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Things To Do In Denver When You're Dead
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Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Rabbit Hole (2023)
Terrific!
What is the deal with networks and streaming kingpins cancelling great shows after one season and keeping putrid dog-s***t going on for year after year? Such is the case with CBS's Rabbit Hole, an exemplary espionage thriller drama that just dropped its single season onto paramount plus, never to be renewed again. This is a vehicle for people who like Kiefer Sutherland, and lots of him. Front and centre and constantly on the run from nefarious shadow organizations (this should please fellow 24 fans like myself), he plays John Weir, a freelance black ops contractor forced into hiding with his former spy father (Charles Dance, stealing scenes with charming vivacity) and a civilian turned ally (Meta Golding). They've been collectively targeted by an all powerful mega villain called Crowley, a vicious rogue asset who kills indiscriminately, blackmails just about everybody, rigs elections, stages assassinations and uses the almighty algorithm of today's internet to his incredibly sinister benefit. John and his team must find a way to use his weapons against him, clear their names and prevent America from spilling into outright chaos. It's such a fun story with tons of deft humour in the writing, a wonderfully nervy electronic score and a sense of surging forward momentum in the narrative that almost never lags. The show-runners understand the genre they're foraying into and cast accordingly; the great Peter Weller shows up as one of the baddies pulling strings for Crowley and the man himself is played by none other than Lance Henriksen, relishing every nasty, sociopathic syllable of his arc. I'm not sure why they cancelled it, but it kind of wraps itself up more or less by the end and can function as a miniseries, one that I'd highly recommend.
Gladiator II (2024)
Falls far short of the first
Ridley Scott follows up his bloody yet soulful epic Gladiator with a sequel over two decades after the fact, and the result feels like too little, too late. It's one of those ones where it really didn't need a sequel, it's a legacy thing where all these classics are getting resurrected for follow-ups that often feel forced rather than organic or even necessary really. The issue here starts with the lead actor, this Paul Mescal dude, who just isn't magnetic or grounded enough to be as compelling as Russell Crowe was, here once again a slave turned gladiator looking for revenge against all of Rome for the sins of the past. It's on Denzel Washington and Pedro Pascal then to carry the charisma cloak and each do their best in roles that feel oddly thin and not as impactful as they should be. Denzel is a doggedly ambitious slave owner who trains gladiators but secretly lusts for the power of Caesar, and Pedro a conflicted general who seeks to righteously dethrone the two piss ant emperors, played by Joseph Quinn and Fred Hechinger who both try really hard to chew scenery like the old pros around them, and fall embarrassingly flat. Token familiar faces from the first film like Connie Nielsen and Derek Jacobi once again return, in diminished capacity and the story just feels like a scattered, overwrought afterthought agains the mighty, almost biblical proportions of the first film. Scott does a journeyman's job staging battles but they lack the propulsive grit of the first and Hans Zimmer's swashbuckling score, here replaced by an uncharacteristically dim offering from Harry Gregson-Williams, oddly not on his usual game here. Filling the Roman coliseum up with water like a big bathtub to recreate an ocean-bound battle isn't quite the flex that Sir Ridley thinks it is, and feels strangely childish compared to the sweeping mayhem of his first film. As far as 'legacy sequels' go this just didn't cut it for me, instead of pioneering new avenues in the lore it felt tired, awkward, over-lit and bereft of the atmosphere and melancholic spirit that gave the first its soul, and its ultimate success.
Caddo Lake (2024)
Fantastic
Time and space shift infinitum alongside the murky, labyrinthine Louisiana bayous in Celine Held & Logan George's Caddo Lake, a sensational esoteric thriller that fires on all emotional cylinders and sustains an otherworldly momentum that is gripping in ways that are hard to define. Dylan O' Brien is one of this generation's most expressive and charismatic actors, offering up another convincingly present portrayal as a young man looking for his eight year old sister who has vanished without a trace into the local wilderness. He and his family search desperately but the very forces of the cosmos seem to be against them as time bends, reality splinters and things become far more complicated than anyone anticipated. The film doesn't really wait for anybody to catch up, after the initial disappearance it becomes such a high concept story so quickly that it's disarming and disorienting to the max, but never anything less than utterly involving thanks to O'Brien's soulful performance, some hypnotic editing and a powerfully emotional score by David Baloche. Filmmakers Held & George already have a brilliant debut feature under their belt in 2021's Topside and they follow it up with something consistent and equally terrific. Both are highly recommended.
