For a large period of the runtime of the film, I still wasn’t sure. Monster isn’t a film, it’s a puzzle that gradually reveals itself to you. But when it does? Oh my science is it worth it. Once you realise the romantic relationship at the heart of the Rashomon-style narrative, your heart will melt. It may seem like it comes out of nowhere, but that’s only because your brain wasn’t trained to read the foreshadowing. The two characters interacting is damn adorable, especially with the conflicted feelings they obviously have, knowing how the world is against their pairing.

Most Me

This is both the easiest and hardest to explain. They’re essentially the films I think are closest to my personality. Sometimes that’s “These are the films I feel I would have made”, sometimes it’s “I have never identified with a character more”.

American Fiction

It shifts skilfully between incredibly unsubtle satire about race in 2020’s America (especially in regards to expectations and preconceptions placed upon black people), to discussions about family trauma, and then ridiculously silly dialogue about nothing. It makes you laugh, it makes you cry, it makes you feel things. I could never write this movie, but I would really want to.

The Iron Claw

It’s a wrestling movie, this was going to be here. I’m a huge professional wrestling fan, and the backstage stories are fucking insane sometimes. You need a certain personality type to be involved in the business, and those personality types tend to do crazy shit. There are a lot of stories from the history of it which would make good films, but I’m not sure any would be as heartbreaking as this.

Winner

Sometimes I Think About Dying

Yes, I rated this movie lower than the others on this list. So it’s not the best movie of the year, but it is the one I would show people if they wanted to know me. I really identified with the lead character and understood her feelings of preferred isolation. The dreary drudge of day-to-day domestication and how you escape into bleak fantasies to feel something is all too relatable. There’s also something to be said about how she craves human connection but denies it to herself, sabotaging her best chances of happiness and romantic relationships. Yet again, the character I related most to in a movie is a woman, that just keeps happening for some reason.

Heart Eyes (2025) Review

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Quick synopsis: Every Valentine’s Day, a serial killer attacks couples. This year is no different.

I watched this the same day as Love Hurts, another Valentine’s Day-based movie with a twist. Heart Eyes is better, I’ll lead with that. Not to say it’s perfect, I have very specific problems with it that I’ll go into later, but it is mostly a pretty fun watch. My big issue is one that I can easily see some people actually liking, it’s all down to personal preference, as all reviews are.

I don’t think the script of the original Scream (as in the movie, not the painting, the script for that is only worth 1000 thousand words) is as highly regarded as it should be. It’s not just a horror movie, it’s a well-crafted mystery. There are clues, red herrings, along with lots of foreshadowing. The reveal is stupendous, when you hear it, you feel as if you should go “Ohhhh, well that’s obvious now I know the answer”. You don’t get that with Heart Eyes. Part of that is because it doesn’t build up the background characters that much. Scream had a large pool of suspects to draw from, so as you watched it, your brain was juggling between them, trying to figure out which one could be the killer. Heart Eyes only provides you with one option, doing all it can to signpost that this person is the killer. So either there’s no mystery, or it’s wasted its time giving you only red herrings instead of actual clues, neither of which is particularly narratively satisfying. The reveal itself is…..well it won’t end up on the list of greatest killer reveals, put it that way.

That’s a shame because if the mystery aspect was handled better, Heart Eyes would be a top 5 horror movie of the year, easily (probably still will be, but it is at risk). It does what I like my horror movies to do; have non-horror moments that are still interesting to watch. The central romance between Ally and Jay is lovely to see. It helps that Olivia Holt and Mason Gooding have really good chemistry. Their meet-cute is legit adorable. Take out the murders and you could easily frame this as a straight romcom.

So how about the horror moments? They’re fucking great. Companion (the other love-themed horror movie of the month) was a better movie, but Heart Eyes had MUCH better kills. They’re brutal, but not gratuitous. It doesn’t shy away from showing you the outcomes, people get squashed in machines and there’s a lot of blood, people get holes in their heads, and stabbed in places. “Holes in the head” does sometimes mean weird body physics in film, we’ve all seen horror movies where the killer punches someone and somehow their fist makes a hole in their skull. Moments like that can really pull you out of the movie because they’re not scary, they turn horror movies into cartoons with characters made of paper. Thankfully, that’s not the case here. Yes, characters do get attacked and end up looking like a polo mint, but the way it happens often makes sense in terms of physics, you can easily see how what happened COULD break through someone’s skull. The attacks all have weight to them, when people get hit with an object, you can feel the pain it causes, and you know they’re not going to get up. This helps it feel scarier and more violent, the realism makes it easy to buy into the concept that this is real.

