Brad Anderson’s Worldbreaker opens with a premise that feels intentionally stripped down. A father and daughter living in isolation after the collapse of the world, training not for hope but for inevitability. It is a setup that immediately recalls post-apocalyptic touchstones like A Quiet Place, but Anderson is less interested in constant escalation than he is in mood, restraint, and unease.
Read MoreThe Confession: Rats, Religion, and a Story That Can’t Find Its Focus
There is a genuinely solid movie buried inside The Confession. The problem is getting to it without losing patience along the way. Written and directed by Will Canon, The Confession opens on an immediately unsettling note.
Read MoreWhen the Woods Fight Back: Grizzly Night Isn’t the Bear Movie You Think It Is
There is something eternally appealing about a good animal attack movie. Put people in the wilderness, add bad decisions, stir in teeth and claws, and let nature do the rest. Grizzly Night arrives looking like it wants to sit comfortably in that tradition, but what it ultimately delivers is something a little stranger, a little heavier, and far more grounded than its marketing might suggest.
Read MoreCabins, Chaos, and End Times Comedy: Weekend at the End of the World Is Dumb Fun With a Dragging Pulse
Some movies aim for reinvention. Weekend at the End of the World just wants to throw you into the woods, crank up the chaos, and see if you laugh before the world ends. Directed by Gille Klabin, best known for The Wave, Weekend at the End of the World is a horror-comedy that wears its influences proudly.
Read MoreTraining Ground for Feelings: Atropia Turns War Games Into an Awkward Romance
There is something immediately unnerving about Atropia, and not just because it takes place inside a fabricated country designed to help soldiers rehearse for war. Directed by Hailey Gates, the film understands that the strangest part of these simulations is not the fake buildings or staged violence, but the emotional labor required to keep the illusion alive. From that discomfort, Atropia builds a dry, frequently funny satire that slowly reveals a softer and more complicated center.
Read MoreJellyfish Season: A Sunburned, Cosmic Love Letter to Friendship
Jellyfish Season is the kind of film that quietly disarms you. What begins as a feature-length buddy comedy about three best friends forcing themselves onto a beach vacation gradually unfolds into something far more personal, strange, and emotionally resonant. Shot on Kodak 16mm and soaked in the sun-bleached textures of Florida, the film plays like a love letter to friendship, Florida, and the strange magic that happens when you finally slow down.
Read MoreIn the Shadow of Skinamarink: Dooba Dooba’s Analog Descent
There is an immediate sense, watching Dooba Dooba, that you are seeing something you are not supposed to see. Shot almost entirely through static home security cameras and lo-fi video fragments, writer-director Ehrland Hollingsworth’s unnerving babysitting nightmare doesn’t just flirt with discomfort, it lives there. This is analog horror stripped to its rawest nerve, messy, abrasive, and deeply unsettling in a way that feels intentional rather than indulgent.
Read MoreQuiet, Haunting, and Underseen: Why Canadian, Sniper Deserves a Second Look
Canadian, Sniper is the kind of film that asks for patience and, for those willing to give it, quietly rewards that investment with something haunting and unexpectedly intimate. Flying largely under the radar upon its release, it deserves a second look as a deeply felt character study about PTSD, masculinity, and the uneasy silence that follows war. Rather than functioning as a conventional thriller or war film, the movie is almost entirely inward-facing.
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