Film Review : "Possessor"

 I saw a few people refer to this movie by David Cronenberg’s son Brandon as horror.  It’s not. It is dark sci -fi.  I mean in a year where there is a noticed lack of horror movies that might be just sitting on the shelves , I am willing to make do with dark sci-fi to fill that void. The movie is violent enough and at times even gorey. Gore alone doesn’t make something horror.  Not as twisted as say “Old Boy” , the mind fuck is very overt. In fact at times it feels like it is perhaps trying too hard.   It looks great. It is also well acted. The sound mix is crucial to the film and nailed pretty well. All the technical elements of filmmaking he has down. He took notes from his father in this regard. In fact he might even go a little overboard trying to convey the traumatic flashbacks suffered by the conflicted protagonist. 

There are moments when you can not tell what reality they are in. This happens more as the film climaxes. The main protagonist you never get connected to as they are off screen and acting as the title suggests. You get more of the bodies they are riding. I think it does a good job of showing the dissonance it creates. How awkwardly they fit into their lives. There is one scene that I would not say is scary as much as it is , oh jeez this is not going to end well. So Brandon succeeds in making me feel something. If a film can do this they are doing something right. Another mark of the film’s success is when I am watching a movie at home there are enough distractions that I often stop and come back to it. I watched this all in one sitting, 

If you are a fan of his father’s work then you are going to like this movie. I mean the obvious comparison that came to mind was “Existenz” . It just benefits from better cinematography. The use of color in this film is impressive. It glosses over some of the discomfort caused by certain situations presented . If you show up to this movie wanting horror you may be disappointed. The trailer is kind of vague  and elusive when painting the best picture of what the tone is going to be. Dark is a fitting adjective for the film for sure. The premise of the movie is much more Phillip K Dick than Cliver Barker or Stephen King. I think if this came out in the summer before we experienced such a drought of horror, the lack of horror might not be a disappointing factor as it is very well made. Adjust your expectations going into this and if you like paranoid science fiction then this will be a fun ride for you.

Review : Lovecraft Country

I love HP Lovecraft , with him the horror genre would not be what it is today. We can not say the same for writer Matt Ruff. "Lovecraft Country" was his stab at horror. Normally he is a left of center urband fantasy author who is mediocre at best "Lovecraft Country " found him trying to work through his conflict in loving  HP Lovecraft. Quality wise it was like "50 Shades of Gray" was to ' Twilight", the idea was there the excution was off.  "50 Shades of Gray" is sadly a better book than "Lovecraft Country".  I went into the show with low expectations . Jordan Peele's name had been attached to it and fortunatly he was only the producer. It is more watchable than any of the garbage Peele has put out. I expected more from director Yann Demange as he also directed 'Dead Set". Instead when the horror elements came in at the end it felt like a bad rip off of Sam Rami.

Good news first ...the best part of the show was Jurnee Smollett. She is way hotter than she was in "Birds of Prey". She was the only actor in this show not made out of card board or playing off a tired stereotype. The point they were trying to make on the show was better made on the most recent season of "Umbrella Accademy". I think even when trying to capture the feel of the time period it was ruined by stupid mistakes like breaking the mood with hip hop. Jazz would have made more sense. Writer Misha Green read the Ruff book in order to adapt it , but it feels like she never got around to reading any actual Lovecraft or maybe she would have known the basics like  ...there are no vampires in his stories! Not showing the monster and letting imagination to the work is scarier. After all if the CGI budget was just big enough to make the monsters look like something from the 2004 Van Helsing film, then what you did now show us wwould have been better than what you showed us. I did like the monster that attacked them with all the eyes, but only when they did not show it full on.

This episode was a let down and the bar could not have been raised any lower. The moral to all horror should be ...abandon all hope, life is futile, you will die. Lovecraft carried this message with a dose of you will be driven mad by the unseen evil. Instead we get a veiled history lesson that we have already have had Hollywood sense us hundreds of times, thankfully not in horror until now. Horror is loosely termed as nothing was actually scary in this episode. I might give it one more episode to see if it either gets better or Smollet gets naked. I have low expectations for either happening.

Film Review : "Blood Machines"

Give director Seth Ickerman all the money in Hollywood so he can make every cosmic Marvel movie planned to come out as well as any HP Lovecraft adaptation. This is not a movie in the most traditional sense of how we cosume movies. It is episodic without being a tv show. It is an odd choice for Shudder sense it is dark but not horror. Organic space ships are the theme.  LSD the inspiration. Music videos from the 8Os also haunt this . The colors are neons , black light rainbows. I no longer do the kind of drugs I need to in order to fully consume this into my brain. Synth wave artist Carpenter Brut is a collaborator on this . The music is a living breathing part of the film. It is like a trip as you are seeing the sounds, and hearing what you are watching.

