Review - Late Night With The Devil

 Late Night With The Devil (2024)

Director: Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes

Writer: Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes

Stars: David Dastmalchian, Laura Gordon, Ian Bliss

Where to Watch: In Theaters (On Shudder in April)

Synopsis: A live television broadcast in 1977 goes horribly wrong, unleashing evil into the nation's living rooms.

Thoughts: It isn't often I walk away from a movie and say, "This would have been a perfect movie if only they changed this one thing". But I feel strongly about it. And it's a shame no one asked me. 

There's a lot crammed into this story. It begins as kind of a 60 Minutes news profile on late night host Jack Delroy, and his show's Halloween episode that shocked the nation. The movie is both found footage and a "broadcast" of that episode. There's some questionable logistics of how they filmed the behind the scenes footage for the "found footage" elements, especially when much of it was secret conversations between various people, but hey, movie magic I guess. But for the most part, it's just a riveting, entertaining movie, that holds itself to the ins and outs of shooting a tv show, and all the breaks they have to do for "a word from our sponsor". It makes the film feel like it's on a time crunch and the clock is always ticking and you've got 30 seconds and now we're back, hello, and now for our next guest. 

It's not a particularly scary movie. It's got a lot of scenes that are meant to unsettle us, and they work to a degree, but nothing outright scary happens until the climax of the movie. And let me tell you, that climax, it was pretty spectacular. I guess I wanted more of that, more of that sweet, sweet carnage candy. But while it may have been brief, it's certainly memorable. There's a lot of hinting at a certain plot point throughout the movie that I thought was subtle and done pretty well. The audience gets the point. We're smart like that. But then in the climax of the movie they really just lay it all out for us, showing us scene by scene, and what a disappointment. I'd rather a movie assume its audience is smart, rather than like children that need to be guiding by a held hand. It's really my only gripe. It goes from a shocking scene that we'd all been waiting for, to a series of exposition imagery that really took me out of the zone.

When all is said and done though - it was a completely original, entertaining movie that I will no doubt watch again and again.

4 out of 5 💀s

Review - You'll Never Find Me

 You'll Never Find Me (2024)

Director: Josiah Allen, Indianna Bell

Writer: Indianna Bell

Stars: Brendan Rock, Jordan Cowan

Where to Watch: Shudder

Synopsis: Patrick, a strange and lonely resident, lives in a mobile home at the back of an isolated trailer park. After a violent storm, a mysterious young woman appears at his door seeking shelter from the elements.

Thoughts: Every scene in this movie is a meticulous, measured movement, a calculated breath, and yet I never tired of the almost slow-motion nature of the film. While I think it wants to be more mysterious than it actually is, we all know who the villain is here. It is a disappointment in humanity. A terrible ugliness dominating beauty. The lonely finding meaning in small moments of connection. Of men, never seeing the person, and only the object. This is why we are here. But it does not define us.

The air in this film is made of tension. Patrick's deep, calm Australian accent is strong and hypnotic, like an Anglerfish, guiding us into a false sense of security. Every scene here is beautiful. Every light, every look, has a purpose. There is a scene in the middle of the movie where Patrick goes outside in the storm and he stands there facing the dark, the rain and wind screaming, fierce in front of him - it is a brilliant cinematic moment. 

The ending gets really weird. I feel like it's a trend with 2024 movies right now, these slow, gorgeous, layered artsy films that just end fucked up and weird as hell. You'll Never Find Me is such a film. Not as weird as many, but weird enough. It's definitely got some Wounded Fawn vibes but like, trailer park level. 

4 out of 5 💀 s

Review - Imaginary

 Imaginary (2024)

Director: Jeff Wadlow

Writer: Greg Erb, Jason Oremland, Jeff Wadlow

Stars: DeWanda Wise, Taegen Burns, Pyper Braun

Where to Watch: Theater

Synopsis: A woman returns to her childhood home to discover that the imaginary friend she left behind is very real and unhappy that she abandoned him.

Tagline:  Meet Chauncey. He's not imaginary, and he's not your friend.