What also helps sell the illusion of reality is how people react. They panic but try to not overdo it. There’s no “everybody in the country locks themselves in their homes”, because (as COVID showed), people wouldn’t do that. But people still took precautions (just like COVID), because everybody realised this is a big deal and to not do at least something would be incredibly selfish (just like…..oh wait, not like COVID, people were selfish during that). Restaurants that take bookings on that day carry out checks for weapons because you would in that situation. What’s not realistic is that this is still America, and there’s no “just because there’s a serial killer around doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be able to bring my gun everywhere I go. Yes, even into a restaurant, table for one since my wife left me, but gun didn’t. Gun still loves me” pushback from Fox News.

For two-thirds of this movie, I thoroughly enjoyed it, but the reveal REALLY let it down. As did two characters who were just unrealistically stupid, even for a horror movie. It is still a really solid 7.5/10, but it could have been so much more.

Companion (2025) Review

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Quick Synopsis: A weekend getaway turns bloody and violent when a subservient android that’s built for human companionship goes haywire.

First Scream (the “new” one, not the original), now Companion. Why do female partners of Jack Quaid keep getting set on fire in horror movies? Amber Midthunder should be relieved that Novocaine will be an action movie instead of a horror (a movie I’m genuinely looking forward to by the way). On the subject of Quaid, why hasn’t anybody cast him as the son of Joshua Jackson in anything? He looks more like him than he does his own dad. Anyway, enough dilly-dallying, on with the actual review.

Companion is god damn delight. More of a thriller than it is a traditional horror movie. That doesn’t underplay the deaths by the way, when characters do die, it’s horrific. Some of the deaths are incredibly cathartic too, it’s good to see bad things happen to bad people. A lot of horror movie writers know this, but make the mistake of writing every character to be an insufferable dickbag (were there any tears for any of the characters in Unfriended outside of tears that it took so long?). In those cases, while you get catharsis, you’re also spending all your time with characters you don’t like, so it’s not an enjoyable experience. While most of the characters in Companion are unlikeable, it’s in a very human way and they’re still entertaining to watch. A lot of is due to the performances; there’s something inherently likeable about Jack Quaid even when he is being an incel douch, Harvey Guillen is too adorable for words, and Megan Suri? There’s something about her performance that is intoxicating to see, she has tremendous presence and feels like she’s destined for leading roles. It’s hard to explain why without giving away spoilers, but Lukas Cage pulls off a fascinating performance.

The story? It’s interesting. Yes, it can be argued that the trailer gives away too much, but Companion still has enough tricks up its sleeves to entertain you. You go in knowing what is happening, but the “why” is just as interesting to see play out. I like that Companion is unashamedly feminist AF, taking multiple shots at male entitlement and inadequacy. I’ve seen some defenders of the character in this, saying “he’s just lonely, why is that seen as a bad thing to want someone?” which would be a fair point, loneliness is a huge issue and one that does need a solution. But it’s very telling that when he’s asked to create his “perfect” partner, he tones down her intelligence significantly. He doesn’t want an equal partner, the robot is not to provide love or to share experiences with; it’s to fuck and to have it fawn over him.

There is a feeling that it is holding back at times. She increases her intelligence, but it doesn’t change that much of the plot (although it may be why she decides to switch language at one point in a scene which is, well it’s genius). There are other moments like that; where it comes up with a cool idea but then doesn’t do the most with it.

Those are very minor nitpicks though. Companion is among the best films I’ve seen in a while. It’s slick, stylish without being overly so, violent without being cruel, and it invites discussion and conversation. It’s smart without being pretentious, modern without risking being dated quickly, and digestible without being dumb. I want more horror movies like this. I also want to see Sophie Thatcher in more stuff, as she seems cool. On an equal level with Anya Taylor-Joy for expressive eyes perfect for horror movies. I caught a preview of this a few days before it came out, and I already know I’m going to buy it when it comes out on blu-ray.

Wolf Man (2025) Review

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Quick Synopsis: Blake Lovell (Christopher Abbot) takes his wife and kid on a vacation to his childhood home. His vacation-as-marriage-counselling efforts are somewhat thwarted by a therianthropic threat intent on killing.

I’m a fan of Christopher Abbott, based ENTIRELY on the fact that I liked the first film I saw him in (On The Count Of Three). Wolf Man having him as the lead, combined with it being made by Leigh Whannell (writer of Saw, director of The Invisible Man) got my hopes up high.

Maybe too high. I didn’t dislike Wolf Man. The last wolf-based movie I watched at the cinema was (I think, but I could be wrong) Wolf, a film so bad that I live-blogged it for Halloween a few years ago, and I haven’t live-blogged anything since. This is nowhere near as bad as that. The score on Metacritic currently stands at 50%, which seems fair. It’s as middle-of-the-road as a dead badger. Not much really stands out as either a negative or a positive.