The Strangers: Chapter 1 (2024)
Not bad at all
Did we need an entirely new reboot trilogy of The Strangers horror franchise that seems to be simply following (more or less) the same beats of the original film? Probably not but Renny Harlin has decided to go ahead and do it anyways and the first offering up isn't half bad, if a bit derivative by design. Again a married couple (Madeline Petsch & Ryan Bowen) are accosted and brutalized by three mask wearing nutjobs in a secluded vacation home enclave, and again the film retains the now infamous super bleak ending except... this is after all the first film in a planned (and already shot and ready for shunting down the assembly line) trilogy so that bleak ending can't be as bleak, or as finite, as the original now can it. The film unfolds much like the first in overall blueprint, augmenting various set pieces and beats to make it at least somewhat new. There is a gorgeous and incredibly unsettling "Knights In White Satin" needle drop in the tradition of this franchise's lovely affinity with soundtrack choices that accent moments of fear and evisceration terrifically and operatically well. I still maintain that the sequel to the first film, 2018's Prey At Night, does the best job in this department and is by a considerable margin the finest and most effective in the franchise, but as far as a reboot of the original goes this could have been much worse and I do find myself looking forward to the two sequels wherein we will get brand new stories that are not reboots of anything. Also welcome here is the choice to make this couple's marriage on anything but the rocks; these are two people who love each other deeply and share a healthy, well communicated bond whereas the first film showed us Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman as cold, distant and emotional estranged from one another. It's much more easy to relate to and care about the former.
The Penguin (2024)
A deeper, denser dive into Gotham
Who could have guessed that an eight episode origin story for one of the less compelling (in my opinion) Batman villains could be one of the most mesmerizing crime drama miniseries we've ever gotten, but HBO's The Penguin is just that. Colin Farrell is grotesquely captivating as the titular waddling wannabe urban despot but he is just one of the reasons the series works so well, and frankly not even chief among them. It's sultry Cristin Milioti as unhinged mob princess Sofia Falcone that utterly and completely steals the show. A doe eyed manipulator full of righteous fury at her pure evil father (Mark Strong standing in stolidly for John Turturro) and a ruthlessly ambitious homicidal streak, she's a character for the ages and her baroquely bonkers costume changes alone are something to behold. Farrell is also a dark sensation here, looking like if Saruman took a Michelangelo cherub and turned it into one of his orcs and as good as the horrific makeup job on him is, it's the actual performance from one of our finest actors that emanates through like poison, a viciously ambitious, thoroughly sociopathic portrayal that's funny, scary and lastingly memorable. Special mention must also be made of the always awesome Clancy Brown in a surprisingly physical and scarily feral performance as Gotham mafioso Salvatore Maroni, a nasty piece of work with a grudge against basically everybody. This is every bit as phenomenal as The Batman was and serves as both a fascinating bridge gap between the film and its upcoming sequel and a rich, immersive deeper dive into this incredible new iteration of Gotham city and all its under-worldly idiosyncrasies.
Spirit in the Blood (2024)
One of the best films of the year
Films rarely nail the nuanced intuitive nature of adolescence and all its contradictory confusions as well as Carly May Borgstrom's Spirit In The Blood, a rousing, soul stirring, at times unbearably suspenseful coming of age monster movie that seems like it's going to take the utterly tired "monster solely as metaphor" route and turns it refreshingly and terrifyingly on its head. Teenage Emerson (Summer H. Howell, who played the daughter in Hunter Hunter, another incredible horror) moves back to the desolate Appalachian mining town her father (always unsettling Canadian character actor Greg Bryk) grew up in and tries to adjust to high school, bullying, family drama and that deep, melancholic sense of being adrift from one's path that only only exists for teenagers. Her father is a strange, enigmatic fellow, supportive and endearing in one note and terrifyingly volatile in the other, Bryk gives him all the requisite complexity necessary in portraying a father that echoes anything close to what is experienced in the real world. When a local girl turns up dead and eviscerated just outside of town, a panic rises among the residents, hunting parties form and nobody is quite sure what, or who they should be turning their blame to. Emerson and her newfound friend Delilah (Sarah Maxine-Racicot) navigate a burgeoning friendship with possible romantic undertones and try to fight the encroaching darkness with their own brand of nature based witchcraft which, in such a religiously inclined heartland town, is a tricky endeavour. The film manages through performances and assured direction from Borgstrom to expertly show human beings as complex, undefinable auras rather than black and white, concretely scripted characters or archetypes and feel like real, tangible life unfolding elementally in front of us. And the monster? Christ, I won't say much but I haven't seen a more hair raising, sickening turn of events in a third act in some time, it's a brutally tense, almost too real twist that lands with a reassuring thunderclap to any viewer that felt like the film was going light in the horror department up until then. Sensational piece, and one of my favourites of the year.
