Top 10 of 2025: 6. Dead Mail

★★★★★--This was a movie my friends and I were watching trailers for movie night, noncommittal on what we wanted to watch when we came across this. Everyone was instantly enthralled. Goes back to the 1980s Peoria, Illinois to tell a story with high creep factor (actor John Fleck is always unsettling) and loads of suspense involving physical mail and one of the effortlessly coolest characters I’ve ever seen, Jasper, played by Tomas Boykin. Co-directed Joe DeBoer and Kyle McConaghy, if you have some nostalgia for video store finds from childhood, genre fans so of course you are, this is the perfect Saturday night flick with other cinephiles.

31 Days of Halloween: V/H/S/Beyond: Lovecraftian Night Falls Flat

V/H/S Beyond - 2024

Directors: Jordan Downey ("Stork"), Kevin Stewart ("Stork"), Christian Long ("Fur Babies"), Justin Long ("Fur Babies"), Justin Martinez ("Live and Let Dive"), Virat Pal ("Dream Girl"), Kate Siegel ("Stowaway"), Jay Cheel ("Abduction/Adduction")

 

★★-Day 15 of Nightmare on Film Street 31 Days of Halloween Horror Challenge.  V/H/S/Beyond. Lovecraftian night. 
 
The latest of the V/H/S anthology series. Made up of six shorts that explore mostly extraterrestrial themes in a found footage style. In one police battle zombies in an abandoned mansion. Another follows a Bollywood popstar doing a dance number that turns into chaos. And so forth. 

Usually have fun with these V/H/S flicks, especially 94, 99, and 85. I usually go to New York in October. Saw those three at the Brooklyn Horror Film Festival. Might have elevated them a little in my mind. Hell, I briefly talked to the Shudder curator, Samuel Zimmerman, on my way out of the theatre following 99, which was hella cool.

Didn't have fun with this one. It was pretty lame, IMO. Framing device (a documentary) veered too far away from all the other films in the franchise. Focus on aliens instead of ghosts and monsters/killers. 
 
There is a very disturbing one where a pair of siblings turn people into dogs called “Fur Babies.” Justin Long and his brother Christian direct the segment, which is a whole lot like Kevin Smith's Tusk, a film that Justin starred in. They claim that it isn’t directly inspired by the film, but the (overrated) body horror cult film was on their minds. I actually liked this better than Tusk, but it wasn’t anything I ever want to see again. 

Mike Flanagan did the writing for the forgettable “Stowaway” about a woman who is abducted by aliens. His wife, the lovely Kate Siegel, did the directing. Flanagan has mostly bangers with Absentia, Oculus, Hush, Ouija: Origin of Evil, Gerald's Game, and Doctor Sleep, probably my favorite horror film of the 2010s. Also, five killer miniseries on Netflix. My favorite of those was The Midnight Club, which was unfortunately canceled after 10 wonderful episodes. Siegel appears in a lot of his stuff and has been nothing but great in everything I’ve seen her in, notably The Haunting of Hill House and The Fall of the House of Usher.
 
Favorite of the pieces was "Live and Let Dive" where a guy goes skydiving with his wife and friends for his birthday. Before they take the plunge, they are attacked by aliens. All hell then breaks loose. It was only alright. 

Again, not really a fan, overall. The segments didn’t hit home for me like ones from previous iterations. Plus, the framing doc format sucked. And it bummed me out I didn't go to NYC. I'm sure I would've liked it more under those circumstances. Next year… I’m sure there will be more of them down the road. 

31 Days of Halloween: Nicolas Cage: Prisoners of the Ghostland: A Wild Ride That Misses the Mark

 Prisoners of the Ghostland - Sion Sono - 2021

 

★★-Day 11 of the Nightmare on Film Street  31 Days of Halloween Horror Challenge. Nicolas Cage night. Recently did a Nic Cage inventory. Of the roughly 120 movies he has been in, I’ve seen about 75. This was one I missed. Should have stayed that way, but I’m kind of a completist.The production value is pretty outrageous. Ghostland is what I imagine North Korea is like, but with Chop Top from Texas Chainsaw 2 instead of the butterball Kim Jong. It has actors I love. Built as a dystopian world that blends Western and samurai cinema, we get the typical themes of redemption and survival as Hero makes his way through the treacherous terrain and its mutated inhabitants. I was expect a combination of Mandy, Waterworld, Fury Road, and Kill Bill rolled into Battle Royale. I was stoked.

Here are the deets: Nicolas Cage plays a notorious criminal named Hero, who is sent on a mission to rescue the adopted granddaughter of a warlord played by Bill Moseley. She’s held up in a supernatural wasteland known as the Ghostland. Hence Prisoners of the Ghostland. 

When Cage is on, he is on fire, sometimes literally. Back when, Cage said in an interview that the film is “the wildest movie I’ve ever made.” So, you know, time to buckle the fuck up. I thought. Spoiler. It’s fucking not. 

Directed by Sion Sono, who is considered a hot shit auteur out of Nippon. So, you know, he’s got that distinctive style, which includes grotesque violence, extreme eroticism, surreal imagery, complex narratives, a cynicism toward modern Japanese society, and so forth. His portrayal of women has sparked debate, with opinions divided on whether his works are misogynistic or feminist. Another spoiler. He’s a fucking misogynist. In 2022, he faced allegations of sexual misconduct from actresses within the Japanese film industry. So he’s probably done, at least in America. 

Sofia Boutella plays the granddaughter that needs saving. Recognize her from movies Kingsman: The Secret Service, Atomic Blonde, Fahrenheit 451, Hotel Artemis, and Rebel Moon, among other things. 

