The Saw That Forgot How to Cut There’s an old saying in horror: if you can’t top it, torture it. Jigsaw, the eighth installment in the Saw franchise, takes that philosophy and runs it straight into a buzzsaw—slowly, loudly, and with a complete lack of purpose. Directed by the Spierig Brothers, this 2017 sequel arrives … Read More “Jigsaw (2017): A Puzzle Missing All the Interesting Pieces” »
Welcome to the Family, Please Leave Your Sanity at the Door Some horror movies are subtle psychological puzzles. Others are sledgehammers made of blood, guilt, and 1980s paranoia. Jackals—Kevin Greutert’s grim, oddly tender horror-thriller—leans gleefully toward the latter. It’s a movie about family, cults, and how “tough love” can turn into “tough dismemberment” before dessert. … Read More “Jackals (2017): The Family That Slays Together” »
Andy Muschietti’s It floats on a delicate balance: it’s a monster movie with a wicked grin and the soft heart of a coming-of-age story that accidentally wandered into a sewer. The miracle is how gracefully it juggles terror, tenderness, and gallows humor. Yes, Pennywise bites—frequently—but what lingers is the Losers’ Club, whose friendship glows like … Read More “It (2017) Red Balloons and Real Feelings” »
You’re Gonna Need a Better Movie Every once in a while, a movie comes along that makes you question not only the state of modern cinema but the basic laws of reality. House Shark is that movie. It’s a cinematic event so catastrophically bad, it could double as a FEMA training exercise. Written and directed … Read More “House Shark (2017): When Jaws Met DIY Plumbing” »
Welcome to the Woods, We Hope You Get Lost There are horror movies that haunt you. There are horror movies that scar you. And then there’s Haunted Forest, a movie that mostly just irritates you until you start rooting for the ghost. Directed by Ian Loreños and billed as a supernatural horror film “with a … Read More “Haunted Forest (2017): A Tree Falls in the Woods, and Nobody Cares” »
The Wolf at the Door “Good Manners” begins like the sort of gothic babysitting ad Mary Poppins would have refused. A woman named Clara (Isabél Zuaa), unemployed, alone, and desperate, takes a job for Ana (Marjorie Estiano), a wealthy, lonely pregnant woman with an appetite for wine, steak, and emotionally unavailable men. What starts as … Read More “Good Manners (As Boas Maneiras): A Fairy Tale with Fangs and Feelings” »
The Gospel According to Blood and Bullets Every once in a while, a movie sneaks out of the cinematic shadows, howls at the moon, and screams, “I am both ridiculous and magnificent!” That, my friends, is Corbin Nash — a movie that dares to mix police procedural, gothic vampire pulp, neon-drenched noir, and a heavy … Read More ““Corbin Nash” — The Neon-Soaked, Fang-Filled Fever Dream You Didn’t Know You Needed” »
Welcome to the End of the World, Set to a Sick Beat Gaspar Noé’s Climax opens like a fever dream and ends like a stomach flu. Between those points lies 96 minutes of French dancers screaming, convulsing, and doing things to each other that make you question both art and the legality of filming such … Read More ““Climax” — Gaspar Noé’s Two-Hour PSA for Never Drinking Sangria” »
Corn Again: The Sequel Nobody Asked For There are bad horror sequels, and then there are Children of the Corn sequels — a series so stubbornly undead that even the Grim Reaper has probably given up trying to harvest it. Children of the Corn: Runaway (2018), the ninth installment in this eternal corn-spiracy, arrives like … Read More ““Children of the Corn: Runaway” — The Franchise That Should’ve Stayed Lost in the Cornfield” »
Sweden: Land of Serenity, Snow, and Sudden Death Ah, Sweden — that picturesque land of saunas, IKEA furniture, and horror movies that start with scenic drone shots and end with someone getting creatively dismembered. The Cabin (2018), the feature debut from Johan Bodell, joins this fine Scandinavian tradition with a film that proves you don’t … Read More ““The Cabin” (2018) — A Romantic Getaway, Now with 100% More Axe Murderer” »