It’s always good to see an indie success story and Bryce McGuire’s is the latest. After delivering the pretty creepy short “Night Swim” in 2014, McGuire was able to develop it in to a feature film and, ironically, mid-way through it I found myself thinking “This would work better as a short.” I wasn’t trying for sarcasm, it’s just that “Night Swim” presents only a seed of a potentially scary horror film that never actually feels fully fleshed out or extensively realized. Its penchant for ambiguity is its big downfall as it’s a victim to so many of the typical haunted house tropes, banal fake outs, and clumsy ghost scares, without ever trying to re-invent the wheel.
Tag Archives: Supernatural
Studio 666 (2022)
I can appreciate what Dave Grohl and BJ McDonnell were going for with “Studio 666.” In spite of me being a big Foo Fighters fan, I respected what they were trying to do. “Studio 666” is a horror comedy musical with shades of “Evil Dead,” “The Exorcist,” and “We Are Still Here.” It’s also kind of a commentary on the compromises you make in order to acquire artistic success, but those more dire themes are passive at best. “Studio 666” looks like one of those movies that was more fun to make than anything else, and that’s both a caveat and advantage.
Elevator Game (2023)
“The Elevator Game” is a really creepy urban legend and one that works by virtue of word of mouth. I really wish we’d gotten a great horror movie out of it, because “Elevator Game” just isn’t it. It’s tough to imagine such a great urban legend being fumbled as bad as it is, but Rebekah McKendry doesn’t do much to add on to the lore. She instead opts for a painfully silly and boring horror film involving contorting ghosts, and what feel like obvious allusions to “Stranger Things” and “The Grudge.”
The Monster Squad (1987) [4K UHD/Blu-Ray]
I’ve written in great length about director Fred Dekker’s “The Monster Squad” over and over. I love it. I’ve loved it since I was a kid, and I love it now. I wore out the VHS when I was a wee lad, I had a bootleg DVD in my collection when it was out of print for many years, and ever since I love to re-visit it whenever I can. “The Monster Squad” is a drastic departure from director Fred Dekker’s other cult classic “Night of the Creeps,” but like it, “The Monster Squad” is an unabashed love letter to horror movies, and the horror genre in general.
The Nun II (2023) [4K UHD/Digital]
2023 was abundant in religious based horror movies, and while many were an absolute bust, I have to say that I quite liked “The Nun II.” I am well aware that I am in the minority in this regard, as “The Nun II” proves to be as divisive as the original film. The original works fine but is still the highest grossing film from “The Conjuring” universe; the producers don’t really aim for a soft reboot, this time continuing the saga of young Sister Irene and her new friend and colleague Sister Debra.
Freddy’s Fridays (2023)
With great success of a blockbuster, there’s always bound to be a mockbuster that comes up from the rear to pull from the momentum. What with the shocking success of “Five Nights at Freddy’s,” we have the UK mockbuster known unsubtly as “Freddy’s Fridays.” From director Ben J. Williams (who gave us “Supernado,” and “Spiders on a Plane”) comes a pretty dull horror movie that is a hefty mixture of “Five Nights at Freddy’s” and “Hellraiser.” It’s a paper thin premise that probably took a paragraph to expound on on paper, and amounts to a barely eighty minute movie that works hard to stretch the run time with a ton of filler.
Halloween Ends (2022)
For a long time, “Halloween” has been a lot about the inexplicable evil that arose in Haddonfield. But what Danny McBride and director David Gordon Green attempt to do is explain that Michael Myers is only symptomatic of what resides at Haddonfield. Like everywhere in humanity, there always has to be a scapegoat for to pit hatred and fear on to something, and Michael Myers was for a long time the epicenter of it in Haddonfield. “Halloween Ends” explores more the idea of evil as an amorphous entity rather than a maniac in a mask. While Michael Myers was every bit as evil and a force of darkness as we saw in “Halloween,” the final film in the new trilogy takes a step back to look deeper in to the darkness.