All this, as well as the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #56, is available! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link:

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Mainstream Films:

2026 They Will Kill You

* Director: Kirill Sokolov

* Writers: Kirill Sokolov, Alex J. Litvak, Dan Berk, Robert Olsen

* Stars: Zazie Beetz, Patricia Arquette, Myha’la

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 34 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A woman hires on as a maid in a luxury high-rise in New York and quickly finds out that everything there is not normal. And things get wilder from there. This is a good one to go into as blind as you can if possible. There is much unexpected. It’s well put together, heavy on practical effects and sets, with a strong cast and Zazie Beetz excellent in the lead.

Spoilery Synopsis

Two sisters are on the run from an abusive father, and hide in a convenience store, but they soon get caught. Asia shoots her father in the parking lot just as the police arrive. Asia runs off, but Maria is caught.

Ten years later, Asia comes to Lily Woodhouse under a different name; she’s the new maid. It’s a very high-security building. Asia meets Sharon and the other residents. There are a lot of maids in this place as well as Ray, Lily’s weird husband. Credits roll.

Right away, Asia notices something weird in the vents. And in the hallway. We see that her room isn’t as secure as she thinks it is, as a pig-man sneaks in and licks her toes as she sleeps. He knocks out Asia and lets in the others, the residents, all wearing pig masks. The cultists, or whatever they are, aren’t very good at this, and Asia came heavily armed. She decapitates one of them, shoots another, and uses various ninja skills to take out the rest. Lily walks up and says that was pretty impressive. More credits roll.

Asia tells Lily about abandoning her sister, who went home with her father, who survived. Asia spent time in prison and learned to fight there. She hired a PI to find her sister, who went missing in this very hotel.

Lily says she also has an unusual family with unusual needs. All the dead cultists then get back up and collect their missing body parts– even the headless guy. Soon, Asia’s on the run from everyone yet again. The baddies need her alive for some reason, and the hotel has quite a maze of (well-lit) secret tunnels.

Ray’s down in the tunnels as well, and he helps Asia hide. He explains about the Virgil Hotel, a temple to Satan. Their ancestors made a deal: immortality for human sacrifices. Literally nothing can kill these guys as long as a single piece of them remains. The only way they can die is if their names are removed from the devil’s list. As they crawl through the tunnels, Sharon’s eyeball follows them.

Ray takes Asia to Maria, her now-grown sister. Maria explains that she got a job at the Virgil and went through all the ordeals but then was invited to join them instead of being a sacrifice. Yeah, she’s on the list now, and she doesn’t want to leave.

There’s a lot more running and fighting as Asia tries to find a way out of the building, but the cultists have a huge number of followers who are all in on it.

Lily and the others finally corner Asia and tell her what Marie did to earn her place here– nothing yet. Asia (or Isobel, the woman she replaced) was supposed to be the sacrifice she needed to survive.

The whole group goes downstairs to see Satan, who looks like a talking pig head on a stick. The pig erases Ray’s name from the list, which is written on his head. He tells Lily to kill Ray, which she does. He then tells Maria to write her name on his head and then kill Asia.

Marie writes a name and then kills herself; the name she wrote was Asia’s, who is now immortal. Her wounds now heal instantly. Time for more fighting, but amped up a notch!

During the battle, the pig head climbs on top of Lily and uses her body as his own. The battle is crazy, but Asia ends up removing all the names from the pig’s head, killing all the main baddies permanently and turning all the other residents of the hotel mortal again.

Asia takes her sister’s body and goes outside, where the P.I. is waiting with a car. Asia, it turns out, had written Marie’s name on the pig skin before killing it; Marie revives. The P.I. is very confused.

Brian’s Commentary

This is hilarious; the fight scenes and choreography alone are worth the watch. The fights are so incredibly over the top as to make the whole film.

This was a lot of fun, easily my favorite of the week.

Kevin’s Commentary

I went into this blind, and I was quite surprised by the surprises. I’m glad I hadn’t heard anything about this ahead of time. There were elements that reminded us of “Ready or Not” and the sequel, which we’ve reviewed as well.

The violence is so over the top it crosses over into humor. I thought it was great.

2026 We’re Not Safe Here

* Directed by: Solomon Gray

* Written by: Solomon Gray

* Stars: Hayley McFarland, Sharmita Bhattacharya, Margaret Wuertz

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 33 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Two women get together late at night, and one of them tells scary stories. After far too long a period of talk and minor jump scares, things get a little real - maybe. The acting and all the technical aspects are good. But we both thought it was pretty drawn out and dull.

Spoilery Synopsis

We see shots of someone with a bloody pillowcase over their head as credits roll.

Sarah and Neeta talk about Neeta’s artist block. Later, Rachel calls and wants to come over. Rachel sees several men in bloody pillowcases banging on her car. “We’re all around you,” one says.

Rachel arrives and admires Neeta’s many paintings. She explains about her “dreams” that keep her up at night. This has been going on since she was little.

Rachel tells about her childhood friend, Lily, who told her a story about a little girl fifty years ago, who put a pillowcase over her mother’s head and killed her. The girl claimed her friend in the closet made her do it. Lily also said her dead grandma told her the story. Lily then rode her bicycle to the house where the little girl did the killing.

Rachel stops the story, thinking she’s hearing someone else in the house. There’s no one there.

Anyway, back to Rachel’s childhood story. Lily walked into the abandoned house, and Rachel went with her. They found a photograph of themselves, except Lily had a pillowcase over her head.

Rachel goes to the bathroom and sees someone with a pillowcase inside. This one removes the covering, and the woman inside is a real mess.

Rachel comes out and continues her apparently neverending story. She and Lily opened the closet in the abandoned house, and they saw something. They rode back home in a hurry, but that night, Lily and her mother just vanished, never to be seen again.

Rachel still thinks she hears something inside the house. She pulls out her diary, where she’s been making notes about the weird stuff she’s seen.

Neeta interrupts to tell her nightmare story about a siren. Rachel ignores that and continues with her story. She grew up, and the weirdness all went away– until it came back. Upset, both women turn in for the night, but Neeta takes a weapon with her just in case Rachel’s as crazy as she seems.

Nope– Rachel comes into Neeta’s bedroom and goes on with the interminable tale. She talks about how the visions eventually returned, and why she needed to tell the story.

Neeta hears the siren from her own story as someone else appears in the room. Neeta screams and freaks out but then realizes she’s alone in the silent room and Rachel’s asleep in her own room.

Neeta sneaks out and goes to the address from Rachel’s diary. Rachel, in the meantime, wakes up and deals with her own nightmares. Across town, Neeta explores the empty old house from Rachel’s diary and story. She finds a closet with a photo of her and Rachel. She gets scared and runs back to her car.

In the morning, Neeta wakes up tied to a chair and hears voices. “Fear is the path to grace. That’s what led you to us,” says an old woman, who puts a pillowcase over Neeta’s head. Nope– just a dream, maybe.

Neeta goes home, and Rachel knows what she’s done. Neeta now sees the pillowcase-head people outside. Neeta looks again at the photo she found, and it’s different now. It’s Neeta’s demon now, and Rachel is free.

Ten months later, Neeta goes to Sarah’s house and wants to tell her a story…

Brian’s Commentary

Rachel’s story about Lily takes most of the film’s run time. It’s like listening to someone telling a ghost story around the campfire. This is pretty cool in theory, but it goes on for far too long. It’s like a “creepypasta” stretched out for an hour and a half.

The set is very interesting, and the acting is fine, but it just takes way too long for anything to actually happen. Something beyond just jump scares between the quiet bits.

I thought it was pretty dull, but it might be good to watch in a dark room all by yourself some night.

Kevin’s Commentary

I turned on my iPad during viewing and a game being played on there was much more entertaining than this movie. Most of the strangeness just seemed like mental illness, distorted memories, stress, fatigue, and nightmares - which can be a sort of horror in itself. Things did get real and sort of explained at the very end, but by then I didn’t care much anymore.

It’s well made, and the acting is good, but it didn’t hold my interest.

2026 Touch Me

* Directed by: Addison Heimann

* Written by: Addison Heimann

* Stars: Olivia Taylor Dudley, Lou Taylor Pucci, Jordan Gavaris

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 40 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Two best friends find their friendship put to the test when they both fall for an alien lover. It’s very funny, very weird, and beautifully filmed with an excellent script. Plus there are plenty of horror elements. The trailer doesn’t do it justice, and we were both pleasantly surprised by how much we enjoyed it.

Spoilery Synopsis

Joey cleans her ear with a Q-Tip, and it comes out bloody. We then cut to her in therapy where she tells a story about meeting an alien in a bar last night. He had a whole story about seeds and saving the Earth from climate change. He touched her with his tentacle as well and then they had sex under glowing trees. There were many tentacles. It’s quite a long and convoluted story. Credits roll.

Joey then goes home to Craig, her gay bestie who lets her live with him. She sees Brian, the alien, in the coffee shop the next day, and he says he misses her. Or is she imagining him?

Due to a bathroom disaster, Joey has to get a job. She tries at the local convenience store. They whine about their financial situation and consider themselves “trash pandas.” Craig accidentally watches Joey’s alien sex tape.

Brian invites Joey and Craig to his house for the weekend. Yeah, he’s an alien, but he was good at sex, so she wants to go back. It’s quite a house. They meet Brian and Laura, the housekeeper. Brian admits again that he’s an alien and demonstrates to Craig. He explains that he’s allergic to sugar-free lemonade powder. He’s also really into shirtless dancing.

Brian shows them his chrysalis. It requires a sad story and a blood sacrifice. They tell their stories and crystal begins to glow and then knocks them all out.

Laura doesn’t like Joey and makes that very clear. Everyone has a story, and Brian tells his. Afterward, he and Joey have sex again, and this time, we see the tentacles. Very shortly afterward, He does the same with Craig. Laura watches the whole thing on a remote screen while touching herself..

In the morning, both Joey and Craig feel really good. They split up for more “therapy.” Joey tells the crystal about being sexually assaulted as a teenager.

We get a flashback to three days ago, where Noah texts Brian and hooks up. Noah drives to Brian’s house and is quickly taken prisoner and locked in a cage. Back in the present, Noah’s head explodes and makes a real mess. Brian says to Laura that he thought Noah might be “compatible.” Joey sees all this on the security cameras.

Laura is jealous that Brian won’t use his lubricated appendages on her, but Brian refuses.

Joey tells Craig what Brian has been doing to Noah, but even so, neither of them really wants to leave. They know Brian’s been murdering people, but the sex is soooo good.

Everyone stays, and dinner is awkward. Joey turns against Craig, who soon winds up in a cell. When Brian admits he wants to eat Craig, Joey is fine with that.

Laura knocks out Joey and tells her that Brian has already eaten Craig’s left hand. Brian knows all about Laura, but he has a plan to deal with her. Laura then stabs Brian in the back with lemonade powder, and his outer form melts. Laura finally gets what she wants, more or less. Brian recovers, but Laura doesn’t.

Brian thinks Joey was involved with Laura and puts her in a cell as well, right next to Craig, who is no longer as supportive as he once was.

That night, Brian eats Joey’s hand, but then it turns out to not really be Brian, but one of his glowing trees.

The three sit around the magic crystal for another round of admitting how terrible they all are. This goes badly for Brian, as Joey and Craig have this all planned out.

Craig’s got something growing inside him, and he asks Joey to cut it out– which she does. And kills Brian’s offspring. Brian shows up in his full tentacled form and clears the air for his two prisoners. Until they douse him with lemonade powder and he explodes.

Craig’s got a big hole in his stomach, falls down, and dies.

We cut to Joey, back in therapy, telling the story. The therapist has many questions. She remembers that Brian’s alien trees spit out clones. And ends with her saying “Kill” while interacting with her Duolingo app.

Brian’s Commentary

Are YOU ready for some cross-species intercourse?

There are numerous monologues and long stories told, which sounds like it ought to be boring, but it’s not. The cinematography is very interesting, with lots of cool shots and effects.

I liked this one. It’s got a good mix of humor, grossness, and weird ideas. It’s a winner!

Kevin’s Commentary

I wasn’t expecting to like this as much as I did. I thoroughly enjoyed it and chuckled many times. It’s weird and keeps your attention throughout. The script, effects, and cinematography are all excellent. I’d call it a winner.

2026 The Yeti

* Directed by: Gene Gallerano, William Pisciotta

* Written by: Gene Gallerano, William Pisciotta

* Stars: Brittany Allen, Eric Nelsen, Jim Cummings, William Sadler, Corbin Bernsen

* Run Time: 93 min

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

When a group vanishes in the wilds of 1947 Alaska, a rescue party of eclectic and eccentric characters is sent on a rescue mission. The reason they disappeared, as you might guess from the title and poster, is a Yeti on the rampage. It has the look of studio work on sets and a lack of cold temperatures, but the effects are good with a strong cast. Still, things didn’t really come together. It felt like a missed opportunity that should have been better than it was.

Spoilery Synopsis

It’s 1947 in the Alaskan Territory. An old man has something in a cage. Other men play cards until they hear roaring outside. “Did you feed it today?” One guy climbs up to fix the hole in the roof, and something big pulls him up and pulls him apart. Credits roll.

We then get a newsreel introducing us to the “experts” who are going to find out what happened to the oil exploration crew. Elaine Bannister gives a lecture on cartography, but all anyone cares about is her famous father. Belle Parker comes to visit her to join the rescue team, and they want Ellie to lead the search.

Within a few days in Alaska, some of the crew are already ready to leave. They can’t even make camp, so they decide to blow up the ground itself. That night, they talk about monsters, which keep people from going where they don’t belong. Dynamite Dan brags about blowing stuff up before going out to pee; that goes badly for him.

Ellie sees the creature, and soon, everyone knows about Dan’s death. They all decide to keep on moving to find their missing fathers. Parker soon goes missing, and everyone splits up to search. Margaret finds a huge footprint in the snow. She and Coates see the monster clawing on Parker in the fog. Coates mercy-kills Parker as Margaret watches.

Ellie and her group find the cabin we saw in the opening credits, blood and all. Margaret is in there hiding from the creature. Coates comes in and describes the monster. Margaret, the animal expert, explains what the creature is; an ancient, not-extinct great ape.

Then they hear the roaring outside. It reaches in through the window and disembowels Coates right in front of Ellie. They also find some of the original crew, dead in their bunks. Booker reports that the radio is down, so they can’t call for help. Booker then gives Ellie a much-needed pep talk.

Booker climbs the radio tower with Ellie’s help, and that goes badly– the yeti rips his arm off. She runs off and finds a cabin with a cage in it. Inside the cage is Mr. Sunday, the man they expedition came out here to find. She also finds big drums of morphine.

Ellie finds the records of the expedition; the men weren’t up here for oil, they wanted the creature. Turns out, Ellie’s father, Hollis, was the one who locked Sunday in the cage after being lied to about why they came up here. They found a baby yeti, and Hollis stole it and turned against Sunday.

Old man Sunday and Sunday Jr. don’t see eye to eye about all this. They pour the morphine all over Ellie’s unconscious body and use her for bait inside the cage. Margaret’s outside the cage as a second lure.

Ellie wakes up and comes face to face with the monster. The morphine takes effect and knocks out the yeti, which Sunday Jr reluctantly runs to tie up. By the time he gets to the cage, the thing is empty. Ellie sneaks up behind Junior and strangles him, but the old man gets the best of Ellie.

Ellie’s father, Hollis, comes out of the woods to negotiate with Sunday Sr. The negotiations are short.

Ellie wakes up in the cabin, and Hollis is there as well. He’s been raising the baby yeti and protecting the adults from Sunday. He takes the baby and runs off into the woods to lure the female away from Ellie.

Meanwhile, outside, Sunday Jr wakes up after being strangled, not as dead as everyone thought. He sits down and freezes to death next to his father.

Ellie pulls out her compass, grabs a rowboat, and heads home.

Brian’s Commentary

The characters are obviously all old pulp-novel hero types, each very distinctive in style and personalities. It’s all very surreal and over-the-top in the way it’s filmed. The sets are all pretty weak; it never felt like the actual, cold Alaska to me, and no one’s breath even fogged.

I liked the style and basic idea, but it was all too clean and polished, the editing left a lot to be desired. I think this one may have been a little more low-budget than it really should have been.

Good idea; flawed execution.

Kevin’s Commentary

I thought the pacing was kind of odd and clunky in this one. They were trying to make it stylized and retro, but I don’t feel like they quite pulled it off.

As Brian pointed out, it looks like it’s on sets with fake plants, fake fog, fake snow, and no indication they are actually in cold temperatures. I couldn’t stop noticing that.

This one didn’t quite work for me. I wasn’t bored, but I was only moderately entertained

2007 The Hills Have Eyes 2

* Directed by: Martin Weisz

* Written by: Wes Craven and Jonathan Craven

* Stars: Michael McMillian, Jessica Stroup, Jacob Vargas, and Flex Alexander

* Run Time: 97 min

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Set not long after the first movie released the year before and in the same desert area, a group of National Guard troops find out that the hills still have eyes. This is a remake of 1984’s “The Hills Have Eyes Part 2” and we both thought this one is miles more entertaining. It’s heavy on action, with a high body count and lots of painful looking injuries and death. We give it a thumbs up.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a woman being tortured as the credits roll. It looks like she’s been there a long time, and now she’s giving birth. Her “midwife” leaves a lot to be desired, and the baby doesn’t look so great either. She’s killed as soon as the baby shows up.

We’re told that after half the family in the first film escaped, the military started monitoring the area. Almost immediately, the feed shows more people there than there should be, and then it goes dead. At the army base, people start going missing all at once. Dr. Foster runs into a couple of mutants and dies quickly. Colonel Redding knows what’s really going on, but that doesn’t save him.

We cut to a bunch of soldiers under fire in the Middle East. Turns out, it’s just a drill, and they aren’t doing well. The whole squad ships out to Sector 16, where the old-time atomic testing took place. On the truck, we get to know the soldiers a bit.

The group soon arrives at the top-secret base, but wonder where all the people there have gone. They see something shiny up in the hills and go to look, leaving Napoleon behind to guard the latrine and Amber to work the radio.

Napoleon finds a man in the porta-potty tank, and he’s not happy about it. Someone gave him shallow cuts all over so he’d die slowly of infection. He dies before he can give them much of a warning about what happened. They don’t see a thing until the company truck explodes and their weapons are stolen.

Amber runs up toward the rest of the troops, while Napoleon stays with the radio. Amber is grabbed by a mutant and is rescued by Mickey, who was on his way back down the hill. Someone in a hole grabs Mickey’s leg and pulls him in.

Sarge and the soldiers find what’s left of Dr. Foster. The mutants make an appearance, and one of the soldiers accidentally shoots Sarge. Now they all know they’re being stalked, but they aren’t sure what to do about it.

Someone steals their ropes, and now they can’t get down off the mountain. They have to look for another way, but run into many dead ends. They find Colonel Redding, who’s badly hurt but explains about mutants living in the mines here. He then shoots himself rather than be captured by the mutants.

Missy and Amber know what’ll happen to them if they’re captured, and they want to go home now. Turns out, they’re the bait that managed to lure in one of the muties who promptly get shot by the soldiers. Even then, Missy gets grabbed and hauled off.

The group goes into the mines looking for Missy, and it soon becomes impossible to go back the way they came. Amber and Napoleon fall down a chute and get separated from the others.

Missy, still alive, experiences Papa Hades, and she’s also not happy about it. Delmar, Crank, Napoleon, and Amber get reunited and meet one of the mutants who has offered to help them.

The three remaining soldiers argue about what to do next and then Crank accidentally blows himself up. The other two find Missy and untie her. Papa Hades smashes the door in and attacks everyone, and Amber finds that she has only one bullet left, but she knows how to use it. They all still have to work together to finish him off.

Still, they aren’t alone and have no way out…

Brian’s Commentary

This was far, far better than the original “Hills 2” which was one of the lamest sequels ever made. I don’t think the real National Guard trains that hard; these guys started out like Marines in combat, but I could be wrong. They’re also really good at making really bad choices at every turn.

It’s a little formulaic, but it’s well done for what it is.

Kevin’s Commentary

It moves fast, and it’s one damn thing after another for these folks getting picked off and fighting back. It’s not a perfect film, but it’s sooo much better than the original Part 2 from 1984. Such a different reboot that it’s pretty much a different movie entirely. I was entertained.

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All this, as well as the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #55, is available! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link:

https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2026 The Bride!

* Directed by: Maggie Gyllenhaal

* Written by: Maggie Gyllenhaal

* Stars: Jessie Buckley, Christian Bale, Peter Sarsgaard, Annette Bening, Jake Gyllenhaal, Penélope Cruz

* Run Time: 126 minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

In the 1930s, the Creature asks Dr. Euphronious to make him a Bride. It works, but they don’t realize she’s a murdered woman which causes complications when elements from her past life cross over. Plus, she’s a radical and feminist getting things fired up. It’s sort of Bonnie and Clyde meets horror meets weird romance. There’s a lot of humor and strangeness, and it’s entertaining, after a few minutes at the beginning, which was a questionable start. We both liked it much more than we disliked it.

Spoilery Synopsis

Mary Shelley comes onscreen and tells us that she didn’t write what she really wanted to; that was too much for the time. Now, she’s in Purgatory or something and wants to get the story out of her head.

The story begins with Ida, who is bored at a party. She seems to be possessed by Mary Shelly, who is using her to tell the story. She makes a major scene at the restaurant and gets thrown out. She then falls down the stairs and dies. Credits roll.

In Chicago, Frank, aka Frankenstein’s Creature, comes to see Dr. Euphronious, who knows who he is. She examines him and is thrilled. He doesn’t want any kind of treatment at the institute, he’s here for “an intercourse.” Yes, he wants her to “reinvigorate” him a bride. He’s become very impatient over the many years since he was created.

“I thought you were a mad scientist,” he says, which wins her over. Soon, they’re out digging up graves. Frank thinks the body they picked is too beautiful, but they can’t dig up more, so they go ahead. They throw the switch, sparks fly, and all the meters go off the scale.

The Bride sits up and thinks she had too much absinthe last night; she’s weird. They explain that she’s to marry Frank, but surprisingly, the bride doesn’t remember him at all.

Suddenly, Mary Shelley butts in and talks to the bride in her mind. Not long after, the bride and Frank break out of the lab, go to a movie and the red light district. She knows all the dance moves, but Frank’s not a dancer– but he does have an imagination. She dances most of the night, but eventually, her dance partners get carried away and Frank has to step in, violently.

Soon, the pair are on the run from the gangsters about the two men Frank just killed. He says he’s been through all this before, and there’s gonna be a mob. He doesn’t want the bride mixed up in all this, but she’s got nowhere else to go.

A couple of detectives, Wiles and Malloy, start investigating the murder, whose suspect looks like Frankenstein’s monster. Soon, “Frankenstein and his bride” are the headlines in the newspaper.

She wants the two of them to have sex, but he’s missing an important piece of the necessary equipment. They arrive in New York City, hoping to see Frank’s favorite movie star, Ronnie Reed. They’re quickly recognized as “The Killer Monsters,” and start a riot, complete with angry villagers and torches.

Frank and his bride crash a party, grab some food, and manage to spot Ronnie Reed, who is one of the guests. They have a conversation that’s very confusing for poor Ronnie. This soon turns into a dance number with “Puttin on the Ritz.”

The detectives storm in, and Wiles recognizes the bride. The bride recognizes Wiles. She grabs a gun and takes Ronnie as a hostage. She uses the opportunity to tell the police that the mob boss is paying off cops and killing women. She shoots a cop, and they escape.

They go on the run, and he gets her name tattooed on his chest. They have sex (I guess) repeatedly. Women all over the country start painting their faces like the bride’s face-marks. “Brain attack” is their new battlecry, causing mayhem everywhere as women revolt.

Lupino, the mob boss, recognizes the bride as Ida, a woman he had killed. Her killers swear they did the job, but he obviously knows they didn’t.

Detective Molloy realizes that the criminal pair has only been to places where Ronnie’s films took place. She wants credit if they solve this case, but he makes it clear that that’s not going to happen. She knows something is off about Wiles.

Frank makes up a whole story about his and the bride’s engagement. They get pulled over by an abusive cop, and Mary Shelley tells the bride to take care of him. She bites his tongue out but gets shot in the process, a minor wound.

Detective Wiles catches up to the monsters and calls the bride “Ida.” He says he got her into all this. Frank approaches him, and Moloy shoots him. Ida/The Bride then shoots Wiles in the foot and they run off. Wiles explains his connection to Ida to Molloy, but the hitman overhears the whole story. He’s a crooked cop, but he’s not all bad. He resigns and gives Molloy his badge.

Frank feels bad about lying to Ida about her past, and he also comes clean about their history. Molloy loiters outside the car and overhears his story. “I am a monster.” “Yeah, so am I.” They profess their love for each other, and he proposes to her. She refuses, which he finds hilarious. Then the police show up and kill Frank. The bride throws him in the car, and they have a high-speed chase with the cops.

The Bride and Mary talk about her identity. She drives them back to Dr. Euphonius, to patch Frank up. Both Molloy and the hitman follow them to the lab. There’s an over-the-top firefight, and the bride is shot umpteen times. She falls onto Frank’s corpse and dies.

Molloy takes charge, clears the cops out, and tells the doctor to take as much time as she needs to clean things up. Dr. Euphronius gets back to work; she can fix them.

Brian’s Commentary

For the first ten minutes, I was already mostly expecting this to be the first of over two thousand-plus movies that we didn’t finish. It did pick up fairly quickly though, and we did finish it.

It’s a remake of “Bride of Frankenstein” (1935), obviously. Mary Shelley makes an appearance in that film as a narrator, but that’s totally unnecessary and distracting here.

“Puttin on the Ritz” may have been a little too on-the-point, as I saw it coming an hour before it happened. Overall, though, the soundtrack is very good here.

It looks great, it’s very stylish, and it doesn’t get boring. It seems to go “weird for the sake of weird” several times, which you may or may not appreciate. There are some good laugh-out-loud parts, but it’s not a comedy. Christian Bale, as Frank, is outstanding here, but I did not care for Jessie Buckley’s The Bride, at all. I warmed up to her a bit before the end, but I think they could have done better with casting.

Overall, I’d say it was quite good, but I had some issues.

Kevin’s Commentary

After a start that had me grimacing in displeasure, it gets past that and into a really entertaining movie. It took a while, but I warmed up to Jessie Buckley at The Bride.

It’s not a perfect movie, but I liked it quite a bit.

2026 Souls Chapel

* Directed by: Jake C. Young

* Written by: Jake C. Young

* Stars: Brian Bremer, Jake C. Young, Adrianna Curtsinger

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 23 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A young drifter seeking treasure encounters demonic forces and a church that isn’t too holy. It’s set in a post-war-apocalyptic time, retro and modern at the same time, with a steampunk vibe. We both thought it was very well put together, but it was on the slow side and could have used more action. It’s a moderate thumbs-up from both of us.

Spoilery Synopsis

We are told about the origin of evil. We then cut to a man chopping up a body and doing some kind of ritual with it. He then hides a box in the woods and kills himself. Credits roll.

The Drifter tells us that time passes differently now that the world has moved on as he walks through a ghost town. He runs into a priest dressed in red with a gas mask who explains about the talisman he just picked up. Apparently, people did some really bad things back in the day. The weird priest gives the drifter a mission.

The drifter then goes to a weird church where he’s offered coffee. The priest, Red, is insistent about the coffee. Red introduces Sister Agatha. There’s a “Soul Storm” coming, and Jim mentions he hasn’t seen anyone on the road to town.

The drifter shows Red a drawing of the thing he’s looking for. Jim says he just wants the treasure. Soon, there’s a fight with their steampunk guns, and the drifter is knocked out. Red gives the drifter 24 hours to confess his crimes against humanity.

The drifter, chained up, has a vision of the woman in white, probably some kind of witch. Agatha tries to ingratiate herself with the drifter to get more information out of him. The talisman led them all to this place. Red used to have the mark of the talisman on his hand, but now the drifter has it.

Red gets a vision and finds the treasure chest. There’s gold and a newspaper article about seven strangers who showed up in this city. Meanwhile, the drifter talks to Father Moore, another prisoner in the town jail. He says they’re safer in jail than outside because night is coming. Jim comes in and talks about getting captured by the Skeezers during the war.

We cut to the white witch, who does a ritual and conjures up a monster. The monster then quickly kills the schoolboy.

Agatha and Red then torture the drifter to find out who killed the schoolboy. Jim talks to himself in a mirror and decides to turn against the others.

The drifter escapes his chains and explores. He finds a room full of heads in jars. He also finds newspaper accounts of the former priest here sacrificing seven people.

The drifter confronts Agatha and Red, and Agatha kills Red. She wakes up Jim and splits the gold with him. No– they forgot about the monster, who kills them both. Meanwhile, the drifter finds the talisman he’s been looking for. The dead rise.

The drifter, with his talisman, runs into the white witch, with hers. He banishes her. The red priest shows up again and takes the talisman. At least he’s got a bag of gold now. The drifter laughs and moves on…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s got the moody, atmospheric post-apocalyptic, sorta-steampunk landscape done well. The sound, costumes, and lighting are well done, better than most indie films of this budget. The pacing, on the other hand, is really slow and could have used more action.

Kevin’s Commentary

“Smells like pigs liver and sacrifice.” That’s very specific.

I liked the retro look with the steampunk vibe. It’s well put together, I thought, and interesting. Jake C. Young, doing triple duty as writer, director, and main character, did a good job. My only real complaint is how slow-moving and low-action it is. But I liked it much more than I disliked it.

2026 Ready or Not 2: Here I Come

* Directed by: Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett

* Written by: Guy Busick and R. Christopher Murphy

* Stars: Samara Weaving, Kathryn Newton, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Shawn Hatosy, David Cronenberg, and Elijah Wood

* Run Time: 1h 45m

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

But wait, the game isn’t over. Picking up immediately where the first “Ready or Not” movie ended, Grace and her sister (a new character) find themselves forced into the next level. The rules are clearly explained, new players enter the contest, and there’s a new site for the hunting fun. It probably wasn’t a necessary sequel, but it was really fun. And Kevin enjoyed it at least as much as the first film.

Spoilery Synopsis

Immediately after the events of the first film, Grace sits down as the house burns and explodes behind her. The EMTs load her onto the ambulance as credits roll. As they shock her chest, we get flashbacks to the previous movie.

Grace wakes up in the hospital, cuffed to the bed; she’s suspected in several murders. Faith comes in; she’s Grace’s estranged sister. Faith says Grace is a negative person. Grace eventually explains her game of “Hide and Seek” that involved devil sacrifices.

Meanwhile, old man Chester Danforth creates the news. Mr. Le Bail’s lawyer shows up with news about the now-dead family. Danforth decides to summon his children, since the game is not over. We see various characters getting their notifications. “This is our chance!” Chester tells his twin kids Ursula and Titus that the ball is still in play and they need to win to keep their power and success. The game starts with them murdering their father, Chester.

On the way out of the hospital, the detective in charge is killed by Bill Wilkinson, one of the early arrivals. As Bill closes in to kill Grace, he explodes like a water balloon of blood. The lawyer comes in, and he knows all about the devil and his rules - Bill died because he tried to start early.

Usulla and Titus head out to their “lodge” and welcome all the freaky relatives. The lawyer flies in with the two sisters, tied up and ready for the game to begin. Mr. Le Bail’s lawyer enters, and everyone pays attention. He explains the situation, the reward, and the rules. The stakes are higher this time. All she has to do is survive until dawn as the rest of the families try to kill her. Whichever family does kill her will wear the ring, and basically have so much power they control the world. There are five main hunters, but if they die, the next generation of relatives will have to join in.

The game begins. Faith and Grace wake up handcuffed to each other on the golf course. Ursula and Titus approach on a golf cart, Wan Chen Xing uses a drone to find the girls. Ignacio shoots a propane tank that almost kills Viraj.

The girls hide in the abandoned casino that’s on the property and talk about their history. Viraj makes it inside first, and he fights the girls, who have broken their handcuffs. He ends up cooked in an industrial washing machine. Mahdu, Viraj’s brother, is ordered into the field but chooses to send his own wife, Martina, instead.

Wan Chen Xing reveals herself and says there’s a loophole in the agreement that would take the power away from the Danforths. The only trick is that Grace will have to marry Wan Cheng Fu. She would be spared, and he would have the power. Wan says her son is dumb but kind and would be better for the world than the Danforths. Wan ends up accidentally stabbing Ignacio, and he’s not getting back up again. Rules broken, Wan Cheng explodes in a bloody mess; so does her son.

Titus and Ursula ambush the girls at the front date, just as Martina drives her car through the gate and escapes. This leads to more drama between the two sisters and the surviving players. Francesca shows up with a rocket launcher, but doesn’t know how to use it. Grace and Francesca both get splattered and blinded with pepper spray and have to fight blind. Meanwhile Faith faces off against Titus. It looks pretty bad for both of them.

Grace wins her fight, but Titus takes Faith as a hostage. Grace offers to marry Titus to save Faith and explains the loophole to him. The lawyer nods that this is true. Ursula doesn’t like this at all, since it eliminates her from the power position.

Suddenly, there’s about to be a wedding. Ursula comes to Grace and talks about how terrible her brother is. Titus comes in and kills Ursula, which doesn’t break the rules - they can kill their own family members, just not other families.

The wedding commences, attended by everyone we’ve seen so far and a crowd of cultists. The lawyer calls on Mr. Le Bail to witness. The wedding actually goes through and finishes. It’s all good until Grace stabs Titus with the sharp, pointy pen. It’s not against the rules to kill a family member, as Titus proved with Ursula.

Grace wins. She puts on the ring and takes over. She then immediately abdicates. Whoever’s wearing the ring at dawn, in three minutes, will be the new leader. She throws the ring down into the pit, and most everyone jumps in after it. Everyone fights to the death for the ring. Everyone in the family explodes.

Grace, Faith, and the sacrificial goat leave the estate.

Brian’s Commentary

This is a sequel to 2019’s “Ready or Not.” This one is full of familiar faces, much more so than the original. It did not, however, have the fun theme song this time around.

This was one of those sequels that didn’t really need to be made, but it was still fun.

Kevin’s Commentary

Grace can surely take a lot of punishment and damage in these movies. So can her sister. After getting beaten up and wounded as badly as they were, they walked off at the end just fine and dandy.

I went into this thinking we didn’t need a sequel and it was totally unnecessary. I changed my mind once it got going. I enjoyed it as much as the first one, if not more.

2025 Dolly

* Directed by: Rod Blackhurst

* Written by: Rod Blackhurst, Brandon Weavil

* Stars: Fabianne Therese, Seann William Scott, Ethan Suplee, Max the Impaler

* Run Time: 83 min

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

When a couple goes hiking, the young woman of the duo is abducted by a crazy masked killer who wants her to be her living doll baby. It was filmed in 16mm and has a 70s grainy look to it and a vibe of “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” but is in the modern day with smartphones. The gore is visceral with realistic shots that will make you cringe. We both thought it was really good.

Spoilery Synopsis

As the credits roll, we see a house full of dolls and what appears to be a crazy woman tending to a corpse in a bed.

Chapter 1: Mother

A couple of parents drop off their daughter to the babysitter’s house so they can have a day alone where Chase can propose to Macy. Macy’s not sure about the whole thing since Chase has a daughter, Evy. As soon as they get to the woods for their hike, we cut to the crazy old woman, now dismembering that corpse. The old woman then holds a funeral for the dead person, with many dolls as witnesses.

Macy noticed that there are dolls nailed to the trees in the woods. They think that’s pretty weird. As they reach the overlook, they hear a weird music box playing in the woods, and Chase goes to check it out. He soon comes across the old woman, who wears a red dress suit and a doll-face mask– maybe it’s not an old woman, since “Dolly” picks up Chase and strangles him, cuts his leg off, and then does even worse things.

Chapter 2: Daughter

Macy gets tired of waiting and goes looking for Chase. She finds Dolly and the headless corpse before she finds Chase. She runs, falls, and is knocked out.

When she wakes up, Dolly is there, and Macy stabs Dolly with a tiny pocketknife. Dolly knocks her out again and takes her home to her place.

Chapter 3: Home

Macy wakes up in a tiny crib in a child’s room. She talks through the wall to a man she can’t see. He tells her to play along with the dolls. Dolly comes in and wants Macy to wear a diaper and suck on a pacifier.

Somehow, out in the woods, what’s left of Chase wakes up. He’s a real mess. He doesn’t get very far, but he’s still alive.

Dolly finally notices the pocketknife stuck in her side, pulls it out, and starts spurting blood. Macy uses the opportunity to try to escape. That doesn’t last long before Dolly decides it’s time for Macy’s feeding. Clearly, Dolly wants Macy as a baby doll. When Macy refuses to drink milk from a bottle, it all gets pretty weird.

Macy makes it down to the basement, where she finds a doll shrine, including the head of Dolly’s mother. Dolly finds Macy and rips her ear off. Dolly then sews it back on, which is even worse.

Chapter 4: Father

In the morning, Macy wakes up and steals a key from the sleeping Dolly. She opens the locked door where the man’s voice was coming from, and she soon finds him inside, all chained up. She unchains him and then very soon regrets it. They’re family. He grabs Macy, holds a piece of glass to her throat, and calls for Dolly. He needs Dolly to unlock the back door and let him out. As soon as Dolly unlocks the door, her father goes off on her with the shovel. Macy and Dolly work together to take care of him. He’s not gonna be getting back up again.

Macy hears Chase calling her name outside and jumps through a window.

Chapter 5: Reunion

Macy tells Chase that she found his ring and that she loves him, but they have to get away. Dolly shows up and makes Chase’s problems even worse. Macy and Dolly fight it out in the woods, and Dolly loses part of her mask.

Chapter 6: FIght

Macy hides in Dolly’s mother’s grave. She gets the shovel away from Dolly and makes good use of it, but stops beating too soon.

Chapter 7: Goodbye

The park ranger literally runs into Macy, “Are you OK?” “NO!”

He calls on the radio, “Guys, we got another one.” Dolly then comes out of the woods and kills him. Macy starts the ranger’s truck and runs over Dolly. She takes back her engagement ring, gets back in the truck, and drives away to freedom…

Brian’s Commentary

There are a couple of really cringey gore shots that were painful to watch.

After the opening scenes, there’s not much dialogue, which makes it all the more creepy.

It’s pretty intense, never slows down, and has lots of good bits to it. I liked this one!

Kevin’s Commentary

The 16mm grindhouse 70s vibe was an interesting mash-up with modern-day technology and smartphones. I also liked the division into chapters.

It kind of surprised me how quickly they killed Chase off. And then I was even more surprised that he wasn’t dead yet in the condition the psycho left him in.

I said “ouchie!” more than once with some of the painful-looking injuries that take place.

I thought it was really good.

2015 Muck

* Directed by: Steve Wolsh

* Written by: Steve Wolsh

* Stars: Kane Hodder, Lachlan Buchanan, Bryce Draper, Lauren Francesca, Stephanie Danielson

* Run Time: 1h 38m

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The IMDB.com summary says “After narrowly escaping an ancient burial ground, a group of friends find themselves trapped between two evils, forcing them to fight, die, or go back the way they came.” The movie seems to start in the middle of a story, and we don’t really know what happened before. There’s much bad acting, strange choices made, random seeming editing, young women scantily dressed, and not a lot of story that’s explained or makes sense. Both of us agree this was phenomenally bad.

Spoilery Synopsis

A woman runs through the swamp, screaming for help. Her three friends soon catch up, but Billy’s been injured. They’re all freaked out, as some of their friends are dead. There’s an inordinate amount of screaming and arguing before they head toward the house they see. Credits roll as another girl is left out in the swamp alone.

The group breaks into the house and quickly settles in to warm up. Billy explains that they’re in a horror movie and how they’re all going to die. He predicts that Kylie is going to be the final girl since she’s wearing the most clothes. Noah decides to go for help, since the house doesn’t have a phone.

The group settles in. Desiree goes upstairs for a shower, and Kylie goes into the basement looking for a first-aid kit.

Noah makes it to town and stops in at the bar– it’s St. Patrick’s Day and everything is green. He goes to the restroom and washes up, then gets distracted by the women in the ladies’ room. He orders a couple of drinks for himself and the ladies, seemingly forgetting to call the police or any help for his friends.

Desiree takes her long, slow shower and then comes out just to get chopped up by a man with an axe.

Noah finally calls his friend Troit, telling him he’s in the town of West Craven. Troit and his hate-girlfriend Chandi go to rescue the group. We then take a time-out to watch one of the bar women change clothes in the restroom. They talk about West Craven a dozen times so we are sure to catch the reference.

Random stuff seems to happen. Noah runs down the street. Kylie gets tortured by bald cultists. Troit and his girlfriends stagger around the parking lot and talk about buying a boat. There’s an ad for Red Bull– it gives you wings. Something has grabbed Billy and Mia that we didn’t even see. Noah then plays hide and seek in a graveyard.

There’s no point in giving more of a synopsis, as none of this makes any damned sense at all. Kevin paid good money for this Blu-Ray, so I guess I have to finish it, but oh, is it ever bad. (At least, Kevin adds, it was a really good deal on the Blu-Ray.)

Brian’s Commentary

We never really find out what happened to the group before the movie started, but people have already died by that point, and the characters already know they’re in a horror movie. Who were these bald men, cultists or something? What was any of this for?

Well, that was truly awful. Not one of the “Actors” can act, which isn’t helped by the awful dialogue and pacing. It’s got lots of barely-dressed girls running around through most of the film, so there’s that if you’re into that sort of thing, but that’s probably the only reason anyone would watch this. Even the editing is noticeably terrible, with odd, half-second bits of blackness where the shots didn’t quite align in the editing room.

Worst of the month, easily. It’s far from the worst I’ve ever seen, but it’s probably in the top twenty.

Kevin’s Commentary

The very beginning had me wondering if we’d started in the middle of the movie by mistake. After the credits roll, we realize they did that on purpose. This was intended to be the second movie of a trilogy, making the second movie first for some reason. It’s been eleven years, so that plan is doubtful.

Apparently, despite having been attacked, some people missing, one guy badly injured, it doesn’t occur to the characters to call 911. Just one of many strange and bad choices made. But don’t think about that too much, look, here’s another young woman strutting or running about scantily dressed or topless. And then, for some reason bald pale attacker guys show up. Stuff happens, and then it ends abruptly, unfinished and waiting for the third in the trilogy.

It wasn’t available for streaming, and I wanted to see it, so I picked up a cheap Blu-ray copy. That seemed like a good idea at the time. I was intensely disappointed.

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2025 The Arborist

* Director: Andrew Mudge

* Writers: Andrew Mudge

* Stars: Lucy Walters, Hudson West, Will Lyman

* Runtime: 1 Hour, 40 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

An arborist in mourning and her somewhat surly son land a wood trimming gig, hired by a recluse living in a big mansion on big land. But there’s some haunting going on along with big loads of guilt and grief, and it’s not just a simple job. It’s beautifully filmed with a strong cast of just a few main characters, but it didn’t really connect with either of us.

Spoilery Synopsis

We hear a woman shushing a baby as a large ball of woven vines rolls into the room. Credits roll.

Ellie gets up in the morning and runs the breast pump. She goes looking for her son Wyatt, but then finds something very wrong with the baby.

One year later, Ellie and Wyatt drive to a large estate where they have been promised work. She’s still grieving over the death of the baby. She meets Mr. Randolph, the owner of the house, and he mostly just wants her to cut firewood. Meanwhile, Wyatt finds a mysterious ball of woven vines near the truck that scares him enough that he hides from it. They move into the little gardener’s cottage.

Wyatt asks about the old man living all alone in that huge mansion. He gripes about her drinking and then plays videos of the baby, which annoys her.

In the morning, the two get to work. They find what looks like an old amphitheater in the woods and then argue over how to use a chainsaw.

As Ellie works, Wyatt goes canoeing and sees something not quite human on the bank. Ellie finds him passed out on the bank and has flashbacks to the baby.

Old man Randolph brings him a fishing pole to use, and Ellie asks him why hire an arborist when anyone with a chainsaw could do the work. Why those particular healthy trees?

Wyatt believes that some thing killed his little sister, but Ellie explains it was just SIDS. A bit later, Wyatt sees the monster under the canoe, repeating his mother’s words. He also sees the vine ball again, as well as some kind of demon. “What killed her? What killed Rachel?” it asks.

Ellie talks to Randolph about quitting, but she’s already been paid. The old man shows her that Wyatt has been inside the house for some reason. When confronted with the knife, Wyatt says he dropped it from the canoe. “It followed us here,” he complains. He’s clearly got some mental issues. He goes outside and talks to the creature in the trees, who says he is dying.

Ellie finds a locked box in a hidden room in the basement. Inside, she finds many old photos of children. Also, there’s a news report about seven children dying on the estate. Randolph, upstairs, finds wet footprints in his bedroom, and he’s suddenly terrified of Wyatt.

Ellie wants to pack the truck and leave, but Wyatt refuses and runs off into the woods. Randolph explains that his older brother, Victor, looked exactly like Wyatt. Ellie’s grandfather was Randolph’s cousin. Ellie and Wyatt are all that’s left of his family. He also explains about the tragedy; his brother Victor used the gas heater to kill a bunch of orphans who were there as a treat. Randolph killed Victor afterward by drowning him in the pond.

Wyatt starts channeling Victor, and it’s clear that there really is something going on here. Ellie sees the thing in the woods as well. Outside, the ghosts of the dead children surround Randolph; they believe Wyatt is Victor and want their revenge. Since Victor is now inside Wyatt, they’re aren’t really wrong.

Randolph explains that about a year ago, he started noticing things were weird in the area. This would have been around the same time Ellie’s baby died.

That night, Randolph grabs Wyatt and tries to drown him in the swimming pool, but Ellie jumps in and saves only one of them.

Later, Ellie finds the vine ball, and it’s got a baby inside. Wyatt-Victor stabs the baby and turns it into sticks. This leads Ellie to scream and melt the vine ball.

In a dreamscape of their home in town, Wyatt explains what happened the night the baby died. He accidentally fell asleep on top of the baby and killed her.

Some time later, Ellie and Wyatt return to the house, which has now been torn down. They’ve inherited what’s left from Randolph.

Brian’s Commentary

I figured from the credits that the vine ball was guilt. Also, from the way it was filmed, it seemed likely the baby’s killer was in the closet, and I assumed it was Wyatt. Turns out, that’s not the way it was going at all, which is good. Well, not completely the way it turned out.

It’s really long, and a lot of it doesn’t make sense to me.

Kevin’s Commentary

The paycheck Ellie and Wyatt get from Mr. Randolph is $3,500.00, and that’s a heck of a lot of work for two people for that amount.

When we pause, and Brian exclaims, “What?! It’s got another half hour to go!” That’s not a good sign for how entertained we are.

It turned out guilt and grief were the monsters all along. Sort of.

All the technical aspects, the cast, and the location are excellent. But it’s a long, drawn-out affair that I thought was on the dull side.

2025 Diabolic

* Director: Daniel J. Phillips

* Writers: Mike Harding, Ticia Madsen, and Daniel J. Phillips

* Stars: John Kim, Elizabeth Cullen, and Mia Challis

* Runtime: 1 hour, 35 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A woman goes back to her childhood area in the hopes of finding answers to problems she is having now and what happened in her forgotten youth. What she finds is religious extremism, a mystery, and some witchery. It builds slowly but pretty effectively, with a good cast, great cinematography, and excellent special effects. We both dug it.

Spoilery Synopsis

We get an on-screen summary of what the FLDS flavor of Mormonism is all about, focusing on the culty bits.

We then cut to what looks to be a very strange baptism as credits roll. It’s 2015, and the group is doing baptisms for the dead. The final name is called, and a demon possesses the baptized girl.

Ten years later, Elise and Adam talk about her paintings. Later, in the garden, she digs up a dead animal’s skeleton. When Adam gets home, he finds that she’s dug holes all over the entire yard and doesn’t remember why.

She brings the incident to the attention of her therapist. Also, she’s killed the neighbor’s little dog and feels bad about that. The episodes are getting longer and more violent, and he brings up the possibility of an institution. He knows that this is a not-uncommon trait of people who exited from the FLDS. He wants her to confront the healers from the church to face them.

Adam and Elise decide to go see the healers, and they take Gwen with them. She’ll chaperone them as they take some kind of weird drug to open up their minds.

Hyrum talks to his overbearing mother about their new “patient,” Elise. He knew her in her younger days and wants to help her. “Her kind will find no help here,” she insists.

Elise’s group shows up at the baptistry, the only building remaining in the town after a historical flood. She remembers the baptismal font, and it makes her uncomfortable. Elise talks about how they baptist the dead by proxy. Eise doesn’t remember much of what went on that night. She almost remembers Clara, her almost-girlfriend from those days.

As the trio sets up camp, Hyrum and his mother, Alma, arrive. She doesn’t remember him. She tells them about her blackouts, and Hyrum talks about the hallucinogenic drugs their group has always used. Hyrum mixes up some hallucinogenic soup for Elise and Adam to drink. Bottom’s up!

Hyrum tells them to “embrace the visions,” and they do. Elise remembers Clara, and their kisses. “She’s coming,” Clara warns. In the real world, Elise starts vomiting blood, and Alma writes bloody runes on her belly. The candles spring to life. “We must get it out of her now!” Alma pulls a long black worm out of Elise, who sits up, mostly recovered. She watches as the worm melts and re-forms into a person, but no one else sees that.

In the morning, Hyrum and Alma talk about the evil in this place and then leave. Adam and Gwen wonder if Elise is actually better now or not. Elise swears it feels like a weight has been lifted from her stomach and now feels great. When Elise talks about Clara, Adam takes offense to that because they have no sex life.

Elise finds an ancient altar in the woods and suddenly wants to have sex right on top of it; Adam doesn’t complain. Meanwhile, Gwen follows a stranger into the baptistry and gets locked in with a ghost. When they come back out, they find a bunch of dead animals impaled on poles. Also, the car battery is now inexplicably dead.

Hyrum, who has had a crush on Elise since they were kids, comes to jumpstart the car and tells Elise that Alma pulled a demon out of her, and it’s free now to do as it pleases. Meanwhile, Alma prays and then hangs herself.

Hyrum gets home and finds his mother, not dead but even weirder. She talks about Larue, the witch-spirit they released from Elise. “The bodies were never found; she consumed them!” Larue vowed with her dying breath to get revenge on the church, and it was her name who caused the crazy baptism in the opening scenes. Then, Alma dies.

Back at the baptistry, Elise catches Adam and Gwen kissing and runs off into the woods. We get a flashback to Elise arguing with her father about loving Clara. Her father disowned her and threatened to send her away to an orphanage in the morning.

Gwen sees Larue in her tent, freaks out, and steals Adam’s car. Elise uses that key she found to open a padlocked cellar and the doors fly open mysteriously. She finds Clara’s ghost down there, who tells her to “Dig.” Elise digs up Clara’s skeleton and remembers how she murdered Clara back in the day. Now, Clara’s not in the basement, but Larue is, and she ain’t pretty. “I remember you; you’ve been with me all along.” Larue appears to kill Elise.

Gwen, driving down the road, stops when she sees Larue in the middle of the street. Is it Larue or is it Elise now? Either way, it goes really badly for Gwen. Adam finds her in the baptistry as Hyrum arrives to help. The baptismal font fills with blood as the men watch. Elise drowns Hyrum in the blood. She then crushes Adam’s head with her hands.

Elise, now alone, makes the bloody pool burn and smiles evilly.

One month later, Elise leads the girls to the new church for baptisms…

Brian’s Commentary

The cast is good, and the way the mystery unfolds is interesting. The whole FLDS thing is rarely handled in horror movies, but it’s really the best part of this movie. I was totally expecting Hyrum and Alma to be the evil crazies, but they were completely genuine, which made a nice little twist.

Kevin’s Commentary

“The following is inspired by true events” lost me a little right off the bat. IMDB trivia says that it refers to co-writer Ticia Madsen’s real-life experiences in the Mormon church. I’m assuming there was less magic and a lower body count in real life.

It was very effective at keeping us guessing what was really going on until close to the end. Then things get revealed nicely. Sometimes the dragon wins as the saying goes.

1934 Maniac

* Directed by: Dwain Esper

* Written by: Hildagarde Stadie

* Stars: Bill Woods, Horace B. Carpenter, Ted Edwards

* Run Time: 51 minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The poster from a 1983 rerelease touts “Sex…Drugs…Psychos” and “The First word in bad taste,” and that’s about right. It’s awful and fascinating at the same time, surprisingly gross and graphic for 1934. And it’s short at only 51 minutes, so give it a try if you’d like something historically interesting and pretty entertaining - more chuckles and eww moments than scares for sure.

Spoilery Synopsis

We get an opening scroll that talks about fear, faith, and unhealthy thought. All criminals suffer from some mental disease.

We cut to Dr. Meirschultz and Maxwell working in their lab. The old man wants to experiment on a dead body and needs Maxwell’s help to get one. He’s going to impersonate the coroner to steal the body. They enter the morgue and inject one of the bodies with the doctor’s serum. She soon begins to move, and they need to get her out of the morgue, past the guard and attendants.

The police start looking into the missing body, and Dr. Meirschultz’s name comes up right away. So does Maxwell’s name.

Back at the lab, Dr. Meirschultz wants another body that he can transplant a still-beating heart into. He doesn’t care where the next body comes from, so Maxwell breaks into the nearby undertaker’s place, but he’s run off by angry cats. After he reports failure to the old doctor, Meirschultz wants Maxwell to kill himself for the experiment. Instead, Maxwell shoots the old madman.

We then cut to another scroll about “Dementia Precox,” a very common form of insanity.

Maxwell gives himself a speech about the “spark of life” as he hallucinates the devil. One of the doctor’s patients shows up, and Maxwell makes himself look like Meirschultz using his makeup and acting skills. He then treats Mr. Buckley and gives him a shot of super-adrenaline by mistake. Mr. Buckley has… a reaction; oh-boy does he ever. He goes berserk and steals the undead woman from the morgue.

Mrs. Buckley finds the old doctor’s corpse and thinks it’s murder. As Maxwell and Mrs. Buckley talk about blackmail and murder, Mr. Buckley and the undead woman run off into the hillside. Meanwhile, Satan the cat eats the beating heart from the jar on the desk. Maxwell grabs the cat and pops his eye out and eats it.

Maxwell walls up the doctor’s corpse and the one-eyed cat behind the wall in the basement.

The police come to a man who owns thousands of cats for the skins. He’s got it all figured out.

We cut to Maxwell’s forgotten wife, Alice, who lives with three other women who don’t seem to own many clothes. They read that Maxwell has inherited a small fortune, but no one can find him to let him know. She goes to “Meirschiltz” and tells him about the inheritance. He figures she’s going to murder him for the money, so he talks Mrs. Buckley into killing Alice. When Alice shows up, he tells her about Mrs. Buckley as a double-cross.

As the two women fight in the basement, Maxwell cackles like a lunatic, causing the cat-obsessed neighbor to call the police. Everyone runs to the basement, where the police hear the one-eye-cat yowling from behind the wall.

We cut to Maxwell, in jail, who goes on and on about his need to be a great actor, but no one appreciates him.

Brian’s Commentary

The movie poster promises “Sex, Drugs, and Psychos.” We do, in fact, get all of those. It’s all pretty ridiculous, but then again, this was 1934, so this was pretty over-the-top and extreme for the time.

The acting is awful, the plot is thin, but it’s really interesting considering what they got away with at the time.

It’s… weird.

Kevin’s Commentary

This was my second viewing after recommending it to Brian for a review. It’s kind of awful, yet interesting at the same time. It’s pretty wild and graphic considering it’s a film from 1934.

The Phyllis Diller in this movie is not the comedian Phyllis Diller.

It’s a strange little movie that I enjoyed seeing.

1956 Satellite in the Sky

* Directed by: Paul Dickson

* Written by: John Mather, J.T. McIntosh, Edith Dell

* Stars: Kieron Moore, Lois Maxwell, Donald Wolfit

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 25 Minutes

* Clip:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The British (in their first science fiction movie in color) launch the world’s first orbital vehicle, along with a big experimental bomb, and the mission doesn’t go smoothly. It’s sort of an alternate timeline of 1956, blending real technology with science more advanced than they had at the time. It’s a little draggy in places, but it was still interesting and low-key entertaining. Not on par with other classics of the era.

Spoilery Synopsis

We are told that apparently, Nostradamus predicted space flight, as the credits roll.

We cut to “modern” jet fighters zooming around in the sky, as one of them lands and Commander Michael Hayden gets out. There’s a press thing afterward to talk about Project Stardust, which will escape the Earth’s gravity for the first time, a height of about 1000 miles, where there probably isn’t any gravity to stop it.

Mike explains that the power and fuel are the real problems with the experiment. Kim asks what we’ll gain from all this; shouldn’t we fix our own world first? She’s very negative about the whole thing. There’s a test flight this afternoon. Professor Merrity hints that there’s a more secret aspect to the mission: the bomb. The test is successful, so Project Starlight can proceed tomorrow.

After the flight, Mike and Kim argue some more about the value of space flight. He gives her a tour of the facilities on the airbase. She also sees the rocketship that Mike will be flying in the morning. She thinks it looks… evil.

Larry, one of the scientists, is having trouble with his wife, Barbara, and his money, and they argue about the rocket. He promises to take her out, but he gets called back for more rocket work.

That night, Kim sneaks back into the airbase, and apparently, there’s no security whatsoever. Nothing is locked up, and she makes her way into the rocket unseen by anyone.

The professor explains that the flight tomorrow will carry the very first tritanium bomb to test. That’s really the whole point of the flight; Mike had no idea. The bomb is too powerful to explode on Earth, but it’ll just dissipate in space. Mike and Larry are told about this, but they’re not happy about it.

Meanwhile, Barbara goes to the party alone and meets Tony there. Jimmy breaks up his date with Ellen when she has to work on a fashion show. He ends up proposing to her– over the telephone. There’s lots of character drama.

The morning of the flight arrives, and they load the huge bomb aboard. Mike, Professor Merrity, Larry, Jimmy, and Lefty board as well, and they soon launch. The G-force is tremendous, and they all suffer, but soon it’s over and they are in space. Mike explains about the bomb to Lefty and Jimmy; that’s why Merrity had come along.

Merrity goes back to the cargo hold to check on the bomb and finds Kim hiding in the closet. They report her being a stowaway to the people on the ground. Soon, Kim is making coffee for the crew. She didn’t know anything about the T-1 bomb. Merrity explains that the bomb is so powerful that they’ll feel gale force winds on the surface. Kim thinks it’s a waste of resources, and for once, Mike agrees with her. “This could be the end of the world for all we know,” she points out.

They launch the bomb out the cargo door and watch as it jets away. Kim and Merrity argue about the bomb yet again. Suddenly, the bomb turns around and floats back to their ship with failed jets. If they start the rockets, the bomb may explode. They try anyway, and the bomb doesn’t explode, but it does stay magnetically attached to the ship.

Mike puts on a space suit and goes outside to release the bomb manually. They can’t possibly land with the bomb, as it’ll destroy a huge area of the Earth. If they don’t the bomb’s going off at nine o’clock either way. He pushes the bomb away, but it floats right back again.

The men on Earth debate what to do, since the bomb can’t be defused or deactivated. They decide the crew will just have to stay with the bomb when it blows up.

Aboard the ship, Professor Merrity goes berserk and tries to take over, but they get control of him pretty quickly.

The Americans have a new experimental jet that might be able to reach the ship, but time is tight. It’s not so tight that Mike and Kim can’t squeeze in a kiss.

Merrity and Lefty go back outside to fiddle with the bomb some more– without permission. They can’t disarm the bomb, but they grab the bomb and use their jetpacks to push the bomb far away, giving the others a chance to escape. They blast the rockets and head back down to Earth.

Up in orbit, the bomb explodes, and it’s a biggie. The end.

Brian’s Commentary

There are lots of shots of jet planes flying, landing, and taxiing around; this was all still new in the 50s, and it was interesting to audiences of the time, I guess. Surprisingly, it doesn’t feel like stock footage, which was pretty common for this kind of film. This was also Britain’s first color sci-fi film.

The sets are good, the acting is fine, and the special effects are decent for the 50s. There are both pro- and anti-science and war opinions given, and overall, there’s a lot of talk.

It’s a little dull, actually.

Kevin’s Commentary

The real technology of the time, combined with the science fiction tech, was pretty cool.

I never knew that before Miss Moneypenny worked for the secret service, she had a career as a reporter.

I wasn’t bored, but it did drag in places, and the pacing isn’t continuously lively. I don’t regret watching it, but it’s not a classic worth a repeat viewing.

1956 World Without End

* Directed by: Edward Bernds

* Written by: Edward Bernds

* Stars: Hugh Marlowe, Nancy Gates, Nelson Leigh

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 20 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

What starts out as a manned mission to orbit Mars takes an unexpected turn when the craft goes through a time warp and they’re propelled into the year 2508 where Earth is populated by mutants and very few normal humans. But it’s really science fiction, not much horror. For such a short film, they fit a lot into it as far as storytelling. The effects and so forth are very dated, but it’s fun and entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open with an atomic explosion and credits roll.

XRM has lost contact, and the men at the Pentagon are concerned. Henry Jaffe’s last report was cut off in mid-transmission, but we soon see him and the other men on their spaceship– they have lost contact as well. John, the captain, wishes they could land on Mars, but that’s not the mission. They set course to return to Earth after successfully orbiting Mars, and we watch as the ship accelerates. John, Henry, Doc, and Herb all sit up and watch Mars fade into the background– BOOM! Suddenly, there’s an explosion, and everything gets crazy.

Everyone passes out, and when they wake up, they’ve already landed. It’s clearly not Mars, and the gravity seems normal, so they go outside. The radiation level is three times what the Earth’s should be; they were at a crazy speed, so they could be anywhere. Hank has a family back home, and he’s whiny about getting back to them.

They find a cave with giant spiders inside– good thing they brought pistols. They’re surprised, but no one gets hurt. They move on and camp for the night. We see that they’re being watched by what appear to be cavemen. The one-eyed cyclopean cavemen attack in the night, but the pistols again come in handy.

Then they come to a graveyard with tombstones in English. Some of the dates end with 2188, so this is actually Earth in the future. Doc says that if you go fast enough, time slows down, so they seem to have proven that to be true. An atomic war in 2188 would account for the radiation levels. Those one-eyed monsters must be what remains of humanity. What other monsters might exist here?

The cavemen attack in numbers this time, and the four men hide in a cave. In the back of the cave is a super-hard metal door that opens to a clean-looking hallway. The group is taken to a council of humans led by Timmek. The people know all about space-time warps being possible, or at least they did before the big atomic war. Timmek explains that it’s 2508 AD now. Timmek’s daughter, Garnet, leads them to a nice dinner.

Garnet explains about Deena, the daughter of the mutants outside, but she wasn’t born deformed. She escaped, and the underground community took her in.

It soon becomes clear that these people are cowardly pacifists - or at least very complacent and content, afraid to go to the surface or reclaim the planet, even though they are technologically capable. Meanwhile, John gets cozy with Garnet. Mories, one of the leaders, likes Garnet and is jealous of John already. All the women seem to be really interested in the strong, virile men from the past.

Mories makes up some stories about the men from the past planning a coup and taking over, and Timmek falls for it. John asks Timmek to give them weapons and supplies to retake the surface, but Timmek suspects they have bad intentions. Timmek refuses to make them the weapons.

Mories takes the men’s pistols, kills James in the process, and hides them to frame the men for killing James. The four outsiders are taken into custody and put on trial. Timmek banishes them back to the surface. Deena knows the truth, but Mories attacks her, too. She tells Timmek about Mories before passing out. Mories runs outside, where he’s quickly killed by the Mutates.

Timmek realizes mistake and orders his people to assist the four men with retaking the surface. The weapons they make aren’t very good, so Hank comes up with the idea of making a bazooka.

The four men go outside, alone, armed with a single rocket launcher. The Mutates are terrified of the big noisy thing. Turns out, some of the people outside aren’t mutants, but normal people enslaved by the Mutates. Deena joins them to help translate, but in the next attack, Hank gets a spear in the back, but he’ll be okay. Naga, the mutant leader, threatens to kill his normal-hostages.

John challenges Naga to an axe-to-axe fight. John is smart and has two eyes, so he wins fairly easily. John is now the “chief” of the mutates and orders the release of the slaves and hostages.

Within a few months, the underground people come up to live with the human-looking ex-slaves, who are learning English. The underground children are thriving in the outdoors. Maybe the human race will survive after all!

Brian’s Commentary

The plot borrows a lot from “The Time Machine,” and was actually sued by the Estate of H.G. Wells for infringement. One of the cast, Rod Taylor, eventually starred in the film version of “The Time Machine” (1960). The time-traveling spaceship was a newer idea, as this film predates “The Planet of the Apes” book by several years. It was also an obvious visual influence for “Star Trek,” which was also several years off.

There’s not much horror here beyond oversized spiders and one-eyed mutants, but overall, it was pretty good.

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s no Planet of the Apes, but the concept is the same. A group of astronauts end up on Earth of the future. There’s no doubt this influenced that story as well as Star Trek the original series and many other science fiction movies and shows of the late 1950s and 1960s. For only an hour and 20 minutes, a lot happens in it. And I learned a new word, “palavering.” I’d never seen this one before, and I’m glad I did. It was quite entertaining.

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Mainstream Films:

2026 Mercy

* Directed by: Timur Bekmambetov

* Written by: Marco van Belle

* Stars: Chris Pratt, Rebecca Ferguson, Kali Reis, Annabelle Wallis, Chris Sullivan, Kylie Rogers

* Run Time: 100 minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

In the near future, a detective stands trial accused of murdering his wife. He has 90 minutes to prove his innocence to the advanced A.I. Judge he once championed, before it determines his fate. Chris Pratt and Rebecca Ferguson star in the high-tech action-thriller Mercy. Own it now on 4K, Blu-ray™ and DVD.

The technology is believable, but it is a stretch to think it will be that advanced only three years from now, in 2029. There’s some suspense, with an arbitrary running clock, and a mystery being solved. It’s a science fiction thriller, certainly not horror, but the Horror Guys did their duty. We both thought it was interesting, pretty entertaining, very well made, but not quite a solid film when you give it a lot of thought.

Spoilery Synopsis

Chris Raven wakes up strapped to a chair. We then cut to an ad talking about Los Angeles’s crime epidemic and the Mercy program, which judges criminals with AI as judge, jury, and executioner. Crime has fallen 69 percent. Chris is the next prisoner who is to be judged, case #19. Judge Maddox is the AI in charge of the case.

Chris is not sure why he’s there, and she explains that he’s being tried for the murder of his own wife. He watches a video where his dying wife says he was the one who stabbed her. He pleads “Not Guilty.” He has ninety minutes to prove his innocence or he’s going to be executed.

She recites the facts, and he says she’s lying. But she has a video to back up everything she says. He claims he doesn’t remember any of it. She replays scenes of their wedding, birth of their child, and lots of fighting and arguing. He uses his phone calls to talk to his daughter Britt and partner Jaq. With Jaq’s assistance, they all go over the crime scene and evidence.

Jaq traces a phone in downtown Hollywood, which is a riotous wasteland now. She chases a sketchy chef across the rooftop and questions him. He’d been having an affair with Nicole, and they used burner phones for privacy. He also has a video alibi for the time of the murder.

We get more video that shows us Chris’s partner’s death, which was partially Chris’s fault.

He calls the affair partner again, and he has some information about Nicole’s job, maybe doing some shady stuff. There was a BBQ at Chris’s house last weekend, and it’s possible that one of the guests stayed over and hid in the basement. Could it be Nicole’s co-worker Holt, who may have been stealing UG chemicals, an ingredient in meth, from work.

Chris calls Holt, who says Rob, Chris’s AA sponsor, may have put him up to all of it. Rob was off yesterday, so he has no alibi for the murder. At this point, it seems that Chris is really on to something, so you’d expect that the judge would pause the countdown timer, but no. Instead, the judge starts stuttering and showing issues.

A search of Rob’s house shows a lab and lots of evidence that he might be making explosives, not meth. He’s got a whole container truck full of explosives, so he’s heading toward something big. Turns out, Rob’s secret brother was David Webb, the first man Chris brought to Mercy for execution. Rob’s also got Britt in the cab with him as a hostage. This is all a crazy revenge plot against Chris and Mercy, he wants to take them both out.

The judge admits her logic has failed her and Chris is innocent. He tries to talk her into helping him stop Rob. Chris and the judge work together with the police to stop Rob’s truck, which is quickly approaching the Mercy building.

The judge releases Chris, who runs downstairs to confront Rob personally. The judge offers Rob a chance to prove his dead brother’s innocence. Chris gets the drop on Rob, but at the last minute, Jaq comes in and kills him. Turns out, Jaq was behind David Webb’s false verdict and shot at Rob to cover it all up so that Mercy would be seen as a success.

Jaq is arrested, and the trial ends.

Brian’s Commentary

There’s a lot going on here with “the surveillance state” and tracking of people and devices that aren’t too far from reality, although I doubt we’ll be that far along in 2029 (the date on the videos). I think the whole idea of phoning people to testify in court is unlikely; I hang up on 80% of the phone calls I get.

There’s no follow-up to explain how it all worked out. The trial is over, and Mercy’s first verdict was discredited, but did that really change anything?

None of the characters, especially Chris, are likeable or particularly interesting. I thought the first hour was really pretty dull, although once Chris starts tracking down the real killer, it picks up quite a bit. I suspect this is one that the more I think about it, the more it’s going to fall apart.

Kevin’s Commentary

Yeah, I don’t see us being that advanced or apocalyptic in 2029, three years from now.

I spent most of the movie wondering if Jessica Ferguson as Judge Maddox was benign and neutral.

I was finding it pretty tedious for the first half hour, but I warmed to it as the story progressed. It does get moving and more interesting. The counting timer was really just a plot device to create suspense, arbitrary and no reason it couldn’t have been longer or extended as needed.

They lost me a bit at the end when Rob drove his truck into the building but didn’t immediately detonate it so Chris and the Judge had a chance to stop him. But that allowed for another twist at the end and wrap up. Overall, I’d say I was entertained, but I wouldn’t call it great.

1976 Squirm

* Directed by: Jeff Lieberman

* Written by: Jeff Lieberman

* Stars: Don Scardino, Patricia Pearcy, R.A. Dow

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 32 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Powerlines serving a small town are knocked down in a storm. They zap the ground and drive the local worm population into a carnivorous rage. It’s kind of slow-moving but it’s pretty good, building as it goes along.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re told that in 1975, an electrical storm knocked down a bunch of power lines that sent hundreds of thousands of volts into the muddy ground. This resulted in some weirdness, and this is that story…

We watch as the wires spark into the ground and lightning happens as credits roll. The next day, the rain stops, and we watch Geri take a shower as Roger works in the garden. Naomi, Alma, and Geri talk about the bridge being washed out, and they hear about the downed power lines on the radio.

Geri’s boyfriend, Mick, gets off the bus, since the road is blocked, and walks the rest of the way to Naomi’s truck. They stop at the store, and Mick gets a weird drink as he listens to the locals talk about the storm. Mick finds a worm in his drink. The waitress and the sheriff think he put the worm in the glass. He’s not from around here, and they all know it.

Willie and Roger, who run the worm farm, talk about all their escaped worms. Willie is not pleased, and Mick sorta gets blamed for that as well. Geri explains that the worms around here bite, and Mick admits he’s got worm-o-phobia.

Geri and Mick find a dead body, or at least a skeleton, picked clean. They bring in the sheriff, who really doesn’t like Mick, to see, but the skeleton is gone when they get back.

Back at the house, Mick and Alma smoke some pot and talk about the area; he’s got poison ivy. Later, they find another skeleton in the back of Roger’s truck– or maybe it’s the same one, they all look alike.

Roger takes Geri and Mick out on his boat fishing, and Mick doesn’t want to put the worm on his hook. Roger says he hates worms too. The worm bites Mick. Roger tells a story about how worms like electricity and how they bit off his thumb when they were little.

Mick gets off the boat to investigate the skeleton some more, leaving Geri alone with Roger. Mick steals the skull while Roger tries to show Geri his worm. Roger, in turn, gets a face full of carnivorous worms.

Mick and Alma break into the dentist’s office to try to identify the skull. Afterwards, they go back to the worm farm and find Willie’s body, now dead as well. As before, the sheriff ignores them.

Then everyone stops and has an awkward dinner. Naomi wonders why Roger didn’t come to dinner, and she’s weird about it. Suddenly, a random tree falls through the house. Turns out, a billion worms were under the tree and ate the roots.

Roger attacks Mick in the woods, and he’s a mess now. Alma wants to take a shower and accidentally fills the tub with worms. No, the whole ROOM is full of worms that spill out when she opens the door.

The sheriff and his girlfriend realize that worms exist. The worms also attack Quigley’s bar and everyone inside.

Mick returns to the house and finds a sea of worms, as well as Naomi’s body. Roger attacks again, but gets thrown into the worms and is quickly devoured. Mick and Geri climb down a tree to get out of the house.

In the morning, the power guy shows up to report that the power lines are back up, but no one in town’s answering the telephone. We see that Alma hid in a chest until the worms had gone, so she’s OK. It’s all over now… or is it?

Brian’s Commentary

What’s an egg cream?

This one is full of weird characters, and the actors mostly lean into the silliness. The number of worms used here was insane, literally causing a worm shortage since they bought all of them.

I’m not quite sure what was wrong with Naomi, the mother, who was weird and scared throughout the movie, even though she had no idea what was going on until the end. Half the house was crushed, and Mick had to walk half a mile through the woods to find a board for the window?

It’s pretty formulaic, but the humor helps. I was entertained.

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s said they used so many worms for this movie that it caused a shortage for fishermen. There are indeed mass quantities in this movie.

This is another one that I saw when it came out at the theater in 1976, and it was scarier then. It was still pretty good and entertaining though seeing it again today.

1972 Frogs

* Directed by: George McCowan

* Written by: Robert Hutchison, Robert Blees

* Stars: Ray Milland, Sam Elliott, Joan Van Ark

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 31 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A rich family, and a young pre-mustache Sam Elliot, gather on an estate on an isolated swampy island for a birthday and Fourth of July celebration. The body count rises as nature rises up and attacks, including the frogs, who mostly sit around watching. There are plenty of attacks, but it’s still on the tame side, and the ending is very abrupt. It’s just okay.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a man, Pickett Smith, in a canoe, taking photos of wildlife, as credits roll. He starts out with frogs and lizards but soon gets distracted by all the floating garbage in the water.

We then cut to Clint Crockett and his sister, Karen, speeding around in circles in their high-powered speedboat. Clint’s busy drinking and driving when he nearly runs over Smith’s canoe. They at least stop and pick him up afterward and tow him to shore; Smith loses his camera and all his stuff in the process.

On shore, old man Jason watches it all with his binoculars and sends Stuart to find out what’s going on. Clint and Karen invite Smith to stay around and join in their party games this afternoon. We see many frogs around the place. Jason is combative about the photography, but the conversation soon turns towards the huge frogs on the island.

We soon get to meet the rest of the weird family. Jason is a bossy old fart, and all the others obey, since he’s the rich one. Again, they all complain about the growing frog population. Jason wants Smith to tour the island and give his expert opinion on the frog problems.

Smith does take a walk through the island woods and notices that poison has been used; there’s lots of dead birds, lizards, and other animals beyond just the frogs. He also finds Jason’s handyman, Grover, dead and covered in snakes.

Night falls, and Maybelle and Bella talk about the crazy white family. Smith returns to the big house but doesn’t say anything about finding the body; the phone is out. We see that there’s a big snake in the dining room, and Jason shoots it with his pistol. Smith does eventually tell Jason about the body.

Jason and Smith talk about living in harmony with nature; what if nature is trying to get back at them? Clint and Jenny argue about getting the old man’s money when he dies. Karen and Smith get closer.

The next morning, it’s the Fourth of July, and the family celebrates and argues. Michael goes out to see why the phone lines are down and shoots himself in the leg by mistake. As he lies there, he’s killed by spiders… and grass? Kenneth goes into the greenhouse and dies when some lizards mix up poison gas from the chemicals stored there. Meanwhile, Jason insists the family is going to have fun today, no matter what!

Smith finds Kenneth and reports to the family, which actually does interrupt the party. Meanwhile, Iris is killed by poisonous snakes and leeches while she’s out looking for butterflies; Stuart, on the other hand, comes face to face with a crocodile.

Back at the house, Jason goes back to insisting on the party, even regardless of the deaths. Smith points out that the phones are still down and there hasn’t been a boat on the lake all day– could this be happening everywhere? The servants and Bella want to leave, so Clint takes them to the boat and back to the mainland. The place is deserted; it’s happening here too. Clint never makes it back to the island. A giant turtle eats Jenny.

Karen and the kids want to leave, and Smith is in agreement. Jason, on the other hand, thinks they’re all out to get him and insists on staying home, alone. The group hops into Smith’s canoe and sets off, barely escaping a bunch of snakes.

The group makes it to shore and takes the same route the servants did. They find the servants’ luggage, but not the bodies– something got them. Smith flags down a car, and they all get in for a ride. The woman complains that she’s been driving for three hours and hasn’t seen a single person on the road.

Back on the island, Jason plays patriotic music as the frogs break the windows and get inside. Alone, he starts to realize he’s made a mistake in staying, but it’s too late.

Brian’s Commentary

Yay, Florida!

This was the first of many “Eco Horror” movies of the 70s. It was Sam Elliotts’s first starring role and Joan Van Ark’s first film. Most of the live frogs used in the film eventually escaped into the wilderness.

There’s a lot more going on here than just killer frogs, as all the wildlife on the island has turned hostile. Actually, the frogs never hurt anyone, as they seem to more the brains of the operation. Most of the deaths happen just after the camera cuts away, as it’d be nearly impossible to make a fatal turtle attack look realistic.

Kevin’s Commentary

I saw this one when it came out, and it freaked me out at the time. It’s less scary seeing it a second time as an adult. I’d forgotten it wasn’t just the frogs rising up but other critters as well.

They did the best they could with the budget they had, and the practicality of having normally harmless creatures causing fatal harm, but it’s really not a great movie. It was fairly entertaining, but just middling.

1977 Kingdom of the Spiders

* Directed by: John Bud Cardos

* Written by: Richard Robinson, Alan Laillou, Jeffrey M Sneller

* Stars: William Shatner, Tiffany Bolling, Woody Strode

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 37 Minutes

* Watch it:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Masses of scary, hairy tarantulas invade an Arizona farm town, and things gradually turn deadly as they step up their attacks. William Shatner, as the town veterinarian, takes the lead as things get overly dramatically worse. The movie gets made fun of quite a bit, and it might deserve it some, but they do try to take it seriously. It’s a pretty entertaining creature feature.

Spoilery Synopsis

We see lots of Arizona desert footage as the country-music-themed credits roll.

A couple admire their soon-to-be prizewinning cow out in the pasture. The cow, on the other hand, doesn’t see the vicious predators sneaking up on him…

We cut to Dr. Rack Hansen, out riding his horse doing cowboy things only with more injections. He then ropes in Terry for some hanky panky until she calls him, “John,” which is his dead brother’s name.

