2012 Horror Part Ten

BYZANTIUM

Dir - Neil Jordan

Overall: GOOD

 

Eighteen years after his exceptional adaptation of Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire, director Neil Jordan returns to similar material by similar means with Byzantium.  Just as Interview was scripted by the book's author, Moira Buffini pens her own screenplay here which is based off of her 2008 play A Vampire Story that was turned into a proper novel in 2016.  The story combines familiar vampire metaphors with inventive tweaks to the mythos.  Here, the undead are transformed not by bite but via a mystical cave which only the terminally ill are granted access to on particular occasions.  The main focus is on a mother/daughter team who have lived for centuries on the run, with one of them making ends meet by following "the code" while the other longs to tell her story and be freed from the burden of solemn, emotional isolation.  It is one of the more humane depictions of blood-suckers out there who walk freely in sunlight, have no monstrous deformities, and only prey on those whom they share their secret with, revisiting them once they are in old age and therefor ready to die.  Primarily a narrative triumph, Jordan still has a keen skill for pacing and elegant visuals even with working within a sub-genre that he had already made his mark in before.

 

RESOLUTION

Dir - Justin Benson/Aaron Scott Moorhead

Overall: MEH

 

For their first of to-date five full-length efforts together, director team Justin Benson and Aaron Scott Moorhead's Resolution works better as an indie buddy comedy than as a thought-provoking Twilight Zone nightmare.  Though it apparently takes place in the same cinematic universe as the duo's 2017 film The Endless, said movie's use of topsy-turvy timelines were more prevalent as well as far better utilized than here.  Mysterious forces are alluded to yes, but they come off as an underwritten afterthought compared to the central drama revolving around a guy who decides to force his drug-addict best friend to detox.  The banter between the two leads is both funny and convincing even if the psychological subtext is pedestrian, thus making the film a successful parody of low-budget character studies.  It is a shame that the last twenty minutes suffer the biggest tonal issues and narrative inconsistencies as the freaky elements are left frustratingly vague as they are trying to simultaneously ramp up.  Out of nowhere, the two characters that we have been spending the whole ordeal with come to arbitrary conclusions in order to keep the setting grounded until it finishes off on a "Huh?" cliffhanger that is even more random in its execution.

CHANTHALY

Dir - Mattie Do

Overall: MEH

A DIY debut from Mattie Do, Chanthaly is also allegedly the first Lao horror movie to be directed by a woman, if not the country's first horror film of any kind.  A significant work in this respect, it has some impressive attributes for something filmed entirely at a single location, (Do and her screenwriter husband Christopher Larsen's home), and with no obvious production values.  Exclusively hand-held camera work and almost no musical score give it an intimate feel, but it is also noticeably the work of a first time filmmaker.  Many of the shots are standard, the performances are stiff, the supernatural jolts are cliched, (arbitrary ghost activity such as refusing to talk yet opening their mouths wide, appearing in mirrors for a flash second, and interacting with the living world when the script allows them to), and the mid-range, digital shot quality is cinimatically lacking.  These are forgivable criticisms though considering the amateur circumstances by which it was made.  The story is an interesting meditation on the acceptance of losing a parent or child, but it is also unfocused, pulling off a nifty yet unsatisfying narrative shift in the final act that raises more questions without profoundly exploring them.

2013 Horror Part Eleven

AFFLICTED

Dir - Derek Lee/Cliff Prowse

Overall: MEH

 

The full-length debut from writer/director/actor team Derek Lee and Cliff Prowse, Afflicted is a perfect example of the found footage framework utilized for the absolutely wrong premise.  One of the biggest mistakes that such movies often make is in maintaining verisimilitude while characters are pointing the camera at things and this fundamental checkpoint is horrendously askew here.  Two bros setting off on a year-long trip around the world and documenting it as a web series is all fine and good, but the second that things go haywire and they still keep filming the dangerous phenomena transpiring, (making sure to pick up the camera at all times and talk into it for the audience's convenience), the entire presentation falls disastrously apart.  This unfortunately happens early on, leaving the majority of the movie to come off as ludicrous and stupid when no such agenda was intended.  On the plus side though, the effects work is convincing, mixing digital and practical trickery flawlessly.  Take away the ill-advised sub-genre gimmick though and this could have been a interesting take on one's succumbing to the undead.

PACIFIC RIM

Dir - Guillermo del Toro

Overall: WOOF

 

The big, loud, wet, loud, aggressive, stupid, and incredibly loud popcorn stinker Pacific Rim is the first bona fide misfire from Guillermo del Toro since 1997's studio-mangled Mimic.  Though it is not as insultingly braindead as the Transformer series per comparison, it is just as sensory-pummeling and elementary in its narrative with groan-worthy over-acting and/or macho posturing periodically breaking up some of the ugliest CGI action sequences ever filmed.  Why the latter were all done at night, in the rain, or under water is a baffling choice since it renders the giant monster vs giant robot fights hopelessly murky, which is further hampered by everything having dark gray, green, or blue hues that muddle together.  As far as the dialog goes, it feels as if it was "written" by a computer program that was fed every testosterone-ridden platitude and monologue from every other schlock-fest action movie that came before it, nearly all of which is yelled at full volume by whoever is over-dramatizing it.  Even Charlie Day, Ron Pearlman, and Burn Gorman in the stereotypical comic relief roles feel the need to strain their voices while delivering their quirky quips.  The bombastic musical score never shuts up, the visual and sound design of the aliens is as stock as they come, every character walks like Jax Teller, (coincidentally since Charlie Hunnam is in the lead and exhibiting zero charisma), and several IQ points will be lost by all audience members, along with two hours and eleven minutes of their life that they can never get back.

