Zombie films have always been hotbeds of teeth-gnashing, blood splatter and almost the origin of stellar gore effects in cinema. But classics of the subgenre such as Danny Boyle’s “28 Days Later” and George Romero’s “Dead Series” have equally served as sociological petri dishes in which the filmmakers examine our own societies. While this breed…
The Down Under is home to danger — again. To the internet, Australia is “Nopeland,” deserving such a name after reading the various listicles or clips about lethal horrors that a person may find in the wild. Among them, crocodiles have had most success invading cineplexes, appendage-to-appendage with equally bloodthirsty bushmen. While we are waiting…
Looks like the summer of 2017 is going to be another mixed bag of movies. For every well-received, attention-getting spectacle such as “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” or “Wonder Woman” we are gifted something rather flimsy and forgettable such as co-writer/director Johannes Roberts’ generic “divas in deep water dilemma” thriller 47 Meters Down. Contrived…
To find an uninteresting interview with a survivor of the holocaust is an impossible task. These are, after all, firsthand accounts of nightmares made real; memories from the extremist boundaries of the human experience. It’s akin to watching Apollo 11 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin discuss landing and walking on the moon, describing experiences…
As rendered in the gut-wrenching “Krisha,” director Trey Edward Shults’ debut film, those with blood ties are hornets that can sting more than their natural counterpart. The within-is-more-volatile notion is elevated in Shults’ second outing, It Comes at Night, that takes place in a world upturned by an unnamed disease. For a while now, 17-year-old…
Here it is, the comeback the “Alien” franchise sorely needed. “Nothing,” remarked Daniels (Katherine Waterston, “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them”) on the noise level of her surroundings, a gorgeous planet seemingly teeming with conditions perfect for them, 2,000 in-cryosleep passengers and 1,000-plus embryos to colonize. Little does the character know this, but what…
For some, watching an M. Night Shyamalan film is an experience that fills them with dread. But this dread can be separated in two distinct camps: First, the good kind of dread that accompanied Shyamalan’s first blockbusters in Hollywood — “The Sixth Sense,” “Unbreakable,” “Signs” — all quietly unsettling thrillers that, despite some weaknesses, still…
