You can pretty much sense that by the time of the sequel, the whole urban legends gimmick had just about wore thin. There aren’t too many menacing urban legends that one can weaponize for a horror film. “Final Cut” pretty much feels like a copy of “Scream 2” where it’s all centered on a film school, film students, and a potential killer that may either be mimicking the movies they’ve seen, or have something so much more personal in mind when it comes to the canon fodder here.
Author Archives: Felix Vasquez
Urban Legend (1998): Collector’s Edition [Blu-Ray]
While it’s important to note that Wes Craven’s 1995 horror entry “Scream” was a very influential horror movie that reinvigorated the slasher sub-genre, it’s also important to chronicle the films that it influenced. After the release of “Scream,” every studio far and wide began releasing their own slasher films, and many of them were whodunits, and or based around some kind of gimmick. While slasher movies are the breakdown of taboos and morality tales with the help of folklore, “Urban Legend” cuts right to the chase creating a slasher who uses urban folklore to dispense of hapless victims in a college. The results are, suffice to say, a mixed bag.
Single White Female (1992): Collector’s Edition [Blu-Ray]
1992 seems like such a long time ago, and “Single White Female” is one of the more influential thrillers to come out of a decade filled with them. While the eighties had “Fatal Attraction,” the nineties had what is one of the more interesting films that inspired a number of copycats in the latter years. Director Barbet Schroeder’s drama thriller is by no means a masterpiece, but it’s a solid film that takes a few pages from “Fatal Attraction” while offering a villain that’s much more psychologically broken.
Batman: The Complete Animated Series – Deluxe Limited Edition [Blu-Ray/Digital]
Even in this day and age, 1992’s “Batman: The Animated Series” remains the definitive iteration of Bill Finger’s Batman. Combining all of the best elements from past Batman lore, Bruce Timm’s iconic animated series is a mature, often compelling take on the Dark Knight that’s action packed enough for children, but sophisticated enough for older audiences to appreciate. Timm approaches the Batman with enough care and delicate creativity to allow the character to flourish in a contemporary setting, embracing the fantasy elements of the character as well as basing a lot of the aspects of the character and his background in reality as much as possible.
Overlord (2018)
The mix of war movies and horror movies have always been a natural combination, since they’re both manage to examine the dark sides of combat and humanity. It’s just a shame that there haven’t been many movies of the sub-genre that have been worth watching. Thankfully, while “Overlord” isn’t a complete masterpiece, it manages to come out in the end as a sleek and very clever amalgam of horror, fantasy, and war oriented action. It might also sweeten the pot that Avery’s horror war hybrid feels like a spiritual prequel to “Re-Animator.” Director Julius Avery approaches the idea of a horror movie set during World War II with great right balance of both genres, allowing “Overlord” to be a character piece first and then delve right in to the horrendous grue and human ugliness.
The Grinch (2018)
After 1966’s “How the Grinch Stole Christmas,” and 2000’s “Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas,” we now have 2018’s “The Grinch” (I assume the next reboot will be titled “Gri”). Illumination Studios continues being the C grade Disney Strudios, adapting the Dr. Seuss tale if, for no other reason, than to have their own holiday title out for the market and appeal to a younger audience. There’s not a lot of reason for this adaptation, as Illumination doesn’t offer a new twist on The Grinch. Except for obviously omitting “Christmas” from the title, “The Grinch” is an amalgam of Ron Howard’s live action movie, and the original Chuck Jones short movie–except bland.
Shorts Round Up of the Week (11/9/2018)
Most of the time we get such a backlog of short films and feature length indie films that we work hard to take them all on and review them before the year is up. In what we hope will become a new feature, “Shorts Round Up of the Week” is a column where we’ll be reviewing a round up of short films of varying quality.
If you’d like to submit your short film for review consideration, submissions are always opened to filmmakers and producers.