The biggest negative for me was the story itself. The cause of the transformation feels unearned. It’s as close to “character was bitten by a zombie, but the audience doesn’t realise” as it’s possible to get. He’s in an accident, stuff happens, and he gets scratched by the “wolf” attacking him. He starts transforming later on, and you do get the feeling that you’ve missed something. It’s all the more baffling because near the end of his transformation, there is a moment where his leg is grabbed and he’s attacked. That would have made a much more logical cause for the infection, and it wouldn’t have been in the middle of a car crash scene. The reveal of who the Wolf Man that’s attacking them is is so obvious that I’m not sure it even counts as a twist. “Hmmmm, this character mysteriously disappeared 30 years ago in this very area, and now we’re being attacked by something with slight human characteristics that’s been haunting these wolves for decades. I wonder if those two things are linked?”

The visual effects are fine, I guess? Nothing will ever top An American Werewolf In London for a transformation sequence with weight and body horror, there are moments where Wolf Man comes close, but then there are also moments where it looks a little bit goofy.

On the plus side, the performances are good, Abbot is good enough that you forgive him for Kraven The Hunter (although I completely forgot he was even in that), the biggest issue I have with Matilda Firth is that she was born in 2014 and that makes me feel old. I was most impressed with Julia Garner. She has such a great look, it’s a mix between 80’s Scream Queen and Classic Hollywood Beauty mixed with a smidgen of Crazy Art Teacher/Madonna. She’s in the new Fantastic Four movie which I’m now looking forward to 12% more because of her involvement.

I also have to praise Wolf Man for the scenes from Blake’s world. The visuals, the audio etc all combine to create something new and also make sense. Once the colour change happens you somehow INSTANTLY know that we’re now in his perspective. It would have been so easy to demonstrate it by saying, “This is what he can see,” in a POV shot, but keeping it in a third-person viewpoint is much more visually interesting. It also allows for transitions between Blake’s version of reality and reality reality to be smoother than a Barry White ballad. As a writer, it’s easy to see moments where you think “I would not have done that”, but as a director, it’s difficult to not be thoroughly impressed with what Whannell has pulled off. I have criticised this film, but I appreciate that it made an effort. It instilled emotional scenes, it added character depth so they all seem like actual humans as opposed to just “characters in a horror movie”. So while I have criticised it, I would MUCH rather something like this exist than “Generic Horror Movie Number 57”.

Nosferatu (2024) Review

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Quick Synopsis: Do you really need me to tell you the story for this? Just watch the original.

There was a lot of hype for this. I have been excited since I first heard of it back in 2016, even mentioning how I was looking forward to it in my review of The Witch (or The VVitch). Many journalists and critics raved about early screenings of it.

But then I heard from actual people; moviegoers who I like and respect. Their feedback wasn’t quite as positive. And I agree with them, I was not a fan of this movie. For whatever reason, I just didn’t care about what I was seeing. I haven’t seen the original from the 1920s, but I know it (mainly through the Kill Count video I recently watched). At no point while watching New-sferatu did I feel I was watching something original. It never felt like anything other than a remake. It’s so heavily indebted to its sources that it never feels like it has its own identity.

My other issue is the filming style. A lot of dialogue is delivered straight to the camera, from the receiving person’s POV. As such, there’s a disconnect between everybody, it kind of reminds me of television shows made during COVID where everybody had to socially distance themselves.

Eggers is a fantastic filmmaker, there’s no doubt about that. The visual style is arresting, with every frame mesmerising and haunting, particularly with the use of light and shadow. As a storyteller? I’m afraid that’s his weakness. None of the characters seem that interesting, Ellen Hunter, in particular feeling more of a storytelling device than an actual character. The title character also doesn’t seem that interesting. He’s played well, looks good, but the character itself doesn’t seem to have any presence; when he’s not onscreen, you don’t feel him looming over the narrative.

The performances are fine, Lily-Rose Depp has a haunted look which really suits the character and themes, Nicholas Hoult was made for these movies, and Dafoe continues to be fucking weird. Dafoe and Eggers work well together, their styles suit each other.

Like I said; all the technical parts? Brilliant. All the parts that require how to make a movie? Brilliant. All the parts that require imagination and heart? Lacking. Remakes should showcase and do what couldn’t be done in the original. All we have here is more of the same. It doesn’t remind me of classic Dracula stories, what it does remind me of? Gus Van Sant’s remake of Psycho.

2024 In Film: Day Seven (The Good)

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Immaculate
Ups: Good chemistry between performances.
Great score.
Downs: Wastes potential.
Sweeney isn’t quite a strong enough performer for large sections.
Best Performer: Benedetta Porcaroli. Sweeney is great in the final section, but she’s too weak in the opening two-thirds to really be effective.
Best Moment: The entire final third.
Worst Moment: Sister Gwens’ death, happens off-screen and we should have seen it.
Opening: A nun tries to escape through a locked gate but instead gets her leg broken and is buried alive. Standard horror movie opening but it does let you into the fact that the nuns are evil, which is obvious anyway, but at least TRY to have a mystery.
Closing: She gives birth to the antichrist, bites through her own umbilical cord, and then kills the baby with a giant rock. Shocking, disturbing, and so well made.
Best Line: “If this is not the will of God, why does God not stop us?”. I used a similar line the time I got urinating in the font, just before I was struck by lightning.
Original review here

