Review by Ben Bussey Sex, mental illness, Japan: these are at the heart of both these films. I should stress straight away that, while I’ve chosen to review the films together, they are not being sold together; they are from neither the same filmmakers nor the same distributor, and were made almost two decades […]
Review by Keri O’Shea Robin Hardy is obviously a man who likes to take his time. It’s been the best part of forty years since The Wicker Man first graced screens and yet, this year, he has – finally – completed and released The Wicker Tree, based on his novel Cowboys for Christ. I saw […]
Review by Ben Bussey An hour and a half of non-stop trailers might not sound like the most entertaining way to spend an evening. However, when the trailers in question are for some of the most ridiculous looking films you’ve ever seen (or, more likely, never seen), plumbing the far reaches of Z-grade horror, ultraviolence, […]
Review by Stephanie Scaife Deadly Blessing was a weird one for me because, despite being directed by Wes Craven and starring Sharon Stone (in her first speaking role no less), I’d never heard of it before sitting down to watch this new DVD release from our good friends at Arrow Video. Turns out there was good […]
by Ben Bussey He was the first great horror director of the talkies era. Responsible for four of the very best 1930s Universal classics, horror cinema would be a very different place without James Whale. While he will of course always be most remembered for the Frankenstein films, he did a lot more than […]
Continuing our celebration of Frankenstein’s 80th Anniversary, Keri O’Shea looks at some of the weird and wonderful Frankenstein films that have come in its wake… The influence of the Universal Frankenstein movies cannot be underestimated. Boris Karloff’s ‘dear old monster’ has become a horror archetype, crossing the breach into popular culture and staying there, for the best part […]
Review by Keri O’Shea It’s probably fair to say that, for those who form part of a prospective audience, not many of us know too much about the country of Serbia. So, when trying to estimate the efficacy of a movie which purports to be ‘an allegory about Serbia’, we’re already in dangerous territory. If […]
Review by Keri O’Shea It’s odd – sometimes when a film itself makes a claim about how ‘original’ it is or how it is somehow ‘redefining genre’, you wonder why you’re hearing it from them, not the fans. Sometimes it even comes across like a kid establishing their version of events first, before you discover […]
Review by Keri O’Shea If, like me, repeatedly seeing people GETTING FUCKING TIED TO CHAIRS in horror movies makes you weep soundlessly into your hands at such a singular lack of imagination, then Village of Shadows might well have something to offer. Atmospheric supernatural horror often gets overlooked (or botched) by low-budget filmmakers, but first-time […]
Keri O’Shea on Abertoir Horror Film Festival 2011, Aberystwyth, Wales UK Well, that’s it for another year: Abertoir has been and gone, there’s nothing left on my horror calendar and I’ve once more been spat out, kicking and screaming, into Real Life. Still, perhaps it’s all for the best. At the time of writing, I […]
Review by Ben Bussey. Finally, it’s the film that David Lean never got to complete… ahem, I mean, it’s the film within a film from Joseph Guzman’s Run! Bitch Run!, brought to life as a complete feature in its own right, Machete style. It has yet to get a US release owing to what I […]