Released nearly two years ago, it turns out that Hell House LLC wasn’t the complete package. Some intended VFX shots for the final sequence were never completed, and investor anxiety over breaching the 100-minute mark meant eight minutes of characterization was shaved from the original release. This “director’s cut,” which I saw, reinstates some of…
When I visited Spain for the first time many years ago, I immediately felt a sense of foreboding, as if I was being reminded of some long buried event, perhaps in another lifetime. Everything that happened during my stay there did nothing to dispel those feelings either and I have never gone back. Of course,…
The one useful purpose that Night of Something Strange may provide is as an interesting counterpoint to another horror contemporary, “WTF!.” Both are modern takes on the 1970s and 1980s teen slasher model, and both depict shallow, reprehensible heroes getting slaughtered. But while “WTF!” succeeds as a critique of its protagonists’ vacuity, Night of Something…
I know what you’re probably thinking. “BnB Hell — must be a terrific horror-thriller! I’m sold on the title alone!” Well, far be it from me to razz you for your terrible taste, but I insist on disabusing you of the notion that this is worth anyone’s time, let alone money. Let us delve into…
The devastating, sharp The Anatomy of Monsters is the kind of movie that lures one into thinking it’s yet another exploitative woman-in-peril movie only to pivot into a seedy, multilayered labyrinth. Aside from an ineffectual first ten minutes, the movie is a solid — if somewhat claustrophobic — thriller. The film begins with Andrew (Jesse…
One certainly has to hand it to Quentin Tarantino — as a film-maker, he has taken violence, hatred and perversity to the next level and has made quite a living from the results. He has also created quite a few amazing two-hour films — unfortunately, most of his movies run more than two and a…
Driving is an androgynous slob. Could be a woman, a man or a mime — she actually looks like Marcel Marceau without makeup. It’s raining, drizzling over her windshield, drops that produce a mud the wipers intermittently splatter onto her sight. When she arrives where she was going to, we watch her leaving her car,…
