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Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Where the Devil Roams (2023)
Adams Family makes another great horror film
The Adams Family (not *that* Addams Family) have made another daring, aesthetically beautiful, boundary pushing horror film in Where The Devil Roams, a hypnotic piece of Depression Gothic carnival spookiness. They are a kickass family of filmmakers, musicians and creative human beings whose prior films, the chilly upstate NY ghost drama The Deeper You Dig and the kickass modern witch flick Hellbender are among my favourite horrors in recent years. They strike genre gold again here in telling the tale of a family working for a travelling circus who slash a bloody wayward swath of supernatural violence and occult mayhem through America's 1930's heartland. Always meticulous in style, sound design and idiosyncratic performance, real life partners John Adams, Toby Poser and their daughter Zelda Adams write and direct their beautifully haunting tale and star as the sinister yet relatable carnies themselves, harbouring a dark collective secret that slowly burgeons with each new muted yet shocking blast of violence on their fascinating voyage through America during one of its roughest periods. It's a great film that does a whole lot on a lower budget and, as always, I look forward to whatever is next for this family of collaborating powerhouses.
American Fiction (2023)
Jeffrey Wright gets a rare lead role
It's nice to see Jeffrey Wright in a lead role that rises to meet his usual brand of introspective maturity in the acting craft, after a decades long career of scene stealing supporting turns. Cord Jefferson's American Fiction is a deft, corrosive literary satire by way of a wry, slightly melancholy dysfunctional family drama and one of the smartest scripts I've come across in a while, even if it does unravel like a ball of yarn just a tad in the third act. Wright plays a fiction novelist whose agent (John Ortiz) laments that none of his work is steered toward his supposed African American demographic. His response is to write a madly hyperbolic, hilariously exaggerated satirical volume of life as a ghetto black dude, something that no agent, critic or reader would ever be able to take seriously... except they do. His work is lauded as the penultimate modern manifestation of the 'Black Experience,' much to both his exasperation at not being taken seriously and his giddy surprise at the amount of money being offered for its publication. He's also dealing with his strained relationship to his sister (Tracee Ellis Ross) his mother's onset of dementia and his raucous, difficult yet loving brother (Sterling K. Brown). It's an impossibly witty, highly intelligent and aggressively funny story that meets Wright halfway as a performer who has never once half assed, phoned in or otherwise compromised the work in his career, ever. Even if it doesn't entirely stick a landing that isn't sure how it wants to end and attempts a multiple choice stunt without decidedly picking one outcome, the overall experience is one of such innovation and enjoyment in writing and acting, I've no choice but to give it full marks. Great film.
Daddio (2023)
Brilliant, challenging film
Sean Penn and Dakota Johnson are hypnotically spellbinding in Christy Hall's Daddio, a thematically challenging dramatic two hander that makes essential, cosmic work of the seemingly everyday and mundane. She's a 30-something girl taking a cab ride from JFK International into manhattan, he's the driver. They hit awful accident/construction traffic and the trip takes longer than expected. They talk. Trivially at first, as you might with a stranger but then their conversation goes to places ranging from captivating to elusive to uncomfortable to cathartic, each with their own distinct personality and worldview, clearly distilled by lifetimes of experience behind them. This is a film that challenged me personally; both characters are in positions and have perspectives that are quite easy to judge and become emotionally inflamed by, until I took a step back and humbly realized that I've been in *exactly* these situations before and that what Hall's script and Penn/Johnson's radiant, pitch perfect performances ask of the audience isn't judgment, but empathy and a caring ear. Had I dealt with these emotions and tough interpersonal relationships any different? It isn't necessarily about how they deal with it here rather than how they find in each other a kindred spirit, despite being strangers, to talk about what's going on for them and that is about as human as this experience gets. Brilliant film.
MaXXXine (2024)
My favourite in the trilogy
Mia Goth kills it again (literally) in Ti West's Maxxxine, third part of what could be described as his nostalgic horror porn trilogy, a blissfully lurid chapter of self referential horror that tackles showmanship, stardom and the need to make a name for oneself. Goth's Maxine feels this need deeply as she makes her way from the brutal 1970's farmhouse events of the first film into sleazy, fabulous 1980's Los Angeles where she works part time as a stripper, always looking for that big break. Someone else is out there looking for her though, a vicious killer who strikes close to home and litters the streets in her vicinity with bodies. This is my favourite film of the trilogy and not just for the obvious 80's nostalgia factor (which I am an abject sucker for) although admittedly that is part of it. The themes here and references to 80's horror in Hollywood are studious, charming and thought provoking as they mirror Maxine's bloody rise to stardom, the scrip arc is handled the best so far in this story. Also the cast is large, loud and just having so much fun. Standouts include Elizabeth Debicki as a no-nonsense horror filmmaker out to make a name for herself as well, Sophie Thatcher in a quick cameo as an expert makeup/FX artist, Giancarlo Esposito as Maxine's ruthless agent and Kevin Bacon in utter sleaze mode as a spectacularly grimy private investigator. Goth owns the character fiercely as Maxine emerges from her 1970's chrysalis into the 80's as a badass, beautiful woman who knows what she wants and will do anything to get it, including lots of murder. Great film.