Nick Cassavetes, son of John Cassavetes, who was cool as fuck, is about the only other person I recognize. He will always be Lyle Pike from one of my 80s favorites, Blind Fury. He plays part of this pair of brothers trying to eliminate a blind samurai type Rutger Hauer. Hauer is trying to rescue his army buddy played by John Locke from Lost who is forced to make meth for the Reno mob. There is a very memorable scene where Cassavetes and the brother get trapped in an elevator. One says “shit”, while the other says “fuck”. They then look at each other and in unison say “shit fuck”, gifting the world that little gem. 

Anyway, this flick is bonkers in a what-the-fuck-is-this way. Turns out it is a lot of boring nonsense. Like, why are the weird desert people turning folks into mannequins, House of Wax style? No fucking idea. 

Then, halfway through the movie, I realized it sucks. It is just interesting enough to keep you watching, but doesn’t deliver on the wild ride that we were promised. For example, I’m about to turn it off, then I see one of Nicolas Cage’s testicles. It is really something. I’m talking outside of his sack, held in his hand. Some new territory there. How’s that for what the fuck? 

This is followed by 20 minutes of exposition in the form of a maybe dream. I don’t know. Then zombies show up. I guess it is supposed to be an apocalypse, spaghetti western, kung fu mashup. Feels like there are a lot of allusions to other media, but I wasn’t getting them. 

Overall, Cage was solid, as were most the other stars, though it was not a good viewing experience. The Nick Allen review on RogerEbert.com sums it up pretty well. “No movie with Nicolas Cage, directed by the wonderfully weird Japanese director Sion Sono, should be this taxing, drawn out, and plainly boring.” It was one of the worst movies I’ve finished. Monumentally bad. Bad in a might be camp way, but not enough to convince me it was intentional.  

Slasher

★★★-The Canadian version of American Horror Story. Canadian Horror Story, if you will. Like AHS, it's an anthology horror series that changes storylines from season to season. Also like AHS, it starts with a good premise that features much of the same ensemble cast from season to season, draws me in, and then gets sloppy as hell. 

Season one is about a family in a murder house, season two about a group of adults that go back to this summer camp where they killed a chick years before, in season three a group ritually kill a dude and then start getting picked off themselves, season four follows a rich family slashing it out for their dad's family fortune, and season five is about Jack the Ripper, this season aired earlier this year. 

Actors are people I sort of recognize but can't place as they are Canadian. Notably appearing in the show is David Cronenberg, the most Canadian of everyone. He appears in the fourth season, “Flesh & Blood,” the most outlandish of them all, in my opinion. 

Example from that season: In this family of psychos, when there are two left, the decent one and the one that seems decent, they bone, this is like a half aunt and nephew that are the same age and didn't know they were related until recently situation. The one that appears decent starts talking about how he should get the money and then he'll marry the other one so she can have some too. She is like, uh, thanks. Dude then volunteers that he has a confession, doesn't want to hold anything back, since his fam is so messed. He got drunk and plowed through a preschool and killed a bunch of children. This when he is laying in the chick's arms in prime choking position with all these murdered people strewn about the house. Under the circumstances, it would be hard not to kill him, if you know what I mean. 

Anyway, a pretty alright show that I keep watching. Better than AHS, I think, as I do keep watching it. 

Attachment - Gabriel Bier Gislason - 2022

★★★★-Oh, the dangers of being a deep sleeper. This movie is scary as shit. 

Shudder original that came highly recommended. Part of the horror genre's New Queer Cinema that we're getting now. 95% on Rotten Tomatoes. 51% Audience Score. Not sure what the disconnect was there. I thought it was great. 

Drawing inspiration from Jewish folklore, this horror flick follows a woman in cohabitation with her girlfriend and girlfriend's mother in a Hasidic community. The idiosyncratic/domineering mother, she finds, is obsessed with supernatural perils to the point that shit gets scary 

I used to have a hard and fast rule that if I went over to a friend or girlfriend's house and the meeting with the parents or roommates was super weird, then I immediately checked out. Mostly because of movies. Blue Velvet comes to mind. This is of that persuasion and a good reason to keep it in place. By the time you realize something is wrong, it's way too late. 

Stars Sofie Gråbøl as the mother Chana, Josephine Park as the outsider girlfriend Maja, Ellie Kendrick as daughter Leah, and David Dencik as uncle Lev. Kendrick is the only one I've seen. She played Meera Reed on Game of Thrones. She was the girl who took care of Bran and hung out with Hodor. Directed by one Gabriel Bier Gislason. This is his first feature film, which is pretty remarkable.

Crazy good flick.Goes from a sweet love story that ruminates on the nature fears of relationships and family, then become completely terrifying in a different way. I highly recommend. 

Bloody Hell - Alister Grierson - 2020

★★★★-“What would you do with that (knife)?” “I would save myself and kill your family. You know, standard stuff.” Gist is a guy goes to prison for killing a bunch of bank robbers in the midst of a hostage situation that results in multiple fatalities. I'm not a vigilante guy, but this guy getting eight years was bull shit. I assumed this was made by a foreign winger who doesn't know how the American justice system lauds “good guys with guns,” or a Trumper who thinks this is what really happens despite people like George Zimmerman and Kyle Rittenhouse walking free. But I'm making a lot of assumptions.

Anyway, while in prison, he shoots a spitball at a world map to decide where he is going to move once he gets out. Lands on Finland, where he is immediately kidnapped upon arrival by a family of psychopath cannibals. Some low-hanging vegan jokes. “A vegan is like a person, but...” This in a movie about a cannibal monster. 

