The Addams Family (1991)

Among some of the best adaptations during the odd period in the nineties where every studio was putting sixties shows to film, “The Addams Family” is one of the best. While this isn’t the first time we’ve seen the Addams Family together again after the cult series, Barry Sonnenfeld offers up a unique retelling of the Addams Family that works well. The biggest change to the lore is now Uncle Fester is no longer Morticia’s uncle but an Addams’ and Gomez’s brother. This allows the writers to offer up a pretty fun and unique re-visiting of the family where the primary brood is played by some brilliant actors.

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Halloween with the New Addams Family (1977)

A lot of what makes Addams Family such a fun series is the darkly comic and sinister tone and great sense of Goth that comes with it. It’s not often I say this but watching the rare 1977 movie is kind of a chore to sit through, and you can sense it’s not a good movie at all once you gander at the grainy video and lack of production quality. This attempt at a series revival is a “feature length” television movie that is supposed to set off the new Addams Family. For some reason this is a reboot with the entire cast from the original series all over again, right down to an adult Wednesday and Pugsley. “Halloween with the Addams Family” isn’t just abysmal, but it’s boring, and painfully silly.

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Terrifier (2017) [Philadelphia Unnamed Film Festival 2017]

A crazed clown terrorizes a group of young women and the people trying to help them on Halloween night.

Written and directed by Damien Leone, Terrifier takes the scary clown idea and ups the violence from recent films such as IT and makes the kills bloodier and more brutal.  The film has some definitely good ideas and the clown’s design is interesting and creepy for sure, but for those without coulrophobia, the clown is only as scary as the performance for him.  This is something that will be touched on in a little bit.  The story here is the classic slasher on Halloween night story; a killer maims and hurts a group of people on Halloween night.  The difference is in the execution which is well done here but still feels a bit like more of the same at times.  The title, Terrifier, gives an expectation for the viewer that this will be terrifying and unless you are really scared of clowns, the film is only a little scary and not quite terrifying.

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Imitation Girl (2017) [Philadelphia Unnamed Film Festival 2017]

A being falls to Earth and copies the first image of a human it sees.  Living as this girl, she starts learning about family, love, and life.  As she does, the girl she has copied lives her life in New York, working in the adult industries and slowly losing herself.  As their lives evolve, their meeting is unavoidable and may bring them more than they expect.

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Don’t Let the Devil In (2016)

Newlyweds John and Samantha’s (Marc Slanger and Jordan Lewis) marriage is already crumbling after an abortion. John’s boss offers to relocate him to a small town in Maryland in hopes to heal and to oversee the development of a casino. But the small town they move to aren’t happy that he’s there and set something sinister in motion.  Don’t Let the Devil In was written and directed by Courtney Fathom Sell.

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