COHERENCE

Dir - James Ward Byrkit

Overall: GOOD

An impressive, minimalist, Twilight Zone-inspired thriller and the full-length debut from James Ward Byrkit, Coherence takes its metaphysics/Schrödinger's cat/doppelgänger/alternate universe/quantum decoherence smorgasbord of ideas and presents them via an improvisational character study.  Byrkit and Alex Manugian both concocted of the story concept as something that could be filmed with no crew, no money, and at a single location, thus the director's own home was chosen with an ensemble cast of friends.  No script was utilized; instead, each actor, (none of whom had previously met each other), was given notes over five nights of shooting which instructed them as to what information they were to convey, information that was not known to their fellow performers.  Almost like an experimental, live theater piece in this respect, the spontaneous plotting ends up being ingenious within a narrative concept where multiple, random realities co-exist and the people trapped in them succumb to paranoia and desperation.  Such filmmaking tactics could have easily wielded unfocused results, but lighting was captured in a bottle here as the naturalistic approach and complete lack of special effects put all of the emphasis on complex, thought-provoking ideas that are far more engaging than a similar concept done through conventional means would have likely been.

2013 Horror Part Ten

THE PURGE

Dir - James DeMonaco

Overall: WOOF

"Dumb people in horror movies" - The Movie aka The Purge is certainly in the top running as the most insultingly stupid film ever made, regardless of genre.  In this respect, it is a fascinating viewing experience where a laughably preposterous idea is played straight in a logic-void manner befitting to the material.  Writer/director James DeMonaco envisions a world where the upper class wall themselves off in mostly impenetrable security systems once a year and show their support for a night where anyone can kill anyone legally, which of course puts them in the hot seat where they have a change of heart once the tables are turned.  Unfortunately in order to pull this off, the premise has to run though a barrage of cliches where every character at every opportunity with no exceptions makes the most asinine decisions that they possible can.  This is because it is an impossible sell to convey a society where people are so detached with their own lives, (either living comfortably or not), where they can even pretend that legalized murder is remotely OK without taking into account any psychological ramifications, let alone while gleefully and ignorantly accepting such justifications.  It is a type of story idea that sounds cool for only about three seconds before even one completely normal question gets asked to make the whole thing collapse.  So how this not only became a hit, scored Ethan Hawke, and spawned a franchise is enough to truly prove that our actual movie-going society very much doomed.

 

CULT

Dir - Kōji Shiraishi

Overall: MEH

Sticking with his favorite of sub-genres, Japanese filmmaker Kōji Shiraishi offers up yet another found footage movie with unfortunately weak results in Cult, (Karuto).  This time it is a ghost hunting-style television show that puts a barrage of footage together from boatloads of cameras while also taking the time to add scary music throughout the whole thing, which already makes the movie far more silly than it was probably intended to be.  Such a trend continues to nearly every other aspect though since the story plays out like a Paranormal Activity knock-off in many respects, except one that actually shows what the supernatural entities look like instead of leaving them to the viewer's imagination.  Considering that such entities are nothing more than cartoony squiggly lines that are occasionally attached to a face, the entire affair comes off accidentally ridiculous.  There is also a young, weird super-exorcist that seems right out of a manga or anime product who finds everything fascinating and announces that the real fight has only just begun, (cut dramatically to credits).  So yeah, this is hardly scary stuff.  Shiraishi's pacing is rather off as well and as is the case with much contemporary found footage, the format is wrongly uses in a lazy way that would be far more fitting to a conventional style.

JUG FACE

Dir - Chad Crawford Kinkle

Overall: MEH

After winning the 2011 Slamdance Screenwriting Competition, Chad Crawford Kinkle's script for Jug Face was picked up by indie production company Modernciné, resulting in a typically small-scale film with some good performances, one or two genre tweaks, and several issues that keep it from being all that impressive.  On the plus side, both Lauren Ashley Carter and Sean Bridgers are good as a troubled young woman and a dim-witted potter, both of whom seem hopelessly stuck in a hole in the ground-worshiping cult and their backwoods traditions.  Though it is always nice to see Larry Fessenden, (plus Sean Young emerging in something is a welcome surprise), both are a bit unconvincing here.  Kinkle's direction is unassuming, fading out of most scenes and trying to make the most out of some gore sequences and hackey-looking specters.  His script underplays its supernatural components too much as well, but the manner of fact way that it depicts the sparse, traditionalist community and their relationship to otherworldly forces is refreshing at least.  Still, the story and its isolated setting give way to a lot of back 'n forth in the long run where it runs through slight variations of the same set pieces over and over again, ending with more of a whimper than a though-provoking gasp.

2013 Horror Part Nine

THE HARVEST

Dir - John McNaughton

Overall: WOOF

Emerging after a significantly long break from full-length movie making and an even longer one since his last to fall into the horror camp, (sans his 2006 Masters of Horror segment "Haeckel's Tale"), John McNaughton's The Harvest is a gargantuan disappointment and not just for a comeback.  The problem lies entirely with Stephen Lancellotti's script which is preposterously idiotic, hinging on a completely nonredeemable couple whose behavior is both horrendous and illogical.  In fact all four grown-ups in this movie exhibit either the type of poor judgement that becomes insulting to the viewer the more that it contradicts previous actions or in the case of Samantha Morton's over-the-top, psychotic mother, just becomes insulting to the viewer because it clashes with an otherwise serious tone.  This is the type of film where people act annoyingly cruel, oddly aloof, or just plain stupid and the answers eventually given as to why are more unsatisfying than could have possibly been imagined.  McNaughton fades out of scenes in a peculiar fashion that makes it seem like a Lifetime television movie, but there is probably nothing he or any other director could do with the material to sufficiently distract from how awful it is.  On the plus side, at least Michael Shannon and fourteen year-old Natasha Calis deliver solid performances that the story hardly deserves.

WORLD WAR Z

Dir - Chris LaMartina

Overall: MEH

 

Boasting a massive budget and Hollywood's biggest A-lister in Brad Pitt, the adaptation of Max Brooks' World War Z still cannot overcome its formulaic shortcomings as one of countless zombie apocalypse movies to emerge at the turn of the century.  The PG-13 rating may be an immediate detriment for gore hounds considering that blood and guts have been a staple in the sub-genre from the get go, but the problems have more to do with the fact that this hardly offers up a differentiating enough take on such incredibly played-out material.  It is a series of set pieces that are thrilling on paper, but also ones that go through all of the expected motions, with high stakes established where only minor characters do not make it out OK.  Pitt's production company Plan B Entertainment locks horns with several others to inflate the scale in order to utilize oodles of CGI, conveying a pandemic sense of global, rabid, animated corpse mayhem the likes of which Danny Boyle's meager in comparison 28 Days Later could only dream of pulling off.  Director Chris LaMartina tackles the material in the safest way possible, allowing for plenty of heartfelt scenes between Pitt and his family while rapidly editing a barrage of footage together to cause either headaches or excitement depending on the viewer's tolerance for such things.  In other words, it is exactly what a two-hundred-plus million dollar Hollywood zombie movie is supposed to be.

