Review – Matthew Liedke on Film

Halloween Adventures in B-Movie Horror 2026 Part 2

Halloween is here and once again it closes another Adventure in B-Movie Horror. What better way to do that than with some shot on video schlock?

For those not in the know, shot on video basically meant shot on video camera. The availability of camcorders gave rise to an SOV boom with independent filmmaking in the 80s and 90s, especially in the horror genre. I usually check out a few each year, knowing they can be quite the zany experience.

For this year, I selected a pair of SOVs, one from 1987, and the other released a decade later toward the end of the 90s.

REVIEW: Conspiracy-fueled ‘Wild Horse Nine’ is a terrific ride

John Malkovich and Sam Rockwell is the duo I didn’t know I needed until 2026.

The latest film to feature the Academy Award nominee and the Oscar winner is from writer/director Martin McDonagh. His follow-up to “The Banshees of Inisherin” (which made the Top 10 list of 2022 from yours truly) stars the two as a pair of CIA agents and is set in 1973, just before the September coup d’etat in Chile.

The veteran agent Chris (Malkovich), and his younger partner Lee (Sam Rockwell), have played an important role in the coup. However, Chris is dealing with a terminal illness, and wants to spend his final days in Easter Island for a last vacation. Lee obliges to join him on a final getaway, but even on a supposed vacation, elements of their espionage background pop up.

REVIEW: ‘Other Mommy’ is a mostly unmemorable horror flick

Jessica Chastain is somewhat frightening here but not quite as scary as who she played in “Zero Dark Thirty.”

The latest film starring the Academy Award winner is another horror project from the studio Blumhouse. In the picture, helmed by Rob Savage and penned by Nathan Elston, Chastain portrays Ursula Martin, a woman who hasn’t quite struck the right balance between her career and home life.

As a result, her daughter Bella (Arabella Olivia Clark) makes a friend with an entity who takes on Ursula’s appearance, earning the name Other Mommy. As Bella becomes hesitant to growing closer with the entity, though, the supernatural force starts becoming aggressive and terrorizing those around her.

REVIEW: ‘Fjord’ is full of drama, but exeuction has a few issues

Just saying, the Special Victims Unit would’ve had this case figured out so quick.

Written and directed by Cristian Mungiu, “Fjord” is a drama about a Romanian family who’ve recently relocated to Norway to be closer to family. Devout evangelical Christians, the family includes patriarch Mihai (Sebastian Stan), his wife Lisbet (Renate Reinsve) and their five children.

Things kick off normal enough as the family begins attending the local church, the kids start attending school and Mihai enters a new job. However, their strict religious lifestyle starts to rub people the wrong way. The family is then further scrutinized when school officials believe there’s physical abuse in the home, and child protective services remove the kids from the parents.

REVIEW: While flawed, ‘Reckoning’ is boosted by investigative elements

I’m usually not happy about actors being replaced in sequels, but Jeremy Strong certainly isn’t a bad option to fill a role.

Unlike the 2010 movie “The Social Network” which featured Jesse Eisenberg as Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, “Reckoning” stars Strong in the role. However, the billionaire isn’t as much of a focus this time. Instead, the movie centers on Jeff Horwitz (Jeremy Allen White), a Wall Street Journal reporter investigating the social media company.

As he begins researching, he connects with Frances Haugen (Mikey Madison), a Facebook employee who takes issue with how the business is conducting itself, particularly with building an algorithm that drives negative engagement, which can lead to radicalization. As this is taking place, Zuckerberg is preparing to appear before Congress regarding Facebook’s operation.

REVIEW: While exeuction is mixed, ‘Primetime’ is overall a positive

Another exhibit in the “Frontline” is better than network news magazine shows folder.

“Primetime” is a film centering on “To Catch a Predator,” a series part of NBC’s news magazine show “Dateline,” which boasted massive ratings for the Peacock channel in the mid 2000s. The film picks up with the series having established success and being bumped to a primetime slot to compete for the highest view share.

Driving a lot of success is host Chris Hansen (Robert Pattinson), who’s become consumed the ratings success, and the thrill of the hunt, so to speak, in exposing the men looking to meet minors. As the show gets bigger, it hires a young actor, Dan (Skyler Gisondo), to play a decoy. While he’s initially excited about the job, Dan begins to question the tactics of Hansen and the TCAP crew.

REVIEW: ‘Resident Evil’ adaptation strong on style, weak elsewhere

I was a bit mixed on both of Zach Cregger’s projects so far in the 2020s, and that trend continues with his latest work.

This time, the writer and director helmed an adaptation of a video game. While it shares the “Resident Evil title, though, what’s shown on screen is a completely independent side story taking place outside of the saga that rolls out in the game series.

The movie stars Austin Abrams as Brian, a medical courier who takes on one more delivery late at night because of a good payout, requiring him to drive to another city in snowy conditions. On the way, he encounters a woman who’s out of sorts because of an illness. He soon learns that this illness causes terrifying mutations and has spread to the city he’s going to with the medical package.

REVIEW: ‘Uprising’ is an intense, but largely forgettable dramatization

Is this a Robin Hood origin story? I’m not really sure. I don’t think the filmmakers were sure, either.

The main focus of this picture, written and directed by Paul Greengrass, is a peasant revolt in the late 1300s where a group of farmers and townsfolk descended on London to demand changes from King Richard II. At the time, the king, still a teenager, had a council making many of the decisions, including the levy of higher taxes.

Helping spark the revolt is a farmer who goes by Ploughman (Andrew Garfield), who kills a soldier to protect fellow citizens. The rest of his town and nearby communities rally behind him, as well as former soldier Wat Tyler (Cosmo Jarvis) and priest John Ball (Jamie Bell), with a coalition forming to march on London and ask for relief.

REVIEW: ‘By Any Means’ isn’t deep, but it does entertain

I’m somewhat convinced the creative team watched 2018’s “Green Book” and thought, ‘yeah, but what if we made this into a pseudo-buddy police procedural?’

“By Any Means” is set in 1966 in Mississippi, a few years after the murders of activists James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner. As the movie gets underway, another murder of a Civil Rights activist takes place, and the FBI once again has a case on their hands.

Special agent Wayne Strider (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II), who knew the victim, is tasked with investigating the killing. To complete the case, the FBI decides to go outside the law, bringing in mafia enforcer Gregory Scarpa (Mark Wahlberg) to assist Strider in the effort. Together, reluctantly, they have to go through rural Mississippi and uncover who was behind the murder.

REVIEW: ‘Mutiny’ is an OK, but unremarkable action flick at sea

Jason Statham was the Transporter. Then, he was the Beekeeper. Now, he is, the Sailor? The Seaman? Let’s just call this one “Mutiny.”

In the latest flick to feature the action star, Statham once again plays a tough but humble badass. In “Mutiny,” he portrays Cole Reed, a former special operations soldier and decorated police officer who now works as a bodyguard for the head of a major corporation. Unfortunately, in an ambush, his employer, and friend, is murdered.

On top of that, Reed is then framed as the one who killed his own boss. To clear his name, and get back at those who killed his friend, Reed boards a ship connected to one of the assassins. There, he uncovers a trafficking operation, which he sets out to stop during his quest for vengeance.