Sleeping Dogs (2024)
Not great, not terrible
Russell Crowe broods, mumbles, drinks and stumbles his way through Sleeping Dogs, a bizarre, overcooked crime/noir thriller and another in his recent foray into B-grade territory. This isn't necessarily a bad film, just a confused, hopelessly convoluted one but Crowe's genuine performance as a former homicide cop with debilitating dementia trying to solve crimes from the past that still haunt him is actually fairly effective, as is the overall atmosphere of permeating melancholy. What isn't so effective is the plot; holy hell is it a labyrinth of dumb flashbacks, red herring suspects and pseudo-psychological nonsense that clouds up what could have been a fascinating narrative. Crowe's character has dementia that's being treated by some experimental neuro-rejuvenation program so he's forgetful but never forgetful enough to hinder the plot moving forward, which feels simultaneously lazy and innovative. Early scenes are interesting as he revisits his unnerving former partner (Tommy Flanagan, intense as ever) and tries to regain some semblance of coherence to solve a decade old cold case, but the film falls into a ridiculous midsection of extended flashback involving a weirdo college professor (Marton Csokas) and one of his less than scrupulous students (Karen Gillan, unusually hammy) that it never quite recovers from. Still, Crowe carries it dutifully and it still manages to sustain a creepy, mournful atmosphere thanks to an ambient, uneasy score. A darkly, sadly humorous scene in which Crowe's gruff ex cop realizes just how much he loves booze after seemingly forgotten about it for awhile is almost worth the price of admission alone.
Berlin Nobody (2024)
Wasted potential
Eric Bana and Sadie Sink sulk their way through Berlin Nobody, a drab cult thriller given the far less tantalizing title "A Sacrifice" for North American distribution. Bana is an American professor in Berlin working on a complicated thesis about cult mindset and dangerous groupthink, unaware that his teenage daughter (Sink) is slowly orbiting the very same deadly cult via a German boy (Jonas Dasser) she's started seeing. Bana is a brilliant actor who doesn't always choose the best scripts and this is unfortunately one of them, Stranger Things' talented Sink also falling into the same trap. They try to do honest character work but the writing lets them down hard, attempting some complex thematics regarding the cut angle that get left completely open ended like they just gave up in fully exploring their ideas and let the credits roll. Skip.
Civil War (2024)
meh
Alex Garland's Civil War is a tense, well made, visually satisfying dystopian thriller that ultimately has absolutely nothing to say about its central premise in core fashion and as a result feels like an utterly useless exercise beyond a few moments of well placed tension. There's a civil war raging in the USA and several disparate war photojournalists careen around the turbulent landscape looking for that 'perfect shot,' or an interview with the disgraced president (Nick Offerman, very briefly). They're played by a reliable lineup including a weary looking Kirsten Dunst, Wagner Moura, Stephen Mckinley Henderson and the excellent Cailee Spaeny. They all give fine performances within the setting including a super evil cameo from Jesse Plemons, but they all feel like they're awaiting some big thematic revelatory threshold that Garland never allows the film to breach. What led to the states descending into war? What are the ideals that each side is striving for in their brutal campaigns? I can think of a few and certainly so can anybody else in this day and age of unrest, but Garland obstinately shies away from exploring this whatsoever and the result dims any effect the rest of the film has in the technical and acting department. This story could have taken place anywhere in any civil war, and the seemingly bold choice to place it in present America becomes a big laugh when we realize there was never any intention beyond that decision, and that frustrating vagueness is the only real approach. Weird.
Poolman (2023)
What's with all the hate? This was fun
Chris Pine writes, directs and stars in his own goofy L. A. noir film that has gotten absolutely eviscerated by critics and audiences alike. Poolman is not only nowhere close to bad, it's actually really enjoyable in a scrappy, loose, and endearingly meandering fashion and I'm really not sure what has prompted the borderline hostile reception. Pine is Darren Barrenman, a hyperactive, wayward pool repairman living in an RV outside a motel with his much older girlfriend (Jennifer Jason Leigh). Along with their oddball friends Jack & Diane (Danny Devito & Annette Bening) they get involved in some sort of goofily clandestine intrigue involving a city councilman (Stephen Tobolowsky, always welcome and a standout here), a corrupt real estate tycoon (Clancy Brown), an almond plantation magnate (Ray Wise) and others, a series of bizarrely Byzantine misadventures that serve less as a coherent through line and more as an excuse for dialogue that consistently and tangentially spirals directly out of control from one ADHD riddled verbal set piece to the next. Pine is his usually effervescent self, the rattling chemistry he has with Devito is sublime, contrasted starkly by a surprisingly poignant scene of hushed dialogue he has with Tobolowsky that crosses an exquisite line from dementedness into genuine heartfelt catharsis. It's not a perfect film, lots of it is scattershot gibberish and it leans heavily on its quirkiness, but simply watching these actors deliver absurdist character bits and relentless banter, all playing up hilariously exaggerated California stereotypes is its own brand of insane fun and underneath the manic stylistic demeanour the film actually has something thematic and disarmingly affecting to say about loneliness and personal melancholy. Don't listen to the condemning reviews.
Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1 (2024)
Don't listen to the haters
Kevin Costner took a hefty personal gamble in self-financing his mammoth mosaic western epic Horizon and it's a shame more people didn't take to it, because Part One is really something special. That's not to say it's perfect; it can drag interminably here and there before leaping forward awkwardly between languid scenes of dialogue and oddly schmaltzy emotional swells that don't quite jive in cohesion. But Costner has created a lush, stirring, gorgeously photographed old fashioned western in the traditional sense, bereft of revisionist sensibilities that the genre has adopted these days and full of surprisingly ruthless brutality, jaw dropping cinematography, sweeping set pieces and enough star power, both A-list and character players, to populate a small frontier town. The roster is too dense and lengthy to make mention of everybody but some sterling standouts include Sienna Miller and Georgia MacPhail as mother/faughter survivors of a ruthless indian massacre, Michael Rooker as the compassionate union soldier who finds and rescues them, Jamie Campbell Bower as a homicidal scumbag, Jena Malone as a battered mother on the run from a vicious clan, Jeff Fahey as an amoral, animalistic tracker, a scene stealing Luke Wilson as the no nonsense boss of a pioneer wagon train and so many others. The complaints coming out are that it can sometimes feel disjointed and not all the characters feel like they belong or are heading in a coherent direction, which is fair. However, there is a sizzle reel for the upcoming second film (sadly pushed to release further towards the fall) that appears to flesh out so much more of what we're given here, and I'm frankly excited to continue the journey into this story.
The Convert (2023)
Breathtaking film
Lee Tamahori is a prolific filmmaker who hasn't made a movie in a minute, but he changes that with this year's The Convert, which is so good it might be a career best for him. The same can be said for Guy Pearce playing a British priest with a haunted past who travels to a small settlement in coastal New Zealand sometime in the 1830's. There he gets swept up in the chaos of warring Maori clans, befriends and forges a deep bond with a teenage warrior (Tioreore Ngatai-Melbourne) who grieves the loss of her husband in battle. The film explores in meditative, mature fashion the troubled dynamics not just between British colonial forces and the Maori but the tribes often brutal relationships with each other, frequently spilling into outright warfare. Pearce is phenomenal, restrained for much of the time but offering a monologue of bruising, heartbreaking vulnerability, one of his greatest performances. Melbourne is sensational as the young warrior, emanating raw anger and passion for her people and the land they inhabit. Not since Lord Of The Rings has New Zealand looked this magnificent; Tamahori and his cinematographer Gin Loane have coloured the windswept beaches, lush forests and misty valleys with breathtaking spatial dynamism and make this one of the most visually gorgeous, thematically rich, altogether stirring films of the year so far.
The Bikeriders (2023)
Jodie is excellent, the rest is so-so
Jeff Nichols's The Bikeriders explores several decades in the lives of a 1960's biker gang through the eyes of one of their wives, and while the film overall only succeeds in fits and starts.. Jodie Comer offers up one of the finest, most effervescent and emotionally honest pieces of acting I've ever seen. She's Kathy, who meets and quickly marries Benny (Austin Butler), a rebellious member of the Vandals motorcycle club run by roughneck Johnny (Tom Hardy). Told in sequential flashback form as a mostly silent photojournalist (Mike Faist) interviews her, we see the meteoric rise and self destructive fall of the club, an endeavour that always ends up in trouble and a fact that the club's members (and so too the script) are very aware of. There's a lot crammed in here, a lot to like and a lot that drags too, the film has a curiously paced vernacular of staccato leaps forward in narrative with languid downtime that isn't so well sewn together. My main issue here is the characters of Benny and Johnny ; Butler and Hardy are just fine, as they always are but they are playing caricatures here that aren't even remotely fleshed out with proper backstory, motivations or shades of complexity and the result is one (1) James Dean pastiche and one (1) Marlon Brando homage.. but that's little else they and the script backing them up have to offer, they don't feel like their own human beings, just echoes of archetypal figures we are more than familiar with. Supporting players like the excellent Emory Cohen, reliable Michael Shannon, Boyd Holbrook, amiable Damon Herriman, Beau Knapp, ferocious Toby Wallace, Karl Glusman, Happy Anderson and an unrecognizable, playfully scrappy Norman Reedus are all terrific and seem like real characters but if your supporting roster has more to offer than two of the central leads, boy you've got a big problem. Comer offers so much though and is the heart, soul and brains of both the bike club and the film overall. She hits notes of grace, pure hearted love and seething anger so effortlessly it makes the aloof Butler stand out all the more in trying to keep up with her in their scenes together, to no avail. I loved her performance a great deal and she saves the film from being an otherwise underwritten exercise with lead characters who don't do much other than stand around emulating genre icons from an era long past.