THE COMPLEX
Dir - Hideo Nakata
Overall: MEH

 

Up until the grandiose finale, The Complex, (Kuroyuri danchi), is Hideo Nakata's version of a Kiyoshi Kurosawa movie; an emotional character piece, deliberately paced with hardly any incidental music on the soundtrack.  The theatrical film was quickly proceeded by a television series titled Kuroyuri danchi: Joshô which served as a prequel to the events here and also had Nakata's involvement, writing and directing four of the twelve episodes.  As one of the forerunners of contemporary J-horror, Nakata had already carved out a successful niche for himself in the genre, this being his return to purely supernatural terrain since Kaidan, his 2007's version of the often told ghost story.  The highly tranquil atmosphere is immediately striking here as the movie has a standard, slow-boil approach that makes it a top priority to build up a mysterious, spooky mood.  While these early moments are enticing, all of the story's would-be twists are made quite obvious, either intentionally or not.  So by the time that things start to rev up and the CGI becomes more prominent and the noise level intensifies, sadly the movie dissolves into a bloated cliche-fest with a creepy ghost kid, spiritual experts performing chanty exorcisms, tinted-color pallets, and mental turmoil.

2014 Horror Part Fourteen

THE VOICES

Dir - Marjane Satrapi

Overall: GOOD

 

A black comedy with a command, layered performance from the usual one trick pony Ryan Reynolds, The Voices serves as the first exclusively English speaking film from French-Iranian director Marjane Satrapi.  The sought after script by Michael R. Perry had been floating around on the Black List for a few years before it went into production, initially having Mark Romanek behind the lens and Ben Stiller in the lead.  As it stands, Satrapi brings some visual inventiveness to the presentation which is most effective when it reveals just how deep in the mentally unstable weeds that Reynold's character is as he perceives the world markedly different without his court appointed meds.  Tonally, it is not entirely on point as it bounces between weird goofiness and unsettling trauma, but it can also be argued that this juxtaposition gives the movie an appropriately quirky aura.  This is heightened by Reynold's portrayal as a disturbed factory worker with a heart of gold who is suffering from schizophrenia brought on by a dysfunctional childhood, all of which makes him that likeable yet "proceed with caution" guy at work.

FLIGHT 7500

Dir - Takashi Shimizu

Overall: MEH

Takashi Shimizu's first American film in eight years Flight 7500 is unfortunately a dumb-dumb B-movie that is disappointing coming from a director with far more impressive entries on his resume.  On paper, the idea of supernatural forces overtaking a Boeing 747-300 seems perfectly cromulent for something in the horror genre, but it quickly becomes apparent here that the isolated setting is far from ideal to maintain verisimilitude where a number of unexplained occurrences continue to happen in rapid succession.  The plot twist gives it the ole college try in trying to explain why only a small rag tag group of people seem to be the only ones experiencing things and wandering around freely, but said twist comes off as more groan-worthy than profoundly frighting.  In fact the would-be scary elements are not interesting enough to warrant their loose ambiguity, mainly resulting in typical, lazy jump scares, manipulative scary music, and loud noises.  Worse yet are the characters themselves who are all either boring or obnoxious parodies of real human beings, making for no one to root for or care about when in-flight mayhem ensues.

LYLE

Dir - Stewart Thorndike

Overall: MEH

This unofficial, low-key remake of Rosemary's Baby serves as the full-length debut from filmmaker Stewart Thorndike and it is one that wears its inspiration blatantly on its sleeve, for better or worse.  Focusing on a lesbian couple that has recently moved into a Brooklyn apartment with a baby on the way, Lyle plays like a stripped-down version of the Roman Polanski classic, clocking in at just over an hour in length, filmed on location with handheld cameras, and featuring very few effects shots.  It still plays the same paranoia game, as Gaby Hoffmann's mother-to-be is ultimately proven right in her suspicions where numerous things about her new abode and the inhabitants living there, (including her partner), do not add up in any wholesome manner.  Hoffmann is excellent in the lead and the part-mumblecore presentation makes it fittingly intimate for the noticeably tiny budget.  Some of the dialog comes off as too scripty, plus the ending is rushed and unsatisfying, but the main issue is the story's derivative nature.  Even without any hacky, contemporary horror cliches insultingly mucking things up, it fails to come off as anything besides just a lesser Rosemary's.

2014 Horror Part Thirteen

MARSHLAND

Dir - Alberto Rodríguez

Overall: GOOD

A police procedural thriller boasting strong performances and a nuanced script, writer/director Alberto Rodríguez's Marshland, (La isla mínima), handles its disturbing subject manner respectfully.  Coauthored by Rodríguez's frequent collaborator Rafael Cobos, the film is set in 1980, five years after the end of the Francoist Dictatorship whose ripple effects still linger in the small, backwater town in which things are set.  The detective team played by Raúl Arévalo and Javier Gutiérrez are far from morally ideal characters, yet faced up against a series of murders, rapes, and tortures committed on teenage girls, the "good guy's" dubious past and police methods are put into a perspective that still paints a troubled playing field where there are no true winners, just those whose ends may justify less horrific means.  Largely void of humor, the tone never becomes too overbearing thanks to the sincere presentation which boats nothing but a most naturalistic and grounded aesthetic that is impressively realized.  Rodríguez also wisely shies away from any and all exploitative measures and keeps the most unwholesome aspects of his story off screen, making them more psychologically troubling in the process.

