Maps to the Stars movie review: kill it with fire
Quite hilarious in a deeply disturbing way that you won’t want to look straight on at, lest it forever ruin you as a lover of movies.
horror
Ex Machina movie review: damselbot in distress
There’s nothing fresh or even usefully true in its cartoonish dichotomy about men, but this pseudo-SF flick will expound upon it with pretentious tedium.
The Woman in Black 2: Angel of Death movie review: orphan blech
Thinks it’s hitting notes of subconscious dread, but it’s just swinging a sledgehammer of tropes and hoping one of them sticks. (Spoiler: None do.)
What We Do in the Shadows movie review: there will be blood
An absolutely hilarious mockumentary combination of utter silliness, social satire, pop-culture cramdown, and heartfelt pathos. And vampires.
When Animals Dream (Når dyrene drømmer) movie review (London Film Festival)
A social-realist werewolf fantasy in which burgeoning womanhood is a thing terrifying to many a man, particularly if a woman simply will not be tamed.
Hangar 10 (aka The Rendlesham UFO Incident) movie review: where has all the sci-fi gone?
Found footage has come to be an excuse for storytellers to completely bypass drama, character development, and plot in an attempt to be “authentic.”
Nightcrawler movie review: how news gets broken
Noirish 1950s cynicism meets nasty 1970s Corman-esque exploitation in a thriller that is uncomfortable, unpleasant, unforgiving, and pretty darn brilliant.
Extraterrestrial movie review: no intelligent life on Earth
Utterly empty. It’s aware of the tropes of the new mythos of alien abductions, but makes no attempt to find anything even the slightest bit fresh in them.
The Babadook movie review: mother of nightmares
Genuinely horrific and deeply scary in a way that draws on the most primal of emotions. A horror flick with rare emotional and psychological resonance.
Dracula Untold movie review: it doesn’t suck
A solid action fantasy more elemental and visceral than I expected, thanks to the potent presence of Luke Evans.