Longlegs (2024)
Brilliant
The devil and his buddies hide out in many varying enclaves, choosing to haunt a stark, dreary Clinton-era Pacific Northwest in Oz Perkins's LongLegs, a harrowing, often gorgeous, frequently nightmarish and altogether brilliant hellish mood piece that begins with a queasy slow burn and culminates at a hectic satanic fever pitch that will rattle anyone's cage. Maika Monroe is Lee Harker, rookie FBI agent brought in by her gruff boss (Blair Underwood) to join the manhunt for LongLegs (Nicolas Cage), an elusive serial killer who has been terrifying the region for decades with ritualistic murders carried out in inexplicable fashion, adorned with coded puzzles to taunt authorities. Harker not only displays a keen, almost clairvoyant knack for staying on Longlegs's trail but also feels the gnawing, uneasy feeling he may be closer to home than anybody ever thought, in ways nobody suspected. Perkins is a visual and atmospheric genius who employs burnished, weary 1990's cinematography (cheers to Andres Arochi) and a beautifully portentous, darkly ambient score (thanks to Zilgi) that all contribute loads in making this one of the most enveloping, anxiety ridden horror experiences in some time. Monroe is by now an undisputed horror queen; if you look at her personally curated resume that includes The Guest, Watcher, Villains, Significant Other, God Is A Bullet, It Follows (and its upcoming sequel) you can see her desire to participate and innovate the genre and this is her finest performance yet. Wound up clock-tight, with a pragmatic force field waveringly shielding bruised emotional trauma beneath and a striking empathy in her field work, she effortlessly makes Harker a comforting force of good amidst a roiling typhoon of encroaching evil. I don't know what I need to say about Cage's performance other than strap yourself in, his career has been so eclectic and experimental of late that a performance this cosmically disquieted was only inevitable. His LongLegs is a pale, gibbering freak who doesn't utter a single coherent syllable and looks like he wandered in from a frozen asylum, it's a truly demented piece of character actor performance art that stands as yet another oddball belt notch on his latter-day career charm bracelet of deliberately startling oddball turns. Underwood is low-key fantastic as the Jack Crawford proxy, nailing the bitter comic relief and displaying terrific mentorship chemistry with Maika. And Alicia Witt, an actress who isn't in nearly enough stuff, gets perhaps the role of her lifetime as Lee's haunted mother, a spectral presence of melancholy regret and repressed memories that emanate forth from her unsettlingly mercurial gaze. Every actor is fantastic here and Perkins has artfully constructed a dazzling gothic ambience for them to express in, by shooting in the Vancouver area but avoiding cliched landmarks (downtown, Stanley park etc) and instead venturing into the eerie outskirts of the Fraser Valley the atmosphere has an emaciated palette of pallid northern desolation and rural folktale menace that ends with a sickening narrative mangle that will linger with you long after. The best film of 2024 so far.
Paradise Highway (2022)
Reprehensible nonsense
When I see Juliette Binoche I think of like... European arthouse cinema or 'based on a novel dramatic stuff,', not grungy, direct to video road thriller in which she plays a long haul trucker trying to bust human traffickers. She just feels so out of place as Sally in Paradise Highway, forced to use her rig for drug muling to help her incarcerated brother (Frank Grillo) shorten his sentence. When the next package turns out to be a preteen girl (Hala Finley) intended for sale in the sex trade, she has a burgeoning crisis of conscience and this is where the film fails so effing miserably, I actively hated it by the end. The script asks us to sympathize with Sally as she *gradually* realizes that what she's being asked to do is wrong, and even bonds with the kid. BUT... she *considered* it, instead of immediately drawing a moral line in the sand and that inability to discern right from wrong at the outset makes her just as bad as the traffickers, which makes the film so goddamn gross as it asks you to forgive her and see her as this... conflicted angel or something. Binoche is so miscast it hurts, I don't believe her and Grillo are siblings for a second. Finley offers a genuinely terrific performance as the young girl, as does Morgan Freeman as a fearsome FBI agent who won't stop until he's caught these evil pricks but their efforts are wasted on this confused, inexcusably misguided piece of crap masquerading as a 'thriller with a message.' Not even some good dusty highway sunset cinematography can save this awkward, icky, ill advised mess from tanking.