 

UNFRIENDED

Dir - Leo Gabriadze

Overall: MEH

 

The gimmicky popcorn horror film Unfriended is better than one would expect from such usually forgettable, bottom-barrel garbage tailored to jump scare-craving teenagers, but it is still not without its flaws.  Told exclusively through a MacBook screencast where several annoying high-schoolers video chat with each other on the one year anniversary of their friend's suicide which was brought on by a viral video of her being rather embarrassingly drunk to say the least, the story deals exclusively with bullying amongst peers and its psychologically ravaging effects.  The young cast does a solid job of portraying their flawed, emotionally immature characters who scream, cry, overreact, and crack jokes at each other's expense in a typically exaggerated manner befitting Hollywood's version of what they think teenagers act like.  All of this is forgivable and even borderline interesting from a narrative perspective, but the film drops the ball when it tries to go for shock-inducing violence.  Every "kill" in the movie is unintentionally funny and the all-powerful supernatural elements at work become less creepy as everyone on screen does not run out into the streets looking for their parents or something, (anything), that knee-jerk logic would dictate.  Nelson Greaves's script makes several attempts to explain such "dumb people in horror movies" malfunctions, but plausibility gets increasingly side-tracked to get to more loud drama and goofy death sequences.  A solid B for effort and inventiveness, but that is about it.

 

AS THE GODS WILL

Dir - Takashi Miike

Overall: GOOD

Following up the same year's wildly different Over Your Dead Body, Takashi Miike returns with yet another horror entry, adapting the first part of Muneyuki Kaneshiro and Akeji Fujimura's manga As the Gods Kill, (Kami-sama no Iu Tōri).  Those venturing in without any information on the source material at their disposal may be a bit lost at the open-ended finale which clearly sets up a sequel that as of yet has not emerged, but there are enough inventively ridiculous set pieces here to delight the uninitiated.  Set up as a series of children's games that are controlled by mysterious forces that are either aliens, deities, both, neither, or who knows what, (since no proper origin for such things is given), they all have a violent and demented, "survival of the fittest" slant.  This theme of "God's chosen ones" is played throughout as the characters struggle to come to terms with, (or in one of their cases, fully embrace), the situation that they are forced in which results in more tragic casualties as it goes along.  At the end of the day though, it is just fun to watch a bunch of high-schoolers try and outsmart a Daruma doll, a Maneki Neko cat, Kokeshi wooden dolls, a white polar bear on a surf board, and Matryoshka dolls from brutally murdering them by way of convoluted, occasionally unclear rules and methods.

2014 Horror Part Twelve

THE HOUSES OCTOBER BUILT

Dir - Bobby Roe

Overall: MEH

 

To enjoy a found footage film like The Houses October Built, (as is the case with many found footage offerings), one has to suspend disbelief to a breaking point.  This is not to say that director Bobby Roe's independent debut here is not without its merit; it is just that the problems are the ones that such movies with problems usually face.  It begins typically enough with a text introduction as well as a disturbing scene that then follows with a "Six days earlier" tag that lets us catch up.  So right away, the issue of who is editing this footage together, where some of it even came from, and why it is presented in such an entertaining fashion becomes an unstoppable elephant in the room.  Outside of that, the characters themselves are given a reason to go as far as they do down their ultimately disastrous trek, but again, plausibility suffers as their behavior seems so idiotic as to routinely break the spell.  This is a shame really as the actually tension building is expertly handled by Roe and his cast.  The things that are meant to be terrifying certainly are, but the hackneyed presentation, stupid Halloween masks, and awful, awful industrial metal music mostly ruins the experience.

 

OVER YOUR DEAD BODY

Dir - Takashi Miike

Overall: GOOD

Drenched in intensely low-key, otherworldly atmosphere, Takashi Miike's Over Your Dead Body, (Kuime), emphasizes one of the many stylistic motifs that the prolific filmmaker toys with.  A "life imitating art", story-within-a-story adaptation of 1825's benchmark Japanese ghost tale "Yotsuya Kaidan", the melding between two supernaturally overtaken worlds is purposely obscured with an almost unbearably slow-boil approach that will surely prove detrimentally excessive for movie-goers who possess a minimal amount of patience.  Bouncing between the contemporary setting and the elaborately detailed stage production rehearsals of the aforementioned part-source material, Miike utilizes the same comatose pacing and unnatural mood in both.  Until the most harrowing of circumstances occurs, the character's primarily behave in a cold, emotionally ambiguous fashion that keeps the tone in check, plus the sound design combines extremely long periods of no incidental music whatsoever with a traditionally eerie score interjecting during the period piece throwbacks.  Being a Miike movie, fan's of the director's penchant for unpleasant, extreme visuals will not be disappointed, that is so long as they can endure the deliberately unhurried presentation.

DIG TWO GRAVES

Dir - Hunter Adams

Overall: GOOD

A strong debut from independent director/co-writer Hunter Adams, Dig Two Graves is an evocative and sincere Midwestern revenge story that weaves its supernatural components in a befitting way for the material.  Chosen as part of the Independent Filmmaker Project's Emerging Narrative Program's twenty scrips in 2013, it went into production in Southern Illinois which offers up an appropriately rustic locale for both its 1940s and 1970s time periods.  Both Ted Levine and Troy Ruptash deliver the most effective performances, one as a benevolent, weathered, marble-mouthed Sheriff with a regretful past and the other a fully grown gypsy kid with a vengeful agenda.  Relative newcomer Samantha Isler is strong as well, giving her young grief-stricken protagonist a sense of survivor's remorse that makes it believable that the unwholesome, mystical temptation that is thrown her way would hold sway.  The story's themes are delivered without any overbearing sentimentality and the few examples of dark magic that we are show could have easily come off as silly in a more genre-pandering fashion than is allowed here.  Last of all, the cinematography from Eric Maddison is naturalist and lovely, even with its derivative, de-saturated color pallet in tow.