Azrael (2024)
So much bloody fun
On top of all the amazing horror we've already gotten this year we also get one with Samara Weaving, who has been carving out an unbelievable name for herself in the genre alongside the likes of Mia Goth, Anya Taylor-Joy and Maika Monroe. Azrael: Angel Of Death is a fearsomely bloody, hellishly atmospheric, ruthlessly streamlined piece of gore heavy folk horror suspense madness and one of the coolest flicks to come out this season. Weaving is a mute woman fleeing through an austere Scandinavian forest, pursued by sinister cult members intent on using her in some black magic ritual. Here and there humanoid zombie beings with incinerated flesh stalk the landscape, out for blood. Mysterious, almost sentient wind heralds the arrival of something otherworldly and amidst the near constant threat of capture and the breathless momentum of the chase, she pursues steadily mounting, carnage strewn battle of revenge against the cult and it's enigmatic witch leader. The visual atmosphere, camera movements/placements and ethereal score provide an utterly immersive experience here and Weaving is scarily committed, offering a dialogue free performance in a dialogue free film that somehow speaks volumes. Streaming now for free on Prime Video.
Smile 2 (2024)
Rare sequel that improves upon the first
So often we see sequels to hit horror movies that just dutifully regurgitate the same formula that made its first outing popular without deviating, innovating and, ya know, reaching for the proverbial stars a little. Nobody can accuse Parker Finn of this in creating a gruesomely grandiose follow-up to his brilliant hit shocker Smile. The only thing rote about this one is the simple title given, 'Smile 2.' And yet, in an age where everyone and their mother resists that urge to just call their sequels '2,' (instead of some silly thing like Resurrection or Reprisal), even that choice somehow feels inspired. His first film is an unrelentingly scary, brutally incisive piece of shock art and I didn't think it was possible to top it, but here we are. Here the focus in setting shifts from the field of mental health work to the glitzy arena of mega pop stars, and the thematics towards the dark underside requisite in that often externally enviable yet ultimately burdensome career choice. Naomi Scott gives an unbelievable performance as Skye Riley, a world famous singer/songwriter/performer who has the rotten luck of being the next person to be targeted by the metaphysical entity that feeds off human suffering and moves from one human focal point to the next, leaving a trail of total decimation behind it. The stakes seem higher here, Finn is awarded with a much bigger budget than before and he puts it to terrific use, shooting his locations with a considerably larger scope and more opulent sense of production design yet losing none of the grisly visual flair and intimately affecting horror that made the first such an enduring success. Well placed cameos, a lovely supporting cast including radiant Rosemarie Dewitt, maniacal Lukas Cage, deadpan Dylan Gelula and always welcome Peter Jacobson add a lot of depth, as does a hair raising, ethereally beautiful score by Cristobal Tapia De Veer. It's not only scarier and more aesthetically well made than than its predecessor, it also manages to find new thematic avenues to place this horror mythology in and genuinely feel like a different film, while retaining connective tissue to the overarching story.
The Wasp (2024)
Good lord
Guillem Morales' The Wasp is the most disturbing, disquieting horror/thriller this year and a strong contender for like.. ever. It's also just a sensationally well written/acted dramatic story with two emotionally flammable performances from Natalie Dormer and Naomie Harris, the latter giving what must be a career defining turn. I can't speak about plot much at all except to say that these two actresses play women who were once vaguely associated with each other when they were girls at school, and now reconnect in some form as adults, both now leading very different lives. The film shines an uncompromising beam of illumination on secrets from the past and deep hurt that people carry with them like a literal shard embedded in their self identity, and explores the often brutal and explosive behavioural ways in which that sort of residual pain lashes out when spurred on by karma decades later. It's a shocking, refreshingly unpredictable, often revolting experience that leaves one with a haunted, bitter shadow on the soul but it's also a brilliant, essential and very thought provoking story that takes on its characters and themes with utmost maturity. Harris has made a name for herself in prolific franchise stuff like 28 Days Later, Bond and Pirates Of The Caribbean, giving excellent and starkly varied performances in each. Here she is a terrifying, showstopping wonder and nails the roiling inner instability of her character's adolescent trauma bubbling forth through a calm, collected adult-life veneer. Dormer I've only seen in Game Of Thrones where her character is the exact opposite of the steely, unpleasant bi**h we see onscreen here, also a terrific portrayal. Bring an emotional umbrella for this one as it's a tough watch, but one you'll be glad you stepped out into the rain beyond your comfort zone for.