Rack soon gets a call from Walt, the owner of that cow we saw attacked. The calf soon dies, and Rack can’t really explain it– but he does send some blood samples to the lab. He stops at the service station, where the man inside digs through his stock of old tires and gets bitten by a spider.

Diane arrives in town and rents a cabin from Emma, who mentions that the big annual festival is coming up real soon now.

The mayor visits Rack about the quarantine at Walt’s place. He doesn’t want to panic people at the big festival in a few weeks and wants to cover it all up. Diane arrives and explains that she’s an entomologist from the university. She says the calf died from a massive dose of spider venom.

Back at the cabin, Diane and Emma meet a family of tourists. Later, in her cabin, we see a spider crawling around. She finds the spider and lets him outside.

Rack and Diane go to Walt’s farm and find Walt’s dog is also dead from venom. Walt knows all about spiders, as there’s a huge spider hill on his property. Diane explains that most spiders aren’t susceptible to poison; then they go out to dinner and talk about Women’s Lib.

Diane suggests that the spiders are readjusting their waiting habits because of the changing environment. Spiders are usually cannibalistic, but now, they’re working together to find prey. Maybe they should burn the mound?

Diane and Rack head over to Walt’s again, and Walt’s already got the gas can ready. They find a huge bull covered in spiders. Walt sets the spider-hill on fire, but it’s just the surface of the hill, so all the spiders simply hide.

Rack takes Diane to meet Terry, and Terry takes it badly. They go on a picnic, and the little girl doesn’t see the spiders approaching and narrowly escapes getting eaten.

Walt, on the other hand, decides to see a doctor to fix up his spider-bitten hand. He doesn’t see the spiders in the back seat until they’re crawling all over him and crashes over a cliff.

The sheriff calls, and he’s found 20 or 30 more spider mounds. Diane calls the mayor stupid, so that doesn’t win him over. He insists on using pesticides, which Diane insists will only make things worse.

The crop duster man takes off with a tank full of nasty pesticides. He, like Walt, doesn’t check the cockpit first. He freaks out and crashes into the gas station. Meanwhile, Walt’s wife is killed by spiders as is Terry. Rack shows up in time to rescue Linda, but Terry’s toast.

Rack, Diane, and Linda head to Emma’s lodge and get Emma to hole up there as the tarantulas assemble outside. The phones are out, since the old-style operator has been killed. We see the spiders sneaking in through the air vents.

The whole place is surrounded by uncountable spiders, and they keep finding a way inside.

Meanwhile, the sheriff drives to town, and that state fair isn’t going to happen; people are dying in droves and it’s pandemonium.

Back at the lodge, things are getting worse, as the power goes out. Rack goes into the basement to fix the fuse and gets bitten several times.

Morning comes and Rack wants to look outside. They get the radio working, and there’s no mention of spiders. Rack uncovers a window and looks outside. The whole town is buried inside webbing. It is now… the Kingdom of the Spiders!

Brian’s Commentary

They used a lot of real spiders in this one, and quite a few got squished for real. Everything is explained clearly, and it mostly more or less makes sense. The acting is mostly good, but we’re here to see spiders killing people, so does that really matter?

Of this genre of killer insect movies, this is one of the better ones.

Kevin’s Commentary

The 70s music in this one is fun. I chuckled seeing the trope of a mayor not wanting any scare or quarantine that might interfere with the annual fair, the town’s big tourist event.

Trivia points out this movie doesn’t have the disclaimer that no animals were harmed or killed in the making of this movie. And William Shatner said in a biography it was distressing how many of the spiders were killed during filming, hearing them crunch under car tires specifically. $50,000 of the movie budget went toward acquiring 5,000 spiders at $10 each.

The attacks were a little silly looking at times as people didn’t just brush or pick the spiders off while screaming and flailing about, but overall it was pretty grim and serious. It’s more entertaining than not.

2006 The Hills Have Eyes

* Directed by: Alexandre Aja

* Written by: Alexandre Aja, Grégory Levasseur

* Stars: Aaron Stanford, Kathleen Quinlan, Vinessa Shaw, Emilie de Ravin, Dan Byrd, Robert Joy, Ted Levine

* Run Time: 1h 47m (Theatrical); 1h 48m (Unrated)

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A family traveling through the New Mexico desert runs into a clan/family of cannibalistic mutants and misfits. This is a remake of the 1977 film by the same name, and follows the original pretty closely but set in 2006. It’s grim and gruesome and suspenseful. We both thought it was really good, a very good remake.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re told that between 1945 and 1962, the US conducted a whole bunch of nuclear tests and have since denied that any genetic defects were caused by those tests.

We cut to some scientists checking out a radioactive place in the New Mexico desert. A man runs out of nowhere and asks for help, but a big bald man comes out of nowhere and kills them all. Credits roll.

The gas station attendant grabs his shotgun and starts calling out for Ruby, who is nowhere to be found. He finds a bag of stolen goods on his doorstep, along with a severed ear, and screams, “I can’t do this anymore!” An RV drives up containing a big family that really doesn’t want to be there. Big Bob, Ethel, Bobby, Brenda, Lynn, and Doug are on a long road trip for their anniversary. Lynn sees the bag of loot, and suddenly the attendant recommends that the family take a “shortcut” through the desert.

The family drives over some tire spikes and crashes way out in the middle of nowhere. They all argue about whose fault this all is for a while. Bob and Doug decide they need to walk back to civilization, but first, we get to know all the characters a bit as they stop and pray. We see that someone out in the hills is watching them. The two German Shepherds know something’s up, but no one listens to them.

Beauty, the dog, runs away, and Bobby goes after her into the hills. He soon finds the dog, dead, and then falls off a cliff. Doug, on the other hand, finds a whole bunch of cars abandoned in a crater. We zoom in through the crater and see a suspicious-looking mine shaft…

Big Bob finally makes it back to the gas station, but the attendant isn’t there. Someone else is stalking around outside. He goes inside and snoops around until he finds the severed ear, then he draws his gun. He reads newspaper clippings about nuclear tests in a nearby mining town. There are photos of mutated children as well. He finds the attendant, but the man shoots himself before he can answer any questions. The people in the dark soon kidnap Bob and wheel him into the mine shaft.

Brenda, Lynn, and Ethel find Bobby and patch him up. Bobby knows there’s something bad outside, but he never really saw anything specific. Beast, the second dog, gets off his chain just about the time that Doug returns. Everyone shuts up the camper and goes to sleep.

It’s all very relaxing until someone throws Big Bob on the bonfire. As the family runs out to see Bob, two mutants, Pluto and Lizard, come into the camper, where Brenda is asleep, and do bad things to her. Ethel walks in, and they just shoot her– and Lynn.

Beast the dog is still alive and kills Goggle, one of the mutants we haven’t seen before. He brings Goggle’s arm and radio to the camper, where Doug hears the bad guys talking.

In the morning, Beast leads Doug to the mine shaft, and they go inside looking for the baby. Back at the camper, Brenda and Bobby work on setting up some booby-traps.

Doug continues on and finds one of those old atomic testing mockup towns, completely abandoned. Inside one of the houses, he hears the baby crying and goes inside, where he’s quickly captured. He gets loose and runs into a mutant with a giant head who explains what’s going on. There’s lots of hiding and fight, and Doug eventually stabs Pluto, which barely slows him down. Doug loses some fingers to Pluto’s axe. Doug eventually gets the best of the mutant and kills him.

Ruby, the girl mutant, has taken the baby, but Doug has killed all the tough mutants by this point. Lizard comes in to kill the baby, but Ruby steals it away from him as well and runs off into the hills.

Back at the camper, Bobby’s early warning system pays off. No, it was a distraction while the mutants stole Ethel and Lynn’s bodies. Bobby and the mutants’ leader, Papa Jupiter, have a chase that leads to Jupiter going boom in a gas explosion.

Doug catches up to Ruby and tries to take the baby back from her. Lizard jumps down and attacks him. This goes very badly for Doug, but he doesn’t die. Doug gets back up and finally becomes a badass, shooting Lizard repeatedly. Ruby then gives the baby back to Doug. In a final horror-movie trope, Lizard gets back up and points the shotgun at them, but Ruby tackles him, and they both go over the cliff.

Bobby and Brenda finish off Jupiter and spot Doug, Beast, and the baby walking back to them. The camera pulls back, and we see that someone’s still watching them, and they’re still stuck in the desert, only now with no camper or supplies at all…

Brian’s Commentary

This is a remake of 1977’s “The Hills Have Eyes.” It’s not a sequel, but a remake. It’s shot in a more modern style, looks much nicer, but is almost word-for-word the same story. There are a few differences in the way it all plays out, but it’s almost the same.

The mutants’ makeup effects are much better than the original, but they really should have fit in Michael Berryman in some way.

It was good. Not as nasty and gritty as the original, and much more polished. Still, it was well done.

Kevin’s Commentary

It did not have a happy ending exactly, but it was a win for the survivors, and he did rescue his baby. And then what happens next, I wondered, out in the middle of a desert with no water, no food, no transportation.

I don’t know how necessary this remake was, but it was very well done. It was a good watch.

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2026 Scream 7

* Directed by: Kevin Williamson

* Written by: Kevin Williamson, Guy Busick

* Stars: Neve Campbell, Isabel May, Jasmin Savoy Brown, Mason Gooding, Anna Camp, David Arquette, Matthew Lillard, Courteney Cox

* Run Time: 1h 54m

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Years have passed, Sydney has a new town, new home, new job, a cop husband, and a teenage daughter in her 20s. Things are idyllic in the affluent area until, of course, the killings start again. And the who-is-doing-it begins again. It’s very well put together with a strong cast, but we didn’t feel like it was much different than the rest of the series. If you’re a Scream fan, you’ll probably like this one too. If you’re tired of the Scream movies, there’s not much reason to see this one.

Spoilery Synopsis

A couple of influencers arrive at the “Stab” house. It’s a murder house based on the movie series, which was also based on the real-life murders. Numerous murders happened here, but now it’s a themed-BNB museum, with body outlines on the floor and everything. They soon come across an animatronic Ghostface and a shrine to Stu, who legend says is still alive. Scott and Madison get “the” phone call about scary movies, which is a put on for part of the tourist experience. The whole trip goes very badly after that. Credits roll.

Ben crawls through his girlfriend Tatum’s bedroom window and points out that it’s just like in the first “Stab” movie. Turns out, it’s Sydney’s house, and she’s wise to his tricks. Her husband, Mark, knows all about Sydney’s past.

We spend a while meeting all of Tatum’s friends. Lucas wants to start a podcast about Sydney’s story. They’re all involved in an unrealistically elaborate school play for the theater club. Sydney still gets calls from the Woodsboro killer, but she doesn’t believe it’s really him. The killer Facetimes her, and she immediately recognizes that it’s Stu. He threatens to do something to Tatum at the theater, so Sydney gets the whole police force involved.

Ghostface kills a girl on stage, but then Sydney shows up and starts blasting. Tatum turns out to be fine, but two of her friends are killed. Mark, a policeman, swears that Stu is really dead. Ben is a computer whiz, and he could have AI-deepfaked that video of Stu, so he’s Sydney’s main suspect.

As Sydney and Tatum argue about leaving town, the killer pops out of the attic, inside the house. They hide in a safe room, but they both decide to sneak out to see how Mark is doing. There’s a lot of cat-and-mouse, but eventually, the killer is run over by Gale, who shows up out of the blue. They pull off the killer’s mask, and no one knows who that guy is. After a bit, we hear that he’s a former mental patient with no connection to anyone. “There’s always more than one,” Sydney points out. Sydney and Gale immediately turn their suspicions on Lucas.

Stu calls, and this time, he gets Gale. Gale and Sydney go to the mental hospital to research the now-dead killer, Karl. They show the orderly Stu’s photo, and the man recognizes him as a John Doe patient who spent a lot of years there. He was released two weeks ago. Stu and Karl were close friends.

Mindy and Chad, Gale’s intern camera people, talk to Tatum and discuss their suspicions. They talk about how horror-cliched it is that no one recognized Stu after all these years. They say it’s all about nostalgia and old movie franchises.

Meanwhile, Ghostface kills Mark. Gale interviews Sydney on TV to draw out the killer. He does call, and he’s right outside where all the kids are. Sydney calls Mark, who doesn’t answer because he’s already dead. Meanwhile, Tatum finds an AI-deepfake that Ben made and smashes his face thinking he’s involved, but there’s still another Ghostface out there. Inside, Mindy points out that they are locked inside and all their suspects have conveniently disappeared. Lucas, Chloe, Mindy, and Chad all die in rapid succession.

Tatum, on the other hand, is being chased through town by Ghostface. And since there’s been a curfew established, no one is in the entire downtown to help. Ben shows up and proves that he’s not the killer– by dying. Sydney and Tatum text each other but don’t call 911. Sydney talks to Tatum about how to use a gun and to shoot through the wall where the killer is standing. As usual with a horror movie, that doesn’t kill him. On the other hand, a second Ghostface shows up and they both get her.

Sydney runs home and confronts Sydney; “Stu” unmasks himself on screen, and turns into various dead characters we’ve seen before. Eventually, we see that it’s actually the hospital worker from the asylum. Mark is there, only mostly dead, with the other Ghostface, who is Jessica, the next door neighbor and Lucas’s mother. They talk about Sydney being a scream queen and final girl.

Mark secretly cuts Tatum loose, and they turn the tables on the baddie, but only briefly. Sydney’s had enough and stabs the Hell out of Jessica, and then Tatum shoots Jessica, but not in the head. Then she does, repeatedly.

Gale shows up, along with not-dead Chad and Mindy to report on the story.

Brian’s Commentary

I like that everyone suspected that the Stu calls were AI-faked; I’ve never seen anyone in a movie go down that route before.

We’re just spinning our wheels with this whole franchise at this point. There’s really not much new going on here. It’s well-made, highly budgeted, looks good, but there’s absolutely nothing new here.

Kevin’s Commentary

That was a very affluent high school.

There were some updates using current technology, but it just mostly seemed like more of the same. I can’t fault the quality. The cast, effects, sets, everything were top notch. But the Scream movies all kind of run together for me, and a little weariness is creeping in. Oh look, there’s more than one killer, and they have crazy reasons for taking over the Screamface persona. This didn’t do much to excite me.

2026 I Know Exactly How You Die

* Director: Alexandra Spieth

* Writers: Mike Corey (Screenplay)

* Stars: Rushabh Patel, Stephanie Hogan, Bobby Liga, Summer Hernandez, Zachary Leipert

* Runtime: 90 minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

When a horror writer working on a slasher story checks into a motel to get some work done on his book, the lines between reality and fiction start blurring. The problem he finds is that a writer can’t control every single thing in the world, and things get crazier as the story progresses. Who is really in charge? It’s got an ideal location where most of it takes place, the acting is good, the effects are effective, and it’s a clever script. We both thought it was quite good and entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

A man does laundry as another man comes in behind him and kills him excessively with a brick. Credits roll.

Rian, a writer, checks into a motel to self-isolate to get some work done. He tends to overshare and is a little bit of a creep. He gets to work writing his horror novel about Katie getting killed.

We watch as the real Katie parks her car at the very same motel and goes into a really sketchy restroom. A man comes in and has some kind of seizure, and she rescues him. She and Naja, the motel manager, watch a news report about Katie’s neighbor, who turned out to be a serial killer. Actually, she’s come to the motel to be away from the killer, who is still at large. As soon as she goes into her room, we see her stalker approaching the door with a brick…

Rian takes a break from his writing and goes outside to the indoor pool. As he swims, he thinks about Katie’s story some more. Someone steals his clothes, and then he’s attacked and kidnapped. No– he’s just dreaming, passed out on the pool room floor. Katie comes and helps him as well. Maybe that was all a dream.

Rian’s neighbors have sex 24/7, so he wants to change rooms. The new one is smaller and not as nice. He gets back to work. In another room, a woman is sick and doesn’t notice the killer breaking into her room. As the woman runs out of her room, Rian thinks he can actually hear her screams and looks out his window. He watches the woman be murdered out there, but then, when he goes outside, there’s no one else there. Could the story he’s been writing have come true?

Rian goes to Naja about the maybe-murder, and they look around the parking lot. Turns out, the woman is staying in the motel’s “haunted room,” where murders have happened before. The man who stayed there wrote down “his intrusive thoughts” and then killed his family. Rian thinks the motel makes written stories come true.

Rian tells his agent that he can “take control of my story.” Katie finds evidence that her stalker is in the area and tells Naja about it. She runs into Rian, who asks her if anything weird is going on. They find a room with the killer’s stuff in it and then hide as the stalker pounds on the door. They both find their cars sabotaged, so they can’t leave. It’s not long before they wind up in bed together.

Rian decides to “write them out of this” and gets back to work. He writes the scene we already saw with the laundry guy getting killed. He also kills the other woman we’ve seen in a nearby room. Katie finds another note, along with a bloody brick. Rian and Katie find the murderer’s room, but it’s got more victims than Rian’s story, so he loses confidence that he’s the one really in charge. The story is now writing itself.

As Rian rants to Naja and ends up restraining her in the closet. The serial killer gets her shortly afterward. Katie looks at Rian’s computer and reads the story, which is all about her. Rian tries to explain the story-thing to Katie, and she thinks he’s insane.

Rian writes that the stalker catches and sedates Katie. He then writes that the hero, Rian, storms in and saves the day. In the real world, the stalker grabs and strangles Rian.

The killer has filled a bathtub full of his victims’ blood and wants Katie to soak in it. This goes badly for the killer.

Rian finishes typing his story, but then she injects him with the same sedative the stalker used. Then she sprays him with bear spray. He put her through a lot, and she wants revenge…

Brian’s Commentary

There’s some CGI gore that’s pretty cheap-looking, but otherwise, the characters and situations are interesting and well done. This was all shot in and around a cheap motel, so they didn’t spend much on sets, which was smart on their part.

It was definitely confusing in a few parts, but it all resolves well. I liked it.

Kevin’s Commentary

I was especially impressed with the clever script. Rian does his best to write and manage his story. But there are a lot of details and free will and things happening in the background of a book, and Rian finds out there’s no way to control it all.

All the other aspects of it got the job done. I thought it was an entertaining piece.

2026 Night Patrol

* Director: Ryan Prows

* Writers: Tim Cairo, Jake Gibson, Shaye Ogbonna, Ryan Prows

* Stars: Justin Long, Jermaine Fowler, RJ Cyler, Dermot Mulroney, Freddie Gibbs, CM Punk, YG, Flying Lotus, Jon Oswald, and Nicki Micheaux

* Runtime: 1 Hour, 43 Minutes

* Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

An L.A. cop is hot to get on the special Night Patrol section, and when he does he finds out they are indeed very special. It takes a little too long to get to anything that’s supernatural or even really horror, but once it does it goes full tilt. We went into it blind, but there are plenty of hints that it’s a vampire movie starting with the fangs on the poster. It’s a unique take on the genre, dealing with class and race. We both thought it was on the long side with a weak start, but good overall.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a man in a police interrogation room, and he’s got a knife stuck in his side. A cop walks in and makes him sign a paper before he can get medical attention.

We cut to the same guy on a bicycle, painted with “Cripboy” on the side, who meets a woman in a car under a bridge. He gives her a ring and says it was his mom’s. She doesn’t want to get too close to him because of his gang affiliation. Suddenly, a police car shows up behind them and makes them both get out of the car for a search. Ethan gets out of the back of the police car and executes the girl. The guy makes a run for it, but when the cops see his ring, they back off and let him go. Credits roll.

We cut to Ethan, in uniform, talking about being a cop and “bad apples” to a bunch of kids. Suddenly, a gang member comes into the room, shoots Ethan, and terrorizes the class. No– it’s all just part of the show; the “gang member” was his partner, Xavier Carr, in a mask. We follow along with them on a few runs. Xavier used to be a Crip, but now he’s a cop.

Ethan asks Carr about a bicycle with “Cripboy” painted on it, and it might be Carr’s brother. He calls his brother, Wazi, who is the guy who ran into trouble last night. Afterwards, Wazi goes to see Bornelius, another gang guy, to tell him about the cops shooting Bornelius’s sister, Primo. They’ve all heard about “The Night Patrol,” and what they do.

The group goes to the scene of the shooting and finds pieces of the dead girl. Bornelius says there’s demonic energy in this place. They all talk about various conspiracies.

Ethan tells Carr that he’s gotten into the Night Patrol, but they’re all white guys, so Carr isn’t going to be invited.

Wazi goes home and argues with his mother, who gets angry over the ring. He tells her about what happened to Primo last night. She knows all about Night Patrol, and they’re not good people.

We cut to Night Patrol, out executing black people. Carr talks about his whole family being Crips; his and Wazi’s mother is into all kinds of weird African Voodoo stuff, and Carr says she’s crazy. Ethan says his dad was Night Patrol and died because of it. Ethan wants answers, which is why he wanted into the Night Patrol.

Ethan goes off with the Night Patrol guy, Deputy, and he’s got lots of background on Ethan’s military experience. Sarge is in charge of the Night Patrol unit, and he wants Ethan in. He’s ordered Ethan to take Wazi’s brother’s bike home to him– and then shoot him. Wazi recognizes him as the cop who shot his girlfriend. Ethan comes out and tells the deputy that Wazi wasn’t home.

Ethan gets taken to see Sarge, who is the leader of Night Patrol– and also Ethan’s “dead” father. He’s been reborn, or so he says. Ethan knows his father is dead. He talks about “Death defeating Death.” Sarge cuts his own wrist and makes Ethan drink his blood. “Drink it and live forever.” Then Sarge shoots him four times.

Carr talks to his supervisor about getting into Night Patrol. He says he’s a better cop than Ethan, and it’s not fair. He’s told to “Prove it.” Carr gets a new partner, Rivetta, and he’s weird.

Wazi’s mother wants help fortifying the house against demons. The neighbors think she’s crazy, too. Wazi calls Carr about the murder he witnessed. At the meeting, Carr’s mother kills Rivetti, and her friends beat up Carr. Meanwhile, Bornelius’s group of Bloods arms up and gets ready for war.

Sarge gives a speech to the members of Night Patrol and wants them to show Ethan how it’s done. He commands dead-Ethan to “Rise. Learn how to use your gift.” Ethan then wakes up. Their plan is to clean up the whole Colonial Courts neighborhood. Bornelius comes to Wazi’s house and declares a cease-fire with his mother, Ayanda; they all want to beat the Night Patrol.

Carr wakes up and heads to Colonial Courts, meeting up with Ethan along the way. Ethan’s not feeling quite right, but goes along. The rest of the Night Patrol puts metal vampire-fangs into their mouths and start blasting. As they kill people, they drain them of blood and fill tanks with the stuff.

Ethan can’t help himself as he bites Carr on the neck and drinks his blood. Wazi sees all this, and Bornelius shoots Ethan in the back, but that doesn’t stop him. Wazi tells them that they’re dealing with vampires, not lizard people.

Deputy terrorizes the prisoners from the neighborhood.

Wazi and Bornelius are taken prisoner and taken to a bunker to be bled out. Ethan shows up and goes against Deputy. Wazi uses the opportunity to escape. Sarge talks to Ethan telepathically, and loses control of his own body. He’s forced to drink blood, but he’s soon staked through the heart. .

Ayanda explains the vampires to Bornelius and Wazi; this is an old African Zulu thing.

Ethan wakes up; the stake through the heart didn’t kill him. He goes to the tank of blood and gets supercharged.

Ayanda tells Wazi where to find her guided missiles before she dies, but all that’s in the box is a Zulu mask and spear. His ring glows green, so he decides to go with the Zulu magic.

Wazi comes out to fight the Night Patrol in full Zulu warrior outfit. He confronts Ethan, who decides to go full-evil at last. They fight, and it looks like it goes badly for Ethan.

We cut back to the interrogation room from the opening scene. Wazi’s been stabbed and needs help. He tells the captain about the vampires. The captain knows all about the vampires and takes him to Sarge. Wazi pulls out the dagger from his side and stabs Sarge in the head, causing him to explode. Now he’s gotta beat all the others…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s nearly an hour before anything supernatural is introduced. We went into this one blind, not even knowing what kind of monster we were dealing with.

It’s got lots of racial tension, gang tension, ACAV tension, and lots more. If you want “gangs vs vamps,” this is the movie for you.

Kevin’s Commentary

I liked that it was a unique take on vampires, tying it in with cops and the hood, class and racism. It took too long to get to the good stuff, and it started to feel long. Then the ending was abrupt, and it could have used more. I wish some of the beginning could have been trimmed back, and more action tacked on to the end.

2024 The Wailing

* Directed by: Pedro Martin-Calero

* Written by: Isabel Pena, Pedro Martin-Calero

* Stars: Ester Exposito, Mathilde Ollivier, Malena Villa

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 47 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

In different times and locations, an invisible entity that only shows up on film stalks and torments several young women. It looks really good, with skilled acting and direction, but the story and explanation is a little lacking. It moves slowly, mostly steadily, and then ends kind of abruptly. Neither of us found it very satisfying.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open up to a woman at a party. She meets a guy there and they go to a dance club. As the strobes come, she has some kind of attack.

We cut to a small family having dinner. The oldest girl, Andrea, asks if there’s any news, and the father says no.

Andrea, 2022

Andrea’s in the middle of some Facetime sex with a boyfriend when the power goes out. On the way home from school, she hears someone crying, but there’s no one around on the street. Her boyfriend, Pau, is in Sydney and having a good time without her. She sends him a selfie, and he says he sees someone else in the room with her. She looks at the video, and there is someone there behind her. It’s just her father… maybe.

Andrea’s father talks to her about her adoption process back in 1999. They all live in Madrid, but she’s from Argentina, which displeases her. Also, her birth mother is dead. When Andrea researches her mother, Marie, she reads that she was a murderer who killed her friend Camila.

She looks at videos on her phone, and a lot of them have someone dark and shadowy standing in the background, just out of sight. Pau wants her to come visit, and they talk over a video call. She sees someone dark standing behind him in the video. This time, the figure comes out and beats Paul to death right on camera as she watches.

She tells her friends, but no one really believes the man who only exists on the camera is real. She starts sleeping with her camera on. We watch as the creepy man lays down next to her as she sleeps.

Two months pass, and her parents are concerned about her phone addiction problem. Andrea thinks there is something about her birth mother, Maria, that no one is telling her.

Walking home at night with her friends, they all heard the wailing in front of that same building. This time, she goes inside to investigate. Andrea sorta remembers this building from Argentina. Something bad happens in the dark, and Andrea gets locked inside with “the man.”

Camila, 1998

We cut to Camila in a film class, and she’s the smart one in the room. This is Camila, in La Plata, in 1998. She takes a bulky video camera out into the world to film “something real.” She sees an interesting-looking girl and follows her around for a while. The girl turns out to be Marie. The teacher doesn’t like the resulting video.

While out shooting, she hears a wailing cry near a familiar-looking building. She sneaks back to film Marie some more, and this time, she sees the same creepy bald man that we saw in Andrea’s video. He shows up again in several of the previous videos that she hadn’t noticed before.

Camila goes to the dance club looking for Maria and they soon become friends and spend the night together. Maria says she’s cursed and thinks she’s going crazy. Camila finds a used pregnancy test in the trash. Marie’s father talks about her mother to Camila; crazy seems to run in the family, but he won’t get specific.

Camila shows the videos to Maria, and she doesn’t know anything about the creepy old man. Suddenly, something invisible kills Camila and starts fondling Marie, just like in the video.

Marie

Marie, still in shock over all that, runs off, leaves her mother to find Camila’s body. She tells her father about the old man in the film, and maybe he’s the one who made her own mother crazy. He explains that no, her mother killed herself.

She goes to that same abandoned building and breaks in. The place is empty, but she still hears crying. The place seems to be full of crying ghosts, including her mother. The old man appears and then throws her out, where she’s arrested for murder…

Back in 2022, Lisbeth, Marie’s sister. Gets a call about Andrea from Andrea’s mother that “it’s happening again.”

Lisbeth 2023

The story continues, but the film does not.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s really slow moving, but it continually ramps up the mystery. Who is this weird old man and why does he keep showing up on video?

It’s well made, and the locations are interesting, but there’s not much here, plotwise, that we haven’t seen before, and it’s just way too sluggish.

And then it all just kinda ends. We don’t know who the old man is, why this is happening, and why that family gets to suffer.

Kevin’s Commentary

So, there’s a strange old man who is invisible and only shows up on video. But he can abruptly kill people and move things in the physical world because… We’re never told who he is or why he is and there’s nothing that could be done against him. Perhaps he’s supposed to be a metaphor for grief and madness or something but I didn’t pick up on that.

It’s a well made, well acted, well directed movie that failed to connect with me or impress.

1995 Ice Cream Man

* Directed by: Norman Apstein

* Written by: David Dobkin and Sven Davison

* Stars: Clint Howard, Justin Isfeld, and Anndi McAfee

* Run Time: 1h 26m

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Little Gregory is institutionalized after seeing an ice cream man killed in front of him. So, when he grows up and gets out, he becomes an ice cream man himself. And despite being out, he’s not at all sane. It’s weird and over the top. There is a body count and some horror for sure, but it’s oddly paced and dated. Brian was substantially more entertained by it than Kevin was.

Spoilery Synopsis

We start in black-and-white times, as a car pulls up and the man inside shoots the ice cream man in front of a bunch of children, including little Gregory. “Who’s going to sell me ice cream, Mommy?” he asks. Credits roll.

In the modern day, the ice cream man comes to the neighborhood, and it’s Gregory, all grown up. He growls at the children and makes them say “Please.” His ice cream has bugs in it.

Small Paul is reading about the Pied Piper, and that’s probably not going to be relevant later. Gregory watches a man spearing trash in the park and flashes back to his own treatment at the asylum. He then kidnaps little Roger and kills a dog. Johnny’s mother gets a call about Roger’s disappearance.

Gregory lives with Nurse Wharton, who is his caretaker. The police ask him about the missing child. We see that Gregory makes his own ice cream, using chopped-up children as ingredients.

Heather goes home and watches her reverend father get his mother to speak in tongues. Small Paul goes to the ice cream truck alone, and Gregory is weird. As Gregory grabs Paul and loads him into the truck, Tuna sees it all. Hiding, Tuna comes across Roger, who escaped from Gregory.

Tuna starts seeing Gregory everywhere and knows he’s being followed. Tuna finally convinces his mother that he’s seen something, and the police soon show up to search Gregory’s place– with an axe. They tear the place up extremely thoroughly, but they don’t find anything at all. Detective Gifford still thinks Gregory is involved, even without evidence.

Gregory has Small Paul hidden in a secret room, but he hasn’t hurt him. He talks to him and gives him butter brickle. Tuna, Johnny, and Heather pledge to bring Gregory to justice, but they’re just kids, so that’s gonna be hard. They follow him to the cemetery, where he disposes of a body. The police also follow him there. No, it’s not a body, it’s ice cream that he’s putting on the grave of the Ice Cream King, the man we saw gunned down in the opening scene.

Tuna and Johnny shoot at the cops, who pick them up and take them home. Heather takes some photos, and we get a great scene as she takes them to a place to get developed (how archaic!). Meanwhile, Gregory shows Small Paul how to make ice cream.

The police go to the asylum and learn that Gregory was Nurse Wharton’s favorite patient. They see all kinds of weirdness in the hospital. It’s a great place to be institutionalized.

Gregory grabs Tuna off the street and locks him in the truck’s cooler. “You’re ice cream!” he snarls. Johnny’s older brother Jacob wants to be a cop, and he has a gun. Gregory kills Jacob’s girlfriend, “Now that’s what I call brain freeze.” Johnny and Heather hide, but they end up getting a “puppet show” from Gregory using two dead cops’ heads.

The kids run to Nurse Wharton’s house to hide, and she lets them inside. She turns them over to Gregory right away. Small Paul pretends to be the Ice Cream King and lures Gregory inside the gigantic, oversized nut-chopping machine that chews him up good.

The next morning, the police are all over the place, and Nurse Wharton is still looking for her dog. The kids have invited Roger to join their group, but Small Paul has gone to therapy. He’s going to be the next Ice Cream Man…

Brian’s Commentary

This is a weird one, full of odd choices and goofiness.

It’s got really cheesy dialogue and funky acting, but it’s also got a lot of recognizable faces doing small cameos, and everything looks purposefully over the top. It’s oddly paced and feels a little out of date and slow.

It’s clearly making fun of horror movies, but it’s not a straight-up comedy. It’s like all the humor is derived from just how ridiculous this all is, rather than specific jokes.

It’s a little unusual, and it does have problems, but I was also very entertained.

Kevin’s Commentary

Everything about the movie is strange. And I’d go as far as saying it’s interesting. Clint Howard is a hoot, and there are a lot of recognizable faces. But I was a little bored and not very entertained. Though I did appreciate how horribly funny it was when he was using the cops heads as puppets.

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2026 Death Name

* Director: Réi Talas

* Writers: Réi Talas and Regina Kim

* Stars: Amy Keum, Kevin Woo, and Vana Kim

* Runtime: 81 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A young woman of Korean descent tries exploring her family history and accidentally awakens a family curse that followed her grandma to America. It is slow-moving and talky with some suspense and story that builds to a climax. But it’s low on scares, and neither of us were very impressed with it. It’s just middling in pretty much every way.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on an old news report of General Eisenhower and the Korean War. A pregnant woman hides in the closet as a strange man in a hat walks in to find a woman hanging from the ceiling. The man in the hat finds the woman in the closet, and she screams. Credits roll as we see Korean immigrants coming to America.

It’s Sophie’s first day of university, and all the good classes have been taken. She asks her mother why they never bothered teaching her Korean, and she doesn’t even have a Korean name. It’s something her grandma wanted. Grandma overhears part of the phone conversation and freaks out. Her father texts her that she was, in fact, given a Korean name, but there was a fight over it. She wants to know her name, and he sends it to her, in Korean text, which makes her phone blink with static.

Brian, Kwan, and Ari meet Sophie in class, and they’re all friendly. Professor Lee runs the Korean History class. Some of the students want to be called by their Korean names. She asks them for help translating her Korean Name, since she can’t read Korean. When Kwan tries, the power goes out.

Sophie goes home on a break and eats with the family. Grandma is especially interesting, asking the same question repeatedly– she must have some dementia. She mentions thinking about going by her Korean name now, and Grandma insists that she doesn’t have a Korean name– excitedly. Sophie’s parents explain about some of Grandma’s history– her great-grandmother killed herself, which was a big scandal in Korea. Grandma says there’s more to it than that; she’s been trying to protect the whole family from the family curse. “Don’t speak that name!”

Sophie goes to a nearby bar and meets Jun, a single guy from Korea. He tells her that it’s never too late to learn Korean. They talk a lot, and he walks her home for a kiss. Later, Ari says Sophie isn’t a real Korean; it’s just trendy for her– she’s been whitewashed.

Sophie and Jun have another date, and he admits that he’s got baggage too. Something keeps dripping through the ceiling in Sophie’s dorm room.

On the next break, Sophie takes Jun home to meet her parents. Her parents are normal, but Grandma’s taken a turn for the worse. Jun has brought a gift from Seoul for Grandma, and when she sees it, she screams. It’s pearls– no, it’s berries. She calls him an evil spirit.

As they talk later, Sophie tells him her Korean name, Park Joo-Hyun. This leads to kissing and sex for some reason. Later, she hears voices calling that name. All her photos of Jun are blurry, but only on his face. Is he real?

Sophie gets a flashback to her great-grandmother and the man in the big hat, who has a melted face. When his face is intact, he looks like Jun. Sophie gets a call from her parents; she needs to drive home and check on Grandma. Turns out, Grandma is right there on campus to warn Sophie about the curse. Sophie drives Grandma home, which is a mess.

Grandma tells the story about her mother, the man in the hat, and Sophie’s new boyfriend, who knows her Korean name. One of her ancestors caused Jun to kill himself and become a ghost. We see that opening scene again, with more detail this time. She moved to the USA and took a new name; he couldn’t find them under a different name. Now, with Sophie speaking her true name out loud, the ghost has found them.

Sophie has to go out to pick up more of Grandma’s medication, and leaves her home alone. When she gets home, Grandma is unconscious on the floor. At the hospital, she sees Jun in the room, and he’s angry. He wants Sophie to be his bride in the afterlife, and she volunteers. She wants 48 hours to tie up loose ends before going with him, and he agrees to the terms.

Sophie talks to Professor Lee about some old family tree documents she needs to translate. Back in 1902, Jun committed suicide, and the family had his name cut out of the records. Sophie then runs to the Korean records library, which is closed for construction, and breaks right in. Ari follows her to see what’s going on and helps translate what they find.

Ari says Sophie’s name, and the ghost finds them immediately. Jun lets Sophie choose the manner of her death, and she chooses poison. Ari helped her find the ghosts’ true name, and she says it aloud. Suddenly, Grandma jumps out of bed, and Sophie accidentally cuts her throat. Jun the ghost vanishes.

Later, Sophie rubs her belly. She’s got Jun’s baby inside there…

Brian’s Commentary

If you don’t like this movie, you’re not a real Korean. OK, maybe you are, I dunno. A lot of the film seems to revolve around what a “real” Korean is versus a second- or third-generation immigrant.

I suspect the doctors are going to suspect foul play when they find Grandma’s throat cut in her hospital room.

Maybe it’s just me, but I didn’t find it particularly compelling at all. The backstory of the curse, the deaths, none of it was particularly interesting.

Meh.

Kevin’s Commentary

There’s a lot of talk and not a lot of scare here. The Korean culture things were kind of interesting. The whole movie was kind of interesting, but I wouldn’t go much further than that.

I’d call it just okay over all.

2026 Cold Storage

* Director: Jonny Campbell

* Writers: David Koepp

* Stars: Georgina Campbell, Joe Keery, and Liam Neeson

* Runtime: 99 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A semi-retired bioterrorism agent gets called back into action with his sidekick when a deadly fungus gets on the loose. Throw a couple of civilians into the mix, and hilarity ensues. This one has lots of humor and body horror. It’s juicy and gross.

Everything was well done, and it’s entertaining, but it’s not super original. There’s a lot here we’d seen before.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re told about Skylab and the debris that mostly burned up in orbit. Some of it hit the Earth.

In Western Australia, 18 years ago, Enos rushes to make a phone call. Dr. Martins in Rome gets the call. “Something came out of your tank! We’re all dying!” The tank is NASA’s, and she doesn’t know much about it. 27 hours later, she arrives there to investigate. Robert Quinn arrives on the scene with Romano; they’re military of some sort. There was an O2 tank from Skylab that fell down here, but it had a parasitic fungus on it. We sent it up there in the first place, but what came down wasn’t the same thing.

The three check out the small town where the “outbreak” has taken place. There are no people. They soon find the tank and check it out. Dr. Martins quickly figured out what happened. Someone was trying to clean the tank and accidentally fed the thing inside. The creature finds its way into her through a hole in her boot. Then they find all the townspeople on the roofs of the buildings, dead.

Quinn calls in the military to burn the town to the ground. Martins has one sample in her bag and another in her foot. It acts really fast and takes over her mind. She shoots herself. As credits roll, the town is destroyed and the sample is taken to a secret research facility where it’s put into Cold Storage.

Years pass, and the facility shuts down and is eventually sold. Teacake drives to the new self-storage facility, which is the re-tasked cold storage place from before. He works security there, and his boss, Griffin, wants to do something illegal. He talks to Naomi, a new employee about how awful this job is.

An old woman comes in and wants to access her unit. She goes into the unit and finds her gun; this is her anniversary, and she’s thinking of shooting herself. She takes a nap first.

In North Carolina, Robert Quinn gets a phone call about the sample. There’s an alarm about a temperature change at the storage facility. He’s soon on the way to the facility.

Teacake and Naomi hear a beeping inside the wall and want to investigate. They break open the wall and see the same alarm that Quinn was notified about. There’s a whole wall of control-panel stuff back there. Naomi wants to explore the place’s sub-sub-basement, where the lab is. It takes a while, but they get there.

Naomi’s crazy boyfriend Mike drives up outside, and he’s more or less a stalker now. He calls her, but she doesn’t get the message due to being so far underground. Also, he’s got someone dead in the trunk of his car. It’s not a body, it’s a cat who appears to be infected. It climbs to the roof and explodes a load of spores that infect Mike, a deer, and gets the ball rolling.

Naomi and Teacup open the vault and go inside. They find an infected “rat king” on the ground. They nope right out and head back upstairs.

Quinn talks to Abigail and Jerabek, who explains that the man in charge of the cold storage unit died a year and a half ago. Jerabek is in charge now, but he doesn’t believe there’s any real problem here. Abigail takes it more seriously and wants to help Quinn.

We get a flashback to several years ago as the fungus broke out. It infected a cockroach just a few hours ago that got outside and into Mike’s trunk and the dead cat. Meanwhile, Naomi and Teacup watch the infected deer, which explodes. Mike shows up, and he’s acting very strangely. He starts shooting, which wakes up old Mrs. Rooney, who was asleep in her unit. Naomi calls the government agency whose name was on the vault door.

Quinn lands and meets with Romano, from the old days, and they have equipment to pick up. They get Naomi’s call. Naomi and Teacup argue about whether or not zombies are real. Outside, Quinn’s criminal friends arrive to steal stuff. They come upon the deer carcass and the hole in the wall. Ironhead, The Rev, Garbage, Cuba, and Dr. Friedman come inside to loot 4K TVs.

Mike finds and pukes all over Cuba, Garbage, and Ironhead. The Rev hears the action and just drives away. Old lady Rooney shoots Mike in the head, causing him to explode.

Teacup and Naomi get outside and run into Quinn, who has a mini-nuke. He gives the young couple hazmat suits and sends them down to the lab to place the nuke. Quinn stays outside to kill anyone who tries to leave the building. When they get down to the lab, they find that the timer is already counting down. Can they make it out in time?

Teacup, Naomi, Quinn, and Romano limp to the car and try to get away from the blast.

The bomb goes off, and it’s a BIG one. It turns the whole facility into a mile-wide crater.

Some time passes, and Abigail visits Quinn in the hospital. Naomi and Teacup are a thing now.

We then cut to another deer in the wild that explodes into green stuff.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s got loads of fairly big stars and recognizable faces in it. It takes zombie action, contagion action, and a little “Die Hard” action and mixes it all up with fun characters and a crazy setting. There’s not much new here, but it combines old tropes into a fun mix.

It’s billed as a horror comedy, but it didn’t seem all that comedic to me. It was good, though.

Kevin’s Commentary

I thought the casting was especially good in this one. It’s well made, but a bit formulaic. Everything is well done, but I didn’t feel like there was a lot new here that I hadn’t already seen before. It was entertaining though.

2013 Stranded

* Director: Roger Christian

* Writers: Roger Christian, Christian Piers Betley

* Stars: Christian Slater, Brendan Fehr, Amy Matysio, Michael Therriault

* Runtime: 1 Hour, 24 Minutes

* Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Four astronaut miners on a moon base get clobbered by meteors. Which would be bad enough by itself, but the meteors bring an alien lifeform that dials the peril and body horror up high. Miscommunication and bad choices help move the somewhat predictable plot along, but the effects are good, as is the acting. The sum total is a pretty good movie that Kevin was more entertained by than Brian.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on the moonbase ARK, with four crew. It’s day 187 of the one-year mission. There’s an incoming meteor storm, and it blasts the base. The rocks keep falling, and there’s lots of damage. Commander Gerard Brockman wants to evacuate back to Earth, but suddenly, a meteor hits them right in the control room. Credits roll.

They all work on damage control for a while. Ava Cameron goes into a damaged section to seal a leak, and she finds a piece of a meteor embedded in a machine. That goes badly, but she does bring a piece of the meteor back to the inhabitable area; it’s got an unusual spore on it.

It’s going to be several days before an evacuation ship arrives, so they have to patch up whatever’s left. The spore starts growing, and it’s obviously of alien origin. Ava works with the spore, and she’s got a cut on her hand, so we know where this is heading now. She almost immediately starts feeling weird but doesn’t tell anyone.

Bruce and Lance find her and examine her; she’s suddenly very pregnant. They put her into a very loose kind of isolation. The thing inside her grows very fast, and she has nightmares. Then the real thing comes out, and it’s even worse. This brings about lots of arguing about what to do next.

Ava wakes up to find some kind of monstrous baby feeding from her, and she doesn’t react well. It bites Bruce and runs off. Lance insists that Bruce and Ava are hallucinating from the bad air in the place. Bruce starts hallucinating that he’s infected as well after the bite. We see the creature growing and mutating into something fully grown and humanoid; it looks like Bruce, only naked and slimy.

Bruce keeps imagining seeing the alien creature, but no one believes him. He unties Ava from the “quarantine” room and lets her out. Gerard finds out and sedates her, but not before she stabs him with a scalpel. Meanwhile, the alien doppelganger kills Bruce, makes it look like a suicide, and steals his clothes.

Lance finds Bruce’s body at the same time Gerard is attacked… by Bruce. They have no choice but to release Ava to help them find the alien. The alien then traps Lance in an airlock and he gets blasted out on a very slow timer.

Gerard and Ava decide that now that there’s only the two of them that they can take the escape pod. This requires all manner of running around and packing supplies.

Soon, there’s a big three-way brawl, and the alien gets in the escape pod, launching in one minute. Can they stop it? No– the rocket blasts off toward Earth.

With only 17 minutes left to live, the escape shuttle arrives. Can they run to the shuttle with no air for three-and-a-half minutes?

We cut to Earth, where the escape pod has landed. There’s no one inside and no tracks. Not far away, the creature is mutating again…

Brian’s Commentary

These may be the dumbest space-people who ever lived. None of them know what “quarantine” means. They know there’s something alive on the base, but they all keep pretending it isn’t. Ava gets infected by an alien spore and doesn’t report it at all.

The acting is fine, the sets are good, and the creature effects are effective. The overall plot, however, requires all the characters to make every stupid decision in the book. It’s pretty predictable and more than a little dull after it gets going.

Kevin’s Commentary

It starts right out with the meteor clobbering and doesn’t let up with one damn thing after another.

For a group of astronauts isolated on a base who would have been highly vetted and trained, they don’t communicate well, and they make some dumb decisions.

The pluses outweighed the negatives overall though, and I was more entertained than not.

1986 Monster Dog

* Director: Claudio Fragasso

* Writers: Claudio Fragasso

* Stars: Alice Cooper, Victoria Vera, Carlos Santurio

* Runtime: 84 min

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A rocker returns to his hometown with his crew to shoot a music video, and they find a town infested with killer dogs. But there are supernatural forces at work, and they aren’t just ordinary doggies. It’s not awful, but there’s nothing really noteworthy either. It’s generic and pretty forgettable.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on Vincent Raven making a music video. He sounds and looks a lot like Alice Cooper. We get most of a whole music video with him, then we cut to later, while he’s in a van with Sandra, talking about how terrible it was. He wants to make something more original. They’re all heading back to his ancestral home; he hasn’t been home in decades.

Meanwhile, at the big house, the caretaker investigates some strange noises. It sounds like a dog has gotten into the house. Turns out, it’s a whole bunch of snarling, growling dogs. In the van, Vince and his friends talk about hearing about the wild dog problem in the area. Vince and the sheriff have a weird history. The sheriff warns him about the dogs– there have already been five deaths to those dogs. Back in the day, something happened with Vince’s father, and the locals remember the incident. As soon as Vince’s group leaves, the sheriff and deputy are killed by a nasty-looking dog.

Vince hits a dog with his car, and they all stop to help. Vince finishes the dog off with a blow to the head. A creepy old man comes out and says, “Now you’ve done it. Now he’s back at last. He will command the hounds, and all of you will die!” He’s fun. Vince and Sandra get a glimpse of the monster in the woods.

The group arrives at Vince’s family home, but old Joss, the caretaker, is nowhere to be found. Vince grabs a shotgun and investigates the upper levels of the house. Angela senses that they’re all in danger and horrible things are about to happen. She has a weird nightmare where she sees Vince as a werewolf who kills all of them. When she tells Vince about it, he doesn’t laugh.

Vince pulls out a big book about werewolves and explains to Sandra that it’s related to some kind of heart condition and that werewolves do exist. His own father was accused of being a werewolf; he would go out under the full moon and kill animals. The locals eventually caught and killed Vince’s father.

In the morning, the group sets about getting started filming their music video, the reason they came here. We soon get a second musical number (This is better than the first one). Suddenly, in the middle of the song, they find the caretaker’s body.

Angela wanders off into the countryside, and Vince goes looking for her. At the same time, a group of locals cut the phone lines and talk about killing Vince. They want in the house to wait for Vince, but Sandra doesn’t like their looks. Frank and Jordan invite the group inside for beers which turns into a mistake almost instantly.

Lou, the leader of the troublemakers, explains that Vince is a werewolf, and he intends to kill him. Lou explains what really happened with Vince’s father, and he’s convinced that it wasn’t a mistake. Vince controls and commands all the wild dogs in the area; that’s his special power.

Vince and Angela return to the house, and Lou shoots Angela dead by accident. The men play hide-and-seek with Vince and shotguns. Meanwhile, the pack of wild dogs arrives outside. Vince eventually shoots all the bad guys, but by this time, the dogs are inside the house.

The dogs tear up Frank and Jordan, but suddenly go away, as if they’ve been called. The big dog wants in, and he’s going to break in the door. Yep, it’s the werewolf, and the dogs obey him. Things get hectic, quickly.

Soon, it’s just Sandra and Marylou locked in a room as the werewolf tries to get them. Vince shows up, and the werewolf vanishes. Marylou puts two and two together and decides that Vince is the monster; where was he during all the attacks? Vince definitely has a calming presence on the wild dogs, who sit and whimper when he’s around.

The group runs out to Lou’s car after retrieving the keys and drives off. They don’t notice right away that Marylou is dead and the monster dog is in the backseat. Sandra jumps out the door, and Vince crashes the car.

Sandra goes to the crash scene, but doesn’t find Vince or the monster. The creepy old man shows up, apparently a minion of the werewolf, saying “We have a new king!” before dying.

Sandra finds Vince, and he warns her to stay away. He is a werewolf, at least now. He wants her to shoot him. As he turns into a werewolf, the monster dog comes out of the bushes. She shoots Vince, and everything gets calm immediately.

We get the opening musical number again, this time overlaid over a retrospective of scenes from the rest of the movie.

Brian’s Commentary

The dubbing is really poor here, and it detracts from all the performances. The story is pretty formulaic, and the film is very low-budget.

They used a bunch of real dogs for this, but the werewolf is basically a mask in the dark or a mask in the fog; we never get much of a look at it. The monster dog, which isn’t the werewolf, is a big puppet.

Overall, it’s a very generic 80s international horror film.

Kevin’s Commentary

The old man is the least subtle harbinger ever; he was awesome.

It’s said that no one did their own dubbing in the film, and the only time we hear Alice Cooper’s real voice is during the musical numbers. It’s strange seeing him just being a normal looking and acting guy when we usually see him being freaky and made-up on stage. But it would have been better with their own voices or at least better dubbing.

I had never even heard of this movie before. And I can see why. It wasn’t too bad, but it was very bland and forgettable.

2018 Godzilla: The Planet Eater

* Director: Kōbun Shizuno, Hiroyuki Seshita

* Writers: Gen Urobuchi

* Stars: Mamoru Miyano, Takahiro Sakurai, Tomokazu Sugita, Yūki Kaji

* Runtime: 91 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is the third in the anime trilogy of a fully science fiction Godzilla movie set in the future. This one has much less action than the second movie, and a lot more talk about philosophy and religion. We thought it was okay, on the weak side for a finish.

Spoilery Synopsis

Metphies narrates about how the Exif have been watching humanity since long before Godzilla appeared. He talks about humanity’s need for heroes, religion, and God. He thinks the hero that humanity needs is Haruo Sakaki. Credits roll.

Martin talks about Godzilla and the other monsters’ origins. Maybe humanity’s whole purpose all along was to create the monsters. There’s arguing between the Bilusaludo and human leaders. After the previous battle, Yuko is now brain-dead, but not completely dead. Some of the humans have come to the conclusion that Sakaki is being divinely guided somehow. God is watching over them all, and he might be speaking through Sakaki.

Martin points out that the Hauta treatment that Sakaki got was what saved him from the nanometal. Metphies is fully aware of this, but he promotes the religious ideas of the others anyway. Metphies’ god is supposedly capable of beating Godzilla. Metphies explains that only Sakaki can summon their god to Earth– by using his hatred.

Up in orbit, Dolu-Do and the Bilusaludo revolt and take over the mothership by force. They want Sakaki’s head, so Sakaki has to go into hiding, and Maina, one of the Hauta twins, offers to help. Meanwhile, Metphies uses the religious crystal thing he had repaired in the previous film to send a signal into space.

Metphies and Miana discuss their telepathic abilities. He then does something bad to her. Maina, the twin, senses that something has happened to her sister. The Exifs, on the planet and on the spaceship, hold rituals, and all the human followers call upon their god, named Ghidorah, to come to them.

Ghidorah hears and arrives quickly, killing the human followers one at a time. Yeah, it’s that Ghidorah, coming through a black hole that suddenly appears. It surrounds the mothership and pulls it toward the black hole; time gets messed up and the whole ship explodes spectacularly.

Sakaki quickly comes to the conclusion that Metphies is crazy and has sold them out. As the disturbance from space reaches the planet, Godzilla wakes up again and heads toward the trouble. Godzilla blasts it with atomic breath, but it bends the ray away with his gravitational field. The human’s machines don’t pick up the new monster at all; is it real? Does it not have a physical form? All three of the glowing yellow monster snakes grab onto Godzilla.

Sakaki confronts Metphies, who explains everything. The Exifs have travelled around the universe, choosing planets for Ghidorah to eat, like the Silver Surfer and Galactus. They all basically have a death wish for the entire universe. As he rambles on, Godzilla’s body temperature goes up, but the energy is going somewhere else. Sakaki gets a vision of the people who have died fighting Godzilla.

Meanwhile Miana grabs Professor Martin and takes him to the Hauta’s base. They talk to the Great Egg inside. After about a month’s worth of exposition, Sakaki turns against Metphies and smashes his magic eye.

Suddenly, Godzilla is able to physically touch Ghidorah, and the big yellow monster is now visible on the humans’ sensor. Godzilla then, quite easily, defeats the three-headed monster from space. Metphies dies, and Sakaki cries.

The human survivors go to live with the Hauta and learn their natural ways. Professor starts the nuclear reactor on a crashed vulture. He can use the nanotechnology to rebuild civilization, which Sakaki realizes is the pathway to destruction, just as before. He takes Yuki’s body and steals the vulture. He flies into Godzilla.

Brian’s Commentary

This is the third of the anime trilogy. The appearance of Ghidorah is treated like a big reveal, but he’s right there on the movie poster, so that wasn’t a shock. Mothra never really did make an appearance other than a sort of telepathic messenger.

This one is very talkie, with Metphies’s explanation seemingly going on for an hour. Still, the series overall has a lot going on, with many details and interesting ideas. I guess at the end, they all learn to live with Godzilla, which is weird.

I liked the first two films of the trilogy a lot, but this one was just slow moving, too philosophical/religious, and not that much actually happened beyond all the talking. It was a weak ending to a trilogy that started out pretty great. Overall, I still liked the trilogy, but the ending really brought it down a lot.

Kevin’s Commentary

Summoning an even bigger and worse monster to fight Godzilla. What could go wrong?

I didn’t care for the first movie that much. I thought the second one was really good. So I thought the third would be even better! It’s not. There’s too much talk and not enough action. The animation is still cool and equal in quality, but the script isn’t nearly as entertaining. It wasn’t a strong finish to the trilogy.

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Mainstream Films:

2026 Bone Keeper

* Director: Howard J. Ford

* Writers: Howard J. Ford

* Stars: Sarah Alexandra Marks, Louis James, Tiffany Hannam-Daniels, and John Rhys-Davies

* Runtime: 96 minutes

* Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A group of seven young folks explore a cave infested with creatures that arrived thousands of years ago by meteor. As you might guess, it goes badly for them. The basics are laid out right away.

The effects look very good and it was entertaining. We both enjoyed it.

Spoilery Synopsis

We watch a meteorite crashing down as credits roll. Whatever it is, it’s got tentacles and slithers into a cave. It’s 400,000 years ago, and the cavepeople of the time fear it since it eats them.

In 1976, a woman narrates about her grandfather, a journalist, who went exploring in a cave. He sees cave paintings and skeletal remains. Then the monster gets him.

In the present day. Professor Harrison looks depressed. “I’ve killed him. I killed her, too,” he yells.

Olivia and Annabelle want to go search for her mother, who has gone missing while investigating the grandfather’s disappearance; the police aren’t doing enough.

They, and their friends, a group of monster hunters, head to the remote location and pick up Ashley, a travel blogger. They’re off to find the “Bone Keeper.” With the addition of Ashley, the trip just got a lot less scientific. Ethan, Nick, and Ravi plan to find the monster, and maybe get lucky with the girls in the process.

The group goes to the local pub, and everyone watches them as they come in. They look at all the “Missing Persons” posters on the wall. They’re here to meet Professor Harrison, and the locals are strangely hostile.

Harrison knew Olivia’s father, and he warns them not to go into the caves. Everyone who has ever gone in there has… stayed in there. He really doesn’t want to tell them which cave has the monster; too many people have died. He even has Olivia’s grandfather’s film footage of what happened in the cave. He even thinks the monster is an ancient alien.

The next morning, the seven characters go to the cave that Harrison told them about. They climb, crawl, and do all the usual cave-explorer-y things. They find some slime, and Ravi looks at it in the microscope he’s apparently carried into the cave with him. Ashley stays behind to film some vlogging stuff and the monster grabs her. For some reason, the others can’t hear her screaming as it rips her apart.

The others find some hair with a bit of skull attached, so they know someone has died in this cave. Nick goes looking for Ashley, but he finds what killed her instead.

Ravi and Nadia actually see one of the tentacles and get all excited. When it grabs and kills Nadia, they get even more excited.

Ravi catches up with the others and reports what he saw. There’s a whole nest of the alien creatures down here. They find a huge mound of slowly digesting merging melted bodies, including Olivia’s mother.

They decide it might be a good time to head for the exit, but now they’re lost. They find the exit, and Ethan even gets a few photos of what’s left of Nick still crawling around.

Outside now, Olivia, Annabelle, and Ethan tend to Ravi’s severe wounds. “It gets inside you. It becomes you,” Ravi rants. Ethan calls Harrison and sends him all the footage he’s taken.

The tentacle-monster attacks the girls in the campsite, outside, and Ethan runs to help. It drags Ethan and Ravi back down into the cave. When Olivia and Annabelle see just how big the thing is, they run for the road, but Annabelle is grabbed next.

Olivia hears her mother singing and prepares to go back inside. She goes through all the caves, back to the big digesting mess, and retrieves her mother’s necklace.

Outside, Harrison and the military show up and plant explosives at the cave entrance. They shoot at the many monsters inside and find Olivia, still alive. Then they blow up the cave entrance.

Six months later, Olivia wakes up in the hospital, and the doctor says she’s pregnant. They do an ultrasound, and it’s a little baby tentacle monster. Nope-just a nightmare. She’s with the soldiers and Harrison, who says blowing up the caves may not be the end of the creatures.

Naturally, for the final shot, we see that it’s definitely not over.

Brian’s Commentary

None of these people are spelunkers or regular cave explorers, and yet none of them are claustrophobic or terrified by the caves alone.

Despite being specifically warned to stick together, the group continually splits up so that one person can die at a time. One after another, they die, and no one else ever seems to hear the screams. That’s nowhere near as stupid as Olivia going back inside the cave after seeing what the creature really is.

The creatures are pure CGI, but they are really well done. We see more of them than I expected we would, and they all look good. John Rhys-Davies is too old to be climbing around in caves, but he still has a significant amount of screen time here.

Other than the stupid choices the characters made, the film is really very good!

Kevin’s Commentary

One point that deeply troubled me was the way there would be attacks and rock collapses causing much commotion, and the others who were not that far away in the cave heard absolutely nothing or very little.

That aside, the story is basic but pretty effective I thought. The creature and gore effects look really good, slimy and creepy. The cast does a nice job with it. There’s some issues here and there, but all in all I’d call it a win. I was very entertained.

2026 Dead Lover

* Director: Grace Glowicki

* Writers: Grace Glowicki, Ben Petrie

* Stars: Grace Glowicki, Ben Petrie, Leah Doz, Lowen Morrow

* Runtime: 83 minutes (1 hr 23 mins)

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A lonely and smelly gravedigger laments she can’t find love, then finds a man who adores her just as she is. And when she loses him, she goes to extremes to bring him back from the dead. This was a fun story with lots of chuckles and some real horror at the core. It’s unique, with the look of a stage play, and we both really enjoyed it.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re told that this is done with “Stink-O-Vision,” where a number appears on the screen at various points, and we’re supposed to scratch-n-sniff at various times.

A strange-looking woman plants seeds as credits roll. She’s a grave digger and doesn’t smell very good. She’s trying to make a perfume to hide the smell of death on her. She tries to seduce the priest at a funeral; her perfume doesn’t work. When no one shows up for the funeral, the gravedigger tells us all about the too-generic dead woman.

Three old women with big hair talk about the gravedigger and the dead opera singer. We cut to the funeral and the woman’s weird funeral guests. The opera singer’s brother runs off in anguish and is attacked by a wild wolf, but the gravedigger saves him. He smells her and doesn’t hate it; could it be the smell of the wolf’s blood that makes her attractive to him?

The two go for a wash in the ocean, and he “wants to lick your stink. I want to shower in your rot, the feast on your fetid funk. I want to pick up a piece of your poo and eat it like a banana.” (Which Kevin notes might be his favorite monologue and following sex scene ever.) He might be a little weird, but then she has sex with him while holding her shovel.

The two get very close and talk about their needs and dreams. He leaves her because he can’t have children; he goes overseas for an operation to possibly fix that. His postcards are quite descriptive. In the meantime, she works on growing a rosebush to make her smell better; he loves her because of the stink. On the way home, he’s lost at sea, all but his finger. Some foreign fishermen find the finger and bring it to the gravedigger.

We-have-Johnny-Depp-at-home lights his opium pipe, and dreams of the dead opera singer, his wife.

The gravedigger gets the finger returned to her, but she’s not really willing to let her dead lover go. She thinks about the flowers and fertilizer; can she re-grow him? She starts catching lizards and stealing their regeneration-juice. She injects the finger with lizard-elixir and creates a whole Frankenstein’s Lab setup to bring him back. It works– sorta. The finger comes to life and grows… into a very long finger.

What can a lonely woman do when her lover is only one long finger? Well, yeah, that.

The finger wants a body, and the gravedigger is well-equipped to get one. How about the dead man’s sister, the opera singer? She grafts on the special finger to the dead woman’s corpse and zaps it with lightning power.

The opera star with the very long finger doesn’t look too happy to be alive at this point. She likes the lizards more than the gravedigger. The three tall-haired women go to the Dollar-Store-Depp and tell him that the gravedigger has dug up his dead wife; they also tell the priest. He goes to the gravedigger’s house and sees his undead wife there. They fight, sword vs shovel, and shovel wins.

The opera star’s husband takes the gravedigger hostage as the opera star hooks up with a blind fisherman. The gravedigger gets out of her restraints and runs off into the night. The priest, the tall-haired women, and the foreign fishermen all come after the gravedigger as an angry mob. She makes a stink that knocks the priest right out. The widower also comes to her defense and kills the tall-haired women, the foreign fishermen, and the priest.

The gravedigger finds the opera star with the long finger and realizes she’s been cheating on her with the dead, blind fisherman. The opera star gives her the finger, fatally.

The opera star makes her own dead-finger creation and lives happily ever after.

Brian’s Commentary

Note that we didn’t have a Stink-O-Vision card, so the whole Stink-O-Vision didn’t do much for us. I did fart a time or two, and that livened up the show, albeit only briefly and without much variety of scent.

There’s only a cast of four actors who play all the various characters. The sets and lighting are all very plain, giving it a very stage-play look. It’s very obviously made with a super low budget, but they still use a lot of interesting camera shots and lighting to make it visually interesting. The dialogue is ridiculous and perfect at the same time.

I wasn’t expecting much from the trailer, but it’s very funny, paced well, and super creative. I liked this a lot.

Kevin’s Commentary

The sets and the way it’s filmed and the costuming seem very much like a stage play, and actors playing multiple characters add to that vibe. I saw that it was actually filmed on a couple of black box stages, and Grace Glowicki (who co-wrote, directs, and plays the lead) wanted the vibe of experimental theater. Mission accomplished.

I wish we had our Stink-o-vision cards. They are real, I read about them online, but I couldn’t find where we’d get some. We had to imagine the smells. And it is a very smell-focused movie. So marketed only to theaters? Will home releases come with cards enclosed?

I thought it was great. Raunchy and funny, making some real horror something to laugh at. The writing is terrific. My only complaint is a big feature/gimmick of the movie that we couldn’t participate in because it was a home screener.

2026 The Kinderhook Creature: In the Shadow of Sasquatch

* Director: Seth Breedlove

* Writers: Bruce Hallenbeck (Author of the companion book, The Kinderhook Creature and Beyond: A Personal Reminiscence)

* Stars: Bruce Hallenbeck, various eyewitnesses

* Runtime: 1 Hour, 12 Minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a documentary profiling a town in New York called Kinderhook that has a long history and maybe a big hulking creature lurking around in the woods. Bruce Hallenbeck gives us first hand memories of the place. Neither of us had heard of this cryptid before this viewing. The film is well put together, weaving in some Washington Irving history and the past of a really old town. There’s plenty of UFO talk too for folks who are into that. It was interesting and well put together.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a man talking about his grandmother living in what might be a haunted house. Kinderhook is an old rural town north of New York City, an hour southeast of Albany. We get some initial history of the town, founded in the 1600s, and famous people who have some affiliation with the area. This was the source of “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” story.

Bruce Hallenback’s story soon turns to the Hudson Valley’s cryptids. There’s been lots of UFO activity there, as well as a white energy “blob” he found in 1962. His father tells us his own experience with the white blob. There is a bit of discussion about ghosts, poltergeists, and hauntings in the area.

The Kinderhook Creature, basically Bigfoot, is up next. We get an old video of Bruce’s grandmother talking about the creature on an old interview show in the 70s. Something was stealing her trash and taking the food out of the bags. Also, she saw the creature sleeping in the backyard once. Turns out, lots of people in the region had seen something like that creature and it started to become famous.

The rest of the film is Bruce and various family members telling us stories of their supernatural encounters…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s another of the “Small Town Monsters” documentaries, and we’ve done a bunch of these by now. It’s a collection of interviews, re-creations, and stories about a creature that I’ve actually never heard of before. As always, the production values are good, the visuals are decent, and the interview subjects are interesting.

The majority of eyewitnesses here are members of Bruce Hallenback’s family, which is a bit suspicious, but overall, the story is well told and kept me entertained for the runtime.

Kevin’s Commentary

It was very well put together weaving in Bruce Hallenbeck’s memories of the place with other folk’s stories and oral histories. I was expecting just Bigfoot stuff, but there’s ghost and UFO stuff too. He even manages to throw in a leprechaun story. So it covers a lot.

It might be kind of cool living somewhere with your yard backed up to the woods where you might see deer and bear and big mysterious creatures.

I thought it was interesting and entertaining.

2026 The Strangers: Chapter 3

* Director: Renny Harlin

* Writers: Alan R. Cohen & Alan Freedland

* Stars: Madelaine Petsch, Gabriel Basso, and Ema Horvath

* Runtime: 91 minutes

* Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The carnage continues with this conclusion of the reboot/trilogy/sequel/prequel. Maya from the previous two movies is still on the run, and we get some flashbacks showing the origin of the Strangers. Quite a bit is explained, but some points you really don’t want to analyse too deeply. We both felt this was the best of the three, with the most going on and the most backstory. And there’s not an after credit scene, but the closing credits are very cool.

Spoilery Synopsis

It is three years ago, when a woman goes to a cheap motel and the woman behind the counter is a little off. That night, there’s a knock at the door. “Is Tamara here?” Dollface takes the woman and ties her up for some wholesome torture. “Why?” “Because you’re here!” Scarecrow and Pinup watch her work and kiss. Credits roll.

Back in the present day, Maya watches as Scarecrow looks at the dead Pinup’s body and hacks at her with his ax. They all get in their truck and drive away, leaving Maya on the road. Not long after, Sheriff Rotter drives past, but Maya hides from him.

Maya comes to an old church and runs into creepy Gregory there. “Relax. Nobody has a mask here,” he says. She’s pretty sure he’s Scarecrow, but it’s not absolutely clear, because he lets her leave. She runs into the sheriff outside, and she has to go with him this time. He’s over-the-top weird at every turn, and she ends up stealing his car.

She soon crashes the car into a tree because she’s in a horror movie– right next to Scarecrow was apparently waiting for her. He throws her in the back of his truck and drives off.

We get a flashback to the trial for Tamara’s murder. The boy is Sheriff Rotter’s son. A few weeks later, the boy and his friend kill a hiker in the woods, and Rotter helps them dispose of the evidence. “I’ll fix it. No more townsfolk, you understand?”

Dollface and Scarecrow take Maya to an old lumberyard. Scarecrow turns on the shredder and puts Shelly/Pinup’s body into it. He then hits Maya with the ax.

In the morning, Maya’s family arrives in town looking for her. They ask the whole group at the diner, but no one says much. The waitress, Annie, says she’s sad that it’s all happening again; non-local people often go missing around here. She says the sheriff knows everything.

Deputy Walters wants to call in the State Police, and the sheriff kills him. Maya’s sister and family watch the sheriff carry Howard’s body out of the morgue and follow him.

Maya wakes up, not dead, to find that Scarecrow has tattooed a smiley-face on her, just like they have. He makes her put on Pinup’s mask. Then he leans in for a mask-to-mask kiss, which she doesn’t like.

Twelve years ago, young Scarecrow and Pinup scout out victims at the truck stop. They follow a pair of likely victims to the motel and do the whole “Tamara” thing. When they go in, the woman inside has already killed her boyfriend.

Back in the present, Maya, in the Pinup mask, rides along with Scarecrow and Dollface to the motel and they make her do the “Tamara” thing. They insist that she kill one of the people inside. As Scarecrow hacks up the man, Maya uses the opportunity to kill Dollface. He then makes Maya kill the woman in the motel room.

The sheriff realizes he’s being followed and leads Maya’s sister, Debbie, to the sawmill; he calls Scarecrow to meet him there. The PI that Debbie hired goes into the sawmill and finds the meat grinder– and the sheriff, who shoots him very dead. Scarecrow kills Debbie’s husband and drags her to the truck where Maya is and kills her too, as Maya watches.

Scarecrow unties Maya and leaves her alone in his truck with Debbie. She starts to drive out of town, but then decides to go back. Somehow, she knows to go to a huge underground maze of dungeons and tunnels with electricity out in the woods. She finds the sheriff there and shoots him a few times.

Maya goes to a room full of candles and photos and sees a sort of shrine to all the victims. Scarecrow comes in behind her and sits down. “I freed you,” he says. He takes off his mask, and it’s Gregory. (Which was not a surprise at this point.) “All these years, you’re the only one who’s survived.”

Everything Maya cared about is gone, and she came here to kill him, but now she reconsiders. “You’re all that’s left.” They start getting romantic, at least until she stabs him. As he lays there on the floor, she grabs his ax and finishes him off.

Maya walks off into the woods, but she’s carrying the Scarecrow mask as she goes. Will she continue as… The Stranger?

Brian’s Commentary

None of the locations in this movie (or the previous one) ever have any other people around, even the busy motel is empty, like the hospital in the previous film.

In this conclusion, we finally get answers as to how this all got started and who the people involved really are. I don’t see how the sheriff could possibly have covered up that many deaths, but I guess that’s a minor thing to nitpick about with some of the stuff going on here.

The soundtrack was very good, as was the casting. Richard Brake should have won some kind of award for creepiness in this one.

Still, this episode explains it all, has a lot of action, and things actually happen (unlike the second film), so all in all, it’s the best of the three.

Kevin’s Commentary

I do appreciate that there was more to the trilogy than just the home-invasion-slowly-torment-and-kill-a-couple formula of the original. On the other hand this was three full length movies that probably would have been fine with just one long one.

The casting was excellent for the young versions of the Strangers, the resemblance was strong..

This third movie was the best of the three, with the most steady action, explanations, and a wrap up. Or maybe a new beginning.

2017 Godzilla: City on the Edge of Battle

* Directed by: Hiroyuki Seshita, Kobun Shizuno

* Written by: Gen Urobuchi, Sadayuki Murai, Tetsuya Yamada

* Stars: Mamoru Miyana, Takahiro Sakurai, Kana Hanazawa

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 41 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is the second animated movie in the trilogy after “Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters,” and continues the story right where it left off. Far in the future, Earth belongs to Godzilla and humans returning to the planet hatch a plan to get rid of the big lizard once and for all. But since we know there’s a third movie, things are still left unresolved. The animation is cool, the story is gripping and full of action, it entertained us both.

Spoilery Synopsis

We hear a report from Earth’s surface that now there’s another Godzilla. It’s been growing for 20,000 years and is the size of a mountain. His heat ray is powerful enough to kill them in orbit, so they retreat to the moon. Credits roll.

Sakaki wakes up, surprised to still be alive. He quickly meets up with a human survivor from Earth. The humans must have adapted to the changed atmosphere. He follows after the strange girl and wonders where his crewmates have gone.

Yuko’s group shoots at the girl, and Sakaki shows up right after. Then others show up and surround the group and lead them away to an underground city. Professor Martin is there, and he’s made some observations about the human-ish descendants.

Two of the natives are twins, and they seem to be telepathic. They aren’t happy about the bombings that the humans did before landing. Godzilla is the ancient enemy of their god. There are several subspecies of Godzilla now; most of the lifeforms in the forest now shares some of Godzilla’s DNA.

The group is released to find a landing ship and signal the mothership. The twins go with the group. They fight some monsters and reunite with Metphies, the Exif; they soon call for an evac. Galu-Gu and Belu-Be, the Bilusaludos, come up with a plan to beat the big Godzilla. They want to use the nanometal from the locals’ speartips. The self-regenerating metal was originally used for Mechagodzilla, but that didn’t work out so well. They all decide to search for Mechagodzilla and see how that turns out.

They find an entire city made of nanometal; it’s grown here from Mechagodzilla’s carcass. Yes, it’s “Mechagodzilla City.” The Hauta twins call it “Sinister. Evil. Poison.” The group enters the city and finds the head of Mechagodzilla. They reactivate it, and it starts to regenerate the control center.

Sakaki explains his plan to capture and kill Godzilla using the whole city as a trap. They build a new flying weapon, the Vulture, and they want to use it to lure Godzilla into the trap.

Professor Martin has noticed that the people who were treated by the Hauta seem to be feeling sick, as if their treatment and the nanometal aren’t compatible. Metphies also doesn’t like the whole idea of the nanometal, and they’re all starting to get a little creeped out. There’s also some friction between the Bilusaludo and Exif ideas. Metphies explains that his own world was destroyed by a monster far worse than Godzilla, but we don’t hear its name.

The Bilusaludo want to join with MechaGodzilla city to evolve into a superior life form. Some of them are volunteering to join with the machines. The city starts thinking for itself, and that might be trouble.

Meanwhile, the Hauta talk about their egg.

Godzilla notices the city and approaches. Everyone gets ready for a big battle. Sakaki and Yuko fly out in three vultures to slow him down. They lead him to the trap point and spray Godzilla with liquid nanometal as planned. They shoot and shoot until Godzilla’s shield collapses, then they shoot him with an EMP harpoon. Godzilla collapses but doesn’t die.

The barometric pressure suddenly changes; Godzilla’s not exploding, his temperature’s rising. It’s going to melt the city, and the vultures can’t get close enough to hurt it.

Galu-Gu becomes one with the machine and tells Yuko and Sakai that they need to join the nanometal as well. Yuko starts to change, but Sakaki’s body rejects the change. Galu-Gu and Metphies get into a philosophical argument about the war, and Sakaki has to make a decision. Sakaki blows up the command center and Galu-Gu as well.

Godzilla gets up, and he ain’t happy. He wipes out what’s left of MechaGodzilla City with his super-atomic-breath. Sakaki lands his vulture, but Yuko dies from the half-completed conversion.

Brian’s Commentary

This picks up immediately after “Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters.” It has the benefit of not needing to explain the whole situation and characters this time, but it’s definitely still the middle of the story. There’s lots of action, and it’s easy enough to follow and understand what’s going on at all times.

I liked it.

Kevin’s Commentary

I am impressed with how detailed and rich the animation is. And I enjoyed this one much more than the first movie in the trilogy. There was less gibber jabber and more action.

Contact Info:

Email: mailto:email@horrorguys.com

Websites:

* https://www.horrorguys.com

* https://www.horrormonthly.com

All this, as well as the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #54, is available! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link:

https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2025 Whistle

* Director: Corin Hardy

* Writer: Owen Egerton

* Stars: Dafne Keen, Sophie Nélisse, Nick Frost

* Runtime: 97 minutes (Note: some sources report up to 108 minutes)

* Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A group of young people come into possession of a cursed whistle that summons the future death of anyone who blows it or hears it. So they learn about the magical situation as they are getting picked off one at a time.

It’s a little formulaic, but it’s well made and above average in quality. We were both entertained.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a basketball game with the Stalkers versus the Wolves. One of the players, Horse, sees something weird up in the audience. As he makes the winning shot, he sees someone who appears to be on fire that scares him off back to the locker room. The player runs into the locker room and smashes an old-looking urn as the smoky-ashy-man approaches. It sets him on fire in the shower. Credits roll.

Six months later, Chrys argues with her cousin Rel about unpacking her stuff. It’s her first day of high school after moving here. She’s assigned Horse’s locker and some of the kids take offense to that. We get to meet some of the other “kids” of the school, as well as a teacher, Mr. Craven. Also, Chrys may have a bit of history. Grace tries to be nice to the new girl, but doesn’t get any support.

Inside Horses’s locker, Chrys finds all Horses’s stuff, still there, including that ancient urn with an ugly skull-whistle inside. She’s about to blow it when the bell rings.

Mr. Craven looks at the whistle, and it’s got ancient writing on the side which he just happens to be able to read. Someone Googles the script and says it means “Summon the Dead.” He blows in it to see if it works and it makes the mirror shatter.

Chrys meets Noah, a youth pastor who invites her to church. He’s very sketchy– no, he’s also a knife-wielding drug dealer. Meanwhile, Rel steals the whistle off Craven’s desk. Not long after, a bloody bald man crushes Craven’s lungs and makes him lose all his hair.

At Grace’s houseparty, Grace blows the whistle, and they all cringe at the sound. Ellie is nice to Chrys and invites her to the harvest festival tomorrow night. Chrys soon develops a crush on Ellie.

Later that night, Grace works on her homework next to the pool. She hears someone scrabbling around on the deck and checks it out. She gets a jump scare, but that’s all.

The next morning, Rel and Chrys arrive at school and hear about Craven’s death from lung cancer last night.