New Life (2023)
Unfocused
John Rosman's New Life tries to breathe exactly that into the zombie genre, and only somewhat succeeds. This is a film with some good atmosphere, scenery and genuinely disturbing special effects but it's consistently unclear in narrative, distracted by its own weird subplots and never quite grounds itself in anything wholly cohesive. A young girl (Hayley Erin) is on the run from the director (Tony Amendola) of a nefarious institute who has hired a mysterious fixer (Sonia Walger) to track her down and eliminate her. Why? Well I've already mentioned zombies earlier which isn't a secret the film really keeps too well from the outset, so there you go. The film is at its strongest when it focuses on the young girl evading her pursuers, seeking food and shelter from a kindly farmer and his wife, the simplicity of moving from place to place. When the story pivots back to the fixer is when it sort of loses momentum; Walger is a great actress whose work I love in LOST, but she's saddled with an odd arc here. Too much dialogue and a bizarre subplot about her early onset ALS do nothing for the story at large and just muddy things up. It also suffers from a jarringly abrupt ending and a general lack of focus.
The Watchers (2024)
This ain't it
M. Night Shymalan's daughter has made a horror movie of her own and the question arises, does the talent run in the family? The answer is unfortunately a "no" that yearns to be a "sort of" in the case of The Watchers. A muddled blend of Irish fairy folklore and wilderness escape room intrigue, it stars Dakota Fanning (always reliable) as a girl who gets lost in the woods while on a UK trip and ends up trapped in a mysterious building that her fellow captors dib "the coop," but it looks less like a coop and more like a fancy-shmancy woodland AirBnb property. Every night they are visited by Watchers, mysterious entities that pose a vague threat that steadily grows as Fanning breaks every rule in the book trying to get to the bottom of their situation, and escape. It's a shame because the cinematography here is beautiful, all hazily lit auburn strokes and dense forest, like an adult version of those awesome Spiderwick book illustrations. It's the story that suffers from being an unimaginative retread of other flicks that presented the material better, and it's not even remotely scary for a second. Fanning does her best and others in the supporting cast like horror vets Olwen Fouéré (Mandy, Texas Chainsaw Massacre) and Georgina Campbell (Barbarian) try to support her but the script lets all of them down. Around the halfway mark the action drastically shifts, the story loses all anchor point and goes flying untethered to the wind, a narrative lost in incoherence. I was so looking forward to seeing Fannjng in her own 'cabin in the woods' style horror flick but this one just misses the mark in most aspects.
The First Omen (2024)
Objectively the best Omen film
There's a prequel to The Omen out and it's actually good! Arkasha Stevenson's The First Omen is aesthetically probably the best in the franchise, going the nightmarish Italian fever dream freak-show horror route rather than blithely through the motions of the original story, which we all are very familiar with. This one takes place a half year or so before the original story as a young American nun (Nell Tiger-Free) arrives in Rome to work for the church but instead senses a growing darkness within the Vatican itself, as a strange sect of devil worshipping kooks prepares for the incoming birth of the Antichrist. But who will be the mother? The plot is predictable as all hell, even a third act twist that one can feel coming a mile away but the fun here isn't in story logic, its in style and atmosphere, both of which the film positively drips with. Tiger-Free is a captivating lead presence, all wide eyed apprehension and unsettling angelic energy, while heavyweights like thunder voiced Ralph Ineson, Sonia Braga, Bill Nighy (sadly a bit underused) and a very creepy Charles Dance show up here and there. So in terms of where this sits in the franchise hierarchically, it's objective I suppose. I find the original to be pretty clunky, the sequels a bit scattered and daft and the 2006 remake, although impeccably casted (Julia Stiles, David Thewlis & Pete Postlethwaite under one roof is a reason to celebrate in itself) pretty uninspired overall. This one though, has the dark gooey and horrifically tactile ambience of something by Rob Zombie or Panos Cosmatos and reaches a diabolically imagined fever pitch of disgusting effects and berserk histrionics (the homage paid to Andzrej's Zulawski's Possession is a tad on the nose) from a totally committed Tiger-Free, and in my eyes stands as the most commanding, singular and well wrought Omen flick to date.
