Tag: horror

Witchboard

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

80’s horror veers all across the board from campy to atmospheric and everywhere in between but I think my favourite specific aesthetic from that era is, and it’s a bit hard to describe in written words, the sort of super dialed-up sexy, billowing curtains in night breezes set to spooky kinky sax/electronic music, permed hair, Ken-doll, Harlequin Romance-esque, impossibly attractive stars, ridiculously lurid 80’s style horror. Make sense? Stuff like the original Fright Night, Spellbound, parts of Hellraiser fit the bill. I am pleasantly surprised to be able to add Witchboard into the category as well, it’s a spectacular horror film I’d never heard of until it popped up on shudder but one that now owns the Ouija board sub-genre for me. It stars Todd Allen, Stephen Nichols and the late Tawny Kitaen as three childhood friends who grew up but never got out of the dysfunctional love triangle they’ve always been in. After fooling around with a Ouija board one night they find themselves in deep supernatural shit when two long dead spirits fixate on them, one the ghost of a little boy who is more or less harmless, the other a frightening, dangerous phantasm who wants them all dead. Now, this could have easily been a cheesy, routine haunting flick full of bumps in the night, POV shots and endless chase scenes but instead they’ve made it packed with dripping atmosphere, full of measured suspense and some writing and characterization that was far more mature and grounded than I was expecting. The two male leads have a genuine history together and their arc develops with believable friction and camaraderie. It’s so sad that Tawny Kitaen passed away so young, this is the first film I’ve ever seen with her but she’s just the *perfect* badass scream Queen in every way. Gotta give a shout out to Kathleen Wilhoite (Twin Peaks, Colour Of Night) too as an outlandish spiritual medium who is so impossibly over the top and adds the only element of genuine camp to the film. The score by Dennis Michael Tenney (Night Of The Demons, Leprechaun) is a beautiful, occasionally legit scary composition that for me stands with the best Carpenter electronic jangles and adds so much to the film. This is one of the coolest 80’s horrors I’ve seen in some time, and I can’t wait to check out the sequels to complete the trilogy.

-Nate Hill

Neil Marshall’s Hellboy

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

Why we couldn’t have just gotten a third Hellboy movie with Guillermo Del Toro and Ron Perlman at the wheel is beyond me, instead of this grossly miscalculated, eye melting mish-mash of bad CGI and disorganized storytelling. It’s sad too because it could have even been decent, they got an accomplished filmmaker I really love and a handful of super awesome cult icon actors to cast the material appropriately, but somewhere along the line of creative process, Neil Marshall’s Hellboy just shits the bed and comes out largely a piss poor effort. I love David Harbour too, he’s a terrifically charismatic and versatile artist but he just doesn’t fit the bill here, his Hellboy comes across as whiny, dour and all the wisecracking fells inorganic and forced. Plus let’s face it, there just wasn’t any hope for any other actor than Perlman to properly sell the character, plain and simple, he was born for it. Harbour’s Hellboy is stuck in a murky plot line about an ancient evil sorceress called the Blood Queen (Milla Jovovich) who has been resurrected by a human/wild boar hybrid to wreak havoc on humanity in some vaguely malicious ritual that involves knockoff Del Toro creatures stomping around London ripping people in half, cue the tiresome CGI. It’s loud, messy, the gore is off putting and there’s just too much noise and commotion to properly discern story or character. Does it do anything effectively? Yes, credit where credit is due, there’s a wonderfully eerie sequence where the pace mercifully calms down a bit as Hellboy visits a terrifying monster called the Baba Yaga, it’s essentially an expository interlude but it’s handled incredibly well, full of tangible atmosphere and genuine terror. Some of the cast fare pretty well, Ian McShane is always awesome and adds a brittle, corrosive edge to Trevor Broom where John Hurt was more subdued. The lovely Sasha Lane is quite effective as a member of the paranormal defence team who is a medium and can summon dead spirits in a genie-like mass of ectoplasmic slime, but Daniel Dae Kim comes across painfully lifeless as a guy who can only be described as the offspring of a werewolf and a cheetah. Most of the supporting cast are just drowned out in a flurry of noise including Sophie Okonedo as a ghost lady, Brian Gleeson as Merlin (yes, that Merlin) and a brief, bizarre appearance from Thomas Haden Church as some dude whose name is Lobster (can you tell I haven’t read the comics?). The film just doesn’t work, aside from a few exceptions that come too little, too late. Everywhere the Del Toro films were tactile, colourful, atmospheric and well written this one is obnoxious, needlessly gory, rushed and unwieldy. You’re better off just revisiting those and pretending this one doesn’t exist.