The Substance (2024)
Buckle up
It takes a lot of courage to put oneself out there in the sort of intimidating tornado of physical performance and thematic taboos that Demi Moore fearlessly undertakes in Coralie Fargeat's the Substance, a positively unhinged socially satirical body horror opus. Moore is Elizabeth Sparkle, a once radiant beauty queen movie star who is approaching the sunset of her 50's and is very unhappy with the perceived diminishment of her good looks, scrutinized under the ruthlessly shallow guillotine lens aimed at her by society at large (which includes us, whether we'd care to admit it or not). Also disappointed with her aging is grotesque network producer Harvey (Dennis Quaid like you've never seen him before), who fires her in favour of somebody younger and more... perky. As if listening in on the proceedings, a bizarre pharmaceutical corporation reaches out to her with their latest mad scientist concoction: 'The Substance,' a complex regiment of serums devised to give an aging body that much needed (or perhaps just desired?) nubile nitro boost. Ah, but not without its brutally karmic repercussions, mind you. Fargeat takes the sort of loony conceit one would find in a particularly imaginative episode of Tales From The Crypt and blows it up like a disgusting parade float with horrifyingly tactile sound design, glisteningly vile practical gore effects, crackhead sponsored editing and a trio of lead performances that seem ripped right out of a tongue in cheek nightmare. Moore is staggering and I'd spoil the best surprises this film has to offer if I mentioned the lengths she goes to in dedication to performance here, I haven't seen her chomp at the bit in her work since... well, since she herself was on Tales From The Crypt many moons ago. Quaid is on behavioural steroids here in a role originally meant for Ray Liotta (that would have been something), Harvey has one note and its 'hilariously despicable' whether he's screaming demands into his phone, changing from one Hunger Games level extravagant outfit to the next at rapid fire speed or devouring a plate of butter soaked prawns with fiendishly horrible enthusiasm. Margaret Qualley, the third musketeer in this casting spectacle, is also unbelievably dynamic and almost opulently hot as a character too fun to spoil with context in a review. Every artist involved gives it their career best all, right down to the B-cam operator tasked with haunting establishing shots of ominous palm trees to the FX team giving new meta meaning to the term "splatter zone." Something that truly has to be seen to be believed.
Murder in a Small Town: The Suspect (2024)
A nice first episode
I live on the Sunshine Coast where this was filmed, and know people in the production, this turned out a really nice first episode. Not too dark, edgy or arthouse-y like a lot of mystery/crime shows on streaming sites, more cozy, mellow and lowkey. I rarely watch cable shows anymore but attended the premiere with some friends and family who worked on the show and we were all happy with the result. Our beautiful town was put to really good use location wise, Rossif Sutherland is charisma on low burn as the chief of police and adorable Kristin Kreuk contrasts his wry, stoic energy nicely with her bubbly, effervescent aura. James Cromwell does a quietly magnificent guest arc and nails a monologue that had our crowd pin-drop silent, always nice to see him show up, I hope this show gets a fair shot, so far it fits comfortingly into that niche of elegiac rural procedurals that don't expect too much of the viewer other than to immerse oneself in gorgeous Pacific Northwest scenery and straightforward, undemanding intrigue. Excited for the rest of the season.
Earthling (2010)
Very fascinating, but it won't be everyone's thing
What if aliens lived among us on earth, in human form, unbeknownst not only to us... but also to them? Clay Liford's Earthling is a strange, ethereally beguiling low budget sci-fi that is very much placed upon the shoulders of its eclectic ensemble cast, who all do a fine job. Several disparate characters in urban USA suddenly find out that they are the extraterrestrial beings placed here by a kind of nomadic sentient spore organism, hung suspended in earths orbit indefinitely. They try to find each other and a way back home while some become attached to the human experience in ways both beautiful and unsettling. This is of course my interpretation of the story because it's told in a fashion that's very hard to coherently access or discern. That's not to say it's badly told or nonsensical, I think that Liford just made this an intensely personal thing from the internal perspective of these beings, and the audience serves merely as flies on a very dreamy wall, observing from the outside and looking down on an experience that's difficult for human brains to understand. It's a fascinating, lyrical, indescribable experience at times, the actors all doing a fine job including Rebecca Spence, William Katt, Savanna Sears, Twin Peaks' Harry Goaz and more. Perennial villain actor Peter Greene shows up surprisingly as one of the humanoid alien beings, getting to play refreshingly against type and display restraint, introspect and use his solid charisma for something other than intimidation. It's a very strange film and won't be for everybody, but if you use the unconscious rather than the intellect to feel your way through the story, you just may be rewarded greatly. Streaming now for free on Tubi.
