leebutler Comedy, Horror, Review, Uncategorized

Slay (2024) – YAAASSSSS!!

Released: 22nd March
Seen: 1st April

A lot of streaming services have taken to making their own original films and for good reason, those films are owned by the streaming service and therefore can’t be taken away by any company (the exception to this is HBO Max who make and take away their own products because HBO Max is run by a fucking moron). There’s a general belief on this blog that those streaming originals are just as valid as any other film and thus they get reviewed, be they from Netflix, Prime or Shudder.

The one streaming service that has been an exception to this and that’s Tubi, which is weird because that’s a free service so their original films are easiest to access. However, their films also just don’t really stand out enough to warrant discussion. No one talks about the Terror Train remake, War of the Worlds: Annihilation or the sequel to the Terror Train remake that came out 3 months after the Terror Train remake so it felt pointless reviewing them when there were bigger things to review. Maybe that snobbery needs to be looked at, maybe some of Tubi’s garbage needs to be ransacked… or maybe I was just waiting for Tubi to release an original film that might interest me and “Drag Queen Vampire movie” is absolutely the kind of film I’m very interested in.

Continue reading “Slay (2024) – YAAASSSSS!!” →
leebutler Comedy, Horror, Review

Dream Scenario (2024) – Dreamy

Released: 1st January
Seen: 31st March

Dream Scenario Info

There is no term on the planet that I hate more than “Cancel Culture”, it’s a term that was basically invented by assholes to make it seem like being told to stop being racist/sexist/bigoted was a free speech violation. It’s almost always an attempt for people to brush aside consequences for when they act like an idiot in public… that being said, there are some times when the reaction by the internet is horribly over the top. Sometimes someone in public makes a joke that’s a little off-colour or does something that’s accidentally disrespectful, the internet jumps on them and vilifies them for a while before the person makes a grovelling apology which only makes things worse until the internet moves onto their next target. On Twitter (I refuse to call it anything else than that) we call this the Twitter Main Character where the ultimate goal is not to become that person. It looks like the cycle of the Twitter Main Character has officially gone mainstream because Dream Scenario is basically a feature film based around that concept and it’s just as weird and hilarious as you might expect.

Continue reading “Dream Scenario (2024) – Dreamy” →
leebutler Horror, Review

Immaculate (2024) – Holy Moly

Released: 21st March
Seen: 31st March

Immaculate Info

Religious horror is a fascinating genre when it’s done right. The concept of something holy being turned into something evil is a prime concept for horror, the catch is that there is a certain section of the audience who don’t believe in the specific holy element that the film is working with so you have to make them believe in it just enough for the horror to work. When done right you can get great works of horror like The Exorcist, Rosemary’s Baby (fuck Roman Polanski) or The Omen. When done wrong you get… well, the sequels and remakes of those three movies. Immaculate is the newest entry into the religious horror subgenre and it’s fair to say this is one of the ones that does it right, but also does it in a way that’s gloriously fucked up.

Continue reading “Immaculate (2024) – Holy Moly” →
leebutler Horror, Review, Thriller

Winnie The Pooh: Blood And Honey 2 (2024) – The Wonderful Thing About Sequels

Copy provided for review

In 2023, Winnie the Pooh entered the public domain. Thanks to how stupidly copyright law has been written, the bear of very little brain was finally free to be used by anyone a mere 97 years after he first appeared in the book Winnie The Pooh. Naturally, the first thing that was done with him is the same thing that’s often done when well-known family-friendly characters are free for anyone to use, someone made a horror movie out of it. Winnie The Pooh: Blood And Honey came out to be a surprising box office hit, making over 5 million dollars on a $100,000 budget… it was also god awful, it ranked third on my list of the worst films of 2023, it swept the ever-controversial Razzies where it took home 5 of the 9 awards and was a joke to everyone who thought about cinema of 2023. The idea that it earned enough to get a sequel was laughable and there was no doubt that any sequel was going to be an inevitable horrible piece of shit… so why the hell do I like this film?

Continue reading “Winnie The Pooh: Blood And Honey 2 (2024) – The Wonderful Thing About Sequels” →
leebutler Horror, Review, Thriller

Night Swim (2024) – Sinking Feeling

Released: 4th January
Seen: 16th January

A big discussion that’s been going on lately concerns film length, how films nowadays seem unable to be under 2 hours and how a lot of films that go for 3 hours or more don’t really need to waste that amount of audience time. What this whole issue comes down to is the idea that certain stories only really need a certain amount of time to tell them properly, Some films need 3 hours to explore every little crevice of their story, others can handle the story in 90 minutes. Then there are short films that often prove how effective they can be with only a couple of minutes, there’s even an entire channel dedicated to films that only last for 5 seconds long because that’s all they need to get the job done… Night Swim is one of those films that probably should’ve stuck to being a short 4-minute film instead of trying to take its general idea and stretch it forcibly into 100 minutes.