-Nate Hill

Gigi Saul Guerrero’s Bingo Hell

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

Gigi Saul Guerrero’s Bingo Hell is a clever, super gory, socially conscious little slice of societal satire wrapped in a vicious, slimy cautionary tale, it comes to us as part of the yearly round of borderline anthology output called “Welcome To Blumhouse”, ostensibly a mini horror film festival with fierce, imaginative original entries from new filmmakers. Set in an obscure L.A. barrio that’s halfway towards tofu eating, hipster overrun gentrification and halfway hanging onto the old school ways for dear life, a group of elderly friends finds themselves forced into a jarring new way of life when their beloved, modest bingo hall gets bought out by a mysterious magnate named Mr. Big (the inimitable Richard Brake). Led by feisty Lupita (Adriana Barraza), these old timers make a stand and fight to fend off the advances of this sinister businessman who is using obviously supernatural methods to lure members of their group in with promises of big wins and big bucks, an act of selling their soul to the grind of progress that has hellish, gory, ill fated consequences. The themes are surprisingly grounded for such a quick, breezy Grindhouse flick and one gets a real sense of care put into the script. Barraza is a fierce protagonist and Brake, as usual, makes a leering, memorable, deranged cartoonish villain in the best way, a living personification of of Big Money mania, he’s a presence that serves any film well. I’m reminded of last years VFW, a somewhat similar horror film about old timers defending what’s theirs from encroaching forces. They both have the same neon soaked, madcap gory vibes that I love to see in the genre. This is a solid effort from an exciting new voice in horror, and I’m stoked to see what she creates next.

-Nate Hill

Neasa Hardiman’s Sea Fever

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

I love a good aquatic set horror movie, whether the events take place down below in the depth in a submarine or on the surface in a boat. Neasa Hardiman’s Sea Fever is a solid offering that features a bit of both of these worlds, set aboard a trawler somewhere off the Irish coast that encounters something previously undiscovered in the animal kingdom. Captained by a veteran couple (Dougray Scott & Connie Nielsen, always welcome in my book), the boat soon finds itself marooned way out in open water as some massive, otherworldly creature attaches itself to their hull with with powerful phosphorescent tentacles and holds them in stasis. It’s up to a loner marine biology major (Hermione Corfield) to try and discover the nature of this animal and how to get it off their craft, but soon it becomes clear that this thing has a terrifying way of reproduction that involves tiny spores ending up in human anatomy systems after which some truly shocking body horror commences. The scenes of horror are bloody, frantic and genuinely disturbing but they’re juxtaposed with an ethereal beauty and reverence for this creature, and the power that nature has over us as a species. One character even observes that this animal isn’t malicious or evil but simply mistook their boat for another large animal and did what is in its nature: attempt to feed and reproduce. There’s a compassion there in the scriptwriting that you don’t often have in these types of horror films, and it gives it a different aura overall. We never truly see the creature in its entirety but the luminous encroaching limbs emanating ghostly blue light from the deep and the vague suggestion of a vast body mass below it are incredibly haunting, almost profound images that linger with you. If you’re a fan of aquatic horror in the vein of things like The Abyss, DeepStar 6, Leviathan and The Rift you’ll get a kick out of this. It’s restrained yet scary, brutal yet lyrical and does a great job at evoking atmosphere.

