Search Results

The Witches (2020)   The rough reception of lost-his-way Robert Zemeckis’ utterly redundant remake of The Witches is richly deserved. It’s as lacking in reason-to-be and filmmaking passion as the majority of his work during the past couple of decades. Unless, by reason-to-be, one means his box of effects tricks, from feverish mocap nightmares – The Polar Express, Beowulf, A Christmas Carol – to a tepid return to live action with as many “seamless” CG augmentations as possible (Flight, The Walk, Allied, Welcome to Marwen). Few now seem interested in his movies, which rather reflects his own visible enthusiasm. The Witches was previously made – quite splendidly – by Nicolas Roeg

The Blood on Satan’s Claw aka Satan’s Skin (1971)   One of the era’s great lurid horror titles – its unhinged company also includes Blood Beast Terror, Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter and the astonishing Zoltan, Hound of Dracula – The Blood on Satan’s Claw, perhaps surprisingly, stands the test of time better than many of its stablemates. It relies less on by-then-established Hammer-esque staples than it on an atmospheric exploration of a community disintegrating from within, not a million miles from The Crucible in malignancy. Rather different in approach, however. Here, the surface is ripped away to reveal an unnerving patch of hairy skin beneath. Doctor: Ah, there are

Prince of Darkness (1987)   John Carpenter’s wounded retreat from the traumas of big studio moviemaking saw its first fruit in this cult curio. Not as legendary as his subsequent They Live! but also very influential in its own scrappy way, as well as being very influenced in its own right (most particularly, and self-confessedly on Carpenter’s part, by Nigel Kneale). Prince of Darkness is also less satisfying than They Live! although its ancient astronauts take still produces several highly memorable moments. Mostly, the movie’s shortcomings are down to the execution, but that’s not because it’s cheap per se. Rather, Carpenter failed to surround himself with

Krampus (2015)   On the evidence of Krampus, you can see why Legendary Pictures might have considered it a bright idea to enlist Michael Dougherty to direct a Godzilla movie. Much less so why they’d also ask him to write one. This horror tale, based on the anti-Saint Nick, posits the title character as the punisher of those who have lost that Christmas feeling (rather than, per se, children who have misbehaved): “It’s not what you do. It’s what you believe”. Dougherty does a solid job with the setup, but unfortunately, he then lets it all go to waste. Max (Emjay Anthony) tears

The Kid Who Would Be King (2019)   Joe Cornish generated such goodwill with Attack the Block – admittedly, I wasn’t its greatest fan – that I suspect no one really wanted to admit The Kid Who Would Be King, his belated follow up was a bit of a damp squib. This modern-day Arthurian retelling, but with kids in the key protagonist roles, may appear to have sufficient reconfigured cachet to appeal, but it’s mostly rather derivative. And that’s without even considering the patchy lead cast. Because with a kids’ film – and perhaps the box-office kiss of death, this is definitely a

The Dark Tower (2017)   The Dark Tower was released only five weeks before It’s stratospheric success had every studio scrabbling around for any Stephen King property they could get their hands on, in the hope of landing a similar goldmine. But even during the ’80s, the heyday of King adaptations, box office was very variable, as was quality, and as the recent Pet Sematary remake has shown, there’s every reason to believe It (and it’s second chapter) will remain an exception rather than a new rule. The Dark Tower’s prospects certainly wouldn’t have been helped had it been released in its wake; a misbegotten disaster that

Bird Box (2018)   45 million viewers can’t be wrong. Right? What’s more interesting about Netlfix’s announcement of the multitudes flocking to see Sandra Bullock shield her eyes from the apocalypse is that previous big events on their part were accompanied by no such swagger. So I guess Bright or Adam Sandler’s latest just didn’t cut it to the same magnitude? Doubtless the streaming giant will be commissioning more end-of-the-world fare tout suite. Possibly starring Will Smith and Adam Sandler, together at last. The success of The Walking Dead made it incredibly obvious, if that was even necessary, that there are huge potential audiences

Hold the Dark (2018)   Hold the Dark, an adaptation of William Giraldi’s 2014 novel, is big on atmosphere. You’d expect as much from director Jeremy Saulnier (Blue Ruin, Green Room) and actor-now-director pal Macon Blair (I Don’t Want to Live in This World Anymore) (the latter furnishes the screenplay and appearing in one scene). However, it’s contrastingly low on satisfying resolutions. Being wilfully oblique can be a winner if you’re entirely sure what you’re trying to achieve, but the effect here smacks rather “for the sake of it” than purposeful. Jeffrey Wright’s wolf expert Core is called to the Alaskan