I Saw the TV Glow (2024)
Unique sensory experience
Whether you're an avid cinephile or TV aficionado as an adult or not, everyone hazily and fondly remembers a nostalgic film or series that held their rapt attention as an impressionable kid, when the not yet fully formed subconscious is adjusting to life in this state and every bit of stimuli still has an otherworldly timbre. Jane Schoenbrun's I Saw The TV Glow is an uncannily well done exploration of this, a haunting, elusive and hard to describe psychological horror show about memory, identity, the enduring power of childhood nostalgia and how it can bring people together to share indescribable bonds. Owen (Justice Smith) and Maddy (Brigitte Lundy-Paine) grow up together in the mid 90's, sharing a love for a strange TV show called The Pink Opaque in which two alienated teens, much like themselves, battle the forces of surreal evil. Until one day when Maddy disappears and The Pink Opaque is cancelled, Owen is thrust forward in life without his friend, the show or the connection they shared. Where did she go? Was The Pink Opaque just a TV show, or something with more intangible esoteric powers? The answers to these questions are not easily surrendered by filmmaker Schoenbrun, who seems less interested in conventional resolution and more fascinated by sifting through the subconscious ambiguities of life and all its inherent mysteries both beautiful and terrifying. While I can't say that I loved this as much as her debut feature We're All Going To The World's Fair, it is nonetheless a mesmerizing effort. Combining the sort of eerie Lo-Fi aesthetics that any 90's kid would remember in stuff like Are You Afraid Of The Dark with an intensely beguiling horror ambience that calls to mind and even directly pays homage to David Lynch's Twin Peaks at one point, the stylistic and tonal recipe here is an unforgettable mix, just like The Pink Opaque is for our two lonely protagonists.
Chutney Popcorn (1999)
Wonderful film
Nisha Ganatra's Chutney Popcorn is a lovely, easygoing slice of life entry into queer cinema, a funny, sweet portrait of several multicultural characters coexisting in late 90's NYC, an era and setting both distinct and decidedly (these days) wistful. Reena (writer director Ganatra in a terrific starring turn) is a 30-something East Indian/American woman running a henna tattoo business and working out issues with her free spirited girlfriend (Jill Hennessy). Her sister (Sakina Jeffrey) and her husband (Nick Chinlund) are trying for a baby but when she discovers she's infertile, somebody has the idea that Reena could be a surrogate mother. This is tricky territory but the film handles it with warmth and a candid honesty brought out wonderfully by each actor, all emoting from a lighthearted yet genuine and realistic place. The sex and pregnancy related interpersonal dilemmas are contrasted nicely by Reena's relationship with her mother (Madhur Jaffrey), a conservative, old school Indian woman who outwardly seems harsh and intolerant of her daughter being gay, but inwardly projects an unconditional love that isn't always so easily expressed. This may be low budget, obscure and very indie but it's every bit as great as anything a Hollywood screenwriter could dream up, a fantastic film.
You'll Never Find Me (2023)
Spooky
A haunted older fellow (Brendan Rock) sits inside his remote wilderness cottage stewing about some long forgotten memories, until a lone young woman (Jordan Cowan) comes knocking, seeking shelter from the raging storm outside. Indianna Bell's You'll Never Find Me is an utterly fascinating, eerily transfixing chamber piece horror/thriller with two vivid performances, an evocative premise and atmosphere thicker than that typhoon, ever present just outside the door. Where does this visiting girl come from and what does she want? Who is this lonely man, disturbed to his core by some buried secret? Who between them is the more dangerous one and how will this night play out? There are a few films like this, its a really tricky setup to pull off and hold the audiences interest for the duration without letting the narrative slack go limp, like last year's Old Man with Stephen Lang and Little Bone Lodge with Joely Richardson, both examples of this genre failing. You'd think that a single location thriller with only two characters would be a slice, but no, it's tough as hell to make it consistently engaging. This one manages it, thanks to the two lead actors who are both very unnerving, the creative work from Bell (also the writer) and her co-director Josiah Allen, an ambiguity soaked piece of pulpy, potboiling psycho-drama that, once its plot revelations are laid ruthlessly bare, you'll want to watch again just to pick up on details you may have overlooked that make that whopper of a twist ending smack you upside the face all that much harder. Great film, streaming now on Shudder.
We're All Going to the World's Fair (2021)
Unique, mesmerizing experience
It's tough to make a film in which almost nothing happens and still manage to have it disturb and haunt the viewer on a primordial level, but Jane Schoenbrun manages exactly that in her striking, brilliant debut feature We're All Going To The World's Fair. Part immersive atmospheric tone poem, part thematic indictment of online horror/creepypasta culture with a melancholy dose of adolescent loneliness, this is a film like no other and my favourite in some time. Casey (Anna Cobb) is a teen living a somewhat isolated life in upstate New York, with seemingly no friends and little parental involvement. She finds solace and belonging in an online horror RPG called the Worlds Fair, an unnerving Candyman like challenge that is said, once the ritual is completed and internalized, to 'change' its participants in some pretty nightmarish ways. A series of blog videos by her attract the attention of a mysterious viewer called LBJ who, behind the screen, eventually happens to be a much older man (Michael J. Rogers) from elsewhere in the USA who has a fervent infatuation with both her and this bizarre game. Rogers is no stranger to horror, already creeping us out in both Panos Cosmatos's Beyond The Black Rainbow and Neill Blomkamp's unfairly overlooked Demonic. He's a wildly disquieting presence in anything and he makes LBJ a character that stews with uneasy opacity and his own heartbreaking brand of helplessness. Cobb is also superb, nailing the complexities and opposites in her character and upholding themes of greatest emotional uncertainty. Is this game a real supernatural phenomenon that is dangerous to its players and their onlookers, or simply a *very* well executed hoax? Schoenbrun deliberately doesn't arrive at that answer easily or accessibly, or even at all really. It asks the hard questions about the internet community, how loneliness can lead to communities being formed there that might not be the most constructive or spiritually stable outlets for anybody involved, and can even potentially lead to disaster. This is a slow burning, open ended piece of spectral ambience that will creep up behind you, and later on when the film is over and the credits roll... it's still standing there.