-Nate Hill

Ant Timpson’s Come To Daddy

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

Come To Daddy is a fairly… unnerving title for a horror movie, it just suggests all manner of demented depravities, so needless to say I went into this one expecting to be… jarred, lol. It was a bit less messed up than I was geared up for, but it’s still a slice of darkly humorous, cheerfully sadistic fun that is genuinely tough to predict as each bizarre new plot point barrels along like a sideshow act at a circus freak show. Speaking of freak shows, Elijah Wood has been deliberately choosing some of the most crazy, weird, off the wall horror scripts in the last few years, stuff like Wayne Kramer’s Pawn Shop Chronicles, Grand Piano and Maniac. This can be squarely added in that category and might even be the strangest in his latter day run of Midnite style horror stuff. Here he plays a fellow called Norval, a semi celebrity DJ (or so he says, anyway) who journeys to Tofino, BC to see his long estranged father (Stephen McHattie) at his remote beach house. Things get odd pretty quick, as daddy seems to be acting anything but like a father, tension mounts, behaviours get increasingly nuts and… I’ll leave it at that, because the plot is one deranged ball of diseased yarn that unravels with stunning arbitration and hilariously madcap, nonsensical abandon, to the point where at times it feels like the writer had a mini stroke at his keyboard and the misfiring neurons took over for the third act. Wood is the Oxford definition of ‘wide eyed’ and while his presence in films can often irk me somehow (don’t even get me going on his fucking haircut in this one), it’s played to effect here where you’re almost supposed to mock this guy and his self applied role as some famous arthouse DJ (snicker). Aforementioned ‘wide eyed’ attribute goes along way here and I promise you my eyes somehow got wider than his as I watched this thing unfold alongside him, both of us confused, perplexed and utterly revolted. McHattie is Canadian acting royalty, an absolute invincible workhorse of supporting villains, indie leads and big budget character actor work, he’s been spinning gold in his craft for decades, often thanklessly, I love the guy to bits and he just lights up a screen with brittle, organic, terrifying charisma every time. His role here is hysterical, a hard drinking, volcanically unstable, verbally abusive, mentally corroded old fucker whose next move is always unpredictable, the guy could just as well pour you a drink as smash the glass across your face and laugh in it, and he lets it rip here. As much as I’d love to mention the rest of the cast (who are all terrific as well) I simply can’t do it without spoiling this thing, which I promised myself I wouldn’t do. It’s well worth a look, for the beautiful coastal Canadian cinematography (Tofino is a happy place for me), for the shocking, disarming black humour, for the certifiably insane performances, McHattie’s in particular, and just the sheer dedication to madhouse intensity, unpredictable thrills and grab-bag scriptwriting. Great stuff.

-Nate Hill

Mike Flanagan’s Midnight Mass

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

Mike Flanagan has done it again with his new Netflix limited series Midnight Mass, but at this point I’m pretty sure the man is incapable of making a misstep in his craft and is the front runner for consistency, quality and innovation among filmmakers working in the horror genre these days. Mass is the best thing he’s done since his now legendary foray into long-form Netflix storytelling The Haunting Of Hill House, a benchmark masterpiece that now sits alongside this equally breathtaking crown jewel in his career so far. Set on the tiny remote Crockett Island off the Canadian coast, it tells the story of many different townsfolk whose lives are all changed significantly with the arrival of a mysterious, unnerving preacher (Hamish Linklater), whose coming heralds other scary, biblically relevant events all over the island. Who is he? What has he brought with him from wherever he came from? The mysteries, revelations and narrative surprises here are too darkly delicious and exciting to spoil in a review so that’s about as far as I’ll go plot-wise. As is always the case with Flanagan, the human elements of character, dialogue, emotion and slow burn storytelling are just as important to him as gore, scares, horror elements and this is what makes him such a strong filmmaker. The acting sees uniformly career best work from Flanagan regulars and newcomers alike, with personal standouts for me including Robert Longstreet as the town drunk with a painful past, Kate Siegel as the deeply soulful schoolteacher, Zach Gilford as a haunted local returning after years and a guilt ridden tragedy, Samantha Sloyan in a terrifying showstopper as the world’s most despicable clergywoman and so many more, all excellent and all with their keystone moments to shine. Linklater himself is a force of nature, so horrifyingly effective as a serial rapist in the phenomenal Amazon Prime series Tell Me stout Secrets and again providing a masterclass here, he’s somehow perfected this acting vernacular and line delivery that is simultaneously as intense as a dragon staring you down but as gentle and lilting as a summer breeze, he’s an artist on another plane. The story and themes here are heavily rooted in Catholicism and Flanagan delves deep into issues of guilt, forgiveness, penance, reconciliation and delusional wayward souls mistaking evil for angelic salvation, but the material never feels preachy or aimed solely at the religious demographic, these are ideas, emotional arcs and universal concepts that are accessible for any viewer, simply refracted through the prism of an isolated town where Catholic values and practices are still a way of life. There are numerous monologues on life, death, the universe and the nature of the soul that are beautifully written and performed with aching soulfulness by several of the actors in Flanagan’s trademark patient, sedimentary long takes that allow words, conversation and emotion to flow freely and organically from the actors on their own time. The horror is at once human and otherworldly as we see this community descend into an escalating downward spiral that feels like the darkest nightmare, the atmosphere and tone straddling this sort of “Atlantic Coast Gothic” meets “Olde Worlde Demonism” type aesthetic that’s just the perfect flavour. This is the real deal; assured, immersive, eerie as all hell, humane, an emotional wrecking ball and one of the best experiences I’ve had with any show or film this year.

