Category: Horror

IMPORTANT NOTE: This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the movies being covered here wouldn’t exist.

Copy provided for review

Taking a classic story and turning it into a horror film is a trend that can go well or go horrifically. We’ve seen the recent burst of these with things like Winnie The Pooh entering the public domain and turning into a horror film that somehow forgot to enjoy the innate silliness of the idea. However, some properties offer a more organic way into the genre and arguably one such property would be The Wizard of Oz which is a franchise that might be mostly family-friendly but still can terrify when needed. Hell, The Wicked Witch of the West is the first truly scary character that most people see in their lives, she’s a truly terrifying creation that can make even full-grown adults recoil in fear. So, there is a little bit of a chance that something like Gale: Stay Away From Oz might actually work and I believe it really could… when it’s done.

Continue reading “Gale: Stay Away From Oz (2023) – Short of Oz” →

Copy provided by Paramount for review

In 1983 Stephen King wrote the book Pet Sematary which is still considered one of his more iconic works, which is saying a lot considering how prolific Stephen is. It, like a lot of King’s work, was naturally adapted into a movie in 1989 and like a lot of 80’s horror movies, it got remade in the late 2010s, 2019 to be specific. The 2019 Pet Sematary didn’t get great reviews (though I personally quite enjoyed it) but what it did get was a serious return on investment with over 100 million from a film made on a 20 million budget. Normally this would mean a sequel was basically guaranteed but Pet Sematary is the kind of story that doesn’t lend itself to a follow-up… apparently it does have a prequel in it though, which kind of works up to a certain point.

Continue reading “Pet Sematary: Bloodlines (2023) – Sometimes, Dead Is… OK?” →

IMPORTANT NOTE: This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the movies being covered here wouldn’t exist.

Released: 15th September
Seen: 20th September

One of the most strangely fascinating subgenres of horror is one where a weird thing on the internet turns out to not only be real but deadly. Films like Slender Man, Grimcutty and Countdown all took modern technology and twisted it to become something strange and deadly, a kind of modern-day campfire story that takes a technology we’ve all become used to and turns it into something truly terrifying… or at least, that’s what it’s supposed to do. You might notice the trio of examples mentioned earlier are some of the worst horror films released in the last five years and sadly, Elevator Game joins them in that group of horror movies that takes a potentially interesting modern story and just does nothing with it.

Continue reading “Elevator Game (2023) – Going Down!” →

IMPORTANT NOTE: This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the movies being covered here wouldn’t exist.

Released: 2nd February
Seen: 2nd September

Fun fact about me, I didn’t see Psycho for YEARS after I started watching horror movies. Years, like I maybe saw it in full for the first time last year. Now the reasoning for this is one that might actually make sense to some of you reading this, I didn’t see it because the film is so widely regarded as one of the best of all time that I didn’t want to risk not liking it so I just kept pushing back seeing it. This is a thing that I’m sure many people do with some classic films, A kind of hype sets in around the film and seeing it becomes a landmine because you might not like it as much as everyone else which can be kind of awkward. This can also happen a lot with modern films, a film gets so many rave reviews to the point of it becoming a meme that it pushes some people away from it. This is what happened when Skinamarink first came out, due to a combo of a general slowness that took up the early half of 2022 and just a general concern that it might not be as good as everyone proclaimed it this film was avoided by me for quite some time.

…so anyway, Skinamarink is bad and you all owe me an explanation of what the fuck happened when it came out to make everyone claim it was so great.

Continue reading “Skinamarink (2023) – Night Night” →

IMPORTANT NOTE: This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the movies being covered here wouldn’t exist.

Released: 1st September
Seen: 2nd September

Horror as a genre is an ever-evolving beast but one thing it’s always great at is metaphor, using the story of the film to touch on heavy topics that might be harder to do in other genres. Sometimes it can work well, the problem of racism, specifically the more insidious subtle racism done by people who believe they aren’t racists, was handled wonderfully in Get Out. Sometimes it fails pretty spectacularly, like the gallant attempt to explore sexism and specifically the crisis of rape on college campuses which was the focus of the last Black Christmas film and ended up just not working (because it was a bad film, not because it was doing politics). Perpetrator is more on the upper end of that spectrum in terms of quality and idea, but its execution is just a little underdone.

Continue reading “Perpetrator (2023) – School’s Out!” →