2015 Horror Part Eleven

HOWL

Dir - Paul Hyett

Overall: MEH

 

For his directorial follow-up to the unwatchable piece of absolute shit The Seasoning House, visual effects/make-up artist Paul Hyett switches gears with the shameless, gimmicky B-movie Howl.  The set-up is simple and the structure formulaic of a bunch of people trapped in a single location who have to stop arguing with each other in order to survive being besieged by viscous beasts.  So in other words, a zombie movie except with werewolves.  Though the unoriginality is not a detriment in and of itself, Mark Huckerby and Nick Ostler's script is full of lame-brain plotting, terrible, uninterrupted monologues, and unlikable characters, many of whom are obnoxious assholes and/or morons for the mere dramatic sake of it.  On the plus and only unique side, the creature design relies more on practical makeup than CGI, making an interesting lycanthropian look that is more demon and Neanderthal than conventional wolfman.  The tone is too miserable and the characters too one-note and annoying to make the intended humor connect, but for fans of dopey schlock who also enjoy cool monsters, this might be worth sitting through.

 

GHOST MOUNTAINEER

Dir - Urmas E. Liiv

Overall: MEH

 

The first non-documentary film from Estonian writer/director Urmas E. Liiv, Ghost Mountaineer, (Must alpinist), tells a fictionalized account of an alleged true story involving a group of students trekking through the Siberian mountain ranges only to end up in a remote Buryate village where things get vaguely sinister.  The first act is set up more in a documentary fashion with the characters providing narration over photographs and the like, but all of that is oddly abandoned once they emerge from the mountains and things settle into murky waters where aloof supernatural elements, Soviet-era politics, suspicion, and aggression all co-mingle in an incoherent fashion.  Several things are alluded to throughout the film, (some mystical and some not), but Liiv never establishes the extent of the stakes and much of the cultural hospitality troubles that the characters find themselves in come off as equally unclear.  It is a frustrating watch from a narrative perspective, but the performances are solid and Ants Martin Vahur's cinematography is captivating, capturing both the expansive beauty and horror of the harsh winter terrain.

 

REGRESSION

Dir - Alejandro Amenábar

Overall: MEH

 

Writer/director Alejandro Amenábar's long-awaited, quasi-return to supernatural horror in Regression is well acted and consistently eerie, yet it is also surprisingly formulaic and disappointing coming from such a high-caliber filmmaker.  Set in 1990 at the tail end of the Satanic panic heyday, the story is a conglomerate of several documented cases that have either been proven or widely accepted to be hoaxes, with Amenábar crafting a psychological thriller where regression therapy as well as traumatized imaginations weave dangerous results.  All of the performances are up to par with Ethan Hawke being excellent as always as a headstrong detective and Emma Watson ideally cast as the young, would-be victim.  The problem lies in the presentation which is deadly serious besides being essentially nothing more than melancholic schlock.  To Amenábar's credit, the used of hooded figures with cartoonishly creepy, painted faces conducting black masses full of baby sacrifices, child molestation, and cannibalism is meant to be cliched as it all stems from sensationalized reports, but the plotting is too textbook to deliver any profound, real world revelations.

2015 Horror Part Ten

THE GIFT

Dir - Joel Edgerton

Overall: GOOD

 

An impressive directorial debut from writer/actor Joel Edgerton, the grown-up bully aftermath thriller The Gift rides that razor-thin line of clever and formulaic with top-notch performances all around.  The script toys with the ole "Nice person must be up to something sinister" trope throughout its first act which makes for several uncomfortable moments.  While most of the behavior exhibited by the people on screen is believable due to gradually fleshed-out characterizations, there are still a couple of logical gaps that unfortunately break verisimilitude.  As things get more intense towards the finish line, it almost bypasses its expertly unnerving, psychological manipulation for crude shock value, but Edgerton maintains a tight control over such a balance which makes the entire thing that much more suspenseful.  Rebecca Hall does her usual excellent work, (with a rock solid American accent to boot this time), and Edgerton appropriately keeps the audience guessing as to the extent of his intentions, but Jason Bateman steals the show in an against-type portrayal that is the most dynamic and challenging of the lot.

BE MY CAT: A FILM FOR ANNE

Dir - Adrian Țofei

Overall: GOOD

 

Notable as Romania's first found footage horror movie and the debut from filmmaker Adrian Tofei, (who also appears on screen and handles all levels of production), Be My Cat: A Film for Anne is of the disturbing meta variety previously established by Man Bites Dog in that its initial black comedy elements turn uncomfortably dark.  Tofei developed the project over a number of years as something that blurs the line between documentary and method delusion and the movie-within-a-movie for the purpose of another movie framework has a purposeful authenticity to it that is deeply troubling.  Allegedly, only first takes were used and the actors did not meet each other until the camera was already rolling.  As one of only three major speaking characters on screen and by far the most prominent one, Tofei is terrifying in his eccentric obsessiveness, utilizing broken English and clueless glee as he films his undying love letter for Anne Hathaway amidst self-justified, deranged, and deadly behavior.  Some of the plot developments may be too aloof to buy into and it is far from a feel good experience, but the latter at least is certainly the point.  As a viscerally bizarre watch then, the stark presentation only enhances its ability to get under the viewer's skin.

 

TALES OF HALLOWEEN

Dir - Neil Marshall/Darren Lynn Bousman/Axelle Carolyn/Lucky McKee/Andrew Kasch/Paul Solet/John Skipp/Adam Gierasch/Jace Anderson/Mike Mendez/Ryan Schifrin/Dave Parker

Overall: WOOF

In the short running as one of the most unwatchably braindead anthology horror films ever made, Tales of Halloween serves no morally admirable purpose besides providing a handful of genre regulars with a paycheck.  As is often the case with such comedic horror movies which behave as if aggressively bombarding the audience with as many stupid and loud cliches as possible with a smirking attitude is all that is necessary to equal funny, everything is played simultaneously straight and nauseatingly camped-up.  Any laughs to be found are purely accidental which is not helped by every single story premise being a moronic, lazily constructed rush-job.  This is both surprising and disappointing considering some of the otherwise efficient talent on board.  Neil Marshall and Lucky McKee have respectable works between them but their segments here are as daft as those from the other slew of filmmakers who come from much more unapologetically schlocky backgrounds.  Clearly everyone's hearts were in the right place by making something so lighthearted, silly, and gore-ridden, but it simply comes off as a groan-worthy assault on the senses that overstays its welcome before the opening credits are even finished rolling.

