The Turning (2020) - Movie Review

A film’s ending has the power to make, or break, the entire preceding story. That feeling where I think I’ve got a handle on what a given film is aiming for, only for the production to pull the rug out from under my feet, is a jarring one and something that can mess with the process of writing a review afterwards because it requires a serious amount of re-adjustment; this is part of the reason why I never really got my head around Hereditary when it came time to formally review it. But then there’s films like this, where that jarring feeling doesn’t make me think I need to re-assess what I just watched; it only solidifies that the film itself sucks.

Winchester (2018) - Movie Review

The plot: Sarah Winchester (Helen Mirren), after the death of her husband, has inherited his firearms company. She has become convinced that the victims of her husband's weapons are now haunting her, building expansions to her already-illustrious estate house in order to capture them. As her fellow employers start to wonder about her sanity, they send in doctor Eric Price (Jason Clarke) to assess her mental state and whether she is fit to continue running the company. However, soon after arriving, it seems that things aren't so simple as just declaring her insane.

A Ghost Story (2017) - Movie Review

The plot: C (Casey Affleck) has been killed in a car accident. Coming back as a ghost, still covered in the sheet that he was left with at the morgue, he returns to his house where his wife M (Rooney Mara) is struggling to cope with her husband’s death. As C learns that he has become more detached from the real world than he first realised, he is forced to come to terms with his own fate and the regrets that are keeping him in this world.

Personal Shopper (2017) - Movie Review

I wish this didn’t need to be reiterated, but the fact remains: Twilight is long since over and done with. Everyone attached to those films has long since moved on to (mostly) better things far removed from it. However, even with that said, I keep getting the feeling that people aren’t giving Kristen Stewart, the most memorable part of those films for all the wrong reasons, her fair due. Maybe it’s because, in the dungeons of comment sections and web forums, jokes about Bella’s utter uselessness and unintentionally malicious behaviour still ring out. That association is hard to break, even if you’re fortunate enough to unironically like those films.

 

The shame in that sentiment furthers once you realise that, since 2012, Stewart has not only kept fairly busy but also done some genuinely fantastic work like with American Ultra and Clouds Of Sils Maria. It’s hardly a surprise that this film, written and directed by the man behind Clouds and who got Stewart to give one of her best performances to date, would be on my radar. But does it continue her winning streak (ignoring that Billy Lynn ever happened) or does it add a chink to the chain?

The Conjuring 2 (2016) - Movie Review

While the original Saw gave James Wan his official debut and Insidious gave audiences a real taste of what Wan’s style of filmmaking was, it was The Conjuring that gave him the break he desperately needed. Aside from being a critical darling when it came out, and being a friggin’ awesome horror flick in its own right, it also proved that Wan wasn’t completely dependent on Leigh Whannell’s scripting to deliver a gripping story. With a nicely retro approach to scares and an insane level of dedication to adhering to the era in which the story was set, not to mention a great cast, it’s the kind of horror film that I can easily see being remembered several years from now.

Then came the spin-off film Annabelle, Wan teaming back up with Whannell for Insidious: Chapter 2, and then Wan being a creative consultant for Lights Out… wow, that’s a bad track record in terms of horror flicks. Don’t get me wrong, I still love the guy’s work but, in terms of confirming that this sequel to probably his most celebrated work will actually be a success, it is less than convincing, shall we say. Of course, because I will never get tired of saying it, I’m willing to be proven wrong on this one.

The Forest (2016) - Movie Review

Yep, there’s two films about Tokyo’s Suicide Forest that got a release this year. I know that the studio system tends to release similar films around the same time, but even still, this is an incredibly niche thing to make even a single film about, let alone two. That said, my reasoning for looking at both of those films today should be fairly obvious, considering how underwhelming Sea Of Trees turned out. Add to that how this is going to be a supernatural horror film, rather than the bland melodrama we got last time, and I’m willing to give this idea another go. So, is this going to make proper use of the concept or, by some anti-miracle, is this going to turn out even worse? Ugh. Let’s just get into this thing already before the lack of engagement makes me pass out.

Ouija: Origin Of Evil (2016) - Movie Review

A couple years back, I looked at a fun little slice of psychological horror with Oculus. Since then, director/co-writer Mike Flanagan has been keeping himself busy. And by "busy", I mean "Good God, how does one person have that much motivation?!" because he has all of three films slated for this year alone. I’m exhausted just thinking about that amount of effort, so hats off to him. Then again, that kind of aptitude is usually reserved for people who make schlock, porn or both, so maybe this arrangement isn’t as ideal as it sounds. Then again again, having seen this film, I couldn’t be more excited to check out the other two because… wow, this is something else.

Jessabelle (2014) - Movie Review

Since I’m at that stage where I am sick of just waiting for Sarah Snook to prove herself to me once again, I figure I might as well start digging into her backlogs to see if there’s anything worth salvaging. This is seriously something that I hope works out and I find some other hidden gem because, after the phenomenal performance she gave in Predestination, I refuse to believe that she is just a flash in the pan. As such, we’re delving into the horror annals this time around, and hopefully that’s in terms of the genre and not the overall product.

Crimson Peak (2015) - Movie Review

With the established horror classics of The Amityville Horror, The Shining and Poltergeist, the haunted house sub-genre transformed into one of the foremost horror film premises. True, much like most peoples’ assumptions concerning Halloween and slasher films, haunted house fare existed long before these three films, but this was the period where it truly entered the Hollywood zeitgeist. Just look at the most prominent horror film series of today with Paranormal Activity which, while starting to drift in quality, also makes for one of the better examples of doing the premise right since the inception of the idea. From the old-school revivalism of James Wan to the annoying failure at parody of Michael Tiddes, it’s quite clear that this isn’t going to go out of fashion any time soon… even if the idea itself is beginning to grow stale. Well, here comes Gothic horror devotee Guillermo Del Toro to give his own take on the idea; with any luck, this will fare better than last time he attempted this with Don’t Be Afraid Of The Dark.

Unfriended (2015) - Movie Review

While The Blair Witch Project might be the first proper mainstream example of the found footage genre, it was Paranormal Activity that revived the genre as it stands today and, to be fair, there’s a lot that can work about a found footage movie. The ‘natural’ camera work that brings believability to the film, the low-fi aesthetic that can hide weaker special effects, not to mention being cheap as chips to make; it can be really effective, especially with horror films because that believability can make the scares hit that much harder. Problem is, however, that the majority of found footage films play it way too safe and just follow the same formula laid down for them by Blair Witch and the PA series, often leading to rather embarrassing results like the horrendous Chernobyl Diaries. Sure, there are some films that take the format in interesting directions: Cloverfield used it to make a decent monster movie and Chronicle had the simple act of filming everything add emotional weight to the main character’s story. But, for the most part, it’s pretty much same-old, same-old. So, when I saw the trailer for this and it looked like someone was going to try something different (a serious rarity these days for film in general), I just had to check it out. But is it really that original? This is Unfriended… and it already loses points for the stupid title.