Horror is more of my jam than sci-fi. I but I do like sci fi if it is dark enough. So your Star Trek / Star Wars pop corn fare feels like they are trying to sell me toys. This is closer to "Blade Runner" than any of that. Though it is written like this is from the pages of Heavy Metal magazine. There are sine great lines like " I have been fucking machines for so long I am beginning to smell like one" . I like sex mixed with both my horror and sci-fi I think from reading said magazine growing up. Things do take a bleaker turn in the 3rd episode. This begins to turn it into more of a horror slant.Man vs machine is one theme prevelant. The characters are almost more symbolic than fleshed out . The protagonist is not the most likeable hero , but he is not a hero. Story telling is very surreal here.

I suppose cyber punk is one genre this might fall into. I have seen things calling it a space opera. Most opera takes grim turns so that might apply here. It does tell the story it sets out to tell though I would like to see this world expanded upon. It is more visually stunning than any sci fi I have seen in recent memory. Some ofthe choices to remind me of "the Color From Space" or "Mandy". The one thing I can agree one in regards to other reviews is that Hollywood can learn alot from what Ickerman does here. This might not commerically be the vehicle that makes them take notice as they are not  ready for this yet. The abundance of boobs is the first thing they will balk at. Morbidly beautiful and orgasmic, all the things i need my sci-fi to be.

Film Review : "the Lodge"

Yes this movie came out in 2019, but there are no horror movies coming out anymore due to the fact we now live in a horror movie. You gotta break some eggs to make a cake I suppose, so here I am reviewing horror movies you might have over looked and are new to me. Riley Keough plays a Grace a girl who survives growing up in a cult .  Riley is no stranger to horror movies as she was also a victim in "the House That Jack Built". She is also battling the impending crisis that is becoming a step mom as much as she is her ptsd. The kids are fucked up and you do not see just how fucked up they are until later in the movie. This movie is horrorific in the sense that anything that could go wrong in the shit show of dysfunction does . As a parent I think the tension and consequences of what does down hit home harder.

If "the Shining" was condensed to a cottage the results might have been similar. Such is the bleak mood of this film. It is more depressing and frustrating than it is scary. But emotionally difficult in a way that makes me not want to watch this again. Is it dark. Yes. Grim is an even better way to think of it. It is slow at first. It is well shot and looks great. The director accomplished everything they wanted with this. It is not a jump scare pop corn film. It messes with your head by toying with the tension. The cult thing is not spelled out for you every step of the way , but if you pay attention the pieces are put together . Is there a ghost ?  I think resentment is what haunts the characters the most. Their past kills them.

The one draw back is every one pretty much digs their own graves in this movies. By the end no one is really likeable. So why you might not want bad things to happen like they do, it is the consequences of their own stupid actions. Not the do not go into the basement kind of stupid. More like a revenge movie that goes all wrong. It is not the kind of thriller you have had hammered into your head and they have on Hollywood repeat. While I did not love this movie I respect it as any movie that makes me feel unease and cringe inside is doing it's job.

Film Review : "Verotika"

I am not sure why I had high hopes for the Glen Danzig film. I should know he is not going to be Rob Zombie by a long shot. His videos alone should have conveyed this. His videos however are a lot better than this movie. I liked the comic books. The sexploitation horror elements in the comics is what this movie appeared to promise. The trailer looked good. The 30 seconds of the trailer cobbles together the 30 second of most presentable footage.Where the go me is if you promise me sex and horror violence  I am there. It was a poor attempt at this, I could have written better before my first cup of coffee.   Low budget I can live with as along as it is given some stylistic nuance and works with the budget to the best of it's ability. This move aside from the scene in the movie theater looks like it was all shot at Danzig's house. There are moments of awkward silence that bring out how badly the dialogue was recorded.

Split into  3 stories, one of the oddest thing about the film is how it tries to set them all in France. This leads many bad French accents.  Ashley Wisdom who stars in the first about a spider thing for a dream realm, has had so much plastic surgery that she doesn't need any make up to look like a weird being with eyes for nipples. This odd feature is never explained, but that despite her prodigiou implants she doesn't want her shirt taken off so they are not revealed, but off course they are. The story line to this one feels like a rip off of Hell Raiser, but is the most entertaining of the three as they get worse. It's followed by one where a girl likes to cut off faces. She preys on strippers. This is where I noticed there are more attractive women cast in smaller roles. I get they should be case in regards to the roles they are suited for based upong acting ability, but no one has any acting ability, so if you are going to make me watch bad acting at least have the most visually pleasing people do it. This is porn level acting. Oh wait they are all porn stars. Of these the host played by Kayden Kross is the best.