2016 Horror Part Thirteen

BAD BEN

Dir - Nigel Bach

Overall: GOOD

The first in a to-date eleven deep movie franchise, (plus a short film and a video game), the initial Bad Ben is a hilarious and intensely creepy work in found footage that acts as both a parody of and a legitimate installment in the sub-genre.  Tom Fanslau, (under the pen and screen name of Nigel Bach), shopped his concept around to potential producers with no bites and ergo decided to make it himself, impressively shooting the entire project for only $300 in his own home.  Equipped with a cell phone, security cameras, and a couple of convincing effect shots, the DIY results are commendable in and of themselves.  Thankfully though, Bach's efforts are engrossing besides their practicality.  As the only fellow on screen, he has a shlubby charisma ala Brian Posehn while he endlessly talks to himself, poking fun at the "Why do I feel the need to document my whole life?" trope in such movies.  The subtle yet undeniable comedic angle allows for his character's behavior to be questionable in one sense, but his stubborn, humorous determination to not be driven out of his newly purchased home by unfriendly entities gives the plot just enough plausibility to work.  Best of all though, the simple and familiar set up does not get in the way of some hair-raising spookiness.  This serves the intended goal of making any audience member at least a little on edge the next time that they are alone in their house and hear/see/smell something they cannot immediately explain.

 

CHILD EATER

Dir - Erlingur Thoroddsen

Overall: WOOF

 

The full-length debut from Icelandic writer/director Erlingur Thoroddsen Child Eater is an unfortunate schlock-fest and a surprising one at that coming from the filmmaker who followed it up in his native country with the far more respectable The Rift.  Insultingly stupid while simultaneously maintaining a grimy, bleak tone, the boogeyman story line tosses in a number of arbitrary tropes.  We have a "weird" kid who gets told that he has an over-active imagination so grown-ups fail to listen to him, shoots a sling-shot at the bad guy during the finale, (lord help us), and wanders around investigating spooky areas by himself like all kids always do in real life of course.  Also, there is a wacky old lady with newspaper clippings all over her wall and a collection of dolls, the strained father/daughter relationship, the melancholy final girl who has a newfound sense of responsibility due to recently having found out that she has a baby on the way, characters exchanging background exposition in a campfire story fashion, and a supernaturally charged title character who is immune to bullets and blunt force trauma until he is not.  Along with all of this hack nonsense is some embarrassing dialog delivered by cringe-worthy performances that range from melodramatic camp, to wise-ass and smirky, to just plain old wooden.  In other words, crap from front to back.

HERE ALONE

Dir - Rod Blackhurst

Overall: MEH

As the zombie apocalypse train just keeps on stubbornly trudging alone, the only two angles that filmmakers seem capable of taking within it are to make it a comedy or an enormously depressing drama.  The latter is the case in Rod Blackhurst's full-length debut Here Alone; an exhaustive film with minimal virus infection mayhem so we can instead painfully bask in a small crop of character's miserable ordeal.  Stylistically bleak and grimy with people literally covering their already dirty bodies with mud and piss to throw their scent off from the plague monsters, Blackhurst of course films it all with a diluted color pallet and peppers the whole thing with a subdued violin score.  As unoriginal as they come in this respect, the script by David Ebeltoft similarly offers up nothing fresh to the formula.  Once again we are just witnessing people grieve and/or put-down their loved ones, only to become metaphorically zombie-like themselves as they wallow in guilt and desperation, meagerly surviving one wretched day at a time.  Performance wise, it is uneven and stiff at times, but to be fair, the minimal assortment of actors are given very little to do besides look sad and make a few through-provoking speeches while not getting interrupted by the person that they are trying to convince.

2016 Horror Part Twelve

THE UNTAMED

Dir - Amat Escalante

Overall: MEH

 

A curious, Mexican hybrid of Coen brothers styled, awkward violence and Andrzej Żuławski's 1981 landmark Possession, The Untamed, (La región salvaje), takes some bold chances with its opaque narrative.  The horror elements are so underplayed as to become bizarre, at least compared to the central drama between a married couple dealing with all manner of dysfunction.  Because there is no concise explanation as to the otherworldly presence or how it seems to be inconsistently affecting the lives of those who come across it, (and the fact that we are barely given an inkling to its existence until well into the film), it becomes difficult to understand what exactly writer/director Amat Escalante was going for by making this a genre film in the first place.  It certainly deals with repressed, sexual frustration, but it would be cynical to think that the entire thing merely points to people doing questionable things just in order to fulfill carnal desires once given the opportunity.  The movie deserves props for its unorthodox approach and the nuanced way that its troubling subject matter is handled, but it is also a bit too nebulous in certain eras to make its intended point, whatever that may be.

 

10 CLOVERFIELD LANE

Dir - Dan Trachtenberg

Overall: GOOD

 

A tight, popcorn sci-fi horror film pigeonholed into the Cloverfield "series", 10 Cloverfield Lane works its low key thriller aspects well; thriller aspects which take up nearly ninety-five percent of the running time.  Originally penned by Josh Campbell and Matt Stuecken as a spec script under the title "The Cellar", J.J. Abrams production company Bad Robot retooled it with screenwriter Damien Chazelle presumably as a marketing ploy to garnish significantly larger interest.  Whatever the tactics, the results play off of audience's expectations while conventionally focusing on a single, claustrophobic setting where gradual layers are exposed to wrack up the tension.  John Goodman does his usual stellar work as a bomb sheltered conspiracy theorist who persistently seems up to no good while simultaneously being a literal life saver, and the script weaves in numerous setups and payoffs that keep things on a steady, suspense-laden incline.  People may have mixed feelings about the final set piece which was either always part of the plan or awkwardly tacked on to make good on the franchise connection, but it does throw a bit of a yawn-inducing, final punctuation to an otherwise gripping presentation.  There is no rule breaking present here, but it is slick and intimate in the best possible way that genre movies with some studio backing can be.

