The Long Night has some great aerial shots but some of the shots go on too long. That is this film through & through. At 90 minutes it has many scenes that go on too long.....too long but too little is accomplished. Nothing happens, and when it does it is not very well executed. Scout Taylor Compton takes her tortured Laurie Strode from Halloween 2 and inserts it in a want to be Wrong Turn(2021). The "twists" don't feel like major reveals, it just feels tired.
If you are a fan of Hack/Slash, the writer, Tim Seeley, has a new film he wrote on Shudder called Revealer. It carries alot of the same punk undertones, macabre humor and gore of the comic. It's one of Shudder's more fun offerings and might be the best they have released this year, not to mention more stylish. It's a great concept of left & right wing having to come together during an apocalypse with plenty of discovery.
Ten years ago Scott Derrickson made one of the more disturbing studio films in Sinister. In that the super 8 film reels feel like snuff films, now we have The Black Phone, and here we see a super 8 almost home video aesthetic in full force via dream sequences, and those feel just as disturbing. The real horror comes from the human element, with Ethan Hawke as the chilling antagonist and Jeremy Davies as an abusive drunk as well as your typical middle school bullies. The lead, Mason Thames, and his sister, Madeline McGraw, you truly root for here. It is unnerving at all the right parts and builds that tension tightly with a creepy atmosphere & unsettling vibe. Besides that, the soundtrack is gold!
Growing up, Beavis & Butthead was pure gold. In 2011 there was a relaunch that just did not pack the same punch. Now we finally get a second film, and it is one of the funniest flicks in the past few years. It is the revival we should have had 11 years ago, but it works even better now with the current climate, and this film tackles various issues that are of today. It's pure dumb Beavis & Butthead fun, it's another road movie but it shines a light and has quite a bit of heart.
Star Wars was inspired by serials, and now with Obi Wan Kenobi being a serialized series it comes full circle. This is the Star Wars prequel we wanted 23 years ago. Ewan McGregor and Vivien Lyra Blair have great chemistry, Kumail Nanjiani will get more eyes on him here that in the Eternals, it's always great to see Joel Edgerton & Flea, but the breakout star was Moses Ingram. It felt like a SW novel come to life, had some fantastic battles and wrapped things up for New Hope.
Picard was a great change to Star Trek. Taking a more serialized approach worked, and season 2 is even better. This season hearkens back to an episodic feel of Trek of yesteryear but does so as a season. Time travel, the Borg, and plenty of heady sci fi. It feels like Next Generation fanfiction at times in all the right ways. Now for Strange New Worlds!
Joseph Kosinski is on fire at the moment with Top Gun; Maverick, a film i have not yet seen, but now he has two films out, the other being Netflix' Spiderhead. I always enjoyed his work but this is probably his best since Tron Legacy. It feels like an idea of a film from the 70s, with it's paranoia, and pharmaceutical driven plot. The cast is solid and Chris Hemsworth once again gives a charismatic villainous performance. I just wish the last act went a bit more batshit crazy.
Phil Tippett's Mad God is an achievement in animation & visual fx. Think of all the post skynet war scenes from Terminator but with a David Lynch sensibility. That continues for 90 minutes with striking visuals, eerie sounds and a general tone of dark surrealism by the way of The Matrix. It feels like a film people that dig Love, Death & Robots would enjoy. It's an acid laced trip but one where your journey would be bleak yet beautiful.
Jurassic World: Dominion is far from the masterpiece which is the original, it is a bit convoluted but damn is it fun. I loved it, it is pretty much chaotic dinosaur carnage for over 2 hours, exactly what you should expect after the events of Fallen Kingdom. Some call backs to the original plus seeing the characters from both trilogies come together was great. I wanted good characters and dinosaurs, i got good characters and dinosaurs. As i said, it is no masterpiece by any means but it's damn fine fun, i will say the end of the film is quite poetic.