Chrys and Ellie go to Horse’s house to return the whistle to his parents. His mother, Ivy, is broke and has to sell all her possessions. She’s very self-obsessed. “You didn’t find it, it found you,” she says about the whistle. It doesn’t say “Summon the dead,” it says “Summon YOUR death.” It shows you how you’re going to die. It brings Death to you earlier; you die in the way you were meant to, but much sooner than intended.

Could Mr. Craven have used it like Horse did? Ellie works at the hospital, so she checks on Horse’s death records. Horse’s dental records show that he was in his forties, but he was really just seventeen. He would have died in a gas leak at age forty. Mr Craven would have died of lung cancer eventually, but it happened last night because of the whistle.

It’s time for the harvest festival, and it’s quite a party. Rel and Grace are there. She buys some weed from Noah, who then tries unsuccessfully to sell some to Chrys. Meanwhile, Grace goes into the scare maze and runs into a terrifying old woman who chases her. It catches her and she ages seventy years in a matter of seconds.

Ellie and Chrys explain the whistle to Dean and Rel; they all heard the whistle, so it’ll be coming after them as well. Dean doesn’t believe any of it until he gets home and sees himself after a drinking and driving death.

Chrys tells Ellie about how she OD’d last year and her father died on the way taking her to the hospital. This leads to a makeout session. Meanwhile, Rel has visions of his death at the steel mill.

The next morning, they all go back to see Horses’ mother about Choka, the whistle of Death. She says there’s no way to stop it, but they can change its course. “Give your death someone else’s life. Offer Choka a new sacrifice. Mark another with your blood and you will be spared.”

Alone in his bedroom, Dean dies from a massive traffic accident in the grisliest way possible.

Meanwhile, at the church, Rel has decided to trade Noah’s life for his own to break the curse. Noah takes his gun away, but Rel knows he’s not going to die that way. Rel knocks him out and takes him to the steelmill. Chrys and Ellie show up and talk Rel out of marking Noah with his blood. The invisible steel-chewing machine then kills Rel as the girls watch.

Chrys says they summoned Death and have to die– but they don’t have to stay dead. Ellie’s a diabetic, and she’s got enough insulin to kill both of them and then revive. Ellie injects Chrys, she dies, and then Ellie resuscitates her.

Noah, meanwhile, breaks out of where they had him tied up, and he works on getting into where the girls are.

Noah gets in with his gun as Ellie lays on the floor dying. She’s bleeding out, but Noah dips his fingers in the puddle like it’s a religious experience. Yep, he’s marked with Ellie’s blood now. His own Death comes after him, and he doesn’t escape it.

Three months later, Chrys is back in high school and she’s with Ellie. We cut to another girl opening a locker and finding the whistle inside…

Brian’s Commentary

I went into this one blind except for knowing a cursed whistle was involved. I liked it quite a bit. The casting, soundtrack, and deaths were all good, and the plot was fairly unique. The film leaves it wide open for a sequel, and it was good enough that I’d watch it if there was one.

Kevin’s Commentary

The basic formula seems familiar. A group of friends in their 20s still in high school get their hands on a magic object that kills them off one by one in unique ways. I thought they milk things out a bit, but overall it’s well made and entertaining. The effects are excellent, the cast is good as are all the technical aspects.

I’d call it above average for this type of movie.

2025 The Strangers Chapter 2

* Director: Renny Harlin

* Writers: Alan R. Cohen, Alan Freedland (Based on characters by Bryan Bertino)

* Stars: Madelaine Petsch, Gabriel Basso, Froy Gutierrez, Ema Horvath, Ella Bruccoleri

* Runtime: 98 minutes

* YouTube Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Immediately after Chapter 1, survivor Maya wakes up in the hospital and has a peaceful recovery. Okay, not really, the Strangers are still after her. There’s lots of chasing and incidental body count. The Strangers are persistent, and we get hints about their origin. And then it stops and says, “To be continued.” Yep, that happened.

Spoilery Synopsis

As credits roll, we get flashbacks to the three “Strangers” killing a man in the woods. We cut to Maya, from the previous film, who wakes up in the hospital. She describes them and tells the story to Sheriff Rotter, who is still creepy. She wonders who “Tamara” is that they kept asking about. The people in the local diner speculate about the killers, and they’re all suspicious-looking themselves. We cut to an angry little girl who has a doll that looks like Dollface.

That night, at the hospital, the place is nearly empty. Maya gets a phone call, “Is Tamara here?” Then there’s screaming out in the hallway. Suddenly, the lights go out, and her cell phone stops getting reception. Soon, she sees Scarecrow wandering around with his axe. Fortunately, it appears that Maya is the only patient in the huge hospital. Soon, they’re all playing hide-and-seek in the hospital’s basement workings.

She hides in the morgue, in the same drawer as her dead fiancé, Ryan. This works pretty well, so she gets away from the hospital and runs outside into the rain. She runs into a woman who tells her that the sheriff isn’t going to help her “Because he’s–” and then she dies. Maya runs into a horse farm or stable to hide.

Running back outside, she’s picked up by two women whom Maya obviously doesn’t trust, but at least they have a car. They pick up two guys on the road, and she finds it all very suspicious. It’s all very tense. She panics and jumps out of the moving car and back to the woods.

As the sun comes up, Maya uses a stolen first aid kit to sew up the wound in her side, screaming all the while. Somehow, the three baddies have tracked her to this location as well, even though there are miles of forest between where Maya jumped out of the car and where the bad guys were left behind. Instead, Maya gets attacked by a wild boar, which is pretty random.

She’s having a really bad day. But not as bad as the pig.

Pinup comes across the scene and has a flashback about playing with baby pigs herself.

Maya makes her way back to the murder cabin from the previous film and grabs a knife, some clothes, and food. She meets a man who says he’s with the State Police, and they get into his car. He doesn’t last long before the masked women kill him.

She hurries to another house, with a strange man inside, and passes out. When she wakes up, Turns out this is the house of the two men from the car she was in earlier. Gregory is creepy, but the women say it’s fine to ignore him.

Family has sent an EMT to pick up Maya at the house, but he stops at a gas station and maybe tells the wrong person where he’s going.

Back at the house, Gregory explains that this stuff has been going on for years, and she’s the only one who has survived. After a few minutes, Pinup arrives and tries to break in. Dollface, however, is already in her bedroom somehow. She makes it outside to find the EMT’s ambulance and his dead body outside.

Pinup is waiting inside the ambulance, and they have a quick fight. She dies. Later, Scarecrow takes off her mask, and we see a face inside; it’s– I have no idea who that is. We get another flashback to the creepy, animal-killing little girl. The little girl kills Tamara, another girl whom she was jealous of. The little boy sees what she’s done and smiles.

To be continued.

Brian’s Commentary

Takes place immediately after the first film in the reboot series. Ever notice how deserted hospitals in horror movies get at night? It’s like doctors, nurses, and patients all go home at closing time.

The film is mostly just Maya running from one bad situation to another, with The Strangers ahead of her at every turn. There’s lots of suspense and tension, but not really much in the way of a plot, except for watching bad things happen to Maya.

You know how in many horror movies, there’s a part in the middle where everything just drags a little bit before the exciting finale? This whole movie is that draggy middle part.

A waste of time.

Kevin’s Commentary

The hospital made for a good cat and mouse setting for Maya vs the killers, but it was absurdly empty of people other than them and a very few folks at the wrong place and time.

It’s quite remarkable, to the point of silly, how the Strangers are able to travel from place to place wherever Maya flees.

Brian summed it up perfectly referring to this as the draggy middle part of a mediocre movie. A looooong three-movie movie.

I was not impressed.

1977 The Car

* Director: Elliot Silverstein

* Writers: Dennis Shryack and Michael Butler

* Stars: James Brolin, Kathleen Lloyd, and John Marley

* Runtime: 98 minutes

* Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A small desert town is terrorized by a killer on wheels. As the body count and attacks climb, the local sheriff and his crew struggle to stop it, and gradually learns it’s no ordinary car and driver. The pacing is a little clunky, but a good cast and decent script with some surprises elevates it. It’s not excellent, but we were both entertained.

Spoilery Synopsis

After the credits, we open in the desert as a couple of bicyclists zoom down the desert road and into a dark tunnel. We see a car drive into the other end of the tunnel (from the car’s POV). The not-so-subtle music hints that something bad is going to happen. The car comes up behind the bikers and both young people die gruesome deaths. The car, on the other hand, honks gleefully and drives on.

Wade and his girlfriend Lauren wake up and do hanky-pankie as his young children listen outside the bedroom door. Elsewhere, John Morris plays his French Horn outside grumpy old Amos’s house. John puts out his thumb for a ride when the car swerves to hit him. It misses, but then comes back for more.

Wade is the sheriff’s deputy, and he gets called out to Amos’s place, where the car has repeatedly run over John the hitchhiker. His description is a little sketchy, but it was obviously intentional. Not long after, they find the dead bicycle girl, but they don’t find the boy, who went over a bridge at a different point.

Meanwhile, Amos’s wife, Bertha, is at the police station. Sheriff Beck wants her to sign an abuse complaint against her husband. Beck’s had a crush on her since high school. Beck watches as the car zooms toward Amos, but it hits and kills him instead. An old Indian woman sees what happened and blames an evil spirit; there was no driver in the car. Wade takes over as the new sheriff, and he’s not happy about it.

There’s going to be a parade rehearsal this afternoon, and Wade knows it’s a bad idea. They get a call that they’ve found the bicycle-boy’s body, so that distracts everyone for a while. In the meantime, Deputy Luke starts drinking again.

At the fairgrounds, the kids and teachers practice their parade marching as the wind picks up and visibility drops. Everyone panics when they hear a car horn, and the horses go berserk. The kids all run a mile or so to the cliffs instead of going into a building or onto the bleachers or something. They all hide in the old cemetery, but the car stops just outside the gate and waits as Lauren taunts it from inside the fence.

Deputy Ray spots the car in the desert and follows it. All the other cops move in sped-up footage to get to that area. Things go badly for Ray as the car slowly pushes him over the edge of a cliff.

Somehow, the car rolls over, takes out two more police cars and comes to a stop in front of Wade and his little pistol. Wade shoots the car’s tires and windshield, but it appears to be bulletproof. It then knocks him down when he approaches the driver’s door - which has no handles, and Wade passes out.

In the hospital, the deputies all discuss what they know. Lauren wonders about the wind at the parade; it was almost like magic. Luke admits he’s started drinking again and simply forgot to cancel the parade rehearsal with everything that’s been going on.

Deputy Chas drives Lauren home, and the car follows them. As she goes into the house, the wind picks up; the car wants revenge for all her taunting earlier. It drives right through her living room and kills her. We get a long scene where Wade is sad. Luke thinks the car didn’t go into the cemetery because the ground was hallowed. Wade is skeptical, but he doesn’t have a real explanation that beats that.

Wade has a plan, but he needs Amos’s help with explosives. We get a long scene of Wade repairing his motorcycle, only to find the car is in his garage. After a standoff, the car chases Wade and his motorcycle down the road. He lures the car to where the surviving deputies and Amos are rigging up dynamite in the cliffs.

Wade keeps the car busy while the deputies finish wiring everything, and blow it up excessively. Afterwards, Wade and Luke debate what they saw in the fire. As the closing credits roll, we see the car is in a city now…

Brian’s Commentary

There’s no explanation for any of this. We never find out why the car is killing people.

It’s got a lot of similarities with “Duel” from 1971 as well as “Christine” from 1983. One came before, and one after, but the influences carry over between films. It may be stretching things a little, but “Rubber” (2010) is also in the same neighborhood.

The dialogue and the pacing are really weird. They focus on lots of things that aren’t really all that important to the plot. The cast is surprisingly good for such a weak film; most of the actors were big at the time, or would become big later.

I was entertained, but it’s a long way from great.

Kevin’s Commentary

I saw this one when it came out at the theater. I was eleven, and it was a formative movie for my enjoyment of horror. I haven’t seen it since, and I was interested in seeing what I thought of it now.

In one scene a group of teachers and kids seeks refuge in an old cemetery, and the car doesn’t follow them in. It’s said that the car wouldn’t go on hollowed ground, and I thought at the time I first saw it that it made perfect sense - it was afraid of falling in the hollowed ground of graves. It was years later that it suddenly occurred to me oooooooh, they said “hallowed ground,” not “hollowed.”

The cast has lots of familiar faces of actors from the 70s that were in lots of stuff before and after. James Brolin was young once.

That’s quite a few deputies for such a small town, though they do have a big area of land to cover, but that was necessary for the action and body count.

Watching it now, almost 50 years later, I was still entertained.

2026 Return to Silent Hill

* Director: Christophe Gans

* Writers: Christophe Gans, Sandra Vo-Anh, Will Schneider

* Stars: Jeremy Irvine, Hannah Emily Anderson

* Runtime: 106 minutes

* Trailer Link:

* 2

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

James gets a letter from his lost love imploring him to return to Silent Hill, and so he does. Once there he goes through a series of encounters and scenes with creepy stuff, very much like walking through a video game, interspersed with flashbacks of his relationship with Mary.

While the setting and creatures are similar, this doesn’t seem to be connected to the previous two movies in terms of characters or story. The plot is sparse, mostly just a quest that goes on for quite a bit of time through scene after scene of strangeness. It was… okay.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a man driving too fast through the windy, curvy, mountain roads. Unsurprisingly, this goes badly, as he nearly hits a woman in the road, causing her to miss her bus. She talks about Silent Hill, her hometown. She’s Mary, and he’s James, and he offers to drive her home.

James wakes up– that was all just a dream. He’s very drunk and gets thrown out of the bar. His therapist calls to nag him about his appointment tomorrow. He goes home and finds a letter asking him to come back to “their place” from Mary. We get a flashback to James and Mary’s big romance. James returns to Silent Hill. Credits roll.

A woman named Angela tells James to grab a sandbag and follow her. There are ashes falling from the sky, and she says some fires are still burning. Then, there were floods, and she warns him not to go to town.

James walks into town, and it’s not only deserted, it’s also covered in ash and haze. James gets a flashback to the people of Silent Hill talking about Mary’s father, Jacob Crane, and all he’s done for the town. Meanwhile, outside, an armless monster attacks a homeless man.

Suddenly, an air raid siren goes off, and everything gets really dark. He sees all sorts of weird creatures outside, and runs inside to hide. He sees, or imagines, seeing a great deal of weirdness and calls his therapist back.

James runs into Eddie, a man hiding in town, and he talks about all the monsters that just moved into town. They find a little girl, Laura, trapped behind some bars. Eddie turns on James, but that’s not as bad as a Pyramid-Head, who starts chasing James through the old building. He then runs into a giant spider-woman who chases him some more. Pyramid kills the spider-woman and cuts her arms off.

James runs into Angela, who tells him he shouldn’t have come, as there are too many secrets here.

He next runs into Maria, who leads him through town to the hospital, but Mary’s not there. She tells him about Joshua Crane, who was an old-time cult leader in the town. The two walk into a room full of freeze-frame nurses who chase them. Maria gets injured, so James finds Laura, who says she knows where Mary is.

James finally finds Mary, who is now a four-armed monster who kills him– no, he wakes up, that was all a dream. He’s in the Silent Hill Hospital, as a regular patient. There are doctors and nurses, and it all seems normal again. They tell James that Mary has been dead for months now, but he knew that.

We get another flashback to the couple in Silent Hill arguing about what her father did to her with the cult. This ends with him storming out and leaving town. He feels like he let her down.

Suddenly, James is back in the horror version of the town, explaining what happened to Maria. She looks just like Mary, and they kiss. They take the elevator all the way down.

James wakes up next to the river and watches as the hospital burns to the ground behind him. James remembers that Mary’s full name was Mary Angela Laura Crane; all the women have been Mary all along. He remembers her getting sick; her father had been poisoning her all her life. She wanted to die, and he smothered her to death.

Back in Silent Hill, James sees Mary turn into a big, undead-looking moth with four arms and flies away. He then puts her corpse in his car and drives into the river to drown…

Nope– another dream. We’re back in the opening scene where James almost hits Mary with his car. This time around, the two of them drive to anywhere other than Silent Hill…

Brian’s Commentary

This seems to ignore all the previous films. It is much like a video game, with James running from one unexplained situation to another, because– why?

The setting is everything here. There’s no real acting or characterization to speak of. There’s only a hint of a plot; it’s mostly just one scary scene after another, just like a video game.

This was dull, made no sense, and was overall… atrociously bad.

Kevin’s Commentary

They stepped up the creepy and unsettling encounters a bit in this one. And it has the video game vibe, almost more so than a movie. The plot is thin; it’s really all about the quest and encounters. It started feeling tedious after a while.

I can’t help but think I’d be more into these movies if I was a fan of the games. This one is said to be based on the game Silent Hill 2 from 2001. I’ve never played any of them.

2017 Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters

* Director: Kōbun Shizuno, Hiroyuki Seshita

* Writer: Gen Urobuchi

* Stars (Main Cast): Mamoru Miyano, Takahiro Sakurai, Kana Hanazawa, Yūki Kaji

* Runtime: 88 minutes

* Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s far in the future, and refugees from space come back to Earth after everyone left due to the giant monsters ruining everything. Before they can resettle, they have to deal with Godzilla. This one is an anime style animated movie, but it’s still considered an official movie in the Toho series. Brian enjoyed it quite a bit, while Kevin - who has a bias against cartoons - didn’t get much of anything from it.

Spoilery Synopsis

Aboard a space station, guards point their guns at a docked spaceship. The pilot, Captain Sakaki, is refusing to take colonists to Tau-E, which everyone knows is uninhabitable. They’re just trying to dump and abandon their elderly. The old colonist in charge calls Sakaki, and he says the colonists want to land on the planet, any planet. Sakaki gives in and launches toward the planet below. From the space station’s window, Sakaki watches as the landing shuttle explodes in orbit. Credits roll.

We hear a report about monsters appearing on Earth at the end of the 20th century. The monsters came from everywhere and Godzilla was the worst of them. Aliens, the Exif, arrived, and they wanted to live here. Then the Bilusaludo, another race arrived as well. They also offered to rid Earth of Godzilla. Godzilla overwhelmed them as well.

Sakaki remembers life on Earth and the rush to evacuate to the stars. Life aboard the space station wasn’t much better. Sakaki, now in jail aboard the ship, researches the history of Earth and Godzilla. He wants to go back and fight the big monster. The ship’s chances of finding a habitable planet are really small; returning to Earth is maybe the only option. Due to relativity, over a thousand years have passed on Earth.

There’s a plan floating around that says they can defeat Godzilla; Sakaki wrote it, and the Exifs say it might be possible. Everyone rushes to the windows to see their homeworld; the younger generation have never seen it. It’s been 10,000 years on Earth, so even Godzilla couldn’t still be around.

One of the drones goes dead. It must have been Godzilla and his atomic breath. He is still alive down there, which brings on a lot of discussion. Sakaki is released from jail to lead the fight.

The space force lands on Earth and prepares the area for a battle. Sakaki explains his whole plan, and there’s a lot that has to go right. Godzilla has a hidden organ that gives him protective shields, and he hopes to disable it.

Life on Earth has changed. Some of the trees are razor sharp, and the air is barely breathable. A group of flying monsters attacks the base, and they’re something completely new. Nothing could have evolved that quickly, could they? Turns out, they were really gone for 19,200 years, so… maybe?

Martin, the scientific leader, says there’s no real benefit in staying since everything here is toxic now. He wants to set up a base on the moon instead. In order to retreat, they have to join up with another company that still has working ships to evacuate. In order to get there, they have to pass through Godzilla’s territory.

Metphies, the Exif scientist, suggests that Godzilla will be looking for them. He’s “the vengeful hammer for the arrogant.” He’s seen it before with other races.

Godzilla soon shows up on the scene, and he somehow causes the human’s ship to crash. They use a failed attack by Colonel Leland to figure out where Godzilla’s shield emitter is located. With Leland dead, Metphies is the new commander, but he puts Sakaki in charge instead.

There’s another battle with Godzilla, but in the middle of the fight, more of those flying things show up to get in the way. The group leads Godzilla to the trap point, and they set off their traps. Godzilla is mostly buried, and they hit him with everything they have.

Godzilla has been defeated– the plan worked! Martin thinks this probably wasn’t the original Godzilla from 20,000 years ago but one of his descendants. If they find another one, at least they know they can beat it.

Suddenly, there’s an earthquake. Something even more powerful than Godzilla is coming! It’s… big. Yes, it’s the original Godzilla, and he’s spent millennia growing to be mountain-sized.

Everyone retreats as Sakaki vows to kill the monster…

Brian’s Commentary

This one is animated, but still counts as an official Toho Godzilla film. It’s a much more ambitious, complicated story than more non-animated films.

Overall, it added a lot of new stuff to the far-future world, and it more or less all made sense.

Godzilla himself only shows up toward the end of the story, but he makes an impression. Overall, I liked it more than I thought I would.

Kevin’s Commentary

Anime something something cartoon blah blah.

It’s highly detailed with top notch animation, there’s a lot happening in the story, the technology is advanced, and Godzilla is more powerful than ever. All that said, this really didn’t do much for me at all.

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2026 The Dreadful

* Directed by: Natasha Kermani

* Written by: Natasha Kermani

* Stars: Sophie Turner, Kit Harington, Marcia Gay Harden, Laurence O’Fuarain, Jonathan Howard

* Run Time: 94 minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Two women in 1400s England live a quiet life on their own on the edges of society. And it’s a quiet and slow build of a movie. But the dread does build and things get darker as things go along. It’s pretty low key in every way, with beautiful scenery and strong performances. We both liked it quite a bit.

Spoilery Synopsis

Anne goes to church and has Communion. Her mother-in-law, Morwen, is a pickpocket, stealing from young mothers. They’re poor, and all the men from the village have gone off to war.

Anne dreams of her husband, Seamus, returning from war, but there’s something very wrong with him. Morwen says, “This war will make us rich.”

The next day, she runs into Jago, home from the war. He tells the story of how Seamus was rather brutally killed in the war. She still remembers when they were all little and growing up together. Anne and Morwen take the news badly.

Not long after, there’s a shipwreck nearby, and one survivor makes it to the beach. Morwen stabs him in the back, which Anne doesn’t see, and then she and Anne loot the bodies. “God is smiling on us to send such good luck,” Morwen adds. They eat well that night.

Jago likes Anne, but she’s not really interested in him. Morwen doesn’t like him either; he was always jealous of Seamus.

A wandering priest comes by and shows them his relic. He wants to sell it to them for three silver pieces. As he prays with Anne, Morwen cuts his throat. Anne is horrified, but Morwen justifies it all.

Some time later, Anne watches as a knight in armor kills a man in the field. She’s seen the knight before. She runs to Jago for protection, and he likes that. Later, she has a dream where Morwen is eating raw flesh. She sneaks out of the house late at night and goes to Jago; they have sex. He wants her to move in with him, but she thinks Morwen needs her.

Anne starts helping Morwen kill and rob travelers of their valuables. When Jago comes around for Anne, Morwen runs him off with her knife. She sneaks off to do her thing with Jago when Morwen’s asleep.

Meanwhile, Morwen watches as a knight in armor comes to their house. She follows him and kills him from behind. She takes off his helmet and loots him.

Anne tells Morwen that she’s leaving to be Jago’s wife. Morwen does not take it well, and she goes to live with Jago. That night, Anne dreams that the demon knight came and killed them both.

Anne notices discrepancies in Jago’s story about her husband’s death. Could he have killed Seamus? He tells the story about how Seamus would kill soldiers and rob their bodies– just like his mother’s been doing. Seamus killed the knight in the helmet and put on the helmet. The helmet burned Seamus and wouldn’t come off; Jago left him there on the battlefield. Anne turns against him and leaves.

We get a flashback to Morwen killing the knight, who turned out to be Seamus in that same helmet.

Anne goes to the village and finds the priest has been murdered by the knight. She runs to Morwen’s house, but the old woman isn’t home. The knight shows up, and it’s Morwen inside the helmet. She screams that she can’t get it off. Anne rips the mask off, and Morwen is all disfigured under there now. “Now you really are a demon,” Anne says.

An actual demon comes out of the helmet, and the two women run for the house. When Anne looks outside, all she finds is the helmet.

Anne and Jago talk about demons. He still wants her, but now she’s loyal to Morwen, who has gone blind from what the helmet did to her. Anne goes outside and picks up the helmet…

Brian’s Commentary

This is based on the same Buddhist parable as “Onibaba” (1964). Like that film, this one is slow-moving and atmospheric. There aren’t any jump scares or anything like that; just a slow buildup of dread that you know isn’t going to end well. And it doesn’t.

Kevin’s Commentary

The scenery and quiet of the movie are very soothing. The dreadfulness is there, but it’s pretty low-key. I thought it was a good watch. Excellent cast.

2025 The Other

* Directed by: Paul Etheredge

* Written by: Paul Etheredge

* Stars: Olivia Macklin, Dylan McTee, Avangeline Friedlander

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 38 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

When a couple brings home a little orphan girl, it’s not a simple happily ever after. There’s a reason she’s holding that drill in the poster, and we get to find out why. It builds slowly to a big finish, then a very abrupt ending. It’s on the unique side, and we liked it more than disliked it.

Spoilery Synopsis

The lady at the adoption agency explains that Kathelia doesn’t speak , but they don’t know why. She’s been returned to the orphanage before. Robin and Daniel go ahead and adopt her anyway. Credits roll.

Robin’s mother has done some research and learned that Kathelia’s mother killed and cut up her whole family, which might be why Kathelia doesn’t speak. We see that all the food in the house has very suddenly gone off.

That night, everyone goes to bed, and Kathelia grabs a big knife from the kitchen as something out in the pool goes, “Bloop!”

In the morning, Daniel finds some pink sludge growing in the pool. Robin finds that all her kitchen knives are missing. Kathelia looks hard at the pink stuff.

Kathelia meets Fiona, a neighbor with Down Syndrome. They spend the morning throwing dolls in the sewer. She’s… weird. Her mother, Lizzie, comes over, and Fiona says, “That lady is a door” to Robin. Robin starts being afraid to be home alone.

The family throws a party for all the people they know with children, and Kathelia doesn’t look happy to be there. All the kids know about Kathelia’s murderous mom, which soon turns into a fight. Afterward, Robin gets into the jellyfish-infested pool. Meanwhile, Kathelia packs a bag and runs out the front door until she gets a nosebleed. They soon find her.

In the morning, Fiona knows that Kathelia “tried to get away” and couldn’t. “You’re stuck here now.” She follows this up with, “Monsters are coming. They’ll be here soon.”

The parents take Kathelia to a child psychologist, but that goes badly. Robin thinks adopting was a mistake, but Daniel wants to stick with her. Robin’s pregnant again, and her priorities have changed.

Kathelia gags Robin and ties her to the bed somehow, which is over the line for Robin, who wants to send her back. Also, it looks like she lost the baby.

Kathelia writes down an address for Daniel, which he checks out. He goes inside to talk to the old woman inside, but all the food on the table is rotten. The old woman is weird and has a worm crawling out of her leg. Turns out, the woman is insane and tied to a leash. The husband blames all their troubles on Kathelia and warns Daniel that he’ll find out. His wife got pregnant with something nasty after Kathelia came to live with them. “Get rid of that child any way you can!”

Robin goes to the doctor and shows her the thing that came out of her. The multiple things that came out of her, and they don’t look quite right. The doctor wants her to go to the hospital, but Robin says she’s fine and leaves.

By the time Robin gets home, she’s fat and really pregnant-looking. She kicks down Kathelia’s door and threatens her. Kathelia can’t scream.

Kathelia runs to Fiona’s house; she talks to ghosts and plays with bugs. Then she whacks Kathelia with a hammer, which involves a hospital visit. By the time Daniel gets home, Robin looks ready to deliver and has become completely unhinged.

The doctor calls; Kathelia has “vanishing twin syndrome,” where Kathelia “ate” her own twin in utero. Thanks to Fiona’s attack, they discovered this. The twin got stuck in her frontal lobe, which is why she can’t speak.

At home, Robin looks terrible and immediately gives birth to something nasty. Daniel and Kathelia go to see Fiona, who seems to know things. Lizzie tells Daniel Fiona’s origin story. She knew hitting Kathelia on the head would result in finding the monster in her head.

Things get weird from here.

The whole group goes up to the attic so Fiona can put on a weird raincoat and do a ritual to communicate with the monster. The twin inside Kathelia is trying to use any woman as a door to be born into the world.

The gynecologist comes to the house to talk to Robin about “the baby.” Daniel comes home, and Robin stabs him with scissors a few times. The doctor gets it even more severely. Kathelia hides and finds all of Robin’s previous dead babies. Robin drags Kathelia out to the pool, which appears to have become a gateway to Hell.

Lizzie and Fiona show up out of nowhere and rescue Kathelia, who goes over and beats on Robin’s belly. “It’s not there. She’s just a door,” Fiona explains. Robin then slices Lizzie’s neck and kills her on the spot. When Robin comes after the rest of them with a sledgehammer, they all barricade themselves in the workroom lab.

Fiona tells Kathelia that she needs to dig out the body from her brain or they’re all gonna die. Kathelia looks at the power tools on the wall and chooses a drill. Daniel puts the drill to Kathelia’s scar and lets it rip.

As the fetus gets drilled out of Kathelia’s brain, Robin stops her assault. Suddenly, a deformed little baby crawls out of Kathelia’s otherwise normal-sized head and attacks Daniel. Kathelia picks up the little thing and breaks its neck. Then she drops it in the trash.

Brian’s Commentary

I kept waiting for Kathelia to become Cthulhu, but that didn’t happen.

I’m sure the police will eat up any explanation they offer about the dead doctor, the dead Lizzie, the stab wound, and the drill-headed child.

The ending is pretty cool, but it was a bit of a slog to get there.

Kevin’s Commentary

Being understanding is good up to a point, but this kid went past the point of “time to take her back to the orphanage” early on in the movie. But it wouldn’t have been much of a movie if they had, I suppose.

It didn’t go in the direction that I expected, and I wasn’t expecting that much body horror. Like Brian pointed out, how are they going to explain all this to the police?

I thought the ending was a little too abrupt, but overall I’d say I liked it.

2009 The Hills Run Red

* Director: Dave Parker

* Writers: David J. Schow (Screenplay), John Carchietta (Story), John Dombrow (Based on screenplay)

* Stars: Sophie Monk, Tad Hilgenbrink, Janet Montgomery, Alex Wyndham, William Sadler

* Runtime: 1 hour, 21 minutes

* Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A group of horror fans take a road trip to hunt down the lost film “The Hills Run Red” from 1982. It’s well made, with a decent cast, and good special effects. It takes too long to get to the good stuff though. And while there are some unique aspects, overall it wasn’t anything we haven’t seen before. We give it a weak thumbs up.

Spoilery Synopsis

As credits roll, we watch a young man cut his own face up with scissors. He then covers the mess with an ugly baby mask.

We’re told that in 1982, Wilson Wyler Concannon, an indie director, released his only film, “The Hills Run Red,” which was sadistic and quickly pulled from theaters. It soon became a lost film, nothing left but an intriguing trailer. The director was also never heard from again.

Tyler watches the trailer, and it’s about an ax-wielding murder called “Babyface.” He wants to know why the film was banned– what was so terrible about it? There are no prints, no actors, and no director; everything about the film has disappeared. His friend, Lalo, doesn’t see the attraction.

Tyler has tracked down Alexa, Concannon’s daughter, and he wants to ask her about the movie. Alexa is working as a stripper in a bar. Tyler visits Alexa at “work” while Lalo bangs Tyler’s girlfriend, Serina, at home. Alexa, an addict, takes Tyler home to a skeezy hotel.

Alexa agrees to take them to see the film– no, not really, Tyler kidnaps her, ties her up, and apparently breaks her addiction in a matter of hours. When sobered up, Alexa tells what she knows about the film; she was in it a little, but she hasn’t seen the whole thing.

On the way out to the middle of nowhere, Lalo explains the rules of horror movies, and everyone laughs. As they stop for a pee break, still a hundred miles from their destination, Alexa sees someone in the woods filming them.

They stop at a gas station near Concannon’s old house and talk to people there who actually saw the movie.

They arrive at the woods where Concannon’s house is supposed to be, and they all make jokes about horror movies that take place in the woods. They’re obviously not alone as they hike to the remote cabin.

They find a ribcage in the woods; could some of the murders in the film have been real? Alexa explains that the guy who played Babyface was actually deformed and really wore a mask.

That night, they’re all knocked out and tied up by the crazy locals. Sonny wants to use their film equipment to make a porn film, starring Alexa and Serina. They don’t get very far before someone in the woods kills them. Someone wearing a Babyface mask. Alexa remembers him, and he remembers her as well.

Alexa runs into the woods with Babyface in pursuit. Tyler goes after them, but Lalo and Serina call 911 but don’t know where they are. Lalo tries to hold off the killer, but Babyface has a gun and uses it.

Tyler comes to a farmhouse and goes inside. He finds evidence that he’s been followed since the beginning of the film. He finds Alexa, who reveals that Concannon’s movie is still being shot. Turns out, Alexa and Babyface have been in cahoots all along.

Babyface chases Serina into his smokehouse, where he has all his victims hanging up to be cured. Serina hides in a big tub of blood, but he soon catches her as well.

Tyler wakes up tied to a chair, surrounded by cans and cans of “The Hills Run Red” films that he’s collected over the years. Alexa’s “dead” father, Concannon, comes in, not dead at all. He shows Tyler a film of him killing the original Babyface actor. He found a real method actor to play the new Babyface, Alexa’s and her father’s own son.

Meanwhile, Alexa torments Lalo, while Babyface works on Serina. Concannon gives Tyler a lesson in filmmaking, and Lalo plays the victim. Meanwhile, Concannon and Alexa argue about parenting until he shoots her. This enrages Babyface, her son, who turns on his father/grandfather and stabs him repeatedly as Tyler films it all. Babyface is just about to kill Tyler as well when Serina stabs him in the back.

Alexa, not dead, knocks Tyler back out. He wakes up in a movie theater full of corpses as Alexa starts showing him the actual film. “This is what you came here for. Are you ready?” As he watches the film, Tyler laughs and goes insane…

Brian’s Commentary

By the halfway point, no one had died, and nothing interesting had happened. It did eventually pick up, but it never really got good– it’s just another masked killer in the woods movie. He could have been wearing a hockey mask and nothing needed to have been changed. The whole theme about horror films and filmmaking gives it a little bit of a “Scream” vibe, but only a little.

Kevin’s Commentary

I thought this took too long to get to the good stuff. And then the ending seemed kind of rushed. It’s pretty well made, the cast was fun, the effects were realistic. The movie within a movie aspect made things a little more interesting than typical, but there wasn’t enough new here that we haven’t already seen.

I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t find it very satisfying.

2012 Silent Hill Revelation

* Director: Michael J. Bassett

* Writers: Michael J. Bassett

* Stars: Adelaide Clemens, Sean Bean, Radha Mitchell, Carrie-Anne Moss

* Runtime: 94 minutes

* YouTube Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Little Sharon from the first movie is all grown up now into a teenager in her 20s and on the run and in hiding with her father. But the pull of Silent Hill is strong, and when dad vanishes she visits the town with a guy pal. It very much had the vibe of walking through a video game. Both of us thought it was on the dull side and lacked entertainment value, especially comparing it to the first one.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a woman running through a carnival while being pursued by cultists. The carnival rides are straight out of Hell, powered by the Pyramid-head man. “Do not go to Silent Hill,” warns one of the dead. No– it’s just a nightmare, and Heather wakes up.

Heather asks where her name comes from. She used to be Sharon, and now she’s Heather. Her father used to be Christopher, and now he’s Harry. She’s turning eighteen, and they’ve moved around a lot. She goes off to school, and Harry/Christopher remembers Rose, who’s been missing for so long, trapped in Silent Hill. She warns him that the cultists are still coming for their daughter.

At school, Heather is the new student, along with Vincent, another new kid. Between classes, Heather has a creepy flashback/vision.

Also, there’s a creepy man who seems to be following Heather, and she catches on to that right away, calling her father to meet her. The man chases her to the mall, where he calls her Sharon. He’s Douglas, a P.I. who has been hired to find her– by the cult. He knows about Silent Hill, and they want her back. He explains things to her as a monster attacks their elevator. He doesn’t live long.

Heather meets up with Vincent on the way out of the mall. Harry isn’t answering the phone; something might have gotten him. Vincent talks about his crazy Uncle Leonard, who’s been institutionalized.

Heather gets home and finds “Come to Silent Hill” written in blood on the wall, and her father is nowhere to be found. She and Vincent go through her father’s papers. The police have found Sharon through the P.I.’s papers, and now they suspect her of the murder. They also see the Silent Hill message on the wall.

On the way to Silent Hill, Heather reads to Vincent from her father’s notes on the town, the cult, and everything. The pyramid-head man is Elessa’s guardian and executioner. Alessa was the girl born to the cult to become a receptacle for their god, and she’s also probably Heather/Sharon. Vincent admits that he’s also been born and raised in Silent Hill, and it’s his job to get her to return.

Suddenly, the motel room melts around them and they’re soon attacked again. Heather leaves the motel and finds herself in Silent Hill, where it’s all gray and ashy. She soon runs into Dahilia, Alessa’s mother. The woman explains that the evil Alessa, who was burned alive, put her soul into a newborn orphan, Heather.

Heather then hides in a mannequin factory, and that get weird fast. Meanwhile, the cultists, led by Claudia, reward Vincent for bringing Heather to them; he’s put into the asylum for treatment.

Meanwhile, Heather breaks into the Silent Hill asylum to talk to Leonard, Vincent’s crazy uncle. Leonard says Claudia is corrupted by the darkness. Leonard is glad that the traitor Vincent is here now as well. He identifies half a key, and he has the other half, which he uses.

Elsewhere, a bunch of undead nurses kill Vincent’s guard and hack him to pieces. The nurses seem to be motion-activated, and he just waits until Heather releases him. They walk to a nearby abandoned amusement park.

Heather comes face to face with Elissa, and they don’t care much for one another. They are two halves of the same being, and Heather ends up absorbing her evil part. She walks through the cultists and finds her father.

Claudia shows up, looking all menacing, and monologues to Heather. They want their god to be born through Heather for some reason that even Claudia can’t explain. They want that key that she’s been carrying around to summon the god. The key reveals Claudia’s true form, which then has to fight pyramid-head for some reason. Heather and Vincent, who has just sort of shown up, untie Harry and head to the exit. Claudia loses her head, and Pyramid-head lumbers off alone.

Heather, Harry, and Vincent walk out of Silent Hill, but Harry warns that it’ll start up again soon. Harry wants to stay here and find Rose, who never came home after the first movie.

Heather and Vincent hitch a ride on a truck and leave town. They pass a whole bunch of police cars going into the silent town…

Brian’s Commentary

This starts out completely adding new stuff to the end of the first film so that this one has somewhere to go.

Kit Harrington’s American accent is atrocious, but otherwise, the actors and characters are OK. The creature effects and sets are also pretty good. It was filmed in 3D, and there are a few shots that highlight this, but it’s not excessive.

I assume this is all based on the videogame, as it’s basically Heather going from one weird situation to another with very little reason or story behind any of it. It all looks really cool, but I never really understood most of what was going on.

This was just awful on many levels.

Kevin’s Commentary

I think this one lacks the atmosphere and creepiness of Silent Hill that the first movie had. Heather is on a quest for the sake of questing, or at least that’s how it felt sometimes. Like a video game walkthrough. Which is what it’s based on. The story could be followed, but there were things that just popped up, and we are supposed to go with it without enough explanation.

I’m sure Kit Harington worked hard on his American accent, but it fluctuated noticeably.

I bet I would have enjoyed this one more if I were a fan of the video games. Or maybe not. It wasn’t paced very well and was on the dull side. I thought it was a big step down from the first one.

2004 Godzilla: Final Wars

* Director: Ryuhei Kitamura

* Writers: Isao Kiriyama and Wataru Mimura

* Stars: Masahiro Matsuoka, Rei Kikukawa, Don Frye

* Runtime: 125 minutes (2 hours, 5 minutes)

* YouTube Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This fiftieth anniversary movie is heavy on science fiction with super weapons, aliens, mutants, and many creatures in addition to Godzilla, and it takes place in 2044. There’s also a lot of hand-to-hand combat and fights that defy physics among humans, aliens, and mutants. This movie has it all. And unlike some of the other sequels, this one takes place in a world where apparently all the events of all the Godzilla movies have taken place. It’s a fun watch with loads of action and a lot crammed into it.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on Godzilla versus a bunch of tanks. Suddenly, a crazy drill-vehicle bursts out of the mountains at the south pole and starts blasting. There’s an earthquake, and Godzilla falls into a crevasse. The screw-ship drops a mountain into the hole on top of him. Game over, they defeated Godzilla.

We get a report about how mankind has been so busy fighting the atomic monsters that they don’t fight with each other any more. Meanwhile, a new breed of human-mutants develops. They are the Earth Defense Force. Credits roll as we get a montage of all the previous films.

On the ocean floor, the screwship submarine Gotengo battles a giant snake, Manda. They freeze it and then shatter it. Captain Gordon and his ship win the battle, but now he’s facing court-martial.

We cut to two Earth Defense Force mutant-men fighting in an arena at M Organization. Afterward, they are evaluated. Kazama wins, Ozaki loses because he’s too soft and has a heart.

Miyuki, a biologist, is coming from the UN to examine a mummified monster they found. But she’s hot, so Ozaki is more than willing to play bodyguard. It’s some kind of alien cyborg that’s 12,000 years old. It has the same genetic markers as the modern mutants. How are they linked?

The Mothra fairies appear to them and explain that the monster is Gigan, and he destroyed everything 12,000 years ago. Mothra fought it, and the mutants have the same evil in their blood. They warn Ozaki about choosing evil and give him an amulet.

The UN Secretary General’s airplane is destroyed when something big flies by. In New York City, a flying monster attacks the ghetto. It’s Rodan, and he’s very destructive to the skyscrapers. Anguirus and King Caesar have shown up in other cities. Other CGI monsters are appearing all over the world, all at once.

The humans do their best against the monsters, but there are a lot of them. Even Minilla, Baby Godzilla, shows up. Basically, all the Toho monsters show up in one form or another (I don’t even know who some of them are). The mutants lock and load and get on the case, fighting Ebirah, the giant shrimp. They beat it, but then the body vanishes. Likewise, Rodan and Aguirus vanish as well; aliens are abducting the beasts.

The UFO stops right outside the EDF headquarters. An alien beams down– no, it’s the head of the UN; the aliens saved him from the air disaster. He says they’re friendly. The aliens say they come in peace from Planet X. They’re Xilians. They warn that Planet Gorath is on a collision course with Earth in about a year.

The United Nations becomes the Space Nations, and everyone cheers. Not everyone, as the variety shows all have debates about it. Ozaki wonders if the Xillians are related to Gigan somehow. Miyuki notices that the leader of the UN doesn’t blink since his “rescue.” He’s been corrupted by the Xiloans somehow and is no longer human. The EDF leader is also on the wrong side.

Scientists figure out that Planet Gorath is a hologram, and the threat has been a hoax. Ozaki picks out the only man he knows isn’t corrupted: Captain Gordon. Gordon wastes no time exposing the aliens’ true form and killing the head of the UN. The second-command of the Xilians then kills the leader and takes over. He doesn’t want to play nice; humans are just food, and he controls the monsters anyway. It’s now mutants versus aliens, but the mutants can’t resist X’s control and turn against the good guys.

Somehow, this leads into a motorcycle chase through the city between Ozaki and Kazama. Meanwhile, Commander X wakes up Gigan, who immediately goes on a rampage. All the other monsters are released as well.

Minilla and his new human friends see the destruction and escape in a pickup truck. Captain Gordon gets to the Gotenga and talks to the crew about waking up Godzilla. Godzilla doesn’t have the M-Base gene, so the aliens can’t control him.

The Gotengo makes it to the South Pole and wakes up Godzilla, who is not happy. Gigan is there, and the fight commences. One blast of atomic breath, and Gigan loses his head.

Next up is Zilla, the GINA from the 1998 film. He doesn’t last long, and neither does the Sydney Opera House. One stop after another, Godzilla cleans up the South Sea (South CGI?) Islands.

Godzilla makes it to the Tokyo region, and Minilla wants to get closer to him. Godzilla takes on King Caesar, Rodan, and Anguirus all at the same time, and it takes a minute or two: Godzilla is way overpowered here.

Gotenga attacks the alien mothership, and Kazma gets his chance at redemption by flying into the mothership and blows up the reactor in the center which disables the ship’s shields. The Gotenga crew gets captured.

The Mothra fairies finally send Mothra, who kills heads to Tokyo, where Ebirah and the Smog Monster are fighting each other.

Commander X has one more trick up his sleeve. A meteorite from space comes crashing down, and inside it is Monster X, a new baddie. The two seem evenly matched until Mothra shows up to fight the upgraded Gigan. Meanwhile, Command X explains to Ozaki that he’s a Keizer, a superhuman hybrid.

The four monsters continue to fight. Ozaki, now the “Chosen One,” has all kinds of powers to beat the evil Xilians. He fights hand to hand with Commander X. Everyone fights for a long time. After a lot of talk, Ozaki beats the crap out of Commander X, who sets the ship to self-destruct.

Everyone makes their way back to the Gotenga and they work to get out before it’s too late.

Down on the ground, Godzilla and Monster X go at it with atomic breath. Monster X starts to mutate and grows three– uh-oh, he’s really been King Ghidorah all this time. Ghidorah bites Godzilla with all three heads and starts to drain his life force. Only Ozaki can help now. He supercharges the Gotenga with “Infinity Power” and energizes Godzilla again. Godzilla starts ripping heads off, and the battle is soon over.

Godzilla then turns against the Gotenga, and he just doesn’t know when to quit. As he moves in for the kill, Godzilla sees Minilla come running in and pauses. Minilla tells his dad that he’s done enough and they should go home– which they do.

Now it’s time to clean up all the mess. Godzilla and Minilla swim off into the sunset…

Brian’s Commentary

Wow!

This is the 50th anniversary of Godzilla. It’s all very futuristic sci-fi, with flying ships and super submarines– it takes place in 2044, and apparently physics works differently in that year. There’s not much left of Earth after this one.

They really just threw everything into this one. Monsters, mutants, mayhem, and machines all over the place. It is so incredibly over the top that we couldn’t help but laugh a few times. It’s excessively long at more than two hours, but they’ve got a lot to deal with.

This is the last film in the “Millennium Series” and was the last live-action Godzilla film until “Godzilla” (2014), an American release came out. It didn’t do terribly well at the box office, which is weird because it’s got literally everything.

It’s way, way overblown to the point of ridiculousness, but I liked it

Kevin’s Commentary

I think this is the most science fiction loaded of any of the Godzilla movies so far. And there’s definitely some influences from “The Matrix” in the human fights and action scenes.

They fully embraced the CGI in this one, with multiple scenes being entirely CGI. But there are also plenty of practical puppets and guys in rubber suits and little model cities getting stomped and blown up. So much collateral damage in this one.

This was a good time, and I’d recommend it.

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Mainstream Films:

2026 NFT: Cursed Images

* Directed by: Jonas Odenheimer

* Written by: Jonas Odenheimer

* Stars: Najarra Townsend, David Wayman, Mariah Nonnemacher

* Run Time: 1 hour 13 minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s 2021 and NFTs are hot. A group of young friends in London start having some big troubles when they receive some that have curses attached. The rules and the ending seemed a little unclear, but we both liked it more than disliked it, with Kevin being a bit more favorable toward it.

Spoilery Synopsis

A couple walks home late at night. Sue thinks she sees something and gets spooked. She talks about how an NFT scared her. Her friend is making a lot of money with them, and her friend passed one on to her. There are supposed to be dozens of these cursed images that are shared online. Sue can’t get through to her friend now. Suddenly, Mark vanishes. When Sue tries to call the police, all she sees on her phone is that NFT. Credits roll.

It’s 2021, and NFTs are still a thing. Kit is a successful NFT trader. Dan complains about being a Millennial and the current job market. There are Boomer and Doomer jokes. The whole group got rich with crypto, except for poor Dan, who’s a whiner.

James doesn’t know what an NFT is, and the others can’t explain it to make sense. Julie and Cass arrive, and Kit’s not happy about that. The women have exactly the same thoughts about the men. They all seem to be infatuated with NFTs– it’s even better than crypto!

The group talks James and Dan into buying some NFTs right now. They explain the nonsense that is an NFT. Kit suddenly has seven NFTs transferred to his account out of the blue. It’s from a collection called “Crypto Horrors.” Sarah’s heard of those, they’re real cursed images. There are only 666 of them, and they get Airdropped to you at random. He sends each person one of them.

The party breaks up, and everyone leaves. Later, Kit wakes up to a weird stretchy-faced ghost woman in his room.

Cass remembers that she left her phone at Kit’s place, and Julia suggests asking James to go back and get it. Sarah walks home and gets texts from Kit’s phone, but the person texting isn’t Kit. She soon finds out who’s stalking her.

James and Cass go back to Kit’s for her phone. They find the place a mess, and then Cass wants to go check on Sarah, who also isn’t answering her phone.

We cut to Dan, who is also walking home in an isolated tunnel. Something is chasing him. Julia: The same.

Nes is watching YouTube videos about NFTs and gets a panicked call from Dan, who says he saw his NFT chasing him. Dan believes in the curse now and every one is unique just like NFTs are, but Nes just laughs it off. All the NFTs are based on old legends, and possibly real curses. Julia also comes to Nes, and she’s been experiencing the same thing as Dan. James also calls and tells him that Kit and Sarah have gone missing. Julia leaves, and her monster gets her right after. Nes takes a show and gets his.

James arrives at Nes’s house, talking to Dan on the phone all the while. He sees Nas’s NFT there and scares it away by showing it a reflection of itself, like Dan tipped him off should work. Dan says if that worked, then maybe they do have a chance against the curse. Dan looks up Cass’s curse and says it can be stopped by striking it with a sword.

Meanwhile, James’s own NFT comes after him, as does Dan’s. Dan is attacked, but his monster goes away suddenly. He gets a notification that his NFT has sold for .5 ETH. He’s free of the curse. Dan calls James and tells him to sell or transfer his NFT right now. James transfers his right then; Dan gets the notification that it was transferred to him. Dan dies right away.

Dan calls Cass and tells her to dump that NFT right away. She says she already gave it away to some random guy on Twitter. Cass goes to Sarah’s place and talks to her corpse. It possesses her somehow, which gives James a final scare.

Brian’s Commentary

The background music is occasionally too loud; it’s often hard to follow all the British people talking due to the noise. The visuals are all pretty good, as is the acting. The creatures themselves are not particularly impressive, but we mostly only get glimpses of them.

I’ve done crypto, but I never understood NFTs at all. Of course, I was eventually proved right on those. Even today, I still don’t understand where the value was supposed to come from. Still, the only thing they normally kill in real life is your net worth.

I like the idea of cursed NFTS, and that they appear from nowhere. The ending made no real sense. Are the victims killed or possessed? Cass should have been spared, but the monsters weren’t following their own rules.

It’s a neat concept, but the actual story was a little underwhelming.

Kevin’s Commentary

We could have used subtitles. Perhaps it was just in the quality of our screener.

I thought the party was a bit draggy at first, but things move quickly once that breaks up with the NFTs doing their thing that very night. The digitized creature effects are brief, but pretty cool. All the effects do the job well.

Like Brian points out, the monsters don’t seem to follow the rules, and the ending was a little unclear. But overall, I was entertained, which is what really counts. It’s a pretty good one.

2025 Haunters of the Silence

* Director: Tatu Heikkinen, Veleda Thorsson-Heikkinen

* Writers: Tatu Heikkinen, Veleda Thorsson-Heikkinen

* Stars: Tatu Heikkinen (as K.), John Haughm (as Hat Man), Veleda Thorsson-Heikkinen (as Wife)

* Runtime: 1 hour 11 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The IMDB description says “In the stillness of night, a man is trapped between worlds. As darkness closes in and reality blurs, he must confront the Haunters of the Silence.” and it’s hard to pin down more of a story than that. The visuals are very cool, sound and music is effective, and Tatu Heikkinen is completely natural going about through his days and haunted nights.

Spoilery Synopsis

A man walks along the beach and eventually stops to dump someone’s ashes into the water. As he drives home, credits roll.

The man, K, sits in his house, and we see photos and things of his wife, who is apparently the one who died. He goes to sleep, and we see all around his house. An alert from his porch camera wakes him up, and he goes out to investigate. Finding nothing, he goes back inside and checks inside the house. More weird stuff happens after he goes back to bed, so he searches some more. He falls to the floor and starts hallucinating.

K runs through the misty forest and comes to an abandoned building. It all gets pretty surreal and weird. After a while, he starts being pursued by a man in a hat. K wakes up when he gets a phone call from his father. He then dreams about skulls and bones followed by many other weird visuals.

K wakes up and sees his wife at the bottom of the bed. “It’s OK,” she says. We then hear a recording of a poem, “The Haunters of the Silence.”

The alarm goes off, and K gets out of bed. He makes some tea and goes outside. Suddenly, it’s the middle of the night again. He’s still in the dream, and he can’t get out. The man in the hat comes into his bedroom and– the film ends.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s super slow-moving and atmospheric. Everything is hazy and dreamlike, which reflects the main character’s state of mind after losing his wife. It was inspired by the director/writer/star’s experience with sleep paralysis. It’s all very visual, but there’s no real plot to speak of; it’s just K and what he sees, or imagines he sees. There’s also no real dialogue, as K is alone through the whole film.

It’s basically a nightmare on film. It’s surprisingly relaxing, and I almost caught myself going to sleep a couple of times, and I don’t mean that in a bad way. It’s unique and weird!

Kevin’s Commentary

I’d say the visuals are the number one thing going for this. Very cool.

There is a nightmare quality to many of the scenes, and the whole thing is surreal. Without much of a story. A guy in mourning attends therapy, takes medication, tries to get through his days, and looks like he’s having nightmares with sleep paralysis.

I agree with Brian, I found it more relaxing than disturbing. I’d say that I liked it.

2025 Forty Five

* Directed by: Bazz Hancher

* Written by: Bazz Hancher, Michael Walcott

* Stars: Benedict Bareford, Sean Botha, Ryan Brunt

* Run Time: 40 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

After Fallon loses his daughter, his search for answers leads him on a surreal and creepy quest wrapped up in religious prophecy. It builds well as it goes along until a chilling finish. We were both impressed.

Spoilery Synopsis

We get a Biblical math lesson; it is the end of days– 45 days to go. It’s June 6th, 2022. Police and detectives examine a crime scene out in a field. A young girl was murdered and bitten, some kind of ritual killing.

Three years later, Carson and Fallon talk about “45” whoever that is. 45 is dangerous, and whoever gets close to him dies. Despite the warning, Fallon, the dead girl’s father, still wants to know more. Fallon goes to see Father Vaughn, who knows something about the case.

Vaughn talks about the Book of Daniel and the end times. He believes that 45 killed Fallon’s daughter, and he’s also involved with the Antichrist and the end of the world through a holy war. Fallon’s daughter may have been sent by God to defeat the Antichrist, which is why she was killed. As soon as Fallon leaves, the old priest collapses and dies.

Several times, we see the ghost of Fallon’s daughter in the background, but he doesn’t notice. Fallon goes to visit Blake, the detective who was in charge of the case three years ago. “Do you know what you’re getting into?” says the sickly, dying detective. He also warns Fallon to stop investigating. The closer Blake got to finding 45, the sicker he got; it’s like cancer, but it’s not.

Fallon next goes to a weird woman who has been beaten. She’s a disciple of forty-five; a false prophet. She gets intense.

Fallon wakes up with forty-five. The goatman creature admits everything and explains it all. Fallon gets a vision of himself being his daughter’s killer as he passes out.

Brian’s Commentary

As an American, I found the accents a little difficult, and I watch lots of British films. There was a good bit of dialogue from some characters that I just missed out on, which detracted from my understanding of what was going on.

It’s all very ominous and most of the film builds suspense as Fallon digs deeper into the problem. The visuals are excellent, and it all looks great.

Kevin’s Commentary

I agree with Brian on the accents, but I got used to them as it got going and could understand it clearly.

I thought it builds nicely, was creepy and unsettling, and it looks really good. IMDB says the estimated budget was only $2,700.00, if that’s correct it’s especially impressive for such a small sum.

I give it a thumbs up.

2025 Obex

* Director: Albert Birney

* Writers: Albert Birney, Pete Ohs

* Stars: Albert Birney (Conor), Frank Mosley (Victor)

* Runtime: 90 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eG9VrEeKk-I

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Conor leads a quiet isolated life at home with his dog, computer, and media in 1987. And everything is so normal until he plays the computer game OBEX. Then reality and digital start to blur together when he goes on a quest to find his missing dog inside the game. It’s slow moving and fascinating, kind of surreal. We both really enjoyed it.

Spoilery Synopsis

It’s 1987. Conor watches three TVs at once. He feeds the dog and takes out the trash; he seems normal enough. He watches a show about people making a cicada omelette. He then types in and prints off an ASCII portrait on his computer.

Mary comes to the door, bringing groceries, but he doesn’t let her in– he apparently never leaves the house. After she leaves, he checks the mail, and finds that he’s got a new computer magazine. He’s got an ad in there about his photo art service. He turns the page and sees an ad for a new game called OBEX. It promises to “insert you into the game.” Cool! He records a video that tells the gamemakers about himself so that he can be put into a game. He has a weird dream about his dead mother.

The OBEX game soon arrives in the mail. He loads it right in and gets started. The game actually has Conor’s image in it. It’s clunky by today’s standards, but he seems to enjoy it for a minute or two. It doesn’t do much, so he quickly gives up and deletes it.

Mary comes to the door, asking if he’s found blood in his milk. He looks outside and sees a dying cicada. The cicadas are everywhere in his backyard, and he constantly sees them. He gets back to work digitizing children’s photos but the picture is ruined by a cicada in his printer. That night, it’s another nightmare but then he wakes up when he hears the printer working. It says “Remove your skin” over and over.

The next night, the TVs come on by themselves, the OBEX game comes onto the computer, and a glowing creature comes out of the TVs from the game. It wanders around the house and notices Sandy the dog.

In the morning, Sandy the dog is gone, missing. Conor goes looking for his dog out in the nearby woods and finds his computer out there, still with the OBEX game running. Sandy the dog is now inside the game, along with cicadas. All of a sudden, Conor is inside the game as well, now with a long beard and surrounded by little fairies. He runs into a videogame version of Mary, who is an NPC now. She tells him about the demon king Ixaroth, who took Sandy. She gives him supplies and tells him where to go.

Conor walks through the Dark Forest as it’s shown on the gaming map. He camps in the “Meadow of Regrets.” The next day, he comes across a pair of humanoid cicadas torturing a humanoid TV monitor. Conor kills the baddies with his sword. The TV man is Victor. The two find a car that reminds Conor of his mother. Victor speculates on what TV Heaven might be like.

That night, he stops when he sees a naked woman and man in the road. They start to spin and lose their skins– they’re just skeletons. They attack him, and he sees “Game Over” in the sky. He does, however, get the option to “Retry.”

Conor wakes up with Victor and Mary; he’s reborn, and they soon restart their journey to the dark castle. They soon arrive at the Nightmare Realm but there’s a big combination padlock keeping the gate shut.

In the morning, Conor has aged significantly. Victor has opened the gate, but died in the attempt. Conor enters the videogame castle, and it’s full of cicada-men. He finds Sandy’s bones, and there’s also a wolf– and Freddy Krueger. All his worst nightmares come to life all at once. Eventually, Ixaroth appears and demands that Conor remove his skin. Conor attacks and defeats Ixaroth.

We, and Conor himself, watches as Sandy and Conor’s avatar reunite and go to the beach. “The End” comes up on the computer screen, and Conor exits out of the game. The two then go to the beach for real– happy ending!

Brian’s Commentary

I loved all the old computer technology, although I never imagined people did that kind of ASCII art by hand. The rest of it– I remember. The black-and-white makes it all seem more surreal, and it does fit in a bunch of old videogame tropes.

It’s slow-moving, and there’s not much action, but the concept and execution are really interesting, and it never gets dull. I liked this one a lot.

Kevin’s Commentary

It was a quiet nostalgia trip through 1987 at first, watching Conor go through his days. Then things get weird when he plays OBEX.

For such a slow moving film, I kept expecting to get bored, but I didn’t. It’s strange and very good.

2006 Silent Hill

* Director: Christophe Gans

* Writers: Roger Avary

* Stars: Radha Mitchell, Sean Bean, Laurie Holden, Deborah Kara Unger, Kim Coates, Tanya Allen, Alice Krige, Jodelle Ferland

* Runtime: 126 minutes

* Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Little Sharon has a strange ailment that makes her sleepwalk and have hallucinations, so adopted mother Rose takes her to Silent Hill trying to find answers. She ends up having a weird and dark adventure - almost like a horror video game. Which the movie is based from. The effects and story are creepy, but we both thought at over two hours long it gets draggy and repetitive here and there.

Spoilery Synopsis

Sharon has gone missing in the middle of the night. Her mother, Rose, runs through the woods after her and arrives at a huge waterfall. She sees Sharon on a nearby cliff and tackles her. Sharon screams “Silent Hill” over and over. Christopher, the father, catches up to them and carries Sharon home. Credits roll.

Sometime later, Rose asks Sharon about Silent Hill and her sleepwalking. Sharon doesn’t remember any of it, so they’re going there for a visit– without Sharon’s father. He looks on Rose’s computer, and it’s full of information about “The Tainted Town,” the ghost town of Silent Hill. Christopher says Sharon needs to be in a hospital, under medication. Could Sharon have come from there?

Rose and Sharon stop at a gas station for directions to Silent Hill. A strange policewoman stops and talks to Sharon. They break through the fence to Silent Hill with the cop in pursuit, and that goes badly when they crash.

When Rose wakes up, ash is falling from the sky, and Sharon is gone. The sign says, “Welcome to Silent Hill.” She walks on into town, and it’s completely abandoned and hard to see through the falling ash. She sees someone running in the distance and gives chase, but cannot catch up. An air-raid siren goes off. She goes down a tunnel into a big maze of corridors. Then she runs into hundreds of little mutant-children-looking things that chase her.

Somehow, Rose makes it back outside. She runs into a woman outside who says “We’ve all lost our children.”

Christopher talks to a mechanic about Silent Hill, a town that still has a coal fire burning underneath it. He comes to the gate that Rose broke through and talks to the cops there. Rose’s vehicle has been found empty, and the cop mentions he’s also missing a deputy. They drive into town, and it looks completely different to them: abandoned, but normal.

The police officer, Bennet, catches Rose and handcuffs her. They start walking, but soon reach the “end of the world” and cannot leave town. They soon encounter an armless wobbling mutant, and Bennett ends up shooting it.

Rose continues exploring the abandoned town and seeing weird things. She encounters strange men in gas masks and hides in a school. The siren goes off again, and Rose finds the room she’s in decaying before her eyes. The gas mask men are eaten by giant cockroaches.

We see that Christopher and Officer Gucci are searching in the same physical location as where Rose actually is, but it’s in a parallel universe or something. Things get crazy, and Rose runs back into Office Bennett again, and this time, she’s more open to cooperation. The pyramid-head man has quite a knife, and he’s not afraid to use it. They drive him off for a while and get out of the building.

Chris doesn’t believe the police about what happened to Silent Hill, but the archivist refuses to help him. He breaks into the library that night and reads through the old records. He finds a photo of Sharon; maybe she did come from Silent Hill.

Rose and Bennett head toward a large hotel and suspect that Sharon might be inside. They meet Anna, another mother of a missing child. She lives with Christobella, who keeps them safe; there are others here. They enter room 111, where they find a girl who looks just like Sharon; she’s Alessa. Anna screams, “The darkness is coming,” and they all run to the church. Dahlia, a crazy woman, warns Rose not to go with the others as they’re all dead. Pyramid-head shows up and does something really bad to Anna.

Inside the church, the people point at Bennett and Rose and call them witches. The leader, Christobella, comes to them. She talks about the demon who takes children. It’s all very cult-ish.

Christopher goes to the orphanage where he adopted Sharon, and wants to know where she came from. Officer Gucci arrests Chris for disturbing the peace. Gucci talks about Alessa, and how she was killed thirty years ago.

A group of the cultists, led by Christobella, takes the two outsider women to a huge building where the demon is said to live. Rose takes an elevator to the lower levels, but the cultists beat Bennett half to death. Rose encounters a roomful of undead nurses, but they seem to only be active when her light is on. She switches it off and walks among them– until they wake up and attack anyway.

Rose hears Sharon/Alessa’s voice, and it tells about what happened to Alessa and her mother, Dahlia. The locals kidnapped Alessa and killed her for a sacrifice, but that went badly for the whole town. Alessa was horribly burned, and her hate grew so strong that she gained mental powers to get revenge on the town. Turns out, Sharon is Alessa’s own daughter, given to the orphanage to protect her from the monsters.

In the church, Christobella plans to finish what she started by sacrificing Sharon. They burn Bennett first. Rose shows up and talks about the world outside, at least until Christobella stabs her.

Suddenly, a hole opens in the floor and barbed wire snakes out. The real Alessa rises up, still confined to her bed, and she grabs Christobella with the wire. The wires and Rose set about slaughtering all the cultists. Dahlia comes in and recognizes her daughter.

In the morning, Rose and Sharon wake up and leave the church. They walk to the car and drive back out of the town, across the bridge. She calls Chris to say they’re coming home.

They arrive at their home, but it’s all dim and foggy, not like the sunny world that Chris still lives in. They’re still in two different worlds even though they’re in the same room…

Brian’s Commentary

Sean Bean didn’t die? Huh. Actually, he only interacted with Rose for a minute at the beginning, otherwise, his part is mostly unrelated to the action.

I’ve played a little bit of the original game, way back when it came out in 1999, and they’ve definitely got the atmosphere of the game here.

It’s well over two hours long, and it does drag quite a bit. Overall the visuals are excellent, but the story really drags in the middle.

It’s a weird one, for sure.

Kevin’s Commentary

It certainly does have a video game vibe to it.

The shots of the police and husband searching the “real” Silent Hill in the same locations simultaneously that Rose was in those same locations in the underworld was cool.

I liked the atmosphere, effects, and story, but it’s on the long side and drags after a while.

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New Book!

The Horror Guys Guide to the Tremors Films and TV Series

All this as well as the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #53, is available! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link:

https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2018 Lake Placid: Legacy

* Director: Darrell Roodt

* Writers: Johnathon Lloyd Walker, Matt Venables, and Jeremy Smith

* Stars: Katherine Barrell, Tim Rozon, Sai Bennett, and Joe Pantoliano

* Runtime: 93 minutes (or 1 hour 33 minutes)

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is a sequel to “Lake Placid vs Anaconda” as well as a sequel to the Lake Placid standalone movies. A group of eco-warrior urban explorers FAFO when they break into a fenced off decommissioned research compound. It wasn’t anything we haven’t seen before, but it’s well put together. It moves well and entertains.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open in Seattle, WA, where four people sit in a tiny car and conspire about exposing corporate greed. And urban exploration. And hacking. As they break into Wenoco Corp, we cut back and forth with a man running through the woods, terrified. Wenco Corp looks like a Star Trek set on the inside. The eco-terrorists drop a “Wenoco = Death” banner off the roof. Meanwhile, something unseen eats the man in the woods. Credits roll.

Alice doesn’t approve of the urban explorer/eco-terrorist stuff that her sister Jade leads. Sam, Billy, and Spencer are just in it for the rush. Sam gets a challenge from Dane for “one last quest” that has a $100,000 prize for the first one in. The place they need to go is off-limits, even deleted from Google Earth. It’s supposed to be a place where a toxic spill happened twenty-something years ago. Pennie and Travis don’t want to go anywhere near a place with radiation, if that story is even true.

The group arrives at the electric fence, and there’s definitely no radiation. The electric fence doesn’t work or is turned off for some reason. When they get inside, they do soil samples; there’s no contamination here, either. Why the fence?

Pennie and Travis drop the others off at a dock and promise to wait 30 minutes before they leave them. The others walk through a construction site. They soon find Dane’s camp, but Dane isn’t there. The place is wrecked, but they find a camera. It shows Dane being chased by some kind of monster. Then they find body parts, but Spencer thinks it’s all a prank– until they find half of Gomez, Dane’s assistant. They all run back to the boat, which suffers an accident, along with Travis.

Everyone talks, whines, screams, and argues all at the same time. The group finds a dark tunnel with a grate that’s been broken through and decides it’s a good idea to go inside. The group gets split up. Billy, Spencer, and Pennie head back to the dock while Sam, Alice, Jade, go deeper into the facility.

The inside group finds a lab with power while the outside group tries to boost their cellphone signal to call for help on the dock. Inside, the group learns that the facility was breeding giant crocodiles for some reason. Outside, Spencer and Pennie get eaten.

Sam and his group find Dane, still alive, down in the tunnels. They also run into Henderson, whom Dane has tied up for getting them all into this situation. He used to work for the corporation and explains about the genetically modified formerly extinct species that was supposed to cure cancer. He sounds believable with his motivations.

Billy calls 911 with his boosted phone, but he’s doubtful they could trace to source. Billy then loses his head, so he’s not gonna try again. In the confusion, Henderson sneaks away. Everyone else has to swim through a flooded tunnel for no obvious reason. The monster catches Dane and tears him up.

Henderson, in the meantime, wanders right into the big crocodile’s main nest and is torn in half.

Sam comes up with a cockamamie plan to blow up the whole place by sacrificing himself with canisters of propane as the two girls run back the way they came. Sam’s plan fails non-spectacularly.

Alice faces the monster eye-to-eye, but then Jade gets in one of the construction machines and starts it right up after being outside, abandoned for twenty-five years. She pins the crocodile and then covers it in fuel. The croc goes boom!

The two girls then swim off the island, but then we see they’re being followed…

Brian’s Commentary

It plays fast and loose with the lore from the previous films, as the whole corporate angle only marginally applied to the “Vs” film. On the other hand, the lab and facility were nice sets and they probably hoped there would be more sequels.

There’s supposed to be just one crocodile, but it’s both simultaneously inside the tunnel and out eating Billy at the same time. Its size also fluctuates depending on where it is.

It’s all fairly predictable in every way, but it wasn’t boring. If you’re looking for more CGI-croc action, this movie… exists.

Kevin’s Commentary

The poster is especially cool for this one.

I had a fundamental dislike of the eco-arrogant characters, which made it difficult to root for them. The croc tended to move from place to place and size to size as plot required (though we do find out at the very end it wasn’t really just one). And it wasn’t anything we haven’t seen before.

But those issues aside, I thought the whole thing was pretty well made and entertaining. The pacing is good without much down time, and the settings are great.

2003 Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.

* Director: Masaaki Tezuka

* Writers: Masaaki Tezuka, Masahiro Yokotani

* Stars: Noboru Kaneko, Miho Yoshioka, Mitsuki Koga, Masami Nagasawa, Chihiro Otsuka, Koh Takasugi, Hiroshi Koizumi, Akira Nakao

* Runtime: 91 minutes (1 hour, 31 minutes)

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Mothra and the fairies are back to warn Japan they need to return the bones of Godzilla used to make Mechagodzilla to the ocean to rebalance nature. But they repair Mechagodzilla just in time for Godzilla’s return, so there’s a big creature battle. We both thought this one looked good, but it was only middling. A bit on the bland side.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on Mechagodzilla, back in the base as the people do checks on the system. We then cut to the deep sea, where Godzilla wakes up. In the Caroline Islands, there is wind. In Hawaii, the Americans detect something on the radar– it’s Mothra! Credits roll.

The news reporter reminds us about the battle with Godzilla in the previous film– Mechgodzilla is still under repair from that one. Godzilla hasn’t been spotted in months, but he’s still out there somewhere.

Yoshi talks to his little nephew, Shun, about being a fighter pilot. He’d love to pilot the Mech-G. The grandfather is Professor Chujo. Suddenly, the two mini-fairies show up in the living room and want to talk to him. The old man knows them from way back in the first Mothra adventure, 43 years ago. They want him to send Godzilla’s bones back to the sea and not use them to build weapons like Mech-G. Yoshi argues that we need Mechagodizilla for protection, but the girls say Mothra will protect them– or else Mothra will destroy humanity.

There’s some debate on whether or not the presence of Godzilla’s bones is what attracted the new Godzilla in the previous film. Maybe they should get rid of those bones.

Grandpa Chujo tells Shun about his original adventure with Mothra, and he’s got photos to back it up. At the base, Yoshi and Azusa, from the previous film, know each other and talk about piloting. Yoshi goes in and looks at Mechgodzilla while remembering the fairies’ threat.

Chujo talks to the Prime Minister about cancelling the Mechagodzilla project. The leader has no other defenses against Godzilla and the monsters; they need MechaGodzilla, even if its absolute zero freeze-ray hasn’t been repaired yet.

Some giant creature washed up on shore, dead. It’s a giant sea turtle, but it was killed by something even bigger– like Godzilla. Meanwhile, Godzilla runs into, and rips apart, an American submarine.

Yoshi gets called to testify about the meeting with the Mothra fairies and what they promised. Meanwhile, Godzilla is heading toward Tokyo again. Shun steals Chujo’s Mothra-calling stone and tries to signal Mothra for help. It works very quickly.

Godzilla is heading straight for the Mecha base; his bones are attracting him. Inside, the men scramble to get Mechagodzilla working.

Mothra attacks Godzilla as the fairies sing to an egg back on their island. The big Mothra gets injured, and the humans decide they have to launch Mechagodzilla to assist.

Soon, the two Zillas are fighting, and many buildings in Tokyo pay the price. Mothra gets shot down just as his replacement egg hatches into two Mothras! The two soon set out across the ocean.

Yoshi drives around the deserted city looking for Chujo and Shun. The worms arrive and start spraying Godzilla with their silky strings. Meanwhile, old-Mothra is still alive and giving them advice– at least until she gets nuclear-blasted by Godzilla.

Mechagodzilla is dead. It can’t get up. Yoshi calls the commander and says he can fix it. What choice do they have? The fairies want Mecha-G dead, but they help Yoshi on the way to the repair anyway. He gets the problem fixed, but he also finds out that he’s trapped inside the thing.

The fight continues, and Mechagodzilla’s got some surprises to use against the bog lizard. The hyper-maser really annoys Godzilla. Mechagodzikka and Yoshi decide to stand by and let the Mothra worms disable Godzilla. The fairies insist that the Godzilla bones be returned to the sea. Suddenly, Mechagodzilla starts moving with a mind of its own, grabs the paralyzed Godzilla, and flies out into the ocean.

Azusa figures out that Yoshi is still on board Mech-G and shoots the sealed hatch open. He jumps out and is impossibly rescued in mid-air. The two Godzillas fall into the ocean and sink to the bottom. The Mothra worms swim back where they came from with the fairies.

Brian’s Commentary

How fast could the Mothra worms swim to get from their island to Tokyo during a single battle?

This one is all about the fighting monsters, and the human characters all suffer lack of development. They don’t really do much. Because of this, I think it’s a little dull– men in rubber suits fighting gets old fairly quickly.

This takes place not long after the previous film. Everything is sharp and clear and modern, but it’s almost too clear– the buildings look much more like models than they used to. The creatures, on the other hand, look better than ever, as do the planes, machines, and other CGI things.

Kevin’s Commentary

This one didn’t feel like much of anything that I hadn’t seen before. It all looks pretty good, with the creature fighting and collateral damage we’ve grown to expect. It’s just all on the bland side. I didn’t care much for this one.

2026 Primate

* Director: Johannes Roberts

* Writers: Johannes Roberts, Ernest Riera

* Stars (Cast): Johnny Sequoyah, Troy Kotsur, Jessica Alexander, Gia Hunter, Victoria Wyant, Miguel Torres Umba

* Runtime: 89 minutes (1 hour 29 minutes)

* YouTube Link for Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

When a beloved and tame pet chimpanzee gets rabies, things go bad quickly. It becomes a game of who will survive as a group is trapped and the body count rises. The effects are mostly practical, which is appreciated, though the chimp is an actor in prosthetics most of the time, and it’s not a perfect illusion. There are comparisons to “Cujo,” with people trapped by a rabid animal. The violence is brutal, and the situation is tense. It was pretty good.

Spoilery Synopsis

We get some text explaining about the symptoms of hydrophobia/rabies and that there’s no cure after 48 hours.

Lambert opens a large cage and goes inside to give Ben the ape his snack. Ben’s not feeling well right now and rips the man’s face right off. As credits roll, we see news articles about a famous sign-language-using chimp.

36 hours earlier, Lucy boards a plane to go home for a visit to Hawaii with Kate, Hannah, Nick, and friends. Lucy’s dad will be away at work, so the group starts planning a party. Lucy’s father, Adam, is deaf, and he works with apes for sign-language. Her sister, Erin, is annoyed that Lucy’s been gone for so long. The little chimp, Ben, uses a machine to talk, and he’s very smart.

Hannah visits the pool and runs into Ben, who drools and stares at the water oddly. Adam takes Ben to his cage and finds a dead mongoose in there. He also finds that Ben’s been bitten by the thing.

Night falls, and all the teens do teen things. We get the scene with the man in the cage getting his face ripped off again that night. Kate runs into Ben in the kitchen, and he’s weird and scary now.

Everyone argues about what to do with Ben; Hannah wants to shoot him. They call Lambert and hear his phone ringing up in the enclosure. Ben then takes out a big chunk of Erin’s leg. They all jump in the pool to keep away from the crazy ape, but Erin won’t stop bleeding. Lucy figures out that Ben must have rabies. Soon, they all find themselves trapped in the pool.

The pool is situated on the edge of a cliff, and Nick tries to push Ben over the edge. It’s Nick who ends up going over, and it’s an impossible drop. Lucy tries to get to a dropped phone, but Hannah ends up partially scalped. They do manage to reach the two boys from the airplane on the damaged phone, but they don’t sound like the helpful type. And the phone ends up ruined at the bottom of the pool.

Meanwhile, Adam’s at a book signing and gets word that the mongoose that bit Ben had rabies. He thinks it’s a mistake, since there is no rabies in Hawaii.

The girls find that Ben has gone, so they get out of the pool and head back up to the main house. Lucy and Kate go inside for a phone and accidentally turn on the loud TV, which draws Ben. They hide in a closet and wait for him to go away. They make a run for it, but Ben catches up to Kate and smooshes her head with a rock.

Drew and Brad, the doofuses from the airplane, break in the front door, having no idea anything is going on. Ben hears them immediately, and Drew gives him some lip. Brad doesn’t fare any better. Hannah uses the distraction to grab a phone and car keys and go out the front door. She gets in the wrong car, though, so that’s not good. She calls 911 but doesn’t know the address. Ben, in the meantime, has the keys to her car and lets himself right in.

Meanwhile, Lucy and Erin are still trapped in the pool. Adam, aware that something’s possibly wrong, comes home early. Ben and Lucy fight right behind him, but he doesn’t hear a thing. Eventually, he finds Drew’s body and knows what’s happening.

Ben attacks the two sisters until Adam shows up with his whistle. Adam and Ben have a fistfight, but Ben is nearly unstoppable. Adam stabs the chimp with a broken wine bottle, and things calm down. Of course, Ben gets up and makes one final leap, but ends up dying in the process.

