Blair Witch
Adam Wingard’s Blair Witch isn’t quite a franchise reboot as it is a do-over or a reworking of previous ideas used in the series’ much-hated sequel Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2.
Horror
Chopping Block
Reviewing films from the Legless Corpse collection is becoming a thankless task. How else do you describe these titles that are oh-so obviously made for the close-knit amateurs that make these low-budget indies?
The Blackout Experiments
The Blackout Experiments could be that “next big thing” for horror folks who avidly discuss the genre. Not only does it offer envelope-pushing originality, it also shows an underbelly that is generally out-of-bounds for a mainstream crowd. Some outsiders may find the doc’s humiliating and semi-exploitive nature to be too intense, but they won’t be able to take their eyes off the screen.
Queen of Spades: The Dark Rite
Making a mythology for a horror film is a complex concept. Filmmakers have to take into account narrative, visual and paratextual elements in order to create an iconic creature that can stand the test of time. The filmmaker may not realize this, but they are inherently forced into this routine when they make a film which involves the creation of an urban legend.
The Neon Demon
There’s not much that can be said about recurring themes in Nicolas Winding Refn’s films that hasn’t been said before, but here’s a recap: self-indulgent, hyper violent, misogynist, pretentious, shallow.
Wylie Writes @ Split/Screen: The Cinema of Brian De Palma
For a career that spans nearly 5 decades, Brian De Palma’s style and subject as a filmmaker remains strikingly consistent. Unlike his New Hollywood contemporaries (Spielberg, Scorsese, Coppola), De Palma has never strayed far from his generic comfort zone.
The Before Time
Sometimes, a film may fail at one or two or even five things. A much rarer find is a film that manages to fail at absolutely everything it attempts. The term “attempt” is important, since The Before Time did unintentionally succeed at making me laugh out loud several times – a much higher success rate than many recent comedies.
Green Room
Jeremy Saulnier, the director of the unusually and undeservedly lauded Blue Ruin, concocts a second feature where hot punk rock meets cold blooded murder.
Hot Docs 2016: ‘Fear Itself’ and ‘Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World’
Fear Itself (DIR. Charlie Lyne) By: Shahbaz Khayambashi What is the source of fear and why does it excite us when we are seated in a dark room, watching awful things happen to photogenic strangers? This is not the question that documentarian Charlie Lyne attempts to answer in his latest work Fear Itself, a deeply personal study of the horror genre told through the same metatextual and introspective methodology that previously manifested itself in directorial efforts like Beyond…