The vigilante guy is played one Ben O'Toole. Never seen him before, or anyone in this film for that matter. He reminds me of this maniac roommate I had in college. A combination of him and Mac from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Icould see either of them getting into this type of situation. Meg Fraser plays the hot daughter, dad is played by Matthew Sunderland mom is played by Caroline Craig. She's an older Malin Akereman type. Come to find out they are basically the same age, just a few years older than me. 

Is it perfect? No, but I really, really liked this flick. An over-the-top comedy horror romance movie with a heck of an original weapon to kill the big bad. Can't beat this “how did you you two meet” story either, which he tells to a group of people at a bar, much to everyone's horror. For a guy who is obsessed with saying something cool before he kills someone but fails every time, he delivers a phenomenal last line of the film, which I shan't spoil. Available on Shudder. 

Huesera: The Bone Woman - Michelle Garza Cervera - 2023

★★★★-Another movie that affirms my child-free status. Solid debut from director Michelle Garza Cervera available on Shudder. This is not my kind of movie though. Again, Rotten Tomato had it right there at the top that this maybe wasn't my cup of tea: 98% Critics Ranking, 63% Audience Score. However, I made it through, and I'm thankful I did as this was another thought-provoking horror flick that has something to say. Plus, the end gets totally cray. 

Never seen anyone in this film before in my life. Stars Natalia Solián as Valeria, the protagonist of the film. She is a really pretty lady. Like a combination of Rosario Dawson and Cristin Milioti of Palm Springs. Her husband is played by one Alfonso Dosal, who seems to be something of an up-and-comer. Others whom I don't know that are in this movie include Mayra Batalla in the role of Octavia, Sonia Couoh as the sister, Mercedes Hernández as the aunt, and Aida López as Valeria's mother. 

Gist is this woman Valeria finds out she is preggers. Her joy at becoming a first-time mother sours when she starts to realize she is cursed by a sinister demon or something. Danger closes in, most people think she is insane and definitely unfit to be a mother. Shit escalates until she turns to traditional ways to rid herself of this dark entity. 

Valeria is obviously under a lot of stress. Her husband is one of those, “what are you talking about, you crazy woman?” types that are some prevalent in horror movies. “You're just a hysterical woman!” So is her family. Her mom and her sister are fucking horrible. Her “spinster” aunt seems pretty cool, but the worst thing that could happen in this family is ending up like her. Then the sister tells her, “people like you shouldn't have children.” Thanks for the support. Of course the husband sides with the family. In general, everyone treats her like an insane person. 

Takes us on a weird side story suddenly that follows a female lover of the protagonist, I thought. This Octavia, the lover, is hanging out with this lesbian couple. One is leaving. The other is staying to go to college even though her brother was killed in the city they were planning on fleeing. “What is happening here,” my notes read. At some point I realized that this was her back in the day. It took me an embarrassingly long time to pick up on that. Anyway, they obviously had a good life, but it didn't work out. Now, Octavia has a pretty dope life in her non-child ways. She hangs out with lesbians, boxes, goes to rock shows and house parties, has casual sex. Her freedom is showed in contrast to Valeria, who keeps creeping back into Octavia's life. 

Several pretty unsettling scenes of the body horror persuasion. Lots of bones poking through skin. There is also a poor chained up dog that barks like crazy and then ends up dead. If you do this to a dog, we are going to have problems. You and me. But one of the most subtly fucked up things I caught was a picture in the OBGYN's office of a baby coming out of a woman's stomach. I'm not sure if it is surgical or what, but it's just casually there to freak the patients out, I guess. Then, of course, there is this defenseless baby whose life gets played fast and loose with. I had to Google “does the baby die” to see if I could finish it. Just FYI, if that triggers you. 

Had myself a sort of feminist film triple feature with this, Unwelcome, and Lucky. The gist of all of them was when your wife or daughter is pregnant or going through some real shit and maybe having some mental health issues, maybe don't berate her. Crazy idea, right? But this is how we act as a society. Have compassion. Be cool and fucking care. 

Zombie - Lucio Fulci - 1979

★★★★-Imagine The Island of Dr. Moreau except with zombies. That's this movie (released as Zombi 2), which served as a loose sequel to George A. Romero's Dawn of the Dead in Italy (released under the title Zombi). Interestingly, there Dawn of the Dead was Dario Argento with a new score by Goblin, who did the truly awesome music for other Argento movies like Deep Red.

Watched this as part of the Lucio Fulci Night on The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs on Shudder. They had composer Fabio Frizzi to play with the house band and tell Fulci stories and give insights to his work on this and the second film in the double feature, The Beyond. They also had the male lead of the film, Ian McCulloch, on to talk about working with Fulci, the director. McCulloch was sort of an embarrassment, not knowing what kind of program he was on and taking himself too seriously. Fulci, from the stories they tell, seemed like a real piece of work. Semi-abusive to the actors and crew, he didn't think you were earning your money unless you getting beat up physically as an actor. But Frizzi had nothing but kind things to say, so there is that. 

The gist of it is that the boat of a scientist thought to be working on a Caribbean island shows up in New York Harbor empty save for a giant, bloated flesh eating zombie. A reporter and the scientist's daughter head down to figure out what is going on. Once there, they find the island plagued by a voodoo curse, which causes the deceased inhabitants to rise as zombies and prey upon the living. You know the drill. 

The movie stars Tisa Farrow (sister of Mia Farrow) plays the daughter, McCulloch the reporter, and Richard Johnson is the Moreau type figure. Didn't know any of them before watching this flick.