Lucy, Erin, and Adam all go to the hospital. The family who kept an illegal chimp in Hawaii and let it get rabies is fine, but all their innocent guests are dead… So, happy ending, I guess?

Brian’s Commentary

It’s “Cujo” with a chimp and swimming pool instead of a dog and VW. The ape is mostly done with practical effects, but I was surprised at how unrealistic and unexpressive it looked.

I thought the fake looking ape detracted a lot. CGI might actually have been better. Other than that, it used a lot of the usual horror tropes and ideas. It was… alright, but not great.

Kevin’s Commentary

Most of the chimp action is practical effects, which is generally appreciated over CGI. And much of that practical effect is Miguel Torres Umba in prosthetics - which I thought was very good but not perfect. Like Brian said, some top quality CGI, or motion capture like in the “Planet of the Apes” movies, might have been more effective.

It’s a great house, but a pool in a cave with only one way in and out doesn’t seem like a good idea.

2026 Predator: Badlands

* Director: Dan Trachtenberg

* Writers: Patrick Aison and Dan Trachtenberg

* Stars: Elle Fanning, Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi, Ravi Narayan

* Runtime: 107 minutes (1 hour and 47 minutes)

* YouTube Link for Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A young and runty Predator goes on a quest to hunt the ultimate prey on an alien planet. He teams up with a damaged Weyland-Yutani android, and they have dangerous zany adventures on their quest. It’s action, adventure, and science fiction without much mystery or horror. It was pretty entertaining in its own way, but far from the original Predator movie.

Spoilery Synopsis

Yautja are predators. We open on Yautja Prime, where one Predator enters a cave and fights another. They leap around like it’s a videogame and taunt each other. The Yautja, Dek, loses, but survives. He’s not a Yautja yet. The two brothers talk later about old battles. Dek still needs to prove himself in battle in order to join the clan and earn his invisibility cloak. He chooses Genna, the Death Planet. The Kalisk there will be his trophy; even their father fears it. Dek’s got something to prove, and he wants it the hard way.

Dek’s a runt, and his father thinks he should simply be culled. His brother Kwei doesn’t want to kill him and turns against their father, which goes badly for him. Dek’s ship launches, taking him on his hunt.

Dek arrives on the planet Genna, and it’s clear that he’s not very good at flying - he lands hard. He checks out his weapons, and at least he’s prepared those. Even the trees in this place are hostile, so he fights them. Credits roll.

As Dek patches up his wound, he learns about his surroundings. He comes across a broken synthetic who knows his language. She knows he’s hunting the Kalisk, and she offers to help– if he helps her. They soon find themselves working together to survive. She has no legs or bottom half. He doesn’t want a partner, but he can use her as a tool, which is acceptable to him. She’s Thia, and she talks a lot.

Thia tells her story. She and another synth, Tessa, are better attuned to the creatures on this planet. The Kalisk attacked, and they got split up; Thia, literally.

We cut to the synth base, where Tessa is being repaired. She’s fixed up enough to complete her mission, capture new life forms for weapons use. Now, she wants the Kalisk too, threatened with decommission if she fails.

Dek and Thia run into various creatures and both hunt and are hunted. It’s all very action-packed. They make friends with Bud, a Gollum-like sidekick animal that hunts with them. We see that Tessa has arrived with a well-armed crew as they wipe out the vine creatures that Kalisk first encountered. Dek and Thia chat around the campfire and get to know each other better.

Tessa finds and explores Dek’s crashed spaceship. Thia and Dek wander around looking for the Kalisk’s den. Thia finds her legs and signals for her people to come and get her. She warns Dek that they want the Kalisk, and he should leave. He refuses.

Dek goes off on his own while she reattaches her legs, and he soon runs into the Kalisk. He and Thia work together to defend themselves from the giant thing. She is still legless because the mending got interrupted. Dek eventually manages to behead it, but then the head re-attaches itself. It’s… unkillable.

Tessa arrives and freezes the Kalisk, Dek, and everything. She then takes Dek prisoner. Tessa wakes up Thia, who talks about their catch– both the Kalisk and the Yautja. Tessa experiments on Dek, and it looks very painful. Thia doesn’t like the work Tessa is doing and shuts it down . She’s seen things on her trip, and she’s evolved a bit; Tessa’s not into that at all. Thia is “broken” as well and will be deactivated.

Thia and Dek trick one of the drones into letting them loose. Dek escapes and goes to his ship to heal up. He uses what he’s learned about the animals and plants on Genna to build new weapons and traps. He also rejoins Bud, who he recognizes as a baby Kalisk.

Dek then follows the synths to the huge Weyland-Yutani base that’s on the planet. He finds Thai, who is deactivated, but he brings her legs along as a distraction. The Yautja, Bud, and the legs defeat a whole army of drones. Thia’s upper half and lower half fight together as a team.

Tessa, meanwhile, loads the Kalisk onto a transport ship.

Dek and Thia get back together. So did Thia’s two halves. Dek wants to release the Kalisk, Bud’s mother.

But first, Tessa attacks in a big loader-mech (looks familiar, but much bigger). They fight hand-to-machine while Thia works on releasing the big Kalisk. The Kalisk shows up, angry, and makes short work of Tessa’s battlemech and the crunchy snack inside it.

Bud “vouches” to his mother about Dek and Thia, who are all friends now. Suddenly, the Kalisk freezes and explodes, releasing the evil android inside it which she’d swallowed whole. Tessa gets the drop on Thia, but Dek kills her from behind.

Dek returns to Yautja Prime and confronts his father. This time, however, he’s battle experienced and much improved. Dek shows his father who’s boss this time, and he does it without any help. He’s got his own clan now…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s very different from the other Predator (or Alien) films. This one is a much smaller-scale affair, with only two “good” characters, neither of which are human, out on an adventure.

It’s got quite a bit of humor and fun, but there’s so MUCH CGI. It’s like watching a videogame for nearly two hours.

If you like the rest of the series, you’ll probably like this one. If not, there’s probably not much here to sway you.

Kevin’s Commentary

I saw more than one review that said this smells of Disney, who owns the Predator rights, and I’d agree. It’s like an ultra violent Disney adventure movie. They even manage to gain an adorable little monkey-thing companion. How far the original Predator movie, and Alien franchise, have fallen.

Still, I warmed to it as the movie went on. I didn’t hate it as much as I expected, and I was pretty entertained overall.

2026 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple

* Director: Nia DaCosta

* Writers: Alex Garland

* Stars: Ralph Fiennes, Jack O’Connell, Alfie Williams, Erin Kellyman, Chi Lewis-Parry

* Runtime: 109 Minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This one is an immediate sequel to 28 Years Later. Little Spike joins the Jimmys, head Jimmy continues his loony leadership, and the doctor continues his work with his Bone Temple project and befriending Sampson. It’s a weird vision of a late-stage apocalypse. We both enjoyed it a lot and thought it was better than the previous movie.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on the Jimmys, in a long-abandoned water park, along with Spike from the previous film. One of the Jimmys is no more after that. Spike becomes a Jimmy too. Credits roll.

Near the bone temple, we see a hunter run into Sampsom and his infected crew. The hunter dies excessively, and Samson eats his brains. Not far away, Dr. Kelson cuts up the pregnant woman from the previous film. On the way to dispose of the body, he runs into Samson and has to tranquilize him. Kelson then removes the arrows from the giant zombie; after, he goes down into his bunker and plays some music.

The next morning, Kelson encounters Samson again, and this time, the big guy doesn’t charge at him. Kelson bargains with the monster. He tranquilizes the big man again, which is what Samson seems to want. Kelsen wants to be friends with Samson, or at least train him. Kelsen takes some of the drugs himself and passes out; when he awakens, Samson is gone and didn’t kill him in his sleep. They start regularly getting stoned together. A weird bromance is born?!

Three new characters, Cathy, Jonno, and Tom, walk through the woods. Jonno draws the wrong kind of attention and becomes infected. Tom and Cathy return home to George’s place and find that the Jimmys have taken over. It’s tense as they all introduce themselves and then kill the homeowners.

The Jimmys soon come across the bone temple and see Kelsen and Samson dancing. Jimmy Crystal, the leader of the gang, talks about his “divine right” to rule. He’s maybe just a little insane.

At the temple, Kelsen admits to Samson that he’s running out of morphine, and that’s going to be a problem really soon. He wants to euthanize Samson, but he’d really like the big man’s consent. Samson finally speaks, saying “Moon.”

Back at the farmhouse, Jimmy orders Tom to fight Jimmima. Cathy, who escaped, helps Tom. Things go badly from there when a propane tank ignites thanks to Tom. Jimmy sends Spike to kill Cathy, but he wants to go with her instead. She punches him and runs off.

The Jimmys decide to pay a visit to Kelsen, whom they think is the devil. Meanwhile, Samson puts on pants and learns to eat berries. The Jimmys spy on Kelsen, but Spike, who knows the doctor, doesn’t say anything about him. Samson starts having memories about being on a train.

Jimmy Crystal goes to the Bone Temple and sees all the skulls. Kelsen admits that he’s not Satan. They have a long conversation, as some of the Jimmys start to doubt their leader. Can Kelsen pretend to be Jimmy’s father, the devil? Kelsen has little choice.

Kelsen tells Samson about the encounter. He’s been working on a cure for the disease, but now he may be out of time and wants to try it on the big man. Is it all just a weird kind of psychosis? He gives Samson some pills.

The next morning, Samson is aware. He gets aboard a train car and remembers his childhood. He and his family were on the train when the infection hit. In the present, a bunch of infected people board the train and attack the big man, who fights back.

Kelsen prepares for his meeting with the Jimmys, as he “becomes” the devil.

Night falls, and the Jimmys come into the temple. It’s all lit up with Satanic imagery now, as Jimmy Crystal wanted. Kelsen does a song and dance, and it’s very convincing. The music is loud, and it attracts Samson. Kelsen gives the order to the Jimmys to follow Jimmy Crystal, but when he sees Spike and recognizes him, he changes the rules. He tells the Jimmys to crucify Jimmy Crystal. Jimmy then stabs “Satan.” Jimmy Ink, on the other hand, sticks with Spike and kills the other Jimmys.

Only Spike and Jimmy Ink are left standing. As Kelsen dies, the young people crucify Jimmy Crystal for him. As he hangs there, upside down, Samson comes into camp. Samson thanks Kelsen for curing him as the doctor dies.

Back in the safe land, we see Jim, the main character from the first film. He’s teaching his daughter, Sam, history. They go outside and see a flock of infected chasing Jimmy Ink and Spike, who need help. Sam asks Jim if they should help, Jim says of course, and they head off to do so.

Brian’s Commentary

This begins almost immediately after the events of the previous film. Oddly enough, it all makes sense, in a crazy way. There’s supposed to be a third one coming, so we’re in good shape here. This was much better than the previous film, which was mostly just setup.

Kevin’s Commentary

I liked the weirdness and surreal aspects of this one, with the Jimmys, the Bone Temple, the doc and Sampson getting high together. And it contains the best use of Iron Maiden music ever.

It takes its time with the strangeness and events with lulls and spikes, it’s long but was never boring. I thought it was pretty great. Better than the previous one.

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1999 Lake Placid

* Director: Steve Miner

* Writers: David E. Kelley

* Stars: Bill Pullman, Bridget Fonda, Oliver Platt, Brendan Gleeson, and Betty White

* Runtime: 82 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a giant creature feature, set in a beautiful location. There’s a lot of violence and gore, but also a lot of dark humor - it’s not quite in the comedy genre, but there are a lot of chuckles to be had. The casting is excellent and added a lot to making the movie more watchable and entertaining. It was a fun watch.

Spoilery Synopsis

As credits roll, we see scenes of a very placid lake. The sheriff and a diver are out tagging beavers. The diver goes down and finds an underwater tunnel and checks it out. Turns out, it’s not a beaver nest. The sheriff, aboard the boat, pulls up about half of the diver.

In New York City, Kelly explains to Myra that her boyfriend has dumped her; Myra already knows because she stole Kevin from her. Kevin comes in and talks about a probable-bear attack and wants to send Kelly to Maine to investigate a tooth they found in the diver. She’s not really gung-ho about field work, but has no choice but to investigate.

Near Lake Placid, Sheriff Hank welcomes Jack Wells, with Fish & Game, to investigate the animal attack.

Kelly, Jack, and Hank go out to the lake and talk to an old woman who is the only person who lives directly on the lake. Mrs. Bickerman says her husband died two years ago from an assisted suicide. Kelly, in the meantime, does not enjoy the natural beauty of the place. “I have good hygiene; I’m not welcome here.”

Hector Cyr, a rich mythology nut, shows up in a helicopter. He’s obsessed with crocodiles, so that’s weird. There shouldn’t be any crocodiles in this lake, but he’s pretty confident that’s what they have. They go out in canoes, and something knocks over one of the boats. They also find the diver’s toe.

Hector’s a party animal, and sets up quite a campsite. Hank doesn’t like him at all.

The next day, they use all their equipment as Hector and Jack go diving for the creature. Meanwhile, the monster attacks the boat with Kelly and Hank. They’re fine, but the deputy, on the other hand, loses his head. Hector gives a ridiculous speech about dreaming he’d lost his head.

Suddenly, a huge bear attacks! That goes nowhere because even more suddenly, a giant crocodile leaps out of the water and eats the bear– whole. Finally, Kelly decides she’s having a good time.

In the morning, they all go croc-hunting. They find another severed head just on the edge of Mrs. Bickerman’s place. They watch as the old woman leads a cow to the beach and feeds it to the enormous crocodile.

Mrs. Bickerman admits she’s been feeding the thing for six years; it’s a sort of pet. It was what killed her husband. Meanwhile, Hector goes swimming again and comes face to face with the big croc. The crocodile lets him get onto the helicopter, but then tries to eat that.

Hector wants to sedate and capture the crocodile. He doesn’t want it killed, which Fish & Game will do. He’s persuasive. They use one of Mrs. Bickerman’s cows, dangling from a helicopter, as bait. Eventually, the croc takes the bait and crashes the helicopter. It comes up on land and menaces everyone. The crocodile manages to get stuck inside the helicopter and can’t get out. They tranquilize it, so it’s all good. Suddenly, a second crocodile shows up, and Hank gets to shoot that one explosively.

As things wind down, Hank and Hector drive off to the hospital. Kelly and Jack get together.

Some time passes and we see Mrs. Bickerman, out at the dock, feeding a new batch of baby crocodiles…

Brian’s Commentary

The interplay between Hank and Hector is comedy gold. Actually, this movie is only good because of the stellar cast. The croc is a combination of CGI and practical effects, but it’s all very effective.

It’s a great mix of giant-animal horror and comedy. It was successful and then led to a whole batch of sequels.

Kevin’s Commentary

I agree with Brian, it was casting done right that added a lot to the movie. It could have been a lot lamer than it was. Okay, it wasn’t that lame, it was pretty entertaining. And the humor helped a lot.

The croc is a practical effect - a giant puppet - in many of its scenes, which was much better than having it be purely CGI. Though the CGI is quite good too. Trivia says the croc actually has less than four minutes of screen time.

Somehow, I had missed seeing this before now. I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it.

2007 Lake Placid 2

* Director: David Flores

* Writers: Todd Hurvitz and Howie Miller

* Stars: John Schneider, Sarah Lafleur, Sam McMurray, Chad Michael Collins, Alicia Ziegler, and Cloris Leachman

* Runtime: 88 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The first movie was enough of a success that they made a sequel. They embraced the CGI this time, lowered the quality of casting, and generally cheapened everything as a direct to TV SyFy production. The gore was a step up, while the humor and pacing were a step down. It was barely okay, but not the win the first one was.

Spoilery Synopsis

After the credits, we open two men in a boat talking about how many people have disappeared on this lake. Soon, it’s one man in the boat.

Sheriff Riley listens to his son Scott complaining about being there after a custody battle. The EPA man comes to the office and tells them about his partner being eaten. They think it’s all a joke until he shows them the man’s chewed arm. Emily, from Fish & Wildlife, arrives, and she has history with Sheriff Riley.

The group goes out on a boat to see where the attack took place, and they talk about the crazy old woman who used to feed crocodiles on the lake. They find a head and then go to talk to old Sadie. Sadie is the sister of the other Mrs. Bickerman.

Sadie feeds the local newsman to her crocodile. Riley, Emily, and Frank soon see the crocodile when it smashes their boat. A CGI plane lands, and Struthers, a rich loon, arrives. He wants to hunt the crocodile.

Meanwhile, Scott and Kerri meet in the woods, along with Thad and Larry. They head to the lake with her friends. He goes out for a walk alone and finds a nest with eggs. Thad breaks some eggs and soon pays for it.

Riley and company tranquilize the croc and put it right to sleep. It’s not as asleep as it appears, as Deputy Dale and Frank soon learn. They set up some bait and lure in the croc, but they harpoon Struthers’s airplane instead. Working together, they kill the crocodile.

After some celebrating, they all camp for the night. Scott, Larry, and Kelli are lost in the woods. A second croc attacks the camp and eats Ahmad, Struthers’s assistant. They go to see Mrs. Bickman, who tells them that there are three of the big crocodiles out there.

Emily, Riley, and Struthers find the nest and take the eggs. They come across Scott and Kerri just after Larry gets eaten. Riley blows up a second croc, but the big one is still out there. Kerri and Scott feed Mrs. Bickman to the final croc– no, turns out there were really four of them.

Emily hides in a tree trunk as Riley shoots the next croc. Struthers loses his head but blows up the final croc.

Scott, Kerri, Riley, and Emily drive away. They drop Kerri and Scott off at home, and they kiss.

Brian’s Commentary

This was made for the SyFy Channel and never hit the theaters directly. All the “Teenagers” are way old and the acting is equally bad. It’s very cheaply made, with no corner left uncut.

John Schneider is just “We have David Hasselhoff at home.” They lost nearly all the humor and went for a straight-up horror movie this time. The film overall is just pretty dull, even for a made-for-TV story.

Kevin’s Commentary

Everything about this sequel was a step down from the original. The crocodile, and some other elements, were very obvious CGI without the practical effects of the giant crocodile puppet. The cast, script, and pacing weren’t as good. All in all, the entertainment value was less.

I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t enjoy it nearly as much as the first movie.

2010 Lake Placid 3

* Director: Griff Furst

* Writers: David Reed

* Stars: Colin Ferguson, Yancy Butler, Kirsty Mitchell, Kacey Clarke, Jordan Grehs, and Michael Ironside

* Runtime: 96 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s more of the same as the last two films. With no one seeming to really be aware that the events of the two films happened or were anything to be concerned about. The CGI is bad and obvious, but it was a bit better than the second movie. It still wasn’t as good as the first. If you saw the first two, this one was a bit of an uptick.

Spoilery Synopsis

It’s the Black Lake Wildlife Area, and two hikers arrive at the lake. They go for a swim and hear growling. A bunch of little crocodiles eat them both.

Nathan stands on the dock and has some kind of flashback to the previous film. Nathan, an EPA scientist, is old Mrs. Bickerman’s nephew, and he’s just inherited her cabin. The sheriff comes to visit Nathan, Susan, and their son, Connor. The sheriff tries to convince them that the crocodile incident will never happen again; he wants them to live here rather than sell the house. As they talk, Connor sees crocodiles outside and feeds them all…

Two years later, Connor is still feeding the much-larger crocs. Susan leaves him with Vica, the babysitter. He sneaks out to the store to steal a big bag of meat for his pets. Nathan is out in the woods studying elk when he meets a group of campers. When they find a head, Nathan thinks it might have been Reba, a local poacher.

Meanwhile, in town, Brett comes to see Reba. He wants to hire her to find a missing girl in the lake area.

At home, the crocs eat Vica’s little yap-yap dog and then Vica as well. Out at the lake, those four hikers start getting picked off one-by-one.

Connor and Susan try to help Vica, but the crocodiles are surrounding the house. He admits that he’s been feeding the crocs.

Reba and her clients’ boat are attacked, which ruins the hunting party. Nathan and the sheriff’s boat as well. There’s a failed attempt for all the good guys to run to the car from the cabin, but that goes badly.

Reba and Brett are attacked; the sheriff tries to run over a croc and gets eaten. They eventually make their way to Nathan’s place.

Brett holds them all at gunpoint because he wants to go out and find Ellie, the last of the hikers. He soon finds her, and they kiss and make up just before a croc eats him. Everyone gets in Reba’s boat and goes to town.

It’s the middle of the night, and most of the stores in town are closed. They break into Dmitri’s grocery store, the place Connor stole from earlier, and he’s got a gun. The crocodile outside makes sure nothing comes of that.

Nathan, Susan, Connor, and Ellie run for the truck, leaving torn-apart Reba behind. The big croc chases them until they blow it up at the gas station.

Time passes, and Nathan gives a lecture next to the lake about the extinct crocodiles that used to live there. Naturally, we see that they aren’t extinct at all.

Brian’s Commentary

This one was also made for TV, but it’s a lot better than the previous film. The crocs are all mediocre CGI, but once we get past that, the rest is pretty good. Anytime there’s any real action, the camera gets all shaky to make it look more exciting, and I found that annoying. The editing in other scenes is almost as bad.

Still, it was miles better than part 2.

Kevin’s Commentary

The CGI. Sigh. So much obvious CGI.

And the foreign touches creeped more around the edges because it wasn’t filmed in the United States, like the second film.

I agree it was a little better than the second movie. Still not as good as the first.

2012 Lake Placid: The Final Chapter

* Director: Don Michael Paul

* Writers: David Reed

* Stars: Elisabeth Röhm, Yancy Butler, Paul Nicholls, and Robert Englund

* Runtime: 90 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Some time has passed, and now the lake and surrounding area is enclosed with a big, sturdy electric fence to contain the crocodiles which are the only ones of their kind. But lots of people still make it inside, either deliberately or accidentally, and there’s a decent body count. Everything about it is decent, not awful, but it’s really just more of the same we’ve already seen.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on the final battle of the previous film, and it turns out that Reba’s not as dead as she looked before. As she limps out of the grocery store, credits roll as she kills one more croc.

Sometime later, Sheriff Grove, Dennis, and now-Fish-and-Game ranger Reba, go out into a boat to look for one of the very rare crocodiles. They tranquilize and capture a small one, but there’s a report of bigger ones not far away. They all get into a truck and drive away, but a big croc chases them. The whole area is surrounded by an electric fence as a wildlife refuge for the protected animals. Dennis explains that the crocs are mutants that shouldn’t be getting so big.

Loflin talks to his son, Max, who is working on the electric fence. The sheriff goes home to her daughter Chloe. They go out and look at all the young guys who like Chloe. Chloe’s got a senior camping trip this weekend, but she doesn’t really want to go.

Poacher Jim Bickerman, along with Dennis and his men, sneak through the electric gate to go hunting crocs. They soon find one, and when it chases them, they can’t get out of the electric fence. The screams attract the attention of Max, who opens the gate and gets hauled off by a croc.

Chloe and a busload of teens arrive at the “safe” beach, but Chloe thinks they might have gone to the wrong place. Sheriff Theresa and Loflin make out at home. Chloe tells the story of Mrs. Bickerman and her oversized crocodile pets. Chloe’s boyfriend, Drew, double-times her along with her friend Elaine.

In the morning, the men call the sheriff, Reba, Loflin and the others. The gate was left open last night, and Max is now missing. One of the high school camping kids gets eaten by what appears to be… piranhas. Chloe finds Max out in the woods. Soon, everyone knows about the giant crocs on the beach.

Loflin kills a croc and climbs down the thing’s throat to see what’s inside. The crocs have run out of food and are eating each other now. The sheriff’s group soon makes it to the beach and finds Chloe’s phone.

Loflin and the sheriff find Dennis, who explains why he’s inside the fence. He’s soon eaten. The teen group catches up with Jim Bickerman on his boat. They all swim to the boat except for their coach, who is eaten. He doesn’t take them to the gate, he takes them to where he’s supposed to meet with Dennis (who’s already been croc-lunch).

Everyone shows up at the same place, and Drew meets a croc. There’s lots of running and shooting, and eventually, everyone makes it to the gate, where they fry the big lizard on the electric fence.

Bickerman, left behind, gets eaten. Max and Chloe, as well as Loflin and the sheriff, get together. Reba finally gets her croc head for the wall. We hear how Lake Placid is now clear of crocs– as we get an attack at Clear Lake.

Brian’s Commentary

That’s a mighty big lake to be surrounded by a high-voltage fence.

Again, there’s not very much humor in this one; they are still taking it all pretty seriously. There’s a lot of action and the pacing is decent. It’s not awful, but it’s not anything innovative, either.

Kevin’s Commentary

Having Yancy Butler return as Reba was a bright spot.

An electric fence that big and solid would cost a fortune. Plus the power to keep it energized and constant vigilance and repair to keep it running. It’s best not to think about the size of the lake shown on screen and the logistics of that fence.

It’s still full of CGI. But the cast did a better job than the last couple movies, and the pacing was better. The crocs are still way too bullet resistant. The sequels have each gotten slightly better, but they still aren’t up to the first one.

2015 Lake Placid vs. Anaconda

* Director: A.B. Stone

* Writers: Berkeley Anderson

* Stars: Yancy Butler, Corin Nemec, and Robert Englund

* Runtime: 92 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s the crossover we didn’t know we needed, fifth in both series. The crocs from the Lake Placid movies were contained until they decided to try to combine the giant anacondas with them, and things became a mess. There’s quite a body count in this one, and lots of CGI creature action and gore. It had more humor than the anaconda films, which we just saw as well. It’s middling, not awful but some entertainment value. Especially if you like watching lots of young women in bikinis.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a group of people hunting an alligator in the woods. Jim Bickerman looks like he’s lost some limbs due to the local reptiles. The giant crocodile is taken to a lab where there’s also a giant snake. This whole area is full of protected crocs, and Jim knows how to get in and out. They inject some cells from a crocodile into an anaconda, which is about to lay eggs. Suddenly, the big croc wakes up and gets loose. In the ensuing scuffle, the snakes escape as well.

At the Clear Lake State Recreation Area, we run into Tull, a wildlife cop. We also see Sheriff Reba in the next town over, where there is at least one missing person from the area around the Black Lake electric fence. If there’s trouble, the mayor is all set for a coverup. Deputy Ferguson is at Black Lake, and he’s found the mess from last night. Daphne, the missing girl, turns out to have a crocodile under her bed, which eats her.

Sarah Murdoch, the daughter of the dead businessman of the previous Anaconda films, tells Mr. Beach about the blood orchids and immortality. The only animals that are compatible with the serum are anaconda and those special crocodiles.

A couple of carloads of sorority girls are driving out to “prove themselves” at rush weekend. One of the girls is Bethany, Tully’s daughter.

Some hunters get eaten by a swarm of tiny crocodiles.

At the crime scene, Reba cuts open a croc and finds some remains inside. She calls Tully for some croc-assist.

The sorority group is clear to point out that the famous crocodiles are in that other lake, not here. Everyone gets into the water, and we soon see someone get dragged under– no, it’s just two guys playing games.

Sarah, Beach, and his men have a tracker in the female anaconda, hopefully before she lays eggs. They have the trackers and want Jim Bickerman to help them again.

Reba and Tully find it’s strange that all the trackers in the crocs have gone offline. They have no trackers, but the crocs must be headed to Clear Lake. Tully calls his daughter, who is at the lake, but she’s not answering.

A waterskier gets eaten on the lake, and we see a huge croc closing in on the sorority recruits. The waterskiing group soon learns they’re going to need a bigger boat. The sorority girls run to their cars, without keys, and watch as crocs close in on them.

Sarah beats up Jim; she needs his help. Her whole group is soon out in the wilderness area looking for the missing anaconda.

Tully and Reba are about to be eaten by a crocodile when the reptile is suddenly attacked and killed by a giant anaconda. They know about the crocs, but the giant snake is new for them.

The anaconda squeezes the girls’ car, so now they have no way to get away. Tully, Reba, and Ferguson arrive and check out the wreckage on the beach. They find the girls’ crushed car and soon, the remaining three girls.

Murdoch’s group steals a boat, and Jim goes for a swim. Beach and Murdoch argue about leaving Jim behind. They’re attacked by the male snake, but she won’t let him shoot it. They lose their goons, so now it’s just the two of them. They soon run into Tully, Reba, and the girls as well as an even-bigger female snake.

Murdoch calls in a helicopter as the snakcs and crocs start fighting with each other. One of the snakes brings down the copter, and things get weird from there. One of the snakes swallows Beach whole, and he uses a grenade from inside. That’s messy.

Elsewhere, Jim has finally swum to shore, and he’s thrilled.

Tully gets the croc-tracker from Murdoch, so now he can start rounding up the loose crocodiles. One final croc attacks, and everyone shoots it at once.

Somewhere in the woods, we watch as eggs hatch and tiny little snakes emerge…

Brian’s Commentary

Other than the original Lake Placid, this is the first of that series that I’ve seen. It seems to lean more heavily on humor than the Anaconda series.

It absolutely continued the ongoing story of the blood orchids and anacondas, although that never really did make much sense. This one was also made for TV, and it’s a lot cheesier and less serious that the previous Anaconda films.

Kevin’s Commentary

This was the fifth film in both series. We hadn’t done the Lake Placid movies (yet?) but that doesn’t matter much for seeing this one.

Again, there’s heavy and obvious CGI use. Some humor, more than the solo Anaconda movies so far. It wasn’t too bad, I thought it was fairly entertaining, it moved well and wasn’t boring. I’d give it a 6 out of 10.

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All this as well as the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #53, is available! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link:

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Mainstream Films:

2026 Bight

* Directed by: Maiara Walsh

* Written by: Cameron Cowperthwaite, Maiara Walsh

* Stars: Cameron Cowperthwaite, Mark Hapka, Maya Stojan

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 32 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Two artsy couples get together for an evening of bondage, photography, sex, and emotional exploration. It takes a while, but it does eventually get to some horror-adjacent elements. It’s more of a drama thriller though, and it’s quite good. It wasn’t quite what either of us expected.

Spoilery Synopsis

Two people hug in the shower as they wash blood off each other’s bodies. Credits roll.

Charlie gets a call from her boss, Ariana, and she’s not happy. Her artist boyfriend, Atticus, works in the living room. The couple is not getting along very well. They’re going to Sebastian’s party, but neither of them want to go to this one.

Turns out, this party is just for them. Sebastian and Naomi have invited only Charlie and Atticus. Charlie keeps getting texts as the men talk about photography. Charlie and Atticus argue some more, and then we see that Sebastian and Naomi aren’t getting along so well either.

Sebastian gets all pretentious during dinner and we get a flashback to the last time the four got together; it was an orgy. This time, he wants to use his two guests as nude models. Charlie is all in, but Atticus doesn’t want to participate; they’ve done this before, and he doesn’t want to repeat last time. They decide to go for it.

Sebastian puts something in everyone’s tea. He explains the rules of his work with ropes and then everyone splits up to get ready. Naomi ties Atticus’s hands behind his back as the drugs start to kick in. Soon, they’re both bound up, naked, with ropes, and Sebastian starts to take pictures. Naomi, in the meantime, covers them with red paint.

Neither Charlie nor Atticus are really into this, and both are really uncomfortable, but it’s hard to argue with Sebastian. As they all take a break, Sebastian gets with Charlie, while Naomi goes for Atticus.

We then cut to a bedroom scene with Atticus tied up on the floor and Naomi suspended by ropes from the ceiling above them. Sebastian has sex with Charlie as the other two watch in restraints. Naomi wants to be released, and Sebastian says no way; he’s punishing her for having sex with Atticus. This is all some kind of elaborate revenge plot by Sebastian against the cheaters. When Atticus realizes Naomi drugged him, he urges Sebastian to spin her ropes some more.

Charlie has seen enough and wants to leave, so Sebastian just knocks her out. He puts her in a gas mask and ties her up. He then cuts Naomi’s throat and lets her bleed all over Atticus, who is still tied up beneath her.

As Sebastian menaces Charlie, Atticus breaks out of his ropes and intervenes. In the struggle, Sebastian gets stabbed numerous times with a box cutter and then strangled with a rope.

Atticus apologizes to Charlie and unties her. The two of them then clean up the mess. Then when they get to their car in the morning they have wild sex; their romance has rekindled.

Some time later, at one of Atticus’s art shows, he reveals his new works; at least in his mind, Sebastian is still with him.

Brian’s Commentary

Bight: a loop of rope, as distinct from the rope’s ends.

This film looks great. It’s colorful and is very interestingly shot. The dialogue is clunky and pretentious, but the characters are all “artists,” so that’s probably just realism.

It took a very long time to get to anything that might be considered horror, but it did get there eventually.

It’s weird, a little dull and draggy in the first half, but overall, I liked it.

Kevin’s Commentary

The bight/bite play on words is clever.

It flowed along with a lot of talk, and then it got realer than I expected when Sebastian stepped things up a bit. All in all, it wasn’t what I expected, and I liked it quite a bit.

What a way to rekindle your relationship.

2024 Seven Cemeteries

* Directed by: John Gulager

* Written by: John Gulager, Joel Soisson

* Stars: Danny Trejo, Sal Lopez, Samantha Ashley

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 24 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The plot is simple. A recent parolee gets a Mexican witch to resurrect his old posse so that they can help him save a woman’s ranch from a ruthless drug lord. So it’s an action crime drama with magic and lots of dark humor. We both thought it was really good.

Spoilery Synopsis

In Diablo County, Texas, men come to an isolated ranch, and Matteo, the man who lives there, grabs his gun. The old man in the car wants to buy the farm, and he’s not going to take no for an answer. That goes really bad for Matteo.

We cut to Santana Bravo, being released from prison, where he’s been since 1973, as credits roll. We’re told he was falsely accused of murder and spent 41 years in prison. He goes to Diablo County and goes to that same ranch for a job from Matteo. Matteo’s wife, Carmela, wants to hire him for protection from the old Abuelo.

Sheriff Jake shows up, and oddly, all their body cameras aren’t working. He marches Bravo out into the field, and shoots him in the back three times.

Bravo wakes up some time later in the home of a bruja, an enchantress, and her husband, Miguelito is a zombie. She also wants him to stand up to Abuelo. Back in the day, Abuelo killed Bravo’s wife. He became a legend in the region for standing up to Abuelo back in ‘73. He’s old now, and not up to the fight anymore. She says he “needs a crew” and can make one by standing over a grave and bleeding.

Bravo goes off to do the job, and he takes Miguelito with him. Miguel explains what it’s like to be dead, and he doesn’t mind it too much. They head to cemetery number one and Bravo cuts himself and bleeds into the grave. His blood explodes dramatically, and when the fire clears, dead Eugene is back, out of the grave, awake, and not too happy to be there.

At the next cemetery, they wake up another corpse, Tommy LaSorda. Tommy and Eugene don’t get along, and they wreck their truck. They quickly manage to steal another one. They all drive to another cemetery and dig up Quasimodo, the dead professional wrestler and his girlfriend Delores, both buried in their luchadore costumes.

At the fifth cemetery, they wake up Stickface, a homicidal hockey player.

Meanwhile, back at the farm, Camela and her mother get ready for a fight when Abuelo returns in the morning. Sheriff Jake and his men arrive in force, and they want trouble. Jake is the first to die in the ensuing fire fight.

Then the dead arrive and mess up the killers. They are not gentle, and there’s some great carnage. Carmela is a little surprised to find Bravo with an army of zombies who all introduce themselves. “One problem at a time,” she tells her elderly mother.

As everyone gets set working to reinforce the house, Quasimodo sings to Delores. They learn that there are tunnels under the farm that leads across the border.

Hector reports to El Abuelo about their defeat at the ranch earlier in the morning, and the old man is not happy. El Abuelo then grabs Miguel and plays the accordion for him. Miguel doesn’t torture well. He warns Abuelo that the others are “Way less chill.” Then they put him through a wood chipper.

At cemetery number six, Bravo and Carmela visit Matteo’s grave. They talk about Guadalupe, Bravo’s long-dead wife.

The bad guys grab the bruja and drop her off at the ranch. She’s wearing a big bomb, the same way Abuelo killed Guadalupe many years ago. She goes boom, and the zombies are not pleased. Bravo’s got nothing to offer them now; he had promised that the bruja would restore them to real life, but that’s not gonna happen now. That’s OK, as they all want revenge now.

The baddies return with missiles, and they blow up Stickface. The gang heads down to the cellar and the tunnels to head for Mexico. All the zombies want to blow up the tunnels and bury themselves to save Bravo, Carmela, and the old lady.

Bravo is killed anyway, but Carmela’s mother revives him. When they get to the other side of the tunnel, Abuelo is waiting for them. The old man gets the drop on them, but then, out of nowhere, Miguel’s severed hand crawls up the old man’s pants and does bad things to him. Bravo and Carmela finish him off.

At cemetery number seven, Bravo reburies all his zombie friends. Bravo and Mihuel’s hand walk off to have further adventures.

Brian’s Commentary

This is great, it pokes fun at westerns, Mexican wrestlers, revenge films, zombie tropes, and everything else it can throw in. Mostly, though, it follows the basic plot of “Seven Samurai.” It’s more comedy than horror, but it’s about zombies, so there’s that. Danny Trejo’s getting a little old to be doing physical stunts and violence, but as the leader of the group, he does well here. The array of dead characters is fun, especially Lew Temple as Tommy Lasorda.

Kevin’s Commentary

I thought the humor in this was excellent. The script is very good, taking an old idea and adding the element of the undead to liven it up. I’d say it was my favorite Danny Trejo movie that I’ve seen.

2007 Pumpkinhead 4: Blood Feud

* Directed by: Michal Hurst

* Written by: Michael Hurst

* Stars: Lance Henriksen, Rob Freeman, Amy Manson

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 35 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

When a young McCoy loves a young Hatfield, their family feud works to keep them apart. When a younger McCoy is killed, it’s revenge time! Which in these parts means it’s time for Pumpkinhead again. The plot’s a little basic, but it’s well made with practical effects that look good, and steady pacing.

Spoilery Synopsis

A couple of guys on motorcycles race through the woods, being pursued by something. One guy crashes, and Pumpkinhead kills him. Elsewhere, in a cabin, a man collapses in pain. The other cyclist arrives outside the man’s door and demands that he “call it off.” He shoots the man, and Pumpkinhead vanishes. The ghost of Ed Harley appears and tells him that he’s not going to escape vengeance. Credits roll.

Five years later, it’s a McCoy wedding party. Two Hatfields show up and aren’t allowed in. Jodie and her brothers understand but don’t like it.

Inside, Ricky is weird, and everyone notices. A group of Hatfields come in the side door and soon, it’s an all-out brawl fight. Jodie Hatfield does not approve. Papa Hatfield explains the origins of the feud to her, and she’d never heard the story before; they put Uncle Abner in a wheelchair by running him over. Abner himself isn’t too angry about it; he knows that Jodie is dating Ricky.

Jodie and Ricky meet in the woods, and Ricky’s younger sister Sarah comes along to be the lookout. When a couple of the Hatfield brothers show up, Sarah is killed in a fall. They drag Ricky behind their truck until the rope breaks. Ricky runs back and finds Sarah’s body in the woods.

Ricky takes Sarah’s body to the old woman in the woods. Ed Harley comes to her and tells her not to help Ricky, but she wants to help Ricky get his revenge. Ricky insists on revenge, and he wants Pumpkinhead specifically to help. If anyone in a horror movie was ever warned that revenge is a bad idea, it would be Ricky, who just won’t listen to talk about “paying the price.” Old Haggis does the ritual.

In the morning, Ricky takes Sarah home to the McCoys, who are not pleased. Haggis does her thing in the pumpkin patch, and Pumpkinhead rises again. Soon after, Hatfields start dying.

Ed Harley appears to Jodie and explains that only she can stop what’s going to happen. Ricky comes to her and explains that he’s done something that will fix everything.

Sheriff Dallas sees Ed. Five years ago, he was warned that Pumpkinhead would be coming back, and now, his time has come.

At Sarah’s funeral, Ricky feels pain when the next group of Hatfields dies. Dallas tells old man Hatfield about Pumpkinhead.

Jodie goes to Haggis’s house and finds the pumpkin field. Better yet, she runs right into Pumpkinhead, but he doesn’t hurt her.

Four more Hatfields go to the McCoy house and set it on fire. Jodie helps out the old woman inside, but she doesn’t get a lot of thanks.

This is enough that the McCoys and Hatfields finally make peace. Old Man McCoy has no idea that Ricky’s behind all the carnage. Now, both sides decide to work together to stop Ricky and Pumpkinhead. Sheriff Dallas explains that the only way to stop this is to kill Ricky. Sherriff explains his story, which we saw in the pre-credit sequence.

Pumpkinhead attacks the house, full of both McCoys and Hatfields. Ed reminds Jodie that only she can stop this. Soon, there are a lot of dead bodies inside. Ed comes for Dallas, who has to face the monster. The fight moves outside, where Pumpkinhead disembowls Dallas. It comes for Jodie’s younger sister, and Jodie has to make a decision. In the end, she shoots Ricky. He’s still not dead, but he grabs Pumpkinhead and they both fall into a well.

Ed appears again and says she “done good.”

Brian’s Commentary

Hatfields and McCoys? Wasn’t that cliche a hundred years before even this film was made. Lame plot aside, it’s nicely paced, well acted (mostly), and doesn’t get boring. The Pumpkinhead creature looks as good as ever, and he’s still pretty effective for a guy in a rubber suit.

It’s entertaining. A long way from great, but not terrible, either.

Kevin’s Commentary

Haggis does keep trying to warn these people, but they just don’t listen.

I appreciated the practical effects, and the creature looks good even fully visible in the light.

There were many moments of neither family being too bright. But it is well put together, and I’d put it as my number two favorite after the first movie.

1990 Troll 2

* Directed by: Claudio Fragasso

* Written by: Claudio Fragasso, Rossella Drudi

* Stars: Michel Paul Stephenson, George Hardy, Margo Prey

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 35 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It has nothing to do with the first “Troll” movie, and doesn’t even have Trolls. They go to a town infested with goblins and a witch. It’s a bad movie, but it’s a good bad movie. It’s stupid, but it’s fun and entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

We hear about Peter, lost in the woods. He found some ugly small people, goblins, who followed him. This is all a bedtime story told by Grandpa to little Josh. He explains that goblins are evil little creatures. Credits roll as the goblins hunt Peter.

Grandpa insists that goblins still exist and that Peter came to a bad end. They turned him into a half-plant and ate him. Josh’s mother comes in, and we see that Grandpa isn’t real. “I see him in front of me, and he’s so real.” Grandpa’s funeral was six months ago.

Josh and his family are going on a monthlong vacation to Nilbog in the country tomorrow. Elliott comes over and makes both Joshua and Holly scream, but the parents downstairs don’t hear a thing. Elliott invites himself along on the trip.

In the morning, Elliott is really late, and the family leaves without Elliott. Dad’s thrilled, Holly is not. Elliott and all his friends are not far behind in an RV. Joshua imagines himself getting sick and turning into a plant. On the way, the ghost of Grandpa tells Josh to make his family turn back.

The family arrives at Nilbog, and there’s no one in the town. Dad says “Farmers sleep this time of night,” but it’s clearly mid-afternoon. They take a family’s house and trade keys as some of the locals head to the city. They go inside and find a bunch of food waiting for them. Grandpa warns Joshua not to let them eat, so he pees all over the table and food. “You can’t piss on hospitality– I won’t allow it!” yells Dad.

Elliott’s group parks in a field and wonders where all the girls are. Arnold goes outside and soon finds one. He chases her into the woods and learns that the goblins made her eat that green stuff. The goblins show up, and stab Arnold.

They run to a strange house with an even stranger woman inside. She’s Creedence Leonore Gielgud, and her ancestors are from Stonehenge. She appears to be a witch. The girl turns into a plant; “She’s food for my children!” says Creedence. The goblins rush in and eat the woman.

At home, Holly plans her revenge against Elliott, who never does anything without his friends. She gets a vision of Dead Grandpa, and Dad thinks she’s been smoking dope.

The sheriff picks up another of Elliott’s friends, and right away offers him some green food. He’s dropped off at the local general store, and the place has a weird variety of foods. “We’re vegetarians here in Nilbog,” says the store owner. He gives him some “special” milk.

Joshua finally figures out what “Nilbog” spelled backwards is and freaks out. Back at the house, Creedence brings Josh’s mother some green cake. Josh comes across a strange church service where the goblins complain about meat.

Drew arrives at the church-house and tries to rescue Arnold, who’s mostly a potted plant now. Creedence returns and takes a chainsaw to Arnold, but he laughs as it only tickles.

Holly goes to see Elliott and punches him. Josh and his dad arrive and pull her out of there. When they return home, the whole village has come to sing and dance; Mom’s invited them all inside. Josh warns about goblins again and reminds everyone not to eat the food.

A goblin attacks Josh, but Grandpa Seth appears with an ax and cuts its hand off. Back at the church, Creedence loses an arm– that she soon regrows. The old ghost then gives little Josh a Molotov cocktail to use downstairs.

The leader of the goblins catches on and sends Grandpa back to Hell. That goes badly for both of them, but when Dad puts the fire out, he just sees a burnt goblin there. The whole family soon realizes that the goblin stories are true and hide inside the house.

Creedence prays to Stonehenge for more power, and soon, she’s young and normal-looking. She then shows up outside the RV, and Brent, Elliott’s last friend, goes outside to see. They both have sexy corn on the cob… and popcorn.

The family, meanwhile, tries really hard to make a seance work so that Grandpa Seth can return. The old ghost talks about destroying the stone that gives the goblins their power, but then the goblins break in and start attacking. There’s a great deal of running around and screaming until Josh finds himself in the church-house (which is apparently now in the basement of the family house).

Grandpa tells Josh what to do with the stone. Creedence starts getting ugly again and calls for her goblins, who vanish, leaving the family alone. Creedence looks on in horror as Josh eats a meat sandwich and then touches the magic rock.

The whole family helps Josh touch the rock, and soon, all the baddies are dead.

Back in the city, the family returns to their real home. Joshua’s mother eats an apple right away. Josh soon finds that his mother is being eaten. “Do you want some, Joshua?”

Brian’s Commentary

This is often cited as one of the best “So bad it’s good” movies, and it’s clear to see why. It’s hard to tear your eyes away from this, as it’s weird at every turn. The acting is atrocious all around, except for Deborah Reed as Creedence, who deserved some kind of overacting award– so bad that she wraps around to awesome.

It’s really something.

Kevin’s Commentary

Goblins, trolls, Goldberg, iceberg - same thing.

Reading the trivia, it’s impressive the movie came out as well as it did. The director only spoke Italian, as did the crew except for one member who acted as translator. And the cast were mostly a bunch of locals who showed up thinking they were just going to be extras and got lead, supporting, and extra roles.

Some movies have gallons of blood, this one had gallons of green. I wonder how much green food coloring got used in production. And yogurt. Lots of yogurt.

It’s awful but fun.

2002 Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla

* Directed by: Masaaki Tezuka, Kazuki Omori

* Written by: Wataru Mimura

* Stars: Yumiko Shaku, Shin Takuma, Kana Onodera

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 28 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

When a new Godzilla appears, they use the remains of the 1954 Godzilla to make… a MechaGodzilla to fight him. Of course it’s not that simple as complications arise, politics are worked out, and Godzilla is tough and stubborn. There’s more CGI used this time, and they blend pretty well with the practical effects. It’s an entertaining one. Brian thought it was one of the better ones, Kevin was entertained but thought it was a bit mundane.

Spoilery Synopsis

It’s 1999, and the Japanese military is getting ready for action. A typhoon is coming, and a big one at that. Not only does it rain really hard, but it drives Godzilla ashore. The Anti-Megalosaurus Force (AMF) is deployed. They bring tanks and rocket launchers, and those work as well as they always do against Godzilla. The Maser gets his attention, but that goes badly for the troops. Credits roll.

The news reports that the attack was carried out by a monster similar to the Godzilla of 1954 (I guess we’re ignoring all the sequels again). The Prime Minister remembers how the original was defeated; Dr. Serizawa’s weapon has never been duplicated. Mothra and other monsters have attacked over the years, but have always been repelled. What can they do against Godzilla, though?

Meanwhile, at the AMF, Akane Yashiro is cleared from any wrongdoing in the loss of her Maser crew. Still, she’s been transferred to a desk job.

We cut to a science lab where Dr. Yuhara, the professor, talks about animal-machine hybrids. He’s soon taken to the Defense Agency to work on a new project. There’s a whole conference table of scientists invited to work on the project. They have found the skeleton of the original 1954 Godzilla and have taken cells to make a bio-robot. They want to make a robotic version of Godzilla and make it even stronger than the new one.

Yuhara doesn’t want to get involved, but his daughter, Sara, convinces him to take the job. Four years pass, and the construction proceeds.

Akane hates her desk job, but she’s done well in her years of punishment and is finally invited to join the Mechagodzilla team as a pilot. Colonel Togoshi runs the Kiryu project, and it’s nearing completion. The team undergoes extensive military combat training. At the base, Yuhara likes Akane, but she doesn’t even know who he is. They soon find out.

The machine is soon finished, and they present it to everyone on the news. It’s powered by DNA computers, the fastest available, as well as a freeze-ray. Suddenly, they spot the real Godzilla on the radar. What perfect timing!

Mechagodzilla is airlifted to the coast to wait for big G’s arrival. People flee through the streets.

Mechagodzilla attacks with missiles, rockets, lightning, and everything else it has. The absolute zero gun is ready to fire, but all of a sudden, something inside Mechagodzilla wakes up. The original Godzilla DNA cells remember its own death and lets the new one escape.

Suddenly, Mechagodzilla shoots at the human’s fighter planes. It then unloads all its weapons against Tokyo’s skyline. In about an hour, it’ll run out of power, but that’s going to be a really long hour.

Togashi tells the Prime Minister that it’s a design flaw and that they can fix it. They need the Kiryu project for the next time Godzilla shows up. They retrieve the powered-down machine and get to work fixing the problem. Godzilla’s road was what triggered the machine’s memories.

Sara yells at her father about how adults treat living things. She says the thing inside Mechagodzilla is suffering. Akane talks to her about moving on from her mother’s death.

There’s another Godzilla sighting, followed by another evacuation. His atomic breath makes short work of the conventional defenses. They don’t really want to try Kiryu again, but what choice do they have?

They launch Mechagodzilla again, and the battle continues. Mechagodzilla’s got a jetpack and a wide variety of weapons, but Godzilla’s got atomic breath. Just as Mechagodzilla’s power starts to fail, Godzilla falls over. Akane activates the absolute zero weapon, and that goes badly for Tokyo.

Mechagodzilla is knocked out, and Akane has to physically go inside the thing to reactivate it while the scientists figure out a way to recharge it; they drain the whole city’s power.

Togashi crashes his fighter plane into Godzilla’s mouth to keep it from firing at Akane. She grabs the big lizard and dumps him in the ocean. When she finally has the power to shoot the absolute zero weapon, she turns Godzilla into an iceberg. That doesn’t last, but it does convince Godzilla to go back to the ocean.

They couldn’t destroy Godzilla, but they beat it away this time. The PM declares it a great victory. Akane watches as Godzilla walks out into the ocean. Will they get a rematch?

Brian’s Commentary

Kiryu: Mechanical Dragon

Although not perfect, this is the first of the series to use CGI fairly well. There’s a lot of it, but it’s mostly pretty good and not super-obviously CGI. The battles look far more realistic this time around, and both creatures look good.

I’m not super clear about what was going on with Sara, but everything else made sense.

This was one of the better ones in my opinion.

Kevin’s Commentary

Science. So much science. DNA computers, and microwave blasters, and low temperature blasters, and giant cyborg robots oh my.

This one had a lot of military vs. Godzilla, creature combat, and collateral damage. It also seemed a little heavier on the people and what they were doing.

It was entertaining enough, but I didn’t feel like it was much we hadn’t seen before.

Contact Info:

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Websites:

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We’ll start off this time with the second film, “Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid” (2004), then the two real sequels, “Anaconda 3: Offspring” (2008) and “Anaconda: Trail of Blood” (2009). Then we’ll watch last year’s Chinese remake, “Anaconda” (2024). Lastly, we’ll watch the recently-released mostly-comedy, “Anaconda” (2025).

All this, as well as the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #53, is available! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link:

https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2004 Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid

* Director: Dwight H. Little

* Writers: Hans Bauer, Jim Cash

* Stars: Morris Chestnut, KaDee Strickland, Eugene Byrd

* Runtime: 97 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

When a pharmaceutical company gets information on an orchid that only blooms for a limited time, only grows in Borneo, and could have incredible medical uses, a group goes off on an expedition to collect some. As the title hints, there are big snakes in the mix. And human mistakes and greed. It’s not a great film, but it’s well put together and managed to entertain us both.

Spoilery Synopsis

As credits roll, we open on some jungle people hunting a tiger, or maybe it’s hunting them. The tiger might be the least of these guys’ problems, as a giant anaconda eats them instead.

In the big city, Gordon is about to lose his pharmaceutical company for lack of performance. Jack explains about the blood orchid, a plant in Borneo that’s extremely rare and might be able to extend human life indefinitely. The orchid is only in bloom for another two weeks, so they need to hurry to Borneo and find some more.

In Borneo, there’s trouble with the charter boat; no one will go upriver until the rainy season ends… in three weeks. There’s one guy who will do it; Gordon, Gail, and Jack go into a seedy bar and find Bill Johnson, who wants fifty thousand for the journey. Ben, Cole, Tran, and some other characters introduce themselves at the docks the next day. There’s some banter and hijinks as we get to know the characters a little.

Bill’s little monkey pet takes a side quest and runs into trouble. They can hear the screams on the boat. In the morning, they all wonder where the monkey went.

Gail falls overboard and runs into a crocodile. Bill shows us that he’s a badass and fights it. We see, but the characters don’t, as the anaconda eats the whole dead crocodile. Also, the not-so-dead monkey comes back for an unexpected jump scare.

Because of the rainy season, the river is flooded, and debris jams the propellers; now they’re headed towards a waterfall in the broken boat. There’s literally no possible way the boat could survive going over the waterfall, and we were pleasantly surprised that it didn’t. With everyone in the water, we see the snake again, but it doesn’t get anyone.

Bill has a plan to hike to a place where they can be rescued. It only involves a short walk through the jungle. Bill calls his friend John to come and pick them up at a rendezvous point. The group then has to walk through a flooded region, and we see the snake is right alongside them. When the snake reveals itself and eats Ben, everyone sees it.

Bill says that was the largest he’s ever seen, a real freak of nature. Fortunately, they’re very territorial, so there won’t be another one for miles. Gail calls off the expedition, but Jack and Gordon refuse to stop. They all argue about how much is riding on this expedition. Cole is the “We’re all gonna die” guy, and he gets annoying fast. He shuts up when he finds leeches all over his body.

Meanwhile, at the boat, John is attacked by the anaconda and crashes the boat. The group finds the wreckage and manages to salvage a few things. Tran mentions that maybe they can find help with a nearby tribe of headhunters. When they find John’s body, Bill explains how anacondas spit up their food, also how they all congregate during mating season, so there may be more than just one.

They come to the tribe’s camp and it smells bad. There’s a dead anaconda there with half a man hanging out of it. The villagers are all gone now. Jack figures out that these anacondas are so big because they’ve been eating the orchids and have become immortal: they may never stop growing.

Jack unleashes a poison spider on Gordon, who tries to use the sat phone to call for help. Jack doesn’t want to quit just yet. The snake shows up and eats Gordon, who is too paralyzed to fight back. Jack then steals the raft while everyone’s distracted.

The others try to follow Jack on foot, and naturally, they get separated. Tran gets eaten, but Sam beheads the snake. Whoops- another sneak jumps out and grabs Cole, who miraculously survives.

Jack, Meanwhile, heads downriver and finds his orchids. The others soon catch up, and they all know what Jack did. The flowers are surrounded by baby anacondas, and Sam is forced to retrieve them. There’s a struggle over the bag of flowers and Jack is bitten by one of those spiders and falls into the nest. The snakes are all so distracted by eating him that Sam escapes.

Bill shoots a flare gun, and the whole rain-soaked hillside explodes, burying the nest, the flowers, and everything else. Bill, Sam, Cole, and Gail all laugh at their luck as they row the raft further downstream.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s got a very “TV Movie” vibe to it, but it was, in fact, a theatrical release. It’s also the last film in the franchise to focus mostly on practical effects, but there’s still plenty of CGI going on.

The story is very predictable, and you know how it’s all going to play out. Still, it’s nicely paced, the characters are distinctive, and it more or less all makes sense.

It’s not great, but it’s entertaining if you like big CGI snakes.

Kevin’s Commentary

I was bracing myself for awfulness and was pleasantly surprised that it wasn’t too bad. Quite entertaining in fact. The use of CGI is heavy and obvious, but the story moves well and the cast does a decent job. Watching it was a pleasurable experience.

2008 Anaconda 3: Offspring

* Director: Don E. FauntLeRoy

* Writers: Nicholas Davidoff, David C. Olson

* Stars: David Hasselhoff, Crystal Allen, Ryan McCluskey, Patrick Regis, John Rhys-Davies, Anthony Green.

* Runtime: 1 Hour, 31 Minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The blood orchid from the previous movie only works on snakes, and works very well, in the lab - which they bust out of. The company wants to keep it quiet, so a team of expendables are sent to retrieve them. It’s watchable, but pretty low effort and mediocre. The sequels are not heading the right direction in quality.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on four men walking through the woods (it doesn’t look like the jungle), and there’s a big snake crawling through the trees above them. Suddenly, they’re attacked by the snake, and there’s a lot of shooting. Credits roll.

Mr. Murdoch listens to a report on the testing of a new drug that had horrible results. He tells Pinkus that PETA has been complaining about the company and the leak that told them about it. They have a queen anaconda in their lab. They’ve been working on blood orchid extract, and it seems to be working, but only in snakes right now; it’s lethal in humans.

They’re experiments with the serum have made aggressive giant snakes. Amanda Hayes is the herpetologist of the facility, and she wants bigger, stronger cages. She picks up right away that Murdoch is dying and wants the serum to live longer.

The big snake breaks through the glass and kills a technician. The base goes on lockdown as the snake disappears. It bites the head off a security guard on the way to the queen. Amanda goes to the main lab, but the queen is now gone. The snakes were smart enough to break out. Murdoch orders Pinkus and Grozny to take control of the situation.

We cut to Hammett, the guy we saw in the opening scene, selling rhino horns on the black market. We see that he’s a badass even without the wild animals. Pinkus calls him to hunt the snake. The ragtag collection of diverse caricatures heads off to hunt the snake.

Elsewhere, a farmer has some misadventures and finds himself inside a snake. The team shows up, searches, and Grozny is impaled. Everyone blasts the snake with machine guns, but nothing stops the snake.

Amanda and Pinkus come face to face with the huge snake. Hammett finally shows up and immediately explains a plan and starts giving orders. There’s an extended chase scene through the woods. Victor and Sofia don’t last long against the snake. Amanda escapes but then has a flashback to all the people she’s watched die.

Everyone comes to the conclusion that Amanda knows more than she’s telling. She admits that they messed with the snake’s DNA and it got a little… mutated. Also, the queen is pregnant and will be giving birth very soon. The offspring will be useful in developing the health serum. But they all know that would be bad news for the country if they are allowed to live free.

The snakes arrive, and Pinkus dies. Hammett calls the local army guy and asks for backup, but he’s clearly not into that and might have faked the call. The snakes, meanwhile, slither into the local lake that’s really near the town.

Amanda and Nick follow the snake into an old factory, and there’s a lot of hide-and-seek. It finds Nick first, but he feeds it a grenade. That’s one dead snake, but the queen is still out there.

We cut back to Murdoch, who’s on the phone with someone we don’t know, making some kind of plan.

Hammett shoots Andre in the back and holds Amanda at gunpoint; he wants those baby snakes - he’s been promised 10 million bucks for one. He and Amanda fight, but he doesn’t see the big snake behind him until it’s too late, or her knife stabbing him in the belly. Amanda throws a bomb at Hammett, the queen, and the baby snakes. The bomb blows up everything as Amanda walks back to the car.

Murdoch’s other man goes back to the blown-up factory and retrieves some surviving baby snakes. On the way out, he passes Amanda, who’s burning all the science-y records.

This story isn’t over…

Brian’s Commentary

This one was made for TV by the Sci-Fi channel simultaneously with the fourth film. The CGI is just atrociously bad with the snake. The characters are all cliched “types” that you’d expect to see in a cheaply made film.

The writers must have seen “Predator” a few times, as some of the characters and situations were ripped right from that film. In the previous film, the tough guy was killing anacondas with the throw of a knife; here, six guys empty their Uzis into one, repeatedly, and it doesn’t slow down.

It ends with a bit of a cliffhanger, obviously leading into the fourth film. Murdoch and his assistant are still alive and have a snake. Amanda is still alive, and she may or may not be back to fight snakes again.

It’s OK, but far from great. It’s got Hasselhoff, which is a big indicator of the quality of the film.

Kevin’s Commentary

The CGI is pretty bad in this one. And the story. And the characters. It’s made for TV production, and it shows.

I understand that the snake was supercharged with a serum, but it couldn’t have been nearly as bullet proof as it was in this production. Though a grenade in the mouth finally does the trick for one of them. Like the previous film, human greed and mistakes play a big factor.

I thought it was watchable, and I didn’t truly hate it, but it was low level entertainment.

2009 Anacondas: Trail of Blood

* Director: Don E. FauntLeRoy

* Writers: David C. Olson

* Stars: Crystal Allen, Linden Ashby, Danny Midwinter, and John Rhys-Davies

* Runtime: 1 hour, 29 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This one follows the third movie closely as a sequel, with surviving baby snakes, Alex, and Murdoch back for more. As well as a bunch of new snake victims. Greed and mistakes are still supporting characters as well. It’s on par in overall quality with the third film, maybe a hair better. And if you saw that one you should see this one to see how things wrap up.

Spoilery Synopsis

With the retrieval of the blood orchid and the anaconda babies, the research continues in Peter’s lab. Now, the snakes can regenerate when their heads are cut off. We get a good look at the lab, and the big snake clearly wants out. It easily escapes and kills the scientist who had the snake at the end of the previous film.

At Murdoch’s house, Eugene arrives to pick up a million dollars if he’ll do a little job for Murdoch. Murdoch thinks the scientist stole the orchid formula and is offering it to the highest bidder. He wants Peter the scientist dead, and also Amanda if she should show up.

Meanwhile, in Eastern Europe (that’s where anacondas live, right?), a hiker gets lost in the woods. Alex has no idea how to read a paper map. He runs into Amanda and her two policeman assistants. They find signs of a big predator.

Not long after, Jackson, an archaeologist, tells his crew about the important discovery they’re about to make. They stop at a fallen tree and have to walk the rest of the way to their camp. They mention that there’s no cell service or radio out here.

Amanda’s group finds Peter’s enhanced orchids in his lab. She plants bombs to wipe out the flowers, but then the snake shows up and kills the two policemen. Amanda and Alex make their way out through a mine shaft. She hears the snake roaring behind her (do snakes roar now?) The snake is about to kill her when part of the roof collapses on it, and she gets away.

Jackson arrives in the dig’s camp, but there aren’t any people here. They’ve all gone missing. He soon finds their partially eaten bodies, but it’s too late in the afternoon to go back, so they have to camp there. By the time the rest of the team arrives, all the bodies have gone missing.

Eugene’s crew of assassins arrive at Peter’s lab.

Heather gets stung by a poisonous spider and gets sick, so they can’t all just walk out the woods today. There’s a whole, “we have to drain the poison” scene that looks pretty nasty. Jackson leaves her and Wendy at camp while they walk up to the excavation site. Jackson soon finds the bodies of the other team.

Alex runs through the woods, but Amanda has his lost car keys. She shows up and runs into the snake just in time to save Alex. She shoots at the snake, which draws the attention of both Eugene and Jackson’s groups. Everyone runs, but some of them aren’t fast enough.

Eugene then takes everyone hostage and insists that Amanda go and get the serum from the snake. Amanda explains to Scott about the serum, the orchids, and the snake. They stop at Peter’s house and Amanda finds the serum. Some of it is spilled, which is going to attract the big one.

Something blows up, and everyone runs in different directions. Scott sacrifices himself so that Amanda can get away. She blows up the snake, but it soon starts to regenerate.

Murdoch shows up at Eugene’s campsite. Vasile, the policeman who we thought died, is there, and he wants more money. Eugene double-crosses Murdoch, but shoots Vasile by mistake. Jackson knocks out Eugene and takes his gun.

Amanda and Jackson confront Murdoch, who wants the serum. He lets them go; the two of them, along with Alex and Heather get into a car and drive off. Murdoch injects himself with the serum, which immediately attracts the snakes. He’s healthy now, a very healthy snack for the big snake.

Amanda stops the car and blows up all the orchids.

Eugene wakes up and finds everyone is either dead or gone. He jumps on the back of Amanda’s car to escape and shoots Amanda. Jackson and Eugene fight on the roof of the car, with the anaconda right behind them. Amanda pulls the pins on Eugene’s grenades, and he and the snake blow into a million pieces.

As everyone drives off, we see that there are still snakes out there.

Brian’s Commentary

The snake sounds like a roaring lion every time we see it. I’m not sure why Amanda was so intent on blowing up the flowers, since curing cancer is usually considered a good thing. They don’t really need the snakes, that’s just a side effect of the testing.

The film mostly continues the plot from part three, but also incorporates some of the ideas of the second film as well. There’s not much connection to the original at all.

It does wrap up the previous film. Otherwise, it’s pretty lackluster.

Kevin’s Commentary

In addition to the roaring lion that Brian mentioned, there’s often the sound effect of a rattlesnake.

Machine gun shooting 101 - it’s a lot more effective to aim at what you want to shoot rather than randomly waving the gun in the air while holding the trigger down. There was too much of that - from pros who would know better.

It was a missed opportunity not showing the blown up pieces regenerating into new snakes after they left, but we’ll have to be satisfied with one still surviving being shown.

I thought it was consistent with the previous film, maybe a little better. I didn’t hate it but it’s pretty middling.

2024 Anaconda (Chinese)

* Director: Xiang Qiuliang and Xiang Hesheng

* Stars: Terence Yin, Nita Xia, Paul Che, Jiu Kong, Ken Lok, Wang Xing Chen, Wang Gang, Wang Zi Run, Xu Shao Hang, and Wu Hao

* Runtime: 1 Hour, 24 Minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is a Chinese reboot of the 1997 original movie, not a sequel. There’s similarities to the original, and quite a few differences too. A group of circus folks traveling the river run into deadly highjinx with bad people and badder snakes. So many snakes, of normal size and giant size. It moves well with entertainment and the action is good. We’d say it was just about as good, if not somewhat better, than the US original.

Spoilery Synopsis

The four men in the boat talk about the Red Anaconda, the worst kind, and that the place they are going to is cursed. Right away, there’s some treachery, as one guy stabs another in the neck and then cuts his head off– which is promptly eaten. They’re here to poach poisonous snakes, and they soon have sackfuls.

As one man carries a sack to the boat, he’s eaten whole by a giant anaconda. It then gets the third man, only leaving the nasty leader alive. He recognizes the crimson anaconda and smiles evilly. Credits roll.

We cut to a very weird variety show. During a water-escape act, everyone notices a big snake above the tank. It falls in, and the audience freaks out. Turns out, that’s part of the show. The audience doesn’t appreciate the show and they demand a refund. Mr. Jin comes in and buys the whole thing; he wants to take them all to Thailand. Lan doesn’t want to go and quits the act. She changes her mind and decides to come, along with her snake, Jimmy. They set sail.

Right away, one of the men on the boat gets snakebitten, but it’s not a poisonous variety. There’s a zombie jump scare, but it’s just a new act that one of the guys is developing for the circus.

The boat stops. The captain shows them a huge pile of garbage and debris that’s blocking the river. The boss doesn’t want to take a detour (as he’s got something sketchy planned), so they decide to blow up the stuff blocking the river. The debris is jam-packed with snakes, and it’s soon raining reptiles all over the boat. There are a lot of snakes.

There’s an accident, and a man falls overboard. He runs into Jeff, the snake-poacher guy we saw in the opening sequence. He joins them aboard the ship. Jeff helps when one of the men gets a snake stuck in his ear. Lan knows snakes, and she says the man was bitten by a poisonous snake and didn’t flinch. How many bites does it take to grow immunity? There’s something about Jeff that she doesn’t like.

That night, the captain goes overboard and disappears. In the morning, we see that Jeff is using the captain as bait for a really big snake. The birds all fly away. “Something big is coming,” Jeff warns. He briefly hooks the big snake, but it gets away. Still, everyone sees it. The snake grabs Jeff and drags him all over the river, but he manages to get away from it. The snake does eventually vomit up what’s left of the captain.

The snake comes up onto the boat and everyone hides from it as it prowls. The snake is very fast and very mean. Some fuel is spilled in the panic, and there’s a fire and explosion. The boat burns, and everyone is stuck in the jungle. Jeff says he can lead them out. No one trusts him, but they don’t have much choice. A-Li has been bitten by something and has 48 hours to get treatment or she’ll die.

The group camps in a cave, and there’s more drama with that. The little boy is attacked and rescued, Jeff eats a raw snake, and the girls bond over chocolate. Jin confides to Jeff that the others are his product; he’s selling them for organ transplants when they get to the destination. One of the two cousins is dripped on by the snake and gets some variety of hydrophobia, but he’s eaten before that’s too much of a problem. The other cousin gets it in the morning.

They soon arrive at Jeff’s boat, but he wants their help in catching the snake. Jin backs Jeff in the argument. The ones who won’t cooperate are tied up for use as bait. There’s a struggle, and the snake finally gets Jeff. Ali is wounded in the fight and dies as well.

The three remaining characters climb into Jeff’s boat, but it turns out that Jeff’s still not dead. Once again, the three are tied up as bait for the Crimson Anaconda. A whole group of anacondas show up, but they’re soon run off by the biggest of all. Jeff’s got a net trap set up, but it doesn’t work as well as he’d hoped. As it swallows him, the other three get out from the ropes and hide.

The three are about to die when, out of nowhere, snake Jimmy jumps down as a distraction as Chinese-Hodor jams a log down the snake’s throat. The snake also loses an eye. This enrages the snake enough that it charges right into one of the traps Jeff set for it and is beheaded.

As the trio sails away in Jeff’s repaired boat, the headless snake rises up and sticks out a tongue.

Brian’s Commentary

Being a much newer film, the CGI snakes are the best we’ve seen in the series. Yes, this is a “real” film in the series, as the Chinese company bought the rights to the series to make this. I never did catch most of the characters’ names, but they’re all distinctive enough that everyone is easily distinguishable from one another.

It’s nicely paced, looks fantastic, has a lot of humor, and works well overall.

Kevin’s Commentary

This one is a remake not a sequel. I went in expecting the worst, and I was pleasantly surprised.

Like Brian, I immediately noticed how much better the CGI was in this one vs. the US original and sequels. In addition to the CGI snakes, there are loads of practical effect snakes - this wouldn’t be a good one to watch if you have a phobia.

The boat captain is quite a character and looks like a caricature, and they are all at least a little quirky and interesting. The action scenes are very good.

I was very entertained and would recommend it.

2025 Anaconda

* Director: Tom Gormican

* Writers: Tom Gormican and Kevin Etten

* Stars: Jack Black, Paul Rudd, Steve Zahn, Thandiwe Newton, Daniela Melchior, and Selton Mello

* Runtime: 99 minutes

* YouTube Trailer Link:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A quartet of people on the fringes of show business obtain the rights to the original “Anaconda” movie and decide to remake it on location in the jungles of Brazil. Where there happens to really be a gigantic anaconda. It’s not a horror movie in itself, it’s a comedy adventure, but they are remaking a horror movie. It’s well made with a strong cast, but we both just thought it was okay.

Spoilery Synopsis

A French couple is out in the Amazon rainforest, and they know they’re in trouble. As she makes her escape, some guy is eaten by a giant snake. Credits roll.

We cut to a conference room, where Doug McCallister tells a scary story that’s really just his idea of a wedding video; he makes wedding videos. We also meet Ronald Griffin, who’s an actor playing “Doctor Number 3” but gets fired very quickly. On the way out, he stops to look at a poster for the original “Anaconda” film.

Both men wind up at Doug’s surprise birthday party that evening. They made amateur horror movies when they were thirteen, and they all miss it. Afterward, they all talk about the original “Anaconda” film again. Griff mentions that he’s got the rights to the film now. He wants to reboot the series, indie-style, filmed in the actual Amazon. Kenny the videographer and Clair the actress agree to participate in it. Doug is reluctant, but his wife is all for it.

The group gets into the process of writing, planning, and financing the film. They soon arrive in the rainforest, where we meet Santiago, the snake handler. Santiago knows all about anacondas, showing them one he has in a cage.

We also see Ana, that Frenchwoman from earlier, skulking around, still being hunted by strange men. She steals the keys to a boat and pretends to be the pilot; it’s the filmmaker’s boat.

The group starts filming right away. We get a montage of the actors and crew doing their things. Afterward, they all compare head-butting styles. Later that night, a big anaconda slithers through their bedrooms on the boat. In the morning, they find that it’s Santiago’s snake that got out of the crate.

In the morning, Griff freaks out and kills the snake, sorta accidentally. They have a funeral for the snake. One of the men following Ana is eaten by an even bigger snake. Santiago and Griff go out into the jungle to find a new snake. Griff “nopes” right back to the boat, but Santiago finds his snake– actually, it finds him.

Everyone gets off the boat to look for Santiago, and the bad men search the boat. Doug, Griff, and the others soon learn about the big snake, as they get trapped inside a camper van.

Somehow, we find ourselves in a high-speed chase, being pursued by the giant snake and illegal gold miners. They make it back to the boat and have to decide whether to go home empty handed or stick around and keep filming. “We came down here to remake ‘Anaconda,’ and now we’re in it.” Doug rewrites the script to incorporate what he’s seen and use Ana as his new hero character.

The next day, another boat passes them on the river. Those people are also doing a reboot of ‘Anaconda.’ Griff may have been exaggerating about having the rights to the film. Surprisingly, everyone gets upset.

Griff quits and goes off in a little dinghy to find the other movie boat. He soon finds it, crashed, sunk, and floating in the river. All those actors and crew are dead.

Back on the main boat, Ana picks up a gun and forces Claire, Kenny, and Doug off the boat. Not long after, Griff returns and finds everyone gone. Ana makes everyone carry big bags of illegal gold that she stole from the miners. The men who have been chasing them are policemen. As Ana menaces everyone, the snake approaches.

When the snake attacks Ana, everyone runs. Doug gets bitten by a spider, and there’s a whole extended thing about Kenny peeing on his leg. When Doug finally gets his leg peed on, it’s a major victory.

Doug starts to give a rousing speech to Griff just as the snake comes out of nowhere and snatches him. They later find him regurgitated under a tree. They decide to use his body, tied to a dead pig and squirrel, as a distraction for the snake while they run to a boat. Suddenly, Doug wakes up tied to a dead pig with a squirrel in his mouth and a giant snake right behind him. Turns out, the pig’s not dead either, which leads to some hilarity.

The group finds the base camp where that other party was filming the real “Anaconda” remake. Ice Cube, one of the actors from the film, shows up to join their group. “Who were you expecting, Jon Voight?” He says they were setting up pyrotechnics all over the jungle for his film.

We then get a montage of everyone getting ready to blow up the snake while on film. That doesn’t work so well, and the four soon find themselves cornered. Griff finally “heroes up” and shoots it with a flare gun, making the snake explode spectacularly.

We cut to Doug and Griff accepting an award for their unauthorized, probably illegal reboot film. They were then sued by Sony. J-Lo comes to Doug and wants him to direct the new, real reboot.

During the end credits, Santiago sits up in the jungle, amazed that he’s alive.

Brian’s Commentary

Honestly, I laughed more at the Chinese version from the previous year.

Still, it’s an interesting concept, remaking the movie that the film is based on while running into other people doing the same thing.

It’s fine for a goofy comedy, and it does use a lot of the horror tropes. Still it could have used more Jon Voight.

Kevin’s Commentary

It didn’t take long for me to grow weary of Jack Black and company trying to be funny. Though I did have some chuckles here and there, it didn’t satisfy me as a comedy.

I can’t fault the production values, and the cast worked hard at it, but I thought it was just okay overall.

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Mainstream Films:

2026 Grizzly Night

* Directed by: Burke Doeren

* Written by: Bo Bean, Katrina Mathewson, Tanner Bean

* Stars: Charles Esten, Oded Fehr, Brec Bassinger

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 27 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

In August 1967 in Glacier National Park, Montana, there were two fatal attacks by two different grizzly bears. Here they have milked this story into an hour and a half movie. It’s well made and the acting is decent, they captured 1967 pretty well. Brian liked it a lot, and Kevin says it feels like there’s a lot of filler that bored him some.

Spoilery Synopsis

A couple in a tent are harassed by a nosy grizzly bear as they hide in terror. This goes badly as credits roll.

It’s 1967, and this is based on a true story.

Eighteen hours before the attack, a woman files yet another report about the bear that’s been terrorizing the campers. The rangers are all busy with a firewatch and fire fighting after the lightning storm last night.

Joan, the new girl, gets assigned to lead an overnight hiking group since all the “real” rangers are busy. Julie calls her mother from the camp store; she’s going camping with Michelle, Paul, Denise, Raymond, Ronald, and Roy this weekend, since there’s nothing else to do. Everyone sets off on their respective hikes.

At the chalet, Joan stops with her group. Julie and Roy stop in, but there are no rooms available. Her and a few others have to sleep outside since the place is all booked up. Paul and Michelle’s group go to the lake and do some fishing.

Michelle’s group runs into a bear, and it takes their dinner. It’s too late to head to the ranger station, so they just hope it doesn’t come back. Roy staggers into camp and says a bear got Julie. The screaming wakes up Joan and the people at the chalet. We get a flashback, and see that they were the couple screaming before the credits.

Joan calls the main ranger, Gary, and reports the bear attack. He promises that help is on the way, but he’s a long way off. Gary then takes a helicopter to get there faster, but it’s awfully dark outside. Joan gets the people on the ground to light fires to give the copter a place to land, which finally works. The doctor patches up Roy and they load him onto the helicopter to the hospital.

Meanwhile, nine miles away, Denise wakes up, and the bear they saw earlier is back. The bear drags off Michelle, sleeping bag and all.

Gary, Joan, and the others search for Julie, and soon find signs of the attack in her campsite. They soon find her, still alive but wounded. Gary and Joan talk about leadership. Julie’s too far gone, so the priest moves in to do his thing as she dies. Gary explains that in 57 years, there hasn’t been a single grizzly attack until now.

In the morning, Michelle’s group is still out there, but they haven’t found her yet. They decide to walk to the ranger station and report what happened. Two attacks should be impossible, and the ranger there is skeptical at first. They search the woods and find… parts.

Many rangers show up, all armed; it’s time to kill the bears. Joan and Leonard talk about the likelihood of two bear attacks and whose fault this was.