1992 (2022)
Ray Liotta's last moment in film
Ray Liotta makes his cinematic curtain call in Ariel Vroeman's 1992, but it's a sadly superficial stock villain in a mediocre thriller that doesn't say or do much for the actor, who leaves a towering legacy behind him. In the violent mess of the Rodney King riots, single father Mercer (Tyrese Gibson) attempts to hide out with his teenage son at his workplace, a metalworks factory, during the chaos as it's in a much safer neighbourhood than his own. Of course it's an out of the frying pan into the cat and mouse situation as this just happens to be the night when vicious ex-con Lowell (Liotta) and his two sons (Scott Eastwood & Dylan Arnold) decide to rob the place, using the fact that most of the city's cops are distracted by the riots as cover. Cue a dimly lit parade of yelling, standoffs, shootouts, uninspired dialogue and thinly drawn characters facing off towards an eventual conclusion where lots of them get shot. It's almost comical how the script attempts tiny bits of social commentary regarding the riots and that infamous verdict before *immediately* getting distracted again by pedestrian thriller elements. Liotta is his typecasted self here: angry, volatile, scary and fired up, he doesn't get to do much else or display any depth beyond surface level menace, and it's unfortunate. The same can be said for the film overall, wherein a bit of atmospheric tension and feverish energy is mounted with the riot backdrop, before sinking disappointingly into the run of the mill conflict at the factory.
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024)
The sequel I hoped for. So much fun.
As far as latter day 'legacy sequels' go (whatever that coined term means anyway) Tim Burton's Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is about as good as it gets and while it obviously doesn't quite match the original, which is one of the most singularly idiosyncratic films of all time, damn if it doesn't come friggin close. Burton has arguably been on a bit of a creative doldrum stretch since Big Fish, or maybe Sweeney Todd sometime after it. That's a hefty slump but with this film it's like he never left, effortlessly bringing the manic energy and bizarro horror comedy tone of the original classic in terrific form. The same can be said of Michael Keaton, reprising what has got to be the best role of his career and certainly his professed favourite. Beetlejuice is back, causing all kinds of otherworldly havoc in the bureaucratic nightmare that is Burton's vision of the afterlife, pursued by his long dead but newly resurrected ex-wife (Monica Bellucci, fitting the spooky goth vibe of this like a glove) and a boisterous undead detective (Willem Dafoe, an absolute hoot). Upstairs earth-side an adult Lydia (Winona Ryder, gorgeous and talented as ever) struggles to raise her teenage daughter (Jenna Ortega) and balance the conflicting chaotic energies of her insufferably pretentious boyfriend (Justin Theroux, oozing hapless smarm) and high strung stepmom (Catherine O'Hara, always an absolute delight). If there's one gripe I had it's that the film is a tad over plotted, with a lot of dialogue to chew through but it's a small issue when you consider how much fun this thing is. From some great surprise cameos to new musical numbers and a callback to the original Harry Belafonte haunts to Keaton being positively let off the chain to do his thing once again to the flat out gorgeous (and entirely practical) production design and effects, this is every inch the follow-up I was hoping for from Burton and everyone involved.
Lady in the Lake (2024)
Ambitious, well produced but kind of all over the place
Natalie Portman investigates several mysterious murders in Lady In The Lake, an ambitious, gorgeously staged, often magnificent yet sometimes frustratingly cluttered miniseries based on a novel by Laura Lippman. In 1960's Baltimore the murder of an aight year old girl prompts Maddie Schwartz (Portman) to gravitate away from her marriage to a persnickety Jewish businessman (Brett Gelman) and take it upon herself to not only solve that one but the apparent suspicious drowning of one Cleo Johnson (Moses Ingram), an African American woman dredged up from the bottom of a lake. From there it launches into a horde of subplots that get so complicated and fill the narrative so full to the brim that at times it feels like each and every episode has enough content to be its own series. That's the issue here is that by the time all is said and done it's tough to discern or remember exactly what *was* said and was done, and there are several plot points that still feel muddy to me. Nevertheless, the performances are all excellent, Portman is fiercely committed as ever, Ingram is a revelation as Cleo as they're supported by all sorts of recognizable faces including the always terrific Pruitt Taylor Vince, Noah Jupe, Mikey Madison, Dylan Arnold, Byron Powers, Josiah Cross and The Wire's resident despicable crime kingpin Wood Harris here playing, you guessed it, another despicable crime kingpin. The attention to 60's period detail in terms of both production design and sociopolitical issues is admirable and it all feels very well mounted. But yeah.. the story is like accidentally opening a shaken up beer can and having everything inside erupt all at once over the course of seven very hectic, often disorienting episodes that should have been more measured, more paced... and far more succinctly explained at the end of the day.