Remembered for a couple of things, the film was notorious put on the “video nasty” list in the United Kingdom for one scene in particular involving an actress getting her eye slowly forced into a wood shard. It's pretty brutal. There are several deaths by zombie that are pretty hard to watch, actually. Also a zombie wrestles a real, very large shark, which is just nuts. You can read more about that here.

While low budget with not the best acting, there is a lot of shock that kept me and my female companion on our toes. We squealed with schlocky delight on multiple occasions while watching this flick. Makes it pretty good in my book. 

Brooklyn 45 - Ted Geoghegan - 2023

★★-Pretty much completely takes place in the same room. Could have been a play , really. Don't see many high schools putting it on though, if you know what I mean. 

Something I always pay attention to is the difference between the Critic Score and the Audience Score on Rotten Tomatoes. This is one of those major discrepancy movies. Critics Score: 89%; Audience Score: 56%. For horror, it often means its good but insanely fucked up. Almost always means that the movie isn't fun. This was indeed disturbing, and it was indeed not fun. 

Movie takes place on the night of Friday, December 27, 1945. Gist is five World War II veterans gather in the parlor of a Brooklyn brownstone owned by one Lt. Col. Clive Hockstatter who just lost his wife Suzy to suicide. They decide to have themselves a nice little post-Christmas séance to conjure up the vengeful spirit of the dead wife. Sounds like my kind of party. 

After the host makes contact with his wife, he blows his brains out in front of everyone. Just before he eliminates his map, he says “before you leave, you have to do something for me,” or something like that .Soon after, a German woman tumbles out of the closet. Turns out, Suzy, the dead wife, suspected this lady was a Nazi spy. “Hock” now won't let anyone leave until she's dead. 

I suspected the parlor was a personal Hell or something. Can't leave the room, possibly supernaturally stuck their with their demons with a potential real demon or ghost on the loose. Even say, “this is Hell, this room, and none of us are leaving until this Kraut is dead.” Everyone just does what they have to to survive and get out. That's the message of this one. Great. Just what I needed at this juncture.

Director, for his part, one Ted Geoghegan, also did the horror flicks We Are Still Here and Mohawk. Everyone in the movie is recognizable but not famous. See them pop up a lot in these Shudder movies, like this guy Larry Fessenden, who plays the guy who kills himself. He was also in Summoners, Offseason, Dashcam, Jakob's Wife, The Ranger, The Dead Don't Die, You're Next, and The Innkeepers. Dude does pretty much exclusively this type of horror. Others in the movie are Anne Ramsay who I recognize solely from A League of Their Own, Kristina Klebe who was one of the murdered girls in Rob Zombie's Halloween, and Jeremy Holm, who was the ranger in the horror flick The Ranger.The other two are Ezra Buzzington and Ron E. Rains who are familiar but unplaceable. 

All the characters are terrible and unlikeable, which is kind of the point. For example, one guy calls his “friend” a “faggot” and then tells everyone the guy was a “baby butcher.” Dude killed children, so, you know, he's a monster. The accused Nazi woman consoles him though, so it's fine. “You're not a bad man for following orders.” Yeah, she seems totally innocent. The Greatest Generation my ass. Also known as the “Me Generation,” they gave birth to the Boomers, a run that fucked up the country. 

Watch a lot of turds on Shudder, but occasionally I get one that is stellar. This was fine, I guess. But I wouldn't recommend it. 

Influencer - Kurtis David Harder - 2023

★★★★★-You see, this movie is why I don't become a influencer. Incredible movie. The best new horror movie I've seen in 2023. Wow. Available on Shudder, by the by. 

Going to give as little away as possible. But explaining any of the plot is a minor spoiler. 

The flick is centered around social media influencer Madison, played by Emily Tennant of Riverdale. As you often hear about these Instagram people, despite her popularity, she feels lonely and dissatisfied with her life and occupation, which took her on a trip to Thailand. Irritated about how her boyfriend (played by one Rory J. Saper, whom I've never seen) canceled going along, he seems to make Instagramers, she meets a mysterious woman named CW (Cassandra Naud, don't recognize her either), who has a distinctive birthmark on her face and is radically antisocial media. Taking CW up on her offer to explore the most Instagram-worthy spots, she goes about adventuring with her new friend: getting a feel for the local culture, engaging in deep conversations, so forth. However, shit goes off the rails when CW leads Madison to a surprise location—an uninhabited island completely disconnected from the world.

Movie opens with a girl washed up on a beach. The title card is the point we see how she got there. 

One of those “the real movie starts a half hour in” flicks. You can tell because that's when you get the title sequence just as the shocking twist hits home. Somewhat cliché at this point, me thought. I've seen like five movies do this in the last couple of years, but that's the only thing that's cliche. 

I can't believe this doesn't have 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The bad reviews say it was predictable, which is insane. Also shallow. Whatever.

The movie is legit terrifying. The bad is a sociopath that I've never seen before. This person is a predator that kills in a pretty inventive way. Also, like that deep fakes are being used in horror now. Check it out.

V/H/S 99 - Flying Lotus, Maggie Levin, Tyler MacIntyre, Johannes Roberts, Joseph Winter, Vanessa Winter - 2022

★★ - Little behind here posting my watches. Counted this for the new release for the Nightmare on Film Street Halloween challenge. 

Got to see the new anthology flick V/H/S 99 a little early at the Brooklyn Horror Film Festival last week. Some of the segments were better than others, but the last one, “To Hell and Back” was great. Overall, not great. 

Shudder put the film fest on and I got to see some of those like-minded horror teevee machine people milling about. Even saw Shudder curator Sam Zimmerman, who I know is not someone most people are going to geek out over but he impresses me.

