Dir - Jordan Downey
Overall: MEH
Credit where it is due, the creative team behind the ThanksKilling movies pull as much of a 180 degree turn as possible while still sticking within the horror genre on their 2018 effort The Head Hunter. Virtually featuring a single actor, (grizzled newcomer Christopher Rygh), it follows the one-note exploits of the Norwegian title character who hunts down monsters or other undesirables and hangs their heads on his wall. He also makes healing elixirs out of their fluids and frequently visits the grave of his murdered daughter, eventually coming into contact with the nasty creature that caused such a death. Director Jordan Downey and cinematographer Kevin Stewart handled most levels of production on a shoestring budget, and they manage to craft something that looks as impressive as any other intimate and period-set viking epic out there. An epic this is not though as the film runs a mere seventy-two minutes, which is fortunate since it is rudimentary in story and wraps up just before overstaying its welcome. While the grimy photography, shrouded special effects, earthy setting, bile-like gore, and well-abused costumes create an ideal aesthetic for some supernatural Dark Age barbarism, the movie regrettably relies on hackneyed jump scares to sell its horror gags, all of which are unremarkable.
Dir - Quarxx
Overall: GOOD
Though it has at least some of its toes rooted in the deplorable New French Extremity movement, writer/director Quarxx' All the Gods in the Sky, (Tous les dieux du ciel), sidesteps its exploitative qualities while delivering a more singular bit of cynicism within a psychological framework. This is to say that the movie is still nasty, still mean-spirited, and still uncomfortable at regular intervals, but it steers clear of obnoxious torture porn terrain and has a steady undercurrent where crippling guilt and mental illness undo its central character. He is portrayed by Jean-Luc Couchard as a bitter schlub who is void of the social niceties, avoiding human contact whenever he can and lashing out at those around him with less and less patience as his paranoia overcomes him. He cares for his invalid sister whose condition is due to a garish childhood accident that he was partially responsible for, and one of the themes of the film is just how much responsibility should be thrown on the unlikable protagonist's back. Couchard's methods are heinous at times and only become more so, but his comeuppance plays out in a curious epilogue that raises ambiguity as to how we are supposed to feel towards the fate of these two miserable siblings and the justice, (or lack-thereof), that is granted them. To each their own in this regard, and Quarxx' decision not to spoon-feed his audience is rewarded with nightmare fuel visuals and dashes of opaque humor to appease midnight movie fans who are craving something heavy, but also something that is not solely bent on bumming you out.
Dir - Lehr Beidelschies/Dimitri Simakis/Nic Maier
Overall: MEH
A seventy-two minute VHS cacophony montage from the experts in such things Everything Is Terrible!, The Great Satan is a borderline unwatchable experience. It follows the collective's usual shtick of cobbling together clips from a barrage of sources, this time focusing on the Great Deceiver himself Lucifer. Most of the clips are a second or less long, often times they overlap, and a great deal of material was scrounged from hilariously and depressingly clueless christian propaganda that emerged in a post-satanic panic landscape. Some of the humor stems from the way in which upwards of a trillion clips are spliced together, the EIT guys even managing to shoehorn in a few snippets from their famous collection of Jerry Maguire video tapes. Often times these are taken out of context, yet they still provide a call and answer response to the footage surrounding them which has the sensory overload feel of an incoherent fever dream and/or device for brainwashing torture, lending itself inexplicably to a "coherent" narrative on all things Satan. Really though, it is the clips themselves that are so preposterous that they deserve at least a courtesy chuckle, but it is still a difficult watch that becomes exhausting within the first few minutes and never for a solitary moment lets up. It may tickle those who are high enough and watching with an equally baked group of friends, but for anyone taking it on solo and with no proper warning, you may want to cut your losses sooner than later.
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