Jackpot
Ups: Satirical brilliance.
Some brilliant lines.
Pretty damn good soundtrack.
Downs: Issues with the plot are so big you can drive a bus through them.
Tonally inconsistent.
Best Performer: John Cena
Best Moment: The wax museum. So fun.
Worst Moment: The villain reveals, only because it’s so obvious that you’re surprised the characters didn’t see it coming.
Opening: A text narration explaining the premise. Bleak but comedic. Then Sean William Scott running down a street being chased by a mob
Closing: She survives, they become rich, and massive pricks. There are some outtakes too, which are pretty fun to see.
Best Line: “The California Grand Lottery © started during the Great Depression of 2026. The New Government was desperate for money and so was the public. It was simple. Kill the winner before sundown and legally take their jackpot. The only rule? No guns. No Bullets Some people call it dystopian. But those people are no fun. LOS ANGELES 2030” Sets the tone perfectly.
Original review here

Poor Things
Ups: Breathtaking visuals.
Unique.
Good ensemble cast.
Downs: Some of the music is physically painful to hear.
Repeats itself a lot.
Might be too weird for some.
The idea that so many men are sexually attracted to someone with the brain and capabilities of a baby is………strange.
Best Performer: Emma Stone
Best Moment: Harry showing Bella cruelty. It’s heartbreaking.
Worst Moment: Duncan finds Bella’s hidden money, mainly because if he didn’t find it then the story would advance in the exact same way.
Opening: A suicide. It’s always a weird way to open a film, but it’s good. It lets you know the visuals straight away.
Closing: The weird family dynamic characters all live together, with the evil ex-husband now having the brain of a goat. I genuinely assumed they were just going to put the dying Dafoe brain in his body, kind of surprised they didn’t.
Best Line: “I’m going to punch that baby”
Original Review here

The Beast
Ups: Hypnotic.
If you stick with it, it makes sense.
Definitely a relief that a film called “The Beast”, based on a piece of work from 1903, and released in 2024, isn’t subtly racist.
Downs: The directing style will be divisive.
The narrative could be clearer at parts.
The central concept doesn’t kick in for 20 minutes
It does the “imagine spot” trick too often.
Best Performer: George MacKay. He is such a good actor. His incel speech is brilliant
Best Moment: The introduction to the 2014 world where Louis is an incel dickbag.
Worst Moment: The earthquake is pretty weak
Opening: Gabrielle is acting in a room comprised entirely of green screen, being ordered around by a director.It then kind of dissolves into he title. Weird, doesn’t really intrigue you and force you to continue watching, but doesmake you wonder “how weird is this going to be?” Especially since it then goes into what looks like an 18th century party of nobility.
Closing: The classic “invasion of the body snatchers” ending. But then it does something very cool, instead of end credits, it has a QR code. The downside is that in a few years they will likely forget to keep up the domain rights, that WILL lead to either porn or a virus.
Best Line: “Tell me why, at parties, we seek the people with whom we live and whom we see every day?”
Original review here

The First Omen
Ups: Some great scares.
Good performances.
Unsettling body horror.
Decent twists.
Downs: Too reverential of the original.
Best Performer: Nell Tiger Free
Best Moment: The childbirth scene about halfway through. Very unsettling.
Worst Moment: The ending, drags.
Opening: Two Fathers (of the religious variety) discuss an evil occult plot. One of whom then dies brutally and with a pie-sized chunk missing from his skull. The death is horrific and scary, but it’s also only done like that as a reference to the original.
Closing: The demon child has been delivered to the correct person. Which we knew. He’s been called Damien. This just confirms it is the same child as the original, which we would have guessed.
Best Line: “What’s not real?” the line itself isn’t great, but its use is my favourite jump-scare of modern times.
Original review here

The Substance
Ups: Creepy.
Some great body horror
Amazing performances.
As subtle as a brick, a brick to the face, a brick to the face with the words “older women have value too and we need to stop placing so much of a woman worth on how men perceive her beauty” written on it, which would be a pretty fucking big brick.
Downs: REALLY loses focus and steam in the final third.
The world feels too protagonist-centered. There’s no indication that the world of this film exists outside of these characters. Every person in this universe exists solely to serve the narrative, there’s no attempt to make it feel lived in. If it sorted this out, it would be at least 2 blogs up, but it REALLY hurts it and kind of dampens the message.
“Look how disgusting the way we treat women is” followed by lots of close-ups of tits and buttcheeks. I get that that’s the point, but still.
Best Performer: Demi Moore
Best Moment: The first transformation.
Worst Moment: It repeats a dream sequence. Not really necessary.
Opening: A walk of fame star being constructed then neglected. The “look at how the world ignores this star until it cracks under pressure” double meaning isn’t exactly subtle. But it looks gorgeous.
Closing: Elisabeth’s face crawls out onto her own star then dissolves into nothingness before wiped away by a floor scrubber. Like I said, not subtle.
Best Line: Have you ever dreamt of a better version of yourself? Younger, more beautiful, more perfect. One single injection unlocks your DNA, starting a new cellular division, that will release another version of yourself. This is the Substance. You are the matrix. Everything comes from you. Everything is you. This is simply a better version of yourself. You just have to share. One week for one and one week for the other. A perfect balance of seven days each. The one and only thing not to forget: You. Are. One. You can’t escape from yourself
Original review here