 

THE NOONDAY WITCH

Dir - Jiri Sádek/Matej Chlupacek/Michal Samir

Overall: MEH

A collaboration between filmmakers Jiri Sádek, Matej Chlupacek, and Michal Samir, the Czech folk horror drama The Noonday Witch, (Polednice), is unfortunately stagnant despite its sincere approach.  From a technical perspective, all aspects are on point; Alexander Surkala's cinematography intimately captures the remote countryside during a particularly warm summer, Ben Corrigan's music is never overbearing, there are minimal to no overused genre tropes present, and the performances are strong with both Anna Geislerová and ten year-old Karolína Lipowská in particular making an emotionally sympathetic mother/daughter team going through a recent trauma.  The problem lies entirely with the narrative then.  Though based on a 19th century poem by Antonín Dvořák, its presentation here is never handled with any convincing menace or majesty.  In fact hardly anything of any supernatural merit transpires at all until the very end when it becomes rather clear cut that what is happening is of a psychological nature.  Before that, we are given too little information to relate to the characters and their plight, plus cryptic warnings by a local, wacky old lady are never investigated or taken seriously until they just randomly are with no proper build up.  Something got lost along the way here to examine a mother's newfound hardships in raising her daughter as a single parent through some of the inherent metaphors or moral teachings of folkloric superstitions.  Instead, we just get an aimless, underwritten series of events that is presented far more profoundly than it comes across.

2016 Horror Part Eleven

DEAREST SISTER

Dir - Mattie Do

Overall: GOOD

The sophomore effort from Laotian/American filmmaker Mattie Do, Dearest Sister is a tragic, family drama that weaves its supernatural components more as a mere plot device than as a means of exploring its class-based themes.  This is not a bad thing though if for any other reason than because the material does not call for hack-laden genre tropes so there are no jump scares, generic horror music to dictate the audience's feelings, or situations where otherworldly activity transpires that either nobody mentions to anyone or is dismissed as "all in one's mind".  Instead, the nature of Vilouna Phetmany's protagonist who is suddenly stricken with gradual blindness as well as the ability to see the dead and receive lottery winning premonitions from them is never explained as it is not important.  What is important is how the characters face their hardships in such a situation, namely Amphaiphun Phommapunya's peasant girl giving in to the temptation of basking in a more privileged, (be it temporarily so), lifestyle.  This also has some more personal aspects for Do and her screenwriter/collaborator husband Christopher Larsen in the interracial marriage dynamics present in the story, which are treated as complex and respectfully as everything else herein.

 

WE ARE THE FLESH

Dir - Emiliano Rocha Minter

Overall: GOOD

A modern day midnight movie that spits bloody/pornographic/incestuous rage in the face of coherence, the full-length We Are the Flesh, (Tenemos la carne), from Mexican filmmaker Emiliano Rocha Minter is a nasty, boundary obliterating nightmare that will equally delight and frustrate only the most forgiving of art house enthusiasts.  Essentially, if Gaspar Noé and Alejandro Jodorowsky masturbated over each other's bad acid trips, this would probably be close to the result, which is a warped aesthetic that Minter is no doubt going for.  On paper, it merely focuses on three people in a single location, but what transpires goes off the rails at such a steady incline that the results are anything but minimalist.  Whether or not the film actually features real intercourse and bodily releases or merely simulated ones is hardly of importance since the visceral results are not for the faint of heart either way.  Though it is certainly disturbed and uncomfortable in the type of manner that a young, hungry, and up and coming artist like Minter seems gleefully determined for it to be, this is hardly just a barrage of grotesque, incoherent images.  Well, maybe it is, but it is also cinematically bold in a way that one cannot take their eyes off of; vividly beautiful and horrific all at once like a naked, grimy, ambient, fevered nightmare of cannibalistic madness and sex.  If it says anything at all, it does so in an impenetrably pretentious manner yet it would veer towards the forgettable if it was done any other way.

ROMEO'S DISTRESS

Dir - Jeff Frumess

Overall: MEH

Shot for a measly $2,553 over the course of fifteen months with a one-to-two person crew, Romeo's Distress has a modern day, SOV charm to it that is commendable, yet as one could imagine, it also does not wield the most professional of results.  Writer/director/everything guy Jeff Frumess goes for a Clerks meets Eraserhead vibe, titling the film off of a Christian Death song and featuring a couple of original ditties from collaborator/musician Nick Bohun, all of which give it the proper DIY, punk rock vibe.  While the story focuses on an eccentric, stereotypically dorky loner with a profound crush on a girl that we only see in his masturbation sessions or colored day dreams, (the rest of the movie is in black and white), the mystery proves to be rather straightforward in its resolve, despite one or two unexplained details along the way.  It still achieves its indented midnight movie weirdness, but the home movie production aspects unfortunately undermine it.  Unnatural performances, YouTube quality visuals, and monotonous pacing make it difficult to take seriously, plus the tone is clashing with awkard attempts at dark/quirky humor, mild perversity and violence, and inconsistent music that leans heavier on the side of melancholic.  Frumess certainly proves to have the inspiration at least for something grander, but it would require a significantly higher budget, a well-trained crew, and better actors to pull it off.

2017 Horror Part Fifteen

RIFT

Dir - Erlingur Thoroddsen

Overall: GOOD

 

Though its supernatural components may be too murky and ill-defined for some tastes, Erlingur Thoroddsen's sophomore full-length Rift, (Sumrak), excels as a heartfelt breakup film.  Björn Stefánsson, (who looks like a cross between Richard Marx and Michael Shannon), and Sigurður Þór Óskarsson play a couple that is struggling with moving on from each other and the entire film can be interpreted as their means of coming to terms with such a traumatic breakup, even by unearthly means.  Writer/director Thoroddsen's script thankfully spends most of its time patiently and realistically showing the frustration and confusion surrounding complex romantic relationships and being a movie where said relationship is a homosexual one, the subject matter is treated respectfully even with some obvious allusions to what many could consider to be universal hardships within the gay community.  All production aspects are top notch, from the performances to J.P. Wakayama's contemporary, naturalistic cinematography that gorgeously captures the Icelandic countryside as well as evoking an effective amount of dread where the spooky sequences are concerned.

