Australia's Dark Nights Film Festival inaugural edition has been announced and is calling for entries.
A to Z
Festivals
★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
🩸 out of 🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸
Come for the kidnapping, stay for the teriyaki! Dead Mail...delivers the weird.
★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
🩸🩸 out of 🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸
Tourists in Eastern Europe meet the wrong locals in Eight Eyes.
★★★★★ out of ★★★★★
🩸 out of 🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸
Eileen is a moody noir thriller of the highest caliber that delves into the deepest, darkest parts of the human psyche.
★★★★★ out of ★★★★★
A young woman gets a job at an amusement park, and falls romantically in love with an amusement park ride, in this bizarre and brilliant dark fantasy. Not so much a horror movie, but it is an absolutely brilliant coming of age piece about madness and unconventional affection.
★★★ out of ★★★★★
Scare Package is a horror-comedy anthology that gets points for knowing all the tropes by heart and trying really hard. It's more lightly amusing than raucously funny, and it doesn't always land the comedic beats, but it will certainly please fans of gory silliness. Bonus points for one BIG horror icon cameo appearance.
★★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
Skull: The Mask is a Brazilian explosion of gore and action, the likes of which we haven't seen in quite a while. Gonzo, gratuitous, and pure sweet bloody syrup for fans of exploitation fare.
★★ out of ★★★★★
The Yellow Night indicated it might be a psychedelic cosmic horror show. Nope! It is a teen-angst movie full of banal and unconvincing dialogue among a group of Brazilian high school grads. And, there might be a cosmic gate in the creepy shed at the beach house they are staying in, but the characters pay it no mind, and neither does the plot.
★★★ out of ★★★★★
Still Life, with horror and dread. Sator is both an artistic triumph but also a difficult movie to get into. The film is elegant, quiet, and cold to the point of aloofness, but there is some very potent material if you are patient.
★★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
This savage and grisly new Danish production features a carefully threaded story line that follows two young women, stuck working at a lonely rural gas station, who are subjected to what at first appears to be creepy pranking turns into something wholly sinister. This movie will reward hardened horror fans. Not for the faint of heart!
★★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
Once upon a time in Estonia, there was a spooky anthology gem that stitched together four fantastical tales of dread. Though only one of them truly feels like a Fairy Tale, each of them spins scintillating storytelling and backs them up with stylish visuals.
★★★ out of ★★★★★
Sweeping cosmic weirdness has been achieved in The Hill and the Hole, an adaptation of a 1942 Fritz Leiber short story. Buoyed by stellar cinematography but burdened by an inscrutable plot, this film might be best understood under heavy hallucinogens.
★★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
A grifter with good intentions, but in need of a lucky break, signs up for a job that seems too good to be true. Lapsis is a dystopian parable for the treadmill of old-fashioned hard work and the fear that technology is going to make you obsolete.
★★★★ out of ★★★★★
Two French dullards discover a giant housefly in the trunk of a car that they stole, and they realize that this monstrous insect could be their ticket to fame and fortune. Toro! From Quentin Dupieux, the director and twisted imagination behind Rubber (2010), the bonkers Mandibles was the festival closing feature for Nightstream.
★★★★ out of ★★★★★
The sequel to the Indonesian horror hit May the Devil Take You is a more than worthy successor to the storyline. Alfie, the survivor of the first film is drafted by a group of orphans to assist with the exorcism of their demon spirit of their wicked caretaker. Strong Sam Raimi and Wes Craven influences are in abundance in this bloody and fun showcase of what Indonesian Horror has in store.
★★ out of ★★★★★
The Doorman is a throwback action movie, starring Ruby Rose as an ex-special forces soldier turned doorman battling Jean Reno and his squad of art thieves. The film gets bogged down in stale clichés and surprisingly bland action pieces. Not everything on Nightstream was awesome, or even horror.
★★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
The ultimate road rage movie that collides with a nail-biting home invasion film. This Dutch film absolutely pours the intensity on in a way unseen in many a year. A rude and headstrong man picks the wrong enemy in a highway tailgating incident, subjecting his entire family to the revenge of a nuanced killer who uses rat poison as his weapon of choice.
★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
A ritzy couples therapy retreat becomes a trap for one of the guests who becomes a pawn in a larger Faustian deal of sin, temptation, and betrayal in The Summoned, which had its world premiere at the Overlook Film Festival. The Scariest Things also got the opportunity to interview the cast and crew of this twisty morality play.
★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
"Let me DIE! Let me Die!" The Brain that Wouldn't Die is a loving note for note recreation of one of the great B movies of the 1960s. Cheeky and continually winking at the audience, the film embraces the silly camp classic and giving it a fresh coat of 4K technicolor paint.
★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
When worlds collide! Witness Infection is a goofy and fun mashup of mob movie and zombie movie tropes. Family, duty, and mob justice become secondary for nice-guy Carlo when tainted Italian sausages ignite a zombie pandemic. Ooooo, maybe you shouldn't have had seconds!
★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
Empowered, woke, and witty, the new vampire film Bit explores how a small band of lesbian vampires survives and thrives in Los Angeles.
★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
A group of paranormal investigators gains access to an abandoned amusement park in Malaysia called Miimaland, as part of a challenge by a shady hustler. What starts out as an amusing lark becomes a deadly curse trap that proves to be a haunted destiny for the crew.
★★★★ out of ★★★★★
A struggling horror novel author catches a fortuitous break, when a dashing young vampire crashes into her life. Red Snow is a cheeky and wicked little horror-romcom with great character chemistry that doesn't always go where you would expect.
★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
There have been a multitude of horror documentaries that chronicle the classic and most famous films of the genre, and there have been documentaries that celebrate certain favorite eras within horror. Director Ruben Pla focuses his efforts on the Independent films and shines a light on a number of the up-and-coming influencers within today's horror.
★★★★ out of ★★★★★
An insightful take on a classic ghost story. Director Alex Galvin manages to maintain the melancholy tragedy of the Henry James Gothic tale, while adding in an appropriate modern twist that adds an extra layer of meaning to the proceedings.
★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
edges, particularly the dialogue, but it has a lot of heart. The introduction of indigenous Borneo Iban villagers is respectfully done and makes this quintessentially Malaysian. You do root for the film, even while wincing at its deficiencies.
★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
Agatha resides at the intersection of an experimental art piece and a horror movie. Knowing that, you know how to proceed with this film. Agatha is visually stunning but ultimately difficult to process at times. It is mesmerizing and dreamy and entirely devoid of dialogue, so your attention span will be tested. Ultimately if you like visually poetic and painterly films, this will be your bag.
★★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
Alien on Stage is a documentary about a troupe of bus drivers turned community theater actors who got the opportunity of a lifetime to perform their production on stage in a theater in the famed West End of London. Though you sweat out whether these charming neophytes can pull it off, there is enough of an inkling that they've got something special that this endeavor is so crazy that it just... might... work!
★★★★ out of ★★★★★
If V/H/S was done in Spanish, that would be Apps, an Argentinian horror anthology that is filled with plenty of shocks and bloody mayhem. Each chapter is really well executed and continues to prove that Argentina is a major player in the horror movie market.
★★★ out of ★★★★★
Bashira is an artistically ambitious and technically accomplished feature debut film from special effects auteur Nickson Fong. As much as it is a treat for your eyes and ears, though, the film's plot is overly complex and the execution of the work sometimes over-shoots the target. The story often feels like two competing stories going at the same time.