Hereditary (2018)   Well, the Hereditary trailer’s a very fine trailer, there’s no doubt about that. The movie as a whole? Ari Aster’s debut follows in the line of a number of recent lauded-to-the-heavens (or hells) horror movies that haven’t quite lived up to their hype (The Babadook, for example). In Hereditary‘s case, there’s no doubting Ari Aster’s talent as a director. Instead, I’d question his aptitude for horror. Or rather, his aptitude for horror when it’s overtly identifiable as such. Because, when Hereditary is focussing on a dysfunctional family with unsettling, possibly uncanny or even supernatural elements percolating around the edges of the frame,

Thor: Ragnarok (2017)   Thor: Ragnarok is frequently very funny. It’s also very colourful. And quite wacky. But very funny, very colourful and quite wacky are, clearly, the current Marvel formula du jour, such that Kiwi director Taika Waititi isn’t so much unleashing a miraculous, newfound irreverent spirit onto the studio’s assorted favourites as rearranging its recently-upholstered furniture. What makes this case a little different is that the rearranging is in the service of their least interesting title character; Ragnarok comes across as if a whole movie had been based on the scene in the first Thor where the god of thunder goes into a

Twin Peaks 17: The past dictates the future 18: What is your name?   So the great evil that Gordon Cole (David Lynch) has been battling to defeat all this time is Judy/Jowday/Jaio Dai (Chinese for “resolution” or “explanation”). It’s kind of a cheap shot, really. Lynch saying “This is what you get when you dare to ask me to make sense of things, or tell you who killed Laura Palmer”. Being, an episode where he offers resolution in an almost perversely perfunctory manner, followed by an episode in which he recants and invites you never to receive any again.

Twin Peaks 3.13: What is the story, Charlie?   After the relative wheel-spinning of the previous episode, What is the story, Charlie? makes up for it and then some, with hugely satisfying Evil Coop and Dougie Coop plotlines and several really nice little moments back in Peaks itself. Damn it, they’re making me care about characters I always found tiresome in the original! Anthony Sinclair: Dougie saved my life. Thank you, Dougie. Dougie-Coop: Thank Dougie. I’m betting Tom Sizemore loves playing Anthony Sinclair. It’s so entirely against his type – “a weak fucking coward” as John Savage’s bent cop puts it –  and there’s

Penda’s Fen (1974)   Confession time: I wasn’t even aware Penda’s Fen existed before reading a recent Fortean Times piece on haunted childhoods of the ’70s: curious in itself, as Play for Today wasn’t exactly teatime, Basil Brush and Doctor Who, viewing (I guess they’re taking in inquisitive teenagers). But it’s very easy to see why the piece, directed by Alan Clarke from a teleplay by David Rudkin, had an impact on impressionable young minds. It’s just the sort of fare, with its open countryside and occult undertones, that proves indelible, in the manner of Children of the Stones or The Owl Service (or Alan Garner generally). That, and simply the way that

Moana (2016)   Disney’s 56th animated feature (I suppose they can legitimately exclude Song of the South – which the Mouse House would rather forget about completely – on the grounds it’s a live action/animation hybrid) feels like one of their most rigidly formulaic yet, despite its distinctive setting and ethnicity. It probably says a lot about me that I tend to rate this kind of fare for its wacky animal sidekick as opposed to the studiously familiar hero’s journey of Moana’s title character. You can even see the John Lasseter-Pixar influence in the fricking cute kids burbling through the opening scenes, before

The Conjuring 2 (2016)   There’s a view that James Wan’s horror movies fall into the category of intelligent genre fare. And, I guess, they do, to the extent that they eschew gore and put the emphasis on character and atmosphere. But that doesn’t mean they’re any less beholden to standard shock tactics than their less esteemed brethren, or that the quality of the scripting is especially remarkable. The original The Conjuring was a decent-enough picture, making the most of its period setting and reputable lead thespians while flourishing its “based on a true story” badge with a pride that masked what

Ghostbusters (2016)   Paul Feig is a better director than Ivan Reitman. Or at very least, he’s savvy enough to gather technicians around him who make his films look good. But that hasn’t helped make his Ghostbusters remake (or reboot) a better movie than the original, and that’s even with the original not even being that great a movie in the first place. Along which lines, I’d lay no claims to the 1984 movie being some kind of auteurist gem, but it does make some capital from the polarising forces of Aykroyd’s ultra-geekiness on the subject of spooks and Murray’s “I’m just

Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977)   While I’ve seen instalments the original and III a number of times, I hadn’t got round to checking out the near-universally reviled first Exorcist sequel until now. Going in, I had lofty notions Exorcist II: The Heretic would reveal itself as not nearly the travesty everyone said it was. Rather, that it would be deserving of some degree of praise, if only it was approached in the right manner. Well, there is something to that; as a sequel to The Exorcist, it sneers at preconceptions right off the bat by wholly failing to terrify, so its determined existence within the fabric of that film

Insidious: Chapter 3 (2015)   James Wan had no yen to go further into the Further with the Insidious franchise, departing for Furious 7, so co-writer and supporting actor Leigh Whannell takes the helm for this prequel, focussing on Lin Shaye’s (deceased in Chapter 1) psychic investigator Elise Rainier. On paper this sounds great, as Shaye’s distinctive performance was easily the best thing about the first two chapters, but unfortunately Whannell has assembled a distinctly underwhelming tale around her, one that offers little of interest other than joining the dots with the first film. If we really cared how Tucker (Angus Sampson) and Specs

Evil Dead II aka Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn (1987)   Evil Dead II (also known with the subtitle Dead by Dawn) is one of the funniest films ever made, as a result of which it remains a high-water mark Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell have yet to surpass. Understandably so, it will be no blemish against them if they are unable to again equal the sheer energy, inventiveness, exuberance, glee and craziness very throw into its every frame. It’s the movie that made both their careers, and the very definition of cult fare; one that was an extremely modest success on

The Evil Dead (1981)   There are fairly few sequels I’ve seen before catching the originals. Aliens is one and, for a while at least (being an action orientated teenager), I preferred it to Ridley Scott’s clearly superior singular first outing. Evil Dead II: Dead by Dawn is another. It was a picture I didn’t catch until about five years after its release, never having been much of a horror buff, and being unconvinced by attestations to its comedy value. When I did get round to it, I was bowled over, and promptly had to investigate Sam Raimi’s shoestring predecessor. And I was desperately disappointed. So

Twin Peaks 2.10: Dispute Between Brothers   A crock of a title for a crock of an episode. Maybe that’s going a bit far (the episode bit; the title stinks). There are several good scenes here, and Kyle MacLachlan’s sterling work very nearly saves the day, but Dispute Between Brothers is a spectacularly misjudged epilogue to the Laura Palmer murder plotline, and makes matters worse by picking up a selection of rum and disconsolate new ones to run with. Agent Cooper: Mrs Palmer, there are things dark and heinous in this world. Things too horrible to tell our children. Your husband fell victim

Twin Peaks 2.9: Arbitrary Law   Even though Tim Hunter does an admirable job here, one can readily see how matters would be even more improved if Lynch had been available. There are moments where Arbitrary Law oversteps its marks, where it collapses into unnecessary exposition for the dumb viewers at home (presumably) at the behest of dumb execs worried it will all be a turn-off. Yet 2.9 also features Ray Wise fully off the leash, and Coop returning to the firmer ground of the properly intuitive FBI agent. Which closes the door on the reason he showed up in the

Twin Peaks 2.6: Demons   David Lynch starred in five episodes of Twin Peaks and directed six. Would that he had ditched the acting gig altogether, swapping it for his appearances for megaphone duties. Gordon Cole is a likeable but one-joke character, a pratfall when set against the rapier wit of Albert, whom he ostensibly replaces. 2.6 is merely so-so, following the trend of the previous few episodes, but it does come together for the final scene in which, yes, Mike finally, and after much running on the spot, makes his presence felt. Harold Smith: You lie, and then you betray, and then you laugh

Twin Peaks 1.6: Cooper’s Dreams   If not quite back up to first gear, Mark Frost’s script for the sixth episode includes a winning combination of the whacky and weird. It’s also blessed with considerable forward momentum. This is Lesli Linka Glatter’s first work on the show, and she’s a mainstay of some of the best TV series around (she started out on Spielberg’s Amazing Stories, and like Tim Hunter she has worked on Mad Men, but also on The Leftovers, Justified, and Ray Donovan). Glatter really gets on with the comedy, and there’s some lovely staging throughout. Agent Cooper: It just goes to prove the

Deliver Us from Evil (2014)   Inspired by actual accounts, except having nothing to do with any of the actual accounts, Deliver Us from Evil is the tale of a New York cop kicking ass for the lord in tandem with an ex-drug addict priest. It really should have been a whole lot more fun and provocative than it is. Scott Derrickson, a rare Hollywood Christian, and co-screenwriter, could at least have injected some searching philosophical ruminations about the nature of good and evil into his picture, rather than the vapid guff discussed by Eric Bana’s Ralph Sarchie (the cop) and Edgar

