The Northman is perhaps the most accessible work of writer/director Robert Eggers’ young career. He purportedly did not have final cut and the film does feel a half step less quirky than The VVitch and The Lighthouse, both of which I loved. Still, even with one eye sneaking peaks at mainstream concerns, The Northman exudes a distinctive creative vision.
Read MoreCrash (1996) #RetroReview
With the news breaking recently that the legendary David Cronenberg is returning to cinemas this year with Crimes of the Future, a film that reportedly will hearken back to his more transgressive genre roots, I decided to check out one of his more notorious efforts to celebrate. I had never seen his 1996 adaptation of JG Ballard’s Crash before last night. The reviews and anecdotes I’d experienced varied wildly on its quality, but I took everything with a grain of salt, as I remember the moral outrage and controversy the film had generated upon its initial release.
Read MoreThe Batman (2022)
As a longtime comic book fan, I’ve been conditioned to easily accept new interpretations of established characters. New creative teams often attempt to place their own stamps on the mythoi of beloved superheroes. In some cases, they are given free range to completely reinvent a character’s entire universe.
Read MoreThe Belko Experiment (2016) #RetroReview
March 17th marks the fifth anniversary of the release of Greg McLean’s lightly satirical, bleakly humorous, and gory The Belko Experiment. Featuring a what-would-you-do type premise and a mile-wide mean streak, it deftly blends a clearly-defined psychological approach with graphic violence. The result is a visceral, if borderline unpleasant, thrill ride.
Read MoreCyrano (2021)
Director Joe Wright has a history of appropriating great works of literature for his movies. His Pride and Prejudice and Anna Karenina demonstrate a healthy regard for the original material, while still infusing them with his own dreamy style. Wright's successful track record continues here with Cyrano.
Read MoreTexas Chainsaw Massacre (2022)
When reviewing something like Netflix’s new Texas Chainsaw Massacre, I think some bonafides are helpful to the reader. I’m a huge fan of Tobe Hooper’s original film from 1974. The rest of the franchise entries I could take or leave, although I don’t mind revisiting the first two sequels every now and again.
Read MoreThe Long Night (2022)
You had me at creepy cult with weird masks. Rich Ragsdale’s The Long Night is a no-frills tale about a young couple facing off against a sinister sect of demon worshipers in an isolated setting. It’s got some familiar plot points, but there are a few slight curveballs and the photography is legitimately strong.
Read MoreThe Runner (2022
I discovered darkwave duo Boy Harsher a few years ago and instantly fell in love with Augustus Muller’s smoky atmospheric synths and Jae Matthews’ sultry vocals. Their four albums have essentially been the soundtrack to my pandemic. So, when the former film students recently announced that they’d written, produced, edited, and directed a short movie called The Runner that would also include an album’s worth of new songs, it immediately shot to the top of my must-see flicks for 2022.
Read MoreThe Matrix Resurrections (2021)
I was pretty surprised when it was announced that another sequel to The Matrix was being produced, even though many fans felt like there was room to follow up on the trilogy capper The Matrix: Revolutions. Now, eighteen years after that seemingly final entry, Lana Wachowski has returned as director and co-writer with the surprisingly meta The Matrix: Resurrections. Let me take care of some business first.
Read MoreAutumn Road (2021)
There’s a scene early on in Autumn Road, a moment of innocence and tenderness between a young boy, Charlie, and his crush Winnie, with a haunted attraction on Halloween serving as the backdrop. It’s a genuinely sweet and touching moment that turns terrifying on a dime as Winnie, played wonderfully by Maddie Lea Hendrix, suffers an allergy attack. For the audience, it should be heartbreaking as we realize this boy’s terror and helplessness, but instead, it’s undercut by poor acting on the part of the actor playing Charlie, who gives such a stilted performance that the scene is robbed of any emotion.
Read MoreMassacre Academy (2021)
As the world spins, what was old inevitably becomes new again, and there has never been a greater example of this in genre filmmaking than with the slasher film. Rising to prominence in the late 1970s and early 1980s, slashers became a staple of the horror genre, churning out countless films where masked killers stalked clueless teenagers before killing them in some violent, and usually creative way. After a brief lull, the slasher film had a resurgence in the 90s after the success of Wes Craven’s Scream, and today we seem to be in the early stages of a mini slasher revival, with a revitalized Halloween franchise in theaters, a new Scream on the way, and the Fear Street trilogy on Netflix, just to name a few.
Read MoreLair (2021)
Lair may not be the best horror movie I've seen this year, but I'm still thinking about it, and that says something. There is a current resurgence of possession genre horror, and I feel comfortable placing Lair in the company of well-reviewed films like The Old Ways and Malignant. A messy but entertaining film, Lair has the pace and tension of a thriller as it slowly evolves into a genuine horror movie.
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