Strange Darling (2023)
Wild ride, great film
You don't often come across horror thrillers that are as genuinely thrilling as JT Mollner's Strange Darling, a small miracle of narrative ingenuity, pulp n' blood soaked violence, Pacific Northwest vibes, viscerally shocking plot revelations and stinging dark humour, all captured on gloriously grainy 35mm and lensed by none other than Giovanni Ribisi in his cinematography debut. A man (Kyle Gallner) and a woman (Willa Fitzgerald) meet at a bar and later arrive at a log cabin motel for some sexy shenanigans. Suspicions arise aligning with the presence of a serial killer in the region and a non linear game of extreme cat and mouse unfolds against lush Oregon scenery, dreamy soundtrack choices and lots of practical gore. Fitzgerald gives a performance for the ages here, shifting gears with uncommon talent and fiercely committed bravura, Gallner amps up his already solid horror presence with grit and menace, and they're supported by old veterans Ed Begley Jr and Barbara Hershey, both darkly effective comic relief. The film is told in chapters that are presented out of chronological order, a stunt that provokes confusion in some stories but here only adds to the sizzle of figuring out just what's going on. The moments of bloody, breakneck action and pursuit are always contrasted well by long passages of hushed, intimate dialogue where diabolical personas are laid bare and delirious nuggets of hysterical black comedy are imparted. It's one of the best films this year and one hell of a ride. Oh, and it has what might be the single funniest and most delicious looking breakfast preparation sequence in cinema, a gluttonous symphony of butter, syrup and ravenous fervour that would have Anthony Bourdain slow clapping and shaking his head.
The Crow (2024)
It's pretty atrocious
People have this thing where they forget that The Crow is a franchise with multiple movies and not just one original with a tragic real life death at its centre. The original is one of my favourite films of all time, I've never been I subtle about that, but some of the sequels after I have enjoyed and I've never been of that "there's only one Crow" school of thought. Having said that... The Crow (2024) is a pretty outrageously mediocre iteration, sitting squarely behind the solid first two sequels, City Of Angels and Salvation, yet still in front of the hopelessly dire Wicked Prayer. It's a shame because Bill Skarsgard is imposing and ethereally menacing as Eric Draven, he's an actor who can somehow simultaneously pull off sexy and creepy, which is exactly the type of aura needed to play a protagonist in this field. WhatsHerName Twiggs is also very good as Shelley, the two have genuine chemistry and the decision to dedicate a full first third of the film to their meeting and relationship, Mandy style, is a good one that you'd think would strengthen the eventual revenge story, if that story had any weight. Danny Huston gets casted in another of his snarling supernatural villain turns he's been stuck in since bringing down the house as the lead vampire in 30 Days Of Night, a performance he'll never live up to or top. That's a huge problem this film has, is villains; each Crow film before it, even the piss poor Eddie Furlong one, had very specific and varied gangs of bad guys, each with their own defining characteristics and style, that's kinda been the running theme. Here they're interchangeable, mostly silent, suit wearing boring people with no distinct mannerisms or character traits, just Eurotrash looking goons who barely utter a word. The visual look of the film is drab and so terminally middle of the road when you compare the look of sets, lighting and costumes from the rest of the franchise. Even the hellish purgatory Eric finds himself mired in just looks like the Vancouver shipyard ports on a rainy day, nothing evocative or innovative put into locations whatsoever. The soundtrack choices range from Joy Division to Enya (lol) and try to mimic the lightning in a bottle musical style of the first but none of the song picks feel organic or in service of story, they're just thrown in there right off Spotify. It's a shame because Bill and Twiggy do really good renditions of Eric and Shelley, their efforts deserved a film that took itself seriously and didn't just opt out of doing anything at less than absolute minimal effort. Overall waste of time.
La bête (2023)
Unbearable
Existential sci-fi about the reality of reincarnation and past lives might be my favourite niche sub-genre in film, my favourites ranging from Cloud Atlas to What Dreams May Come. Immense was my disappointment at the languid pretension, baffling incoherence and overloaded stagnancy of Bertrand Bonello's The Beast. This is a bizarre, two plus hour attempt at profound science fiction that sees Léa Seydoux and George McKay as two souls who I guess keep finding each other again and again over centuries, once in Olde France, then sometime in the early 1900's, present day and way in the future where a vague form of domineering Artificial Intelligence regulates human emotions to keep us from getting too excited. One only needs to show them this film and they'll settle right down for a nap. Léa and George are both phenomenal actors on their own and paired up elsewhere but they have no chemistry here (not to mention a hefty age gap), both looking terminally confused in every timeline, mumbling underwritten lines and wandering around corridors and neighbourhoods with nary an ounce of agency or clarity. This might have worked as a short film but it's stretched painfully out into 145 minutes of torturous gibberish that ends on Seydoux belting out a scream worthy of Laura Palmer, perhaps all at once realizing what a colossal waste of time her involvement in this film was.