Late Night with the Devil (2023)
Fun stuff
1970's era talk shows are already creepy enough what with all that tacky floral and overtly tan production design, but you add demon possession into the mix and you've really got something. Late Night With The Devil is a mirthful blast of meta pop culture and freaky supernatural shenanigans, as a talk show broadcast helmed by Jack Delroy (David Dastmalchian) descends into a spectacular meltdown when ghosts invade the live-air filming and all breaks loose in real time. Jack has some spooky personal history with the occult that's generously hinted at (references to the real life Bohemian Grove are dropped) and his past has come full circle back to haunt him, along with everybody unfortunate enough to be participating in his show. Dastmalchian is a hell of an actor who has amassed a jaw dropping lineup of horror/scifi credits in the past decade or so: The Dark Knight, Twin Peaks, Prisoners, Blade Runner 2049, Dune, Ant Man, you name it. It's nice to see the dude get a lead role and one that seems tailored to his aura and the 70's ethos overall, it just somehow feels right. There's a healthy amount of scares, tension and otherworldly mayhem here and even if the film didn't quite ascend to the level of outright bloody pandemonium of stuff like say, Evil Dead, it still has enough gory chaos to please genre fans. They also scored the great Michael Ironside for voiceover narration as well, which is always a plus especially in the horror books.
Force of Nature: The Dry 2 (2024)
Not as great as the first but still well made
Eric Bana's surly, sympathetic federal agent Falk solves another mysterious murder case in The Dry 2: Force Of Nature, a sequel I didn't think we'd get so soon but one that I'm nonetheless happy to see. The Dry was a huge surprise, not only one of the very best films of 2020 but one of the best examples of its genre, simply a stellar piece of outback/mystery/crime. The sequel is, I'm sad to report, not quite as brilliant as that, but it's not without that same operatic atmosphere, eerie ambience and pathos that drew me in so well before. Falk and his partner (Jacqueline McKenzie) are investigating a group of female hikers on a corporate retreat excursion who ran into some trouble with the elements and each other, which has led to one or more of them still missing. The reason they're even interested in this is that one of the girls was set to testify against her own boss, a slick rich prick played by Richard Roxburgh in another of his patented intense slimy villain turns. Things get complicated when the survivors of the trip recount coming across human remains, which opens a decades old cold case of an ancient serial killer who used to operate in the region. Now if this sounds a bit convoluted... it is. I found myself struggling to care about this extended bout of chick drama trying to pass itself off as a compelling mystery, despite the performances all being good and the filmmaking proficient at every level. If they had used the drama of the trip as a launching pad to explore the old serial killer and forge something out of that I feel like the film would have been so much stronger, but they frustratingly sideline that for this main plot line that just doesn't have the narrative wings to carry the film. Bana is terrific once again in the role though, this is a character he was born to play and even if the film can't match the magic of the first, I say keep em coming and who knows what we'll get with this solidly established formula. One area it succeeds and is different from the first is in setting; The Dry was just that, an arid, dusty outback vista of desolation and emptiness, but here they've chosen to film in lush Dandenong Ranges National Park which is essentially a beautiful primordial rainforest and the backdrop is striking. They should have called this one The Wet.
Arcadian (2024)
A wonderful surprise
Every passing year brings new promise of at least a handful of late career Nicolas Cage flicks, a perennial dose of healthy mix cinematic grab bags that walk a respectable line between offbeat gems, genuine earnest fare and paycheque generating smut. Thankfully his latest, Benjamin Brewer's Arcadian, is a terrific film. Slow burn post apocalyptic intrigue infused with father son drama and fearsome creature feature horror template, this is a tale of one man (Cage) trying to survive after a cataclysmic event has rendered the world in pieces. He finds two orphaned infant boys abandoned in the rubble and raises them into teens, where they're played by the excellent Maxwell Jenkins and an unrecognizable Jaeden Martell. Unfortunately the end of the world isn't the only event to contend with, as now it seems demonic monsters roam about preying on people and while you may have heard the term 'unique creature design' thrown around in horror movie roundtable discussions, I can promise you that term doesn't even begin to describe the special effects effects they've used here. Nothing I say could prepare you for how sickeningly scary and outrageously innovative these things are, so I'll say nothing more about them and let you discover them yourself. While the film sets Cage up as the focal point early on, it decidedly segues away from him and becomes the story of these two brothers trying to survive. Cage plays it dead straight dramatic and gives a wonderfully emotional supporting turn while both boys are equally great, especially Jenkins who has real charisma and definite leading man potential. Sadie Soverall also offers an incredible performance as a girl from a neighbouring farm commune who befriends and joins forces with our two protagonists, giving a third act eulogy speech that is so laden with genuine melancholy and earned sadness it will haunt you for sometime after. This is a great film, a subdued blend of sorrowful dramatic storytelling and shocking suspenseful horror with a burned out, unobtrusively shellshocked world and weary, tired yet hopeful characters who inhabit it, all played beautifully by the cast.