Witchfinder General is the okayest movie of all time

"If they swim, the mark of Satan is upon them. They must hang." Yeesh. Too much torture, rape, hanging of innocent people, and screaming in agony for my taste. Even see a woman get burned alive while her husband is forced to watch. While a "good" movie, I fucking hated watching it. Therefore, okayest, I guess. 

Gist of this extremely disturbing movie is that Matthew Hopkins, a real POS, and his even worse assistant, John Stearne, wander the English countryside gathering up supposed witches before torturing confessions out of them and condemning them to death. 

Law and order are pretty much nonexistent. The film takes place during the English Civil War between the Royalists and Parliamentarians when everything was in complete chaos. The film mostly focuses on a Royalist soldier named Richard Marshall who pursues Hopkins and Stearne for raping his fiance, Sara, and murdering her priest uncle, John Lowes. 

Released in 1968, the film was directed by Michael Reeves. It stars Vincent Price, Rupert Davies (Lowes),  Hilary Dwyer (Sara), Ian Ogilvy (Marshall), and Robert Russell (Stearne). It was based on the book of the same name by Ronald Bassett. 

Vincent Price plays the role of Hopkins, the witchfinder general, a historical figure, making it all the more disturbing (though this is highly fictionalized). It was in the government's interest to murder clergy at that time. Clergy lived off tax money, so murdering them meant that they could just pocket that money. They paid sociopaths like Vincent Price's character to do this shit. It was cheaper to pay them a one-time fee than continually pay the clergymen. Plus, they could seize the land and whatnot. So, yeah, these witchfinder general types not only loved killing and inflicting pain, but it was also in their best interest to make shit up and kill as many "witches" as they could. The world has never been just. But eventually, Parliament got uneasy with his mass murder and such and accused him of witchcraft, because why not, and forced him into retirement. When Oliver Cromwell tells you you need to chill the fuck out, you are indeed wilin' out. 

Anyway. This is part of a folk horror collection on Shudder. It's considered part of the unholy trinity of the genre, along with Blood of Satan's Claws and The Wicker Man. I saw the remake of the latter, a real insane piece of work staring Nicholas Cage, this is the "not the bees" movie. I'll probably check those out. If they are equally brutal, I'm done with folk horror. 

Superhost is the worst movie of all time

Superhost. “This episode is the most special episode yet! Be sure to like and subscribe as we hunt down your favorite host, Teddy. First impressions of this place are not good. There is blood EVERYWHERE and I found a dead body in the basement. Absolutely zero stars.” That shit is pretty funny. This movie though, uuuugggghhhhh. Not my cup of tea. Though it has a 92% Fresh rating on Rotten Tomato. So what do I know? Judge for yourself if you have access to Shudder. 

Gist is that a couple of influencers with a travel vlog do what they do whilst stressing about their dwindling follower count. They decide to start creating content focused around their "superhost," Rebecca, who is out of her fucking mind and really wants a great review. Everything as far as plot goes hinges on them having shit cell service. But they have good enough WiFi to upload videos. Okay.

Directed by one Brandon Christensen who also did the movies Z and Still/Born. The movie stars Sara Canning (Claire) and Osric Chau (Teddy) as the sloggers, and Gracie Gillam as the psycho Rebecca. Gillam, who also goes by Gracie Phipps it appears, looks and carries herself like a girl I boned back in the day. The girl I knew wasn't nearly as insane, to my knowledge. But this fucked with me for some reason. 

Anyway, the always lovely and talented Barbara Crampton shows up in the flick too for what I assume was a half-day of filming. MVP is sort of a toss-up between Chau and Gillam who are both more than serviceable if over-the-top.   

Acting is solid all around. The crazy chick is believably insane, the female lead is a major buzzkill, and the Asian guy is a huge bitch. They are all super good in these roles.   

Glad I don’t have to care a lot about my number of followers is all I’ve got to say. Looks way stressful and fucking terrible, being an influencer who depends on that shit. Legit sad. 

I had a cousin who was a YouTube influencer who was like this, and I thought it was pretty pathetic. But what do I know with my sub-300 Instagram followers? I like using YouTube and blogging and posting photos and such, obviously, but I do it more for me and my friends and don’t have to worry about making a living at it, with all my high-level marketable skills and all (I kid [sort of]). 

Also, this lady, not marriage material. Yeah, she cute, but fucking with someone else’s livelihood for followers and likes is low as fuck. Now the host did end up being crazy, but that is beside the point. The chick he wants to marry, we see, has a track record of this. I just can’t get over how little I respect this dude’s character. Think about what you want out of life and a partner, dipshit. He can barely even go downstairs to check out strange noises and shit. This dude needs to learn how to be a fucking man. Of course she doesn’t really say yes by the way. As you can guess, the rest of their video is bound to be stellar.   

A lot of bad horror movie decisions. Idiot logic like going back to the house instead of the car because the killer might be waiting on them even though the house is monitored by surveillance cameras and locked via codes she provides. They had so many opportunities to run when they were able-bodied, but the dude, as been established, is a bitch. Also, there is a security system they could have set off to get the police there but they didn’t. I guess if the killer had remote access or something, but, again, no cell reception. They waited too long though and she was able to turn it off with a fob. Could have hit the panic button, but these two don’t want to live. I feel like this is on-brand for them though and they get got because of it. Fucking noobs.  

The Love Witch is the greatest movie of all time

The Love Witch. "Men are like children. They're very easy to please as long as we give them what they want..." "I'm the love witch! I'm your ultimate fantasy!" I loved this movie. Like Season of the Witch except good. Solid movie with a lot of layers to unpack. Plus it is extremely visually appealing. Would be a hell of a movie to trip to. 