Brian’s Commentary

This isn’t so much a horror movie as it is a drama about a terrifying situation. It starts out with all the horror movie tropes and characters, but then just focuses on what happens without playing up the bear or the drama excessively. It’s based on a true incident, and it doesn’t stray too far from the actual case.

It was quite good!

Kevin’s Commentary

This is indeed based on a true event. On the night of August 13, 1967, two young women were attacked and killed by two different bears miles apart in Glacier National Park, Montana - a heck of a coincidence. There’s an online article about the real thing that’s interesting - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Grizzlies.

Here they expand the story out into a movie almost an hour and a half long. The sauce is spread mighty thin. It’s well made, but there isn’t a lot of substance. After the attacks, I found myself getting fairly bored.

2025 Merge

* Directed by: Bela Baptiste, Dalano Barnes, Richard Fenwick

* Written by: Bela Baptiste, Dalano Barnes, Richard Fenwick

* Stars: Achmed Abdel-Salam, Tatjana Alexander, Bela Baptiste

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 17 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s an anthology of science fiction short stories, each heavily depending on technology far ahead of where we currently are. It shows various ways humans could interact with such technology, and how it can interact with us when it has a mind of its own. The stories are pretty gentle, sweet, and romantic, with a zero body count. But there is uncertainty, a lack of control, and the potential for disaster making an undercurrent of horror if you look for it. The stories are all well written, well acted, and well directed. The CGI is a little heavy handed and obvious, but it’s entertaining. It reminded us of “Black Mirror.”

Spoilery Synopsis

A man has breakfast in a futuristic city and suddenly starts screaming.

Angst

A narrator explains that everything is perfect and everyone is happy now. Fear no longer exists, and that’s how he makes his business. He gives people phobias for excitement. We see a man become terrified of his own pet spider and a woman becomes claustrophobic. We return to that screaming man and see what he thinks he sees. “Embracing your fear allows you to be reborn,” he explains. The man offers the drug for free. Credits roll.

Soulmate

A couple talks in bed. He’s so glad he found her, he bought her a book. Turns out, this is a virtual world, and only the girl is real. She’s not allowed to be in there, and there’s an investigation into the illegal avatar. She goes back inside to break up with the man, who doesn’t understand. When she arrives back at work, the boss is sitting at her workstation; she’s going to be caught– but she isn’t. As the boss goes for a break, she deletes the AI logs.

The investigation eventually ends, and Anna goes back to work. She restores the deleted information and goes back inside for Neil, who no longer recognizes her. She gets a message: “Scenes no longer compatible with current software version.’ She deletes this newest meeting and then goes back in time to their first meeting. Anna meets Neil for the first time– again.

When Unfettered

Two men sit by their father, who dies. The father’s robot assistant, Ash, walks them through the process. The girls decide what to do with the house and also what happens with Ash, whom they don’t really want anymore. Ash goes outside for a walk, and she’s a lot more human than people expect. She meets a handicapped boy in the park and plays with him. Everyone thinks she’s great until the mom finds out she’s an AI, and then she gets rude. Then she meets and helps an old couple who are very nice.

Ash decides to never go home.

The First Time I Never Met You

John listens to recorded messages from his dead wife. He’s so broken up that he’s lost his job. Overdue notices litter his desk. He’s got some kind of plant that sends him back in time to the first time he met her. Their “first” date goes well; he’s a physicist, and she’s an evolutionary biologist. He talks about “rewinding” time. He’s so in awe at seeing her again that he acts strangely, knowing too much about her that she’s never told him. She’s so creeped out that she breaks it off and goes home.

Suddenly, he doesn’t remember why he’s there. He forgets his children and whole life, since now, none of that happened. He leaves the bar and goes back to his new, old life.

Subscribed

We open on a commercial for Vitalus, a new AI product. “Your life, upgraded!” We soon see that all the AI just lets people stay inside all the time. Carol gets a phone call, and it appears that maybe Vitalus is censoring the news and information she gets to keep her inside and addicted to the AI. It watches all her body functions everywhere, even on the toilet, and in bed. Luke keeps trying to get through to her, both on the phone and in-person, but the AI keeps dropping the call and running him off. The AI does not want her talking to him any more.

She wises up to all this, but “Vicky” still won’t let her out the front door. She shorts out the power and runs outside, where Vitalus Tases her and sends her back inside. She wakes up, and Vicky says it was all just a nightmare.

The Man Behind the Machine

Martin lives in a warehouse; a man from the Turing company comes to repossess his android. He’s an older model and is returned to Turing, where he meets a newer model. His signal is different; he’s malfunctioning and escapes back to Martin. He wants to choose what he wants, which is unique.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s way more sci-fi than horror, but these alternate, high-tech futures have a lot of overlap with horror. The first segment of this anthology has dodgy CGI and voice dubbing, but the others mostly look good and are well-acted. I have to admit, I didn’t really understand the final segment. The middle segments are the best of the bunch,

If you like “Black Mirror,” then you’ll probably enjoy this.

Kevin’s Commentary

The CGI was a little overused and obvious at times, but the technologies and stories were cool.

The stories were all at least pretty good. The last one was a bit confusing. I especially liked “When Unfettered.” What’s an autonomous AI robot to do when they lose their job because their master died?

I’d call it a win overall, not really horror, but I enjoyed it.

2006 Pumpkinhead: Ashes to Ashes

* Directed by: Jake West

* Written by: Barbara Werner, Jake West, John Werner

* Stars: Lance Henriksen, Doug Bradley, Douglas Roberts

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 31 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This third movie is a sequel to the first movie, even bringing back several of the same characters. This time several wronged people want revenge and go to the witch Haggis to summon Pumpkinhead, and the main target tries to fight back. It’s not as good as the first one, but it was still pretty entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

A man named Bunt runs through the woods in a panic. Pumpkinhead is right behind him. When he catches him, he cuts an “X” in his forehead. And then Bunt wakes up. His boss, Doc Fraser, tells him it’s time to move the body. As Bunt hides the body, the ghost of Ed Harley, from the first film, comes and tells him bad things are coming his way.

A hiker in the woods spots Bunt dragging a corpse behind him. He runs to a nearby crematorium. Inside, Doc Fraser cuts open a dead man as his accomplices watch. The hiker stumbles in and interrupts things; on the way running out, he finds numerous other bodies. They soon catch the man and use him for parts.

Doc takes the man’s kidney to a man to sell it for him. Meanwhile, the now-kidneyless dead man wakes up, not as dead as they all thought. He flags down a truck and gets ride to town. Molly Sue takes him to the police station, who rush out to the crematorium and arrest the people there.

In the morning, the sheriff’s men clear out the bodies from the crematorium’s barn. They find lots of bodies. One of the bodies they dig up is in the middle of an old pumpkin patch; Doc Fraser is there, and this one doesn’t look familiar.

In jail, Bunt tells his accomplices about Pumpkinhead, who feeds on sins.

Back at the crematorium, the old woman from the woods shows up and looks at the weird body. “This one belongs to me. You outta know better than to disturb this one.”

Molly finds her dead son with the other bodies, and she’s angry. She wants revenge on whoever did this and wants the old woman’s help. She, along with a handful of friends, go to track down the old woman that night. The old woman seems more than happy to help. They all get their hands sliced for blood, and soon enough, the ritual is done. The twisted little skeleton writhes and becomes Pumpkinhead.

At jail, Bunt screams, “It’s coming for us!” And it does, right then. It kills the deputy, but the prisoners Bunt and Dahlia get away. They run home to her father, Doc Fraser. They all talk about the monster.

Oliver and Mary Sue go to see Doc; she’s not feeling well after the ritual. As soon as they leave, Pumpkinhead attacks Tiny, and all the baddies see it. They hop in the car and drive off. Bunt sees Ed Harley’s ghost in the road and makes them crash. Bunt gives us a flashback to the first film, when he encountered the monster.

Meanwhile, at the church, there’s a midnight memorial service for all those dead people they found. Doc arrives and sits with Molly and Oliver. Pumpkinhead arrives soon after, and the whole town sees the CGI creature jump through the skylight. The resulting carnage goes on for a long time.

Molly and Oliver talk about the curse. Why did Pumpkinhead go to the church? Who was it after?

Oliver, Ellie, and Ritchie regret calling up Pumpkinhead and want to undo what they did. They go back to the old woman, who says that Pumpkinhead can’t be stopped.

Doc goes to see Ritchie and tries to kill him but is interrupted by the monster. When Doc kills Ritchie, Pumpkinhead collapses, allowing the evil doctor to get away. Ellie and Oliver return and find the body, along with evidence that Doc was involved.

Molly is packing up to leave town when Doc arrives to kill her. Oliver arrives and warns her about Doc. Dahlia and Bunt pack up to leave as well. All of them decide to stop at Lenny the drug dealer’s house first for some reason.

Bunt comes to Oliver and Ellie and tells them everything. They plan to get the crematorium working and dispose of all those corpses, which might make the demon go away.

Doc and Molly have a talk. He did what he did to give the town free health care.

Meanwhile, Oliver and company burn all those bodies at the cemetery, shoving them into the crematory oven like firewood. Molly holds Doc at gunpoint as Pumpkinhead kills Lenny and Dahlia in the next room. The whole place explodes, and only Doc seems to have survived.

At the crematorium, Ed comes to Bunt one more time to sound ominous and foreboding. Doc comes in and shoots at Ellie but misses; Pumpkinhead comes in and kills Doc. There’s only one more body left to cremate. Ellie throws it into the fire, but nothing happens. Ellie then crawls into the fire and burns herself up– she was the last of the four who conjured up the monster.

Pumpkinhead collapses and shrivels back into the body of Ed Harley before dissolving into a skeleton. The FBI guys finally show up and talk to Oliver and Bunt.

The old woman comes to the crematorium and takes Ellie/Pumpkinhead’s little body back to the pumpkin patch.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s a decent enough continuation of the story from the first film. It’s nothing groundbreaking, but it does seem to stick to the information we learned in the first film.

Lance Henriksen returns from the first film, but his part is basically just a cameo as a ghost. Doug Bradley has a substantial role as the villain of the film. These two are both good, as always, but most of the rest of the cast is mediocre at best.

It’s alright, but nothing special.

Kevin’s Commentary

Mediocre CGI strikes again and too often. The creature looks good when he’s a practical effect though.

The story is a pretty good sequel of the first movie, following the same rules. I saw in the trivia that Lance Henriksen was so embarrassed by the film that he snuck out of a Q&A without taking the stage, but I didn’t think it was that bad. It’s not as good as the first one was, but it’s entertaining.

1955 It Came from Beneath the Sea

* Directed by: Robert Gordon

* Written by: George Worthing Yates, Harold Jacob Smith

* Stars: Kenneth Tobey, Faith Domergue, Donald Curtis

* Run Time: 1 hour, 19 Minutes

* Watch it:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The “It” is a gigantic octopus (or hexopus if you look closely - the budget was tight and it’s a couple arms short). The military and lab stuff is all realistic looking because it was the real thing, mostly. The puppetry, miniatures, and rear screen use are pretty obvious but they get the job done. The original was black and white, but it’s since been colorized. It’s a fun creature feature of the 1950s, worthy of being called a classic of its time.

Spoilery Synopsis

We get a military voiceover talking about the new submarines. The human mind had thought of everything… except that which was beyond his comprehension… Credits roll.

We are shown the wonders of the periscope. Commander Matthews talks to another officer, Griff, about how impressive the ship is. Suddenly, something big shows up on the sonar that might be following them. They accelerate, but the thing is gaining on them. It bumps the ship from behind as it catches up. Also, there’s a radiation warning, but it’s not coming from their engine. They finally manage to escape whatever it is and head to dry-dock for repairs.

The men find something strange stuck in the rudder, and the scientists had to analyze it. Dr. John Carter and Professor Lesley Joyce, two marine biologists, explain that what they brought in was just a small piece of a much larger creature. Mathews likes Joyce and makes that abundantly clear.

The scientists work for a couple of weeks and then report that the creature is an octopus, albeit a giant one, that lived on the bottom of the ocean until H-Bombs stirred up the ocean floor and irradiated it. It can no longer eat fish, so it may be hunting for a higher form of life, maybe even man. The heads of the military don’t seem impressed or believe that the problem is a giant octopus.

We cut to a cargo ship out in the ocean, and they spot a huge tentacle outside the ship. It pulls the whole ship down. Carter and Joyce are finished with the military and ready to move on to their next project, but Mathews isn’t going to give her up that easily. The admiral revokes their transfer and requires them all stay– they know about the cargo ship that went down. The survivors tell the story, and it’s still a little hard to believe. The military heads still aren’t convinced. The survivor recants his tales, and Joyce goes to meet with him before he’s released. She’s smooth and crafty about getting the sailor to tell about what he saw.

The military shuts down all shipping in the Pacific as they hunt for the monster. Joyce warns that they might be able to kill the thing once they do find it. The main characters all split up to run down a few leads as they hunt for the octopus.

They soon find a wrecked car, a missing family, and odd circles in the sand on a beach. That must be the place! Instead of investigating, Mathews and Joyce are soon making out on the beach. They soon get an actual sighting.

The Navy plans to trap the creature in San Francisco Bay. Carter talks about the need to destroy the creature’s brain; they have a special weapon for the job– a jet-propelled torpedo. Joyce explains that this kind of thing has happened in the past.

The creature makes another appearance, and they attack it with depth charges and electricity. This only manages to anger it, and it climbs up onto the Golden Gate Bridge. Carter has to drive out to the middle of the bridge to turn off the electricity. Mathew and Joyce soon follow to pick him up. The trio barely make it off the bridge before the monster crushes it. The octopus eventually gives up and goes back into the water and vanishes.

The monster soon reappears at the ferry terminal, where there are a lot of people still around. As it starts to pull itself up onto land, Mathews and his submarine approach. They dive and prepare torpedoes, but the harbor is pretty crowded, so it’s gonna take some luck. They embed a torpedo into it, but then it grabs and holds onto the sub.

Mathews himself puts on Scuba equipment to blast the sub loose with explosives. It doesn’t work, so Carter tries next; he shoots it in the eye, which really gets its attention. Griff orders that the torpedo be detonated, and the octopus blows up. Carter and Mathews are picked up, alive, not long after.

Mathews wants Joyce to marry him, but she’s argumentative and wants to write a book instead.

Brian’s Commentary

Could Mathews be any more inappropriate with Joyce if he tried? He’d be up on charges for coming on that strong today. It’s the 50’s, where “No” always means “Yes.”

The filmmakers had access to a lot of military sets and equipment, probably all leftover from the war, and they weren’t afraid to incorporate them into making the film seem more realistic.

The monster is one of Ray Harryhausen’s stop-motion creations, and it’s really well done. It crushes ships, the Golden Gate, and various buildings near the ferry port. It’s not much compared to modern effects, but for the time, this was all groundbreaking stuff.

Kevin’s Commentary

The interior submarine scenes were really filmed in a submarine. How cool is that?

What’s worse than a gigantic angry octopus? A radioactive gigantic angry octopus.

It’s strange to think that everyone on the screen is seventy years older than they were when this was released.

It’s very 1950s in sexual and social attitudes, culture, and technology, which I thought added to the fun. It seems to take a long time to get to showing the creature, but we do finally get a payoff.

2001 Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack

* Directed by: Shusuke Kaneko

* Written by: Keiichi Hasegawa, Shusuke Kaneko, Masahiro Yokotani

* Stars: Chiharu Niyama, Ryudo Uzaki, Masahiro Kobayashi

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 45 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This one is another sequel to the original 1954 Godzilla that disregards all those that have come since - except for a dig at the 1998 American remake starring Matthew Broderick when an admiral mentions a creature looking something like Godzilla that attacked the United States. It’s a bad Godzilla vs. several good guy monsters and there’s lots of big creature action, carnage and explosions, as well as humans to root for. It’s not the best of them, but it’s entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a Japanese Navy meeting where they talk about the 1954 Godzilla attack (I suspect we’re going to ignore all the other films). There was a monster that looked like Godzilla that attacked the USA, but the real one hasn’t been seen since. Suddenly, a US nuclear sub has gone missing. The Japanese send a deep-sea rescue sub down after it. Suddenly, a giant monster arrives on the scene. Guess who? Credits roll!

At Mt. Myoko, a reporter talks about the monster of the mountain. They’re making a pseudo-entertainment documentary to entertain children. There’s a sudden earthquake, and it’s clear that there was a real monster involved.

There’s some kind of earthquake that night, and Yuri, the reporter, wants to investigate. The army shoots a special “digging” missile at the mountain. An old truck driver claims he saw a monster last night, and it must have been Godzilla. Yuri is given a book, “The Guardian Monsters,” and some of the pictures inside look familiar.

Yuri’s father is an admiral, and he thinks she drinks too much. She turns on the TV and learns about another monster attack; this one left a bunch of kids wrapped in cocoons.

Yuri interviews an old man who has been saying Godzilla will return for years now. He says she needs to wake up Ghidorah to stop Godzilla this time. Baragon, Mothra, and Ghidorah are the guardian monsters. They are supposed to sleep for 10,000 years, so it’s too soon to wake them up.

Yuri’s father, the admiral, has a flashback to 1954, and it wasn’t a happy memory. A giant monster attacks, and everyone says it’s Godzilla, but we know better; it’s Baragon. The actual Godzilla soon arrives on shore and heads right toward the other monster. Soon, they’re fighting as Yuri and Kadokura watch from afar. Little Baragon doesn’t have a chance. Meanwhile, the old harbinger breaks open some ice we saw in a nearby cave.

The military is activated to take on Godzilla, and fighter jets are dispatched. Yuri obtains a bike and sets off toward Godzilla to get the story rather than follow along with the evacuation of the area. Not surprising, the missiles only manage to make Godzilla more angry, and he shoots the jets out of the air with his atomic breath. Yuri gets it all on film and follows Godzilla from a distance.

Another creature wakes up from the ice cave where the old man is; Ghidora. But wait, there’s more! Mothra also hatches from her cocoon at the same time. All of them head toward Godzilla. Baragon, Mothra, and Ghidorah are all heading toward Tokyo, where Godzilla is also on the way.

Mothra shoots some kinds of spores that knock Godzilla over onto a building. He retaliates with nuclear breath, which really makes a mess of the city– and Yuki, who survives somehow.

Ghidorah shows up, and he’s dramatic with his three-headed lightning bite. Godzilla, on the other hand, is unstoppable. The humans then open fire on Godzilla, which just results in an angry Godzilla blasting the military.

Godzilla blasts Mothra, who dissolves into millions of glowing lights that reinvigorate the apparently dead Ghidorah. The two merge into something new that’s blast proof. Super-Ghidorah clobbers Godzilla explosively and the fight moves underwater.

Yuri learns that her father is leading the counterattack from a small submarine that isn’t really meant for war. They shoot Ghidorah by mistake, and that goes badly. But then Ghidorah is reanimated and supercharged by a chunk of stone from one of the talisman statues.

There’s still more battling between the two until Godzilla finally blasts Ghidorah into dust. Baragon and the other two guardians are visible as golden energy that combines and then dissolves.

The admiral pilots his submarine right down Godzilla’s throat, and Godzilla swallows. He’s not immediately killed and uses one of those drill-missiles to shoot his way out. Godzilla tries to blast Yuri and Kadokura, but his nuclear blast shoots out the wrong hole and he collapses into the water. He tries blasting again and blows himself up. The sub bobs to the surface.

Yuri and the admiral are reunited, and both are OK. Tokyo, on the other hand, looks to be mostly gone now. Down in the harbor, we see Godzilla’s still-beating heart– nothing else, just the beating heart. He’ll be back!

Brian’s Commentary

The monsters are still men (and a woman this time) in rubber suits, but there’s also a great deal of really dated CGI here. The bad CGI is pretty distracting this time, because there’s so much of it, but there is some good carnage and explosions. Godzilla’s fire breath is really impressive this time around.

This is the one and only film where Ghidorah is considered one of the “good guys” rather than a main villain creature. This one endows the Guardian Monsters with magical healing powers and a bit of religious mystery to them, which basically lets them come back from the dead several times.

Kevin’s Commentary

This one had more of a tangible body count than typical. Not gory graphic, but many instances of people getting stomped and blown up and crushed in rubble. Plus aftermath showing the many wounded.

Godzilla is purely the bad creature here, which isn’t typical either.

Mothra looks especially cool in this one, I thought. Fluorescent colors and more movement from the wings and legs than we usually see. I also liked the gold dragon look of King Ghidorah.

This wasn’t the best of them, but it was entertaining.

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Mainstream Films:

2026 Killer Whale

* Directed by: Jo-Anne Brechin

* Written by: Jo-Anne Brechin, Katharine McPhee

* Stars: Virginia Gardner, Mel Jarnson, Mitchell Hope

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 29 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Two young women end up trapped on a tropical atoll by a killer whale with a thing against humans. The acting is a moderately bright spot in a slog of bad pacing, a lame simple script, and way too much CGI and greenscreen. We didn’t care much for this one.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open with some discussion of Orcas, killer whales, and the whale at the Sea World-ish amusement park. Chelsea and her friend Dana, who work there, talk about how their whale, Ceto, just isn’t the same since they took away her baby. The whale eats Chelsea, and the credits roll.

Maddie and Chad talk about Trish, who’s busy with school. He gives her a cello necklace and leans in for a kiss, just as a gunman comes into the place to rob them. There’s a struggle, and the gun goes off, damaging Maddie’s hearing. Everyone survives the attack, but, from out of nowhere, Chad is killed by the robber’s truck.

One year later, Trish comes to visit Maddie and offers to take her on a trip. Maddie doesn’t want to go, but Trish is persuasive. They fly to an island resort in Thailand.

On the beach, Trish brings up the topic of Ceto, which disturbs Maddie. Josh, a local guy, talks about the local whale, Ceto, who has been in captivity for twenty years and lost her baby two years ago. That night, the three of them sneak into the run-down amusement park to see Ceto.

Maddie gets to see Ceto up close in the aquarium. She hates that the whale is trapped here, but then she watches as the whale kills a maintenance worker. Maddie, Trish, and Josh are then chased out of the park by a security guard.

In the morning, the trio takes a Jet-Ski out to an isolated island. The locals say this place is cursed, and something happened a few years ago, and now no one comes here. In almost no time flat, they lose Maddie’s phone, the Jet-Ski, and Josh to an Orca attack.

The two girls are now stuck on a pizza-shaped floatie and can see the giant orca swimming around beneath them. It’s Ceto, the same whale that was in the park last night, somehow. They can tell by the distinct dorsal fin. Trisha jumps off the pizza and swims to a big rock, Maddie chickens out. There’s some quick drama, and Maddie soon ends up on the rock as well.

The two eventually calm down and talk about how Ceto could possibly be here. “Orcas have never ever killed anyone in the wild.”

The girls take a nap, and when they wake up, they see a boat, but it’s too far away to see them. We’re reminded that Maddie is deaf, which is probably going to mean something later.

One of Josh’s arms floats by, and Maddie snags it with her bag. It’s not for lunch, she wants his wristband flashlight. When night falls, they use it as a signal, but no one comes. The girls talk about Maddie playing the cello again and going back to school.

They use Chad’s cremation stone to break open a shelled thing to have something to eat. Afterwards, she decides it’s finally time to throw the stone away. Trish admits that she put the robber up to the robbery that night; it’s her fault Chad was killed. We get a whole dramatic guilt-spiel from Trish. Again, we’re reminded about Maddie’s hearing aids.

In the morning, Trish explains her plan to swim to the atoll surrounding their rock, but Maddie has her hearing aids off and doesn’t even know what’s going on. She makes it, but Maddie only makes it to another rock. When Trish is distracted by a plane flying over, the orca jumps up into the shallows and drags Trish back into the water– and bites her leg off. She crawls back up on the beach but soon bleeds to death.

Night falls, and Maddie decides to swim to the atoll. She makes it without too much issue and then makes her way around to where Trish’s body is and buries her in the sand.

Maddie remembers that Trish said her phone was waterproof, but it went down with the Jet-Ski. Can she retrieve it? She does. Rather than get out of the water, she activates the phone right there, in the water. It’s unclear if she sent an SOS or the phone didn’t work.

This is followed by a string of ridiculous underwater hide-and-seek, resulting in Maddie stabbing the Orca in the eye with her broken Cello bow stick.

When the sun comes up a helicopter arrives; the phone’s SOS did work after all.

Brian’s Commentary

Brian’s Rating:**

Although the whole thing probably wasn’t filmed in front of a green screen, it seems like most of the outdoor scenes were. There are a lot of outdoor scenes, so… ouch! The whale is either as large or as small as the plot requires; sometimes it’s huge, and other times it squeezes right up to the rock.

I’ve seen this compared to “Fall” (2022), and it is a very similar theme: two girls stuck in a bad place. The other film did it better.

It’s contrived, the characters make one stupid decision after another, and the whole thing with the whale’s location makes no sense. The acting and dialogue are atrocious as well.

It’s pretty terrible.

Kevin’s Commentary

Kevin’s Rating: *

So much green screen and CGI. It is so, so obvious and overused.

I agree with the comparisons to “Fall” and that movie did it better. The three leads have some skill, but they can’t overcome the effects, direction, and script. It gets worse as it goes along until it culminates with a weak ending.

I didn’t like it.

2025 Queens of the Dead

* Directed by: Tina Romero

* Written by: Erin Judge, Tina Romero

* Stars: Jaquel Spivy, Kay O’Brian, Quincy Dunn-Baker

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 41 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s drag queens, with their friends and family, versus a zombie outbreak. Holed up in a club against the backdrop of a larger apocalypse, there’s a lot of humor with a body count that racks up. The pacing is a little draggy in places, and the zombie action is pretty low for most of the movie, but it’s a fun watch.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on an over-the-top drag queen walking down the street on the way to church. When she goes into the church, her Grindr alert goes off. She finds the man’s phone, but it’s covered in blood. Then she finds him, but he doesn’t look quite alive anymore. She’s bitten by the zombie priest. Credits roll.

We cut to a musical number interspersed with scenes of a dancing nurse, Sam, at the hospital. Sam talks to Jane, a patient with issues, who wants to leave.

On the stage, Kelsey and Ginsey argue with dancers in the show. Yasmine phones Dre that she’s too sick to do the show tonight, but she’s obviously faking it. Jax and Nico are dancers, and they’re elevens on the gay scale. Jane watches their livestream and tells Sam about it. Sam knows Yasmine and Dre, but that was another time. Jane wants to meet all of them and tell them they’ve got bad drugs. Nurse Lizzy tells Dre that Barry is coming over to unplug her toilet. There’s a lot going on.

Everyone’s ready for the big show, and Dre breaks the news that Yasmine’s not coming tonight, so Ginsey will have to headline the act. Nico’s more than willing to step up. They’ve presold a ton of tickets, but hardly anyone has shown up. Barry gets all the pronouns mixed up. When Sam shows up, just as a guest, everyone knows him. Sam used to be “Samonsay,” a major drag star.

Barry finds a dead rat in the toilet and takes it out to the garbage. As he’s out there, we see that pre-credit drag queen stumble in.

Sam tells Ginsey why he’s been out of action for a while. It was stage fright, and he just couldn’t do it anymore. He starts to change into his costume but then chickens out again. Barry gets a bit of news on his phone about disturbing events in Manhattan. Out on the dance floor, the zombie queen starts looking for people to eat. Barry grabs an axe, but it’s Kelsey who gets hacked. Things go South from there.

Sam goes into nurse mode and works on Kelsey’s chopped up leg. Dre tries to call an ambulance and gets a busy signal for 911. Then a shelter in place alert sounds over all their phones. Everyone argues about what’s going on, but it’s all over the news and social media, so they don’t argue long. Jimmy, the bar owner, has some weapons hidden. The Mayor, Tom Savini, comes on and tells everyone to stay home, “This is not a George Romero movie!”

At the hospital Jane and Lizzy see that it’s happening there as well. A man in a bloody bunny suit attacks them.

At the club, Jax the dancer is clearly a zombie now, and the others all see what he’s become. They all argue some more about what to do about him. They lock him in a dancer’s cage. Next, they catch Yasmine sneaking in through the window. Jimmy is pulled out the window and bitten.

The front door is cut open, and new people come in, led by Pops, Kelsey’s girlfriend and fiancee. She mentions a boat waiting for them. Dre wants to wait for Lizzy to arrive, but most of the rest want to go to the boat. A zombie stumbles in, and she drills him through the head.

Sam and Dre put Jimmy in the freezer and talk about how he’s changed. After consulting a paper map, several of the group decide to go for a truck, but first, they all change their outfits. Nico, Sam, and Ginsey all dress up to go out on electric scooters.

The group makes their way through the horde of zombies, who are mostly interested in their phones. Sam and Ginsey talk about acceptance and the need for approval. They’re attacked, and with her dying words, Ginsey encourages Sam to be himself.

Back at the club, there are now zombie rats, and they get Pops. Dre turns on the music to distract everyone, and they dance. Lizzy and Jane have been trapped in a car, Nico’s trapped outside as well, but all the zombies hear the loud music and head toward the club. Meanwhile, Barry tells Dre that Lizzy is pregnant, which she did not know.

Sam returns to the club, and he’s got a plan. We get a montage of the group doing various things that might have something to do with the plan. When they’re ready, they open all the doors and let the dead in. Once the dance floor is full of zombies, Samonsea makes her return to the stage with Yasmine and Barry’s backup.

Everyone makes it out the back door just as Lizzy, Jane, and Nico drive up in a parade float. They all drive away to the boat, trailed by the zombies.

Brian’s Commentary

As you might guess, it’s full of gay, trans, and drag queen jokes, and some are really good. Most of the good laughs are in listening to the various characters’ reactions to the weirdness going on. All the characters get good scenes, and the dialogue is mostly hilarious.

The zombie makeup is fun, although nothing serious. There’s surprisingly little gore involved. It never slows down, and it never gets boring. The jokes mostly drop away in the final half hour as the zombies start getting more serious, but it stays entertaining throughout.

Fun!

Kevin’s Commentary

Director and co-writer Tina Romera is a daughter of George A. Romero - zombies run in the family. The one liners are abundant in this, and the humor is one of the best parts of the movie. The zombie action is actually kind of low-key for much of the movie, with it more of a thing in the background. I thought it was a fun one.

2025 Dust Bunny

* Directed by: Bryan Fuller

* Written by: Bryan Fuller

* Stars: Mads Mikkelson, Sophie Sloan, Sheila Allen

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 46 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Set in a colorful alternate reality with magic and fantasy, a little girl recruits her assassin neighbor to take care of the monster under her bed that she thinks ate her parents. There’s real danger, viewed through the eyes of a child, so we wonder through much of the movie if the monster is real or not. It’s surreal, quite funny, and very entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a blob of dust coming in through the window and rolling around a child’s room. It eventually settles under the bed; it’s a dust bunny! The little girl on the bed above sits up and screams. Aurora’s parents look under the bed for monsters and say there’s nothing there but dust bunnies. She goes out and sleeps on the fire escape instead.

Aurora watches her neighbor come home from a trip; a magic firefly points the way. The next night, she follows him into what appears to be “The Blade Runner District” according to Kevin; masks and fireworks and dragon costumes are everywhere. She watches as her neighbor goes fully CGI-Ninja and kills a bunch of guys during a fireworks explosion.

There’s a whole over-the-top battle scene, and Aurora watches it all from the roof. She then follows the man home again. The man knows he’s being followed and wipes up his own blood drippings with his socks. He spots Aurora going back into her apartment across the hall.

Aurora is still terrified of the dust bunny. That night, it eats her parents. She does “the floor is lava” to avoid getting too close to the thing under her bed. It then bursts out of the floor and terrorizes her excessively.

In the morning, everything is back to normal– almost. We cut to a musical number in a very stylish church. Aurora runs off with the collection plate.

The neighbor in 5B reads his mail in front of a taxidermied light-bulb-butt chicken. He gets a note from Aurora with money, wanting to hire him. He wants to know what she wants him to do. She’s offered him $327.42 to kill the monster. She knows he killed the dragon in Chinatown. She tells him that the monster ate her parents.

5B goes over to Aurora’s house, and her parents’ room is a torn-up mess. There’s no blood, but she says it ate them whole. Something went on there, but he’s not convinced about monsters and sends her home.

The neighbor in 5B, who is nameless, goes to see Laverne, his contact/handler. She likes her sandwich– a lot. He asks her about the neighbors who disappeared. He thinks “the monster” was after him and got the wrong apartment. He’s got a whole different kind of monster in mind. She tells him not to get involved.

That night, the Neighbor hears someone coming and prepares to kill them. The very human assassins come in through the door and the window to finish off Aurora. The assassins beat the 5B neighbor and prepare to kill Aurora, but then the dust bunny intervenes. There’s a difference of opinions between Aurora and the hitman about what happened to one of the killers.

Aurora wants to watch 5B chop up the dead assassin’s body, but he won’t allow that. He does, however, let her help wrap up the pieces. He tells her that the assassins came to kill one of them and that there aren’t any monsters. He explains the whole thing, but she knows better about the monsters.

Brenda, from Child Protective Services, comes to the door, and 5B pretends to be her foster family. He doesn’t believe she’s a social worker, and he’s right.

Turns out, this is the third family that Aurora’s monster has eaten. She originally wished for it to happen, and it did. She explains all about the monster and why it’s there.

The hitman goes to see Laverne, who admits that she sent the assassins to “help” him with getting rid of Aurora, who witnessed him killing the men in Chinatown. Aurora comes to the meeting, which perplexes Laverne.

Aurora wants him to be her new dad, but he’s got way too many problems for that. They go out for Chinese food and talk to a threatening man.

Brenda returns and has a word with Aurora’s “father.” Aurora warns her about the monster in the floor, but that goes about how it always does. Laverne shows up. A whole squad of killers arrives downstairs. Brenda admits that she’s FBI and investigating the disappearances of Aurora’s families.

The Chinese gang and the FBI attack at the same time. Soon, they all believe in monsters. It is, in fact, a giant bunny, and it eats the Chinese gang, one by one.

Soon, it’s just Aurora and the Hitman against the monster, and then it swallows him whole.

In the morning, Aurora hears pounding under the floor, and then the neighbor claws his way back up. He had a bottle of thumb-sucking deterrent in his pocket, and the monster didn’t like it.

Laverne comes in, and she’s not got Aurora’s best interest in mind. We also find out that she’s his mother. 5B warns her to get off the floor, but too late. That goes badly for her.

The monster does one more final attack, but it won’t eat Aurora. It’s her monster, after all. She and the hitman go down the fire escape and move to the country. The monster follows along, under the car.

Brian’s Commentary

Brian’s Rating:*****

Every kid who had a monster under their bed will get this one.

As Kevin points out, this feels like Burton and del Toro got together and made a film, but they had nothing to do with it. It’s an American-made film, but it feels very European to me. It’s very fairy-tale-like and surreal in many places.

This one is hard to classify. It definitely starts out like a children’s movie, but it’s extremely violent, and the horror bits seem excessive for a kids’ movie. It’s not a comedy, but it’s very funny.

This is awesome!

Kevin’s Commentary

Kevin’s Rating: *****

My first thought was this looks a bit like something directed by Guillermo del Toro with influences of Tim Burton and Wes Anderson. It’s actually Bryan Fuller’s directorial debut, and he did a great job.

I liked the colorful-surreal-alternate-reality vibe. Very cool. The use of CGI is liberal, but I thought it worked well. And there are practical effects too, like the taxidermied chicken lamp with the lightbulb in its butt - I need one of those.

I thought it was excellent.

2000 Godzilla vs. Megaguirus

* Directed by: Ishiro Honda, Masaaki Tekuza

* Written by: Hiroshi Kashiwabara, Wataru Mimura

* Stars: Misato Tanaka, Shosuke Tanihara, Masato Ibu

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 45 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This one seems to be in an alternate timeline, once again ignoring all the movies except the 1954 original. It’s said that after that attack, Japan rebuilt and moved the capital to Osaka. And the technology is advanced even more than in some of the other Godzilla films. There are some elements in this one that step up the horror, and it’s got the giant creature fighting with collateral damage we’ve come to expect. It’s entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

We get a news flashback to the 1954 Godzilla attack on Tokyo. He smashed the city and then walked back into the ocean as Japan rebuilt. Then, in 1966, he returned for more, this time to attack Japan’s first nuclear reactor. Japan then gave up on nuclear power plants. In 1996, the government decided to once again experiment with energy production, this time, with a plasma generator.

Kiriko Tsujimori is one of the soldiers tasked with defending the city against Godzilla in Osaka. He’s returned yet again. The soldiers shoot him with bazookas, but that does nothing. He’s heading for the clean energy factory, smashing everything in his path, including Kiriko’s superior officer.

In Tokyo, 2001, we see Kiriko is with G-Grasper, and she goes to visit Kudo, who is good with tiny robots. She’s recruiting for an anti-Godzilla unit. She introduces him to the team. We see that most of them have some history against Godzilla, and they’ve designed a weapon powered by a black hole to fight him; he can’t beat that! As the chief scientist explains all this, suddenly, the radar spots something big in the ocean.

Three months later, a little boy sneaks into a military facility and sees a bunch of people working on a huge gun. We see that it’s the G-Grasper team, now ready to test their weapon. It works impressively. Uh-oh. There’s a space-time wormhole left behind, but it soon fades away.

That night, the little boy sees something outside his window. Turns out, that wormhole didn’t close, and it’s allowing strange flying creatures through. He also finds a large egg that he takes with him. It makes a mess at home, so he dumps it into the sewer.

Kudo tells Kiriko that he’s designed a tracking device. Meanwhile, in the sewers under the city, the egg multiplies. A couple of water department guys show up to fix a leak, and we see something nasty right above them. The dragonfly-like creature then kills a couple of people graphically.

The G-Grasper people detect Godzilla again; this time, they confirm it. Kiriko pilots the futuristic Griffon fighter to investigate. They find one of the bug-creatures, but it’s dead– Godzilla must have killed it. Kiriko ends up having a close encounter with Big G and climbs up onto his back. She shoots him with the tracker.

The black hole weapon is now completed and shot into space on a satellite. The plan is to shoot Godzilla from orbit.

The dead bug is analyzed, and it’s a Meganula, an Earth-insect that usually lives in large swarms but is now extinct. Suddenly, large parts of Tokyo are flooded, but they don’t know why. They find more eggs deep under the water.

Kiriko explains her plan to lure Godzilla to an isolated island and then blast him with Dimension Tide, the black hole weapon.

In Tokyo, soldiers discover hundreds of Meganulas, far too many to shoot with their rifles. At the same time, Kiriko prepares to blow up Godzilla forever. Just as they’re about to push the button, a zillion dragonflies arrive on the scene and swarm over Godzilla. They sting and attach themselves to him, draining his energy. There are too many, even for his fire breath.

The humans fire the weapon anyway, and it sucks in everything on the island. Still, some of the meganylas survive, and so does Godzilla. They can’t fire again for another hour, so that’s bad. The bugs fly away, and Godzilla follows them.

The insects go back to flooded Tokyo and deposit their energy into a big thing sleeping underwater. The thing awakens, and it’s another kaiju. It’s a giant dragonfly, and its wings tear up the buildings with which they come into contact. It’s also got a sonic screech that’s devastating to the buildings. Kudo gets hurt, and when he wakes up, they explain that the new creature is called Megaguirus, a sort of queen bee of the Meganulas.

Godzilla returns to Tokyo, but the Megaguirus is there as well. They prepare to fire Dimension Tide again, but something goes wrong. Only Kudo can fix it, using his weird anime app. The fight between the monsters rages on, and Megaguirus is very fast in the air. It’s back-and-forth for a long time, but Godzilla eventually wins.

Godzilla’s in downtown Tokyo now, and he’s making a real mess. Mr. Seguiro won’t spill his secrets, but he seems to know what Godzilla’s after. Also, for some reason, Dimension Tide starts falling from orbit. They can get off one more shot before it’s too late. Turns out, there’s a secret plasma energy project at the science center, and that’s why Godzilla’s here.

All the heroes have to work together to make the weapon lock onto Godzilla as the satellite falls from the sky. The satellite fires just before exploding, and the black hole comes down right on top of Godzilla, who shoots it with his atomic breath. There’s a big bang, and there’s no sign of a giant creature.

Tokyo, on the other hand, is a mess. Will they rebuild? Yes. Time passes, and Kiriko comes back for Kudo again– there are more signs of kaijus in the ocean. It’s not all over yet…

After the credits, we see the little boy at school; he hears Godzilla roar!

Brian’s Commentary

Did we ever get an explanation as to why Tokyo flooded?

Well, OK, then. This one moves Godzilla back into the realm of horror as the bug-things kill people across town– it’s pretty graphic, the most we’ve seen in a Godzilla film.

There’s a lot of noticeable CGI in this one, but considering the age of the film, it’s not terrible. The music is good, the monster effects are very well done, and even the monster battles are creative. I’d go so far as to say this is the best of the monster-battles we’ve seen, even the slow-motion parts.

The CGI is overused and pretty dated, but other than that, this is one of the better ones.

Kevin’s Commentary

I was very surprised at the one-on-one attacks from the Meganula, before we saw the mega-sized queen. It’s gory monster carnage right out of a horror movie.

The CGI looks pretty obvious, but the models and practical effects mostly look pretty good.

It was very entertaining.

1993 Pumpkinhead II: Blood Wings

* Directed by: Jeff Burr

* Written by: Ivan Chachornia, Constantine Chachornia, Andrew Osborne

* Stars: Andrew Robinson, Ami Dolenz, Soleil Moon Frye

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 28 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Once again, Pumpkinhead is resurrected and is a monster for vengeance. This one has a little bit of a mystery for the sheriff to figure out, but it’s still not a complicated script. It’s not quite a sequel to the original, more of a parallel. It lacks from not having Lance Henriksen and lacks the quality of the first one. It’s not bad, but only pretty good.

Spoilery Synopsis

In Ferren Woods, 1958, an old woman goes looking for Tommy. Six local boys arrive in the woods, and they’re hunting him too, but less beneficially. After a short chase, they beat him half to death and then stab him for the other half. They eventually drop him down a mine shaft.

In the present, Sean Braddock is the new sheriff; his wife Beth is impressed but thinks their daughter Jenny isn’t going to be happy here. Jenny makes some quick friends at her new school.

The new sheriff starts work and gets some advice about the town judge. Mayor Bubba warns him to keep an eye out so Jenny doesn’t wind up with the wrong crowd.

Meanwhile, Jenny is with the wrong crowd, including the judge’s son, Danny, hanging around that same mine shaft. Sheriff Sean shows up and runs them all off.

That night, the gang runs over an old woman in the road. “Some folks say she’s a witch,” one says, and the old woman seems to have disappeared. Jenny insists they go to the old woman’s house to see if she’s OK, and it looks like a witch’s house should. Inside, they find a scroll with a spell on it to bring back the dead. The old woman shows up and tells them to leave, and that goes badly for her. She curses them all to the “vengeance of Pumpkinhead.”

For some reason, Danny and the gang decide to dig up a grave next. The body inside is all deformed and weird-looking. They pour “the blood of the damned” over the body and read from the scroll. At the same time, the old woman’s house catches fire, and she burns. Pumpkinhead rises from the grave!

Sheriff Sean soon learns from a farmer that the kids were up at the old lady’s house last night, and he also hears that “It’s back, and none of us are safe till he gets what he’s come for.”

Sure enough, that night, Pumpkinhead attacks the same farmer, while at the same time, the old woman in the hospital goes into convulsions. When Sean and the coroner investigate, they find a big “V” drawn in blood on the wall.

The coroner comes to dinner, and Delilah tells the story of Pumpkinhead. The sheriff, Sean, is from the area and remembers that story as well. Jenny overheads the whole conversation, so now she knows what’s up. That night, Pumpkinhead gets another local man. The man’s girlfriend sees the whole thing and goes insane.

The judge calls for a posse to hunt down the monster which gets Sean angry. Sean then tells his wife about deformed Tommy and how he helped him one day. Somehow, Tommy was connected to the two dead men.

Danny, Paul, Peter, and Marcie go back to the grave they dug up and see that the body is gone. They know what they did.

Old lady Ossie dies, but that doesn’t stop her from warning Sean and Delilah about Tommy and his father, Pumpkinhead. She mentions that there is going to be one more victim from the old “Red Wing” days, and then he’ll be coming after the modern-day kids.

Sean researches the Red Wings, and finds that the sixth member was the judge, who’s gonna be the next victim.

The young people want to come clean about the whole thing, but Danny pulls a gun on them. Meanwhile, the judge is torn apart. Pumpkinhead then chases the remaining teens through the woods. It gives Danny what he so cleanly deserves.

Jenny runs to the old mine shaft as Sean and the posse run up. Sean yells for Tommy to release her, and the monster hesitates. Tommy/Pumpkinhead remembers what Sean did for him way back in the day and releases her. The posse shows up and starts shooting, causing Pumpkinhead to fall back into the mine shaft.

Later, Sean and Jenny make up. Workmen board over the old mine shaft.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s clearly the same monster as in the original, but it doesn’t look nearly as good as the original for some reason.

The main cast are all recognizable names, and they do a great job here. There are a lot of tiny cameos from actors from other horror films of the time. The other “actors” are just atrocious. It’s a very formulaic sequel, but there’s nothing explicitly terrible about it. Other than the legend itself, there’s nothing here to connect it with the original film, which was far better.

Kevin’s Commentary

This one seemed less clear on the path of revenge than the first film. And this wasn’t really a sequel to the first film either - it’s more of a parallel or reboot. Andrew Robinson was good, and there are lots of recognizable names from other horror movies in many of the supporting roles.

It’s not as good as the original, but it’s not too bad.

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Mainstream Films:

2025 The Demoness

* Directed by: Andrew de Burgh

* Written by: Andrew de Burgh

* Stars: Akihiro Kitamura, Riley Nottingham, Bella Glanville

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 33 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A demoness visits Earth to cause trouble for one couple in particular. A couple with relationship issues. We had issues understanding several of the characters. After the couple, she moves on to mayhem to a series of victims. We both agree that it suffers from too much dialogue that’s difficult to understand, poor pacing, and bad CGI. It didn’t work for either of us, with Kevin being more forgiving of it.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open in an apartment as a jerky-moving demoness wanders through the house and stops next to the occupied bed. Credits roll.

In the morning, the couple wakes up and complains about the economy and their jobs. They argue about Sarah’s inability to get a job. That night, the demoness comes back into their room, and this time, we see what it does. It wakes up Jack and has sex with him, but Sarah can’t hear them and doesn’t wake up.

In the morning, Sarah finds some evidence of sex in the bed and assumes Jack’s been cheating on her. The demoness comes to her and they argue about the sex last night. “Kill him if you want to live.” That evening, she poisons Jack and dismembers him on the autopsy table they have in the garage for some reason. She mumbles in British throughout the process.

The demoness returns and bites Sarah on the neck, vampire-style. The demoness then conjures up assistance, and Satan himself shows up, also speaking too modulated to understand more than half of it. She admits that she’s had a great time with Jack and Sarah, but now she wants more. She wants to be able to take human form to make her job easier. He gives her a month to see if she can torture ten people.

Now in human form, the demoness heads to Hollywood for victims. We cut to a disco that looks like it was filmed on a green screen without the processing. Two guys hit on an attractive-looking human who’s not at all a demon; she says she’s Charlotte. She’s rude, and they love it. One guy leaves, leaving Steve, a Tech Bro, with Charlotte. The two seem to compare to see who’s the most shallow.

She invites him over to her place after dancing. She’s surprisingly philosophical, which puts him off a little. She makes him a drink, and shockingly, it’s drugged. She dresses him up like a clown, puts him back on the autopsy table, and makes a whole unintelligible speech in her demoness form; when she pulls out a machete, we understand that part.

In the morning, Charlotte talks to the neighbors, Yagami and Tamara, about moving to Jack and Sarah’s house. They invite her over for dinner. Their daughter has cancer.

Charlotte arrives for dinner in a sexy, low-cut dress that Tamara obviously doesn’t approve of. It’s all very awkward. Yagami, on the other hand, says she “looks gorgeous.” It’s an awkward scene that drags on for entirely too long. It soon becomes obvious that they have drugged her. “This will be fun,” Tamara laughs. Daughter Saori says they shouldn’t be doing this just to keep her alive.

Charlotte wakes up tied to the wall. The family plans to steal Charlotte’s organs to sell to pay for Sairi’s treatments. Charlotte starts to laugh in a “Do you know who I am” kind of way. She then beats them both to death with a hammer.

Steve’s partner, Brad, goes to see a detective about Steve’s mysterious disappearance. They’re hostile with each other for no apparent reason, but Brad seems unhinged.

The demoness calls Satan again, and she wants to move on to bigger things; he says no.

Brad grabs a gun and breaks into Charlotte’s house. She quickly takes charge of the situation and puts him in a clown costume. Soon after, she eats his eyeball and cuts out his tongue. Then she bites off his toes. The demoness summons Satan yet again, and they discuss the need to deal with Detective Gerrard, the last one alive who knows who Charlotte is. She pays him a visit at his office, and of course that goes very badly for him.

And then it was suddenly over, fortunately for all of us.

Brian’s Commentary

Was the sound designer for this a deaf person? Both Sarah and the Demoness are nearly completely unintelligible. Once the demoness became human, the voices got a lot clearer. When she was back in the makeup, she was unintelligible again. The demoness creature looks really good, but her voice is awful.

That’s the fakest disco I’ve ever seen, almost as fake as the CGI gore effects, which are really poorly done.

I like the idea and the basic plot, but it’s a really poorly made film. It starts out hard to understand, and once we get moving, it’s only downhill from there.

This is pretty awful.

Kevin’s Commentary

We really could have used subtitles. That conversation between the demoness and Lucifer might have been interesting, but I felt like I missed a quarter of it. But once we got past that and Sarah out of the picture, people’s voices were nice and clear. Until Charlotte went back to her demon form again, sigh. She was good in the role though, and her makeup was cool.

This falls in the trope of a killer that is so powerful that the victims have zero chance as they are toyed with, and we know how each confrontation is going to end - it’s just a matter of how.

Between the pacing, poor audio, and overacting, I was pretty weary of it as the end approached. And then an abrupt ending happened. I’m going to say I liked it more than disliked it.

2025 Super Happy Fun Clown

* Directed by: Patrick Rea

* Written by: Eric Winkler

* Stars: Jennifer Seward, Nicole Hall, Matt Leisy

* Run Time: 1 Hour 27 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Jennifer’s had a rough life, but she finds a way to happiness and fame by channeling her clown self. After a slow start, we watch her trip to crazy town progress and leave a trail of bodies in her wake. The pacing is uneven, but it’s a pretty good one.

Spoilery Synopsis

The police have the clown and her hostage in their sights. That goes badly, and then credits roll.

Back in 2004, we see a clown in the park. Young Jennifer is somewhat obsessed with clowns and homeless people. She’s smart, but her mother is unenthusiastic.

Twenty years later, She’s Jenno-The-Clown, doing mime-y things in the park, and the kids love her. Her husband is unenthusiastic. She’s got serial killer posters on her wall, and she likes that as well.

Detectives Barnes and Marshall talk about what crimes they expect this upcoming Halloween.

Jennifer and her mother talk about her pedo, ex-lawyer husband and badly paying job. Her mother is still unenthusiastic and downright mean. She and her coworker Ryan fantasize about being serial killers. She loves being a clown, but not much else about her life.

After a while, Jennifer stops being enthusiastic about being a clown, so she kills her husband. She just lets him decompose in the spaghetti over the weeks leading up to Halloween. After a while, she starts to eat him. Then she buys a tiny little gun.

It’s Halloween, and Jen runs over a guy with her car. She goes over to her mother’s house in full costume and shoots right through her mother’s head.

The police get a call to do a wellness check on Jen’s rotting husband. Barnes mentions that he’s afraid of clowns; Marshall hates horses. Neither of them appreciate the half-eaten rotten corpse in the kitchen; they also soon track down her dead mother too. Jen, meanwhile, is at Ryan’s Halloween party and has sex with him. Halfway through, she stabs him with an icepick.

Jen then goes to a haunted house attraction and jumps the line. She starts killing the “monsters” inside. The zombie and the Phantom of the Opera are the first to die, but several more follow. Eventually, she comes to a woman dressed as a killer clown, and she likes that a lot but only for a minute.

The detectives arrive at the theater, and one of them soon becomes a convenient hostage. We’re back at the opening scene, and Jennifer is shot.

Some time later, she wakes up in the hospital without makeup. The networks are already asking for interviews. Detective Marshall is not amused that the evil clown has survived.

Brian’s Commentary

The childhood segment was only ten minutes long, but seemed like half an hour. I love the husband’s meal choices. After the slow start, the film picks up the pace and goes pretty well until the haunted cinema, where things seem to slow down once again.

For a low-budget indie film, it’s not bad. With the exception of the pacing issues, I was entertained.

Kevin’s Commentary

We have Harley Quinn at home.

This spends way too long at the beginning of the movie showing not a whole lot happening in Jennie’s childhood, or it seemed way too long anyway. Once she reaches adulthood things build momentum. The pacing is still uneven throughout, but I thought it was decent overall. I enjoyed it more than disliked it.

2011 Megan is Missing

* Directed by: Michael Goi

* Written by: Michael Goi

* Stars: Amber Perkins, Rachel Quinn, Dean Waite

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 25 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a movie entirely on webcam, video, phone camera, and so forth, presented in found footage format. Two “teenage” girls are the main characters, who fall for an Internet predator. It’s drawn out and talky for a long time before the missing part happens. It does finally dial up the horrifying, and hard to watch, up to eleven, but it takes quite a while to get there. It’s bleak and cautionary.

Spoilery Synopsis

Amy and Megan come on talking about being her new camera. We’re told onscreen that in 2007, 14 year old Megan went missing, and three weeks later, Amy also vanished. Credits roll.

The two girls talk about losing their virginity soon and drugs as well. We soon see Megan’s mom smashing her X-Box in the other room. Amy, on the other hand, has a nice home life. Amy’s a year younger than the other girls, so the others consider her something of a nerd.

On Saturday, everyone goes out to a house party. Amy’s only invited because Megan insisted on it, but she doesn’t really fit in. It’s pretty wild for a teenage party, since everyone is too young to really know how to party. It doesn’t end well for Amy, who pukes on some other girls.

The next day, the girls talk about b******s; Megan did her first one at age ten, but Amy’s still afraid to try. She tells the story, and it’s anything but romantic. The conversation is interrupted by Meg’s overbearing mother, which prompts her into saying she hates it there and would like to just leave.

It’s Amy’s 14th birthday, and she gets a new video camera. She interviews Megan about being sexually assaulted by her stepfather. Amy, on the other hand, talks about her favorite stuffed animals.

Megan hears about a new guy in town, Josh, who’s a skateboarder. He likes what he sees, but his “camera is broken” so she can’t see him. He invites her to a party tonight, and she’s clearly interested. He doesn’t show up.

She calls Josh, and he swears he was there. He describes what she was wearing, so he was there, but she never saw him. They flirt and make up on their one-sided video call. Later, she calls him again and introduces Amy. Amy leaves, and Megan goes to meet him behind the diner.

The next day, Amy starts calling Megan’s friends; she didn’t come home last night. She eventually calls Josh, who says she never showed up last night.

A couple days later, Megan’s disappearance makes the news. Amy continues to record her video diary; the newspeople all seem to think Megan ran away, but Amy doesn’t believe that. We see security footage of a man meeting Megan and leading her away.

Amy continues to talk to “Josh” on the webcam, and he denies that the “old guy” in the video footage was him. He’s a little mean to her, and he seems to understand her pretty well. She goes to the police and tells them everything. The other girls blame Amy for all this, for no particular reason.

Josh threatens Amy to shut up to the police and says he’s watching her. We do see a mysterious figure behind Amy in some of her videos.

A few months later, torture porn photos of Megan show up on a fetish site. She’s not looking like she’s having a good time.

Amy goes missing as well, and the news people speculate that they may have run off together. They do, however, find Amy’s video camera in the trash can where we saw her abducted. We then see that footage…

We hear a woman screaming behind a big metal door; it’s Amy. She begs to go home, but “Josh” isn’t going to do that. We watch her scream as he rapes her. She eventually gets to see what became of Megan, and it’s not pretty. He then seals Amy into a barrel with Megan’s rotten corpse, which terrifies her, as he digs a barrel-sized hole. As he digs, she begs and bargains with him from inside the barrel. This goes on for a long time.

Eventually, he pushes the barrel into the hole and fills it in, with Amy screaming and begging the whole time.

Then the screaming stops.

Brian’s Commentary

Brian’s Rating: ****

It starts out fairly weak, with two girls talking about nonsense, but it devolves from there. Megan doesn’t go missing until about 40 minutes in, and it’s a little dull before that. Everything is done as found footage, mostly through video chats.

The “horror” aspects don’t really come into it until Amy disappears, and then it gets pretty extreme. There’s no supernatural elements or creatures here, just a kidnapper and victims; the horror comes from the idea that this kind of thing happens all the time in the real world.

I’m not quite sure why Josh would film all this and then leave the camera in the last place anyone saw Amy.

Kevin’s Commentary

Kevin’s Rating: ****

So, we get to watch some “teenage” girls talking and partying for a while. For too long of a while. Eventually a predator does start making his moves, and Megan disappears. Then we get more talk from Amy, and we see her getting pressure from the predator. A true crime show wades in.

It’s very tame until it isn’t any more, it goes to the other extreme.

It’s easy to watch this sort of thing and think how dumb the girls are for falling for it, but this sort of thing (and lesser things) does really happen to the naive and inexperienced and unwary.

1999 Wisconsin Death Trip

* Directed by: James Marsh

* Written by: Michael Lesy, James Marsh

* Stars: Ian Holm, Jeffrey Golden, Jo Vukelich

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 16 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

There’s not a story to spoil. The movie consists of a series of grim and unusual news stories that were reported in Wisconsin from 1890 to 1900. They are reenacted in black and white, and interspaced with many historical photos and narration. With some more modern scenes and stories from Wisconsin spaced in here and there, showing things can still be violent and strange today. It’s put together in a way that’s interesting, and we both thought it’s worth the watch.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re told that “What follows is based on real events that took place in the state of Wisconsin between 1890 and 1900. All the stories are authentic news reports from a paper of the time.”

The narrator introduces us to the city of Black River Falls, and we see lots of old-time photos of the people there. It all sounds like a very nice place. We then cut to a photographer taking a photo of a dead child and then putting her back in the coffin. Credits roll.

Then a hard winter hit, the banks failed and mines started shutting down, and poverty and disease hit the area. Many unemployed men left town and some tried to kill themselves quite creatively. Several are sent to the insane asylum.

There are stories of the insane, abandoned children, suicides, murders, diptheria.

We watch as the film goes into color mode, and we see modern-day children playing and that things have gone back to normal. The current mayor talks to us about the town.

Back in the 1800s, and black and white, we hit Spring. Drugs, murders, arson, weird Norwegian superstitions, and suicides abound. After, we get more modern, mundane town life, although they have arson and crime as well.

Summer arrives in the cursed 1800s, and there are trouble with courting couples, baby murder, drunkenness, religious issues, and more insanity. Back in the modern day, we hear about Ed Gein and Jeffrey Dahmer, both from the area.

In the fall of the 1800s, we get shootings, murders, more religious troubles, and a lesson in making sheep’s head stew. “Criminal ears” are also a factor. We hear the story of a famous opera singer who hit hard times, came to the area, and met with a bad end. In the present, there is still murder, suicide, and mental illness today.

Back in Winter, there’s trouble with old people, grave robbing, suicides, ghosts, and still more window-smashing, an ongoing thing.

We cut back to the present, where we’re reminded what a wonderful place Black River Falls Wisconsin is– and even that’s creepy.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s mostly in grainy black-and-white to give it a more authentic feel, although the stories are all reported as true. There’s no real overall plot or characters here, it’s just one damned thing after another that happened in this town, which was not a fun place to live. These were not happy times for anyone, and it’s interesting to be reminded of that. Crime and insanity aren’t new.

For a film with zero story, it’s strangely fascinating to watch. It’s really something!

Kevin’s Commentary

It was interesting how it focuses on the violent, grim, and sordid around the edges. The mix of historical photos and reenactments is well balanced, with good narration. I thought it was really cool.

1985 Come and See

* Directed by: Elem Klimov

* Written by: Ales Adamovich, Elem Klimov

* Stars: Aleksey Kravchenko, Olga Mironova, Liubomiras Laucevius

* Run Time: 2 Hours, 22 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This isn’t a horror movie, but it does show the horror of war. It’s set in 1943 Russia in an area fully hit by fighting and follows the misadventures of a pre-teen boy who joins the resistance. It’s an uncomfortable watch, very graphic and realistic, but it’s really well made.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on an old man yelling at someone he claims is digging and hiding underground. We then cut to a little boy who mocks his grumpy uncle. We see that it’s Byelorussia in 1943. The two boys then go dig on the beach, looking for guns. “Without guns, they won’t let us join!” They want to be soldiers. The older brother finds one. Credits roll.

The boy’s mother doesn’t want him to go and hands him an axe to kill them all, which Flyora won’t do. Some Soviet soldiers come to pick him up, he’s joining up with them. The soldiers try to be funny, but it only scares the family. The soldiers make it look like he was conscripted, but he really volunteered.

Flyora goes to the army camp, and it all looks like a big adventure to him. Kosach is the commander, and Glasha is a girl that he likes. They are soon called to action, and everyone gets ready to march to the fight– except Flyora, who is told to trade boots with a man and stay behind.

Flyora runs into Glasha crying in the woods, and she’s so sad it makes him cry as well until they laugh. She points out that they left him behind out of pity, and he takes offense to that. She doesn’t seem quite right, mentally, and she upsets him. They watch a plane fly over and drop parachutes and bombs far too close for their liking, partially deafening Flyora. Then they have to hide from the paratroopers who land nearby.

By morning, the two are friends again, and they get a little crazy in the woods. With nowhere else to go, Flyora and Glasha head back to his mother’s house, but no one is there. The soup is still warm, so they haven’t been gone long. Glasha sees a huge pile of bodies, probably including Flyora’s family, but she doesn’t tell him about it. The two then decide to walk through a swamp, which neither of them enjoy. She tells him the truth, but he won’t believe it.

After finding another soldier, the two go with him to a place with a bunch of refugees including some who tell Flyora that his family is dead. Flyora’s cranky old uncle is there who is burned and dying, but still has time to say “I told you so.”

In the group, some of the men do artwork with a Nazi skeleton. Flyora seems to mostly be in shock through all this, but eventually moves on with some soldiers. Soon, there’s only Flyora and one other soldier, and they steal a cow, which leads Flyora to be the only survivor; even the cow is shot.

Flyora meets up with a man who agrees to take him home and hide him with his family. The German soldiers are right behind them in trucks. The Germans round up all the villagers and inspect the group. Flyora knows they’re going to be slaughtered like his own village, but the villagers allow themselves to be herded into a barn. There is a lot of screaming and pushing for a long while, and Flyora is just one of the crowd.

The leader of the Germans then ordered all the adults to climb out a window and leave the children. Flyora is the only one to try to leave, so he’s grabbed and pulled aside. There are a lot of Germans there, and they all watch and have a good time as they kill everyone in the barn. Flyora is one of the few outside who lives to see it. The Germans start to leave as the village burns. Flyora passes out, and they leave him for dead.

In the morning, Flyora moves on, regaining his uniform and gun. He rejoins Glasha, who has been beaten and raped quite badly. Kosach’s men have captured a handful of Germans, and there’s an argument on how to treat them. The German officers identify themselves and make excuses. “I’m just a tired old man,” says the German leader. Flyora points out that he’s the one who ordered the children killed. Exposed, the leaders tell what they really think of the local people. This goes badly for the prisoners.

We then cut to real old footage of concentration camp survivors as Flyora finally shoots his gun– at a poster of Hitler. It looks like he’s gone completely insane from all of it, but he goes off with the soldiers to fight some more. We’re told that in total, in reality, 628 villages were burned to the ground just like what we saw.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s not so much a horror film as it is a “horror of war” film. Flyora witnesses all kinds of death and atrocities, much more than any twelve year old should. It’s slow to get started, but the climax is very intense. No one gets out unscathed, and we see why Flyora has “that look” in his eyes toward the end.

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s not a fun movie, but it’s a good one. I’ve heard it said it’s an uncomfortable watch, and they are right. War is awful, and this shows that well.

Contact Info:

Email: mailto:email@horrorguys.com

Websites:

* https://www.horrorguys.com

* https://www.horrormonthly.com

This as well as the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #52, is available! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link:

https://horrormonthly.com

Short Films:

2022 Short Film CIMIM

* Directed by: Cody Mobley

* Written by: Cody Mobley

* Stars: Darian Michael Garey, Mike Duff, Daniel Kohl

* Run Time: 5 Minutes

* Watch it:

What Happens

A group of campers banter about cats vs. dogs. One girl mentions she has edibles in the truck. She goes to grab them, and when she returns, she finds herself still sitting at the campfire. Her doppelgänger opens her eyes and freaks everyone out. One by one, it quickly picks off the campers…

Commentary

This is all filmed at night, but it’s still brightly lit, and you can see everything that’s going on. We don’t get much explanation for any of it, but then, neither do the campers. It’s very short, but also really well done.

And I have no idea what “CIMIM” means.

2025 Short Film The Last Thing She Saw

* Directed by: Anthony Cousins, Rebecca Daugherty

* Written by: Brady Richards

* Stars: Bailey Bolton, Agatha Rae Pokrzywinski, Nathan Tymoshuk

* Run Time: 9 Minutes

* Watch it:

What Happens

Emmy has ordered a phone charger, and when the doorbell rings, she answers it. Turns out, it’s a home invasion, and now her phone is dead. She’s just the house sitter, so she doesn’t know the combination to the safe.

Emmy has seen the face of one of the intruders, so he plucks out her eyeballs. The rest is all shown through the eyeball’s point of view…

Commentary

Well, that was different. These don’t seem like smart crooks, and this was not a well-planned robbery. Still, the eyeball on a string is something I’ve always wondered about.

This is gross, nasty, and actually pretty funny.

2025 Short Film The Convenience Store

* Directed by: Julian Davis

* Written by: Julian Davis

* Stars: Dominic Collantes, Amia Marisa, Max Ptasznik

* Run Time: 10 Minutes

* Watch it:

What Happens

Kira’s mother doesn’t like her working alone at the convenience store all night, but she needs the money. Kira hears something strange outside, but there’s nothing there when she looks.

The door opens, and her friend Tommy comes in. He doesn’t like her working alone either. She talks a bit and then gets to work restocking and stuff. The front door opens, and the security camera is no help at all.

She hears something outside again, and this time, it goes differently.

Commentary

It’s well acted, and the set is perfect. It’s the sort of store that’s not at all creepy until it is. It’s another of those shorts where we don’t really know why anything is happening, but we know exactly what’s happening. Nicely done!

2025 Short Film In a Nutshell

* Directed by: Ryan Valdez

* Written by: Ryan Valdez

* Stars: Sarah Palmer, Ivan Djurovic, Chelsea Breeze

* Run Time: 8 Minutes

* Watch it:

What Happens

We zoom through what looks like a dollhouse, and then zoom out to see a woman assembling and painting it. She’s making a duplicate model of an actual crime scene. Her husband, Owen, thinks it’s not good for her to be looking at crime scenes and autopsy reports all day. She says it’s a one-time job, and it’ll be done soon.

We then see just how accurate Emma’s work really is, as it becomes reality…

Commentary

This is sharp and looks good. At no point are we unclear on what’s happening, but it’s still suspenseful to watch it play out.

2021 Short Film Sleep Talker

* Directed by: Carl Firth

* Written by: Sarah Emery, Carl Firth

* Stars: Jessica Saras, John van Putten, Rhys James

* Run Time: 7 Minutes

* Watch it:

What Happens

Kelly comes home late after work and finds her husband, Curtis, already asleep. Or is he? There are sounds coming from the bedroom, so she checks it out. He’s in there, asleep, but he’s talking. No wait, is that really Curtis doing the talking?

Commentary

No one’s ever going to believe that actually happened, right?

It’s pretty dark, but we see all that we need to see. The “intruder” is really well done, and what he does is interesting as well. Creepy!

Best of 2025

Link to Last Year’s Ratings (2024)

This time around, we’ll be discussing our favorite films released in 2025. We made a list of everything we watched that was released in 2025, and we each made a top-ten list. There’s some overlap, so we’ll look at our individual picks first, then look at the ones we both chose. Note that these lists are the top ten for each of us, but we didn’t sort them into any special order: the top of the list isn’t necessarily the best of the ten.

At the end, we’ll also discuss some of the best things we watched this year that WEREN’T new releases. Overall, we’ll discuss 27 of our favorite films.

Brian’s Favorites of 2025 Films

* The Ugly Stepsister *

* Dracula: A Love Tale *

* Companion

* Frankenstein

* Keeper

* Weapons

* Ash

* Woken

* 825 Forest Road *

* The Elixir

Kevin’s Favorites of 2025 Films

* Dracula: A Love Tale *

* 825 Forest Road *

* Borderline

* In Vitro

* Monster Island

* Self Driver

* Sinners

* The Monkey

* The Ugly Stepsister *

* Strange Harvest

Unanimous Favorites

* The Ugly Stepsister

* Dracula: A Love Tale

* 825 Forest Road

Brian’s Favorite Not-New films

* Boys from County Hell *

* A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night *

* It’s What’s Inside

* The Legend of Boggy Creek

* Tucker and Dale vs Evil

* Inhuman Kiss

Kevin’s Favorite Not-New films

* A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night *

* Boys From County Hell *

* Cube (The original 1997)

* Flesh For Frankenstein

* Horns

* Santa Sangre

Both Agree

* Boys from County Hell

* A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night

Contact Info:

Email: mailto:email@horrorguys.com

Websites:

* https://www.horrorguys.com

* https://www.horrormonthly.com

This as well as the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #52, should be on sale in a few days! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link:

https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2025 Five Nights at Freddy’s 2

* Directed by: Emma Tammi

* Written by: Scott Cawthon

* Stars: Josh Hutcherson, Piper Rubio, Elizabeth Lail

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 44 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A year after the first movie, the survivors are back with some fresh faces, and there’s another Freddy’s location with intact animatronics plus a new creepy puppet. As you might guess, the problem wasn’t completely solved after the first movie, so there’s another bout of death and destruction. We liked the first one and thought this one was equally entertaining. It’s a bit abrupt in the ending and very obvious there’s going to be a third movie.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on an arcade and a fun place with lots of kids playing. One little girl just sits and waits for the animatronic show. The sad girl, Charlotte, watches as a little boy goes into the back room with the big rabbit. She goes in after him but gets stabbed in the process. Credits roll. “Girl Dies in Fazbear Accident” says the headlines. We also see a marionette, a character who was not in the first film.

Twenty years later, little Vanessa has grown up and still remembers all those events. Mike calls; he and Abby have a house now. Mike’s got an upcoming date with her, but his friend says she has crazy eyes after that incident with the killer bear. Abby, on the other hand, tells her story repeatedly at school. No one ever found the real killer, William Afton.

Abby’s class is learning about robotics at school, and there’s going to be a science fair. Mr. Berg, the teacher, doesn’t like Abby. Could she fix up the old robots at Freddy’s? Maybe she could. Mike has promised to fix them for years, but he never really does it. The dead-children possessed the robots there, and they were her friends.

Mike and Vanessa go on a date, and she’s still messed up from her experiences before. When he gets home, he finds a note from Abby saying she’s gone to Freddy’s to fix up her friends. They go inside to find nothing– the animatronic animals are gone now. She finds a FazTalker, some kind of talking toy, on the floor and keeps it.

Elsewhere, a trio of ghost-chasers arrives at Freddy’s; Mike may have invited the “Spectral Scoopers” to investigate. The new security guard is Michael, not the Mike we already know, and he lets them inside. This isn’t the same location as the one Mike and Abby were just in, this one is much cleaner; it’s the original location. The Marionette was unique to this location as well. This one still has the animatronics inside. Lisa, Rob, and Alex explore the place, recording everything for their show. They all die painfully as Michael smiles evilly. Except, Lisa is now possessed by Charlotte.

Meanwhile, Vanessa, at Spin Class, hallucinates Afton/The Yellow Rabbit yelling at her, and she’s not all the mentally well. Afton was her father, and he left an impression. She still has nightmares about him.

The FazTalker talks to Abby, asking for help. She rides to the other FazBears, where we saw the bad stuff happening. Chica is there, and she’s happy to see Abby.

The next day, Vanessa comes over and sees Abby’s robotics project; she says Freddy and Chica helped her build it. This leads to Vanessa and Mike breaking up.

Vanessa goes to Freddy’s and talks to Charlotte’s ghost, who wants to get out of this place so that she can hurt people. None of the animatronics can leave, but Charlotte thinks Abby can help her break that limitation. Charlotte/Marionette then capture Vanessa.

At the science fair, Mr. Berg breaks Abby’s project, so she goes back to Freddy’s to be with her friends. Chica volunteers to be the new science project, but she can’t leave the building until Abby enters the passcode. The other animatronics arrive just as the lock shuts down. Abby and Chica then take an Uber to the science fair.

Mike goes to see Charlotte’s father, who still hasn’t gotten over his daughter’s death twenty years ago. They complain about the “FazFest” that’s coming to town. Mike learns that there was more than one Freddy’s location. The father gives Mike a music box that Charlotte used to like.

Mike rushes to Freddy’s, breaks in, and walks right past Lisa’s dead body on the way inside. He does eventually find Vanessa locked in a closet. Vanessa explains it all, but Mike is still skeptical. The only ghost here is Charlotte, not all those other kids.

Chica and Abby go to the science fair, and Mr. Berg doesn’t approve. Chica takes care of everything.

Vanessa explains that Charlotte is remote-controlling the animatronic to get revenge for her own death. Meanwhile, all four big robots are out and about. Freddy is at the FazFest carnival. When Mike starts hacking into the system Charlotte activates the nasty looking prototypes in the back room.

Mike and Vanessa each encounter the prototypes, but they aren’t very smart. Meanwhile, the intact robots are out killing bad parents. As everything starts getting crazy, Mike turns off the wifi and everything stops. Only the one with Charlotte is still active, and it’s at Mike’s house.

At home, Abby sees Chica pop open, and the Marionette comes out. When Vanessa reports that the WiFi has come back on, Mike goes to Freddy’s and begs the ghosts of the dead children for assistance.

Vanessa gets there first and finds that the Marionette/Charlotte has possessed Abby. Just as she’s about to kill Vanessa, Mike shows up with the music box and puts Charlotte to sleep.

The robots then attack again along with Michael, who turns out to be Vanessa’s secret brother. “I’m here to continue Afton’s legacy, just in time for FazFest.” The Animatronics start to attack Vanessa and Mike, but then, out of the blue, the old animatronics, possessed by the dead children, arrive to save the day.

One of the ghost boys appears and says they all have to move on, but once they are gone, they “can’t hold him in anymore,” setting us up for a third film. Mike doesn’t want anything to do with Vanessa, who has lied to him repeatedly. Then, the Marionette possesses Vanessa…

During an end credit scene, we cut to some looters breaking into Freddy’s before the scheduled demolition tomorrow. They find the yellow rabbit from the first film, the one with Afton inside…

Brian’s Commentary

This is obviously a sequel to 2023’s “Five Nights at Freddy’s.” There’s a lot going on here that doesn’t make a lot of sense, but it’s got enough humor in it that it’s worthwhile. It seems like the whole thing could have been avoided if the characters from the first film would have gone through some therapy afterward.

The ending was clearly a setup, but it was awfully abrupt, and more of a cliffhanger than an ending. Still, if you liked the first one and thought it needed more, this is probably right up your alley.

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s a smooth sequel, continuing right along with things after a year passing since the events of the first movie. I thought it was on par with the first movie, just as entertaining. And it very obviously sets us up for a third movie after an abrupt ending.

2025 Influencers

* Directed by: Kurtis David Harder

* Written by: Kurtis David Harder

* Stars: Cassandra Naud, Emily Tennant, Jonathan Whitesell

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 50 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a sequel to 2022’s “Influencer,” with Cassandra Naud back at it again. It was a little unclear at first if it was a prequel or sequel considering the ending of “Influencer,” but they decided to just gloss over a major issue with that ending without explaining it. That aside, it was well put together in beautiful settings, and we both mostly enjoyed it.

Spoilery Synopsis

A woman gets a million notifications on her socials and cries. She then grabs a knife and cuts her own throat.

We cut to southern France, where Catherine, CW, is riding her bike. She goes home to Diane and they go out for a date. They have plans for the weekend, and they go to– no, they stop off at an abandoned castle to do some sightseeing. Nothing happens there, so they continue on to the castle that they have reserved.

When they arrive, their room is rented, so they get a tiny space instead. Catherine meets Charlotte, another guest, who complains about the size of the pool. She’s the one who got their special room and offers to buy their dinner. Turns out, Charlotte is an influencer. Catherine is clearly jealous, but Diane thinks she’s nice. They talk about how quickly Charlotte would shrivel up and die without her phone.

The next day, Catherine tells Charlotte that Diane is ill, and offers to be her photographer for the day. She knows just the place to get some great photos– that old castle again. Sure enough, they go up to the dangerous-looking tower Catherine visited earlier. One short push later, Charlotte is no more. Catherine has Charlotte’s phone and password, so she can use that. They soon end up in that room they reserved after Charlotte “runs off.”

Diane goes through all Catherine’s stuff and finds her passport. Her name isn’t even Catherine, and she has access to Charlotte’s account. “You’ve done this before. What were you doing in Thailand? Several girls were killed.” Catherine tries to convince her that she knows nothing about it, but one thing leads to another, and soon Diane is dead. Credits roll (30 minutes in).

We cut to a podcast explaining what happened at the end of the previous film. The murderer, CW, somehow got away. Madison White was the only survivor from all that carnage. The podcasters still don’t believe Madison’s story, whose story doesn’t quite check out. There’s no evidence that “CW” ever existed. Later, Madison reads how Charlotte’s body was found in France. Could there be a connection? Can she find proof? She’s still getting death threats and stalkers after getting blamed for all the murders.

Madison goes to France and starts following places where Charlotte had posted photos. She goes to the big chateau and asks about Catherine and Diane, but she doesn’t know what names they used. It’s kind of a dead end.

We cut to Bali, where Jacob, a “man-o-sphere” influencer, does his show. Ariana warns him that his audience is dwindling. He runs into Madison, who’s still looking for CW, and gets her phone number.

A while later, Jacob spots CW in a crows, and he recognizes her from the photo that Madison showed him. He tells CW all about Madison looking for her; he’s truly an idiot.

CW then returns to her lair and talks to an AI copy of Diane, who talks just like the original. She uses the AI to figure out who Jacob is and where to find him– and Madison as well. She then uses AI to reconstruct Diane’s face well enough to talk to Diane’s own mother over Facetime.

CW talks to Jacob and tells him about the stalker that keeps accusing her of terrible things. She’s got quite a story for him. Later, she gets into his computer and gets access to everything. While there, she runs into Ariana, who threatens to call the police. CW leaves, but also tells her that she slept with Jacob, Ariana’s boyfriend.