Requiem for a Dream (2000)
Well made, but I have no desire to ever view again
It's taken me a longggg time to finally commit to watching Darren Aronofsky's Requiem For A Dream and now that I have, I have no earthly desire to ever, ever see it again. Aronofsky's filmography is a fascinating one for me personally; one of his films (The Fountain) is in my top three of all time and has endless rewatch capability, while every other one I've seen I've either not been huge on, or admired but felt like once was enough. That certainly applies here, this is a well made and thoughtful film yet it's pessimistic to the bone and so bleak in its outlook that you feel a dark stain on your soul when it's choking narrative of several Coney Island drug addicts comes to a hellish, cacophonous ending. Jared Leto and Marlon Wayans are a pair of sad sack heroin junkies, Jennifer Connelly is Leto's equally strung out girlfriend and Ellen Burstyn his hopeless mother who withers away at home, getting sicker and sicker on poisonous diet pills that rot her body, and a toxic daytime TV talk show (hosted by Christopher 'Shooter McGavin' McDonald, no less) that rots her mind. These various individuals each occupy their own disheartening downward spiral and weave in and out of each other's orbit as they all proverbially circle the toilet bowl of a very dark outcome and while there are momentary flashes of what could be called compassion for these people, Aronofsky mostly just ruthlessly focuses on this very disturbing, apocalyptic chapter in their lives with little room for rhyme, reason or philosophical commentary. Perhaps it's best that way for this film, and seems to mirror the lack of answers or understanding all of us seem to have when we drive through a particularly derelict part of town where these horrifying trajectories can be observed in real time. The film starts off with false hopes of being kind of comedic in the fashion of other drug films like Spun or The Salton see but, like those films, it's all fun and games in the beginning stages of addiction and when the situation becomes dire, things spiral into oblivion faster than anybody can comprehend, especially those it happens to. So, while I will concede it's a terrific film with solid performances and a now iconic score from Clint Mansell, I'll tuck the dvd away, change the channel when it comes on and skip past it in the streaming queue, for I have no inclination to ever experience it again.
Being Human (1994)
Stories about reincarnation are important
What if you had a comprehensive picture of all the lives you've lived so far, instead of just the one you're in right now? What if every reincarnation so far was laid out in tapestry form so you could see the decisions, mistakes, trials and cathartic outcomes of every chapter? Bill Forsyth's Being Human explores this in tender, wistful fashion as one human man (Robin Williams) lives out four very different lifetimes that unfold centuries apart. In the first he's a prehistoric caveman somewhere off the coast of Scotland, caring for a family he eventually loses and will not find again until thousands of years later. Williams is restrained and subdued in each radically different characterization here, from a Roman slave to a Spanish colonialist to a displaced Scotsman and, in the present day incarnation, a 1980's NYC businessman attempting to reconnect with his two estranged children. There's a deep poignancy and emotional resonance to both the film and his multiple performances that hold it up, helped by a wonderful supporting cast including John Turturro, Hector Elizondo, William H. Macy, Vincent D'Onofrio, Tony Curran, Robert Carlyle, Bill Nighy, David Morrissey, Ewan McGregor, Jonathan Hyde, Lindsay Crouse, Lorraine Bracco, down to earth narration from the great Theresa Russell and a show-stopping turn from Anna Galiena as a 16th century Italian widow who forms a romantic connection with one of William's incarnations. Reincarnation does indeed exist, whether people choose to believe in it or not, and I think that films about it are important and essential to understanding our purpose and overarching journey through time and the cosmos; Cloud Atlas comes to mind, as does What Dreams May Come (also starring Williams) and if you compare those with this, a sad yet predictable pattern emerges: they were all excellent, spiritually inclined films that were all not received well at the time, this one particularly languishes in obscurity and I had no idea it even existed until I was searching for Williams films I hadn't seen on iTunes. I've no clue why the film hasn't been more widely seen, whether it's that people aren't ready to explore the subject matter or some behind the scenes drama, but in any case it's more than worth a watch and even finds notes of genuine profundity, especially in its hypnotic, thematically satisfying final few beats.