Rotten Tomato Consensus: The Love Witch offers an absorbing visual homage to a bygone era, arranged subtly in service of a thought-provoking meditation on the battle of the sexes.

Gist is a a modern-day witch uses her magic to get men to fall in love with her before killing them for failing to live up to expectations. She drugs them with love potions made out of hallucinogenics before giving men "what they want." She is totally deadpan, which allows the guys to project whatever they desire onto her, which drives them crazy. It's a playful tribute to 1960s horror and Technicolor films, combined with its serious inquiry into contemporary gender roles. It's a super interesting take. 

Came out in 2016. Was written, edited, directed, produced, and scored by Anna Biller. Stars Samantha Robinson (a very pretty lady) as Elaine Parks, the modern-day witch who uses spells to get men to fall in love with her. She played the role of Abigail Folger in Once Upon a Time In Hollywood. Didn't really recognize anyone else from the movie, but all the acting was serviceable. One of thems, one Laura Waddell, looks just like Chassie Tucker from At Home with Amy Sedaris, which is like my favorite show. Others include Gian Keys, Jeffrey Vincent Parise, and Jennifer Ingrum, if you've heard of any of them.

Watched this on The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs. It was his Valentine's Day special. He has a great interview with Biller. His drive-in totals highlight the six "wang doodles" in the film. Also talks a lot about how the movie is super colorful and looks so good because it was shot on 35mm film, instead digital. The last bit focuses on this crazy sequence near the end that involves a random renaissance fair and includes a mock wedding. It's out there... Again, love.

Really hard to pick an MVP in this since Robinson is so great in this role and Biller's vision is so well executed. Ultimately giving it to Biller for putting together such a fine and visually appealing film. Good shit. 

Haunt is the greatest movie of all time

Do you still want to see my face? It's a work in progress, but I think you'll like it. Sort of a standard slasher elivated a little bit with intriguing killers and a cool location. I'm sort of a sucker for these horror movies set at a haunt. Basic gist is that folks think they are going to a haunted house to get scared by dudes in masks, but people really start to die. The Funhouse back in the day was sort of like this, then you got two pretty interesting ones that were ultimately unsuccessful in The House October Built and The House October Built 2. 

As someone who goes to these more extreme haunted houses, I get it. Twice I've gone with chicks who freaked out, thinking it got real like it does in these movies. The first time I was in eighth grade and the girls started to cry. The next time I was in college with a pair of friends and my sister. My friends were from Germany and France and had never experienced anything like a haunted house. The French girl locked on to me and screamed at anyone who came near us. The German girl went ahead with my sister. When we got out of the corn maze, we saw the German girl absolutely sprinting away from a guy wielding a chainsaw. "Ze chain-saw wus real, Ay-run." That was a fun night. I thought what a good idea this type of movie would be that night. Now, 10 movies later, it's starting to get a little overplayed. However, a Shudder original, this was the most popular movie on the streaming service this year. So don't expect these to go away. Also, this is better than most of the ones I've seen. 

Rotten Tomato Consensus: Haunt is spooked by the spirits of its obvious influences, but still packs enough thrills and chills to satisfy horror fans up for a haunted house excursion.

Gist of the movie is that a group of college kids go to a secluded haunted house. The kind where you have to sign a waver and shit. Eventually they discover that the actors are real killers after several of them indeed die. 

Written and directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods. These guys wrote A Quiet Place. The kids include Katie Stevens, Will Brittain, and Lauryn McClain. Haven't seen or heard of any of them. One of the killers, Damian Maffei, the Devil, was one of the killers in The Strangers movies. He's masked in that as well though. 

There is some dumb shit about this movie. First, there is this whole abuse victim/chilhood drama subplot that the writers throw in for the survivor chick. Gets them a car at the end though and pads the bodycount a little bit. Then at the very end, the Clown goes to the survivor girl's house, she had to put her address down when she went into the haunt, to finish the job. However, chick has Home Aloned her house and she ends up killing the dude, which is deserved, but come the fuck on. 

Overall, the movie is some pretty creepy shit. The people that work at the murder house all wear these masks. Shit like a ghost, a devil, a witch, a clown, so forth. Underneath those masks their faces are tattooed and mutilated to look like a much more horrifying version of the mask. These are guininely pretty scary. No thank you. We get told that one of them is a tattoo artist and all the workers are into death metal and they earn their faces by killing people. Producer Eli Roth, the "Bear Jew" in Inglorious Bastards and director of Hostel, told the writers to write out backstories for all these killers even though it wouldn't be used in the film. I feel that definitely gave the characters some richness that shined through. For that, I'm giving him the MVP. Hell of a talent, that Eli Roth. 

Scare Me is the greatest film of all time

Power outage. I'm bored. Let's tell each other scary stories. I loved this movie. If you are a fella that might be interested in some scary stories, you'll like it too. A Shudder Original, released on October 1, it's available to watch right now. 

Rotten Tomato Consensus: Smart, well-acted, and suitably chilling, Scare Me uses its familiar horror setting as the backdrop for a fresh deconstruction of standard genre ingredients.

Gist is that a writer-type who works for an advertising agency rents a cabin in the woods to write a cliche werewolf novel and bumps into a neighbor who is a cute, kooky, best-selling author. He is pretty jealous and sort of unpleasant, but things sort of turn around when the power goes out and she comes over and forces him to play a game where they tell each other stories. It's all fun and games until shit gets real. 