Alien: Romulus (2024)
Enjoyed it for the most part
We have a new Alien film on our hands for the first time since 2017's disappointing Covenant and Fede Alvarez's Romulus is, for the most part, a slappin' great time at the movies. Taking place in a specific chapter of time between Alien and Aliens, it chronicles a team of young Weyland-Yutani employees who feel a bit more than disillusioned with the company and decide to hijack a derelict vessel floating in orbit above their bleak, dreary mining colony planet and get the hell out of proverbial Dodge. You don't have to guess what's waiting for them onboard and pretty soon they're faced with a fight not just to escape horrible bosses, but one for their very lives. The decision to cast Cailee Spaeny here is a great one; she first caught my attention almost walking away with the otherwise underwhelming Bad Times At The El Royale and has since been on a meteoric hot streak. Her protagonist Rain is one of the best lead characters in canon, a badass, bruised warrior with a fierce emotional compass and the will to survive. There are a few things that didn't work for me; some on the nose verbal references to other films in canon were kinda lame and the choice to add the cameo of a long deceased character (and actor, I might add) using really dodgy CGI is... questionable and didn't resonate at all with me. I was hoping the film would more do it's own independent thing within the Alien-verse rather than try so hard to tie in to every little aspect and please all the disparate fans spread out over the galaxy of what has been a decidedly segmented, somewhat divisive franchise since it began all those light years ago. Nevertheless, Alvarez's passion for the lore shines through and he has wrought a visceral, propulsive iteration that excites around every bend and has some of the nastiest, squirmiest gore and creature moments to date.
Cuckoo (2024)
Now THIS is a horror film
Tilman Singer's Cuckoo is a bone-fide miracle, the kind of hellbent, cheerfully berserk, wantonly WTF, aesthetically gorgeous piece of ethereally pulpy arthouse schlock madness we deserve in the genre. American teen Gretchen (Hunter Schafer) arrives to Bavarian alps to live with her dad (Marton Csokas, always a welcome face in intense horror/action fare), stepmom (Jessica Henwick) and their kid (Mila Lieu). They live near a creepy resort owned by Dan Stevens and his outlandishly perfect eurotrash accent and mannerisms, an outwardly affable German gentleman whose oddly agreeable demeanour barely masks a dangerous mad scientist persona lurking just beneath. There is something profoundly wrong going on at this idyllic sanctuary, and that's as far as I'll go in talking about it because this story is one jaw dropping, visceral ball of yard to unwind and get immersed in. Schafer is an uncommonly gifted actress and makes Gretchen a dogged survivalist with a warm emotional core, a fiercely relatable protagonist you literally cheer on and want a good outcome for in the end. Stevens is already horror royalty after unforgettable turns in stuff like The Guest, Apostle, A Walk Among The Tombstones, FX's Legion and the upcoming third season of AMC's superb The Terror. He's a spectacle onto himself here and while the (very hilarious) decision to make him a well spoken German weirdo could have come across as too gimmicky, he fully commits and offers up a performance of meticulously calibrated derangement. While I wasn't a fan of Singer's debut horror film Luz, this truly struck a chord with me, it's a a fully enveloping sensory vision with a Final Girl for the ages, a beautifully loopy score and, most importantly, horror that is genuinely terrifying. Brilliant film.
Trap (2024)
So much fun
M. Night Shyamalan's Trap hinges on a delicious high concept premise: what if a serial killer took his daughter to a concert, but authorities were tipped off he might be attending and set a highly calibrated, heavy artillery dragnet for him. This is all revealed in the highly marketed trailer so by the time we sit down for the film we're already one twist in and we can watch an unhinged Josh Hartnett, who plays both loving father and deranged mass murderer, attempt a daring exodus from the crowded venue with SWAT teams and a dogged FBI profiler (Hayley Mills, of ALL people) steadily closing in. This film is a ton of fun, Shyamalan knows what a larger than life scenario he's picked here and just pulls the ripcord for all it's worth and manages to generate a ton of crackerjack suspense. Hartnett slides so easily into the groove of an unassuming serial killer because he's casted so awesomely against type; who wouldn't trust such a good looking, affable dude? It could be the performance of his career and he gets to have so much diabolical fun as a dangerous man backed into a tight corner who uses ruthless stealthy violence and careful psychological tactics to escape. Shyamalan's own daughter Saleka is also fantastic in her film debut as Lady Raven, the pop star putting on the concert who isn't just a fixture up on stage but gets to actively participate in the cat and mouse game with her own ingenuity and agency. It's a terrific thriller and Shyamalan is on a roll these days (save for last year's disappointing Knock At The Cabin) with one of the best theatre going experiences of the year.