-Nate Hill

Villains

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

Some films are good, some are bad and some are great, but there are those that can only be described as an utter delight and Villains fits that bill. It’s one of those demented, go for broke horror comedies that doesn’t always add up or coalesce it’s various tones together symmetrically but goddamn of it isn’t a blast of pitch black humour, blessed practical gore effects and four lead performances that truly push the boundaries of the craft of acting into something else. Maika Monroe and Bill Skarsgard play two unbelievably dumb petty criminals, a sort of dimestore Bonnie & Clyde, who run out of gas as they’re on the run after robbing… wait for it… a gas station. Their only option is to break into the nearest, and only, house in the area to look for more options and it’s there they find a five year old girl chained up in the basement, and must contend with the homeowners, a deranged pair of loons played with American Apple Pie hospitality and charm by Jeffrey Donovan and Kyra Sedgwick. These two chipper darlings are as crazy as they come and have soon ensnared the two wayward youngsters in their bizarre antics, while the two race to outsmart them and free the poor mute girl below. The plot can be kind of random and wanton, but the real treasure here lies in the meticulously calibrated, phenomenal acting work from all four and the razor sharp, diabolical scriptwriting to back them up. Monroe is already horror royalty from modern classics like It Follows and The Guest, while it goes without saying that Skarsgard is squarely in the pantheon for his portrayal of a certain evil clown. They work brilliantly together because they both lose their trademark moody, withdrawn and wistful styles of acting for a bubbly, effervescent, mile-a-minute-slapstick concoction that is joyous to watch, and manage manage to find a genuine sweetness and caring for each other that shines through all the more madcap, lurid elements and makes them rough yet lovable and blessedly bumbling characters to invest in. Donovan has slowly been building a repertoire of darkly sarcastic, terrifyingly dangerous villains in stuff like FX’s Fargo, Let Him Go and more, his work here is a class act in balancing insanity, southern charm and sudden bursts of punishing sadism. Sedgwick is a natural beauty who has this spotless Miss America aura to her that she turns on its head and plays to full effect as the mot certifiably bonkers character in the story, she’s at once scary, pitiable, sultry and hysterical. This is one of those specific, special flicks like Raimi’s Evil Dead or Friedkin’s Killer Joe where the story might not always play by the rules or stay on the tracks but you really don’t care because the actors just tear the scenery to shreds, the laughs and violence come fast and furious, there are even a few arthouse flourishes sprinkled in and it’s just such a wild fuckin ride. Great film.

-Nate Hill

Adam Salky’s Intrusion

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

Home Invasion thrillers are pretty much their own genre by now, and another has entered the fold with Adam Salky’s Intrusion, a sleek, nerve wracking, fairly predictable yet really well oiled piece that Netflix funded and just added to their lineup last night with little fanfare or marketing. This film doesn’t necessarily spend too much time on the invasion itself, but rather on what comes after and the motivation behind the crime. Logan Marshall Green and Freida Pinto are an affluent yuppie couple who have moved into a swanky post modern home that seems absurdly out of place in the flat, humdrum prairie county they’ve moved to. One night a group of masked men breaks into their house and tosses the place, clearly looking for something. After they are shot in self defence by hubbie, it seems as if the case is closed and it’s time to move on… right? The suspicious local sheriff (always nice to see Robert John Burke) doesn’t seem to think so based on details from the investigation that don’t add up and soon Pinto doesn’t either as she notices her husband’s odd, elusive behaviour and secretive ways. Why did these guys choose their house, and just who were they anyways? That’s the fun, and if the unfolding plot veers frequently into easily predicted beats, that’s made up for with some truly breathtaking tension and innovative camera work, some fluid visual dynamics in shot composition that clearly echo the work of Brian De Palma and add layers of atmospheric dimension to the film. Pinto, beyond being one of the most drop dead beautiful women I’ve ever seen onscreen, is also a terrific actress and owns the role here, never devolving into hysterics or going into stoic autopilot mode and always coming across as a real human being in a terrifying situation. The score by Alex Heffes adds another layer of spooky electronic beats and pulses too, especially in breathless sequences set inside their large, spacious and inherently eerie home. It isn’t anything groundbreaking in terms of thriller material and you can pretty much guess where it’s going midway through the first act but it’s very well executed, slickly produced and suspenseful like nobody’s business.