Written, directed, and staring one Josh Ruben. Don't recognize him. He's pretty good though. In a show called You're the Worst. His character is horrible. Total involuntary celibate type. He gets progressively worse until the end when you totally hate him. Cute writer chick is played by Aya Cash who is probably most known for her roles in The Boys and You're the Worst. Prob how they came to work on this together. You think they might hook up, but that dude is really the worst. Only like two or three other people in the movie. Only one you'd recognize is Chris Redd from SNL and Deep Murder, which is fantastic. He plays a pizza dude who get's high with them and plays out a couple of tales. 

This telling and acting out stories looks fun as shit. Might start doing something like this with my buddies. We are the creative types who would get into it. Anyway, hard to pick an MVP because all the performances are so good. Tempted to give it to Ruben because he was great with all three of his functions on the picture. But, I'm leaning toward Cash. She is really good. Great flick for a Halloween Saturday. 

Hack-O-Lantern is the worst movie of all time

This was legitimately one of the worst movies I've ever seen. 1988 straight to video, if that tells you anything. Wouldnt have finished it if it weren't on Joe Bob Briggs Last Drive-In. Even then it was something of a chore. Diana Prince, aka Darcy the Mail Girl, was really unimpressed. "You should have shown another movie." It's MST3K bad without the riffing to get you through it. Had to supply a lot of our own to not go mad. 

Gist of the movie is that this maniac of a grandfather/pumpkin patch proprietor is secretly this satanic cult leader whose group sacrifices folks on Halloween night. He also practices incest and fathers a child with his daughter. That child, this little blonde kid, is being groomed to take over the cult and grows up to be Mac's dad from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. 

Some shit to watch out for... Lots of nudity. All gratuitous. Some of the ladies are pretty attractive, too, surprisingly. Odd number of breasts, which is always fun. The blonde child from early in the movie looks exactly like the brother of Mac's dad and nothing like Mac's dad. It could be that guy's son. 

Gramps kills his granddaughter's BF after getting trapped in a recently dug grave. Instead of burying him in, you know, the deep ass grave, we later see that dude was buried next to the hole in a dirt mound, which was an interesting choice. Making Love in All the Wrong Places: Hack-O-Lantern features a cop having sex with a girl right on top of a freshly dug grave. Later, a girl bones a guy on the mound and mistakes a corpse's exposed hand for her lover's. Insanely, the girl then shows her friend exactly where she had sex at where they find the corpse, who is the other chick's BF. 

Some other dumb shit includes the four times I thought the movie was over but then it just kept going on. Lots of pump fakes. Hate a pump fake. Also, Gramps thinks he is making the sign of the devil and making the pentagram in the air like a Catholic would cross himself, but he is really making the sign for "I love you." WTF. 

Worst offender of all, maybe, is the name Hack-O-Lantern. Like, why? Has nothing to do with anything that happens in the movie. Waste of a perfectly good title. 

Only real positive I have is that the band is pretty solid. The director, one Jag Mundhra, came out of Bollywood which seems to pretty much always have more or less music videos in the movie (at least the few movies I've seen playing at Indian restaurants). I guess this came out of that style. Band was D.C. La Croix, metal but not metal AF. Total MVP of the movie. 

Madman is the okayest movie of all time

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Revenge is the greatest movie of all time

Revenge. Do you like rape revenge movies? Of course not. Usually too into the rape, if you know what I mean, or turn the victim into a psychopath. Examples of the former would be I Spit on Your Grave or Last House on the Left or Eye for an Eye, while examples of the latter would be Ms. 45 or Teeth. This movie, however, is one of those rare flicks that does it right, movies that are becoming more common as we become more woke to such things. Some examples of these movies would be American Mary and Bound to Vengeance. This one does it perfectly. We get enough of the shit to not only hate the rapist, but also get a glimpse at the dude's bros, the worst of whom isn't even the rapist, who enable rapists, the culture, and are violent against women. All that stuff goes down pretty quickly (the rape happens, it's terrible, it's effects are lasting but we don't have to sit there and watch it for half an hour) and we get right into her fighting for her survival in an extremely satisfying way in this gem of a revenge movie. Greatest movie of all time.

Rotten Tomato Consensus: Revenge slices and dices genre tropes, working within an exploitation framework while adding a timely -- yet never less than viscerally thrilling -- feminist spin.

Pros: Sick cinematography. Great use of landscape and color. So. Much. Blood. Like an unreal amount.

Cons: While it's not Funny Games or anything, it still features a lot of uncomfortable violence against a woman.

Gist of the movie is trio of rich as fuck friends convene on a remote island somewhere for their annual hunting trip. One of them, Richard played by Kevin Janssens (good time to point out that all of these actors are pretty much unknowns), brings his young mistress along, one Jen played by Matilda Lutz (she was the lead in the film Rings which is still on my to watch list). They get along for a day, drinking, flirting, dancing, and doing drugs, but Richard's buddy Stan (Vincent Colombe) thinks that Jen was coming on to him and tries to have sex with her. When she refuses, he brutally rapes her. She cries for help within earshot of the third friend on the trip, Dimitri (Guillaume Bouchède), turns up the volume on the TV before going outside for a dip in the pool. When Richard comes back, Jen tells him. When he barely gives a shit, saying she wants to leave and what not, and that if she can't, she will tell his wife, he beats her. Next thing everyone knows, she is out the door, sprinting for her life. Once she gets to the edge of a cliff, they push her off. Through grit, she survives and the dudes set out to find her and finish the job, only Jen is tough as fuck and hell bent on getting her mother fucking revenge!