Thelma
Ups: Very sweet.
Funny.
Pretty darn good chemistry between the two leads.
Teaches you basic cyber security.
I found it very funny how when she called her old friends she went through a list of various deaths and then “moved to Cleveland?”
Downs: The use of focus on the surroundings may be distracting to some.
Richard Roundtree has since passed and this was his final film.
Doesn’t quite run with the concept as much as it could.
Best Performer: June Squibb. Obviously.
Best Moment: The villain reveal.
Worst Moment: The phone call with the ex doesn’t seem as important as it could
Opening: Thelma being shown how to operate her e-mails by her grandson. Then the two sit around. Very sweet interactions between the two. Did kind of make me miss my nan though so boo for that.
Closing: She succeeds. That’s the real ending, but then it continues. But I don’t mind. Because whilst the story is over, the themes continue, and the post-story interactions are so sweet and wonderful that it’s heartwarming. She then twats a cockroach with a newspaper.
Best Line: “If I fall over I’m toast, that’s why I don’t fall”
Original review here

Woman Of The Hour
Ups: Creepy.
Never pretends to be anything that it isn’t.
Kendrick is a pretty damn good director.
Made with passion.
Downs: Somewhat weak narrative
Muddled story.
Doesn’t make the most of the premise.
Best Performer: Anna Kendrick
Best Moment: When she asks her own questions.
Worst Moment: Valentine’s day car ride with one of his victims. Just feels a bit superfluous and kills momentum.
Opening: A guy takes photos of a woman in an isolated exterior. You can tell he’s creepy because he has long hair. Some beautiful establishing shots though. Yup, he kills her, and it’s REALLY well shot.
Closing: The truth is fucking infuriating. He was released on bail where he then killed more people.
Best Line: “Did you feel seen?” “I felt looked at”
Original review here

2024 In Film: Day Six (The Thoroughly Okay)

On By troubledproductionsIn Year round upLeave a comment

A Quiet Place: Day One
Ups: When its silent, it’s brilliant.
Shows just how LOUD New York is.
Downs: Too much music. By which I mean “any”.
With the exception of the opening scene, the fact it’s a prequel barely matters.
Best Performer: Lupita Nyong’o. Obviously.
Best Moment: The scene in the jazz club is very sweet.
Worst Moment: Eric on the construction site. Only way it’s not a waste of time is if its referenced in another sequel, but in the film itself? Pointless.
Opening: Sam is in a cancer hospice. Very good way of showing her situation. Excellent example of “show, don’t tell” scripting. Before that, there’s a piece of text telling you that the standard noise of New York City is at the same level as someone screaming constantly.
Closing: Sam commits suicide by Simone. Excellent idea, average execution. The noise difference between her listening to it on headphones and her playing it out loud should be a lot different.
Best Line: This place is shit. This place smells like shit. Betsy’s voice sounds like shit. Cancer is shit. Oscar does that stupid walk when he wants to hide he shit his pants. And Milton has shit taste in music.
Original review here

Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F
Ups: So much more fun than the trailers made it seem.
Doesn’t piss on the legacy of the franchise.
New characters slot in effortlessly with old favourites.
Downs: Doesn’t feel like that much has happened since the last movie.
Relies on nostalgia a bit too much at times.
Some of the performers have aged in the last 30 years and it reminds me I’m old as hell now.
Best Performer: Eddie Murphy
Best Moment: The opening. Reassures you that this will be just as fun as the original.
Worst Moment: The ending feels like the script completely ran out of steam.
Opening: Relatively sombre DJ talking on car radio. Then The Heat Is On plays and we see Eddie Murphy. It felt like it was there to surprise people “hey, you thought this would be a super serious movie but instead its an Eddie Murphy one”. As if people didn’t know that. There’s then a scene in a hockey arena featuring him doing his usual “what, you [make assumption] just because I’m black?” shtick, but this time it’s clearly just to fuck with someone he’s friends with.
Closing: Axel comes out of the hospital and reunites with Taggert and Rosewood. Kind of meh.
Best Line: I’ve been a cop for 30 years, I’ve been black a whole lot longer. Trust me, I know better.
Original review here

