By Ben Bussey Anonymous small-town middle America: always the last place anyone anticipates crazy things happening, yet more often than not the first place crazy things happen in horror fiction. Stephen King’s main stock-in-trade for much of his career has been presenting us with an average, humdrum little place, going to lengths to ensure we’re […]
By Keri O’Shea I’d been wondering what had happened to director Sean Byrne since his brilliant debut feature The Loved Ones assured audiences that you could still weave an effective, horrific and ultimately heartwarming story out of elements which – on the surface – seem tried-and-tested. Incredibly, it’s been seven years since that film was […]
By Ben Bussey Just when you thought ‘Sinister’ was the most generic horror title you’d ever heard… but, much as was the case with Scott Derrickson’s 2012 film, this may belie a film which sports more surprises than you might initially expect. That’s pretty much where the similarities with Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s latest film end, however; […]
By Quin I get so giddy with excitement every time another anthology horror film is released. They always remind me of some of the older films I saw as a kid and there’s just something comforting about them. I also find the length of each segment more appealing as I get older. Sometimes it’s nice […]
By Ben Bussey and Keri O’Shea Sheffield horror festival Celluloid Screams hosted a screening of Kevin Smith’s (how to put this generously) somewhat divisive latest movie Yoga Hosers, starring the writer-director’s daughter Harley Quinn Smith and Lily-Rose Depp (daughter of Johnny Depp and Vanessa Paradis, who also co-star) in a reprise of their roles from […]
By Keri O’Shea There seems to be a minor trend in modern horror (and posssibly other genres, though I see less of those) for starting the narrative of a film at around three quarters of the way through the arc you’ll eventually get to see in full. I noticed the same thing about the very […]
By Ben Bussey As high concept one sentence pitches go, ‘Jurassic Park with zombies’ isn’t a bad one. Playing on much the same vacation from hell theme, The Rezort presents us with a literally post-apocalyptic vision of a world which has survived a rampant zombie plague. A few years on, with the world’s (living) population reduced […]
Do creature features get much more iconic than this? The classic combination of eye-catching monster and attractive leading lady has served filmmakers well over the decades, but to take one of the most renowned big screen beauties of all time and pit her against the creations of the most celebrated creator of special effects in […]
The recent release of Blair Witch, to considerably lower box office and critical acclaim than anticipated, prompted my colleague Dustin Hall to question whether the film marked the last nail in the coffin of the found footage horror movie, remarking that it would be a “sad, but fitting place to end” the subgenre. This, I […]
By Dustin Hall As the fifth and final Phantasm film hits the screens, we examine it and have a look at the previous installments in the legendary cult classic. One last time, let the Tall Man release you from your imperfect flesh, which ties you to time and space… But before looking at Ravager, let […]
It’s a curious sensation when cheap, willfully base trash attains a sense of real poignancy. Who could have known back when Arrow Video first announced this mighty Herschell Gordon Lewis box set back in the summer that the man himself would not live to see its release? Still, as sad as Lewis’s recent death was, […]