Thoughts: So many thoughts. My first thought is, rather a statement actually, this is not a horror movie. I mean, if you're say, six years old, this might be a horror movie. But for any adult or teenager for that matter, this is solidly a kids movie. I'm not saying that in a snarky, "This wasn't scary enough for me!" way. I'm saying it because, this isn't scary enough for anybody. If you have children and you want to take them to a scary movie, this movie is for you. In fact, I'm not even sure why it's PG-13. Maybe there's a swear word? There was reference to drugs at one point. And a boy pees. I'm not sure how these ratings work. In fact, writer/director Jeff Wadlow cites 1982's Poltergeist as being an inspiration for this movie, and Poltergeist is rated PG and is ten times scarier than Imaginary. (I just remembered, one person does die off screen, maybe that's it.)

So, this teddy bear is "imaginary" but we the audience see him for almost the entire movie. There is a twist there later but, yes, the imaginary teddy bear is there. And his voice is that of the little girl whose friend he is. And they just go about their business, playing and trying to adjust to their new stepmom because og mom is mentally unstable? Sick? It's unclear. They don't talk about her even though she shows up once. Anyways, so the teddy bear, Chauncey, gets really big and scary sometimes, but that's really only reserved for the end of the movie and honestly, he looks ridiculous. They would have been better off using an actual live bear for the scary Chauncey, because real angry bears are terrifying. And angry Chauncey is ... jacked. And when the climax of the movie happens, dad, who is apparently a rock star? Has to leave and go on tour. Because we can't have a MAN around when shit goes down, because he'd like, fix everything right away and not let all the girls get in danger in the first place? It's a confusing plot point but I'm probably just overthinking it. The man is gone, we have to save ourselves. Oh shit. (moving on)

I mean, Jeff Wadlow does know how to make an actual horror movie. We can debate the merits of their quality, but in 2005 he wrote and directed Cry Wolf, in 2007, Prey. In 2018 was Truth or Dare. In 2020 was ::cough:: fantasy island. He's written and directed episodes for The Strain, and Bates Motel. So I know the dude can conjure up a kill and a scare. But I guess when you're making a movie for your six year old, you hold back...

I'm not exactly sure how Imaginary got marketed to adults. I feel a bit bamboozled. Like the evil Hollywood men are sitting in their fancy offices with their pencil mustaches tenting their hands together under their chins and going MWAHAHAHA. 

Yup, you got me. I've been got. You still made a shit movie, but I did see it so, the jokes on me.

2 out of 5 💀s

Review - Amelia's Children

 Amelia's Children (2024)

Director: Gabriel Abrantes

Writer: Gabriel Abrantes

Stars: Brigette Lundy-Paine, Carloto Cotta, Anabela Moreira

Where to Watch: VOD

Synopsis: Edward searches for biological family in Portugal. He finds a villa and reunites with his long-lost mother and twin. But their shared past holds a dark secret that will forever change his understanding of his identity and origins.

Tagline:  A mother's love never dies.

Thoughts: I've written three opening lines for this review so far and deleted all of them. It's obvious that I don't know where to start with this one. It's just. Well. Within minutes of watching this movie the main consensus was... what the hell is going on? And that feeling, that question, remains unanswered until the third act. The entirety of the movie was spent spouting theories - they're vampires! it's time-travel! he's possessed! she's possessed! Everything about this story was a mystery. Even the location was hard to pin down until someone said the word, Portugal. 

Actor Carloto Cotta plays twin brothers Edward and Manuel. And he does it so well, each one fully their own person, with different gestures, walks, styles, accents - I honestly thought they were actual twin brothers until IMDB proved otherwise. The performances are really impressive. And Anabela Moreira, who plays the older Amelia - oh good lord. The woman is creepy with a capital C. It's hard to look at her, her beaming unashamed confidence despite the monster she's become. Bravo to the whole cast. 

The movie starts off as a mystery and just keeps getting weirder the longer it plays. And it gets weeeeird. Like, so bizarre I couldn't have ever guessed what was actually happening until it was spelled out for me. Even then, after the movie was over, I rewound it to the start and watched the first ten minutes all over again. And the third act, when shit starts to really go down, there are some Ti West 'X' vibes that I was so, so happy about. Super proud of writer/director Gabriel Abrantes for getting really gross and making his audience uncomfortable and just going there. I'm here for it. Always. Give me some nasty taboo shit in my horror. Make me squeal, Noooooo! I love it. And I loved this movie. What an unexpected treat.

4 out of 5 💀 s

Review - The Piper

 The Piper (2024)

Director: Erlingur Thoroddsen

Writer: Erlingur Thoroddsen

Stars: Charlotte Hope, Julian Sands, Alexis Rodney

Where to Watch: VOD

Synopsis: When a composer is tasked with finishing her late mentor's concerto, she soon discovers that playing the music summons deadly consequences, leading her to uncover the disturbing origins of the melody and an evil that has awakened.