Hard to call a movie with a brutal rape and so much violence beautiful but this is. Vividly colorful, the movie is a feast of natural beauty. It is also a very satisfying movie as these three are some of the most easily hateable characters of all time. Spoiler, there are three kills total and all of them are fucking great. She gets hers.

This Kevin Janssens guy wins the movie. Dude was a pretty convincing psychopath. Sort of reminded me of Aaron Eckhart. Totally an alpha male type who treats everyone, including his mates, like complete shit. Spoiler, there is this super intense scene when they are back at the house and it is just him and Jen left alive at this point. He is naked running around the house hunting her like a mad man. Think American Psycho except more deranged. Making it even fucking crazier is when she shoots him and then she is hunting him. But he seran wraps his guts in and the two of them are chasing each other around in circles for a crazy long time, each with the intent of killing the other. When she slips and falls and he finally catches her and knocks her out. He begins to choke her out and you think she is done but reaches in through the plastic wrap and pulls some of his guts out at which point she shoots him point blank in the chest with a hunting shotgun. There is so much blood in this house it is fucking unbelievable. And so ends this amazingly beautiful rape/revenge fantasy (or whatever you want to call it).

The debut film of one Coralie Fargeat. This lady is going places. The movie is one of my favorite horror, since it's on Shudder I'mma call it that, movies of last year. Get a lot of use out of that subscription. That and Mandy were Shudder exclusives. Two great, trippy films. Shudder has so much good content. This was one of the best. Can't wait for Fargeat to make more flicks. Check this one out. Loved it.

Prevenge is the greatest movie of all time

Prevenge. British. Pretty good for an independent movie with little budget. Is sort of marketed as a comedy horror. Would more call it a horror movie that has some dark comedy tossed in. It's pretty solid. Carried by the performance of Alice Lowe who is great in the film. She also directs. This is her first movie. She was really pregnant in the flick. Looks like a young Catherine O'Hara (the mom in Home Alone who is also in pretty much every Christopher Guest movie). Took me forever to realize where I knew her from. It was the British show I fucking loved called Garth Marenghi's Darkplace. She plays Madeleine Wool/Liz Asher. The female doctor who "went to Harvard College Yale, passed all her classes, and got an A." One of my favorite programs of all-time and what opened my eyes to British humor. Anyway, the movie is pretty good and very engaging. Mostly because of her. She wins the movie. Also, the (mostly) dickbags that she kills. They are good, too.

Rotten Tomatoes Consensus: As ambitious as it is daringly transgressive, Prevenge should thrill fans of pitch-black horror-comedy -- and open untold opportunities for writer/director/star Alice Lowe.

Gist of the flick is that a recently widowed pregnant woman, Ruth (Lowe), is told to kill the people "responsible" for her baby daddy's death (we get bits and piece that show him on a climb and his line getting cut with him falling to his death in a situation where they had to sacrifice him in order for the rest of them to survive) by the unborn fetus growing inside her. The film is basically a slasher movie told from the perspective of the killer. It also stars Tom Davis, Kate Dickie who is in a bunch of stuff like Prometheus, Game of Thrones (she is Catelyn Stark's sister who breastfeeds her nearly grown son), and The Witch, Kayvan Novak who stars in the television version of What We Do in the Shadows and is also one of the terrorists in the mockumentary Four Lions, and Gemma Whelan who is also in Game of Thrones as Yara Greyjoy and one of the detectives from the show The End of the F***ing World (she also looks straight up like a former coworker of mine).

A bit on the costars. Also, spoilers. Never seen this Tom Davis chap before but he is memorably good and disgusting as fuck. At one point he pukes in his afro wig and then goes in for a kiss. He then tells her she looks like Elton John whilst trying to bone her. Killing this guy is easy because he is such a piece of shit. Ruth asks if anyone loves him and he tells her his mum. We then see his mother lives there with him and is seriously clouded mentally, coming out several times to do the laundry. He sort of berates her and then gets murdered by Ruth. The mom comes out during this and says something about that needing bleach, you see, Ruth cut his dick off and he is covered in blood. As Ruth puts her back to bed, the mom tells Ruth she is too good for her son. Yep, even the mom knows. This looked like a fun role and the actor does a good job yucking it up. Whelan is pretty funny, too. Ruth poses as someone going door-to-door for charity who attacks her. But she is proper fit, as the Brits say, and throws on boxing gloves to defend herself punching Ruth in the gut even though she is preggers. After Ruth finally kills her with the cops on in earshot, she has trouble opening the door and has to escape through the doggy exit, dragging her enormous belly along the bottom of it as she goes.

Not all of the people really seemed to deserve to die like the Davis character or a creepy pet store owner whom she kills first. Like the HR chick, Dickie, sort of sucks, I mean, I wouldn't hang out with her, but she isn't terrible. Like every HR person. But she gets got. Then the flatmates, at least the one we talk to, is lovely. Does kind of complain about the other one, the one that was part of the event or what have you, but goes out of his way to say what a good guy he is. They get it too and one of them wasn't even there at her husband's death. He was just a witness to her crime.

Eventually she has the baby (on Halloween whilst she is dressed like some sort of demon) and with the help of Kayvan Novak (who was the climb leader who cut the rope on her dude so the rest of them survive) realizes that it wasn't the baby making her kill, she was doing it for herself. We think she learns her lesson or whatever and then, in the final moments, she returns to the spot where her dude died and the Novak character is there. They sort of smile at each other and then Ruth screams in rage with Novak looking on in horror. Yeah, she gonna kill him anyway.

That last scene is pretty representative of the film's humor. Dark as shit. You aren't gonna LOL but you'll chuckle in a fucked up way. Pretty solid flick that you can find exclusively on Shudder. Check it out.