Twin Peaks 1.1: Northwest Passage (Pilot)   It’s unlikely that the first thing one thinks of, when one thinks of Twin Peaks, is intricate plotting. This, despite the “Who killed Laura Palmer?” hook that heralded its first (truncated) season and just short of the first half of the second. No, it’s a safe bet that the David Lynch trademarks of mood, atmosphere, surrealism and eccentricity will be front and centre of one’s thoughts. And what the hell befell Agent Cooper after his encounter in the Black Lodge, of course. Those aspects have not diminished in the 25 years since, despite the

A New York Winter’s Tale (2014)   I was intrigued to see Winter’s Tale, as it was titled in the US (probably in Britain we’d have thought it was the Sir Ken’s next Shakespeare adaptation), despite the lack of esteem in which I hold screenwriter (and here debut director) Akiva Goldsman. Magical realism is a deceptively difficult fish to fry, even though it’s an increasingly popular dish; perhaps one for whom Mark Helprin’s novel had become a passion project could muster the goods to pull off it off. Goldsman couldn’t, as it turns out, but, despite its myriad flaws, and at

Odd Thomas (2013)   Writer-director and all-round auteur Stephen Sommers’ latest movie wasn’t greeted with the box office reception that he’s used to. It wasn’t greeted with critical acclaim either, although he ought to be familiar with that by now. Sommers is one of Hollywood’s most unbridled “talents”, unleashing attention deficit disorder puke of unmartialled images and edits onto cinema screens and then having the cheek to advertise the results as coherent movies. Odd Thomas is visually of a piece with this typical lack of restraint but, in contrast to the resto of his post-Mummy output, the big thing it has going for

The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (2013)   This might be the least glorious of the endless line of Young Adult fiction adaptations of late. Which is saying something, given they’re at-best modest merits. Adapted from the first of Cassandra Clare’s fantasy series (of six), The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones sports a mish-mash of familiar destiny-based and more-than-human tropes, without ever once crossing into anything distinctive and individual in its own right. The at once over-portentous and underwhelming title says it all. Tangentially, the subtitle also evokes memories of one of the Marvel Star Wars comics. Death in the City of Bone found the post-Empire

Insidious (2010)   Right from the off, Saw duo James Wan (director) and Leigh Whannell (writer) clearly intend to embody the most recognisable conventions of the classic frightener. Fraught strings accompany a roving camera around a darkened house, up until the point where the viewer is granted the briefest glimpse of … a disturbing face illuminated by a candle. For the first 40 minutes or so Insidious continues in this vein, laden with atmosphere, lurking menace, and sudden shocks. But then it unravels, falling back on sub-Poltergeist investigations, botch-job explanations, and an uninspired exploration of an underdeveloped alternate realm. There’s an awful lot that seems

Room 237 (2012)   Stanley Kubrick’s meticulous, obsessive approach towards filmmaking was renowned, so perhaps it should be no surprise to find comparable traits reflected in a section of his worshippers. Legends about the director have taken root (some of them with a factual basis, others bunkum), while the air of secrecy that enshrouded his life and work has duly fostered a range of conspiracy theories. A few of these are aired in Rodney Ascher’s documentary, which indulges five variably coherent advocates of five variably tenuous theories relating to just what The Shining is really all about. Beyond Jack Nicholson turning the crazy

The Box of Delights 6: Leave us not Little, nor yet Dark   The final episode exhibits many of the strengths and flaws of the previous instalments. The first half wonderfully ups the stakes, only to have them effortlessly blown away. It’s a more serious error than releasing Joe minutes after he has been locked up because, even given Abner’s poor choices, he needs to be demonstrated as an effective villain. But, during the first ten minutes at least, he is at his peak. First of all, he draws an upturned pentacle on a stone wall to produce a hidden

This is the End (2013)   As the apocalypse comedy of 2013 that isn’t The World’s End, This is the End was at least favoured by limited expectations. Schlubby Seth Rogen and his semi-famous pals essay versions of themselves as the world falls apart. Cue a succession of semi-improvised scenes of variable quality. Rogen and co-writer/co-director Evan Goldberg based the picture on their short film Jay and Seth vs. The Apocalypse. It’s more a credit to the essential narrative fortitude of end-of-the-world scenarios than their threadbare plotting that This is the End is, for the most part, moderately amusing. Possibly the best choice Rogen and Goldberg