 

MARLINA THE MURDERER IN FOUR ACTS

Dir - Mouly Surya

Overall: GOOD

 

A collaboration between Indonesian filmmakers Mouly Surya and Garin Nugroho, (the former being behind the lens and the latter conceiving of the story), Marlina the Murderer in Four Acts is a low-key rape and revenge western that casts a unique spell both for its narrative and execution.  Set on the island of Sumba, (where exteriors where likewise shot), the remote location provides an eerie backdrop where even in contemporary times, people can find themselves so easily brutalized when miles upon miles of desert landscape lay between any neighbors.  Similar to the American Old West which may as well have been a lawless no man's land in such respects, the women in particular here are left at the mercy of men who will nonchalantly overpower them.  It all creates a tense atmosphere where such brutality is taken at face value and Surya downplays every threat as well as every act of violence in a chilling manner.  Pacing wise, it certainly takes its time, but this is to the film's benefit.  Beautifully photographed in mostly wide shots and long takes as well as peppered with both regional music and soundtrack motifs lifted right out of the Spaghetti Western playbook, the audience is left to simmer in a combination of uncomfortable and evocative moments throughout. 

 

REPLACE

Dir - Norbert Keil

Overall: MEH

 

German director Norbert Keil's second full-length film Replace is a schlocky affair that attempts a type of David Cronenberg-inspired, psychological body horror with a tone straight out of bargain bin silliness.  Things begin interesting enough with what seems like a pretty singular premise of a young woman discovering that both her memory is a bit faulty as of late and that she has deteriorating skin patches at random spots on her body.  As the plot thickens though, the goofy melodrama takes center stage and half-baked ideas and characters do things like murder, fall in love, make promises to each other, or in Barbara Crampton's case, lazily behave in a way that about a billion other cold-hearted, "mad scientists working on top secret medical technology that will revolutionize the world as we know it" have.  Keil's idea for an intense finale is to loop the same piece of music over and over again to the point of daring the audience to plug their ears as Rebecca Forsythe and Lucie Aron haphazardly attempt an escape, only to give up and profess their love for each other as the credits arrive with a false sense of profoundness that the movie never earns.  The photography is quite excellent though and while Crampton's one-note villainess character leaves her no choice but to B-movie her way through it, Forsythe and Aron's performances are pretty decent at least.

2017 Horror Part Fourteen

THE CURED

Dir - David Freyne

Overall: MEH

While pessimism is often an inherent trait in horror, it becomes quite exhausting in David Freyne's debut The Cured; yet another goddamn zombie movie where the nature of humanity is thrown up against hopelessly dour circumstances.  In all fairness, Freyne's angle here is a unique one in that he presents a world where the 28 Days Later styled, aggressive "zombie" virus is actually cured, only the caveat is that the once infected are treated as lepers by the rest of the society, causing a violent uprising to stand-in for real world, "us vs. them" marginalization.  All of this sounds fine and even intelligent on paper, but things quickly become obnoxious as it is all based on shaky, illogical footing where the discrimination seems preposterously uncalled for and exaggerated.  To make matters worse, Freyne utilizes hacky genre tropes, most egregiously with predictable, deafeningly loud, monster noise jump scares and characters leaving long pauses to let each other dramatically contemplate their dialog before exhibiting asinine behavior in the messy, final act.  The presentation is heady and bleak enough to disguise its poorly thought out details with the humor kept to an almost non-existent minimum and lots of gut-wrenching crying to go about, but the whole thing collapses easily.

GOOD MANNERS

Dir - Juliana Rojas/Marco Dutra

Overall: GOOD

Imperfect yet commendable for its bold choices and unique presentation of dark fairy tale subject matter, writer/director duo Juliana Rojas and Marco Dutra's latest full-length collaboration Good Manners, (As Boas Maneiras), is one of the most interesting, live action Disney homages disgusted as a horror film that one is likely to see.  Structured in two parts, it reveals its cards very slowly, unveiling more stylistic layers as it goes on which throw in everything from conventional monster movie, lesbian romance, and burst into song musical in as least likely of a manner as possible.  The first half is comparatively the strongest as it offers up the most surprises, focusing on the natural bonding between hired caretaker Isabél Zuaa and estranged-from-her-wealthy-family, mother-to-be Marjorie Estiano.  When things jump ahead, it becomes more foreseeable where it will all lead, but the emotional core at the story remains gripping, which focuses in no spoon-feeding terms on the loyalty of unconditional love.  The performances are excellent all around and Rojas and Dutra bathe the movie in vibrant colors as well as a heightened aesthetic that never becomes distracting.  Save a few minor plot holes in the end and some unfortunately terrible CGI, it is an excellent, refreshing work that has both its heart and genre admiration in the right places.

 

THE SLEEP CURSE

Dir - Herman Yau

Overall: MEH

 

It is no wonder that Herman Yau's The Sleep Curse, (Shi mian), is allegedly the movie that broke actor Anthony Wong from doing any future horror films as it is a laughably misguided mess all of the way through.  Even during the initial set up which sees Wong arguing about not being granted the funds to pursue a sleep deprivation experiment, Yau proves to be working within a schlock framework.  Yet once the narrative detours into a half-hour long flashback sequence for the second act, the momentum suffers exponentially from there as it then proceeds to bounce between two different timelines at irregular intervals.  The production values are noticeably cheap; like early 90s straight-to-video cheap except with occasional bouts of terrible CGI and modern day, screechy jump scares that would be annoying if not for how hilariously stupid they are.  Tonally, the real life World War II atrocities sit very awkwardly with whatever else Yau was going for here, especially considering that the last twenty minutes busts out cartoon level violence and preposterous shock-value tactics, though granted neither of these are new to the director's earlier gore spectacles.  We witness Wong removing a corpse's face for no reason in order to take out his brain, feasting on his love interest's arm, and most ridiculous of all, cutting a bad guy's penis off and shoving it in said bad guy's mouth before decapitating him.  At a hundred and two minutes, it is an egregious experience to sit through, but if trash fans are willing to cherry pick a handful of bloody, outrageous moments to laugh at, it at least has you covered there.