Fly Me To The Moon
Ups: Fun dialogue.
Easily digestable.
Charming
Downs: Will fuel idiots.
Forgettable.
There’s a mismatch between the directing and the script. The script is fast and silly, and the directing is slick and slow.
Much longer than it needs to be.
Not Tatum’s best performance.
Best Performer: Scarlett Johansson
Best Moment: The meet cute actually works.
Worst Moment: Kelly’s first actions on the base. Ignoring national security concerns, taking people away from engineering work to paint her wall and put a new window in. Makes her seem incredibly rude.
Opening: Newsposition. Not quite as good as Valerian but very effective at setting up the situation.
Closing: It worked. Obviously, the two characters kiss. Because of course they did.
Best Line: You know what they say about black cats, if they cross your path, they’re probably going someplace else.
Original review here

Longlegs
Ups: Tense.
Good performances.
Downs: Very brown.
I’m fed up with trans-coded villains
Best Performer: Maika Monroe.
Best Moment: The transition shot between the mask and Longlegs face. Simple, predictable, but damn finely executed.
Worst Moment: The victim in hospital. The performance is superb, but the dialogue feels fake.
Opening: Scene fades in from red, nice touch. The music is suitably creepy and sets the tone REALLY well. You can’t watch this and NOT know it’s a horror movie.
Closing: The villain dies, but their legacy possibly lives on as a doll couldn’t be shot (don’t know why they couldn’t just physically smash it with a hammer but still).
Best Line: I know you’re not afraid of a little dark. Because you *are* the dar
Original review here

Monkey Man
Ups: Some superb visuals from a first-time director.
Violent.
Some really good action scenes and fight choreography.
Depressingly relevant.
Downs: Doesn’t make the most of its time.
Leaves a lot unsaid in terms of what you need to know to understand certain parts.
Best Performer: Dev Patel.
Best Moment: The kick to the face.
Worst Moment: The white monkey mask, doesn’t last long enough.
Opening: The story of Hanuman. Not needed, but is appreciated.
Closing: An incredibly personal action scene, rife with emotion and despair.
Best Line: In the great tapestry of life, just one small ember can burn down everything
Original review here

One Life
Ups: Emotional.
A story that needs to be told right now
Downs: Kind of hides the fact they’re Jewish, only slightly alludes to it.
Incredibly predictable
Best Performer:
Best Moment: The Nazi’s taking over the train, heartbreaking.
Worst Moment: Going to focus more on a moment it DIDN’T have. It didn’t show the original film footage of him on That’s Life, bit weird as that felt like a guarantee.
Opening:
Closing: Standard “what happened next” text. More pictures or film footage of the real person would have been nice.
Best Line: I don’t know what you’re doing, but if you’re doing what I think you’re doing, I don’t want to know.
Original review here

Seize Them!
Ups: Very funny and brutal.
Brilliantly silly.
Those who love British sitcoms will have a blast with the cast.
Downs: Is it really the best time for a “Rich people are actually fantastic, and anybody who goes against them is a tyrant in disguise” message?
Terribly marketed.
A lot of convenience.
The third-act argument seems a little contrived.
Best Performer: Aimee Lee Wood.
Best Moment: The potential assassins all dying. So stupid, goes past funny straight to annoying, and then back to funny again.
Worst Moment: The split between the group doesn’t really feel earned.
Opening: Narration, then a servant gets stabbed. Sets up the tone (funny and bloody), and the character of Queen Dagan as a spoilt brat.
Closing: “what happened next”, would have been nice to see this for more of the characters. Does mean the film ends with the line “the two died in separate wanking incidents”, which would improve every film ever made. Even Schindlers List
Best Line: I’m finished. Strangle me … but gently
Original review here

Sonic The Hedgehog 3
Ups: Made with a genuine love of the franchise.
Funny.
Has actual emotion.
Continues to be much better than you’d expect.
Downs: Inconsistent speed.
A bit TOO similar to the first two.
Predictable.
Some REAL pacing issues.
Best Performer: Idris Elba
Best Moment: Maria and Shadow bonding. Incredibly sweet and feels very real.
Worst Moment: The two Robotniks meeting. Feels very self-indulgent from Carrey.
Opening: The birth of Shadow.
Closing: Another sequel hook. Exciting, but quite frustrating from a narrative standpoint.
Best Line: I have dishonored my marshmallow
Original review here

Spaceman
Ups: Some good shots.
Sandler gives a decent performance (albeit as the wrong nationality)
The flashbacks are really well done.
Downs: The spider moves too fluidly to feel like a real spider.
The character doesn’t react to the spider in a believable way.
Best Moment: The reveal of the spider. The director knows he’s got a good design here, and wants you to know it.
Worst Moment: When the president withholds Lenkas message, seems to only be done to advance the plot.
Best Performer: Paul Dano. I know Sandler is great in this, but his accent is too bad for me to have him as the best.
Opening: The titular character wearing a spacesuit, walking. Then we see him on his ship doing mundane shit that astronauts need to do. I feel the walking part wasn’t needed. Start with him on the ship.
Closing: We see that him walking through the lake at the beginning was a dream, which continues on here. Nice book-end, but is only there to be a bookend. Like it had to end like that because it started like that, and it had to start like that because it ended like that.
Notable Line: “You have many boundaries skinny human, perhaps they are the cause of your loneliness”
Original Review here

