★★ out of ★★★★★ Crack open the dusty dictionary parked over on your bookshelf and look up staid British horror film. We’ll wait. What’s it say? 1976’s Satan’s Slave? Yep, that’s what we thought.
Twisted Dreams Film Festival Goes Virtual Again for Its 6th Edition
The fine folks behind Milwaukee’s Twisted Dreams Film Festival have done it again, booking an incredible array of pulse-pounding cinema for the fest’s sixth edition, and its second virtual version. Following you will find what’s playing, how to see it, and more . . .
Joseph’s Review: Digging to Death
A man going through some difficult times discovers $3 million on his new property, but it comes with ever-heavier emotional baggage and a corpse that won’t stay buried in this well-crafted chiller.
Slash ½ Features Shocks Aplenty and Gore Galore
Austrian film festival Slash ½, presented by the fine folks behind Slash Filmfestival, returns to cinemas after an absence last year, and the slate of 11 incredible films is highly impressive. The fest, which runs June 17–20, 2021 at Filmcasino in Vienna, Austria, features the gory trappings of The Stylist, the gross-out horror comedy Cyst, the supernatural shocker Son, and much more.
Trailer Alert: Last Night in Soho
Edgar Wright channels his inner Argento with a dreamy giallo-noir trailer for his upcoming film Last Night in Soho starring Anya Taylor Joy, Tomasin McKenzie, and Matt Smith.
Horror Shorts: We Got a Monkey’s Paw (2018)
“What Could Possibly Go Wrong?” The most accursed of curse tropes is brought to hilarious proportions in one of our favorite horror shorts from the Portland Horror Film Festival in 2019, now released on Alter… and now The Scariest Things!
A Podcast Extra: An Interview with Actor/Director Ryan Barton-Grimley
The Scariest Things sat down for a fun and lively discussion with director Ryan Barton-Grimley to break down his raucous horror-comedy Hawk and Rev: Vampire Slayers, one of our favorite movies from 2020.
Mike’s Review: Army of the Dead (2021)
★★ out of ★★★★★
Gone are the days of Bub from Day of the Dead. Gone are the days of the zombie nurse, the fat guy, and the Hare Krishna from Dawn of the Dead. Gone are the half-dogs and headless zombies from Return of the Living Dead. Most importantly, gone is a fun but serious dissection of societal woes and man’s modern day pitfalls. IInstead we’re now being fed a pile of ghastly super-hero zombies, that shriek like space aliens, set inside a hyper-realized video game construct. It’s a sad state of affairs to be sure. One might even say that the zombie genre has jumped the shark, or in this case the albino zombie tiger.
South Korea’s BIFAN Film Festival Invites You to “Stay Strange” for Its 25th Birthday
One of life’s highlights for me each year is attending South Korea’s Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival (BIFAN), which I […]
Trailer Alert! False Positive (2021)
Oh, Hollywood and your ever-clever marketing minions. You really had us at “…contemporary take on the classic horror film Rosemary’s Baby.” That just makes our hardened horror heart go pitter-patter.
Liz’s Book Report: The Final Girl Support Group
Grady Hendrix has tackled many horror tropes in his novels: a gateway to hell, possession and exorcism, selling your soul for rock and roll and vampires. In his latest book he takes on perhaps the most well known trope of the genre- the Final Girl.
Trailer Alert! A Classic Horror Story
Giallo and Texas Chainsaw mashed up? Uh, yes, please. We’d love to see that! Well, now you can! Those horror geniuses over at Netflix have officially dropped the official trailer for 2021’s A Classic Horror Story.
Joseph’s Review: Seance
★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
The directorial debut from renowned screenwriter Simon Barrett treads familiar territory but is crafted with great affection for a few different horror subgenres.
The Supernatural, Subversiveness, and Strangeness Highlight Fantasia’s First Wave Announcement
Every year, the staff members of The Scariest Things look forward to the Fantasia International Film Festival — North America’s premiere genre-film fest — and the first wave announcement for the fest’s landmark 25th edition shows exactly why!
