Tag: Horror

REVIEW: Moss, special effects boost ‘Invisible Man’

No Dark Universe, no problem.

After the shared cinematic universe idea for Universal’s famous movie monsters crashed, plans were reworked to have more independent, individual films. The first one up is “The Invisible Man,” written and directed by Leigh Whannell. The movie stars Elisabeth Moss as Cecilia, a woman who just left her abusive boyfriend.

Cecilia is shaken from the relationship and is left with anxiety, fearing that her ex, Adrian, (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) will come after her. However, she soon learns that Adrian has supposedly committed suicide. Just as she begins trying to rebuild her life, though, Cecilia begins to feel stalked and terrorized by an unseen force, which she believes is Adrian.

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REVIEW: ‘Gretel & Hansel’ burned by poor story, character execution

It’s so disappointing when a movie is close to winning you over and doesn’t.

The most recent example is “Gretel & Hansel.”

The film is inspired by the classic dark fairy tale, although this one takes liberties. As the story goes, the two young protagonists Gretel (Sophia Lillis) and Hansel (Samuel Leakey) are forced to venture out into the woods on their own and fend for themselves.

As one would expect, they stumble upon a welcoming structure with plenty of food and a kind woman (Alice Krige) willing to share. However, there’s of course something more nefarious going on.

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REVIEW: ‘The Turning’ never turns into a good movie

Oh January, you have such a way with horror movies.

“The Turning” is one of the latest scary pictures to get released in the first month of the year, with the type of quality one would expect. It stars Mackenzie Davis as Kate, a young teacher who’s hired to be a tutor for a little, wealthy girl who lives with her brother and their caretaker at a large estate. Since the death of their parents, the girl Flora (Brooklynn Prince) and brother Miles (Finn Wolfhard) don’t get out much.

Despite their social skills being poor, especially with Miles, Kate decides to stick with the job and tries to have a positive impact. However, her teaching Flora and attempts to extend an olive branch to the rebellious Miles are made difficult from an apparent paranormal entity in the mansion.

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Best of the Decade: Horror

This is a series called “Best of the Decade.” It’s a list including 10 movies that I found to be the best in a specific genre from 2010-2019.

If I had to describe the direction horror took in the past decade, I’d say it was revolutionary. There has been a lot of creative horror and thriller films from the last 10 years, and it doesn’t look to stop any time soon. Here were my favorites.

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REVIEW: To its detriment, ‘Black Christmas’ is more concerned with themes than thrills

I wasn’t expecting any other movie this year to give “After” a run for its money as the worst film to be set on a college campus in 2019, but here we are.

This is the second time “Black Christmas” has been remade, with the other coming out in 2006 and the original having been released in the 1970s.

In this film, the main characters are college students and members of a sorority. The leads include Riley (Imogen Poots), Kris (Aleyse Shannon), Marty (Lily Donoghue) and Jesse (Brittany O’Grady). The four are preparing for the Christmas holiday, but Riley is struggling with her life after having been raped by a fraternity member. Making matters worse is the fact that her story wasn’t believed by law enforcement.

Riley’s Christmas season only goes downhill more, when she begins noticing disappearances on campus. Eventually, her and her friends learn that the female students on campus are being killed and they become the next target. As they try to survive, they also unravel what’s really going on and the truth has a connection to the school’s founding.

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REVIEW: ‘Doctor Sleep’ won’t put one to sleep, but is forgettable like a dream

Stephen King’s universe really needs an equivalent to Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters.

“Doctor Sleep” begins roughly a few months after the events of “The Shining.” Dan Torrance is still being somewhat haunted by the Overlook Hotel, but eventually manages to get things under control in that regard thanks to his Shining power. Unfortunately, though, his life takes bad turns and he later ends up becoming homeless and addicted to alcohol.

Dan (Ewan McGregor) does come across another man, Billy (Cliff Curtis) in the northeast, though, who helps him get back on his feet by bringing him into rehab and assisting him in getting an apartment. However, while he seems to be settling in and even using his power for some good, trouble rears its head with a new threat. That threat is a group of people who not only stay alive, but keep their youth, by killing individuals with Shining powers and breathing in their life force.

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REVIEW: ‘The Lighthouse’ is a captivating film creation

While “The Lighthouse” is simply centered on two men and a maritime structure, it also happens to be one of the best films of the year.

Director Robert Eggers returns with “Lighthouse,” his follow up to his feature debut, 2015’s “The Witch,” which earned a lot of acclaim. This time around, his latest movie follows Thomas Wake (Willem Dafoe) and Ephraim Winslow (Robert Pattinson), two lighthouse workers who’re tasked with operating an Atlantic coast facility for about a month.

The experienced worker, Thomas, takes the night shifts and operates the tower to guide ships, while Ephraim is given mostly maintenance work. The labor is tough but appears fairly routinely. However, strange occurrences start taking place and Ephraim begins questioning what’s real and what’s not.

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Halloween Adventures in B-Movie Horror 2019 Part 5

Happy Halloween and welcome to the final installment of this year’s write-ups. So for Part 5 we’re leaving behind the 80s and 90s and jumping right into the early 2000s. Both of these movies I’m writing about today are from sub-genres that were popular at the time.

“Live Feed” is a sort of torture horror piece, coming two years after the first “Saw” and a year after “Hostel.” “Awakening,” meanwhile, released four years after “28 Days Later” and two years after the “Dawn of the Dead” remake.

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Halloween Adventures in B-Movie Horror 2019 Part 4

The last flicks for this Halloween Horror Fest will be on movies from the 2000s, so this is the final write-up featuring late 80s and early 90s films. Thankfully, one of these is an anthology!

Anthology movies are features with usually three to four separate stories, which may or may not tie together depending on who the filmmakers are. The next movie here is one where the stories are a little more loose.

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REVIEW: ‘Countdown’ is generic, hollow horror

What can’t movie demons possess at this point? In “Truth or Dare” one could possess a thought-process game among friends, and now one possesses an app.

The latest horror movie to hit the PG-13 market features a number of people discovering an app that can tell when a person is going to die, counting down everything from the years to the seconds. The app is a simple running clock, and many laugh it off as a joke.

However, that is until a few look at the phone and see they only have a few days or hours left. Sure enough, those people end up dying. After some deaths from the app early on, the character Quinn enters the mix. Played by Elizabeth Lail, Quinn is the main character and apparently is set to die in the next several days. Deciding to take action, she and another character, Matt (Jordan Calloway), try to figure out how to change fate.

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