The End We Start From
Ups: Excellent use of water.
Joey Fry is REALLY good.
Downs: Her being separated from her husband for the duration of the birth doesn’t affect the birth much.
Characters don’t have names so it’s really weird to review and describe them.
Best Performer: Katherine Waterston.
Best Moment: The two women walking down a road whilst singing the song from Dirty Dancing. Very sweet.
Worst Moment: After the mother’s death, scenes of sadness etc but there’s a section where the music is a little bit too upbeat.
Opening: Woman runs a bath whilst on the phone. Eventually, the water covers the camera. This is an effective way of setting up the themes without hitting you in the face with them. She then sits her pregnant self in the bath. I appreciate that she didn’t mention it in the phone call, in fact, it would have been weird if she did it.
Closing: Both characters arrive home. Kind of bittersweet but really the only way it could end.
Best Line: “They trampled on my mum’s neck, people are starving, they don’t give a fuck”
Original review here

Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person (2023) Review

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Quick Synopsis: I feel the title adequately explains it.

As we approach the end of the year, I’m starting to think of the awards I will give out in January, and try to note the contenders for each award. Some are pretty much settled (Worst Moment is likely to go to Twisters for a character introduction that tainted the rest of the film). In contrast, some still require a lot of thinking (the Most Disappointing category is depressingly packed so far). One award that won’t be given is Best Title, if it was, Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person (HVSCSP, pronounced Hoo-vis-car-seep) would win that easily. I love that title, it promises so much. Not just the plot, but also the type of film it will be. A title like that is not going to be an incredibly depressing look at the human condition. It will be quirky, and it will be unique.

What you might not expect is just how damn sweet it is. It’s incredibly heart-warming, with the central relationship being more believable and recognisable than a vampire story should be. Some writers would have focused on the sexual energy of vampires, but HVSCSP is more sweat than sexual, and is all the better for it. I love the central relationship. There’s a moment between the two where they’re just sitting listening to music. There’s no dialogue, no dancing, they’re just sitting near each other. By all logic, that should be boring as hell. But it says something about the talent of director Ariane Louis-Seize, plus the performers Sara Montpetit and Felix-Antoine Benard that it works. You can tell there are moments when both of them want to speak, and you know exactly what they would say, and the characters know that too, so they want to respond, but because it wasn’t actually said, they don’t. That scene is a microcosm of the film as a whole; incredibly sweet and wholesome.

I’ve seen some reviews which have stated they wished this had more bite. I’m assuming they only said that for pun purposes. Cynicism and meanness would have ruined this. Yes, vampire movies usually do need to be dark and broody, but this particular film? It needs niceness. It’s like a Wes Anderson movie being caressed by Tim Burton.

Don’t get me wrong, there is some violence, but it’s used to tell a story. The killing of the clown in the opening scene is shown to have traumatised Sasha, so it makes sense that even with the ability to do so, she would be reticent to commit violence unless she needed to. This builds up beautifully to a moment where she violently attacks a group of people threatening Paul. If the film was filled with violence, that scene wouldn’t land. If the violence was shot as “cool” and fun, that moment wouldn’t land. HVSCSP understands restraint better than a German dungeon mistress and uses it to great joy.

It’s not perfect. The soundtrack is kind of bland. The aforementioned scene of the two listening to music together? Perfect song choice. The rest of the movie? Forgettable. I’m not saying EVERY film needs more 80’s dark synth music, but some Bauhaus would have improved this immensely.

I also found it difficult to get a solid grounding on the universe contained within HVSCSP. Are people aware of vampires but decide to ignore them? Are they aware but deathly scared? Do they consider vampires as mythological creatures? There are moments which support all three assertions, so it’s difficult to work out what world this takes place in. This leads me to the other problem; with the exception of the main two, the characters are all tremendously bland. It doesn’t feel like a real group of people, they’re not main characters in their own life, they’re only supporters of the tale we’re being told right now.

This is still a lovely film. It’s not among the best of the year, but it’s worth watching, even if only once.

Don’t Move (2024) Review

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Quick Synopsis: When a killer injects her with a paralytic agent, a woman must run, fight and hide before her body completely shuts down.

Did Netflix gaslight us into thinking their original films used to be good? I thought they were, but looking at the list, there’s a lot of shit there. Well, maybe “shit” is a bit harsh, but for every Glass Onion, there are about 40 Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga‘s, films which are so forgettable that they barely register as being watched. Maybe Don’t Move will be different?

It starts promising, it sets the tone very quickly, and it’s really interesting. The opening kidnapping is shocking, not just because of how sudden it is, but also how cold and calculating it is. You can really see how the killer lures his victims. He picks up character information so quickly, incredibly observant. He’s essentially a detective who uses his powers for evil.