Trailer Alert! Censor
Fresh off of its award-winning film festival run, the U.K. horror feature Censor is set to premiere at U.S. theaters on June 11, 2021, and then to debut On Demand on June 18, from Magnet Releasing. The Scariest Things has the trailer and poster debut for you!
Eric’s Review: Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021)
★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
Spiral: From the Book of Saw attempts a fresh start to a somewhat tired franchise, and packs in A-list celebrities into a pedestrian plot, that ties itself up with too much exposition and not enough of the tricks and traps that made Saw such a draw.
Trailer Alert! Forever Purge
In light of all the insurrectionist lunacy that we faced in early 2021, it’s an incredible stroke of kismet that the horror gods would be throwing us the Forever Purge in the very same year. But they are.
The Scariest Things Podcast Episode CXXIII: The 2021 Thingy Awards Show!
It’s time to celebrate the best of horror from 2020, with the third annual Thingy Awards! Once again, we summoned a jury of expert horror aficionados to determine the worthy winners from a pool of great (if perhaps under-seen) scary movies. Raise the curtain and let’s hand out some awards!
Joseph’s Review: Don’t Let Her In
★★★ out of ★★★★★
A mysterious woman turns out to be a real roommate from hell in this fun new terror tale from Full Moon Features.
Trailer Alert! Digging to Death
Supernatural consequences await a man who digs on his new property and accidentally finds millions of dollars buried next to a dead body in Digging for Death. The Scariest Things has the poster reveal and trailer for you! Following is the official press announcement.
The Scariest Things Podcast Episode CXXII: The Best Horror Mothers
Happy Mothers Day! The archives of horror films are filled with great matriarchs. It’s the strongest, and often the most important relationship of our lives, and the horror genre takes full advantage of all the emotional triggers of all things mommy.
Trailer Alert! New George Romero Movie: The Amusement Park
The almighty George Romero has a new movie coming out in June 2021! Wait, hasn’t he been dead since 2017!?!? Indeed he has, but that doesn’t mean that he didn’t create a mountain of content never before seen by human eyes. In the same way that Prince will be releasing albums well in to the next century, Romero may have some additional gems that have never made their way out of the crypt. Until now!
Joseph’s Review: Vurdalak Blood (Fantaspoa 2021)
★★★★ out of ★★★★★
The vurdalak legend finds new blood in this exciting, top-notch chiller.
Mike’s Review: Things Heard and Seen (2021)
★ out of ★★★★★ Serious question. Are horror movies required to be scary? Can they just pass off a sense of dread and doom in other less frightening but equally provocative ways? Answer: it sure makes horror more horrifying if there’s some actual horror in the horror film.
Joseph’s Review: Initiation
★★★1/2 out of ★★★★★
Slasher-film fans should have a great time with this whodunit thriller — set on a present-day university campus — that shines a light on some ugly social issues.
Liz’s Review: My Heart Can’t Beat Unless You Tell It To
★★★ out of ★★★★★
How far would you go for your family?
Portland Horror Film Festival: A Call for BIPOC Horror Directors
Are you an aspiring horror movie director, and happen to be from an underrepresented ethnic minority in filmmaking? Well now is a golden opportunity chance for your work to be seen! The Portland Horror Film Festival is offering FREE film submissions for BIPOC film creators. Deadline is May 4.
Horror News: HOST scribe to make video game with HOST cast!
Jed Shepherd, writer/executive producer of Host (2020), is Kickstarting a new horror video game!
Mike’s Review: Deadhouse Dark (2021)
★★ out of ★★★★★ The horror anthology is one of the true staples of the horror genre. Always clever, always engaging. As we’ve said before, anthology horror is the traditional extension of gathering around ye’ ole campfire and scaring the hell out of each other. They hearken back to the oldest root forms of scary storytelling. It’s always frightening to hear a scary story, until it’s not.
Movie News! Neill Blomkamp’s “Demonic” Unveils 8mm Behind-the-Scenes Footage and First Stills
The first two stills and some cool 8mm behind-the-scenes footage has been released for director Neill Blompkamp’s upcoming horror movie Demonic.