The medevil set in the last one that is based of Countess Bathory is most visually workable. It also is not shot in Danzig's house . At least not his one in LA, he could have a castle in England some where. After what he charged for Misfits reunion shows I am sure he could afford it. The acting in this one is the worst of the 3 though the costumes are the best. Every time they get something right here something else goes wrong. The erotic blood bath scene is the most poorly directed thing I have ever watched. So as a director, Danzig, should focus on well, getting his voice back and not touching a camera again.  I feel foolish for hoping this was going to be good, it's the worst piece of film I have seen in some time , unless we are countin porn, oh wait we are,. You can ot argue well this just isn't you thing as I am 100 percent the demographic this movie was shooting for since sex with iolence is my jam , it justfailed on every level. 

Film Review -"Gretel & Hansel"

Saw this movie a couple weeks ago and just now getting around to typing out my thoughts. Not the title is Gretel and Hansel, not Hansel and Gretel. This classic piece of Germanic  folk lore is being spun in a way that places the focus on Gretel. She is older than Hansel who is just the little brother she takes care of in a paternal manner after he mother goes crazy and kicks them out. That is when things take on a creepier tone. This movie is a horror movie in the same tone as "the VVitch" . There lurking dread more than jump scares or the less subtle forms of typical modern Blumhouse film making that seems prevalent in today's horror movies. This movie is very visual, sometimes it might even seem slowly paced. We all know the story. Once they get to the witch's house we know things are not going to go well, though once they arrive the plot takes a turn from the normal story.

The acting is great, because you can not really imagine any of the actors as any one other than their roles. It also works that these are not big name faces you have attached to other roles in your head. In some ways this takes  a more realistic take on the classic story. The house is not made of candy. There is a not a big oven. Though there is that element. I would say the direction they take this movie is darker than the original story, It explores Gretel's darkside and young Hansel often seems like the voice of reason.  The witch sometimes seems pretty reasonable. This makes her scarier. There is a strong feminist under current to the film's main message In today's culture of instagram witches, it might be a cautionary tale as every thing comes with a price. .This echoes the original story . You can not just eat a candy house without knowing you are being buttered up for something. That sounds like a message Bernie Sander's followers could stand to hear,. The writer for Plugged In, did not like the message and thought it was hollow. This is because he is also a fucking idiot.

Oz Perkins, yes... Norman Bate's son, did and excellent job directing this. When things got gruesome its well done. . Yet pushes the bounds, especially when you consider children being eaten is part of the premise.  Jessica De Gouw plays the young witch, if she looks familiar that is because she played Mina in the Darcula show that came out a few years ago with Johnathan Rhys Meyers. Would have like to see more of her , but you get what you get. Overall, if you like gothic supernatural horror that works off mood then this movie is worth your time. 
  

Film Review : "the Color Out of Space"

Mandy was fun, I feel it got a great deal of cult cred perhaps too quickly. I would also say it was more like a "Mas Max" revenge flick with a weird cult in it . There were too many things that were explained in a sloppy fashion. Here this is gotten away with because that is part of HP Lovecrafts style to not give it all away . Lovecraft worked off the notion that what you do not see, the unknown is what is scariest so the film did keep that tone. Though I would not say this movie was all that scary.   Nicholas Cage might have been better in "Mandy' it seems like he was transitioning into playing the kinds of roles that John Lithgow once played. The co-star was really the scientist kid, who was pretty boring and I did not give a shit about what happened to him. The mother in this movie was also unlikeable. I which they did more with Tommy Chong, his character was one of the best , along with the Witch daughter. The Necronomicon was placed in her scenes which was an amusing wink.

The scene with the color were pretty to look at. I read a review that said this is a movie about how the color pink ruins your life. Not untrue and fair synopsis. It mutates what it touches in a manner that would have made Stuart Gordon proud. I like when the color rippled through their bodies. I think some of the monster effects were better done than others and some could have been better served more suggested which would have stayed closer to HP Lovecraft's vision.  I remember being on a horror panel once where someone brought up the reason Cthulhu has such a hard time transitioning to the screen because once you show a tentacle monster it is no longer scary. Stuart Gordon managed to blend this in a way that mixed camp with the grotesque and this movie while paying homage to his style could have taken better notes on this part.


Does it seem like I am talking about many other things that are not this movie ? Well that because it is made up of parts that are not all that original. Perhaps by today's standards, but when most horror these days is remakes then the bar is pretty low. This is not a bad movie. I made it through and was marginally entertained most of the time. I think it plays it too safe and experiments in the wrongs ways . This is so mediocre that if it makes it onto my end of the year list then it had to have been a pretty sad  year for horror movies if we do not ten more better than this one.