Tagline: A Deadly Tune

Thoughts: I'm not really into music horror, neither in books nor in film. Usually the story revolves around Metal or Rock and for some reason "the devil" is always involved. I guess it's a crossroads trope that has been regurgitated in one form or another for as long as storytelling has existed. But The Piper leans more into the folklore than into the "evil music", which is classical, and more haunting than the usual fare. I'm unfamiliar with the piper folklore, but it was scary in that familiar way, like The Brothers Grimm, stealing children because the adults are terrible people and must pay for being such. And the monster is the scariest kind, not obvious and in your face but instead made of shadows and fiery light with no voice but a simple focused purpose of destruction and revenge. 

One of the biggest complaints I have about the film is that the main child, Zoe, is supposed to be hearing impaired, and yet they used an actress that was not. The actress that played Zoe, Aoibhe O'Flanagan, played the role well, but I can't help but wonder if they couldn't have employed a child who really did wear a hearing aid and who really did know how to read music through vibrations. More and more filmmakers make an effort to fill roles using actors that are authentic to the culture/race/gender/sexual orientation, etc. portrayed in their film. But I so often don't see the same effort when it comes to impaired or disabled roles. ::stepping off the soapbox::

Bottom line is, if you're looking for a moody folklore horror with some cool atmosphere, this one will do quite well.

3 out of 5 💀s

Review - Stopmotion

 Stopmotion (2024)

Director: Robert Morgan
Writer: Robin King, Robert Morgan
Stars: Aisling FranciosiStella Gonet
Where to Watch: VOD (on Shudder in April)

Synopsis: A stop-motion animator struggles to control her demons after the loss of her overbearing mother.

Tagline: Bring Your Nightmares To Life

Thoughts: I'm not super versed in stop motion live action films. I've seen a handful of Harryhausen movies, and Mad God when it was finally released a few years ago. But this, this was something. A  bizarre, brilliant, original film full of metaphor and allegory. With themes  of trauma, loss, creativity, and (horrible) self discovery, there's a lot of unpacking to be done here. But among all of that is a captivating, gross, suspenseful, and creative story, trying to make its way in the world. And make its way it does - kicking and screaming and oozing blood and slime.

This is the kind of movie that, if you don't watch it sober and alert, you're going to miss a lot. I did this film the disservice of watching it as my second viewing, a little late at night, and a bit buzzed on wine and smoke. By the time the credits were rolling I was like - what? What the hell just happened? The next morning I rewatched the last thirty minutes while drinking my coffee. It cleared up (almost) nothing.

There is not a time in this film that it is not unsettling. Many horror movies start out bright and normal and it's not until forty minutes in that we see the normalcy devolve into horror. But in Stopmotion, the world that our main character lives in from the very beginning, is a bleak one. And it just keeps getting darker, and darker, until it swallows her whole. And us along with her.

5 out of 5 💀s

Review - The Seeding

 The Seeding (2024)

Director: Clay Barbaby
Writer: Clay Barnaby
Stars: Scott Haze, Kate Lyn Sheil
Where to Watch: VOD

Synopsis: A man finds himself trapped in a desert canyon with a woman living off-grid who is captive to a pack of sadistic boys.

Thoughts: As a horror movie aficionado I subject myself to all kinds of horrific scenarios. I think part of the fun is determining what I would do if I was in the situation that these poor, unlucky folks are that I'm watching on screen. Being stalked by a killer? Kill him first! Being haunted in a house? Burn that house down! I kid, but you know exactly what I mean. We all do it. We sit in our safe homes and yell at the tv, instructing those unsuspecting victims exactly what we think they should do to survive. 

But watching this movie? I had nothing. This guy is stuck at the bottom of a giant canyon with a woman living in a shack house.  He was led there by design. And he is kept there  by a dozen or so feral boys. It was a very unsettling watch, me feeling as trapped as the man whose life as he knew it was just taken away from him, with no hopes of escape. But I kept rooting for him. Build a ladder! Make some climbing shoes! Find a cave! But sometimes fucked it just fucked.

The whole movie is essentially a two-person show in one location. It would make a really compelling, stage play, you know, for twisted people like me. I do love plays but not many of them are created for the horror-loving audience. 