Continue reading “Night Swim (2024) – Sinking Feeling” →
leebutler Comedy, Horror, Review

Destroy All Neighbors (2024) – There Goes The Neighborhood

Released: 12th January
Seen: 15th January

At the start of this year, I put up a list of the best films of 2023 and top of that list was something called Cocaine Bear, a film that to this day delights me with its simple direct fun. Honestly half the time I go see a movie that’s what I go for, something that’s just uncomplicated fun that can be enjoyed without much thought at all. Horror comedies tend to be probably the best genre for doing this because often they are so heightened in their stupidity that even the average ones can be good enough for a fun time, especially when they embrace their own insanity and do something unexpected. This is why Destroy All Neighbors is such an enjoyable time, although it probably isn’t going to end up topping this year’s best list.

Continue reading “Destroy All Neighbors (2024) – There Goes The Neighborhood” →
leebutler Horror, Review, Thriller

Suitable Flesh (2023) – Skin-Crawlingly Creepy

Released: 27th October
Seen: 24th December

In 2020 we lost the great Stuart Gordon, one of the gods of 80s horror. The man gave us such glorious works as Re-Animator, From Beyond and Castle Freak along with having a hand in classics like Honey I Shrunk The Kids. A lot of the work that made him an undeniable icon of the genre was his adaptations of H.P. Lovecraft stories and a lot of those films were written by Dennis Paoli who has screenwriting credit on five of Gordon’s films, those being Re-Animator, From Beyond, Dagon, Castle Freak and The Pit And The Pendulum. It’s safe to say that a large number of the early films that gave us an idea of what a Stuart Gordon film could be wouldn’t exist in the same way without Dennis Paoli’s writing. So, the question is what would happen if you paid tribute to Stuart Gordon by getting Dennis to write another adaptation of an H.P. Lovecraft film and let the director of Wrong Turn 2 handle the direction? Turns out, you get something that’s pretty fucking fun.

Continue reading “Suitable Flesh (2023) – Skin-Crawlingly Creepy” →
leebutler Comedy, Horror, Mystery, Review

It’s A Wonderful Knife (2023) – Season’s Stabbings

Released: 1st December
Seen: 18th December

Without a doubt, the best new trend in horror has been slasher movies taking classic comedies with supernatural elements and twisting them into corny fun slasher movies. This trend started when Happy Death Day took on Groundhog Day, then Freaky repeated it with Freaky Friday and Totally Killer used Back to the Future as its main inspiration. It’s a trend that feels like it’s going to go on for a while, upcoming horror films like Time Cut (which also sounds like it’s using Back to the Future as a jumping-off point) show that there is a lot of potential fun to be had with this new trend… enter It’s A Wonderful Knife which is possibly the most basic version of this concept yet which proves that it can work even when being phoned in.

Continue reading “It’s A Wonderful Knife (2023) – Season’s Stabbings” →
leebutler Horror, Mystery, Review, Thriller

Five Nights At Freddy’s (2023) – Bearly Enough

Released: 26th October
Seen: 23rd November

In 2014, a man named Scott Cawthon released a game called Five Nights at Freddy’s. The idea of the game was incredibly simplistic, you played a bodyguard who has the job of watching over a defunct pizzeria via a set of monitors rigged up to cameras all around the building. There are only two doors into the room that can open and close and you have to just get through a series of five shifts from midnight to 6am, which is difficult because the animatronics in the restaurant are alive and are coming to get you.

As the nights go on, the game gets harder and harder and if you fail then one of the animatronics leaps at the screen creating a loud jumpscare that ends the game instantly. It’s a simple game that happened to get noticed by a certain segment of gamers who play games while overreacting on camera and soon became an obscenely popular franchise with a new game being churned out seemingly every couple of months. It was such a monster hit that a film adaptation was inevitable, indeed one was greenlit in 2015… it’s languished in production hell for 8 years but now it’s out and you can kind of tell this thing has been rewritten a couple dozen times, but it’s not like my opinion matters on the subject.

Continue reading “Five Nights At Freddy’s (2023) – Bearly Enough” →
leebutler Action, Horror, Review, Thriller

The Wrath Of Becky (2023) – OH MY GOD!

Released: 16th November
Seen: 23rd November

In 2020 a little film called Becky came out and delivered something that cinema desperately needed, a 14 year old girl who kills a whole assload of Nazi assholes in various wild and wonderful ways. It was an absolute blast of a film, filled with great performances by absolutely everyone involved and created an instantly iconic female character with Becky. It was a film that I enjoyed so much it made the honourable mentions list on my best films list that year and the Kevin James performance was the 11th best performance on my list. When news of a sequel came out you can imagine the genuine excitement that built, more fun time with Becky violently killing a bunch of bastards just sounded like the best thing possible and thank goodness, The Wrath Of Becky absolutely lives up to the standard set by the film that came before it.

Continue reading “The Wrath Of Becky (2023) – OH MY GOD!” →