Writing and directing team Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury are another couple of filmmakers who, after the initial rise of ‘new French extremity’ in the Noughties, didn’t maintain the same prolific trajectory. Hey, it happens – as I’ve mentioned elsewhere in a feature on Martyrs, once you’ve gone that far, where is left to go? […]
It’s possible that Baphomet benefits from the power of reduced expectations. This is a low budget horror movie of the sort you might find propping up the arse-end of Amazon Prime listings, complete with gimmicky casting or ageing and perhaps not all that fussy genre icons, and so you might understandably expect it to be […]
Starring former Captain America Reb Brown[i], the 1986 ‘macaroni combat’ picture Strike Commando, now available on an exemplary Blu-ray release from Severin Films, is one of a number of pictures that Italian film director Bruno Mattei – that auteur of so many awful-but-oh-so-watchable Italian exploitation films of the 1980s and 1990s – made in the […]
Can we really go anywhere new with the whole guy meets girl, guy kidnaps girl, guy tortures girl horribly thing? Apparently, yes we can. Miranda Veil (2020) has a savvy idea which puts an original spin on some oh-so recognisable elements, shifting its emphasis and focus as it goes. It’s not without a few lesser […]
The mockumentary standard was probably set by Man Bites Dog in the early Nineties, and since then the basic format has changed very little. Surprisingly little, perhaps. There’s the renegade subject (usually a man) who forms a dangerous relationship with the film crew, then the loss of control over the creative project itself and an […]
In rural Texas, grown siblings Louise (Marin Ireland) and Michael (Michael Abbott Jr) have returned to the family farm, knowing that their father is close to death. Their arrival is, however, no cause for celebration and the reunion is strained; their mother tells them that they shouldn’t have come at all. Even so, and through […]
The death of a loved one is undoubtedly a difficult time, but just as undoubtedly, a lot of the difficulties stem not from straightforward grief, but from the suddenly pertinent issue of money. Only weddings kick up as much dirt. Whether settling debts, distributing legacies, or selling property – or more usually, arguing about all […]
Picture the scene. A fatal disease starts to spread across Britain, forcing the government into making difficult decisions that curtail civil liberties and also into relying on a team of scientists whose data crunching and knowledge is wheeled out to placate the public. Fear starts to take hold, which transmutes into anger, which transmutes into […]
Science fiction has become increasingly sombre of late. That’s not to say it hasn’t always explored the intricacies of human interaction in some pretty heavy ways, but it at least feels as though this more often happened against a backdrop of bigger-picture world building, rather than the more intimate films we see more now. Step […]
By guest contributor Chris Ward Every so often a movie breaks through the barriers of genre, dares you to question what you think you know and threatens to make you think differently about horror movies and how they can challenge and defy social norms. Road Head (2020) isn’t that movie, mainly because at its core […]
Our fascination, as film fans, with the extraordinary era of the ‘video nasty’ continues unabated. Perhaps then, it’s fully understandable that films and filmmakers themselves display the same fascination; the lure of the heady mix of frenetic output, myth-building, mass appeal, liberal ignition and the puritanical pushback of the 80s is irresistible. That goes for […]