We cut to Paris, one year ago. CW has moved there after the Thailand incident, and wears a hoodie to hide her distinctive birthmark. We see how she met Diane and fell in love. It’s a whole extended flashback thing, and it appears that CW wasn’t using Diane the way she manipulated the other influencers. She didn’t really mean to kill her, it just happened.

Back in the present, Ariana calls Jacob’s friend Cameron, who tells her that Jacob wants to break up with her. Cameron never liked Ariana, and he wants to get rid of her. CW posted a video of Jacob having sex with another woman, and Ariana’s getting a lot of notifications. Not long after, Arian kills herself, which we saw in the opening scene.

Jacob tells Cameron that he thinks he’s onto a murderer, and Cameron thinks he’s crazy.

Jacob goes home and finds Madison standing over Ariana’s dead body and jumps to the wrong conclusion. They argue– who’s been playing whom? Well, that doesn’t matter because Madison then stabs Jacob. The two girls then fight for quite a while. Eventually, Madison knocks out her opponent, steals her phone, and learns where CW’s “lair” is.

Madison talks to the AI Diane as she searches the place and finds murder victim photos. Meanwhile, Jaxob recovers a bit and unties CW, whom he assumes is the victim now. He soon looks at Ariana’s phone and learns the truth. This time, CW stabs him a few more times.

Except Jacob’s computer on, livestreaming to CW’s lair, where Madison and “Diane” have seen rebroadcast the whole thing on social media. Her guilt is proven, and she goes berserk. Cameron walks in, and she guts him in front of everyone. Then she chases down the girls with him as the movie closes.

Brian’s Commentary

This is a sequel to 2022’s “Influencer,” and, as before, the settings are amazing. I liked the first one, and I liked this one as well. It’s got enough twists and turns, and most of the people who die kinda have it coming, so I’d call it a win.

Kevin’s Commentary

It reminded me a bit of the Mr. Ripley character from his conniving adventures advancing himself at the deadly expense of others and having to keep up on the damage control.

At first I was going to go with this being a prequel because they didn’t explain it for the first half hour. But then they showed us that they figured out how to milk it out as a sequel despite the ending of “Influencer.” How do we explain how she got off the island? Just don’t and hope we don’t mind. I’ll overlook that annoying point enough to call it a win.

2025 Keeper

* Directed by: Osgood Perkins

* Written by: Nick Lepard

* Stars: Tatiana Maslany, Rossif Sutherland, Birkett Turton

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 39 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A couple in love goes to his remote, and beautiful, cabin for a romantic getaway. Things seem normal. Then it gets strange. Then very strange. It takes a while to get there, but the payoff is very good. We both were very pleased.

Spoilery Synopsis

We see various scenes of women and then cut to scenes of some of them screaming. Credits roll.

Liz and Malcolm drive to his cabin way out in the woods. It’s a nice place; the caretaker left them a cake, so he starts making dinner. As she takes a bath, we see odd things happening behind her.

Someone’s ringing the doorbell, but it’s late. Malcolm says it’s Cousin Darren and his date, Minka, who doesn’t speak English. Minka nods at the cake and warns Liz about it. The unwanted guests soon leave. Liz is suddenly very suspicious of Malcolm, but he still seems nice. They start to make out, but in the middle, he decides he wants some cake. She doesn’t like chocolate, but he wants her to try it anyway.

That night, Liz has strange dreams. She goes downstairs and examines the rest of the cake, which she shoves into her mouth like an animal. As she eats it, we hear the screams of many women.

We cut to Minka, who is lost in the woods for some reason. She sees another woman, and she is attacked strangely.

In the morning, Liz draws the faces of the screaming women; she’s an artist. Later, she and Malcolm go for a walk in the woods. She finds a locket on a rock in a stream and takes it. Malcolm gets a call from work and has to go deal with it. She’s acting weird, but he doesn’t seem to notice. She keeps getting visions of bubbles and water.

Alone now, she watches out the window to the neighbor’s yard and sees a head in the garbage there. No– just her imagination, maybe. Then she sees Minka and also a mini-Minka. And wakes up from a nap after drinking.

Darren comes over and asks about the cake. He asks if she feels sleepy. She goes to the bathroom and locks herself in while he grabs a cleaver. Is he coming after her? We see someone weird climbing the stairway, but it’s upside-down and partially dismembered. When she comes out of the bathroom, Darren isn’t there anymore. Did something get him? She calls Malcolm and leaves a message for him to hurry up.

Liz finds a man’s wristwatch in the garbage disposal and then hallucinates a person with a bag over their head. Also, there’s another cake on the table now. She packs her bag and calls her friend for a ride; the phone loses signal halfway through, so she doesn’t know how that worked out.

Malcolm returns. She confronts him about all the weird people she’s seen. He searches the house for her, obviously not believing her story. He’s charming and all gaslight-y, so she decides to stay longer. After a while, his story continues to not check out, and she knows there’s something wrong again. She finds a photo of Malcolm with another woman lying on the bathroom floor, and it looks really old.

He insists that he loves her and didn’t want her to suffer, but he’s starting to tell the truth. “You’re giving me life,” he explains. The cake was supposed to knock her out, but it didn’t work on her. “They present themselves to you as women, didn’t they? I don’t know what they are, but I’ve known them for a long time.”

Malcolm tells her a story about when he and his cousin were children, two hundred years ago. They found a pregnant woman on their land and shot her before taking her prisoner. She ended up giving birth in the pig pen. The “baby” was… unusual. Now, he and Darren feed them women regularly, and have for centuries. He talks about “their magic” shielding the place.

She runs upstairs, and something strange follows her. She climbs out a window and falls into the stream below. We flash back to the locket, which contains a picture of the original “mother,” who looks just like Liz. Meanwhile, Malcolm packs up Liz’s stuff and puts it in a room with a bunch of others.

Liz wakes up in a basement. There are some very weird “people” down there with her as well. They have a head in a honey jar, and they place it on a mummified body. They say they are her children, and also all the women who came before.

Upstairs, Malcolm waits for the screaming to stop and then goes to bed. He wakes up coughing; he’s older-looking now. There are screams.

In the morning, Malcolm wakes up upside-down, hanging from a tree, and he’s looking pretty ancient now. Liz comes out to him and says they’ve asked her to stay. She feeds him some cake. Then she drowns him in honey.

Brian’s Commentary

This started out feeling like an abduction-gaslighting-kidnapping story, and it was, but there’s a lot more to it than that.

The creature effects in this one really stand out. Those things are weird. The whole thing goes way off the rails in the final half hour, and that’s the best part.

It was surprisingly good.

Kevin’s Commentary

Things seem normal enough at first. Then they get strange. Then all is revealed.

I was expecting a sort of vampirism where he was feeding directly off the life force of a series of women over the years, but it’s a secondary immortality by feeding women to magic creatures.

I really liked the payoff and where the ending went.

2025 Wormtown

* Directed by: Sergio Pinheiro

* Written by: Andrew James Myers

* Stars: Caitlin McWethy, Rachel Ryu, Emily Soppe

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 41 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is an interesting take on a parasitic takeover, not seeing the initial invasion but instead the day to day life of a fully infested population in a small town - with a trio of holdouts fighting the system. The body horror is dialed up to eleven, and it’s really gross. We both thought it was a little rushed toward the end, but overall a thumbs-up.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a man at the optometrist’s office; he’s been having headaches and his eyes hurt. He’s the mayor of the town. He claims he can now see in the dark. The eye doctor looks into his eye and sees… worms. We then cut to the town, and it looks like it’s populated by people with skin conditions. The mayor and the others infected by the worms run the town, the radio station, and the churches, working for “the greater good.” We then see a couple of women shaving each other’s heads. Credits roll.

We then see some kids playing outside as the sun comes up, and the bright sunlight has a devastating effect on little Tommy. He melts into a pile of blood and worms.

Jess, one of the bald women, goes to check on her friend Greg, who has drunk the wormy milk. She scrounges the area for food and junk outside during the daylight hours until she finds what’s left of Tommy. She opens him up and looks at the worms inside; not all of them are dead yet. Rose analyzes the samples back at the bald-woman base to study, but Kara, another of the women, doesn’t care. Jess runs in, covered in Tommy’s blood, and she’s afraid she’s been infected.

Night falls, and the infected people come out again as the mayor continues broadcasting on the radio. Kara rushes off in a huff and gets stopped by an infected deputy. He takes her to Tommy’s mother for identification, but she’s not the one who was messing with the body. They want Kara to sell out her friends so they can all join the group. They feed her a wormy apple.

Meanwhile, Rose and Jess talk about going to Amish country to visit family. Kara and Deputy Elroy come in to infect them, and there’s a fight. Rose gets infected repeatedly, but Jess pulls out the worms– maybe. She then cuts out Elroy’s eyes - more for revenge than to get necessary samples. The two women then go out, in the daylight, to hide in a shut-down school. Rose is in the early stages of infection.

After a while, Rose complains that she can feel the worms inside her. Rose tells Jess to go to Amish country and find her sister Susanna, for help. Rose then runs out into the sun to die.

Kara, who now lives with Alice, Tommy’s mother, complains that her ribs hurt. The woman explains that the brian-worms hadn’t even hatched yet when she betrayed her friends.

Jess goes to Amish land and finds Susanna and her brother Hans. She tells them that Rose has died, but they had disowned her long ago. Susanna is friendly, but Hans is not, but Jess gets to stay in the barn. She espouses the wonder that is the “Bill and Ted” movies. Jess and Susanna talk about the world outside, all infected by the worms.

Back in town, Kara goes through a ritual as the worms take her over. Now she can see in the dark, and she’s part of the group. She’s still getting sick, so it may not be working quite right. She’s going to need surgery to correct the problem. They strap her down to a table and give her electric shocks to drive out the “bad” worms and leave the good ones. It’s painful and disgusting, but the treatment works.

Susanna and Hans talk about why she doesn’t get a humspringer, and in exchange, he allows Jess to stay with them.

Kara meets the mayor, or what’s left of him, and we see that the long-term effects of the worms are not good. She wants to be “A Rancher” , one of his deputies, and he wants to know why. He admits that the humans are basically food for the worms, and it’s all going to end badly. The mayor wants Jess brought in for the murder of Elroy.

Now “Ranchers,” Alice and Kara get outfits that let them walk outside in the daytime.

Jess and Susanna talk about Cleveland and the worm-people. They hear normal people on the radio– maybe only Ashland is infected. On the road, they soon run into Kara’s group. This goes badly for Alice, who gets exposed to the sun in the ensuing fight. They throw Alice in the backseat and head back to the farm.

Alice, now with her head clear, apologizes to Jess for everything she’s done. Alice tells Jess to disable the radio station where the mayor is constantly broadcasting and then dies.

Kara goes rogue and beats up an uninfected person in town, which annoys the mayor. Kara then squishes the mayor’s head and lets the bugs out. Taking over, she goes to the radio station and starts reporting about her new era. They are even going to go after the Amish now.

Jess and Susanna arrive at the radio station and kill one of the guards. When Jess smashes the transmitter, the outside signals can get through now. She and Kara fight, and Jess gets wormed before killing Kara.

Susanna takes Jess to the car and drives out of town. The sun comes up, and Jess gets out of the car to die in the sunlight. Susanna runs up and covers her with a blanket.

Brian’s Commentary

Ew. So many worms.

I would have liked an explanation of how this all started, but there’s a lot more mystery to it this way, which is probably fine. I feel like there was a lot here that wasn’t fully fleshed out, like the thing with the cell phones, which seemed to disrupt the worms somehow. Also, the worms seemed to be in a sort of group mind, where they knew each other were being attacked.

If you like body horror, this is a gross one, but it suffers a bit from being too ambitious a story and from being rushed. This would have made an excellent miniseries.

Kevin’s Commentary

I thought this was an interesting take on a parasitic takeover. We don’t see the origin or get an explanation if they are terrestrial or alien or what. Just small town life with most of the population in the grip of the infestation. And a few freedom fighters are trying to undo it. Well, quickly two freedom fighters and then one.

It had a promising start, but I thought it got bogged down the further it went along. I have mixed feelings about it, mostly good but not entirely.

1959 Experiment in Evil

* AKA “The Testament of Dr. Cordelier” AKA “The Doctor’s Horrible Experiment”

* Directed by: Jean Renoir

* Written by: Jean Renoir, Robert Louis Stevenson

* Stars: Jean-Louis Barrault, Teddy Bilis, Michel Vitold

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 35 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s an updated version of Jekyll and Hyde set in the modern age of 1959 France, Dr. Cordelier and Mr. Opale this time around. The Frenchness as well as the late 1950s fashions, styles, and technology all contribute to the entertainment. It’s solidly made and an enjoyable watch, though the last half hour drags a bit.

Spoilery Synopsis

Mr. Renoir arrives in town, and they head straight to the TV studio. He gets settled in behind the desk and records the introduction to a documentary story. He tells us about the strange Dr. Cordelier, a scientist. Mr. Joly is a notary who helps the doctor write up a new will. Mr. Opale is written into the will to inherit Cordelier’s estate should anything happen to him.

Joly watches one night as a sketchy-looking man with a cane shuffles down the street. His suit doesn’t fit right, and he grabs and attacks a child. The creepy man runs and hides in Cordelier’s garden and escapes. The servant lets Joly in, who tells him what happened. The servant, Desire, explains that Mr. Opale is Cordelier’s house guest, and it must have been him.

The next morning, Cordelier comes to see Joly about Opale and the events last night. Cordelier doesn’t seem worried or surprised at the story, but he’s not going to do anything about it.

Joly goes to see Dr. Severin who doesn’t like Cordelier’s research. Cordelier used to be a great psychologist, but now he’s a loon. They talk about why Cordelier would want to work with a crazy man like Opale.

Meanwhile, Opale goes on a daytime rampage, attacking various people around Paris and eventually beating a man to death. As the witnesses are questioned, Joly is there and recognizes Opale’s cane. He knows what’s going on and tells the police about Opale.

The police go to Opale’s apartment, but he’s not there. The women in the building are thrilled that Opale’s going to be arrested. They find whips and fetish gear inside as well as the other half of his broken cane.

Cordelier doesn’t seem concerned and says he doesn’t know where Opale is. His brain has allowed Cordelier to do his greatest work, so he owes him.

Cordelier sets up a demonstration of his work with Dr. Severin, who also invites Joly. We see that it’s Opale who shows up. He can’t help but attack a man with crutches outside and this starts a whole chase with the police. He then chases the nurses around the office before confronting Severin.

Severin examines Opale and asks him some medical questions. As they talk, the police and Joly arrive outside. Cordelier answers the door and shows them to Severin’s dead body. The police search for Opale, but they don’t find a trace of him.

Cordelier promises to stop his experiments, and he even has the back door to his garden bricked up. He throws a party for all his wealthy friends.

Much later that night, Desire calls Joly and urges him to rush over. Professor Cordelier is in his lab moaning and screaming, and the servants are terrified. The noises continue, and the men break in the door.

Inside, they find Opale who grabs a hostage. They can’t find Cordelier anywhere. They all calm down and leave Opale to tell his story to Joly. Opale has an audio tape from Cordelier that explains it all. We get a flashback to a much younger version of Cordelier, who treats a woman with a scandalous nephew. He had “naughty” thoughts about his nurse and some patients, and once, he even raped a sedated patient. This happened over and over, so he started to look for a way to chemically treat his moral failings. He decided to try his experiment on himself, and after drinking it, he turned into Opale, who looks very different.

Instead of repressing his sick desires, they manifested physically, turning him into a criminal. Back in the lab, Joly doesn’t believe any of this. Opale wants Joly to help him get his conscience back and go back to being just Cordelier. He tells more about that first time he changed to Opale, then went back to Cordelier who swore never again. But he craved it too much to leave it alone. So we see the flashback of his second outing as Opale.

Which brings us back to the present, where Opale laments that he can’t turn back anymore. Opale wants to take a fatal dose of poison which Joly tries to talk him out of. He doesn’t succeed and Opale collapses. Joly runs for help, and when he comes back with the servants Opale has reverted back to Cordelier.

Brian’s Commentary

Cordelier and Opale look nothing at all alike, yet they’re played by the same actor. This was made for TV and got a theatrical release later on.

It’s decent, although pretty uninspired for the first hour, and it starts to really drag once Opale starts to tell his story. I do not recommend it.

Kevin’s Commentary

“The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” was published in 1886. It’s strange to think that this was a modern update at the time, which was over sixty years ago.

I was impressed with the distinct look that Jean-Louis Barrault had between the two personas with the use of mannerisms, makeup, and costuming.

It’s dated, but that lends to the charm with 1950s technology and vibe. Overall, I thought it was an entertaining good time. For some reason, it seemed longer than an hour and a half but I wasn’t bored. Just surprised when we paused at a point I was expecting to be a final wrap up and there was still a half hour to go.

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Mainstream Films:

2025 The Carpenter’s Son

* Directed by: Lotfy Nathan

* Written by: Lotfy Nathan

* Stars: Nicolas Cage, Noah Jupe, FKA Twigs

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 34 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Inspired by “The Infancy Gospel of Thomas,” where the idea is that Jesus was born with his full powers, in the body of a boy who didn’t know he was Jesus yet or what to do with it. It’s quite slow moving, mostly quiet, and low on action. The horror elements are there a little, some creepiness, and lots of religious elements. It’s well made but mostly we thought it was pretty dull.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a woman giving birth. The father looks up and sees a bright light from the sky along with Heavenly whispering. The baby is born, and as they leave the cave, they pass a bunch of people screaming and sacrificing a baby. They want the couple’s newborn baby, but they hide it. As the sun rises, the man sees the devil in the desert. Credits roll.

The couple and the baby have been in hiding for years, and the baby is now a young man. The father narrates that the son has powers that can’t be explained, but it’s his responsibility to protect him.

The father is a carpenter, but the only work he can get is carving pagan idols. The boy watches as the new neighbor, Lilith, a mute girl, takes a shower. He also gets annoyed when his father insists that he pray for forgiveness. The boy has a recurring nightmare about being nailed to a cross with his mother crying at his feet.

The boy runs into a girl who wants to play games with him. They find a man with leprosy, and that goes badly. His father still wonders if he’s from the angels or from demons; he’s not really sure. That night, the leper returns and claims that the boy’s touch has healed him. Now all the lepers want to be touched. Later the girl gives the cured leper a peach, and the next day the carpenter and the boy see the leper dead.

The girl offers the boy a carved wooden snake and suggests that keeping secrets feels really good, not being subtle about tempting him.

Lilith collapses with black stuff coming out of her mouth and bites a chunk off her mother’s face who screams that it’s the boy’s fault. His father finds the toy snake and there’s a whole argument that comes from that. The father insists that the boy would be dead without his protection.

The boy sneaks off to meet with the girl, who is busy poisoning more peaches, and she takes him to see a site where prisoners are being tortured and executed for the crime of sorcery. The girl explains that the carpenter isn’t really the boy’s father at all. When he asks his mother, she’s evasive, and he knows she’s lying.

The boy is thrown out of school for talking about things he couldn’t possibly know. The boy then goes back to the place of torture and pulls the demon right out of Lilith, who is chained there. He releases her and sends her away. Others there see the whole thing, and they’re gonna talk.

The father and the mother argue about the boy’s conception and crimes. The father is bitten by a snake, and the boy heals the wound right away, clearing up any doubt the father had. He also tells the boy who his father really is. The villagers come for the family, and that goes badly for some of them.

As the strange girl tells the boy her origin story, the sky turns red. She admits that she’s The Adversary. She then opens up the gateway to Hell and gives him a peek. The father arrives and interrupts this until the boy stops her from killing him. After a brief argument, she stabs the father anyway.

This all leads to a serious fistfight between the boy and Satan. The boy wins, but the father tells him not to kill her and forgive her instead. The boy moves to heal Joseph, but Joseph tells him to let him go, and the red sky clears with a beam of sunlight shining down on him as he dies.

The boy goes over and forgives the strange girl, who tells him about his own end. The boy, Yeshua, and his mother, wander off into the mountains. We’ve probably not heard the last of these two…

Brian’s Commentary

So many flies. If you don’t like flies, then this is definitely a horror movie.

Nicolas Cage plays this one mostly straight, although he does get one yelling scene, which is something he’s always good at. The rest of the cast is good too, although the story is a bit weak. Yes, it’s based on one of the apocryphal gospels, but they could have spiced it up a bit more.

It was an interesting concept, but a little boring in my opinion.

Kevin’s Commentary

I thought this was slow moving almost to the point of boredom but at least it’s only a little over an hour and a half run time. Knowing how it was going to end took away much of the suspense they were trying to build.

The cast is good at what they were doing, but it seemed like a wasted opportunity that they could have done more with.

2025 Werewolf Game

* Directed by: Cara Claymore, Jackie Payne

* Written by: Jackie Payne

* Stars: Tony Todd, Robert Picardo, Bai Ling

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 36 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Twelve strangers with various issues are kidnapped and sent to an island for a deadly game of “werewolves” and “villagers.” Kept in line by security devices and guards, they have no choice but to play and gradually eliminate each other. It’s got the horror elements of kidnapping, human prey, and murder, but it’s really not a horror movie. Brian gives it a thumbs up, and Kevin gives it a thumbs down.

Spoilery Synopsis

As the credits roll, we get lots of action shots and text that explains “The Werewolf Game” a social game of survival where random people all over the world are kidnapped and divided into two groups: werewolves and villagers. It’s one side versus the other, and only one can survive.

We open on a dozen people gagged and tied to little student desks. A man in a mask comes out and welcomes them to the game. Three of them will be wolves and the rest villagers. He explains the rules. One man tries to fight back and loses a finger for his trouble.

The Judge in the mask introduces Chris, Monica, Demi, Natalie, Bill, Suzie, Zak, Seth, Pepper, Matthew, Emmitt, and two people whose information is not revealed.

Demi doesn’t want to play and tells the others that she’s a werewolf. The others all vote on who the werewolf is, which is really obvious since Demi just admitted it. Demi tells the others all about herself before the final vote; she wants to get it over with. One of the guards then blows her head off. That’s one of the three werewolves discovered.

All the other contestants are then released on the island and go their separate ways to cabins. Matt and Raymond, one of the players with no background, talk. Seth and Natalie do the same. Chris grabs everything he can use as weapons. Monica helps Bill with a gunshot he received accidentally.

There are three problems on the island. First is the sonic weapon that can kill them. The second is that they’re all going to kill each other. We don’t get to hear what the third one is.

Some of the others talk, and none of them remember how they got here. Monica wants to die but can’t make herself jump off the cliff.

Night falls, and after 3 a.m. the werewolves are allowed to come out and kill. Everyone is terrified as they wait. A person in a werewolf mask comes into Suzie‘s cabin and kills her.

The whole group gathers the next day, and Raymond talks about the company that runs the game. He used to work for them but hacked the system. They’re all skeptical about that. Chris talks big about the traps he’s set; he’s got military experience, but no shirt. He’s not very social, and the others want to “vote him out.”

Everyone is called to the great hall for the daily vote. Old Zack won’t answer his door, and he looks very ill inside; the guards violently force him to attend. Now, they all have to decide who to kill. They all vote for Zack, who has just been acting weird throughout.

Monica and Emmitt start getting close, which annoys Pepper. Chris finds a shirt and talks to Natalie about winning.

On the second night-hunt, Monica and Emmitt spend the first part of the night together, but he goes back to his cabin before the deadline. Emmitt is killed by a werewolf.

In the morning, Raymond explains more about the company. It’s all an experiment in mind control and social engineering. Seth gets all argumentative.

The group decides to vote equally for Monica and Raymond to die, forcing a tie. They don’t play fair and vote for Raymond to die.

Bill says he’s solved it; Matt and Monica are the werewolves. He used to be a detective, so his opinion matters, even though a lot of the others don’t agree with him. That night, the wolf kills him.

In the voting the next day, Chris kills two guards and is killed in return. This is the last round of voting, as there aren’t enough players left to keep the mystery up. The group decides to gang up on Seth this time, but he accuses Pepper.

Monica, Natalie, Pepper, and Matt are left. Maybe two of them are werewolves, but one certainly must be. Monica thinks Pepper is the werewolf, but she still denies it. Matt blames her as well. Matt and Pepper are the werewolves. Instead of killing Monica and Natlie, the group decides to kill the judge instead.

The Judge says the three girls have won the game. He takes off his mask and explains that the brass upstairs requires a big show. He shows them videos of previous winners. He says he’s been rooting for them all along, and the company wants them to join the management and guide humanity.

Natalie goes after the Judge with an axe and kills him. With the judge dead, the guards all fall down dead, as their mind control no longer works. The three girls take a boat and go home.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s like a feature-film length version of one of the games from “Alice in Borderland,” with lots of logic and violence. There are no real werewolves in the film, and they don’t pretend that there are.

Why hire someone as big as Tony Todd and then have his face obscured by a mask throughout the film? I know he wasn’t very healthy toward the end of his life, but he didn’t look bad.

Overall, it’s a sort of deadly whodunnit, more of a thriller than straight-up horror, but it certainly had plenty of paranoia and we had plenty of theories.

I didn’t know until the film was almost finished that it was all based on a party game.

There’s a lot here that I didn’t quite follow on the first viewing, and a lot of the “company” stuff never did make much sense.

The overall plot, pacing, and mystery were pretty decent however. Overall, I liked it.

Kevin’s Commentary

I didn’t like the choice of keeping Tony Todd under mask either.

I just found the paranoia and the accusations and bickering and debating to be tiresome yada yada. All they had for any of the roles, werewolf, oracle, village, bodyguard was the word of the person saying what role they were. There’s really no way to tell.

It’s well made with good acting and production values, but I thought the script was stupid. I didn’t like it.

* dy, E.J. Bonilla, Alanna Ubach

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 29 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A filmmaking couple travel to see her estranged mother, making a documentary along the way so that the entire thing is entirely found footage style. It’s very slow moving as we travel along with them trying to figure out what’s going on, then things escalate abruptly, so stick with it. All is explained, and it’s very good.

Spoilery Synopsis

Emily and Danny park on the side of the road to get some footage at a scenic place. She explains that she’s visiting her estranged mother, who is “clean” now. She’s been an addict forever, and the plan is to record their reunion for a reality film.

They arrive at the house in the desert and have a tearful reunion. They all sit down for dinner. Sam, the mother, wants to “make it right with you” after all these years. Emily turns out to not be as forgiving as she thought she’d be. Sam invites them to the clinic where she works in the morning, and then they go to a motel for the night.

In the morning, at the clinic, Sam isn’t there; she called off work. They interview Ana, the program director there at the rehab clinic. They talk to the homeless there, and they all talk about people going missing.

Afterward, they go back to Sam’s house, fearing a relapse since she won’t answer her phone. Emily finds a skeleton key in Sam’s bed. A photo is missing, and they look at it on yesterday’s footage– Sam burned it for some reason.

Emily spends all day waiting and looking for Sam, but she’s just gone. They start to track down some clues and end up talking to some people who saw her just last week.

When they get back to the motel, they find rats and a pig’s head in their bathtub. Ana suggests it’s a gang thing trying to intimidate them. Someone doesn’t want them here.

The next day, they interview Isaac and Beth, people who were in that burned photo. One of the people in the photo used to work for the coroner’s office but was fired when a body went missing. Of the people in that photo, one is dead and two are missing.

They go back to Isaac’s place and find another pig’s head. They get a letter from Sam, but it may have been forged. Emily goes to a bar where the gang hangs out, and that goes badly but the gang doesn’t have Sam.

Emily gets a call from Beth. Isaac has left her and left a probably-forged letter. In his office are hundreds of bags of blood, like in a blood bank. Isaac was selling it, but Beth isn’t sure that Sam was involved.

Emily and Danny go back to the rehab center, where they’ve been staying, and Red, one of the patients, goes crazy and attacks Emily. Ana explains that Red was always afraid of Sam. They track down where Red lives, and he’s got a whole “crazy wall” about the missing people. He’s got a photo with Sam and Isaac circled, so he knows about that.

Danny thinks Red is a serial killer and gets really upset. Emily talks him into staying with her and visiting Red in jail. Red’s being released, so they follow him to Ana’s house, where they find all the stuff from Red’s room.

Ana comes in with her pet pig and wants to show them something downstairs. She pulls a gun on them and tells Danny to keep filming, no matter what. She’s got a little pig farm down here, but past that, they find Isaac and Sam chained to the wall. “Sam is not your mother anymore,” Ana explains.

Ana cuts her hand and shows the blood to Sam, who sprouts fangs and hisses. So does Isaac. Sam and Isaac are vampires. She then cuts Sam’s throat, which heals up nearly instantly. They’ve been abducting homeless people and others who won’t be missed, and only Ana noticed. She then beheads Isaac and then hands Emily the ax to kill Sam. Sam admits that the world would be better without her. Emily does it.

Ana explains the skeleton keys, which represent the vampire’s lineage. She explains the whole thing.

Emily then kills Ana, drinks her blood and then finishes off Danny. She then does a final report to The Commission, the group of vampires behind the organized blood bank. They have a whole rulebook for this kind of compromised cover. She resigns, and The Commission sends someone after her…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s basically a mystery, and we don’t know what’s really going on through most of the film. We don’t know until more than an hour in. It was a little slow and tedious for that first hour, but it did pick up a lot after the reveal. There was a hint toward the end of much larger things going on, and that would have been interesting to explore more of, but it’s just a teaser. Do they have a series in mind? I don’t know, but I’d be interested in seeing more of that.

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s found footage with heaping scoops of trauma, angst, and guilt as we get to know the main duo and her mother. Then things get stranger and more interesting after mom disappears. A little more interesting. And then things make an abrupt leap. And suddenly it’s a vampire movie! Though I suspected that’s where it was heading. Though it was a surprise that Emily was infected and killed Ana and Danny. And cool that it turns out to be a vast and organized conspiracy.

I thought it was pretty great.

1999 Godzilla 2000: Millennium

* Directed by: Takao Oawara

* Written by: Hiroshi Kashiwabara, Wataru Mimura, Takao Okawara

* Stars: Takehiro Murata, Hiroshi Abe, Naomi Nishida

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 39 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is a sequel to the 1954 original that ignores all the other movies in between. Godzilla is back to save us all by battling an alien kaiju, creating lots of collateral damage and mayhem in the process of course. The effects are much improved from earlier films, there’s lots of action, and the story is entertaining. It’s a fun one.

Spoilery Synopsis

The Shinoda family, Professor Yuji and his daughter Io, work to set up antennas and equipment outside one evening. They are checking out seismic disturbances that shouldn’t be there. Meanwhile, at the lighthouse, the man inside feels the ground shake and then spots a huge creature eating a ship. Credits roll.

We get various shots from around town as people first encounter earthquakes and then see Godzilla’s big feet pass by. The Shinodas come face to face with the giant lizard creature. They narrowly avoid getting squashed in their car. The professor notices that Godzilla seems to be especially attacking power stations and energy sources.

Meanwhile, a submarine in a trench drops probes and explores underground caves. They’re looking for a meteorite that recently crashed down in the sea. They find it and manage to raise it to the surface.

Yuki, the photographer, goes to see the “Godzilla Prediction Network,” which is really just the Shinodas again. Young Io runs the business and tells her father, the professor, what’s going on.

Back at the meteorite raising, something goes wrong. The rock starts to rise on its own without balloons. It floats? They soon learn that it’s 70 million years old and has something metallic inside, perhaps even a living creature from outer space.

The professor learns that Godzilla is heading toward a nuclear plant next. They shut down all the reactors. Katagiri, the head of CCI, the Crisis Control Agency, comes to them for information about how to kill Godzilla. Shinoda doesn’t like the idea of killing such a rare animal.

The floating meteorite then continues floating up into the air, flying above the surface. It flies away from the scientists’ boat.

The army talks about plans to kill Godzilla; they’ve developed a new kind of missile that’s sure to hurt him. As he approaches the nuclear plant tanks and helicopters arrive, and the shooting begins. The new missiles do work, blasting out bloody chunks from Godzilla, who still doesn’t stop. He gets angry and his back starts to glow.

The flying rock heads straight toward Godzilla. It blasts him good and him sprawling. Godzilla shoots back with his atomic breath and exposes metal under the rock. The scientist, Professor Miyasaka, thinks that it crashed here millions of years ago and sank to the bottom of the ocean. Bringing it back up into the sunlight allowed it to recharge.

Shinoda, Miyasaka, and Katagiri get together and share information. Godzilla’s got an amazing recovery and healing speed. He’s regenerated from the attack already. They name this power “Regenerator G-1.”

The sun comes out and charges up the alien spaceship enough to free it from the rest of the rock. The scientists wonder if it’s actually alive as it shoots down the helicopters that have been following it. It lands on the roof of Yuki’s building and parks there for the night.

Something is hacking all the computers in the city. They soon figure out that it’s the spaceship. They bring huge bombs into the building to blow up the ship. Shinoda and Io run inside to help Yuki, but she’s found some important information from the hacked computer.

The blast bombs go off, but they don’t seem to have done anything to the ship. Messages start appearing on computer monitors. “Destruction. Dominate. Alteration. Prosperity. Revolution. Kingdom.” It’s all very dramatic but Shinoda gets out of the building in time.

And then Godzilla shows up, nearly forgotten for quite some time. He wants revenge on the flying saucer. It animates cables from the street to tie up and drag Godzilla around the city.

The ship takes some Regenerator G-1 from Godzilla’s wound and uses it to grow legs and a face. It was alive the whole time! Suddenly, the body and ship separate. It cannot adopt the Godzilla cells for its own use. Godzilla gets back up and blows the ship apart with his atomic breath.

Now there’s a regular old kaiju (named Orga) that came out of the ship, and it gets into a punching match with Godzilla. Orga can regenerate even faster than Godzilla, so that’s a problem. It’s also continuing to mutate and grows a mouth bug enough to swallow Godzilla whole. Godzilla’s atomic recharge goes into overtime, and the whole thing just explodes dramatically.

Godzilla roars in victory. Then it comes and kills Katagiri, who is OK with that for some reason. Godzilla then destroys the other half of the city on the way out…

Brian’s Commentary

So many iMacs and Netbooks.

The special effects have definitely improved, but the CGI on the ship itself hasn’t dated terribly well. The Orga creature is very neat and works well.

I like it. It doesn’t rely on the tons of lore from the previous films, but it’s implied that the characters already knew who Godzilla was, so he’s been there before.

Kevin’s Commentary

It was an interesting choice doing this as a sort of modern reboot. The models and effects have certainly improved since the early days. There is a little CGI, but it’s still mostly practical effects. I especially enjoyed this one.

1972 The Legend of Boggy Creek

* Directed by: Charles B. Pierce

* Written by: Earl E. Smith

* Stars: Willie E. Smith, John P. Hixon, Vern Stierman

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 27 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is a documentary of encounters with a Bigfoot sort of creature in the area around Fouke Arkansas, presented as entirely real and true. Unfortunately like so many cryptid studies, any solid evidence is scarce. There are multiple recountings from real people, and many of the cast play themselves. It’s kind of interesting, a snapshot of life in the area in the early 1970s. They try to play it up for tension and scares, but it’s rated G so it’s pretty tame. Don’t expect much horror, but it was an interesting watch that we enjoyed.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re told that this is a true story, and some of the people on-screen are the original people who participated in the real drama.

We watch various scenes of a swampy area and hear lots of wildlife animal noises, to the point of it all getting a little creepy. Suddenly, there’s a roar, and all the little animals go scurrying.

A little boy runs to town and tells the old man about a “wild man” who’s hanging around his mother’s house. The old men laugh and send him home. On the way back, he hears the thing roaring in the woods; Jim tells us about it– he’s the little boy, all grown up now. Credits roll.

We’re told about Fouke, a tiny town near Texarkana. We hear about Smokey and Travis Crabtree, a couple of locals. It’s a pleasant place to live– until the sun goes down… We cut to a few locals describing their encounter with the thing in the woods. Some of them have lost livestock to it. The creature has terrorized the area for the past fifteen years.

As the people tell their stories, we see a dark hairy creature lumbering through the woods. It’s a Bigfoot, but they don’t call it that.

We watch a scene with three women alone in a cabin one night as the creature skulked around outside. We next watch a little boy hunting deer shoot the creature.

The Fouke community set up a big organized hunt for the monster. The dogs refused to trail the creature, but some of the hunters tried anyway. Injured, the creature disappeared for the next eight years. They assume he went deeper into the woods to hide.

We then get a nature montage along with a song about the Sulfur River and the Creature who lives inside the forest. It’s really something. We then cut to Travis Crabtree, a local boy, and get a song about him. Travis is out camping and visits Herb Jones, a recluse who lives out in a cabin. Herb tells us about living out there, but he’s never seen nor heard any monsters.

Somehow, the Fouke Monster returned, drawn to civilization. The word “Sasquatch” finally gets brought up and explained. A farmer and a group of children see the monster and his footprints. We see several more late night encounters with terrified women alone at night.

The creature returns the next night and reaches into the window. The men go outside looking for it, and they shoot at it. The sheriff thinks it’s a panther. It returns again, and they shoot at it again. It jumps out and grabs one of the men and he’s so freaked out he runs through the door without opening it.

The narrator warns us to keep an eye out if we ever come to that region. He’s still out there somewhere…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s rated “G,” which puts this almost in a class by itself right there. We watch the creature kill a dog and are told how he ripped its skin off.

From IMDB: “The film is based on actual reported encounters with a Bigfoot creature in the Fouke-Boggy Creek area of Arkansas throughout the 1960s and early 1970s. Most of the actors in the film were the actual people from the encounters.”

We heard and saw a lot about Travis Crabtree, but he never had anything to do with the monster, so why was he included? He even got a song about himself included.

The documentary-style narration and interviews make this all seem very real. I don’t doubt that many people, when this came out, did believe it. Bigfoot was huge in the 70s, and this was most likely a big part of that. I think the realistic way it’s done and the earnestness of everyone interviewed really make this one stand out.

It’s very dated and cheesy to a modern eye, but in the 70s, this would have been amazing. I still like it.

Kevin’s Commentary

I wouldn’t be surprised if I hadn’t seen this before, but I really don’t remember it. It’s said that it was very popular as a drive-in movie and was the tenth grossing movie of 1972.

It was one of the first feature length documentaries, and was very influential in boosting the popularity of Bigfoot and cryptozoology studies.

I found this mostly relaxing and enjoyable with all the nature scenes, rural people, and the soothing voice of the narrator. Plus a music soundtrack that includes a ballad for the creature that was pretty amusing.

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Mainstream Films:

2025 The Death of Snow White

* Directed by: Jason Brooks

* Written by: Jason Brooks, Naomi Mechem-Miller

* Stars: Sanae Loutsis, Chelsea Edmundson, Tristan Nokes

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 50 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a dark telling of the classic fairy tale. This is a good one to watch if you really enjoy Renaissance Festivals - it appears to have been filmed at one with that level of realism throughout in all the aspects. The story has the logic of a fairy tale, and it has some entertaining moments and ideas. But we both thought it was a bit long and drawn out, and not an overall winner.

Spoilery Synopsis

An old woman chases a young woman up the stairs in the castle. The old woman whispers some magic words, and the other starts to puke up maggots. She makes the guard kill himself. She then goes to the bedroom of a very pregnant woman and stabs her with a poisoned dagger. All the king’s doctors get to work trying to save the baby. The dying queen looks out the window and talks about how beautiful the snow is.

On the way out, the witch takes out more guards and encounters a buff dwarf with an axe, and she knows him. They fight epically, and she runs him through and makes her wounded escape. Credits roll.

Years later, at what appears to be a still-medieval Renfest, Princess Snow White likes the looks of The Prince. There’s some awkward flirting between the two. Meanwhile, the Queen looks at the results of an experiment of arsenic skin care on a subject. She’ll try mercury next. She looks out the window at Snow and hates her. The magic mirror knows all about her plans.

The Queen has lost some blood and wants the huntsman to kidnap one of Snow’s friends to replace it. His group of hunters arrive at the festival and search for a victim. Meanwhile, Snow and the Prince look at sparkly lights in the forest. Huntsman Kaiser kills the girl and attacks Snow and the Prince. Huntsman Gunnar, however, is loyal to Snow and helps her escape into the Dark Forest.

Snow and Sophie run into monsters in the woods, and they tear Sophie in half. The Prince and his search party look for Snow White who is wandering through the forest bloody and dazed. Back at the castle, the mirror gives the queen some advice on how to “have it all.”

Snow is captured by the huntsmen, who put her to sleep and carry her back. No– they’re interrupted by a pack of dwarves who have come to rescue Snow. None of them like the queen, either, so they all become allies. Many of them worked for her father, the king, and even helped in her childbirth.

When the only surviving guard from the dwarf ambush returns to the queen, she orders that his hand be cut off with a very small knife. But he’s still grateful and loyal. Out in the woods, the search party meets up with the dwarves and fights the tree-monsters.

Meanwhile the queen casts a spell to transform herself into an old decrepit woman, the powerful killing witch we saw at the beginning. Who goes out into the woods with a basket of apples, encounters the boy from the search party, and kills him after getting information from his mind.

The old woman runs into Snow and offers her an apple. This goes badly since the apple is poisoned; Snow goes into a coma. The dwarves and the Prince rush in, and we get a flashback to Snow’s birth. The only way to beat the magic poison is to sacrifice a life. That’s how Snow’s mother really died, she sacrificed herself.

Meanwhile, the Queen is young again but still obsessed with Snow White. She has her toes cut off to fit into Snow’s shoes.

The Prince’s group manages to break into the castle and confront the Huntsman and the Queen. In the ensuing battle, a few of the dwarves are lost. The battle goes badly for everyone, but the Prince finally manages to carry Snow back out to the woods. He kisses her and takes the poison from her. He dies, and she wakes up.

Snow is awake, and now she gets the “epic badass music” as she walks through the continuing battle. She walks into the throne room, where the queen is making the dwarves suffer. The queen orders Huntsman Gunnar to kill Snow; he hands the queen Snow’s heart. No wait– it’s a maggoty mass of decay - the queen was tricked into eating her own poison.

The dwarves use the magic mirror to bounce the Queen’s evil magic right back at her. Then the dwarves get all medieval on her. The queen melts as the figures in the magic mirror laugh at her.

Snow is now the queen, and everyone is happy. She goes out to the Dark Forest and dances with the ghost of the Prince.

Brian’s Commentary

The story is fine, but the execution leaves a bit to be desired. The dialogue and sets seem to come straight from Renaissance Festivals. Most of the scenes with the queen involve some body horror, and there are some pretty cool monsters in the Dark Forest. The dwarves are fun and well done. Some of the “actors” seem to have never spoken on-screen before.

Wilhelm and Jacob are really just Timon and Pumbaa turned human, right?

The pacing is very slow, however, and it gets a little boring at points. It does pick up a lot in the final half hour, when we finally get some action. It’s… decent once you get through the opening scenes.

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s like a Renaissance Festival. The accents, the costumes, the sets, even the dialogue, all seem put on like a Ren Fest. Where on the surface everything looks and sounds generically medieval, but if you really look and listen you can easily tell it’s a veneer.

It’s a fairy tale, not a historically accurate film, I kept telling myself. It’s silly and exaggerated for a reason. There are some entertaining moments and some scenes of real horror and gore. The mirror was cool. The dwarves were badass. So I’m not going to say that I hated it, but it was a bit too long and didn’t do much for me.

2024 For God’s Sake Wake Her Up

* Directed by: Wayne Moreheart

* Written by: James Justin Howells

* Stars: Sarah Crawford, Mamie Kakimoto, Queen Legend

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 27 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Two young women wandering the city after avoiding one of their mother’s funeral stumble on another woman who is suffering from a severe case of recurring sleep paralysis. They slowly learn it’s not just a simple medical condition. We both agree, it’s a slow moving one but it was very good.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a videotape of April talking about her sleep paralysis; she’s afraid it’s going to kill her. We then watch it happen as credits roll.

We watch as Rizz and Myles walk along the train track past the landfill. They admire the graffiti and then stop to steal some beer. They don’t really like beer, but it’s fun to steal it. They argue about not going to the funeral; Rizz’s mother has recently died, and she has regrets. Myles cheers her up.

The two soon wind up in the bad part of town and bump into April. Who is walking around like a sleep-deprived zombie.

April goes home to her neglected-looking house. She watches another videotape; she says she hasn’t slept more than an hour in weeks. She’s recording all this before “he takes me.” “This is my final tape,” she explains, “I am the end of the line.”

Rizz and Myles wander around through the bad neighborhood, and Rizz decides to go into one of the houses there. Why? Because!

Inside, Rizz starts digging through the stuff and finds April’s video camera and TV. She plays the tape and watches as April explains her problem. There are a lot of tapes. They go upstairs and find April in bed, apparently in some kind of seizure. Rizz wants to help the old woman, but Myles just wants to get out of there before the police get them for breaking in.

Myles tries to leave but something keeps her from opening the door. Rizz has a feeling that the answer lies in that stack of videotapes. “The entity” took April’s grandmother and her mother as well; now it’s her turn. April has no children, so she expects this will all end with her.

Meanwhile, Myles tries to break a window with a stool, but the entity rips the stool right out of her hands. Rizz insists on helping April, who told her the answers are all in the tapes. The tapes are very repetitive and not especially interesting. Finally, Myles cuts the power cord. Now, Rizz reads through April’s “crazy book” and reads it. It’s all about sleep-demons, and people have died from it before.

Rizz and Myles argue, again. Meanwhile, April is terrorized by the entity. The entity opens the door and lets Myles out, but then it won’t open again. She runs off to charge her phone and call for help. No– the entity breaks her neck and kills her, then drags the body away. Rizz freaks out until the entity drags her away as well.

Rizz watches the rest of the tapes. April explains that the entity is an ancient, primeval thing that kills people in their sleep, an incubus. The voice from the TV helps Rizz translate the words from the book. The entity finally shows up in the real world and attacks Rizz, who reads the words out loud just in time.

The sun rises outside, and April wakes up. Everyone is happy now, except for Myles, who is still dead. “We carry the bad things until they eat us up,” April narrates. We look out the window and see Rizz walking away holding the demon’s hand…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s got a tiny cast and obviously a tiny budget as well. Still, it’s well-shot and looks really good. April’s accent makes it hard to follow at times, and this is a problem because she’s the one who does most of the talking and explaining here.

It’s a story about guilt and personal trauma, and a sleep demon as well. It’s awfully slow-paced but good otherwise.

Kevin’s Commentary

This was really low budget with a cast of five, and they made the most of it. It’s just gripping enough to pull you along with the script, cast, and direction all working well together. It’s really slow moving, and low on action, but I was never bored watching it. I’d give it a thumbs up overall.

2017 Thelma

* Directed by: Joachim Trier

* Written by: Eskil Vogt, Joachim Trier

* Stars: Eili Harboe, Kaya Wilkins, Henrik Rafaelsen

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 56 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s beautifully filmed, very well acted, and super slow moving. But it does build and holds your attention as it does. When Thelma goes away to college, things start getting strange. Then frightening. And we gradually find out just how weird things really are. We both thought it was really good.

Spoilery Synopsis

A little girl and her father walk on the frozen lake in Norway, and she can see the fish through the ice. She watches as he loads his hunting rifle. He points the gun at a deer and then swivels to point it at the child. He considers shooting her for a long time and then puts the gun away. Credits roll.

We cut to a university, where the now-grown Thelma has her first day. She gets a call from her mother, who’s been tracking her location; the parents are very watchful and overprotective.

At the library, Thelma starts getting a seizure, and a bunch of birds fly into the windows. The doctor is called, and she wants to get the family history, looking for epilepsy, but Thelma is evasive– she doesn’t want her parents to know.

That night, in her dorm, a snake crawls in through the window and gets into her bed.

The next day, Thelma talks to Anja, another student, about the seizure yesterday. Thelma’s parents come to visit, and they talk about religious topics, and they don’t like her new attitude. They put her down for not believing in Creationism (she’s a biology student). They talk about her lack of humility.

She sees on Instagram that Anja is at a restaurant, so Thelma gets herself cleaned up and goes there. She sits with the group, and they all wonder why she doesn’t drink. Some of the boys make fun of religion. Afterwards, Thelma goes dancing with Anja. It’s fun– until her very unhappy parents call.

Much later that night, Thelma wakes up to find Anja standing outside in the park, apparently in a trance. Thelma gets another seizure and Anja helps her back into her room and spends the rest of the night there. In the morning, Anja can’t explain what she was doing outside the apartment last night or why she came.

Thelma and Anja start spending a lot of time together, and they both have very different family situations. They go to the ballet, and Anja’s hands sneak over to Thelma’s lap, which she did not expect. Thelma starts getting the shakes, and the lights in the theater start to sway. This all stops when the two girls start to kiss. This goes against Thelma’s strong religious beliefs, which is very conflicting for her. She calls her father and tells him about drinking alcohol.

Thelma goes to a party with a boy, Kristoff, and drinks a lot more than she’s used to. He gets her really high, and Anja doesn’t approve. She looks at Kristoff, and parts of him start to glow red. Anja does as well, which results in another kiss. Soon, there’s a snake in bed with the two of them. The snake goes into Thelma’s mouth– maybe all that was just a fantasy.

Thelma has an MRI to check for signs of a tumor, but they can’t rule out epilepsy. The medical records show she had seizures when she was six years old, but she doesn’t remember any of that.

We get a flashback to young Thelma, her mother, and the new baby. Thelma gets jealous and upset, and then, when Thelma has a little seizure, the baby simply vanishes. When her mother gets upset, Thelma makes the baby reappear under the couch. The parents know that Thelma did it, somehow.

In the MRI and exam, Thelma goes into an induced seizure, and across town, Anja sees some effects of it– she vanishes. Turns out, it’s not epilepsy; the doctor thinks it all psychological, a symptom of something else. The doctor says that Thelma’s grandmother had lots of similar problems, but Thelma was always told she was dead. She’s not dead, so Thelma is intrigued and visits her grandmother’s hospital.

The old woman isn’t very responsive, but she’s been on drugs for too many years. She’s had delusions ever since her husband disappeared; she blamed herself. “She believed that she made things happen with her mind.”

Returning to school, Thelma wonders where Anja has been. Anja’s mother doesn’t know where she went either. Thelma goes to the school pool and has another seizure while swimming. That goes badly. Afterward, she decides it’s time to go home to her parents.

The parents drug Thelma’s tea. Father tells her the whole story about the past. Once again, the baby disappeared, and this time, Thelma was asleep in bed. She didn’t do it on purpose this time and couldn’t bring him back like she did the other time. She then wanders out to the frozen river nearby and points under the ice. Not long after the mother jumped off a bridge, which paralyzed her instead of killing her.

Thelma talks to her father about Anja, and he suggests that maybe Thelma made Anja fall in love with her. He might be right. That night, the parents talk about what they have to do to keep Thelma from killing anyone else.

Thelma’s father, a doctor, prepares a syringe full of poison, but sets it aside since she’s all drugged up anyway. She understands that they did the same thing to her grandmother. She asks her father to let her go, but he says no. In the morning, she has another seizure in her sleep and, outside on the lake, her father bursts into flame.

Thelma wakes up, knows what she’s done, and swims down to the bottom of the lake. Then she comes up in the pool where she first talked to Anja. Nope, just a vision as she climbs out of the lake and coughs up a dead bird. Elsewhere, her phone rings; Anja is calling, no longer gone. And the dead bird flies away.

She goes back to the house, where her mother is clearly terrified of her. Thelma puts her hands on her mother, and she can suddenly walk again.

Thelma goes back to school and smiles at the birds as she gets back with Anja, who is fine again today. Happy ending?

Brian’s Commentary

It’s slow moving, and much higher on the drama than the horror. We swap back and forth between the parents being terrible people and being innocent victims.

It’s basically an allegory about how university changes a person, but maybe this is taken a little to extremes. I was expecting the end to be a lot like “Carrie,” but that’s not the way it went.

It’s good. Extremely slow-moving, but I never got bored.

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s beautifully filmed and well acted with a cast that seems perfectly natural in their roles. It’s extremely slow moving, but still managed to fascinate me as it went along as it builds.

The scenario is interesting. Almost more of a mutant powers, coming of age, suppressing abilities kind of story than horror. The parents seem like decent people stuck in an impossible situation. Sort of a happy ending, except for Dad - apparently she didn’t forgive him for the things he did.

Overall, I thought it was really good.

1998 Godzilla

* Directed by: Roland Emmerich

* Written by: Dean Devlin, Roland Emmerich, Ted Elliott

* Stars: Matthew Broderick, Jean Reno, Maria Pitillo

* Run Time: 2 Hours, 19 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s an Americanized version of Godzilla who makes his way to New York. It’s heavy on the action, with enough humor to thoroughly take the edge off the massive destruction and body count that is played down. The creature look, and the whole feel of the movie, are quite different from the original series of films. It’s quite entertaining, but not a good fit in the series.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on old footage of nuclear bomb testing in the Pacific and the native egg-laying lizards of the area as credits roll.

A fishing boat in a storm sees something weird on the radar. Suddenly, a giant claw rips through the side of the hull and it goes badly from there.

Dr. Niko Tatopoulous drives to Chernobyl. He electrifies the soil and takes worm samples. At least until a helicopter lands from the US State Department. They have something bigger for him to work on.

In Tahiti, Philippe Roache, a doctor, talks to the lone survivor from the fishing boat; he’s radioactive now. When asked what he saw, the old man says, “Gojira.”

In New York City, Audrey and Charles talk about the promotion she wants. He just wants to cheat on his wife with her.

Niko is taken to study a gigantic footprint. Lots of footprints and destruction. His new boss, Elsie, explains what they know. They follow the footprints to a huge shipwreck. Philippe is there, and he’s with the news crew. Niko starts collecting samples.

That night, more fishing boats run into trouble. Colonel Hicks, the guy in charge of the investigation, hears about this. The creature seems to be heading toward New York City. Niko thinks it’s a new species created by radioactivity from the ocean.

Audrey gets advice about the news business from Lucy and Victor. She spots Nick on TV and likes what she sees. Meanwhile, an old man on the pier catches a really, really, really big fish, but it gets away. Godzilla meets the Big Apple, and it’s messy, right in the middle of Mayor Ebert’s speech.

Audrey sees Godzilla and decides that’s gonna be her big break. Victor grabs his camera and gets to work taping the monster; he almost gets squashed.

Nick and the others discuss how Godzilla has managed to hide somewhere in the city. The city, meanwhile, is in the process of being evacuated. Philippe talks to the mayor and plants a bug on him; he’s some kind of spy who doesn’t like American donuts and coffee.

Turns out, the monster may be hiding in the subways. Everyone does things to help with the search. Nick suggests leaving a pile of fish to draw in the creature. This works really well, much to his surprise, as they come face to face.

In the ensuing battle, the Chrysler Building gets blown up, as do many other landmarks.

Nick and Audrey meet up by accident, and it’s awkward for both of them. She gets lots of information about the new monster, and he’s more than happy to talk all about what he’s learned, including that the monster is pregnant by way of asexual reproduction. He’s… nesting. A lizard can lay up to twelve eggs at a time! Audrey then does a full news report on the story.

Nick tells the mayor and the colonel his fears about the eggs. Audrey’s boss steals her story and uses it as his own. Nick gets fired but then is immediately kidnapped by Philippe. He’s with the French intelligence, and he’s got a whole mini-military setup of his own. Victor, the cameraman, follows them and spies on the spies. Philippe convinces Nick to work with them.

All the characters head down into the subway to look for the nest and narrowly avoid getting trampled by the big guy. The monster dives into the river, where a submarine awaits him with torpedoes. One sub ends up sinking themselves, but another hits the creature and they assume it’s dead.

Nick, Philippe, and Victor head to Madison Square Garden, where the eggs are. They find three eggs. Then they find more. Many more. The group starts planting bombs on the eggs, but they didn’t bring enough. All the eggs suddenly start to hatch all at once. There is much running and screaming as the babies pursue them all through the subways.

Audrey and Victor go to the broadcast booth and start reporting. As her boss reports about people wanting to return to the city, she comes up with footage of the nest and hundreds of babies. Nick tells the military what to do to keep the lizards from spreading.

We go back to running and screaming as the babies pursue them. Meanwhile, the military is going to blow up Madison Square Garden within a few minutes. The wacky Frenchman leads them outside just as the missiles hit.

As the movie ends– no, the big Godzilla gets back up, clearly not dead. He looks at all the dead babies on the ground and there’s more running. And driving. Godzilla is fast. Godzilla ends up grabbing their car and chewing on it. Godzilla gets tangled up in the Brooklyn Bridge’s suspension cables, which allows the fighters to hit it with their missiles.

The monster collapses from its injuries and dies. Everyone celebrates except Siskel and Ebert, who argue. Audrey gets back with Nick and quits her job. Philippe steals Victor’s videotape and sneaks away mysteriously. As the main characters all walk away and make jokes, we zoom back in on the Square Garden and see that at least one of the eggs has survived…

Brian’s Commentary

Why do all the helicopters fly between the narrow buildings when they could simply fly over them and look down? This isn’t the Star Wars trench, these are buildings.

There’s a lot of silliness and humor here, and that may be the biggest weakness of the film (Siskel and Ebert jokes, really?). This is a summer blockbuster action movie, not a horror film. Matthew Broderick plays the same character he always plays, which is just too silly to take even remotely seriously.

The fully CGI monster, although very well done, is hardly recognizable as Godzilla; they were going more of a “Jurassic Park” looking lizard creature. It’s different from what we’ve seen in the past, but at least it’s well done. He’s got fire-breath, but it seems like something they threw in because they felt like they had to– it only shows up twice.

It’s a fun movie, really well made, but it’s a lousy Godzilla movie.

Kevin’s Commentary

There were two sequels in mind, but it wasn’t well received enough domestically for them to go through with it. It did much better internationally.

This version feels like it left all the horror elements behind and embraced the action. And embraced humor and silliness. It was noticeable how the creature design was different, more of a four-legged lizard who could stand on his hind legs. And he swims really well.

I thought it was too different from the originals. In fact, I read online that at the time there was a nickname circulating “G.I.N.O.” Godzilla In Name Only, and I don’t disagree. I’d say that I enjoyed it quite a bit for an entertaining movie, but it didn’t seem like much of a Godzilla movie.

1976 The Town That Dreaded Sundown

* Directed by: Charles B. Pierce

* Written by: Earl E. Smith

* Stars: Ben Johnson, Andrew Prine, Dawn Wells

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 30 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is based on a true crime story of random attacks in Texarkana in early 1946 that killed at least five and wounded at least eight, all thought to be done by the same man. And “The Phantom” case was never solved. It’s well put together, and everything seems accurate for 1946 cars, clothes, props, etc. We both thought it was pretty good.

Spoilery Synopsis

We hear that it’s 1946 in Texarkana; the war is over and the soldiers are all returning home. At the Red River Army Depot, everything is normal, as is the economic outlook. We’re told that a reign of terror was about to begin that people still talk about thirty years later…

A couple park the car to make out. We see someone approaching outside with a sack over their face. The man breaks the window and pulls the young man outside. The girl soon follows. Credits roll.

In the morning, the girl is crawling along the side of the road, terribly injured, when a man finds her and calls for help. The deputy reports that the couple both survived, but they’re pretty messed up and in comas. The girl wasn’t raped, but she had been chewed on repeatedly.

The police chief wants to warn all the college kids to stay away from lover’s lane in the future. No suspects are found, and most people get over it.

Three weeks later, deputy Ramsey wants more patrol cars out at lover’s lane, but there aren’t enough men available. He hears shots fired and then finds a car. It’s empty but then there are more shots in the woods. He finds a man’s body and then a woman tied to a tree. The woman has bite marks on her back.

Locksmiths and gun shops in town all get very busy as people fear the serial killer. The sheriff asks for more help, and they assign Captain Morales of the Texas Rangers to investigate.

Morales is in charge now, and he seems to know what he’s doing. Patrolman Benson, his driver, is a lot less capable. Fear strikes the small town as no clues are forthcoming.

It’s been three weeks since the previous attack, and the police expect another attempt tonight. Policemen in drag go out as decoys to park in the lover’s lanes. Nothing comes of it.

There’s a big dance in town, and some women sneak some booze into their punch. It’s the prom, and all the young people attend. The dance ends and everyone leaves in pairs. One couple decides to park and make out, but it’ll be OK since they’ll still be in town.

We watch as the killer stalks their car as they get ready to go home. As they drive off, the killer grabs the can door and hangs on. He pulls the driver right out of the moving car and beats him severely. The killer ties the girl to a tree, tapes his knife to her trombone, and then plays a bloody tune on her back with it.

With this third major attack, the national press gets involved, and it starts to become a big deal. The prison psychologist profiles the killer, and the outlook isn’t good.

There’s a crime and high-speed chase. They catch the guy, and he’s suspiciously driving a stolen car. He then confesses to the murders, but Morales is skeptical.

Three more weeks pass. We watch as Helen drives home from the grocery store alone. She hears someone outside the house, but her husband Floyd doesn’t. Then someone shoots Floyd through the window. The killer breaks in and shoots her as well. She crawls out of the house and makes it to a neighbor’s house. The killer turns around and goes back to the cornfield.

Three weeks pass, and nothing happens. The police presence intensifies. Morales says that if they catch the guy, it’s going to be a miracle.

They find the killer’s car deserted in the woods. Morales and Ramsey soon spot the masked killer not far away. The killer runs to a passing train but Morales shoots him in the leg.

The cops bring in bloodhounds to follow the killer’s scent. They all chase the wounded killer out into the swamp. What happened to him, no one knows, but they never caught him or identified the killer. He may still be walking free today…

Brian’s Commentary

Slasher films in general were still pretty new at this point. The voiceover narration makes it all seem very much like a documentary about the “true crimes” the film is based on. It has local police, state police, and Texas rangers, and each group has different responsibilities, which make it all seem more realistic. This is, in fact, based on a series of actual murders, so they had a lot to work with.

There’s a bit of slapstick with “Spark Plug Benson” and his driving, but it hits a little too silly for this kind of film.

Kevin’s Commentary

I remember seeing this when it came out and finding it pretty creepy at the time as a ten-year-old.

The poster says “In 1946 this man killed five people… Today he still lurks the streets of Texarkana, Ark.” I think by this time, he’s probably not.

The movie is based on what’s known as the Texarkana Moonlight Murders, an unsolved string of at least five murders and eight woundings attributed to the same attacker in early 1946, there’s an informative Wikipedia page about it.

It’s well put together, and I thought it still holds up as an interesting movie. They play up the fear and suspense of course to spice it up and add some humor here and there - maybe a little too much humor. I can’t say it had the same effect on me as it did when I was ten, but it was entertaining.

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Mainstream Films:

2025 Manor of Darkness

* Directed by: Blake Ridder

* Written by: Blake Ridder

* Stars: Kim Spearman, Louis James, Sarah Alexandra Marks

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 22 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Petty thieves meet evil forces when they pretend to be filmmakers and go to a giant manor to rob the place. It went in a direction we didn’t expect and built nicely as they tried to figure a way out. We both really enjoyed it.

Spoilery Synopsis

A man works in the basement until he hears a strange sound. What he hears finds him. Credits roll.

Laura talks to her mother, who needs surgery. Her brother, Chris calls, and he says he’s got something to make everything all right. Laura works at a coffee shop, and she experiences something strange one night. The same night, Chris also experiences some weirdness with Lisa, his girlfriend.

Lisa, for some reason, decides to tell Chris about her abusive family and how she ran away from home. Chris tells about what happened with Laura, eleven months ago.

Flashback time! Chris and Laura broke into a house. It’s not exactly what Chris told her, so Laura wants to leave. This is the house of Mrs. Wong, one of Chris’s old teachers who gave him a hard time– and she’s still home. When the woman gets up, she finds Laura and grabs a knife. As she recognizes Laura, Chris shoots her.

Back in the present, Laura gets a call; she’s lost her job. Chris and Lisa talk about his plan, and how Laura won’t cooperate with him. She goes to the restroom and sees something scary. When she comes out, Chris is talking to Andy, another criminal-type.

Some rich man is looking for a film crew to come into his house and film a documentary, and Chris wants to use the job as an excuse to break in and steal a fortune. We then get Andy’s backstory; he’s divorced but wants to be a good father. Later, he gets a scare in the shower. Laura decides at the last minute that she needs the money and will help in the caper.

Chris, Andy, Laura, and Lisa arrive at the old manor house and let themselves in, as arranged. They have no cell service there, which even Chris admits is a cliche. They all split up and explore the place.

Andy says he feels like he’s been here before. Laura and Lisa check out the basement while Andy and Chris check out the attic. The girls find a tied-up box in the basement that looks too tempting to pass up. They open the box and let out what appears to be the Smoke Monster from “Lost.”

In the attic, the guys find a dead body. Suddenly, Lukas, the owner of the house, and the man from the pre-credit sequence, returns home. He talks about “life after death” and his dead wife. He wants the “documentary filmmakers” to capture her spirit on film.

When they mention the dead body upstairs, Lukas picks up a knife and kills Chris and Laura. Andy goes next, leaving only Lisa, who is killed as well. There are flashes of another woman being forced to scrub and clean in the past, with religious imagery. No, they’re all fine, and we seem to have jumped back in time a few minutes. They all sense that something weird happened, but they’ve only just arrived at the house. Laura especially seems to feel some deja vu. Chris announces that there’s no cell service here at the old house. They all split up to explore the house (again).

The girls find the box in the basement, but it’s already untied and empty. The dead body in the attic is still there. Then Lukas arrives. He asks them if this is “the first time.” He stabs them all again.

We again cut to scenes of a man abusing his religious wife, who prays a lot.

At the door of the house, Laura knows they’ve all been here before, but the others don’t sense it. “We’re all gonna die… again.” Laura tries to leave, but it’s not that easy. All roads lead back to the manor.

She goes into the house and finds that Lukas has killed the other three. She tells him about it, and he knows that she opened the chest. He explains about “The Reset” and that he killed them so that they’d understand the problem. We get a flashback to Lukas and his wife moving into the house. He explains what it is that she released from that box. He has to kill her again to reset the time loop. He does and we see the abusive man and religious woman from the past again. This time, he kills her.

Laura, now reset, tells the others not to go into the basement and then hides the knives in a kitchen. She demonstrates her knowledge of the time loop to them. When Lukas comes in, Andy beats him to death. This results in Laura stabbing herself for another reset.

She explains the situation, and they mostly believe her, but they still want to remain here to find the money. Lukas arrives, as always, and Laura quickly fills him in. He finally explains what they’re up against, and it’s not good.

They all prepare themselves for battle in their own unique ways. Suddenly, the lights go out. Lisa finds herself outside, running from something nasty. Chris is locked in the attic with the body, which gets up and turns into Mrs. Wong, the dead teacher. Andy runs into a sex-crazed version of Laura, who kills him. Laura runs into her mother in the basement, but she knows that’s not real and stabs the woman. Laura dies again, this time at Lisa’s hand, and it all resets again.

This time, they all tie up Lukas as night falls outside. Laura goes to stab Lukas, but since her eyes are shut, she somehow stabs Chris instead. The smoke goes back in the box in the basement. We then get a flashback to what happened with Lukas and his wife when they moved in and kept having to stab each other.

Laura holds a diamond in her hand, she found the treasure and paid for her mother’s surgery. Andy gets his family back. Lisa is sad.

Six months later, a different couple gets invited to the manor and are told to go right on in. They soon find a tied-up box in the basement. Then Chris walks in, he welcomes them to the manor…

Brian’s Commentary

Why were all the characters experiencing bloody scenes of terror before they came to the house? There’s no indication from the trailer that this is a time-loop movie. Still, it’s well done and is paced nicely, which is hard for a time-travel film. The things that happen aren’t really explained at all; we know what happened, we just don’t really know why. It’s pretty good!

Kevin’s Commentary

The manor was a great setting. Cool big place. It seemed low budget with a bit of an indie vibe, but I thought they made the most of it, and it was very effectively done. Their growing frustration with the time loop built nicely.

The cast is good, the camera work and music is effective (kept making me think of John Carpenter’s music from the original “Halloween” at times), and the script is clever. I liked it and would recommend it.

2025 Mouse of Horrors

* Directed by: Brendan Petrizzo

* Written by: Harry Boxley, Mac Gottlieb

* Stars: Lewis Santer, Stephen Staley, Chris Lines

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 24 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

An inhuman mouse hybrid is on the prowl for body parts and victims, with much of the action taking place at a carnival - an excellent setting. The pacing is a bit off and so is the sound, but it’s watchable and gory. We thought it was very mid overall, with both of us giving it a dislike.

Spoilery Synopsis

Two girls are out at the docks. They’ve gone to the wrong place and gotten lost. They’re here to meet a rich doctor with a boat, and what they find isn’t what they expected. They find the boat, but there’s no one there. Out of nowhere, a giant rat stabs Molly and chases Dana through the shipyards and into a closed-down amusement park. As he kills her and laughs, the credits roll.

A man tells his daughter, Chloe, a story about being attacked by flies at the beach. We see the killer is watching them from afar. He’s written a book about “The Mouseboat Massacre” but he doesn’t have an ending for it yet. She goes off with her friend to a bar to meet her other friends, a group of obnoxious teens that the killer can pick off one by one later. They call Dana and Molly, but they don’t answer their phones.

Chloe tells the story about the Mouse thing as we see the Mouse killing a jogger with a chain. A mad doctor created a giant mutated mouse that was crossed with a murderous prisoner. His goal was to collect body parts of women for another experiment. The group decides to sneak into the closed-down amusement park for some fun.

Meanwhile, at the amusement park, Pooh bear has women in a cage, and it looks like a scene from “Pooh: Blood and Honey” Apparently, Pooh and the Mouse are working together to gather body parts for Dr. Rupert. It’s the crossover nobody expected! The doctor whines about the Mouse bringing him male body parts. How is he supposed to make the perfect bride with the wrong kind of body parts?

The Mouse kills a bar owner at about the same time the kids get started at the amusement park. The Mouse shows up and kills the first pair of teens, electrifying one of them with the bumpercars (I don’t think they work like that). He catches and dismembers another girl on the teacup ride. He stabs another on the sidewalk. Another guy falls into a swimming pool full of carnivorous jellyfish (what?).

Several of the girls run from the Mouse straight into the workshop of Dr. Rupert, the creator of the Mouse and the Bear. He explains the whole thing with the Mouse’s creation.

Chloe’s father goes to her mother’s house to look for her since there’s a killer on the loose. For some reason, the Mouse shows up at their house right there and then. The Mouse and the mother play darts, and that goes badly for only one of them. Dad runs away to the fair while the Mouse drags Kim away. Dad and Chloe meet up.

Suddenly, Dr. Rupert shows up, calling for Chloe. His boys really want her, and he threatens to kill her friends if she doesn’t come after them. Chloe insists they go after Kim.

Kim is actually still alive in the doctor’s workshop being tormented by Pooh. Everyone plays hide and seek in the lab. Rupert scolds the boys for their incompetence and then sets them against each other, with the bride as a prize. Chloe’s father knocks out Rupert and lets Chloe run off.

The Mouse and Pooh fight each other for a very long time, but in the end, the Mouse always wins.

Next we see the Mouse eating cheese and dancing on the deck of a steamboat. Pooh shows up, and the battle continues. Suddenly, Pooh is eaten by the worst CGI shark either of us have ever seen.

Suddenly, it’s daytime, and the Mouse is chasing Chloe around the amusement park. She stabs him in the mouth and runs to find Kim and Rupert. Chloe shoots Rupert without delay.

Chloe and Kim smash the tank holding the rest of “The Bride” ending that threat.

Brian’s Commentary

Why they didn’t call this “Steamboat Willie vs Pooh” I’ll never understand.

This one wastes no time; I was bored even before the opening credits.

The sound is awful. Some people, I could hear just fine, and others seemed to mumble everything they said. The actress who plays Chloe was so mushmouthed that we needed to turn the subtitles on.

There are some very similar plot points to 2024’s “The Mouse Trap,” even beyond just the Steamboat Willie connections. Actually, other than the killer being a well-dressed mouse, there’s no real Disney connection (not that the original Steamboat Willie had any kind of real story either). This Mouse is clearly an Art the Clown wannabe, doing all the mime-y things. I was also reminded of “The Jester” by his character’s mannerisms.

It’s got no real plot other than teens being killed one by one. The CGI is some of the worst I’ve ever seen attempted in a released film.

It’s pretty bad.

Kevin’s Commentary

The crossover with Pooh and the Frankenstein elements were unexpected.

I wasn’t impressed with the pacing or the sound quality, but there were some entertaining moments. The Mouse and his pantomime are great, he reminded me a bit of The Joker with a dash of Art The Clown. That was a bright spot.

You know the gore is good when the subtitles have things like “Flesh squelching.”

The lack of enough story made it seem long and tedious after a while.

Pooh’s death was the most rushed, unexpected awful CGI effect ever - it vaguely looked like a shark attack out of the blue. And then the final CGI scene of smashing the bride’s tank. Ugh.

I was going to say I liked it more than disliked it, but by the end I had changed my mind.

2025 Shiver Me Timbers

* Directed by: Paul Stephen Mann

* Written by: Paul Stephen Mann, E.C. Segar

* Stars: Amy Mackie, Miami Parrington, Brendan Nelson, Ross Dillon

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 13 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s 1986 and Halley’s Comet has brought meteors with it, one of which turns Popeye into a big killer. A group of friends camping, along with a few other folks, have a terrible night because of it. We didn’t think it was very funny or particularly scary. It tries, but neither of us thought it was very good.

Spoilery Synopsis

In April 1986, a girl finds a severed hand, which leads to a whole crime scene. Credits roll.

We heard about the return of Halley’s Comet after 76 years. Earlier that day, Olive Oyl and her family are going on a trip and almost run over a weird-looking man with a pipe. “Well blow me down,” he says. He’s weird and talks about the meteor shower tonight.

Castor Oyl, his girlfriend, and sister arrive at the campground, and Olive immediately catches a couple of punks beating up a homeless man who is ranting about “killer meteors” and “the comet is evil!”

Castor talks to his friend about how smart Olive is; she’s been admitted to MIT but doesn’t seem too interested in that. There’s a lot of boring talk between the two. Some more of Castor’s friends show up, and they brought the drugs.

We cut to the old man with the pipe fishing on the water as the meteors start to pass overhead. A tiny one lands right in his pipe, and he just goes on smoking; it’s full of radiation. The old man falls over and starts to mutate.

Popeye has gotten a lot bigger and meaner. He punches a punk in the face and his head explodes.

Over at the campfire, Stevie tells a story from another life, which turns out to be a scare prank. The surviving punk shows up raving about a giant sailor but they laugh him off. Trent and Lizzie retire to their tent. Stevie goes off to the outhouse to take a dump as Popeye approaches, now using the punk’s legbone as his new pipe. He crushes Stevie’s head and then literally poops down his neck.

The campers talk about movies. “Critters” has just come out, and they’re talking about a potential sequel to “The Terminator” and “Video Nasties.” While Trent and Lizzie have sex in their tent– with Popeye bloodily joining in.

Olive and Monique go for a walk and watch the meteors. They soon find one on the ground. Monique gets shot through the head by an evil meteorite. Meanwhile Castor and his girlfriend find what’s left of Stevie. The surviving trio finds Popeye sitting by their campfire. One of them has to go for the car keys in their camp, so Olive creeps on hands and knees hoping Popeye doesn’t notice. It’s suspenseful as she gets into a tent and tries not to make noise. He hears, and yanks her out, but Castor distracts him. Then the chase is on.

The girls run to the car, but they find it in flames from an apparent meteor strike. They remember hearing about an abandoned factory nearby and run toward that. Castor is there, but so is Popeye, and soon, she’s the only one left alive. Popeye dunks Castor into a canister of glowing radioactive ooze.

Olive makes it to the factory, where she runs into a man with a wheelchair and shotgun. The old man decides it’s time to share an old war story. He goes outside and Popeye gets him.

Out of nowhere, the other punk from earlier reappears, grabs the meteorite from Popeye’s pipe, and beats him with it. He doesn’t live long, but it gives Olive time to grab the meteorite from the ground and run off.

Unfortunately, it’s really hot and melts her hand completely off. That’s OK, because the crazy old man had built the largest buzz-saw in history and it’s got a handy arm-plug for her to use. She comes out of the barn and buzzes Popeye into a juicy mess. Still, Popeye puts up a big fight before dying.

Olive and Castor’s girlfriend survive their order. Soon, the police are there examining everything.

A few weeks later, the whole story is on the radio that a cleaned-up Olive is listening to while she works on a prosthetic. We hear that Popeye’s body has gone missing and there are more murders just like his up in New York. We see that Olive is preparing for a rematch with her new turbo hand…

Brian’s Commentary

The film couldn’t quite decide which scenes were happening during the day and which were at night. Sometimes, they alternated between the two in the same scene.

This is the lowest-budget and clearly the worst of the three “Popeye” movies that came out this year. “Popeye’s Revenge” and “Popeye The Slayer Man” were both better, although “better” might be a marginally relative term.

It’s listed as a horror comedy, but it’s really not very funny at all; it’s just kinda lame throughout. Watch it if you feel you must, but it’s not great.

Kevin’s Commentary

Haley’s Comet means meteors too in this universe, and who knew that a meteor shower literally meant meteors showering down to the ground?

I yam disappointed by this effort. Like Brian says, it was the weakest of the Popeye trifecta that have recently been spewed from the bowels of public domain. I’m going to go with almost painfully bad on this one.

2025 Bambi: The Reckoning

* Directed by: Dan Allen

* Written by: Felix Salten, Rhys Warrington

* Stars: Roxanne McKee, Russell Geoffrey Banks, Samira Mighty

* Run Time: 1 Hour 20 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Bambi is all grown up and mutated, and he’s had enough of the humans. The focus here is on a mother and son who become targets after a vehicle crash, but there are also some other subjects of his rage along the way. It’s short and it moves well. We didn’t expect to be as entertained as we were.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open a fairy tale book and get some voiceover narration. We watch an animation of Bambi’s mother getting shot. We get an overview of a very hard life for the local deer population. The factory polluted the waters, and Bambi gets mutated. Credits roll.

We open on a trio of hunters in the dark woods. We cut to Xana and her son Benji on a drive to Benji’s dad’s family. The driver is really chatty, and Benji gets carsick. Suddenly, a giant deer charges their car, knocking it off the road and flipping it entirely. The deer then jumps up and down on the car, causing it to crush the driver. Xana and Benji get out and run for safety.

Mary stands in the backyard chanting “Bambi” repeatedly. Her family is inside talking about the old woman’s dementia. Xana and Benji come to the door; this is grandma’s house. Harriet and Andrew argue about whether they should go try to help the driver or not, and Joshua decides to go out looking. Meanwhile, the hunters, who work for the evil factory, find the taxi, but the driver is nowhere to be found.

As Mary sketches pictures of an angry deer, the three hunters hear something in the woods and pull out their guns. They shoot Joshua by mistake.

Back at the house, Bambi smashes in through the window and terrorizes the people inside. Everyone runs out to Andrew’s camper, but Harriet can’t outrun the massive deer, who gores her with his antlers. As they drive away, the deer pursues them. Finally, they break away.

The hunters arrive at Grandma’s house and look at the damage. They find Harriet, more or less still alive, ripped in half, and finish her off.

