A family living in the woods is faced with doing all they can for survival when a wildfire cuts them off from the road as it closes in on their home. Escape looks unlikely, but they forge forward.
Category Archives: Movie Reviews
Scooby-Doo! and Krypto, Too! (2023) (DVD)
Warner Bros. killed it and decided to throw it away, never to really be seen. Then thanks to uproar from the hardcore comic, Superman, and Scooby-Doo fan bases, “Scooby-Doo! and Krypto, Too!” was thankfully saved and thrown in to the already massive library of “Scooby-Doo” movies. This was of course put over in to the straight to home media market where Hanna Barbera’s cash cow rests comfortably. But that’s not at all a slight, as “Scooby-Doo! and Krypto, Too!” is a very good mixing of the crime fighting mutt, and Superman’s poochy pal.
The Curse of Willow Song (2020)
Following her release, Willow makes her way through life while trying to maintain her sobriety, deal with her abilities, and survive as an artist.
V/H/S/85 (2023) [Fantastic Fest 2023]
I’ve been an avid fan of the “V/H/S/” movie series since its initial release, and it’s been fun watching it evolve and run through the aughts over time. With Lo-Fi horror still a big deal in the modern internet stratosphere, “V/H/S/” has a surefire shelf life of at least two or three more entries. However, I do hope we get a much better installment than what “V/H/S/85” ends up becoming. It’s not to say that this newest entry in the series is terrible, it just feels so confused and lacking in the chaos and scares that make the original first two films so exciting.
Expend4bles (2023)
Sylvester Stallone’s “The Expendables” was a fun novelty. In 2010. It took all of the big action stars from the eighties, striking the pleasure spots of Gen Xers and got by on its gimmick–for a while. It began life as “The giants of action cinema! All here! All kicking ass!” right down to “Well, here are people that have been in a few action movies.” With the series only four movies in, “The Expendables” has cashed in all of its nostalgia points. It’s now ironically transformed from a loving eighties homage to the one of the numerous clumsy, stale, action vehicles that many eighties action stars resorted to headlining in the late nineties and early aughts.
Pet Sematary: Bloodlines (2023) [Fantastic Fest 2023]
This is the third adaptation of Stephen Kng’s “Pet Sematary” and we’re still not in that area where King’s story is remotely interesting or comprehensible. Never really confirming if “Bloodlines” is a prequel to the book or to the movie, Lindsey Anderson Beer’s is a confusing, lethargic and often grotesque horror drama that never has any idea what kind of movie it wants to be. It has eighty five minutes to unfold the narrative of Jud Crandall and despite the implications that Jud had seen a lot of horrifying disturbing imagery in his lifetime, we’re given a dull glorified remake of “Deathdream.”
Spooktacular! (2023) [Fantastic Fest 2023]
Director Quinn Monahan’s history of “SpookyWorld” is perhaps one of the most wholesome horror documentaries that I’ve ever seen. That’s by no means a slight, but it’s a wonderful testament to the often pure and unbridled passion that the horror community is capable of. I regret to admit that in all my time I never actually heard of “SpookyWorld” but it’s one of the forefathers of the horror attraction. It set the template and the bar for other haunts and horror attractions in America and would manage to become one of the biggest, if not the biggest, Halloween theme park in the world.