Offseason, the latest from Shudder, is one of their best from a technical standpoint. It looks great and has solid acting. The tone is right and the overall story keeps a paranoid and creepy vibe. It starts off great and is very Twilight Zone esque in it's approach. However once things get good is when they start to fall apart. There are moments that are definitely awesome in the last act but overall it leaves you wanting more of the nightmare aspect.
In 2019 Riley Stearns blew me away with The Art of Self Defense. His latest film, Dual is much in the same vein, off-putting leads learns to fight. Karen Gillan is great as a awkward and neurotic sad sack, one that finds out she is going to die so she gets a clone. The clone is even more awkward. The original finds out she isn't going to die but the clone is now dating her husband and her mother prefers her, so the two must battle to death. Great concept but i found myself disinterested throughout. The best scenes involve Gillan and Aaron Paul training with guns & knives, they have an amazing quirky chemistry. The film ends rather bleak in all the right ways. It is an enjoyable little film but unlike Self Defense it is not one i will be talking about years later.
I was not huge on Harry Potter until Children of Men came out, that film made me go and watch Prisoner of Azkaban, and i loved it. The franchise is full of wonder and awe, they are truly magical films. The first two Fantastic Beasts are on par in quality of the main series but the characters, while still full of quirks, don't pack the same punch(of say Hermione). The latest, the Secrets of Dumbledore is flawed, you can tell there was turmoil, whether with JK Rowling, the recasting of Grindelwald, or maybe ever Ezra Miller(yes i know time line doesn't match up) but everyone felt like they were just sleep walking through this chapter. Originally a 5 part series, the financial & critical flop seems to be ending here, and it wraps things up pretty well. What does it wrap up? I have no idea, i honestly do not know what the fuck i watched. The plot is all over the place, scenes seem randomly connected, nothing makes sense. This is a mess of a film and went out with a whimper. Rowling may have pissed people off but there were still fans of the Wizarding World, however i feel this is the asteroid that killed that world.
We're All Going to the World's Fair is a film i read about during Sundance but once my local art house played the trailer for it, i was stoked. The film has a raw & edgy indie vibe to it. There is heart & brains at work, only the first 45 minutes is a chore. There is a unique scene involving tickets but after that it becomes a chore again. I admire this film but it is beyond tedious.
I am not a huge fan of the original Firestarter but i know many that swear by the book. The influence on Stranger Things is obvious, and in turn the trailer for the remake of Firestarter looked to be pure Stranger Things. The reviews were awful but with it being on Peacock what a better way to end the night after Hell in a Cell(also on Peacock) than by watching Firestarter. Well it winds up ANYTHING would have been better. Zac Efron tries here....but do not as there was no try, and the rest of the cast is wooden. The plot feels rushed but in terms of being compelling and in horror, the characters feel like they are written by Tommy Wiseau only this is not so bad it is good, it is just bad.
I wasn't a fan of Robert Egger's The Witch. I found it well crafted but a chore. I really dug The Lighthouse, it made me check out Egger's shorts and made me stoked for his possible Nosferatu. Now we have The Northman, it is full of his visuals, and is methodical as his work usually is and it starts and ends strong.....it is just another tedious chore to watch for those middle 90 minutes. I rank this above the Witch, and i can totally see why people are loving it, i just wasn't feeling it.
David Cronenberg's The Fly is a film, THE film that made me throw up as a wee lad. I had a McRib(my last one) and a cappuccino, then watched the Fly on TNT, during the morphing scene i barfed. So as a teen i was needing to revisit it and then i discovered the world of Cronenberg. I loved body horror and then came History of Violence, my first Crongeberg film in theatres. After that i kept hoping he would return to the world of genre filmmaking. Well i finally got it in Crimes of the Future. It feels Cronenbergian, it is pure body horror, it is sexual as fuck and pretty gory is a visceral way. It is also pretentious, tedious, boring, made me want to fall asleep and made me want to leave. I hated this flick, i love the ambition but this was a terrible experience.
Ilja Dragunov vs Jordan Devlin. NXT UK Title
Briscoes vs Violent By Design: Under Siege
Honor No More vs Bullet Club: Under Siege
PCO vs Jonah: Impact