-Nate Hill

Dominic Sena’s Season Of The Witch

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

Dominic Sena’s Season Of The Witch is one of those glossy, noisy supernatural medieval romps that somehow hovers on the line between feeling like a big budget blockbuster and a direct to video outing. It stars Nicolas Cage and Ron Perlman as two veteran knights of the crusades who become disillusioned with their often brutal cause and the unfortunate civilian casualties that accompany it. They set out on their own as freelance mercenaries and are soon hired by a plague-ridden Cardinal (a near unrecognizable Christopher Lee) to transport a suspected witch (Claire Foy)… somewhere, I wasn’t really paying attention but it involves lots of snowy mountains, dangerous bridge crossings and eventually a spooky old castle for the grand finale. This is pretty run of the mill stuff, the CGI is really weak, the plot is inexcusably thin, historical accents are dodgy and the PG-13 rating pretty much guarantees a lack of genuine bite or edge as far as horror is concerned. It’s mediocre on almost every level but for some reason I found myself enjoying bits of it, despite my best efforts. I think that it has to do with Cage and Perlman, who are both terrific here and really deserve to be in a better film. They’ve never acted together before but they have effortless bromance chemistry here, they take full advantage of the writing and simply seeing them bantering, bickering or slinging tavern pints together is kind of a small delight. Aside from them it’s generic, the supporting cast includes familiar faces like Stephen Graham, Ulrich Thomsen, Rory ‘The Hound’ McCann, Brian F. O’Byrne and Robert Sheehan who all try valiantly to make impressions with… varied results. The problem too is that the film promises us a witch and when it comes time to deliver they reveal that this chick isn’t really a witch at all, she’s something far worse and unfortunately something that the film just didn’t seem to have enough budget bucks to properly present onscreen, and it hurts its chances. Still, it’s worth a look for the beautiful, rugged scenery (filmed mainly in Austria) plus Cage and Perlman, who are legitimately engaging and perhaps someday will get a better film to do their buddy-cop knights edition routine.

-Nate Hill

Larry Cohen’s The Stuff

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

The Stuff is all the rage and people can’t seem to get enough lol, in a dusty, hazy old Larry Cohen flick that Shudder has salvaged for a VHS quality transfer. This is a great little schlock flick as long as you ignore the sheer, hilarious lack of a proper beginning or ending, seriously this thing just… starts without any sort of introduction and then when it’s had it’s fun it just… ends, quite unceremoniously as if there were multiple reels missing from the original print. What’s in between is top shelf schlock with bizarrely earnest performances from a terrific cast and some gloriously gooey, visually stimulating practical effects. Hollywood character actor royalty and Cohen regular Michael Moriarty plays some kind of corporate investigator who is mighty suspicious of The Stuff.. what is ‘The Stuff’, exactly? It’s a sentient, gelatinous white goo that literally bubbles up from crevices beneath the earth and has now been patented by a food processing conglomerate and marketed as a tasty ice cream style dessert, to massive popularity and demand from the public. Only problem is, this stuff has a malicious agenda and not only inspires dangerous cravings and maniacal addiction in its indulgers, it takes over their minds and even physically attacks them. As in all Cohen flicks there is deft social satire woven in amongst the slime and there’s something in here about mad consumerism and the unchecked corporate greed that fuels it, brought to deadpan life by some truly great actors having a blast of hammy fun. Moriarty is always on his A game and rocks it here, with a crisp suit and cowboy boots as oiled up as his attitude, while we are treated to great supporting work from Paul Sorvino as an impossibly patriotic army colonel and the late great Danny Aiello as a smarmy company man who gets his just desserts. There’s a genuinely creepy sequence where a young boy’s entire family, now mentally enslaved by The Stuff, cajoles and coerces him into eating it, it’s a terrifically suspenseful midsection interlude that’s most effective in raising tension. My favourite aspect of the film are the effects used for The Stuff, which are brilliantly tactile, wonderfully animate and really do feel like a disgusting 7-11 dessert full of horrible ingredients that has somehow come to life, like they melted down the Stay Puft marshmallow man from Ghostbusters and the remaining ectoplasmic goo started running about the place Terminator 2 style. I don’t know if a Blu Ray or even DVD transfer exists for this but the version Shudder has gotten it’s hands on is so shockingly low quality it’s tough to understand everything that’s happening onscreen but on the other hand it adds atmosphere and ‘lo-fi VHS’ vibes that are appropriate considering the tone of the film. Good Stuff.

-Nate Hill