The "twist" is revealed in the second act but it's not much of a twist. It's a movie that we've all seen a dozen times but we just haven't seen it done this way. The third act imagery is just fantastic. It really goes from quiet and unsettling to full on fucked. And the last shot of the film - *chef's kiss*. 

4 out of 5  💀s

Review - Frogman

Frogman  (2024)

Director: Anthony Cousins
Writer: Anthony Cousins, John Karsko
Stars: Nathan Tymoshuk, Benny Barrett, Ali Daniels
Genre: Horror, Creature Feature, Mockumentary
How to Watch: VOD

Synopsis: Three friends in search of the Loveland Frogman find out that he is more than just a local legend.

Thoughts: This mockumentary screened at our very own 28th Annual H. P. Lovecraft Film Festival at the Hollywood Theatre last October. The buzz was loud and positive and I’d been looking forward to its arrival on VOD for months. And it’s not that the hype wasn’t warranted. The last thirty plus minutes are bonkers and gross and completely original. I just wish it wasn’t an absolute  slog getting there. With most mockumentary horror you encounter a fair amount of moments “secretly” caught on camera, and those moments reveal drama between characters in the form of serious conversations and/or fights. It’s a feature practically baked into the mockumentary subgenre. And while I enjoy the character development, it has to be done right in order for it to stay as riveting as the rest of the film. Unfortunately the execution here is fraught with long pauses, lingering stares, and uninspired conversations. Not to mention that the actress, while completely cute and charming, overacts her ass off and can’t stop touching her hair. I admit, I almost turned it off thirty minutes in, but instead I just got another beer and buckled down and it turns out, I’m extremely glad I did. While the beginning and the ending feel almost disjointed in tone, it still turns out to be one super weird creature feature. The lack of tension and suspense getting to that crazy climax, however, is almost enough to squash this one dead, but if you have the patience, the payoff is unforgettable.

3 out of 5 💀s

Review - Night Shift

NIGHT SHIFT   (2024)

Director: Benjamin China, Paul China
Writer: Benjamin China, Paul China
Stars: Phoebe Tonkin, Patrick Fischler, Madison Hu Genre: Horror, Slasher, Psychological
How to Watch: VOD

Synopsis: While working her first night shift at a remote motel, a woman begins to suspect that the property is haunted.

Thoughts: So many delightful tropes are presented in one tight little 80 minute movie - a night shift; trapped in a motel; killer on the loose - and I do love the tropes. Our main character, Gwen, seems to know she’s in a horror movie right from the start. She’s spooked by every shadow and noise and is suspicious of all the guests, and lack thereof. It’s perhaps because of this that the movie is dripping with tension even if it doesn’t deserve to be, yet. But after the ghostly apparitions, the creepy car, the impossibly ringing phone, we get there, to that paranoid screw this I’m out of here moment. I hate to say that I called the ending in the first twenty minutes but I guess I’ve just seen too many movies and not every movie is an original idea. Despite this, the journey was super fun. I second guessed myself on multiple occasions and I didn’t stop waiting for the final girl to earn her title.  Night Shift isn’t exactly fresh. But it's a tasty junk food option at the end of a long day.

3 out of 5 💀s

Review - Here For The Blood

HERE FOR THE BLOOD  (2024)

Director: Daniel Turres
Writer: James Roberts
Stars: Shawn Roberts, Maya Misaljevic, Joelle Farrow
Genre: Horror, Comedy
How to Watch: Screambox

Synopsis: A peaceful evening becomes bloody violent chaos. Masked intruders descend on Tom and Grace's home. The couple fights for their lives.

Thoughts: This splatter horror comedy is what horror movie nights with your friends were made for. A low budget direct-to-video throwback that pours all of its heart and soul into the gore, the practical effects, the humor, and the batshit craziness of the story. A pro-wrestling babysitter must use all of his sick-ass wrestling moves to defeat some unkillable crazy cult dudes with creepy-ass masks. There’s tons of odes to classic horror films sprinkled throughout, buckets  of spurting blood, reanimated corpses, a talking head (FEED ME), and a scary evil dimension in a cool metal box populated with powerful gods. But what really shines here are the actors, who take this film as seriously as we want them to, and because of that, we root for them the whole way. Move this film to the very top of your watch list and get ready for a ridiculously good time.

5 out of 5 💀s