The Instigators (2024)
Tons of fun
Matt Damon and Casey Affleck get their own idiot-brand buddy comedy of errors in Doug Liman's riotous The Instigators, which is getting not so great reviews right out of the gate. I thought it was terrific but I can *kinda* see why people aren't taking to it; it's a very simple, loud, streamlined story of two hapless morons surrounded by a horde of aggressively unlovable, sometimes downright hostile supporting characters and anybody expecting a 'feel-good buddy flick' is going to be a bit burned. They play two Boston losers who are forced by an angry Jewish mobster (Michael Stuhlbarg in full ham mode) and his bakery owning colleague (Alfred Molina, restrained) into pulling off an ill advised heist by robbing the city's unbelievably corrupt, scumbag mayor (Ron Perlman in mad-dog mode) on a campaign party night. Of course everything goes about as wrong as it could go and soon these two schmucks are on the run with Damon's exasperated psychiatrist (Hong Chau, always excellent) as hostage, pursued by all kinds of lowlifes including a hotheaded townie thug (Paul Walter Hauser) and a relentless dirty cop (Ving Rhames). It's all a bit madcap and messy but damn is it ever hilarious, with Affleck and Damon playing up their idiocy to delirious heights and trading deftly scripted verbal banter (co-written by Affleck himself, no less) like bullets. It doesn't have a brain in its head or anything to say but it doesn't slow down for a friggin minute, has a wicked great ensemble cast all having a blast.
Heartbreakers (1984)
Wonderful 80's gem
Peter Coyote and Nick Mancuso are two edgy, slightly threatening character actors who routinely play intense dudes in action/horror/thriller stuff so it's refreshing to see them through the lens of a benign interpersonal drama, playing two regular dudes in the 80's navigating sex, relationships, the passing of a parent, corporate jobs versus artistic careers and most importantly the fierce, committed friendship they have to each other. Coyote is the restless artist having issues with his headstrong girlfriend, Mancuso the would be career man who yearns for a romantic relationship that has meaning to it, and both absolutely nail their performances, supported by an emotionally mature, grounded script by director Bobby Roth and a cheerfully ambient score by the great Tangerine Dream. A true hidden gem, streaming now for free on Tubi.
Monolith (2022)
Interesting, but the 'twist' doesn't really work
Monolith is a tricky one, an eerie one location thriller that tries a pretty ballsy bait and switch manoeuvre with its ending that I'm not altogether sure about being effective or not. A semi-famous radio journalist (Lily Sullivan) from a wealthy family sits alone in a fancy secluded manor, doing interviews over the phone for her podcast that probes into various obscure conspiracy theories. Her latest fixation is on some shred of evidence over the years that objects of alien origin have somehow made their way into human households, and she tries to track down accounts that back this up. What she really finds is some half forgotten secret closer to home that might even relate to her own past and this is where the film attempts a prompt and jarring turn right into left field that, although fascinating, grounds what could have been a spooky extraterrestrial horror experience into something very, how should I put it, socioeconomic and decidedly "of this world." It's a shame because I felt like the former option would have made for the better, stronger film. In any case it's still creepy, atmospheric, well acted and makes good use of its single location trappings.
Detained (2024)
Godawful
Detained is a strong contender for worst film of the year so far, I haven't seen a thriller this insanely overblown and outlandishly meaningless since... I dunno. It's sad to see a classy actress like Abbie Cornish stuck in this crap, playing a young woman who wakes up in a police station and is grilled by two hostile detectives (Moon Bloodgood & Laz Alonso) about a supposed hit and run that she has no memory of. Of course that's not really what's going on, and once the film gets past that initial setup and tries to orchestrate a bunch of stupid twists that it thinks are oh so clever, you'll abandon all hope of making sense of it. It tries everything to impress; weird double crosses, red herrings, nonsensical plot turns and even an eye rolling Keyser Soze angle that makes it feel even more like a try-hard ripoff. I have seen thrillers that walk a fine line in making sense of their more bombastic elements and even some that don't, but get a free pass on sheer energy and enthusiasm alone. This one gets neither; it's loud, mean spirited, lazy storytelling of the worst kind.