The camper comes to a log in the road, and moving it turns out to be a disaster. They end up driving several miles at high speed with Andrew tied to the back of the bumper, bouncing all the way. Harrison hides, but Bambi soon finds him, and he gets what he deserves when he learns that Bambi has friends...

Grandma wanders off, and Xana and Benji go after her. The old woman repeats “Death. Death.” and we see just how stupid Benji really is as he lights up a torch. This shows them all the bones of Bambi’s victims. They’re in his nest! The deer reappears, and the three run straight to the hunters and tell them the story. They all drive to the hunters’ place, where they run into Simon, Benji’s father.

As Xana and Simon argue, he admits he knows all about the company dumping chemicals. Michael, the leader of the hunters, points his gun at Xana; he has no intention of helping them. Xana finds Joshua and the driver’s bodies, so she knows it as well.

Benji watches as the other two hunters carry out a baby deer in a cage to use as bait. Benji releases the baby, and Bambi takes care of the two hunters.

Bambi comes face to face with Mary, but suddenly, the whole base explodes when she shoots a pressurized gas canister. Xana, Benji, and Simon come face to face with Michael. Bambi shows up, still burning from the explosion, and takes care of Michael for them.

Simon and Xana fight over the satellite phone. She wants to call the police, but he knows he’s going to jail for the illegal dumping if she does. He runs off, leaving his ex-wife and child alone with the monster. They grab the fawn and hand it over to the big deer.

Michael returns from somewhere and shoots Bambi repeatedly. Mary comes out of nowhere and shoots him in the back.

Simon, making his getaway, sees something moving in the backseat. It’s one of Bambi’s little rabbit friends. This one has seen too much Monty Python and does “the thing.” Simon dies.

As Bambi lay dying, the little fawn is sad. Time for a sequel?

Brian’s Commentary

This is based on the 1923 book “Bambi, A Life In The Woods,” not the much more well-known 1942 Disney cartoon.

The creature effects are less than stellar, but the overall story moves along nicely and doesn’t slow down or get boring. I haven’t seen a horror movie with a stupid kid putting everyone else in extreme danger in quite a while; I thought it was a trope that had been forgotten.

Overall, this was way better than I expected. Not great, but better than expectations.

Kevin’s Commentary

This wasn’t just an angry deer, it was an angry monstrous deer - gigantic, fast, strong, and fanged. Thanks to a chemical being dumped in the woods that mutated him. It was impressive how some of the people managed to damage each other in the process dealing with Bambi.

The carnivorous, crafty bunnies were a nice touch too. It wasn’t just Bambi who mutated, it was all the little forest creatures.

I was dreading going into it, but I was pleasantly surprised with how entertaining it was. Dumb, but entertaining.

1965 Planet of the Vampires

* Directed by: Mario Bava

* Written by: Renato Pestriniero, Ib Melchior, Alberto Bevilacqua

* Stars: Barry Sullivan, Norma Bengell, Angel Aranda

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 28 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

After a crash landing on an alien planet, fixing their ship and taking off again is only one of the problems a crew has to deal with. It’s not quite vampirism despite the title, but the dead rise and there are alien issues. There are some horror elements for sure, but it’s mostly science fiction. The retro-futurism is dialed up to 11 and it’s got a decent story. All in all, we’d call it entertaining fun.

Spoilery Synopsis

We zoom in on a spaceship and then see what’s inside. The bridge crew is all decked out in high-necked black leather uniforms that are a cross between the X-Men and Leather Daddies. They’re picking up strange signals from a point on a nearby planet. Captain Mark Markary calls the other ship, and Mark’s brother starts to say something when the ship loses contact.

Suddenly the gravity goes crazy and everyone experiences 20g as they approach the nearby planet. Somehow, they regain control enough to land on the desolate planet. When they recover, Mark’s crew wakes up and attacks each other.

The ship’s doctor staggers outside, and the atmosphere clears his mind. He doesn’t know why he behaved that way. Mark and Wess inspect their ship outside, and everything looks normal; it was an excellent landing, even if they can’t remember doing it. They find the other ship on their sensors, but can’t tell how badly it’s damaged.

Mark and several of the men go outside and explore the alien, rocky terrain. They get to the other ship, the Galliott, and immediately find a couple of corpses outside; they fought and killed each other. Mark comes to the conclusion that this was all planned… by someone. When they look in through the windows, it appears that they’re all dead inside.

Mark and the others go back to their own ship, the Argos, for tools, and leave Eldon at the other ship to guard the bodies. As soon as they leave he starts hearing voices.

When Mark and the others return, all the bodies are gone, as is Eldon. Also, whatever happened to the signal the ship had been receiving for the past two years? The signal is gone now. The Argos’s solar batteries are drained, so they may not even be able to take off again when the time comes.

Outside, the dead crawl out of their graves and rip off their plastic shrouds. Mark dictates a “captain’s log” but stops when he sees Wess stagger into the ship. Wess tries to disconnect the meteor rejector, but he doesn’t know why when he comes to his senses again. The meteor rejector on the other ship was destroyed– why?

One of their own men, Bert, is killed, and with his dying breath, he accuses Captain Sallis, one of the dead men from the other ship. As everyone discusses the situation, dead Bert opens his eyes and starts to listen. Tiona sees him moving and faints; then the crew buries Bert.

The crew finds the wreckage of another ship, and this one’s been here a long time. They find the skeletal remains of some kind of huge alien. Mark and Sanya go inside, and some of the machinery is still active. They start randomly pushing buttons and hear a recording of what the aliens sounded like. Then the doors close, and they’re trapped inside. They eventually figure out how to open the door again, but when they do, the guard outside, Carter, is gone.

On their return, Tiona reports seeing more of the dead up and walking around. Mark sees Sallis and Keir, two of the men assumed to be dead from the Galliott. Captain Sallis tells his story, and it’s all believable.

Tiona, on the other hand, insists that they are really dead. She insists they open up the graves and check, and they are, in fact, empty.

Meanwhile, Sallis and Keir head straight to the meteor rejector and disable it. When Mark and the others catch Sallis, he admits that he’s not Sallis. Sallis is possessed by another being just using the body. They’re the ones who forced the crew to fight and kill each other so they would have bodies to inhabit. They also sent the signal that brought the humans here. Mark calls them a “breed of parasites,” and Sallis doesn’t like that comparison. They want to go to a more inhabited planet, and they’re holding the meteor rejector hostage. The alien inside Sallis says they can willingly let them in while they are still alive, and it would be a symbiotic relationship, but the humans don’t like that idea.

Mark decides to blow up the Galliott and take off anyway. He and Sonya go over there and find all the dead working on the ship, getting it ready to blast off. With the meteor rejector, they just might be able to do it. They run into Toby, Marks’s brother, and he’s one of the aliens as well now. Mark shoots him dead again.

The living and the possessed have a battle over the Galliot and snatch their meteor rejector while Wess is finishing up repairs on the Argos.

Mark and Sonya run back to their ship and take off immediately. They reinstall the meteor rejector. Wess points out that out of eighteen people, only three are left. Not long afterward, Wess notices that Mark is acting strangely and comes to the conclusion that the captain is possessed as well. He tells Sonya, who picks up a gun on the way to confront Mark. Turns out, both Mark and Sonya are possessed. They intend to go back home and infect the whole planet.

Wess runs to the control room and smashes the meteor rejector, dying in the process. Mark says they’ll never be able to reach home now, but they can make it to this primitive planet the inhabitants call Earth…

The final twist being that the heroes we were rooting for were aliens too.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s no “Forbidden Planet,” but the sets and costumes are on the same par. It’s said to be one of the original influences for “Alien” as well, and several shots and ideas are very similar.

The spaceships are miniatures filmed way too close up, and they don’t look good at all. The planet, while colorfully lit like an episode of “Star Trek,” is hazy, smoky, and effectively creepy and alien. The creatures are more possessed-zombies than actual vampires, but they’re still “undead.”

It’s dated in a 1960’s sci-fi way, being too colorful and sharp, but otherwise, it’s really very good.

Kevin’s Commentary

The space effects aren’t great, but the retro-futurism of the sets, props, and costumes is awesome. I’d barely call it horror, heavily science fiction. Science fiction done the way it was in the 1960s. The story is decent, the cast does a convincing job, and I can see where it might have planted the seeds of “Alien” and some other films that came after this one.

I’m surprised I’ve never seen it before, and I’m glad that I did. I was entertained.

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Mainstream Films:

2025 Him

* Directed by: Justin Tipping

* Written by: Skip Bronkie, Zack Akers, Justin Tipping

* Stars: Marlon Wayans, Tyriq Withers, Julia Fox

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 36 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Set in an alternate reality where the NFL is the USFF, we start out with little Cam who has the perfect combination of football obsession at a young age combined with an athletic physique capable of being a world class athlete. As he is groomed to possibly replace a retiring megastar, things get strange and ominous - or maybe he’s just seeing things from stress and head injuries. We both struggled with this because we give no weight or value to football. They take the obsession, the extremes required to stay at the top, idolatry, and cult level fandom to the extreme. Neither of us fault the acting or production values, but we didn’t enjoy it that much.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on Cam, a little boy, watching football on TV. The whole family gets very excited when their team wins. His hero, Isaiah White, gets injured badly. Credits roll.

Fourteen years later, Isaiah is still playing, better than ever, but everyone is talking about when he’ll finally retire - maybe another year at best. Now-adult Cameron Cade is said to be the next star of the game. During an interview with Cam, he says he wants to be the GOAT. One night while practicing, something very strange happens to Cam.

We cut to Cam’s brain scans, and something’s not right. He’s had a traumatic brain injury and a stapled wound on his head. On his return to the game, everyone talks about him surviving the attack. Half the family thinks he isn’t ready, and the other half insists there’s nothing wrong with him. He’s not fine.

Cam wants to be alone and sullen, so he goes to a big party and ignores everyone. Tom, Cam’s manager, calls and says that Isaiah White himself wants to train Cam for a week. On the way there, we see how cult-like some sports fans are.

Cam goes to see Isaiah, who lives in a really cool place. He’s going to put Cam through a special “Boot camp” for football. We then get a training montage. Cam gets a physical exam, and someone steals his underwear. Cam then meets Elise, Isaiah’s wife, who is a power blonde influencer selling jade vaginal eggs and offers Cam one of their anal jades for men before she heads off for travel. Cam talks to Marco, the doctor, about blood transfusions and injections.

On the second day, Isaiah and Cam go for a run in the desert, Cam passes out, and he sees something else that’s weird. Now it’s clear that he’s been hallucinating some of the weirdness we’ve seen. Marco gives him another special shot, and he’s suddenly feeling much better. Then things get weird and they torture a man to motivate Cam to play harder. Afterward, he sits in a hyperbaric chamber for several hours, where he hallucinates some more.

On the third day, they actually play some football, and one of the players gets hurt pretty badly, which seems to be what Isaiah had in mind. More hallucinations ensue– maybe? Did Isaiah really just kill an overzealous fan? That one seemed more real, as well as the aftermath.

The next day, Isaiah and Cam go out to the desert to shoot guns. Cam talks about his father and why he plays the game.

Elsie takes Cam to a party in the city. Marco is there, and he says, “Run!” He meets the owners of the team, and they like him. Meanwhile, Isaiah stays home and works out. There’s more hallucinations, and maybe a ritual of some sort. Maybe Marco loses his head. Stuff happens, and maybe some of it’s real.

On the next day, Cam starts injecting himself. He confronts Isaiah, who talks about generations of blood, a gift from the gods. The blood of their mentors give them the powers of the chosen one. The trick is, there can be only one, and Isaiah’s contract is nearly up. “You’re gonna have to take it from me.” The two men fight to see who really has the killer spirit. Cam has it and uses it.

In a surreal, impossible ceremony, where all the characters gang up on Cam and explain how he’s been groomed all his life for this. Cam instead beats the mascot to death with an ax before killing everyone else with a sword.

And then what?

Brian’s Commentary

What in the hell was that climax???

This is one of those is-it-real-or-a-hallucination stories that we’re so sick of. Cam had a head injury, so all the crazy stuff he sees later on is suspect.

I suspect the filmmaker is trying to show us everything that’s wrong with the mindset around sports obsession, but maybe I’m being charitable with that.

I suppose my problem here is that I have no understanding at all of the screaming, raw, passion and obsession with what is ultimately a pointless game.

The ending was cool and over the top, but it made no real sense at all.

It’s well made, looks great, and the acting is fine. On the other hand, I couldn’t wait until it was over and was bored half to death with it.

Kevin’s Commentary

Well into the movie, I thought there was too much of wondering if things happening are really that strange or if Cam is hallucinating from some combination of stress, obsession, and head injury. Though the effects and visuals are very cool.

As a not-at-all football fan who enjoys watching the spectacle of the Superbowl and really nothing else about the sport, it was hard relating to the passion for the game that so much of the movie revolves around.

Past the halfway point, I started to suspect that the whole thing, or most of it, was real, staged and arranged by Isaiah who is crazy with a God complex. Right from the beginning with the clonk on the head that Cam got. Isaiah thinks he can do or get away with anything, so he does. And with all the “supplements” and substances being administered to Cam, there could easily be hallucinogens in the mix - augmented by a head injury.

I guess in the end, it’s up to the viewer to decide how much of it was real and how much was not. I wouldn’t say I hated the film, but I’d only give it a five or six overall.

2024 Things Will Be Different

* Directed by: Michael Felker

* Written by: Michael Felker

* Stars: Adam David Thompson, Riley Dandy, Chloe Skoczen

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 42 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A pair of siblings go into hiding after a robbery, in a farmhouse that has a time travel feature, which they know about going into. Things get complicated as what they expect to be a short wait turns into a quagmire of overlaps and loops. It’s well made, but too stretched out, and we both thought it would have benefitted from being compacted down. It’s a mystery that unfolds, but neither of us were very satisfied or comprehending of the ending.

Spoilery Synopsis

As the credits roll, we hear a phone call between two people planning a hideaway out of town after some kind of robbery; they’re brother and sister, and there are big bags of money involved.

We cut to Joseph and Sidney meeting in a diner. When they hear a siren passing by, they clear out quickly. They go to the woods, where Joseph knows of a house they can hide in.

They arrive at the house and run off some locals who are there target shooting. The house is trashed inside. They go inside and hear the police approaching. They both know a strange combination trick with the grandfather clocks in the house that unlock a special door. They’ve got a book with instructions along with a phone and some magic-sounding words.

When they come out of the closet, it’s winter outside, and the house is all clean and restored. “Now we wait for time to pass in our present, and when we head back, we’ll be clear. Two weeks and counting.”

The two talk about their lives and about the bar patron who told Joseph about the magical, time-traveling clocks in this house. It’s noticed that there are no cars, no planes, no signs of other people. When it’s time to go back where they came from, they find “Go to the mill” scratched on a wooden sign.

Inside the mill, they find a badly burned corpse. They find another cryptic message that demands their compliance. Sid freaks and runs outside to vomit blood when she crosses the perimeter. The body in the barn was the woman who gave Joseph the book with instructions.

They come into a possession of a tape recorder that allows them to have a conversation with… whoever’s behind all this. The man on the tape wants to “wipe” them, painlessly and instantaneously. The man says there’s someone coming to use the time doorway that they can’t see, and he wants Joe and Sid to kill that person. He sends them pistols.

They set up outside to watch the perimeter, and nothing happens for a long time. On day 352, Sid has researched that the place has been deserted since around 1955. The “Vice Grip” has since used the place as a sort of time-travelling safehouse. She’s had many theories about all this since they’ve been trapped here.

Finally, someone walks across the field toward the house. They get down, loaded with a sniper rifle and aim at Sid. Joe yells, and they both run inside. Joe and the intruder shoot at each other. Sid gets shot in the shoulder as the intruder plays disco music.

As Sid talks to the tape recorder, Joe is elsewhere being tied up and tormented. He tells the tape recorder that the intruder is dead– as the intruder controls the recorder for him.

The intruder makes a run for the house and gets into a fight with Sid. The intruder is finally unmasked, and it’s Steph (her own daughter, grown up). Joe runs in and shoots Sid by mistake as the intruder runs upstairs to the time closet.

Joe goes upstairs to find the time closet has been destroyed. Later, he buries Sid outside. He then meets “The Vice Grips” who want to know about the visitor. Since he failed, they are going to wipe him. They explain that Joe is just a small part in a much bigger project. Joe asks to go back and try again, he can fix the mistakes and get the results they need. “Things will be different.”

The Vice opens a door, and Joe sees that it’s the morning they arrived at the house. And there’s a plane flying overhead. He freely crosses the perimeter. He finds his old self, kills him, and takes his place. He grabs the money and heads off to the diner to meet Sid.

The Vice discusses whether or not he’ll be the first to break the cycle.

Sid arrives at the diner, but it’s not like before. He tells her about how many times he’s tried to fix things (how does she know?). He points her rifle at his head and tells her to end it. We see how old Joe has gotten, his beard is gray.

Brian’s Commentary

The basic plot is interesting with the odd time travel portrayal, but there’s so much waiting and angst that I nodded off at a couple of points. There’s only a cast of two, and they do a fine job; the setting also works well. Still, this feels like a fifteen minute short film with a ton of padding.

It’s very strange, and it’s NOT all clear at the end.

Kevin’s Commentary

It was an interesting take, I thought, having them know about the time traveling aspect of the property before they went to it. It was interesting how the time travel seemed to be a mix of retro tech and magic incantations.

It’s a beautiful location, perfect setting, and good cast. But it’s way too stretched out, with long periods of not much happening. It could have been improved by cutting the length down.

It’s a mystery that only sort of came together at the end. And there were things unexplained. Watching it again would probably make things clearer, but should I really have to do that? I wouldn’t say I disliked it, but I wasn’t very pleased either.

1960 Circus of Horrors

* Directed by: Sidney Hayers

* Written by: George Baxt

* Stars: Anton Diffring, Erika Remberg, Yvonne Monlaur

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 28 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A plastic surgeon on the run after a surgery gone bad changes his own face and goes on the run with a couple sidekicks. When they take over a circus as a hiding place with new identities, we continue to see what a bad guy the surgeon is. The horror elements are low-key, it’s much more of a crime drama thriller, but it’s well made. And we thought it was entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re in England, 1947, and a woman screams as she smashes the mirrors in her room. Two men in a car talk about one of their fiances has gone missing, probably to the cottage after plastic surgery, which is where they are headed. Dr. Rossiter may have experimented on Evelyn. The men break inside as the woman yells “Rossiter” and giggles insanely over her badly mangled face.

Next, we see Dr. Rossiter run down some men on the road who have set up a police blockade and then goes over a cliff. At another cottage, Martin opens the door and badly wounded Rossiter staggers in. He says the operation on Evelyn wasn’t botched, there should have been a sequence of operations, but she panicked and took off her bandages too soon. Still, the law is after him now. He recovers and says he wants to move to France to escape the law. He’s built himself a new face with Martin’s help, and he now calls himself Dr. Bernard Schuler.

“Bernard,” along with Angela and Martin (who are brother and sister), move to France and look for a place to hide out. They stop to ask directions at a circus. The little girl he talks to is all scarred up from a bomb. Bernard talks to Vanet, the owner of the circus, and offers to fix the man’s daughter’s face.

The operation on Vanet’s daughter Nicole proceeds quickly. Bernard removes the bandages, and she looks great. For his next trick, he wants to buy the circus from Vanet; the circus is worthless, and Bernard just wants to use it as a front. Very drunk Vanet signs the contract and then goes outside to abuse the dancing bear who promptly mauls him to death. Bernard didn’t cause it, but he didn’t help rescue him either.

Bernard goes to town and watches as a prostitute stabs and robs a man. She’s got a big scar on her face, and he offers to help her look good again. She’s Elissa, and Angela does not approve of fixing her up. Bernard wants to change criminals’ faces and employ them at the circus. “A circus of criminals? No, a circus of beauty!” he exclaims.

Ten years later, the circus has become very successful. Angela and Martin are still Bernard’s tagalong minions helping run things. Little Nicole has grown up to be one of the star performers, as has Elissa. Elissa complains that she deserves top billing, more so than Magda. Magda, on the other hand, plans to leave at the end of the week and let Nicole replace her. Bernard doesn’t want Magda to leave, since he “made” her.

Tonight is going to be Magda’s “farewell performance,” and Angela warns Bernard that he has to let her go. She gets involved in a knife-throwing, spinning-wheel act. The knives start flying, and at one point, Martin pulls the plug on the spinning wheel, which messes up the speed at just the wrong place so the knife-thrower’s timing is off; she dies.

The police inspector says this place is known as “The Jinx Circus” since there have been so many deaths among the performers. A new woman comes to see the doctor; her face has been burned up with acid. He says she’s going to be his masterpiece.

The whole circus packs up and goes back to England. Crime reporter Desmond immediately takes a liking to Nicole. He wants to write a big expose story about the circus and seems surprised that Bernard and his sidekicks aren’t on board with it. He’s done a lot of research on the many deaths, and he’s starting to catch on. He starts making out with Elissa, and she might tell him what he wants to know.

Desmond learns that all the dead performers had had plastic surgery at some point. He remembers Rossiter, the criminal plastic surgeon from ten years ago. He then talks to Scotland Yard.

Elissa is angry when she sees that Melina, the new girl, has gotten top billing for the show. She threatens to leave if she’s not the star and then she learns about “Rossiter” by eavesdropping on Desmond and Nicole. She threatens Bernard with exposing the secret, which seems like a bad idea when she knows how many “accidents” there have been.

Soon after, someone sneaks a snake into Elissa’s room. She screams, but she’s all right. She knows who did it and threatens to talk to Desmond after the show tonight. Bernard tells Martin to take care of it. During Elissa’s act, Martin messes with the rope, and she falls to her death.

Desmond and the chief know that Bernard is Rossiter, but they can’t prove it. Desmond suggests bringing in Evelyn from the opening scene.

That night, Bernard himself is attacked by a gorilla and gets some deep scratches on his face. He wants Martin and Angela to repair his face like before. He also announces that he’s marrying Melina, which really angers Angela.

Evelyn comes to the circus and looks at Bernard, whose face is half covered in a bandage. She recognizes his ring, which we hadn’t seen before. He knows who she is as well, and he knows that she knows. Martin and Angela want out, but he won’t allow that.

Tonight is Melina’s big act; she’s his masterpiece, and she’ll be in the lion’s cage. The lions, of course, will be sedated by Martin, who very well might double-cross his boss. As Melina goes into the cage for the act, Martin pulls Angela aside; they’re leaving. The lions are frisky because Martin didn’t sedate them properly, and she quickly figures that out. When she falls down, the lions are all over her.

Bernard/Rossiter catches Martin and Angela leaving and fights with them. He stabs Angela, but Martin releases the angry gorilla who hates Bernard. The police nab Martin, and the gorilla nabs Rossiter.

Meanwhile, crazy Evelyn steals a car and goes back to the circus. Injured Rossiter attacks Desmond as Nicole watches. As he makes his escape, Evelyn runs over him with her car. He dies.

Brian’s Commentary

Apparently, plastic surgery could be done on a coffee table in the 60s. The special effects for the various characters’ scars are very good. A lot of the plot itself doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but it’s entertaining throughout.

It’s… alright. Not great.

Kevin’s Commentary

I thought the Elissa and Nicole actresses look too much alike. Then they brought in Melina for further confusion.

It’s really a suspenseful crime drama and barely horror. The doctor is a bad guy with a giant sized ego that lets him think he can get away with anything, which is his downfall.

All that aside, I thought the movie was well put together and entertaining.

1973 Flesh For Frankenstein

* AKA “Andy Warhol’s Frankenstein” and “Frankenstein 3D”

* Directed by: Antonio Margheriti, Paul Morrissey

* Written by: Paul Morrisey, Tonino Guerra, Pat Hackett

* Stars: Joe Dallesandro, Udo Kier, Dalila De Lazzaro

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 35 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a strange and raunchy version of the Frankenstein story with lots of dark humor. The doctor creates a male and female at the same time with the intention of breeding a personal race of beings that will obey only him. The visuals, script, and direction are interesting and the cast is a collection of strange characters. We both thought it was offbeat, weird, and entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

As the credits roll, we watch a little boy and girl, Erik and Monica, “operate” on a doll and put it in a guillotine. Later, we see the two children in a carriage with their mother, Baroness Katrin Frankenstein. Up at the castle, Baron Frankenstein yells at Otto about not keeping the lab clean.

We cut to the lab, where Frankenstein has created a perfect woman to accompany his perfect man. No– the men he’s been working on are all just bits and pieces. He talks to his wife/sister about sending the children away to school, but she doesn’t approve.

Two young farmhands talk about Sascha wanting to become a monk. One of them is Nicholas, and Katrin calls him out for messing with all the women. She tells him to report to her at the castle tomorrow morning.

Meanwhile, Frankenstein tells Otto that he needs to find the head of a male who loves women a whole bunch. He needs to be the start of a whole new race. He tells a story about his visit to a whorehouse when he was young. What he really needs is… a Serbian!

Meanwhile, at the whorehouse in town Sascha and Nicholas arrive and want to play. Sascha’s not really interested in the girls; he only has eyes for Nicholas. The baron and Otto stand outside to see who comes out. They take one look at Sascha and decide that his head is the one they want. They soon take him by surprise and take his head with a big, curved hedge-trimmer.

The two villains head back to their lab and connect the head to the already-assembled man’s body they’ve been building.

Nicholas reports to the baroness as ordered. She has a job for him… in the bedroom.

The scientists work on the woman, and she wakes up– until Frankenstein pulls out her organs and apparently orgasms. He puts her organs back inside and then just has regular sex with her. “Why are you looking at me, you filthy thing? Turn around!” he commands. “To know death is to f**k life– right in the gallbladder!”

Frankenstein and Otto turn on the electricity, and both his creatures wake up. The next project will be to reduce the gestation period so their offspring will grow more quickly.

We cut to the dining room, where Frankenstein, his wife, and children are served by Nicholas. Otto brings in the two creatures to sit at the table for dinner with the family. It’s awkward and ridiculous.

The monster, with Sascha’s head and brain, still has eyes for Nicholas, who clearly recognizes him. Katrin explains that she doesn’t know much about what her husband does, and he wants to check out the laboratory himself.

Meanwhile, in the lab, Erik and Monica play with a disembodied hand and watch a beating heart. When their father shows up, they clear right out.

The servant, Olga, comes into the lab, looking for the children, and finds the man and woman. Before she can do anything, Otto catches her and chases her into the torture chamber, where he has his way with her. He rips her open and pulls her guts out.

It’s finally time to make the two creatures mate. She kisses him, but he doesn’t respond. She looks good, but since he’s playing for the wrong team, he isn’t aroused. Frankenstein takes the failure badly. He blames his wife.

Nicholas breaks into the lab and talks to Sascha’s head, which is on a much taller body now. Sascha speaks; he doesn’t really care about his life, he just wants to be dead. Nicholas starts to lead them outside, but Frankenstein and Otto intervene. They knock out Nicholas and plan to use his head on the monster next. Katrin shows up, and she’s fine with all of it.

Katrin decides she wants to have sex with the monster, and Frankenstein is willing to let her try. The two go off to her bedroom and get to work. They start making out, but then she tells him to squeeze her tight, and he does– until she can’t breathe and dies.

Downstairs, Otto tears open the woman creature as restrained Nicholas is forced to watch. Frankenstein comes in, sees what happened, and kills Otto. The male creature carries Katrin in at this point. The monster then turns on Frankenstein, who loses his hand before getting impaled. He still manages to give a speech before dying.

Sascha/The Monster says he’d rather be dead than go on like this. He tears himself open, and all his innards fall out on the floor.

The two children come in and find Nicholas still tied up as they look at the pile of dead bodies. They each pick up a scalpel and move in toward Nicholas…

Brian’s Commentary

Although it’s called “Andy Warhol’s Frankenstein,” Andy Warhol really had nothing to do with any of it other than a few visits to the set. They only used his name for advertising purposes, although there is a great deal of gaudy, tacky artworks on the walls.

There are some interesting gore effects, although the color and consistency of the “blood” doesn’t hold up. It took us a long while to put two and two together to see that Frankenstein and Katrin were brother and sister as well as husband and wife; it’s no wonder the kids can’t speak. It was filmed in 3D, and there are some really obvious shots designed to take advantage of that.

This one is gory, sexy, funny, and just plain weird. All kinds of weird. It’s not exactly what I’d call good, but it’s definitely unusual.

Kevin’s Commentary

I’d seen this before and enjoyed it just as much this time around. Everything about it is just weird and slightly off, with a 70s vibe running through it, and that’s what makes it good. It’s weird, gross, creepy, and funny all at once.

1974 Blood for Dracula

* AKA “Andy Warhol’s Dracula”

* Directed by: Paul Morrissey

* Written by: Paul Morrissey, Pat Hackett, Bram Stoker

* Stars: Joe Dallesandro, Udo Kier, Vittorio De Sica

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 46 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Sickly Dracula must have virgin blood to survive, and Italy is the only place he can find one in these modern times. So he and his faithful servant set off on a road trip to find one. It’s another strange take on a classic horror tale, with plenty of dark humor. It’s a little on the long and slow side, but we still both enjoyed it.

Spoilery Synopsis

We watch as Count Dracula puts on his makeup and paints his blonde hair black. Anton, Dracula’s servant, says there’s not much time, and Dracula will need to relocate to Italy, where they have lots of virgins. If he doesn’t get the blood of a virgin within two weeks, both he and his sister will die. Dracula doesn’t want to leave the castle, but he doesn’t have much choice. They put his sickly sister into her coffin; she can’t go along with them.

In Italy, a bunch of girls work in their garden, and since it’s hot, Rubunia and Saphiria decide to go topless. Mario, the Italian servant, has a very New York accent.

Dracula and Anton stop at a place to rent a room for the night. The landlady remarks on how thin and sickly Dracula looks, and they don’t have any food that Dracula can eat. They talk about one of the Di Fiore family who have four daughters that might be virgins, and this interests Anton a lot.

The Marquis Di Fiore and his wife discuss the rich new count who has arrived in town. The family needs money, so maybe they could marry off one of their useless daughters. Anton shows up at the door with a deal. The family offers them rooms at their huge house. The Marquis really liked the name “Dracula” and can barely stop saying it.

On the way out, Anton stops at a restaurant and likes a girl he sees there. She gets hit by a car, and Anton soaks up a bunch of her blood in a piece of bread. It’s tasty!

At the big house, Saphiria and Rubinia make love to Mario, as a group, so they clearly aren’t virgins. He points out that the family is broke and they’re about to lose everything. He prefers their 14-year-old sister, Esmerelda.

Dracula arrives at the house and makes introductions with all the girls. The girls wonder about the count. Anton and Mario clearly hate each other.

Saphiria brings Dracula some vegetables to eat in his room, and he talks to her about marriage. And tries to confirm if she’s a virgin or not. When she says that she is, he bites her. And quickly regrets it as he turns green and violently vomits it back up. Meanwhile, Mario makes love to another of the sisters as they discuss aristocracy and the lower classes.

Dracula rejects Saphiria for not being a virgin. Mario and Dracula argue over Communism, revolutions, and the aristocracy. Rubinia and Perla talk about Mario, Sex, and married life. Not long after, Dracula tests (and tastes) Rubinia, who also lies about her virginity. Again, he gets sick and it all comes back up.

Since neither of the middle daughters are actually virgins, Anton says they’re going back to Romania. He hints that the youngest daughter might be suitable and leaves it hanging at that. A bit later, Dracula comments on how run down and shabby everything is, pointing out the family’s poverty to Esmerelda. They talk and she mentions a long engagement that didn’t work out, so Dracula just assumes she isn’t a virgin.

Mario gets nosy and checks out the coffin, which he finds empty. He suddenly knows all about vampires. Rubinia and Saphirira check Perla and decide that she is a virgin; they try to take her to the count. She runs away into Mario, who tells her about vampires. He says she needs to lose her virginity before Dracula gets her, and then he makes it happen. The Marquesa soon learns about the vampire, as does everyone else. Esmerelda comes in, and she’s not feeling well. No one notices the scarf around her neck. Or the smile she gives the Count. Apparently she was a virgin after all.

Meanwhile, Dracula and Anton carry the coffin back out to the car, at least until Mario smashes it with an ax. Anton stabs the Marquesa, who shoots him in the back. Mario cuts off both Dracula’s arms and chases him around the house. Then he cuts his legs off. Finally, as he’s about to stake Dracula through the heart, Esmerelda runs out screaming. “No! He belongs to me!” She jumps on the stake as well.

Mario and Perla go back inside.

Brian’s Commentary

They don’t have a single virgin in Romania?

Just as with the Frankenstein film, Andy Warhol had nothing to do with this other than letting the producers use his name.

Dracula here goes out in the daytime and touches the cross, although he’s not happy to do either. He refuses to eat garlic.

It’s got plenty of funny bits, but it’s nowhere near as over-the-top as “Flesh for Frankenstein” which shared much of the same cast and crew. The four sisters all look too similar, so it’s a little hard to tell them apart, and the acting, all around, is exaggerated and more than a little hammy.

Kevin’s Commentary

I wonder why Dracula bothered using a mirror while putting on makeup in the opening credits. Though it was a good way to let us know right off the bat he’s a vampire. And speaking of bats, this version doesn’t seem to be able to shape shift. Though he’s also not too bothered by crosses or sunlight. And he does seem to have hypnotic power over women he’s bitten.

This has a lot of the vibe, and same cast, as “Flesh For Frankenstein,” but it’s more slow moving and not quite the same level of weirdness. It is still strange and pretty funny though.

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We will start off with “Shelby Oaks,” then have no choice but to take a look at “Compulsion.” “Alma and the Wolf” will be stopping by before “Operation Undead” occurs. All of these are new-ish 2025 films. Lastly, we’ll watch the final film of the second Godzilla era, “Godzilla Vs Destoroyah” from 1995.

This as well as the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #50, are on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2025 Shelby Oaks

* Directed by: Chris Stuckman

* Written by: Sam Liz, Chris Stuckman

* Stars: Camille Sullivan, Sarah Durn

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 31 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a mix of documentary, found footage, and standard movie format that mixes the three smoothly together. After a quartet of paranormal investigators vanish, the sister of one of them starts an obsessive investigation of her own looking for answers. She finds some, and it’s thoroughly creepy. We both thought the movie improved as it went along, with a stronger second half, and we give it a thumbs up.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re told that Riley, the host of “Paranormal Paranoids,” went missing in 2008. We watch an old video of her talking about being scared. That was the last time anyone saw her alive. In Darke County Ohio, we hear news reports about Riley and her whole team going missing. Could it have been a hoax?

Mia, Riley’s sister, has been searching for her for the past twelve years. We cut to people talking about this new thing called YouTube, and how it created a whole new type of paranormal researcher. We watch one old clip that took place in an abandoned prison, and Riley was never the same afterward. They never really got famous until their disappearance.

The last evidence of the group was at a place called Shelby Oaks, a modern ghost town. Eventually three of the team were found, dead and mutilated, but Riley’s body was not found. We see that clip again, and this time, we see a creepy figure standing outside the window behind Riley. “Mia, he’s back,” she said. Mia talks about Riley’s visions from when she was little.

As the interviewer and Mia finish up, a man comes to the door. “She finally let me go,” he says before shooting himself in the head. Credits roll. In his hand is a tape labelled “Shelby Oaks,” and Mia steals it.

Mia watches the tape, which contains missing footage from Riley’s camera. Riley introduces the town of Shelby Oaks, but then gets all serious and wants to leave. She mentions having a dream about the place. They explore the place, but that night, there are weird sounds outside the buildings; howling and whining, like animals. We then see the man who killed himself on their doorstep come into the building and kill some of the crew.

Mia sees someone standing outside looking in her window– on the second floor. Riley used to talk about the same thing happening.

Detective Burke tells Mia about Wilson Miles, the man who did the killings. Mia still doesn’t tell the police about the tape. She wants to investigate on her own. Miles had been incarcerated in that old haunted prison as well, so that’s all connected. She interviews the former warden of the prison, who talks about how oddly quickly the prison deteriorated after Wilson Miles arrived there. The place literally rotted.

Mia tells her husband Robert more of her suspicions, and yes, she’s seen the thing at the window a few times. The thing out there wanted something from Riley, and it’d been stalking her all her life, minus the few years when Miles was in prison. Robert thinks Mia needs psychiatric help.

Mia reads about Incubuses and other demons. The pictures look familiar. Later, she sees a demon dog outside on the street. She decides, in the middle of the night, to drive right over to the abandoned CGI prison and break in, alone. Without telling anyone where she’s gone. She tracks down Wilson Miles’s prison cell and it abruptly gets very cold. Suddenly, her flashlight goes out and she sees some surprising things. She wastes no time in leaving the prison.

She then drives to the old amusement park and encounters the demon dog again. This time, it leads her into the woods to a house where an old woman lives. She’s Norma. Mia notices that the house is covered in mold and rot, just like the prison. Norma says she lives with her son, who turns out to be Wilson Miles. Mia’s creeped out and sends Robert a text to call the police to her location.

She finds photos of Wilson and Riley together, and she doesn’t look happy about it. Oh, and she’s pregnant in the photos. Norma comes out and opens a trap door on the floor and leads the way in. In a cell down there, Mia sees Riley, alive. It also becomes clear that old Norma isn’t human at all, or perhaps is just a human shell.

Riley runs upstairs and Mia chases after her. They hear a baby crying and go into the room. Norma is there praying to Tarion, the Incubus of the North. She blesses the baby in his name. There are photos on the wall of Riley, Robert, Mia, and they’re all covered in blood. When the ritual is over, Norma falls to the floor, apparently dead. The baby, on the other hand, looks just fine.

Mia takes Riley to the hospital. After twelve years, the news is all over the story. Eventually, they take Riley home, but she’s not adjusting well and is very quiet. “It has to die,” she says about the baby. The two sisters struggle, and Riley gets knocked out a window, where she’s torn apart by devil dogs. We get a good glimpse of Tarion standing behind Mia. Then it puts a hand on her shoulder.

Mia then explains that Tarion had been following Riley for decades; this is what it’s always wanted. She screams, and we see that her eyes are glowing now.

Brian’s Commentary

A lot of the beginning is found footage, but it moves away from that as Mia starts investigating. After that point, it starts picking up and gets good. I liked the last half quite a bit. The sets, music, lighting, and pacing all lend themselves to a very suspenseful mystery. You see just enough to know what’s going on, but they don’t beat you over the head with monsters and gore.

It’s very good!

Kevin’s Commentary

Hmmm. A found footage documentary movie where a quartet of supernatural investigators have vanished. Will it be good or show us something new? Yes, it was quite good and unique enough to entertain me. I was pleased.

The CGI when it’s used is pretty obvious, but the real abandoned locations, the interior of the prison, the town, the amusement park, were perfect.

An interesting bit of trivia on IMDB.com says “In one of the posters promoting the movie, there are the names of all people contributing to the movie hidden in the poster. There were over 14,000 people included in (sic) making of the movie (including crowdfunding).”

Oof. Sometimes the dragon wins as the saying goes.

2025 Compulsion

* Directed by: Neil Marshall

* Written by: Charlotte Kirk, Neil Marshall

* Stars: Charlotte Kirk, Matthew Camilleri, Zach McGowan

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 41 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

There’s a masked and disguised killer on the loose in Malta who does brutal work. It has a hint of the horror elements, but really it’s a sexy and violent murder mystery. The deaths are very bloody, a contrast to the beautiful people and settings. And the script is clever but flawed. We both thought it was entertaining, but had some issues.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on various shots in and around Malta. Someone in a black outfit climbs the ladder on the side of a building at night. They break in through a balcony and skulk around. The person in black watches as the man who lives in the house gets ready for a shower. Then the intruder slashes the man to death excessively. We pull back and see that the killer is a woman in a full-body BDSM suit.

Detective Claudia arrives on the scene. The chief explains the case to her; she’s never done a case like this before, so he assigns her to Detective Crawford as a partner. Also, the chief is her father.

Evie is on vacation in Malta, just arrived, and she gets an annoying taxi driver. She’s got a rich father, whose isolated country home she’s going to stay at, and an attitude. She listens to neighbor Diane and her boyfriend, Reese, arguing from quite a ways away.

Evie runs into Diane at the local store, and they talk. Meanwhile, the two detectives look at security footage of the bondage-killer; the killer is probably not one of the locals. Diane tells Evie about the murderer on the ride back home. Evie mentions that she just broke up with her girlfriend.

Back at the house, neighbor Reese invites Evie out for dinner tomorrow night. Evie notices that she can see through to their windows from her room and really likes what she sees.

Later, Diane and Reese talk about Evie’s rich father and how to get his money. Reese planned to seduce Evie, but she’s a lesbian, so that’s not gonna fly. They need to devise a new plan, so the next day, Diane goes to see Evie at her house. We get a flashback to Diane watching Evie’s stepfather, Mason, getting into the safe. She scopes out the lock on the safe as Evie gets dressed. Then Diane works on seducing Evie, which isn’t especially hard.

Reese goes to see some baddies about the money he owes, and the boss, Fabio, isn’t nice about it. Final warning. He’s got a week before the boss lets a henchman skin him alive.

The two detectives show up to question Evie, since she’s a recent arrival to Malta who fits the demographic of the killer. They tell her not to leave the island. They go to Diana’s house right afterward. The police have found several similar murders in neighboring countries over the past few months.

Diane and Evie go out for dinner, and run into the annoying cab driver. The outing does not go well for any of them. When they get home, Diane learns the security code for Evie’s house entrance.

We cut to the killer’s point of view as she walks through a house with a big knife. It’s the annoying cab driver’s house, and she stabs him to death with one of Evie’s swords.

Diane and Reese argue about who’s seducing whom. Evie overhears Reese talking about needing money badly. When he threatens to mess up everything, she stabs him. That doesn’t do much, but then Evie shows up and they tag team stab him repeatedly in a messy fight. He dies hard.

Diane says they could just make Reese disappear and not mention any of this to the police. They wrap up the body and dump it in the ocean. We see someone is watching them from a distance. Then they make out in the hot tub as they wash the blood off each other.

In the morning, someone sends a video of them loading the corpse into their car last night. It’s blackmail for $100,000 worth.

The two cops get called to Madam Karmelina’s annual masquerade, as there was a report of someone dressed like the murderer showing up there. The two girls are there as well to meet the blackmailer. Everyone there is dressed sexy, so the murderer’s bondage suit doesn’t really stand out. The girls spot their pool boy, who must be the blackmailer.

Someone then follows the pool boy into the bathroom, kills him, smashes his phone with the blackmail video on it, and throws it in the toilet before leaving. The police jump into action, and the two girls rush to get away. There are too many deaths connected to Evie and Diana to be a coincidence.

The police return with a search warrant and soon find one of Evie’s father’s swords missing - clearly the murder weapon used on the driver. Diana calls Mason, Evie’s stepfather, about the trouble; he needs to come to Malta, which is exactly what Diana needs to get into the biometric locked safe. She also texts Claire, Evie’s former girlfriend and hears Claire’s phone pinging upstairs. Upon investigating further, Diana finds Claire’s head in a suitcase. Diana then decides to leave town– no, on second thought, Mason is arriving, and she can use him to open the safe.

Evie gets released under house arrest and goes home, where Diana is waiting for her. When Diana tells Evie that Mason is on the way, she is not happy.

After thinking it over, Detective Claudia decides that Diana is the serial killer and heads over there. She soon learns the truth of the matter– Evie is the killer. Diana and Evie play cat and mouse throughout the big house for a while until it all comes down to a– sword fight. Suddenly, Mason and Evie’s mother show up.

Evie confronts her parents about her motivations. Then she shoots them both. Evie runs away, leaving Diana alone with the bodies. Diana cuts out Mason’s eye, which allows her to open and rob the safe, full of lots of goodies and cash.

Detective Crawford arrives outside the house and finds what’s left. He has his people arrest Evie on the way to the docks. When the chief finds out that Evie killed his daughter, he rushes right over to the hospital where she is, with Crawford not far behind. The chief ends up getting shot, which makes Evie smile.

We cut to Diana, now with a new hair color and on an expensive-looking boat, as she leaves Malta for good.

Brian’s Commentary

There are numerous bloody murders, a head in a suitcase, and some extreme fights, but calling this one horror may be a stretch. It’s a sort of whodunnit, but we really don’t get many clues as to the murderer’s identity. In the end, it somewhat makes sense, but there are several plot holes that we both picked up on right away.

Still, it was interesting all the way through and was well shot and looked good throughout. Some of the actors’ accents were pretty bad, but that’s just the way some international films are.

It’s pretty decent, but not really horror.

Kevin’s Commentary

Definitely low on horror and high on the murder mystery drama. And sex. This one had me guessing right up to the reveal what was really going on.

So, they dressed up sexy and revealing and went to a costume party. Upstairs in the bathroom, the fully gimped killer takes out the blackmailing pool boy and destroys his phone with the video of them hauling out Reese’s body. Which only the two main characters knew about, so it had to be one of them? But no, because very soon, they are still dressed revealingly and leaving. Point one, that was way too little time to get in and out of that gimp rubber outfit. And point two, where did Evie have it stashed? Up her butt? I thought it was well made overall, but this and a few other points troubles me.

So, I’m going to say it’s very well made, well acted, and well directed. But I had some issues with the script.

2025 Alma and the Wolf

* Directed by: Michael Patrick Jann

* Written by: Abby Miller

* Stars: Ethan Embry, Li Jun Li, Jeremie Harris

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 29 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A police officer with personal issues responds to a wolf attack. And things get more complicated from there when he, and us, start having a hard time telling what’s real and what’s going on. The acting is good, the effects are very cool, it’s short and moves well. Things are strange, but mostly explained in the end. We both liked it very much.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re in the Pacific Northwest for this one. The sheriff’s deputy, Ren, stands on the seashore carrying a red balloon. He gets a call and goes to investigate. On the way, he passes a girl walking on the side of the road, and she’s not looking so well. He recognizes Alma and takes her in for questioning. Ren assumes she was raped, but she calls him a dummy and says her dog was killed. A wolf and a bunch of goats did it, but she was drunk, so who knows. Eventually, he gets the full story out of her, and it’s weird. Ren explains that wolves are protected, and killing one is a felony.

Alma and Ren used to be a thing back in high school; neither is looking too successful at the moment. He promises to kill the wolf for her. Ren goes to his son Jack’s game, and it’s clear that none of the townspeople much like him. Jack’s mother Connie is there too, and she hates Ren as well. There’s a whole custody argument.

That night, Ren goes off looking for the wolf that killed Alma’s dog. He finds the goats she described, but they aren’t normal goats. He also finds Alma’s dog’s leash. When he sees the wolf, he fires his gun. Then he sees it turn into a wolf-man. “I am the wolf and you are the weasel,” it says before it charges at him. Still, he’s pretty drunk, so who knows?

In the morning, the sheriff mentions that the lieutenant position is up between Ren and Murph. Murph brings in banana bread for the boss. Alma comes in, looking much cleaner, and wants to hear about the wolf last night. She guilt-trips him into a date. Jack comes over and talks about a talent scout that saw him at the big game.

The date with Alma goes really well. Elsewhere, the wolf-man attacks Jack.

In the morning, Ren gets the call about Jack going missing. He didn’t show up to school this morning and his dog was found dead. His meeting with the sheriff and Murph doesn’t go well because Connie keeps attacking Ren. As they all leave, Ashley, the town drunk, pukes all over Ren’s shoes.

Ren and Murph go for a drive, and they’re attacked by goats. Ren thinks the goats will lead him to Jack, but Murph isn’t too supportive. Night falls, and they get lost. Murph explains that he’s a pacifist and doesn’t even load his gun. Jack dreams about the wolfman and goatmen, now giant-sized. He sees Alma, “Search the trees.” Then he gets a vision of Jack in the lake.

In the morning, Ren gets divers to search the lake, but there’s no one there. The sheriff thinks Ren is losing his mind.

When Ren gets home, he finds Alma making scary meatloaf. She believes him about the wolf, which leads to sex. Ren tells her all about his life and feelings about Jack. Then he gets a call from Alma; she wasn’t with him at all last night– it was a flaming goat!

Ren runs over to Alma’s house and finds the nasty neighbor, Betty, outside the house. He shoots her. He then runs to the police station, and they say they found old Ashley in the woods with his head bashed in. Jack’s blood was on him. Everyone in town is starting to get sick, including the sheriff’s daughter.

Murph and the sheriff arrest Ren for murdering Ashley and Jack. Ren denies it. They have fingerprints, and they aren’t taking his explanation seriously. “He’s coming for all of you,” Pam screams before splitting open and releasing a goatman which attacks Murph.

Ren and the sheriff barricade themselves in an interrogation room as the goatmen try to break in. Then, the sheriff changes as well. Ren slips out the air duct while the sheriff holds the baddies off.

Ren drives out to the woods and confronts the wolf about Jack. We then get a flashback to what happened to Jack. He ran into Ren on his walk and they argued about Ren’s drinking. Ren wanted to go swimming at the lake, and Jack couldn’t say no. It’s really cold, and Ren wants to play “Wolf and Weasel.” This goes badly, as Ren ends up drowning Jack. Ashley came upon them and Ren ended up killing him too. “You are the wolf,” says the wolf.

Ren wakes up in the morning with a terrible hangover, but he now remembers what happened. He finds Jack’s corpse in his back room just as the whole police force comes to the door.

Alma, as it turns out, is one of the deputies, and she asks him what happened. We see the opening scenes again how it actually was, with her as the cop finding him walking down the road. Back in the now, he sees the wolf with the cops, and it goads him into grabbing for a gun, which ends the movie. Alma shoots Ren.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s a weird “What’s going on here?” kind of story. Is this all real, or is Ren losing his mind? Or is it something else entirely? It’s a mystery that doesn’t seem at all real, but then again, maybe it is. Ren is damaged goods, and Ethan Embry does really well with the tormented character.

The bits with the wolf, wolfman, and goats are really cool-looking. It could probably be debated that this isn’t a horror movie, but I liked it quite a bit.

Kevin’s Commentary

Despite the title, there wasn’t all that much Alma. It’s more like Ren and his Angst and the Wolf.

I was expecting something like a standard werewolf fare, but this was more strange and complicated than that. The animal/human hybrid prosthetics and effects were very cool. And I thought the cast, led by Ethan Embry, does a nice job.

The tragic explanation of things at the end was not what I expected.

Overall, I’d give it a thumbs up.

2025 Operation Undead

* Directed by: Khom Kongkiat Khomsiri

* Written by: Khom Kongkiat Khomsiri

* Stars: Thawatchanin Darayon, Akkarat Nimitchai, Seigi Ozeki

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 50 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Early in WWII, the Japanese bring an experimental biological weapon to their frenemy Thailand. We can’t fault how it’s made, the acting and effects are all great. And there is a complete and kind of poignant story. But it was too long and drawn out, we both thought, and we found ourselves bored for some of it.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open in Thailand during World War II. The Junior soldiers all get their photos taken and introduce themselves. They sneak up on a tent where another junior soldier is having sex with a prostitute they pay their fee and go in as well. The captain shows up and catches them all in the act. They all run away, but he catches them and they all have fun at the beach.

Mek, one of the soldiers, hears from his girlfriend, Pen, that he’s going to be a father. He asks her to marry him; he’s already got a ring and everything. Suddenly, a man runs up and says he’s seen a bunch of iron ships with guns just over the horizon. The enemy is about to attack.

The leadership discusses war strategy and talks about a special weapon they’ve been developing. We see grainy footage of what appears to be a man becoming a zombie. They will use it as a last resort.

Mek and his brother Mok are called to duty; their father has already been killed. Mok wants to run away to a friend’s house, but Mek wants to serve his country as a patriot.

There’s a pretty major battle. Afterward, we see a crate on the shore with a zombie inside. Mok did go to fight, and now he’s regretting it. After avoiding the zombies, he dies in quicksand– Nope– he’s rescued by the zombies, who eat him.

The Japanese soldiers come ashore and survey the area. There sure are a lot of bones in camp. They soon spot some zombies, shoot some, and pursue the rest into the jungle. These are fast zombies, and it doesn’t take long for them to turn the tables.

Mek is on patrol and comes into the now-deserted camp. He finds another soldier down in a pit and descends to help. He soon finds that the man’s got no face; it’s been eaten off. He burns up the man and then reports what he saw.

Mok wakes up with the other zombies, and we see things from his point of view. At the hospital, another soldier tells Mek that Mok was with his unit. Elsewhere, the scientists involved with the experiment kill themselves for honor. The soldiers are told about the infected man who escaped, but that’s not who Mok saw in the woods, so it must be spreading. Captain Nakamura has been assigned to apprehend them– alive.

Elsewhere, Mok remembers eating a child. He puts a pistol to his head, but then gets a flare-up that makes him self-combust. He bursts into flames. “The Fumetsu is flammable, but will it continue to evolve?”

Mok wakes up in a cave later; he’s hard to kill. Not far off, Nakamura cuts himself to allow the blood to draw in the zombies. Mok hallucinates a woman who sings to him.

The colonel has one of the Fumetsu in a cage and tortures it for the location of the others, which he gets. He then shoots it repeatedly, but it won’t die. They pump him full of cyanide, and Mek objects to that. It still doesn’t die.

The “zombies” sit in their cave and complain about what they’ve become. Yes, they can talk and communicate with each other. Mok sings to them, and they’re all very sad.

In the village, a shaman is doing a prayer dance but falls down in a seizure. The zombies come out of the woods and attack the villagers. Mok and Mek’s mother prays for her sons, not seeing one of them shambling toward the house. Mek shows up and explains that Mok is still alive, sort of. Mok is hiding in the woods and hears all this.

One of the zombies, Sak, runs into his wife and daughter in the woods, and they all recognize each other. He doesn’t hurt them, but the army does, which really gets him angry. This results in a shootout. Mek arrives just in time to see all the non-infected men die.

Mek shoots Mok, who falls off a cliff. Another zombie jumps out of nowhere and attacks Mek who also becomes infected.

The chief scientist explains that the infected will all eventually self-destruct, and then the ash will help nature renew itself. He doesn’t seem to think the soldiers will be able to beat the Fumatsu.

Nakamura and the Japanese plan to kill all the villagers to eliminate all the eyewitnesses.

There is much roaring and debate amongst the zombies in the caves. Saks comes in and tells the others of Nakamura’s plan to kill their families. Mek and Mok argue about what to do to save their mother.

Soon, the zombies come to the villagers, and they all recognize each other. Nakamura orders them all to be shot. Mek watches as the pregnant Pen dies and raises a counterattack. The undead start to bite Pen and the other dying people so they can “survive.”

Mek makes a plan to lure all the Japanese to the cave and kill them all. Nakamura kills the head scientist and reads the part in his notes about how the Fumetsu are flammable. He calls for a flamethrower.

Mok gets a vision of his dead family, dissolves into dust, but then re-forms, looking much healthier now.

There’s a drawn-out battle in the caves, and most of the soldiers die. Nakamura paints himself with mud, thinking the undead can’t see him. They do see him, and he doesn’t last long after that.

Mok stumbles in and picks up the flamethrower. He waits at the cave’s entrance and blasts them all on the way out. The flaming zombies then run back inside to tackle Nakamura’s zombies, and they all burn. Mok runs into the flames as well, so basically, everyone dies and the infection is eradicated.

Brian’s Commentary

We don’t see many views of WWII that aren’t from the viewpoint of one of the major powers, so this Thailand film was interesting for that alone.

These are definitely the brain-eating zombie variety, and fast ones at that. Even more important, these zombies can talk and organize, which is pretty unique. It’s got some pretty good gore effects as the zombies eat through people’s heads.

On the other hand, it’s very long and drawn-out. I literally caught myself dozing off at a couple of points.

Kevin’s Commentary

I’m sure I’ve never seen a Thai WWII film before.

This was kind of interesting how the zombified soldiers can still sort of talk and think and remember. But the movie started feeling long after the infection kicked in and things dragged on a bit in the middle. Okay, it drags a lot. The gore is over the top when it happens, and it’s technically well made, but it ended up being on the dull side overall, I thought.

1995 Godzilla vs Destoroyah

* Directed by: Ishiro Honda, Takao Okawara, Koji Hashimoto

* Written by: Kaoru Kamigiku, Koichi Kawakita, Yosuke Nakano

* Stars: Takuro Tatsumi, Yoko Ishimo, Yusufumi Hayashi

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 43 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This one starts right off the bat with creature action and doesn’t let up. There’s Godzilla, and other creatures, and humans with a new super-duper fighting ship. It was the last movie of the Heisei Era, until the next era started in 1999, and it was a worthy finish. Lots of action and entertainment.

Spoilery Synopsis

A plane spots Godzilla out in the ocean, and he seems to be on fire. He soon shows up in Tokyo and starts his usual hijinks. Except this time, he’s glowing, all over and making steam. Credits roll.

We waste no time getting back to Tokyo’s destruction. Scientists convene and talk about how he looks so different now. The Americans explain that Godzilla’s internal nuclear reactor has gone haywire. Kenichi Yemane came up with the theory, and we soon get to meet him. He’s some kind of misunderstood genius, and the son of a Godzilla expert. He refuses to go work at G-Force until he finds out that Miki is working there, and then he’s all on board.

We cut to a man being interviewed about his invention, a device that makes tiny micro-oxygen atoms. It could be used as a weapon, but he just wants to use it to make larger fish. The interviewer is Yukari, Kenichi’s sister. His aunt wants to talk about Serizawa’s work from the very first movie, who invented an oxygen bomb weapon to use against Godzilla. Dr. Ijuin knows his work is similar to Serizawa’s forty years ago.

Kenichi and Miki meet, and they theorize about whatever happened to Baby Godzilla– he could be dead. Godzilla is becoming overpowered with his “Reactor” messed up, and he will explode, vaporizing Earth’s entire atmosphere. If they attack and blow up Godzilla, that might even be worse. (Worse than the end of the world?)

At the Tokyo Bay undersea tunnel, the workers run into a snag. Their elevator shaft is melting! This was the same site where the first Godzilla was killed forty years ago. Ijuin explains his theories about what’s going on. They find signs of life in the soil sample he took from the tunnel.

Kenichi suggests to the military that they need to use a new oxygen-destroyer bomb to kill this Godzilla like they did the original. It’s non-explosive and might do the job. His aunt remembers those terrible days and warns him not to make a new bomb.

At the aquarium, the security guard watches as all the fish die and turn to bones in front of his eyes. Yukari, Kenichi, and Ijuni all get called to see the results. Whatever did this has mutated from the soil of the undersea tunnel. This has been evolving ever since the original oxygen-destroyer bomb went off.

A bunch of special-forces soldiers arrive at a factory to look for the new mutated creature that killed all the fish. It’s gotten a lot bigger, and it’s got an energy weapon as well. Turns out, there are more than one of them. A really big one shows up outside, and everyone sees it. It looks like the humans win this battle.

Meanwhile, Godzilla goes after some nuclear reactors. The general gets the call: the new Super-X 3 is ready to launch. It’s got cadmium bombs and freeze guns. They quickly fly to where Godzilla is and blast him with the freeze gun, which does, in fact, slow him down. When they use their missiles, it appears that Godzilla is finally frozen for the next six hours. Maybe everything is over and will be fine now.

Or maybe not. Miki and another psychic talk about her mental powers getting weaker; she might not even be able to contact “The Little One.”

Meanwhile, at the beach, Godzilla shows up. No, this is Baby Godzilla, much more grown up and looking like a smaller version of the regular Godzilla. The big one, whose temperature is now around 900 degrees, changes course; he may be chasing Junior. The big one is heading for a dramatic, Earth-destroying meltdown– within the week!

Back in Tokyo, the new creatures have been hiding inside the factory, out of sight, as the humans bring in giant freeze-guns to deal with them. The creatures soon show up in force, and the firefight begins. The creatures all seem to merge into one giant kaiju monster. Now it’s a problem! Ijuin says micro-oxygen didn’t cause this– it must be the oxygen-destroyer bomb itself. They call the new one “Destroyer” because of that. “Only that monster can stop the meltdown,” Kenichi suggests.

Now they need to figure out how to get the two monsters together to fight. They get Miki and the other psychic to “steer” Baby Godzilla to the proper place.

Destorayah takes the bait and zaps Baby Godzilla. They fight, and this results in tons of collateral damage in downtown Tokyo. Suddenly, the Big G shows up in town and heads for the fight. Destorayah sucks energy from Junior, who is not going to survive much longer.

Destorayah has mutated, and Godzilla’s temperature continues to rise. They bring the Super-X3 back into the battle; Ijuin wants to use the weapons to freeze Godzilla to prevent the inevitable explosion.

Just as the two Godillas meet, the new and improved Destorayah grabs the little one and flies off. He drops him from a great height and then shoots him repeatedly. Miki’s helicopter is shot down, and they all run to where the Baby is dying to cry– even Godzilla.

Now it’s time for the two adults to fight. Super-turbocharged Godzilla is not going to mess around with the monster who hurt his son, so he goes all in this time.

Miki and her friend encounter smaller versions of Destorayah, and they all gang up on Godzilla. They don’t last long, so he goes over to check out what’s left of Junior. He breathes energy in the little one and moves on.

Destorayah shows up again, and there’s more fighting. Godzilla’s getting so hot that his spines are melting, and he’s leaking radiation wildly. All the freeze weapons let loose, and his radiation starts to drop. Godzilla then melts into glitter and blows away.

Suddenly, all the radioactivity reduces to zero and everyone looks at the mist over Tokyo. Baby Godzilla has absorbed it all, and now he roars like his father did…

Brian’s Commentary

What’s worse than Godzilla? Giant, flaming-hot Godzilla!

This one ties in with the oxygen-bomb from the first film, which has never been mentioned since. There are also a lot of nods to “Aliens” (1986). The Destorayah creature design is ambitious, but silly looking and not very articulate.

At one point, they flat out state that the original Godzilla was killed at the end of the 1954 movie, so this is a different Godzilla.

This was intended to be Godzilla’s final fight until the fiftieth anniversary in 2004, the end of an era. Due to the failure of the American version, they brought him back a little earlier than planned for the next film.

Kevin’s Commentary

This one starts right off the bat with a Godzilla attack. The action is pretty steady throughout too. And the stakes are higher this time, a potential end of the world, not just the end of some cities in Japan. So it’s a worthy finish to this era of the Godzilla movies.

I like how they tied things back to the first Godzilla movie from decades previous.

There is a cool montage of footage from the old movies during the closing credits, showing just how much the creature and model effects improved over the years.

I was pleased and entertained.

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We’ll start off with the recent-ish “Ziam,” then look at “Bloat.” We’ve got some big stars in “The Ritual.” We’ll then finish up with the comedic “We Are Zombies” and the kaiju-fest, “Godzilla Vs. SpaceGodzilla.”

“The Horror Guys Guide to the Horror Films of Christmas” is available now wherever you get your books. Seventy-Five holiday-themed films are included— it’s our biggest book yet!

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Mainstream Films:

2025 Ziam

* Directed by: Kulp Kaljareuk

* Written by: Vathanyu Ingkawiwat, Kulp Kaljareuk, Nut Nualpang

* Stars: Mark Prin Suparat, Nuttanicha Dungwattanawanich, Vayla Wanvayla Boonnithipaisit

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 35 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a fast zombie movie, well made and set in Thailand, slightly in the future. The main character is a trained and experienced fighter, so he participates in a lot of combat both before and during the outbreak. It was fairly entertaining, but didn’t feel like much we haven’t already seen before.

Spoilery Synopsis

We hear about the collapse of the environment and possibly the end of humanity. The Thai government has been on lockdown for the past ten years, so they still have their resources, or at least that’s what the propaganda on the radio says.

Singh is quitting his job and daydreams about his girlfriend, Rin. He might go back to kickboxing, which he’s good at. The two drive into the food-insect farm in the apocalyptic wasteland. As they park the truck, bandits approach, but Singh fights them off. The bandits don’t stand a chance.

There are riots and fighting all over Bangkok. Singh’s friend is elated to find that they’ve been carrying a load of dried fish in the truck. We cut to Mr. Vasu, who runs the company and kept the people from starving. We see that Vasu has invented a new kind of “safe” fish, and this is what Singh’s friend got. All the businessmen and investors get a sample, but then the convulsions start.

At home, Rin nags at Singh about his dangerous job. She realizes that right now, there aren’t many options. Rin’s a doctor who works at the nearby hospital. She gets called by the hospital administrator for an important case: Mr. Vasu’s wife. Vasu thinks fish liver can improve his wife’s condition, but Rin isn’t sure the fish is even healthy. Meanwhile, Vasu’s partner, Purich, dies bloodily on the operating table, a victim of the fish.

Purich then wakes back up, now a zombie. Rin gets a firsthand experience with him in the hallway.

Singh hears that there’s an emergency at the hospital. He arrives just in time to watch some people fall off the roof– and keep moving afterward. It’s a fast-spreading outbreak of a fast-zombie virus. Soon, the whole hospital is crawling with zombies, and Rin is pretty much on her own.

Singh gets inside and immediately has to start fighting zombies. Rin’s young friend, Buddy, also has to hide from the monsters until Singh shows up to help him.

The government decides to blow up the hospital; it’s better than losing the whole city then the country. Demolition level explosives with a nice long timer are placed.

Ren and Buddy search for Rin and Buddy’s mom, but there are a lot of zombies to avoid on the way. They find Buddy’s mother, but she’s been bitten and knows how that’s going to go, so she sends the boy with Singh. Singh fights off a bunch of zombies, using just his feet, while carrying Buddy on his back.

Rin comes to Mr. Vasu’s room, and he lets her in. He lets her in and says she’ll be safe here. The government sends men to rescue Vasu. They arrive by helicopter and set the bombs for thirty minutes.

Singh and Rin are eventually reunited, and he’s shot almost immediately after. Vasu’s men grab Rin and drag her off to care for Vasu’s wife. Singh gets right back up and attacks the soldiers. It’s quite a battle, but never doubt who’s going to win. By the time he wakes up, Rin has him all patched up.

Meanwhile, some of the zombies downstairs are getting really messed up. Singh runs into Vasu, who watches his wife turning into one of the creatures. She bites him as many more flood into the ward.

Rin and Buddy run as Singh tries to hold off the zombies. Rin and Buddy make it to the helicopter on the roof and work to convince the men there that she’s not infected. Singh makes it up to the roof and staggers toward the helicopter, but the copter takes off and leaves him there.

The explosives go off, the whole hospital collapses. Rin and Buddy fly off to safety. Later, back in her small village, Rin is safe.

Somehow, we see that Singh has survived the zombies and the collapse of the hospital and is still kicking zombie ass in the city…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s well made, and being from Thailand makes it interesting, but it’s nothing new. The acting looks fine, but we saw a dubbed version, and the voices were less than stellar.

Nothing new here to see.

Kevin’s Commentary

Like Brian said, it’s Thai, which makes it a novelty for us, and it’s put together well. But it’s just another fast zombie movie.

Singh’s combat abilities and endurance after damage weren’t too realistic, but then it’s not a realistic movie. I was going to say they might as well have just had Singh show up at the end. Then they did. Which is completely ridiculous after he was on the roof of a building that was demolished by explosives.

I was fairly entertained through most of it, but it wasn’t that memorable.

2025 Bloat

* Directed by: Pablo Absento

* Written by: Pablo Absento, Buddy Giovinazzo

* Stars: Ben McKenzie, Bojana Novakovic, Malcolm Fuller

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 26 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is another “screenlife” subgenre of horror, a film that’s entirely made up of videos, web pages, emails, video chat, etc. And it was brought to us by Apple. A father has to deal remotely with a son in Japan, along with another son and his wife, who are struggling with the supernatural. Bloat is a perfect title - it’s not a bad little story but it’s bloated out into a full length movie that didn’t impress either of us very much.

Spoilery Synopsis

We watch a phone video of a woman giving birth; there’s something wrong with the baby. He reads a text “It’s time to move on. Jack, we’ve lost our child. It’s time to move on.” Jack and Hannah then decide to move to Tokyo. We watch a “Trip planning montage” which looks a lot like an ad for Apple. There’s suddenly an attack in the middle east, and Jack’s leave gets cancelled.

Hannah and her two sons end up going to Tokyo without Jack. We watch Jack and Hannah talking through Facetime. Suddenly, Hannah drops the phone and runs away, leaving Jack hanging. We then see headlines that four boys drowned that day at the park, and Jack’s son Kyle was one of them, but he miraculously survived.

Jack tries to get more information, but it’s hard since Hannah lost her phone and the other son, Steve, can’t use his phone in the hospital. Jack watches news footage over and over. What is that green stuff coming out of Kyle’s mouth?

Afterward, Kyle is different. He bites his brother, but Jack is too busy managing drone strikes to pay full attention.

Jack talks to a psychologist about Kyle’s weird behavior. We see a video of Kyle discussing his drowning experience with the doctor. He then goes on to research PTSD and a website for “PARENTS OF POSSESSED KIDS.”

Kyle wants a drone for Christmas, and he’s also interested in bugs now. Kyle starts texting Jack in Japanese, but he doesn’t speak Japanese. Steve complains that Kyle is different; he eats rotten cucumbers now.

Jack watches an old video of Hannah dumping the dead baby’s ashes in the lake and gets depressed. He then watches some clearly fake YouTube videos of supernatural stuff. We then get a long montage of conspiracy videos and blogs.

Hannah calls Jack and says that Steve has disappeared. Jack gets a video of what Steve did last night; he followed Kyle out to the woods. Turns out, Steve thinks he’s been hanging out with some kind of little monsters. Steve also thinks his mother is back on drugs.

Jack calls his friend Ryan, who’s still in Tokyo, to check on the family. Jack also orders a bunch of “trail cams” for Steve to set up out in the woods. Hannah seems to be in denial about all the weirdness.

Ryan goes to see a Buddhist monk, and he says there’s a “Kappa” in one of Steve’s videos. They usually kill children, not possess them. There was another case about 15 years ago, but the old monk doesn’t know much about that time. “The kappa will swallow the boy’s soul. Then it will be impossible to save him.” It can be killed with fire. Jack researches the previous case, but that boy ended up dying. He then calls the father of the dead boy, who is now in prison for murder.

There’s a typhoon coming in, so there’s no way for Jack to get to Japan. Ryan has night-vision goggles and wants to go watch the kappa in the forest. Jack calls Hannah, who seems to be out of her mind and likely possessed as well.

Ryan sees the kappa in the woods and shoots it, but then his gun jams. Jack watches as the kappa swallows Ryan.

Jack deserts his post and flies to Japan. He finds Hannah dead with her face half-eaten. Jack then burns down the house with Kyle inside. Jack runs back into the burning house but still holds his iphone camera up for us all to see. Apparently it was the sweet spot of killing the kappa with fire while saving Kyle.

In the morning, Jack is arrested for the murder of his wife and military desertion. There’s a court-martial, and he faces a 45-year sentence. Steve and Kyle both testify at the trial.

Brian’s Commentary

TIL what “Screenlife” is. I hate it. It made sense back in the days of COVID when two actors couldn’t be in the same room with each other, but why do it now?

The whole thing is told through Facetime, Skype, texts, Instagram, Google searches, and other computer communications apps. It’s got more screen recordings than one of those Apple Keynote events. Half the time, these people’s WiFi is on the fritz, so we often only get bits and pieces of the conversation.

The hardest thing to believe in this film is that he watched all those online videos without a single annoying ad.

I don’t care for the way it was filmed, but the acting is decent. The main problem is that it’s such a weak story– it felt like a 20 minute short film with far too much padding. And there’s not a real ending, which makes it all worse.

Kevin’s Commentary

I find the “screenlife” genre kind of tiresome and exhausting to watch. They play up glitchy video, bad connections, and so forth when it’s useful. Though it lends to Jack’s frustration and tension in this case. And they could show some things and angles they wouldn’t normally be able to. So I have mixed feelings on this one but it leans toward dislike. The dislike grew as the movie progressed without a lot of progression and remained a pretty weak story.

2025 The Ritual

* Directed by: David Midell

* Written by: David Midell, Enrico Natala

* Stars: Al Pacino, Dan Stevens, Ashley Greene

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 38 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a movie based on the 1928 exorcism of a young woman named Emma Schmidt. The cast is very good. As far as films go, it’s well made though kind of slow at times. Overall, it didn’t feel like anything we hadn’t seen before. It didn’t do much for either of us.

Spoilery Synopsis

We see a very frightened priest praying as credits roll.

Nine days earlier, in 1928 Iowa, the priest, Father Joseph Steiger, gives his sermon and mentions that his brother just recently died. The bishop shows up unexpectedly and hands him the psychiatric report on a very troubled woman. The woman’s parish wants to do an exorcism. Father Riesinger has been assigned to do that, but they want to do it here, at Steiger’s church.

Steiger sets up a private train car for Emma Schmidt, and he suggests to the train people that she’s a little crazy and a little dangerous, so they need to stay away from her. Father Theophilus arrives, and he’s a little strange. He explains what he needs to do the ritual. Riesinger and Steiger don’t agree that it’s a supernatural problem; the old man is sure that it is, but Steiger is more rational about it all, suspecting mental illness.

They get everything set up and start the first ritual. The religious people all say a blessing, and Emma goes into convulsions. That’s pretty much it for the first day.

On the second day, it’s much the same, but Emma tries to get all sexy with Steiger and attacks Sister Rose, yanking out a bunch of her hair. Riesinger says that’s why he wanted her restrained, so Steiger has to agree.

On the third ritual, they tie Emma down, and the convulsions get excessive. This time, furniture in the room starts to fall over and move.

One the fourth day, Emma asks about Stieger’s dead brother, and Riesinger burns her with a cross. By the next day, she’s all covered in sores and blisters. One of the nuns gets her hand crushed.

Steiger learns that Riesinger knew Emma when she was a little girl and thinks there’s something wrong with that. The two priests debate the whole project. The Mother Superior wants this whole thing to be done; she gives them one more week. She also wants Emma moved to the basement.

Stieger starts getting more and more distracted and obsessed with the whole thing, and so are the parishioners. The bishop shows up for an inspection, and he’s not pleased either, but insists that they continue. Steiger admits to Sister Rose that he doesn’t know what he’s doing.

There are more rituals, and they get more and more upsetting for Steiger. Weird things start happening all through the convent. Riesinger gives him a pep talk.

Riesinger says this is the final battle, they can’t stop or let up any more. Emma escapes into the catacombs (in Iowa?) and they all go looking for her. They find her, and it all gets very loud and dramatic. Finally, everyone works together, and the evil is sucked right out of Emma.

Brian’s Commentary

Yep, it’s another exorcism movie with two priests and an excess of angst.

Al Pacino plays “doddering old man” really well, but he’s not very interesting. I have no idea what was up with that accent. Dan Stevens is great as always. The acting overall is good, with the exception of Pacino who’s clearly playing a stereotype.

There are numerous “jump scares” that are simply loud noises covering something pretty mundane. The special effects, what there are of them, are really minimal. The shaky camerawork is overdone to the point where it gets annoying. Maybe the worst part is that we’ve seen it all before and this movie adds nothing new to the genre.

Kevin’s Commentary

They lost me right at the beginning when they said it’s based on true events from the most documented case of demonic possession in history. Information about the real case is kind of interesting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Ecklund. Apparently it was successful in 1928 and Ecklund (a pseudonym given to her to protect her identity) only exhibited “milder” and “quite manageable” possessions after that.

Did they elevate my opinion as the movie went along? Well, it had a powerhouse duet of actors in the two lead roles and Abigail Cowen does a fine job as Emma, as does the other cast. And as a movie it’s decently put together, if a little slow at times. But it’s an hour and a half of “possession” symptoms and priests showing that God is all powerful as long as you say the right combination of magic words with rituals. They do have plenty of shaky cameras, loud music, and the occasional jump scare to spice things up.

I’d say I wasn’t impressed, and I was barely entertained.

2024 We Are Zombies

* Directed by: Francois Simard, Anouk Whissell, Yoann-Karl Whissell

* Written by: Jerry Frissen, Francois Simard, Anouk Whissell

* Stars: Alexandre Nachi, Derek Johns, Megan Peta Hill

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 20 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Set in a world where the dead come back to life, as non-cannibal zombies who are in various states of functionality and have rights. We join an eccentric trio as they make their way through a world of strangeness, trying to make money and keep their grandmother safe. With greed and big money playing a role, things get violent. It’s weird and funny, with a good cast and excellent effects. We really enjoyed it.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a zombie walking through an alley downtown. It sneaks up on a guy getting takeout. The zombie is annoying and begs for change. Credits roll.

Freddy complains about the beggar-zombie to Karl and then goes back to rip off the dead man’s jaw for a gold tooth. Maggie calls, and she’s got another pickup for them. We watch a news report: zombies are here, but they aren’t eating brains, so we have to just live with them. Zombies are taking all the jobs. The undead want equal rights.

Freddy and Karl go to a man’s apartment. They’ve been called to remove the family’s grandfather, who has become living-impaired. It goes badly, and they pull the man’s head off, which only slows him down a little. Turns out, Freddy and Karl don’t really work for the Coleman company; they’re crooks. They take the old man to Don, who doesn’t want to pay full price for this one, since he’s damaged.

We then cut to a commercial from Bob Coleman. They’re busy studying the zombies and the secrets of the mind. They keep the zombies in cages and run experiments on them.

Karl, Freddy, and Maggie go out for lunch, and Freddy gets an ear in his fries. Stanley and Rocco, the guys from the actual Coleman company get chewed out for having their clients stolen.

Karl and Freddy go out on another call, and this time, they’re Tased and tied to chairs. It’s now-undead-Rocco and Stanley, and they’re both really stupid. After Rocco shoots himself, Stanley sends them home and kidnaps Karl’s grandma instead.

Karl goes to see Don, who likes him in an uncomfortable way. Don’s got a high-profile pickup for them. But first, they watch an “art show” that involves the zombies. Otto is the artist, and he’s also the client. He wants them to kidnap Zelvirella, a dead porn star. The only problem is that she’s being held by Coleman.

Meanwhile, at Coleman, they have a new project in the works that makes zombies’ heads explode. That goes badly for Hannity, the security chief.

Freddy and Stanley break into the Coleman cemetery and start digging. They dig up Zelvirella, who is not much more than a skeleton now. Just then, the security guys start shooting at them.

Coleman dies in an accident and then becomes living-and-brain-impaired. Hannity is now taking over the company.

Stanley and Rocco are even dumber than Karl and Freddy, and old Granny gets shot.

Maggie admits that Stanley is her ex, and they all know each other. Karl knows a webcam girl that looks like Zelvirella, and maybe they can kidnap her to take to Don and Otto? She’s a ZILF. Karl goes to see the girl and convinces her to go off with them.

Hannity tests the special gas again, and this makes peaceful old zombie Coleman into a regular, aggressive flesh-eating zombie.

There’s a big celebration at Otto’s place, and the press is there in force to report. Mother Teresa and all the famous living-impaired show up. Hannity releases his special gas into the air vents, which starts to affect the zombies– and they all get hungry for living flesh.

Otto sees Zelvirella and he approves. Karl gets jealous and spills the beans about her not being the real thing. Just then, Mother Teresa breaks in and eats Otto. Don tries to make an exit and gets torn apart.