I like how minimalist DM is. There are a few other characters, but it is mostly just Finn Witrock and Kelsey Asbille. Finn Wittrock is good, but he never really feels like an individual, instead coming off as a mix between Bill “Pennywise” Skarsgard, Casey “Not Ben” Affleck and Leonardo “No Don’t Turn 26, you’re so pretty” DiCaprio. Asbille does A LOT considering she’s paralyzed for the majority of the runtime. She has tremendous eye-acting, which is essential because that’s the only way she portrays emotion for most of it. The small cast allows the talents of the two leads to really shine. It also helps Asbille’s character seem more isolated. This could have been TERRIBLE if it cut to her previous life too often (as was done in The Mercy) in an attempt to examine her life. Because we only see her in the context of a kidnapping victim, we feel scared and isolated alongside her; all we know in this world is her and her kidnapper.

I do have some issues with the script though. Not that it’s bad, but I feel it wastes potential. Whilst DM is good, it could (née, should) have been great. Her losing her body autonomy (we call that “Being An American Woman”) should have taken place in real-time, it lasts 10 minutes onscreen instead of the (I think) 20 it was said to have taken. Adding the extra 10 would have made it so much more interesting. That’s the case for the whole film actually. It’s crying out for a gimmick. Maybe that’s real-time, so we get LONG shots of her being driven to the cabin the kidnapper hopes to keep her in, the longer the drive, the more we become aware of just how hopeless her situation is. Maybe it could have done the always impressive long take, making it seem like it was all filmed in one take (as in Boiling Point and 1917) with scenes of forestry masking cuts and time jumps. Maybe if it was all from her POV, so we are truly in her shoes, feeling her fear and helplessness. Any one of those would have made it a genuinely impressive feature and would have helped it stand out. As it is, it’s just pretty good.

It’s a shame to watch a film and get distracted by what it is instead of what it could be. But this isn’t quite refined enough to distract you, so you can’t really help but let your mind wander. It’s a great concept, but there’s not quite enough in the narrative it to justify stretching it out to feature length instead of just having it as a short. It’s not, but it does have big “based on a short story” energy. This is where a gimmick would have helped it, it would have hidden the narrative swamp of boredom.

Longlegs (2024) Review

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Quick Synopsis: Lee Harper is a clairvoyant who is assigned an unsolved murder case involving satanic sacrifices, possession, and Nicholas Cage

I will say this to start: there have been three films this year with lead characters named Lee, none of them male. Longlegs, Civil War, and the one where Kate Winslet played Lee—I can’t remember what that one was called though. Of the trilogy or trilog-lee, as some people (nobody) calls it, Longlegs is probably the one I enjoyed least.

I get the feeling it’s not supposed to be enjoyed though. It’s dark, gritty, and disturbing. That works in its favour as it means every moment is full of tension, so you never get a chance to relax. Osgood Perkins has made it so that even when the characters are in no danger, it somehow still feels uncomfortable. This is partly due to the way it is shot; the colour scheme and use of focus make everything feel like a mix of memory and a dream, where the rules of reality are still there, but you have a sneaking suspicion those rules could be torn up at any point. The narrative also helps; the sudden death of a character plants in your head the idea that all bets are off and nobody is safe.

On the downside; it is sometimes too bleak to care about, and the lighting makes it an uncomfortable watch for all the wrong reasons at times, making it resemble the visual equivalent of Tenat’s dialogue, you know stuff is there, and you know it’s important, but you can’t make it out at all.

The performances also help the tone. Cage, in particular, is disturbing. It is slightly disappointing how horror movies keep falling back on the “androgynous people who were assigned male sex at birth are creepy and likely to be serial killers” cliche that has real-world implications for trans people, but arguing for horror movies to stop doing that would be like asking Will Smith to stop saying “aw hell no” in his films, it’s not going to happen so you might as well just accept it.

Maika Monroe continues to be excellent. She has a habit of picking really good horror movies to start in, first It Follows, and now this. Nobody else is really given that much time to shine, but whoever decided to cast Alicia Witt as Monroe’s mother deserves a raise as that is spot on. Kiernan Shipka continues to impress whenever I see her, but her appearance in this is basically an extended cameo, and features some truly bad dialogue.

The dialogue is definitely the worst part of Longlegs, especially towards the end where it treats the audience like a nervous mother treats a child at traffic lights and holds their hand so tightly that you can sense it doesn’t trust you to know what’s happening. It then dumps so much information on you at once that it’s kind of annoying. Especially since it’s a detective horror, it would have been so easy for the script to simply reveal the killer M.O gradually throughout the runtime instead of “and here’s EVERYTHING”. The lead up to that with a character killing themselves by headbutting a table is pretty damn gnarly though.

So in summary, disturbing, kind of wonderful, but completely falls apart in the third act.