The Haunting of Flat Dialogue and Flat Lighting Every now and then, a film comes along that reminds you horror isn’t just about monsters, curses, or things that go bump in the night—it’s also about what happens when your popcorn goes cold halfway through and you still have 70 minutes to go. Bhoot Chaturdashi (2019), … Read More “Bhoot Chaturdashi (2019): A Ghost Story So Bland It Needs an Exorcism of Its Own” »
Thou Shalt Not Bore If you’ve ever sat through a sermon that went on too long, where the priest started sweating and the air conditioner broke, congratulations — you’ve already survived Banal. Directed by Peter Abanna, this 2019 Philippine psychological horror film takes the sacred and turns it into something far more terrifying: a 90-minute … Read More “Banal (2019): The Holy Horror of Nothing Happening” »
Welcome to Missouri, Where the Aliens Are Bored Too There’s a special kind of irony in watching a movie about soulless, emotionless duplicates—and realizing the film itself might be one of them. Assimilate (2019), directed by John Murlowski, is a loose retelling of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, if the pod people also ran a … Read More “Assimilate (2019): Invasion of the Bland Snatchers” »
Welcome to Wet Valley — Where the Water Slides Are Bloody Murder If you’ve ever been to a water park and thought, “You know what this needs? More severed limbs,” congratulations — your cinematic soulmate has arrived. Aquaslash, directed by Renaud Gauthier, is a gleefully deranged Canadian slasher that asks the bold question: what if … Read More “Aquaslash (2019): Wet, Wild, and Wonderfully Wrong” »
Welcome to the Hospital from Hell If there’s one universal fear that transcends cultures, languages, and time, it’s waking up in a hospital you don’t recognize. The beeping machines, the sterile lighting, the suspicious doctor asking you too many questions—it’s pure nightmare fuel. Now imagine that hospital also doubles as a torture chamber run by … Read More “122 (2019): Love, Blood, and the Loudest Hospital in Egypt” »
Welcome Back to the Family Only Rob Zombie could make mass murder feel like a family reunion.3 from Hell, the long-awaited conclusion to Zombie’s gleefully depraved Firefly trilogy, is a blood-soaked grindhouse lullaby sung by America’s most dysfunctional brood. And somehow, against all logic, taste, and good sense, it’s glorious. If House of 1000 Corpses … Read More “3 from Hell (2019): Blood, Banjos, and the Ballad of Beautiful Psychopaths” »
Welcome to the Creepiest Art Exhibit You’ll Ever Watch If you’ve ever stared too long at a children’s puppet show and thought, “What if this was directed by a haunted doll possessed by Werner Herzog?”—then congratulations, you’ve just described The Wolf House (La casa lobo). This Chilean stop-motion fever dream, directed by Cristóbal León and … Read More “The Wolf House (2018): A Fairy Tale for Cult Survivors and Fever Dream Enthusiasts” »
Welcome to the House That Ghosts—and Plotlines—Forgot There are few things scarier than a horror movie that isn’t scary. Actually, scratch that—there’s nothing scarier than sitting through Winchester, a film so dull it could be used as a sedative in haunted asylums. Directed by Michael and Peter Spierig, this 2018 supernatural “thriller” (a term used … Read More “Winchester (2018): The House That Built Boredom” »
Welcome to the Chamber of Regret If you’ve ever wondered what it would feel like to be locked in an empty IKEA showroom with the thermostat set to “hell,” congratulations—you’ve basically experienced White Chamber. This 2018 British sci-fi “horror” film (quotation marks earned) is what happens when you mix dystopian politics, pseudo-intellectual torture porn, and … Read More “White Chamber (2018): Fifty Shades of Beige and Bad Decisions” »
Welcome to the World’s Worst Hospital Visit Imagine you go to therapy for a little emotional tune-up and end up committed to an asylum, drugged, stalked, and surrounded by people who make your local DMV staff look compassionate. That’s Unsane, Steven Soderbergh’s gloriously twisted psychological thriller that proves three things: one, your therapist might not … Read More “Unsane (2018): When Gaslighting, iPhones, and Claire Foy Collide” »