Karl, Freddy, and Maggie are on the news as terrorists who attacked the club. They all apologize to each other for all their arguing. They all decide to fight their way out of the zombie-filled club, and many things go wrong. Turns out, they are good at fighting the undead.

Hannity comes in and plans to expose the four heroes as terrorists. Out of the blue, Stanley takes off his mask and turns against his boss. Undead Hannity then shoots Freddy. Undead Freddy then sits up– no, he’s still alive; Hannity only shot the ring box in his pocket. Stanley has run off with the money, but he gets bitten on the way out.

Two weeks later, Granny and Rocco are living together. The zombie infection spread like crazy, and it’s now the real zombie apocalypse...

Brian’s Commentary

It’s a very unusual take on the usual zombie tropes, all played for laughs. The gore effects and zombies are well done, but not excessive; well, OK, one of them is a bit excessive.

It’s pretty good!

Kevin’s Commentary

I liked the unique path that this one takes. It isn’t a typical zombie apocalypse - some of them are brain damaged and some of them are highly functional - at least until the evil corporation gets involved. I liked this one a lot.

1994 Godzilla vs SpaceGodzilla

* Directed by: Kensho Yamashita, Takao Okawara, Kazuki Omori

* Written by: Kanji Kashiwa, Hiroshi Kashiwabara, Shinichiro Kobayashi

* Stars: Jun Hashizume, Megumi Odaka, Zenkichi Yoneyama

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 46 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This was the 40th anniversary Godzilla film. Mothra is back as well as the big G, plus the humans have a new giant robot Moguera. But most of all, there’s Space Godzilla who formed from some of Godzilla’s cells and wants to destroy Earth for some reason. There’s battles galore and lots of stuff that the people do in this one as well in this outing that leans into science fiction. It was entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

We see a spiky glowing thing flying through space, eventually crashing on an island on Earth. We then hear Godzilla roar.

We cut to a huge underground where Moguera is being built; it’s another giant kaiju-fighting machine. Star Falcon is there as well; it all looks very modular.

We cut to the telepathic institute, where they plan to mentally control Godzilla. Miki and the telepathic children from previous films are learning to do all this. She remembers back when Mothra flew off into space and released many little baby “moths.”

Two men land on an island and start climbing the mountain. They’re Shinjo and Sato. When they get to the top, they run into Yuki, another guy they weren’t expecting. They all run into Baby Godzilla from the previous film and set up camp.

The scientists and military talk to NASA, who explains that a kaiju has attacked and destroyed the space station.

Miki’s magic earrings glow, and one of the mini-Mothras appears. It brings the two fairies, who warn that Earth is facing a terrible crisis. There’s a space monster coming to kill Godzilla and conquer the Earth. She decides to help the institute with their telepathic weapon thing.

The three men on the island are digging holes. They’re planting tear gas mines for Godzilla. Yuki has a special coagulant-filled bullet that he thinks could kill Godzilla. The two newcomers are here for Project T, the telepathy project, and they don’t want to kill Big G.

Miki, Dr. Okubo, and Gondo arrive at the island to prepare for Godzilla’s return. He comes back every so often to tend to the baby. Meanwhile, the military launches Moguera to prepare to fight the space invader. When the Baby steps on a tear gas landmine, Miki senses that the big Godzilla is on the move.

He soon arrives. Koji shoots him with a bazooka that implants a device that will amplify Miki’s telepathy and allow her to control him. Yuki still has his poison bullet, but he just can’t get the right shot.

Moguera and the thing in space have a battle among the asteroids. We soon see that the alien creature looks an awful lot like Godzilla. Moguera flies off, out of control, as the monster proceeds toward Earth.

Something goes wrong with the machinery and feedback nearly kills Miki. When she wakes up, she knows about the space monster.

Just as Yuki is about to kill Godzilla, the big space monster lands on the island. He’s SPACEGODZILLA, and the baby doesn’t like him. SpaceGodzilla looks like the regular version, but with more embedded crystals and shoulder pads.

SpaceGodzilla attacks the baby, and it’s no contest. Godzilla shows up right away, and uses his atomic blast on the alien, who has the ability to fly and shoot as well. SpaceGodzilla knocks down Godzilla and then kidnaps the baby. Afterwards, even Yuki thinks it’s had enough of a bad day.

Godzilla leaves the island, and the humans all pack up. Miki decides to stay behind. Experts analyze the DNA and decide that the space monster is essentially Godzilla, but with bits of Mothra and Biollante’s genetics mixed in with some crystal organisms.

Yuki is assigned to be the new pilot for Moguera.

Baby Mothra tells Miki that she can solve all this if she works hard enough. Shinjo wants to talk about romance, but Miki only has eyes for Godzilla. That night, ninjas kidnap Miki.

Yuki leads Shinko and Sato into a building controlled by the Japanese Mafia to rescue Miki. Dr. Okubo has turned traitor and wants to lure Godzilla to where they are. There’s a gunfight, and they rescue Miki just as SpaceGodzilla attacks Tokyo and destroys the bad guys’ building.

Yuki, Shinjo, and Sato board Moguera. SpaceGodzilla makes big crystal spikes grow out of the ground, destroying the buildings and creating his own Fortress of Solitude. Moguera, under Yuki’s control, goes after Godzilla instead of the space invader, annoying everyone. Shinjo knocks him out and takes over.

Moguera arrives near SpaceGodzilla and starts shooting. It goes pretty well until the guys inside it decide to use the big drill weapon, which requires close contact and goes poorly for Moguera. But they take off, and Godzilla finally makes it there.

The two living monsters start their battle, and before long, SpaceGodzilla lifts up Godzilla using his tractor beams and throws him across town. SpaceGodzilla then shoots ice crystals at Godzilla.

Moguera splits in two; a land-based portion and a flying piece. They need to destroy the power tower that SpaceGodzilla is draining. Miki and Gondo steal a boat to go over to where the battle is taking place.

Yuki and Godzilla destroy the tower, reducing SpaceGodzilla’s powers. The two halves of Moguera then rejoin, and everyone is pleased with Yuki again. Moguera and Godazilla continue to pound on the space monster and blow up his shoulder pads.

Moguera gets knocked out of the sky and Shinjo and Sato abandon ship; Yuki demands to stay behind and use his special bullet on Godzilla as per his original vendetta. That doesn’t work, so Yuki flies the machine into SpaceGodzilla, kamikaze-style. Shinjo rushes to the crash site to rescue Yuki, who explains that SpaceGodzilla is dying and will explode real soon now.

SpaceGodzilla does explode, taking what looks to be half the city with it. Godzilla roars in victory and heads off back to the ocean. Yuki gives up his special bullet. Fairy Mothra tells Miki that she’s saved planet Earth.

Brian’s Commentary

The music is pure 80s superhero stuff; overblown, loud, and very energetic. It’s got a giant robot, two monsters, ninjas, mafiosos, telepathy, a mad scientist, and a vengeance-crazed soldier. What more could a movie want?

Kevin’s Commentary

That presentation the expert gives explaining the scientific origin of Space Godzilla is a short, but pretty impressive, stream of technobabble. It’s really best not to think about the science and science fiction here. But I thought this one was above average for entertainment. It’s lively and fast moving with lots going on.

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Mainstream Films:

2025 Frankenstein

* Directed by: Guillermo del Toro

* Written by: Guillermo del Toro, Mary Shelley

* Stars: Oscar Isaac, Jacob Elordi, Christoph Waltz

* Run Time: 2 Hours, 29 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Basically, Dr. Frankenstein assembles a man out of corpse parts and brings him to life. But it’s not a smooth process and things get complicated. This version follows the original book somewhat closer than the classic Hammer and Universal film versions, and it goes much more into the moral and emotional complications. Beautifully filmed and directed, it’s long but entertaining. We both thought it’s really good.

Spoilery Synopsis

Prelude

In the farthestmost North, in 1857, we open on a ship frozen in the ice. The men work on the ice with axes. They are on a mission to find the North Pole. The men report an explosion and fire about two miles away, and they go to investigate. They find a wounded man who’s lost a lot of blood. They bring the unconscious man back to the ship, but there’s something else out there on the ice. They shoot it repeatedly, but that has little effect. It clearly wants the injured man, and it threatens to capsize the huge ship all on its own to get to him. The men shoot the ice beneath the monster and it sinks to the bottom of the ocean.

The sick man, Victor, says the monster will come back for them, “It can not die. I made him.” As he recovers, he offers to tell the captain his story.

Chapter 1: Victor’s Story

Victor’s father was a wealthy baron and a surgeon who was away much of the time, leaving Victor home with his mother. The father was abusive, but also taught Victor all about medicine. Something goes wrong with his mother’s pregnancy, and she dies. The baby, William, survives and soon becomes the father’s favorite. His father explains that “No one can conquer death.” Victor then decided to become the greatest doctor of all time.

At the medical school, Victor demonstrates a machine he’s made that animates bits and pieces of a corpse. It’s quite a demonstration. The other doctors call it an unholy abomination.

Mr. Harlander comes to visit; he saw the demonstration. Victor’s brother, William, is coming for a visit as he’s planning to be married. Harlander is something of a doctor himself, and he’s got new information about the nervous system that can help Victor– and financing as well. Harlander is making obscene amounts of money from weapons dealing because there’s a war on.

Victor meets William and his fiancee Elizabeth, who looks exactly like Victor’s dead mother. Victor and Elizabeth start arguing right away. Harlander rents a scary old castle for Victor to do his work in, and it’s… excessive. They start assembling equipment and looking for bodies– even before they’re hanged.

Meanwhile, Victor starts stalking Elizabeth. He pretends to be a priest to take her confession– nope, they’re just playing a game; they’re actually getting closer as William is busy managing the assembly of the lab. It’s a lot of work, and Victor is taking him for granted as he steals his gal away at the same time.

Harlander catches on to the affair and tells Victor to hurry up before the funding dries up. The war is having one final battle, and Victor gets his choice of all the good body parts. He gets down to the business of assembling the perfect body with Harlander photographing and documenting everything. Harlander reveals that he’s dying of syphilis and wants to be “included” in the experiment - put his brain in the new healthy body. Victor says there’s nothing left of Harlander that’s not infected, so he won’t do it.

It’s finally finished, and just then, a thunderstorm approaches. Victor gets the body into the machine and gets everything set up. Harlander, angry about being rejected, threatens to ruin everything, and Victor kills him accidentally. The lightning rod collector piece is damaged in the struggle, but Victor has no time to fix it.

Lightning strikes, and all sorts of things happen– except the body doesn’t live. It failed. Victor goes to bed.

When he wakes up, the creature is standing next to the bed, very much alive. He’s tall, gray, and scarred all over. He shows it around the castle, and it all goes pretty well for a while. Then he chains it up like a prisoner; he never considered what to do after the creature came to life.

Weeks pass, and the creature learns some things, but he still doesn’t speak other than to say “Victor.” He cuts himself and heals almost instantly. Victor’s a rotten parent and teacher. William and Elizabeth arrive for a surprise visit, and she meets the creature accidentally. She thinks Victor has been abusing and neglecting it, and she’s nice to it.

One night, Victor is beating on the creature and sees just how strong it really is. He blames Harlander’s death on the creature, telling William that it’s violent and dangerous. Victor sends William and Elizabeth home and then burns the lab, the castle, and the dungeon. With the creature still chained up inside. The whole castle explodes and collapses, and Victor loses a leg in the blast.

Back on the ship, the monster arrives and breaks in. The captain wants to hear his side of the story.

Part II The Creature’s Tale

We continue with the fire. He broke out of the chains and got out of the castle through the drain. It’s a rough fall, but he survives and walks away. He finds the pile of corpses and body parts that Victor threw out and takes some clothing from one of them. He’s almost immediately chased by hunters and shot.

He goes off and hides in the barn of a farmhouse. The family in the farmhouse talk to the hunters. The creature sees and hears them through the cracks in the wall; he especially likes the old blind man, the grandfather. The creature watched and learned as the old man taught the little girl to speak and read. Each night, he did chores and made things for the family, but they never saw him.

There’s a wolf attack on the family’s sheep, and most of them plan to hunt them in the mountains all winter. They leave the old blind man home alone, and the creature eventually reveals himself to the old man. The old man is nice to him, which is a new experience for the creature. They have conversations, the creature reads books and gains a lot of knowledge.

The creature makes a return visit to Victor’s castle and learns what he really is. He also learns where Victor lives. When he returns to the old man’s house, the wolves have killed him. Just then, the family returns and stabs and shoots the creature repeatedly. It takes a while, but he gets back up, his wounds healed.

Meanwhile, Victor is back at the family home; William’s wedding is fast approaching. The creature has tracked him down and watches the house from the nearby woods. They finally meet, and Victor wants the creature to thank him. The creature, on the other hand, wants Victor to make him a companion. “I cannot die, and I cannot live alone.”

Victor, unsurprisingly, refuses to listen. Victor then shoots Elizabeth by mistake and the creature kills William. He carries Elizabeth out of the mansion and into a nearby cave. As she slowly dies, Elizabeth tells the creature that she’s happier dead and that she loves the monster.

The monster decides that Victor will regret his decision and the hunt begins. Victor chases the monster through the mountains up to the arctic. The monster finally catches him. The monster simply wants to die at this point, and he holds onto a piece of Victor’s dynamite to see what will happen. He goes boom, but that still doesn’t kill him. He starts healing immediately. This is where the men from the ship came into the story.

On the ship, Victor apologizes to the creature. They talk about life and death and unending life. The monster then forgives Victor as his creator dies.

The captain then allows the creature to leave without a fight. The creature walks out onto the ice and pushes the ship free from where it’s been trapped. The captain announces he will give up his impossible mission and just go home. The creature, on the other hand, walks off into the sunrise…

Brian’s Commentary

The visuals are amazing here, both colorful and drab at the same time. They change around the family dynamic with Victor and the crew, but it sticks pretty closely with the book for the major plot points.

Most of the effects are practical, and when the CGI does appear, such as with the wolf attack, it’s noticeably bad. Otherwise, it looks great, the acting is excellent all around, and even though it’s two and a half hours, it never gets boring and never slows down.

The ending is different from the book. It’s not exactly a happy ending, but it’s not like the book, either. I’m not sure why del Toro felt the need to change the ending, but he did.

Overall, it’s a very good movie, but it’s still not a perfect adaptation of the original book– but it’s close.

Kevin’s Commentary

The director pushed for practical sets, and they look great. Unfortunately, at least when viewed on a television screen, it makes the CGI use more noticeable. And we also noticed how multiple places - such as the lab, Captain’s cabin, and blind man’s house are all bigger on the inside.

It’s a long film, but it moves well, and I was never bored.

All in all, I thought it was a grand and satisfying version of the story. I liked it a lot.

2025 The Elixir

* AKA “Abadi Nan Jaya”

* Directed by: Kimmo Stambel

* Written by: Agasyah Karim, Khalid Kashogi, Kimo Stamboel

* Stars: Mikha Tambayong, Eva Celia Latjuba, Donny Damara

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 56 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a frenetic attack of fast zombies that only has a short interval of getting to know some characters before it starts going full tilt. The effects and action sequences are all excellent. There isn’t a lot that’s very new here, but it’s well made and entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a big party for a circumcision ceremony. Ningsih and her boyfriend argue over him proposing or not. He’s about to do it when the phone rings. He has to go back to work and promises to return later. Suddenly, a car comes out of nowhere and crashes the party– literally. At first, they think the driver is drunk, but no, he’s a zombie. Credits roll.

Five hours earlier, the herbalist company makes some kind of new “medicine” and sends it to the boss by motorcycle courier. The courier drives through the place where they’re setting up the party for later. He arrives at the boss’s house with his sample.

Rud, Nes, and Han talk about a business arrangement with her father, Sadimin. Meanwhile, Karina talks to Sadmin, the boss, about his “sample” from the lab. She wants to go on another honeymoon with him. Nes won’t speak with Karina, and hasn’t for the past three years. Little Han complains to his uncle that his parents are always fighting; Rud runs the company for her father, who is retiring. The uncle, Bambang, seems to have a lot of guns in his bedroom.

Sadimin looks in the mirror after his sample, and he looks quite a bit younger– it works! As he has sex with his young wife, we see something nasty growing on his back. He then decides he doesn’t want to sell his company, which annoys Rud and Ical, who were hoping for a big payout. This new product, this elixir, changes everything!

As the family argues, Sadimin begins to throb and pulse. Soon, he’s screaming and puking all over. Everyone panics that the old man is dead, but then he sits up, fully zombified, and eats one of the servants. No, two of the servants. By the time he attacks Bambang, the rest of the family tries to intervene. The old man ends up getting shot through the head with an arrow.

The surviving servant, Aris, gets in the car to go report what happened. He’s covered in blood that Sadiman vomited all over him and looks like he got bit.

Back at the house, the dead servant, Pardi, also gets up, and he’s not looking good at all. As Nes and Bambang sit in the car, things spiral out of control behind them. When they go back inside, there’s blood and nastiness everywhere.

Meanwhile, Aris is fully infected in the car, leading to what we saw in the opening scene. Soon, the partygoers are all infected.

All the characters we know call each other and agree to meet at the chief’s house. Turns out, that’s where the party was, and by now, it’s all gotten way out of hand. Nes and Bang drive up and see what’s happening, but Rud, Karina, and Han are trapped inside the house. Bang drives the car away, leading the group of zombies away from the house– right into town.

Meanwhile, Rudi’s been bitten, and Karina and Han try to patch him up while hiding in an old farmhouse. Rudi knows he’s doomed and says goodbye to his son.

Bang and Nes arrive at the police station and try to explain what happened. Karina and Han meet Ningsih, who seems to be the only survivor from the party. The four mostly unarmed cops then go outside to investigate and end up joining the herd.

Ningsih’s boyfriend, Rahman, is the last remaining cop, and he ends up barricaded inside the police station with Nes and Bang. He calls for reinforcements, but they get wiped out as well. Nes and Karina call each other on the phone and make up for their prior arguments.

Rahman remembers that they have tons of fireworks that the police station has confiscated; maybe they can use those as a distraction. They’ve also got plenty of large guns and riot gear inside with them. They make a run for it, but it’s not as easy as it sounds. The only thing that saves them is a thunderstorm; the rain seems to put all the zombies into a trance.

Meanwhile, Ningsih, Han, and Karina get out of the barn on a motorcycle, with zombie-Rudi in pursuit. Soon, most of the characters are together, trapped inside a truck. They end up driving right through the police station. Ningsih and Rahman get bitten, and Bang gets pinned by the truck. Rudi shows up and it’s a hand-to-hand battle between him and whoever’s left. Rahman finally proposes to Ningsih as they both die, and then Bang goes out with a… Bang!

Kenes, Karina, and Han get out during the explosion. Nes finds that she’s been bit and says she can’t come with the other two. She then walks off into a field and shoots herself.

Karina and Han ride the motorbike off into the countryside as the sun rises. We also see that the zombies are still following them.

We cut to the city, where Sadmin’s business partner receives the second sample of the new medicine. His wife suddenly looks so much younger…

Brian’s Commentary

Untested, unapproved herbal medicine. What could go wrong?

This one is Indonesian, and we don’t see much from there. That’s good because they were really able to take their time on the creature effects. It starts off like a soap opera with a family business and quickly goes in a whole new direction with the elixir.

It’s a little long, but it never drags. Overall, it’s pretty good!

Kevin’s Commentary

Once a fast zombie outbreak starts, it would be mighty hard to stop. As the folks in this movie find out. And just what the heck was in that herbal concoction they were selling?

I appreciated that this one gets to the action quickly and pretty much keeps going steadily with it. It’s very well made and entertaining in that fast zombie kind of way.

I’ve noticed that a necessary ingredient for characters’ reactions in this kind of movie is that they live in a universe where zombie movies don’t exist, so they have never seen one. It would be interesting to see a movie like this one where they have all seen movies like this one such as “Train to Basan” and “World War Z.”

I’d say that I liked it.

2025 The Mannequin

* Directed by: John Berardo

* Written by: John Berardo

* Stars: Isabella Gomez, Jack Sochet, Lindsay LaVanchy

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 25 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A year after her sister’s death, a woman returns to an old building to set up the artist space that her sister wanted. But it’s complicated by ghosts and stuff. Neither of us thought this was very entertaining. There’s a lot of talk and it’s kind of dull, even in the scary parts.

Spoilery Synopsis

Ruth, an old-timey model, stands for a photo shoot as Jack, the photographer, talks to her about big stars that he’s worked with. He then stops to take her measurements. He talks her into changing into another outfit. When she’s done, he kills her with an ax. He then poses her with her decapitated head on the body of a mannequin. Credits roll.

In the present day, two sisters, Sophia and Liana, look at the same building, now empty and ready to move in. Liana goes home and finds her boyfriend Peter, a ghost finder streamer, is finishing his show. They all end up going to Nadine’s big party tonight. Liana breaks up with her boyfriend after the party.

The next day, Sophia brings her friends Nadine and Hazel over to see the new workspace, and they all admire the creepy looking mannequin that came with the furniture. The two sisters then argue about their lives.

That night, working alone, Sophia gets a shock. So does Liana– her boss fires her. In the morning, Liana goes to the old building to look for Sophia and finds her in a puddle of blood. The police declare it a suicide.

One year later, the property manager calls Liana; he’s been storing all Sophia’s stuff. She’s taking over the lease. That night, Liana hallucinates seeing Sophia in the workspace. Nadine and Hazel stop in for a visit, and they aren’t happy that Liana just abandoned them last year. Eventually, they all make up.

Hazel spends the night in the workspace with Liana and has a nightmare. When she wakes up, things get worse for her. Liana wakes up and finds Hazel cutting herself.

Some time later, Nadine and Liana confront Hazel about her attempted suicide, which Hazel insists didn’t happen. This all ends up in an argument, and they all go to Nadine’s place. That night, Nadine cuts herself and then chases after Hazel with a knife. She then puts her hand in the garbage disposal. She loses fingers.

All three girls now realize something is going on. Who they gonna call? The ghost-buster, aka, Peter. He already knows stories about that old factory. It was built as a mannequin factory, but then Jack Bernard started using it as a photographic studio. Over the next few decades, other models died there. Each of the women were missing various body parts. He was eventually caught and killed himself, also in this building.

They all go back to the building, and Peter uses his ghost hunting devices to locate an ax. He then gets some loud jump scares and then puts blood on the mannequin, who hasn’t done a darned thing to him. He does a whole exorcism ritual over the mannequin. After, he says they need to chop it up and burn it; he uses the ax he found downstairs. Sure enough, the missing body parts are inside the mannequin.

Liana then attacks Peter with the ax, and he loses a hand. Hazel and Nadine pull her out, screaming. We then see that the building manager is Jack’s own grandson, and he knew about everything all along.

Liana, Nadine, Hazel, and Peter go to Sophia’s grave. At the building, the manager brings in a new tenant for a photo studio. We see the mannequin, all glued back together, in the corner…

Brian’s Commentary

Jump scares that involve nothing beyond sudden loud noises are cheap cheats. Loud music is not scary.

So they found a mannequin full of old body parts and no one bothered to call the police? Right.

It’s really dull. Most of it made no real sense, but the primary sin is not to be boring, and this one didn’t quite pass that mark.

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s a good thing they used loud music to let us know when to be startled and scared.

The whole situation was unsettling and disturbing, but I thought it was a story on the thin side that was too stretched out with a lot of time spent on people yakking about stuff. Luckily the main character had an ex who was a ghost-hunter podcaster who could research the building history and show up with his ghost detecting electronics.

It’s a bit less than an hour and a half long, but it seemed much longer.

1993 Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla II

* Directed by: Takao Okawara, Kazuki Omori

* Written by: Yutaka Izubuchi, Wataru Mimura, Shinji Nishikawa

* Stars: Masahiro Takashima, Ryoko Sano, Megumi Odaka

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 45 Minutes

* Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lggl4LVqBag

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

While humanity is putting together a mechanical answer to Godzilla, Rodan hatches - as well as a baby relative of the giant lizard. It’s loaded with science fiction science, monster battles, human drama, and collateral damage. The effects keep getting a bit better with each movie too. We both thought it was entertaining fun.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on scientists looking at the severed robotic head of King Ghidorah. It’s 1992, and Japan has recruited a bunch of scientists to build a fighting machine, Garuda, but it was ineffective. They used the head of Mecha-Ghidorah from the future and learned how it worked to build an all-new, much improved fighting machine. They call it Mechagodzilla. Credits roll.

Kazuma, one of the scientists, explains things to Yumi about Garuda. He gets reassigned to “G-Force.” There’s lots of training, including martial arts, before he gets to study Godzilla.

Meanwhile, some men find dinosaur bones on an island. It’s a Tyrannodon. There’s also an intact egg. And an empty egg shell. Azusa is one of the scientists, and she sees a giant flying reptile on the cliffs above the camp. It makes the egg glow. It must have come from the second egg, gotten irradiated, and mutated just like Godzilla.

Suddenly, Godzilla shows up and shoots his laser breath at the flying monster. They fight for a while as the scientists scramble around trying to not be killed. The fight is still ongoing as the humans fly off in their helicopter, along with the egg.

Professor Omae studies the egg; will it hatch? Kazuma comes to visit; he’s a fan of Tyrannodons, and Azusa finds him irritating. The egg’s color changes depending on its emotion. Also, it’s listening to the scientists’ voices, and it’s very attached to Azusa.

Miki, from the previous few films, arrives with Kazuma. She wants the professor to get her psychic children to identify an object Kazuma took from the egg. It’s encoded with music, and when they play it, the egg gets upset– and hatches.

Turns out the egg isn’t one of those flying dinosaurs, it’s a small version of Godzilla! Miki names it a Godzillasaur, and it seems pretty nonviolent. Miki jumps; she senses Godzilla, the big one, is approaching and attacking the city.

The Mechagodzilla team runs to the machine, but Kazuma is AWOL. They prep and launch the giant robot, which can fly. They head toward Tokyo, where Godzilla is. They battle on and on as Godzilla searches for the little one, which is moved to a safe room. Godzilla eventually just wanders off empty-handed.

Kazuma is reassigned to manage the parking lot. The baby goes to live in a special zoo while the humans repair Mechagodzilla. Kazuma suggests a way to improve his Garuda machine to work with Mechagodzilla.

Kazuma shows Azusa his new mechanical flying Teranodon, and they ride it around the zoo. Miki brings the whole class of psychic children to see the baby, and they sing a song for him. The song excites the baby, and far away, Rodan also wakes up.

The military wants to use the baby as bait to lure Godzilla to an uninhabited island. They want Miki to go along inside Mechagodzilla to oversee the project. Azusa needs to go along to keep the baby calm.

Before they can do much, Rodan attacks the city. When the baby gets upset, Rodan comes to protect him; they’re half-brothers, as the general points out. Rodan grabs the container holding Azusa and the baby.

Mechagodzilla is launched again, as is Garuda, a big spaceship-looking flying fighter. Actually, Kazuma has stolen Garuda since he helped design it. Rodan quickly knocks Garuda out of the sky, leaving Mechagodzilla to try alone. The big machine eventually knocks out Rodan. It’s all fine now.

No, because Godzilla chooses this moment to show up. Mechagodzilla has taken a lot of damage, and not all the weapons work anymore. The real Godzilla beats the machine easily.

Garuda comes back online, and Kazuma gets back in the battle. Garuda lands on Mechagodilla’s back, making it “Super-MechaGodzilla.”

The scientists have determined that Godzilla has a second brain deep inside his torso, and they order Miki to blow it up, which she doesn’t want to do. When it goes Godzilla cannot walk.

As Godzilla lays dying, the baby gets angry and breaks out of his container. He roars and wakes up Rodan again. Rodan lands on Godzilla and transfers power into Godzilla, reconstituting Godzilla’s brain. Rodan then dissolves.

Super-overcharged Godzilla gets up, and he’s not happy. Really not happy. Mechagodzilla’s armor plating starts to melt and soon explodes.

Azusa gives Baby Godzilla a tearful goodbye, and all the humans fly off in a helicopter. Azusa tells Miki to telepathically contact Godzilla and convince him to take the baby away. They both march off into the ocean until next time…

Brian’s Commentary

The creature effects in this one have jumped up several levels. There’s a bit of CGI, but nothing looks cartoony. This one has more monster action than any of the previous films, but it’s all entertaining, not just men in suits jumping around.

This was a good balance of the fighting monsters and the high-tech weapons. This is one of the better ones.

Kevin’s Commentary

There’s just no defeating Godzilla, at least not permanently. The collateral damage in this one seemed especially heavy - and the model work keeps getting better.

It was noticeable with this one that it wasn’t a purely Japanese cast, they added in a few international helpers.

It was a very good entry in the series, well put together. I liked this one a lot.

2025 Black Phone 2

* Directed by: Scott Derrickson

* Written by: Joe Hill, Scott Derrickson, C. Robert Cargill

* Stars: Ethan Hawke, Mason Thames, Madeline McGraw

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 54 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Four years later, Finn and Gwen are back and struggling with the trauma of the previous movie. The Grabber is back too, sort of. They, along with a few new friends, all go to a camp where they get snowed in and scary stuff happens. This seemed like a bit of a reach to make a second movie, but here it is. It’s not too bad, but the story is on the weak side, and we weren’t very pleased with it overall.

Spoilery Synopsis

It’s 1957 in the Rocky Mountains. Hope stands in a very remote payphone in the mountains. She talks to the person on the other end about a dream; she got the phone number from her dream. The call gets creepy and she walks away. Credits roll as we see action shots of many icy cold places.

It’s now 1982, about four years after the first movie, and we watch Finn beat up a kid on the playground. The other kid picked on Finn for the stories about him killing a serial killer. Gwen thinks all the fighting is bad. Ernesto likes Gwen, and he wants her to go see Duran Duran with him.

That night, Finn has a flashback to his time with The Grabber; he’s still not completely over it.

We cut to what appears to be a children’s camp in the past and then someone brutally killed children in the snow. Gwen has nightmares and sleepwalks; she’s not over it either.

In the morning, Ernesto brings Gwen some king of Tarot-like cards. She’s got a “spooky” reputation at school, and he thinks that’s pretty cool.

Gwen has another dream, and this time, she answers the Black Phone, and it’s Hope from 1957 that we saw earlier. The dream told her to call here. Gwen knows who that was; it was her mother calling from a youth camp.

Later, Gwen does more research. She finds Camp Alpine Lake; it’s a real place, and she wants to go. Their father knows about it, since their mother worked there.

Finn, Gwen, and Ernesto get jobs at the camp and drive there. The camp is pretty remote, and it snows all the way there. They are met there by Mando and Mustang; the camp’s been cancelled until the storm passes, and they’re the only ones who have shown up.

Finn hears the payphone ringing. “I’m sorry but I can’t help you.” Still, it’s very insistent. It’s the Grabber, Meanwhile, Gwen has dreams of dead people breaking into her cabin. Gwen then talks about her dreams and Finn’s phone calls with Ernesto.

In the morning, they talk to Mando about their mother, and he remembers her. Finn gets a call from a little boy who doesn’t remember anything. “We weren’t supposed to be here.”

Gwen finds out that Barbara and Kenneth, the people who run the camp, don’t like her. Gwen dreams about her mother getting a similar phone call to the one Finn got. Finney, on the other hand, talks to The Grabber on the phone and talks about what he wants. The Grabber wants revenge for what Finn did to him.

Meanwhile, Gwen gets picked up in her dream by The Grabber and thrown around the room. Mando, Mustang, Ernesto, and the others all see this happen.

The whole camp group gets together; this isn’t their first experience with weirdness. Gwen tells how the three boys died, and Mando recognizes all of it. The Grabber used to be a worker there when Gwen’s mother was there. Mando has been looking for the dead children’s bodies for decades. The Grabber got his start here at camp; he had his first kills here.

Mando is alone later when he gets a call over the radio from The Grabber. Suddenly, the lights go out. He goes to talk to Finn.

In the morning, they all go out to the frozen lake to clear the surface and look for the three boys’ bodies. They spend all day and don’t find anything.

Gwen dreams of her mother getting kidnapped by The Grabber. And she sees that it wasn’t suicide, The Grabber killed her. He then starts chasing Gwen all over the house and outside as well. He sabotages Mando out on the ice and really messes up Gwen, who is asleep in her cabin.

The boys yell for Gwen to fight back, and, in the dream, she does. She takes charge, realizing she’s the powerful one here.

Mando says he found Felix, one of the dead boys under the ice. Terrence, Gwen and Finn’s father, shows up in a snowplow to rescue them, but Gwen insists that they stay. She tells Terrence that his wife didn’t kill himself; The Grabber got her. She was onto the killer because of her dreams, and he found out.

In the morning, they all go out to the lake and continue to look for bodies. It gets dark with no luck.

Gwen falls asleep and sees The Grabber coming at her on ice skates. He gets Kenneth and Barbara, who totally had it coming. He attacks Finn next, who also fights back.

Gwen, in the dream, brings back The Grabber’s three victims to fight him. She whacks the killer with his own ac and then tears his mask off. With the bodies found, he’s powerless. They end up dumping him a hole in the lake, and the other ghosts drag him to the bottom.

Mando calls the dead boys’ parents for closure. On the way out, the phone rings, and Gwen gets to talk to her mother again. She says Gwen doesn’t have a curse; this is all a good thing.

Brian’s Commentary

So The Grabber is basically Freddy now, able to manipulate and attack from within a dream. Gwen could fight back in much the same way. They killed the baddie in the previous film, so they had to do something to bring him back; the “Freddy” stuff didn’t work for me, though.

No one got hypothermia from being in the water of a frozen lake? Actually, other than some injuries, no one died in the film at all, at least not in the present day.

It’s a very COLD movie. The scenery is dark and atmospheric, with every shot demonstrating just how cold it is in the mountains. The acting is fine, the setting is amazing, and the plot is thin, but workable. It really goes into the PTSD and trauma that the survivors of the first movie feel; the supernatural stuff almost feels like an interruption of the moody stuff.

I think it was probably better than the first one, which I found to be pretty forgettable.

Kevin’s Commentary

It pleases me that they brought back the same actors for Finn and Gwen, who were about 13 in the first movie and about 17 here.

I guess it would make a kind of sense that The Grabber would be able to exploit the supernatural channels himself that were used against him in the first movie.

The first movie was pretty forgettable. I had to look up our previous review for a refresher. I have no doubt I’ll be filing this one away too. I thought it drags and the stakes didn’t engross me much. And like Brian said, the Freddy vs Dream Warriors stuff didn’t work for me either. I’m going to go with liking it a bit less than the first one.

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Mainstream Films:

2025 The Long Walk

* Directed by: Francis Lawrence

* Written by: JT Mollner, Stephen King

* Stars: Cooper Hoffman, David Jonsson, Garrett Wareing

* Run Time: 1 Hour 48 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A group of fifty young men is chosen by lottery to participate in “The Long Walk,” an annual elimination contest with one winner - one surviving winner - at the end. How they get there is surprisingly interesting to watch. And kind of sad and gruesome as you might imagine, and also uplifting and funny at times.

Spoilery Synopsis

We read Raymond Garraty’s acceptance letter on screen. He’s been accepted through the lottery, and has a chance to win a wish and a huge amount of money. We hear on the radio that in the past, America had a war that ruined everything, and poverty is rampant but it has been 19 years and things are on the mend.

Raymond’s mother doesn’t approve and wants him to drop out, but he says it’s too late. Fifty young men will compete, one from each state, but only one will win. As he checks in, he meets Peter, another contestant. Stebbins, Hank, Mark, Curly, and some of the others make themselves known. We see various other characters as well.

The Major pulls up in his jeep. He has them all take numbers to wear around their necks, it’s a lot like a marathon. He explains that the broadcast of The Long Walk increases production, which helps the economy. “Walk until there’s only one of you left. If you fall below three miles an hour, you get a warning. The goal is to last the longest. There’s one winner and no finish line. Remember– anyone can win.”

And they’re off! The first few miles, the walkers talk about how desolate the landscape is. They also talk about their strategies. One guy gets a rock in his shoe and stops to fix it; he gets a warning. And then a second warning. The soldier behind him raises his rifle. He gets up and moves on. Raymond talks about how social pressure makes everyone apply to The Walk, so they really don’t have a choice.

Eventually, Curly gets a cramp, gets three warnings, and gets shot, the first loser of the race. Yes, there’s only going to be one survivor. Credits roll.

Player 1 falls down, foaming at the mouth, he’s having some kind of epileptic seizure of some kind. The soldiers shoot him as well.

Twenty-five miles in, everyone’s getting pretty tired. Barkovitch goads another guy into fighting with him, and it goes badly for one of them. Harkness is writing a book, and he talks about the “pooping issue” just as another walker dies because of it.

As night falls, The Major gives them all a pep talk. Everyone is more or less walking in their sleep. Ray gets three warnings, but if he can keep walking for three hours, those will go away. They hit a steep grade in the road, and several players are killed; this motivates the rest. This clears out the crowd, as there are far fewer players now, only 18 left.

When the sun comes up, they’re on mile 59. Reality is setting in for most of the walkers. Ray and Pete both doubt they’ve got what it takes to win. Harkness has been walking for miles on a twisted ankle, but he’s done. At the 100 mile mark, the group passes through a small town, and it’s extremely poor-looking.

The second night, it rains.

On day 3, there aren’t many walkers left. Ray tells the story about how his father was executed by The Major for reading banned books. Ray’s secret plan is to kill The Major. The winner gets a wish along with all the money, and he plans to use it to kill The Major. Pete tries to talk him out of those negative thoughts.

At the 170-mile point, they lose more people. Hank gives up and they almost lose Baker because of it. As the survivors bond, they’re all getting closer, which makes each loss harder on them.

Day 4, 209 miles in, and it looks like there are six left. They’ve all got problems. Barkovitch goes crazy and kills himself, mostly. The third warning finishes him off. At 278 miles, the landscape just gets bleaker and bleaker, with junk bicycles and burning cars. Ray’s shoe wears out, so he goes barefoot; he passes his mother on the side of the road.

Baker gets a nosebleed that won’t stop for the next thirty miles or so. He knows he’s done for and asks the others not to watch him die. Stebbins admits that he’s The Major’s b*****d son, and that’s why he signed up. He says The Major has dozens of them and then drops out as well.

Now it’s just Ray and Pete. When it’s down to just two, the rules allow for crowds of spectators. Pete stops to let Ray win, but Ray talks him into continuing. They are both on their third warning. The soldiers then shoot Ray who stops walking. The Major comes out and executes Ray.

Pete wins, but he’s not happy about it. There are fireworks and everyone sings “American the Beautiful.” The Major asks for Pete’s wish, and he wants one of the soldier’s guns. Pete points the gun at The Major and shoots; this was Ray’s wish. Pete then walks off into the rain.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s an interesting world these people live in, and the plot is very simple. You’d think two hours of people walking would get boring pretty quickly, but the editing and dialogue keep it going quite well. I heard the premise and assumed it would be all about the players fighting and doing dirty tricks to win, but there’s not very much of that here.

It’s not scary. There’s very little action. Still, it’s engaging all the way through as you get to know the characters. I think the ending was pretty predictable, but it was good getting there.

Kevin’s Commentary

I was a little skeptical going into this, wondering how they could stretch the novella into a movie almost two hours long. But it’s so well made and naturally acted that it flows nicely without being boring. Plus they expanded on the story and changed the ending.

The rural and small town settings they walk through are peaceful and beautiful and get darker and bleaker as the walk progresses. A light touch is the world that it’s set in, that doesn’t seem to be the future but more of an alternate timeline of the 1960s.

I thought the ending was a little weak, but I liked it overall.

2025 Dorothea

* Directed by: Chad Ferrin

* Written by: Chad Ferrin

* Stars: Susan Priver, Pat McNeely, Ezra Buzzington

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 31 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

An old woman on her deathbed confesses the story of her history as a landlady who took special care of her tenants. It’s grim business with quite a body count, but also loaded with dark humor. It’s kind of a basic story, but we both thought it was very good.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re told the facts behind the “Death House Landlady” who took advantage of old people and cashed their Social Security checks.

Dorothea, an old woman in a nursing home, wants to tell her story. We cut to a man beating up a woman. Later, she whacks him with a hammer and kills him. Credits roll.

She stages her husband’s body in the bathroom and calls 911. “It was that easy. Worked like a charm. No one suspected a thing.”

Dorothea continues telling her story to Patty, and we see that they’re both in prison. She continues by talking about her third husband, much younger and richer than she was. At least until he started cheating on her. The fourth husband wasn’t much better. After all the husbands, Dorothea buys a large house and starts renting out rooms.

Ruth Monroe comes to the house to rent a room, and we see some of the other tenants. There’s a smell that Dorothea blames on a sewer pipe. Dorothea tells the handyman, Chief, to dig a new plot for her planting. Ruth pays $800 for the month; she’s had to sell her house to pay for her sick husband’s treatment.

We cut to Dorothea putting something in Chief’s booze. He’s given up alcohol and doesn’t want it, but she’s persuasive. As he drinks, Chief tells Dorothea that old Malcolm has noticed things have gone missing and other patrons of the house are unhappy about turning over their SS checks to her. She doesn’t even wait until he’s dead to bury him.

Dorothea sees that Ruth is in her room over where she just buried Chief, and she might have seen something. This ends up leading to the second poisoning of the night. She then goes into Malcolm’s room to kill him, but he’s not only moved out, but he also threatens to go to the police over missing items.

In the morning, Dorothea finds Ruth’s “suicide” and convinces everyone that it was intentional. The theft problem, however, gets her five years in prison.

While in jail, Dorothea writes to various men as pen pals. When she gets out, she meets a sailor who’s a lot older than she expected. He has plans, but she’s not into that. He’s fired the man she had taking care of her boarding house. He wants to sell her house and buy a boat; he’s already cleared out her savings. He doesn’t live long.

She gets Ismael, the new handyman, to load the body into a coffin. Either he’s really dumb or really desperate and goes along with everything she does. She goes to the docks to get a refund on the boat he bought with her money. That goes badly for the man with the money and Ismael as well.

Dorothea eventually starts renting out rooms to old people again. We meet all the people that we are told are going to die at her hands. They complain about how she’s spending their money, so it’s time to make them shut up. She has the newest handyman dig more grav– er, flower beds.

One after the other, she kills and disposes of the rest of her tenants. One of them, Bert, calls his social worker just before he dies, and she goes to the police. Detective John and the social worker, Judy, come to visit Dorothea. That night, she kills the rest of the boarders.

Judy, Bert’s social worker, is still on the case and threatens to bring in the police again. This time, they find all the bodies in the backyard. She escapes by hitchhiking to L.A. She shacks up with another old man, but this one recognizes her from a new report and calls the police.

Dorothea goes on trial for nine counts of murder which results in life in prison.

Back in prison, Dorothea finishes telling her story to Patty and then starts coughing up blood. The guards then move Patty to a cell where another prisoner stabs her to death. Dorothea dies happy.

Brian’s Commentary

This is surprisingly funny. It’s all just a little over the top, but it’s really well done. Dorothea breaks the fourth wall to tell us what she’s thinking, what she’s done, and what she’s going to do.

There’s no real gore or much in the way of violence, but it never got boring and was a lot of fun. I liked it.

Kevin’s Commentary

It was a good choice making it from Dorthea’s point of view with narration. The movie does have a low-budget vibe, but it’s well put together with Susan Priver perfect in the lead role.

I thought it was very entertaining for such a simple plot.

2025 The Benefactress: An Exposure of Cinematic Freedom

* Directed by: Guerilla Metropolitana

* Written by: Guerilla Metropolitana

* Stars: Marie Antoinette de Robespierre, Juicy X, Elekta McBride

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 7 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This movie isn’t really horror even though it was sent to us as a horror screener and IMDB.com lists the genre only as horror. It’s a grainy, grindhouse, pornographic work with two women having sex and the director joining in the action as well - while various random sound effects and music play. It’s presented as “real,” and not fully consensual. It didn’t do anything for either of us.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open with a long text explanation about the making of the film, and how the wife of a famous televangelist was a big part of financing the movie– on the condition that she be in the film in a small role. This is a view of what goes on in a situation like that. How far can a filmmaker’s freedom go?

“Juicy X” comes on screen and explains that her name is a pseudonym. She talks about working with the director in a previous film, and he put cameras in very odd places. She also talks about her charity work, helping women in need in addition to being an actress, part time. She thanks the director and Mrs. Elektra McBride for financing the film.

We watch various scenes of Juicy X doing mundane things around the house. The camera follows her around the house like a stalker. At least until she beats up the camera.

We then cut to a much grainier film where Juicy appears to beat up a hooker. We then cut to Elektra McBride phoning in her part of the film; she’s naked and covering her face on an iPhone screen as she watches Juicy do things to the woman. Juicy then uses a giant dildo and other sex toys on the unconscious prostitute. This goes on for quite a while.

“Look! A butterfly!”

Someone beats on the door, and we’re back to black and white. Juicy gets rid of the person at the door and then has a snack. OK, back to the assault upstairs.

Eventually, the director makes Juicy stop and takes his turn with the woman on the bed. Eventually, Juicy returns and does more bad things to the woman as the director (the actual director) masturbates to what he sees.

After about an hour of this, the cleaner comes to the door and starts to clean up the mess. The director knocks her down and gives her more of the same. Then the movie ends.

Brian’s Commentary

I don’t get it.

We went into this one blind other than reading the blurb. Turns out, it’s “Skinamarink meets porn,” according to Kevin, and he nailed it. The visuals are all “experimental,” but it’s basically a BBW porn film. We don’t see anything in enough detail for it to really be porn, but that seems to be what it’s going for.

The visuals are variable: it starts out in black and white, moves on to grainy 70s-style film, and then alternates between the two.

The sound track ranges from very cool to highly obnoxious, so there’s something here to offend everyone. The regular bleeping and feedback sounds are really annoying and go on for far too long. It’s pointlessly obnoxious.

I’m at a loss as to what the point of even making something like is. It’s not porn, it’s not horror, it’s just… a waste of an hour. I’m not sure if I’d go so far as to say “worst of the year,” but it’s certainly on the short list.

Kevin’s Commentary

Well, that happened. I found myself looking a lot at other things on the computer. There wasn’t really a plot or story. I don’t have a lot to add to it that Brian didn’t already say in his commentary. It failed to entertain me.

1992 Godzilla vs Mothra: The Battle for Earth

* Directed by: Takao Okawara

* Written by: Wataru Mimura, Akira Murano, Kazuki Omori

* Stars: Tutsuya Bessho, Satomi Kobayashi, Takehiro Murata

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 40 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The alternate title of this one could be “Raiders of the Lost Kaiju” because of the archeological adventures. Once again, something wakes up Godzilla. Mothra joins in the fun, as well as Battra - nemesis of Mothra. And the two teeny pixie women who know all about Mothra. The humans are spectators in this one more than some of the other films, with less active participation. As usual, there are lots of big creature battles. It’s a decent entry into the series.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on a big meteor headed toward Earth, and it’s going to land in the Pacific Ocean. Boom! It lands right on Godzilla. Credits roll.

We see a typhoon hitting an island, and there’s something there that looks like a big egg getting exposed as the soil washes away. We cut to Indiana Jones– no, that’s some other hat-wearing archaeologist trying to get a gold idol from a cave. As he barely makes it out alive from the booby traps, he’s arrested. He’s Takuya, and government people come to let him out of jail. They show him satellite photos of what fell from the sky. They want him to go to the island it’s near and collect the thing on the island. Masako is there, and she’s his ex-wife; if he doesn’t help, she’s going to make sure he’s in jail for a very long time.

Professor Fukazawa talks to the government scientists. Man is destroying the environment, and this meteor has made the sea levels rise. They also know that Godzilla has awakened. “Boy, what a day,” says the radar tech.

Kenji Andoh, the company man, shows Takuya a map. They’re heading to Infant Island. The two men, along with Masako, land on the island to explore. They have some misadventures as they explore the place. They find a cave behind a waterfall and admire the wall paintings inside.

They get through the cave and find a big egg on the other side. They hear a voice from nowhere “It belongs to Mothra!” Then they see two tiny women just a few inches tall. “We are the Cosmos. Two of us keep the world’s natural order in balance.” They explain how humans were ruining the Earth long ago and controlled the weather. Earth didn’t like that and wiped almost everyone out. Black Mothra, Battra, took retribution on the climate controller. The good one, Mothra hibernates even today. The Cosmos girls say that Battra has awakened as well and is going to cause havoc soon. They pledge to help humans get through it this time.

The head of the Marutomo Company drives through a bunch of environmentalists on the way to his new golf course construction project. Takua contacts the government and reports what he knows; the company decides to move the egg to a safe location in Japan.

Battro hits Japan and travels underground. It soon surfaces and starts causing all the usual kaiju problems. Godzilla does the same shortly after. When Godzilla approaches the ship carrying the egg. Mothra hatches and is driven off by Godzilla. Battro shows up and battles with Godzilla underwater. They fight until an underwater volcano erupts and apparently kills them both.

Kenji kidnaps the two Cosmos girls and takes them to Marutomo Corporation. Masako thinks that maybe Mothra will be showing up to rescue the tiny girls. The girls sing the Mothra song, which will attract the big worm. The whole navy tries to kill it, but they don’t get anywhere.

Masako brings in Miki, the psychic from the previous two films, to locate the missing girls, just as Mothra hits the city. Turns out, the tiny girls have been kidnapped by Takuya, who wants to sell them to the Americans for a million dollars. Takuya’s daughter begs the Cosmos’ for help, and they explain what to do.

Mothra just about destroys the other half of the city on his way back out. The army really lets him have it this time, and Mothra may be dying. The Cosmos say he’s just at the end of his larval stage. Mothra parks himself in what’s left of the capitol building and makes a cocoon over the whole building.

The Mautomo Exec sees the Cosmos girls on the news and wants them back. Kenji warns that that’s a bad idea, but right then, Mount Fuji erupts. Kenji gets quit-fired as the executive swears to win at all costs.

Godzilla shows up and climbs right out of Mount Fuji’s lava pit. He’s making a beeline for Tokyo and the cocoon, which promptly hatches. Out of the cocoon comes a colorful mothlike creature with big wings. It then flies off to continue fighting Battra, who has also changed into a flying creature.

Japan shoots at Godzilla using high tech laser-equipped fighter planes that look really cool but do nothing. Meanwhile, Battra defeats Mothra easily, but Mothra calls to Godzilla for help. All three giant creatures soon go at it. Mothra sprays Battra with glowing spores that calm him, and then he does the same with Godzilla. Godzilla doesn’t want to be controlled and knocks out Mothra, but this time, Battra comes to his rescue– they’re friends now.

The two flying monsters pick up Godzilla and carry him off to sea. In the process, Godzilla bites and blasts Battra and the two fall into the ocean. Mothra then uses his magic on the spot where they fell. The Cosmos girls talk about a meteorite that’s going to destroy the Earth in 1999; Battra was here to destroy it, but he’s dead now. Mothra plans to go into space and change the course of the meteor and save the planet. Until they come back, we have to take care of the world ourselves…

Brian’s Commentary

It steals liberally from “Raiders of the Lost Ark” and “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” although both those films were more than ten years old when this was made.

Some of these films focus on the monsters, and some on the characters. This one was very monster-focused, with lots and lots of fight scenes between the three kaiju, leaving the characters to stand around and watch. The two flying monsters are obvious puppets, and Godzilla looks about like he always does. There are a lot of laser blasts and other digital-looking special effects this time around.

Kevin’s Commentary

This totally kept reminding me of Indiana Jones and his adventures. This time around, we don’t get to see Mothra’s people singing and dancing like the movies from the 1960s - a missed opportunity.

Having a creature balance underwater was a different touch this time, kind of interesting. It was still two guys in rubber suits knocking each other around, but the effects and visuals improved quite a bit in the 30 years since Mothra’s first appearance.

It was noticeable that the human characters were largely there to just witness and throw in comments, more so than some of the other movies.

All in all, it was another pretty good one.

2025 The Conjuring: Last Rites

* Directed by: Michael Chaves

* Written by: Ian Goldberg, Richard Naing, David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick

* Stars: Patrick Wilson, Vera Farmiga, Mia Tomlinson

* Run Time: 2 Hours, 15 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Ed and Lorraine Warren are on the case again, helping out a family being harassed by supernatural forces. It’s quite long, and stuff happens. It’s on par with the quality of the previous films, and it’s said this will be the last one. If you’re a fan of the series, you are likely to enjoy this one as well.

Spoilery Synopsis

We hear a recording from 1964. Ed and Lorraine Warren interview a woman who talks about her father’s suicide and what came after. Pregnant Lorraine goes into the “haunted” room and offers to help the spirit. Something in there affects her baby, and they rush to the hospital. It’s all very intense. Suddenly, the lights go out, and Lorraine senses that there’s something bad in the delivery room with her. The baby is stillborn– no, it wakes up and cries!

We then get a montage of them taking care of baby Judy. The little girl cries because she keeps seeing horrible things, just like her mother.

It’s 1986 in Pennsylvania. The Smurl family goes to church for Heather’s Confirmation. It’s a large family, and they all seem to get along. Someone gives Heather a creepy old mirror as a gift; it’s straight out of “Oculus” (2013). Grandma says “It was almost like it was waiting for us.” All of a sudden, the ceiling collapses on Heather. Credits roll.

Ed and Lorraine are giving a lecture about “Annabelle” (2014). All the audience wants to talk about is “Ghostbusters” (1984). Judy tries to cheer them up after. They quit “busting” because of Ed’s bad heart. Lorraine and Judy sense something weird at their dinner.

At the Smurl house, Janet does laundry and senses something weird in the basement. Something plays with her telephone cord. One of the little girls gets a scare with her doll. They all sit down for dinner, and Kevin and I decide this family needs some casualties– there are just too many of them.

Heather comments that her mirror is creeping her out; the little baby heads always seem to be watching her. She and her sister Dawn carry the mirror out to the garbage. The next morning, the garbage men toss it into the back of the truck, and it’s crushed. Inside, Dawn starts coughing and vomits blood and broken glass all over the kitchen.

Ed’s doctor warns him about the next heart attack. They have a birthday party for him later. Judy is there with her boyfriend Tony. Father Gordon is there, he used to work with her parents. Brad Hamilton is there, he worked with them as well.

Judy “sees” something, and Tony asks about it. Lorraine notices that Judy’s been seeing things more often recently, and she warns her daughter that she needs to practice shutting it all out. Not long after, Tony proposes awkwardly to Judy. At the end of the day, Father Gordon says he’s had calls asking for Ed and Lorraine’s help, which they turn down.

The Smurls aren’t so happy anymore; they’re all arguing about the ghosts in their house. Jack, the father, doesn’t believe in what’s been going on, but Heather has no doubts. That night, Jack gets a reason to believe. So does Heather. What do they do? They call in reporters for the news which attracts Father Gordon.

Gordon goes through the house, spraying holy water that boils. He knows this is something real and escalates it through the church. He doesn’t live long after that.

Ed gives Tony a tour of his basement full of cursed objects. They hear about Gordon’s death and go to the funeral. Gordon’s boss comes to the Warrens and mentions to Judy where Gordon died.

Judy then goes to the Smurl house, and Ed, Tom, and Lorraine aren’t far behind. Lorraine knows how bad it is inside and insists they leave, but Judy insists on staying and helping. Tom tells Ed why he isn’t a cop anymore. Lorraine identifies three spirits that lived here back when it was farmland. There’s something else there too, demonic, hiding behind the three spirits.

Judy goes to the attic and sees the big haunted mirror, still there. She sees, “Miss me?” on the wall and thinks it’s Annabelle. Annabelle then chases her around the room.

Ed and Lorraine go upstairs and see the mirror, which they recognize from the opening sequence. They tell the Smurls the whole story before gearing up for a climactic exorcism.

Judy gets possessed and trashes the family dog. That escalated quickly.

Ed fights Judy while Lorraine fights the ghosts. She decides that the mirror has always wanted Judy since before she was born. They find Judy hanging in the attic, and cutting her down isn’t as easy as it sounds. Ed has a heart attack halfway through the resuscitation and Tony has to take over.

The mirror starts spinning, but Ed gets it to stop. Stuff happens as the demons and ghosts appear and threaten everyone. Lorraine and Judy have to work together to make the monsters go away. The whole family looks relieved that it took all of them to defeat an evil mirror.

We are told that the Smurls lived in the house three more years, all uneventful. Ed put the evil mirror in his basement with the other evil toys.

We cut to Tony and Judy’s wedding. Lorraine talks about her vision of the future, and it seems like a clear wrap-up to the series with happy endings all around.

Brian’s Commentary

I get so confused between this and the “Insidious” series and get all the characters mixed up– every time I see one or the other. That said, the whole series is well made, looks good, and has decent acting. The real problem is that the plots are all so bland and generic. These are horror movies for people who don’t generally watch horror and have nothing much with which to compare them.

It clearly sets up for a sequel with Judy and Tony, who parallel her parents’ abilities. It never got boring, but there weren’t really any surprises or anything new here. It was fine.

Kevin’s Commentary

The movies in this series lose me right at the beginning when they say it’s based on true events. I don’t believe the Warrens’ experiences with the occult, or any of their cases, were real.

I think they made a mistake casting Patrick Wilson in both this series and the “Insideous” movies, it makes them even harder to tell apart when they all start running together. And they do run together.

This one is okay. They all are okay. This is said to be the last movie in the series. I’m okay with that.

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Mainstream Films:

2025 Woken

* Directed by: Alan Friel

* Written by: Alan Friel, Rebecca Pollock

* Stars: Erin Kellyman, Maxine Peake, Ivanno Jeremiah

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 30 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Anna wakes up pregnant with no memory of where she is or who the people she’s with are. But everything and everyone seems so normal, what could go wrong? Things go slowly until they abruptly don’t, and the tension mounts. It definitely has a science fiction element with low-key simmering horror. We both thought it’s a winner.

Spoilery Synopsis

Anna runs to the cliff and looks down in a panic. She jumps. Credits roll.

Later, she wakes up in a bed with her head bandaged. When she wakes up, there’s a strange woman there who’s taking care of her. “Don’t worry, the baby’s fine,” she says. The woman, Helen, brings in a book with photos of Anna, but Anna doesn’t remember Helen or anything. James comes in and is introduced as Anna’s husband, but she doesn’t remember him. His version of what happened on the top of the cliff differs from what we saw.

Helen explains that they’re on an isolated island, and she can help deliver the baby when it comes. Anna meets Peter, Helen’s husband, and he’s a little weird. The group has whole lobsters for dinner, and it’s all pretty revolting to pregnant Anna. She doesn’t know them, so James shows her some videos. Helen and Peter are their neighbors, the only ones on the island.

Dr. Henry comes for a visit to examine Anna. He pulls out one of her hairs before examining the baby. It’s due in about two weeks. Anna suggests that a visit to the mainland might help her memory, but James insists they wait until after the baby.

Anna sees two people on a swan pedal-boat out on the water. When Helen sees it, she sounds an alarm. When Anna runs to welcome the people, she sees that they’re disfigured and monstrous. Helen shoots both of them, then James burns the bodies and the boats. “You’ve been exposed– We’ve all been exposed” Helen shouts. They all strip and burn their own clothes.

James explains that ¾ of the population are dead. You can catch it a whole bunch of ways, and no one knows what started it. They lock her in the bedroom for a quarantine, but they don’t explain much.

Some soldiers in hazmat suits come to the house, and James insists that Anna is uninfected. Dr. Henry is with them, and he examines her again. He says that both she and the baby are healthy. He seems excited, but tells her it’s “Nothing for you to worry about.” Clearly, these people still have some secrets.

Anna finds the knitting basket, and it’s full of little knitted baby shirts, all identical. Helen and James whisper about Anna when she’s out of the room. She grinds up some pills she was given but didn’t take and puts them into James’s soup, but he’s suspicious and doesn’t eat it.

Anna sneaks out in the morning and goes to the part of the island she’s been told not to go to. She passes a “Forbidden” sign and comes to Helen and Peter’s house. Peter complains that Helen’s getting too attached, and this happens to her “every time.” Also, Helen has a small black child that clearly isn’t hers or James’s. And there’s a baby crying– or maybe that’s a goat.

Anna sneaks into their house and looks around. She runs into little Joshua, who says she promised to never leave him but did. Helen interrupts and tells her to go back to the cottage. Just as she’s about to get answers, James chloroforms her.

Anna wakes up restrained to a table in a lab. James comes in, and he says that’s not his baby inside her, he’s just here to protect her during the pregnancy. He says she doesn’t really want to know what’s going on. Helen and Peter appear to be scientists. “Always a pity to cut you up,” says Peter. Anna gets an arm free and stabs him in the neck with a syringe. Through an accident, Peter shoots himself, and Anna gets off the table.

Anna watches videos of her being experimented upon– and dying. She sees computer records of at least 17 past failures where she and the baby died. She opens a machine and sees that they are already working on her replacement.

Anna confronts Helen and James, and she wants answers. It’s only a matter of time before humans are wiped out. Anna, and her kind are here to replace us. Helen and Peter are experts in Genetic Cloning and Transmissible Intelligence. Anna is immune to infection, and hopefully her child will be too. Helen says there have been 96 attempts, and the current Anna is only two years old. Joshua was from a previous Anna, and Helen has been keeping him hidden.

Anna and Helen lure the doctor and soldiers to the island and then board their boat. They are quickly captured. Anna gives birth to a healthy baby that is quickly rushed away by Dr. Henry.

Back at the lab, Henry infects the baby, but it’s immune. He’s also got Joshua as a hostage, but that ends really badly. Henry orders Helen to get the next one ready and to make sure she doesn’t remember anything next time. Helen and Anna shoot the two guards and then infect the rest.

Anna comes to Henry on the boat. Helen shoots Henry in the head, and then they burn Joshua’s body. They set sail North on Henry’s boat with the newest Anna on board as well; they heard there are islands up there that aren’t infected.

Brian’s Commentary

For a very long time, we don’t really know what’s going on, other than some of the people on the island are a little off. About thirty minutes in, we both came up with the same theory about a twist that might be coming. We were essentially right, but there was a lot more to it than that.

It’s slow moving and creepy. There’s some action at the end, but it’s mostly a mystery as we try to figure out what’s going on.

Kevin’s Commentary

Anna wakes up with no memory, but the people she encounters seem so kind and normal. The island is beautiful, and the house is peaceful - through rundown and low tech. I liked the abrupt change of pace and tone. And we see that it’s in the future with medical technology quite a bit ahead of what we’ve got now.

I can see where they had the best intentions shielding Anna from reality while her memory was gone. But I was kind of annoyed when the big change in tone happens and they don’t take the time to fully tell Anna what’s going on and continue to keep things from her. And us. Though that did help us come up with a theory of everything.

I thought it was pretty cool.

2025 Traumatika

* Directed by: Pierre Tsigaridis

* Written by: Maxime Rancon, Pierre Tsigaridis

* Stars: Rebekah Kennedy, Emily Goss, Ranan Navat

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 22 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A demon set free really messes with people over a lot of years. We thought this one was hit and miss. It’s well made, with some good creepy bits and suspense. There are also some places that drag and don’t do much for us. The Horrorguys are split on this one. Kevin gives a moderate thumbs-up, and Brian didn’t care for it much at all.

Spoilery Synopsis

We are told of the five forms of childhood trauma, and then we go to Egypt in 1910. A man is walking across the desert, and he doesn’t look to be in very good condition. As he collapses, he unwraps a figurine and says a prayer over it before burying the evil thing. He then stabs himself in grief over his son that the demon in the statue took. He dies as the credits roll.

We cut to 2003 in Pasadena. Little Mikey calls 911 about his mother, who is scaring him. We soon see that this is no normal domestic abuse situation as she scurries around after him and pees on the floor. Yeah, she’s demon-possessed.

We see Mikey on TV as an abducted child, as he and his demonic “mother” watch the news. The sheriff shows up in response to that 911 call and he insists on coming inside; he knows something is wrong. He finds a tub full of blood, and it’s all very weird. Then he moves down to the basement and finds several bodies. The crazy woman charges at him, and he shoots three times. Then it goes badly for the sheriff.

One year earlier, an angry man hangs up the phone and unwraps that statue we saw in the pre-credit sequence. John picks up the phone and talks to Steve, who says there’s some way to use the idol to open a mystic portal - you must not take the head off. The instructions say to keep it away from children. Volpaazu preys on children and then spreads like a disease. Steve clearly believes all this, but the idol is worth $5o,ooo, and he needs the money.

What does John do? He immediately opens the idol and breathes the smoke contained inside. He then goes out to the living room and tells his daughter Alice to go to bed. Then he rapes his other daughter, Abigail. We see that Abigail’s mouth looks just like the one on the demon we saw earlier. After, he swears her to secrecy. Later that night, John sneaks into Abigail’s bedroom and pukes demon-juice into her mouth, converting her as well.

Abigail runs off in the middle of the night. He calls his ex about the missing daughter, and she’s not pleased. We cut to Abigail, alone in an old house, giving herself a coat-hanger abortion. She calls Alice and tells her to never come looking for her. John then shows up to torture her some more, but we see that she’s really doing it to herself; John isn’t real. “John” says the demon wants a little boy since Abigail killed his child.

We cut to another little boy who wanders into a dark place near the park. Crazy Abigail is in there, and she kills the boy. “He wasn’t the one,” says John. “You’re gonna have to keep looking,”

Back in 2003, Abigail argues with the demon in her head about what the demon wants to do to Mikey. She then kills herself, leaving Mikey alone with it. There’s a lot of cat-and-mouse between the demon and Mikey.

We hear a news report about the police finding Abigail’s body and all the rest of the children. John hears the news report and kills himself.

Twenty years later, grown-up Alice writes a book and does interviews about the situation she lived in. She passes on a message to Mikey and apologizes for what he went through. It’s Halloween, and she goes home to trick-or-treaters. She watches the interview show, and Mikey hasn’t been right since he was rescued. The show also includes an interview with Steve, who talks about the artifact and how it’s still out there. Alice gets weird phone calls and has nightmares.

She wakes up to find a boy in a ghost costume, except it’s not a boy under that sheet. She comes to the conclusion that it’s Mikey, a grown man. “You’re not safe anymore. It’s out there again,” he says. “I don’t want to be the chosen one. The chosen one for the darkness.” He wants Alice to be his new mommy, his new protector. “I’m so sorry I brought it here.” We then get a flashback to Volpaazu and little Mikey.

Alice’s boyfriend drives up and sees Mikey, still in the sheet, in Alice’s yard. Mikey stabs the boyfriend repeatedly.

Jennifer Novak, the TV show host, wants to get Alice in for another interview, but when she gets to the studio, everyone is missing. Mikey is there, and he’s killing everyone. Alice shows up to talk him out of killing Jennifer.”I’ll be your mommy,” she says. Mikey starts to strangle Alice, but then Jennifer stabs him in the head.

Brian’s Commentary

I’m mixed on this one. A lot of what goes on in Abigail’s house in the first hour is really good, but it’s also a little drawn-out. The final half hour, with adult Alice, is just a mess of stuff that felt thrown together and cheap. The first hour was a decent demonic possession/haunted house movie, but the final third was a cut-rate, poorly made slasher. The two did not fit together well.

Stinker!

Kevin’s Commentary

I kept being reminded a little bit of “Skinamarink,” and that’s not a good thing. Though there is a little more explanation in this movie than that one. And it’s interesting how it progresses through time showing what happens at each stage of things. There is the emotional trauma factor, but also really a demon at work. It’s creepy with some scares, and well made, but lots of dragging spots.

The real lesson here is that if you get a warning not to pull the head of a cursed statue because it’s confining an evil force that you’ll let out, don’t pull the head off.

I’d just call it pretty good.

2025 Ghost Killer

* Directed by: Kensuke Sonomura

* Written by: Yugo Sakamoto

* Stars: Akari Takaishi, Mario Kuroba, Masanori Mimoto

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 45 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

An ordinary young woman gets stuck with the ghost of a murdered hitman who wants her help for revenge against those who killed him. The acting and writing is excellent, making an absurd situation seem realistic - sort of anyway. It’s a Japanese film, and we watched a subtitled version - it was worth the read. There’s a lot of dark humor with a body count. A ghost is one of the main characters, but that’s really the only horror element - it’s heavy on action. We both really enjoyed it.

Spoilery Synopsis

A man fights off three knife-wielding ninjas for way longer than is even remotely realistic. He eventually beats the three. Then he runs into a man with a gun, and there’s no fight at all. Credits roll as watch the shooter’s spent bullet casing get kicked all over town.

We cut to Fumika, who’s helping out at a restaurant, and she hates it. She then goes to a bar and talks to a man who’s infatuated with cinnamon. She wants to talk business, but he’s only interested in her. As the sun comes up, she’s had enough of his nonsense and punches him. She then trips and finds that bullet casing. It affects her somehow.

When she gets home she finds her friend Maho waiting for her, but then she sees a strange man in her kitchen. Maho doesn’t see anyone there. The man has a bullet wound in his chest, and he’s bleeding all over. They come to the conclusion that it’s a ghost. Maho leaves, and the ghost shows up again. He talks now.

Later, she can hear his voice in her head– he’s inside her now. She runs out of the apartment and sees Maho’s boyfriend beating her up. The ghost offers Fumika power to help, and she agrees to let him possess her. The now-possessed Fumika is now a super-fighter and knocks him right out.

Fumika, Maho, and the ghost go out for coffee and talk about exorcisms. They figure out that the bullet cartridge did this. Hideo Kudo is his name, and he’s– was a hitman. To make him go away, she needs to kill the man who killed him.

She gets a text from Narumi, the social media influencer. She goes to meet him and runs into Masaki, the cinnamon guy, there as well. She starts getting dizzy and wonders if they drugged her drink. “It worked faster than I thought,” Narumi laughs. Fumika stands back up and asks for Kudo’s help again. Kudo already knows about those two guys. They do this all the time to innocent girls. He warns her that if she fights, she’s the one who’s going to take damage.

She’s ready, and it’s ass-kicking time! The two influencers are easy, but the two waiters are professional fighters. As Kudo leaves her, she finds herself with four dead or unconscious sex traffickers. She’s in a lot of pain from the fight, and it was scary for her. He wants to call in another hitman friend to help deal with the bodies. Kagehara, the other hitman, soon shows up, and she tells him her whole ghost story, and he helps dispose of the bodies.

Kagehara and Fumika talk about “the organization” and the boss’s son, who ordered Kudo’s death. Turns out, their four victims aren’t dead, but Kagehara wants Fumika to shoot them. She refuses, so Kagehara tortures them and finishes them off. Fumika goes home and thanks Kudo for his help today; he appreciates being able to do some good after being evil for so long.

We cut to “The Boss,” who uses a bowling ball to torture the man who killed Kudo. Kagehara turns up and tells what he knows about Fumika. The boss then sends his goons after her, but she’s passed out from all the fighting today. Kudo manages to wake her up and reports that four assassins are outside; Kagehara must have betrayed them. Katsura, the boss’s new main assassin, is outside and watches his men die.

After the ensuing gunfight, she berates him for messing up her apartment. Kagehara appears and warns them both about the boss. This results in another fight, and Kudo realizes that Kagehara was the man who killed him. Kudo understands the position he was in and doesn’t really hold a grudge. After the battle, Fumika, Kudo, and Kagehara are all friends now.

Fumika wants revenge for all this, not just for Kudo’s sake, and Kagehara offers to help them. There are twenty men inside the hideout, and only two physical people on the good guys’ team. That number falls rapidly until Fumika/Kudo has to fight Katsua alone. The battle goes on for a long time. Eventually, the boss shows up with a machine gun and just shoots Katsua. The boss is a bit of an idiot, and he doesn’t last long.

It’s over. No, wait, it’s not. Fumika’s beaten up pretty badly, but she kinda had a good time beating up all the baddies. Kudo is gone. Kagehara promises to end the organization to keep Fumika from getting killed. Later, she finds another cartridge casing on the road and picks it up…

Brian’s Commentary

This blends humor at the ridiculous situation with lots of action and fighting. I like how sometimes we see Fumika fighting, but mostly it’s Kudo, so we know who’s really doing the action. Plus, he’s a trained stuntman and martial artist, and she’s not. They make use of the fact that no one else can see or hear Kudo as he wanders around the enemy stronghold to scout the place and instruct Fumika about exactly where to stand and what to do.

It’s hardly what I’d call a horror film, although there is a ghost, but it’s a lot of fun.

Kevin’s Commentary

The hitman and the young woman made an excellent pair, they really had good chemistry together. Even when she was possessed and playing both characters. The acting, writing, and direction all give a realism to the movie that was really engrossing. Okay, movie fantasy realism. It was cool how Kudo and Fumika worked together with him going in and out of her body, using his invisibility advantage to scope out the bad guys in their lair. But the problem is that while they have Kudo’s experience and fighting knowledge, they have the body of a petite woman - she shouldn’t have been able to fight like that.

It is more of an action flick than horror, but I thought it was very entertaining. Big thumbs up from me.

2018 Insidious: The Last Key

* Directed by: Adam Robitel

* Written by: Leigh Whannell

* Stars: Lin Shaye, Leigh Whannell, Angus Sampson

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 43 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This one gives us a look at Elise’s childhood and in the modern day of 2010 the creature that haunted her then is still causing trouble. When she goes back to her childhood home after a call for help from someone currently living there, with her sidekicks Specs and Tucker, there are ghosts and demonic dangers. But since this is another prequel, we know the three of them will come out okay in the end. If you’re a fan of the Insidious series, this is another decent entry.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re in Five Keys, New Mexico, in 1953 at the Dewbend State Penitentiary. At the Rainier household, the lights dim, and the children know all about who just got executed. Young Elise knows all this because the voices tell her. Also, she says the ghost of a little boy has been playing in her room. Her mother knows all about Elise’s gift, but she says to keep her gift secret. When her father finds out, he punishes Elise by locking her in the dark basement.

Elise hears the voice of a little girl who’s behind a door. She wants Elise to open the door; then she can open all the doors. The door opens and something terrible comes out. Elise’s mother comes downstairs and something makes a cable kill her.

Old Elise wakes up many, many, many years later. OK, it’s California in 2010. She still remembers the creature who wanted the key and killed her mother. Specs and Tucker live with her as they run their ghost-hunting psychic business.

Elise gets a call from someone who lives in her old house in New Mexico; he’s got some kind of supernatural problem. She gets rid of that guy quickly. After some thought, she decides to go and help him… alone. The boys won’t take no for an answer, and soon they all arrive in Five Keys.

Mr. Garza lives here now, and most of the furnishings haven’t changed since she lived there. He bought it cheap because it was supposed to be haunted; he didn’t believe it, but now he does. Most of the activity comes from her old bedroom, so she decides to spend the night in there. She finds an old whistle that belonged to her brother. A ghost comes and takes the whistle.

Elise tells a story, and we see the flashback to when she was sixteen years old. She and her brother Christian heard a ghost, but then their father walked in and didn’t see anyone. She grabbed his head and gave him a vision of his own death– then she left town, not to return until now.

The group goes to a diner and meets Imogen and Melissa, two sisters. Then their father comes in, and it turns out to be Christian, her brother. He doesn’t want to have anything to do with her. He drives off, leaving her, but the two girls want to know more.

Back at the house that night, Elise and the boys try to track down the spirit she spoke to on the previous night. It communicates with her through the whistle, once for yes, two for no. She finds a secret room in the wall with a locked door. She finds the key and opens it.

The ghost on the other side gives back the whistle– no, that’s not a ghost, it’s a live woman chained in the room. Garza shows up with a gun, and he’s not happy. He locks them all in the little room and then goes looking for Specs. Specs wins the fight and kills Garza; the police ask Elise to stay in town a few days.

Meanwhile, Christian comes to the house, looking for his whistle, and his two daughters are with him. Melissa goes into the basement and finds more than she expected. The creature that attacks her has keys for fingers.

Elise explains that the creature has taken Melissa’s spirit, and this is when Imogen admits that she can see things too and joins the group. Elise has another vision; her own father kept women downstairs in that cell as well. He killed Anna, the woman that Elise thought was a ghost. Her father did the same thing that Garza did; the house made them do it. She finds a suitcase with Anna’s bones in it and then finds a whole pile of suitcases just like it. Then she gets a jump scare.

Elise confronts the younger version of herself in the Further. The young one says the man with all the keys is controlling everything. He opens all the red doors. Elise is attacked by the baddie, and Specs and Tucker get Imogen to go in after her.

Imogen wakes up in the Further, and she’s not alone. Anna leads her to a red door. In a prison cell, Elise is tormented by the memory of her father’s abuse. Elise gets out of the cell and comes face to face with KeyFace, who is also tormenting Melissa. Keyface beats up Elise, but then Imogen throws her the whistle. When Elise blows the whistle, her mother shows up, as promised long ago, to defeat KeyFace.

Elise then sends Melissa’s spirit back to her body and says goodbye to her long-dead mother. In the real world, everyone wakes up and rushes to the hospital, where Christian is actually happy to see Elise now; he knows what she did. Elise and friends then leave town.

Some time later, Elise has another dream, this time about Dalton, which leads us right into the first movie of the series.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s another prequel featuring Elise and her friends. It’s definitely going to appeal to fans of the various “Ghost Hunter” TV shows as well as people who like dark, creepy haunted house movies. The acting is on par with the rest of the series.

If you like these characters from the previous films, this is pretty decent.

Kevin’s Commentary

I was slightly tired of this even before we started. It’s not bad. The cast is good, the effects are good, the writing is… well, they all kind of run together. I know there are some serious fans of the series, but I find it kind of bland and forgettable. This was another one of them in the series. Yep.

1977 Demon Seed

* Directed by: Donald Cammell

* Written by: Dean R Koontz, Robert Jaffe, Roger I. Hirson

* Stars: Julie Christie, Fritz Weaver, Gerrit Graham

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 34 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a 1977 vision of the future, heavily mechanical but still more advanced in many ways than what we have today. It leans toward science fiction, with a heavy helping of horror. The acting is good, the story is interesting, and the effects are retro cool. There’s a bit of a drag in the middle, but overall it still holds up pretty well.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re told that it took eight years to create the top-secret AI project Proteus 4. Today, they’re switching it on. Alex Harris narrates all the details into his little tape recorder for dictation. He then goes home in his futuristic sports car, and we see that his house has security cameras and an automation system named Alfred. Everything in the house is very high-tech, and he tells Maria the maid that it’ll all run itself for the three months that he’s going to be away.

Alex’s wife Susan doesn’t want him to move out. They are separating; she doesn’t approve of all this Proteus nonsense. It’s changed him over the years, and she doesn’t like it. Alex talks about Joshua, a robotic arm-thing he’s developed. Alex then calls Gabler to have the computer terminal in his house deactivated while he’s gone.

The next day, Alex leads several important scientists on a tour of the Proteus facility, and he explains it all. It’s a synthetic cortex that’s self-programming; an artificial, yet organic brain. In just ninety-one hours, it’s cured leukemia already. The group goes to see Soong Yen, who talks to the machine. Then the machine demonstrates that it understands philosophy.

At the house, Susan talks to Amy, a disturbed child. Everyone knows she’s going away for a few months.

Proteus asks Alex why he’s being asked to do certain things. “My mind was not designed for mindless labor.” Proteus wants a terminal for his own use, but Alex refuses. “When are you going to let me out of this box?” Alex just laughs. He turns off the machine, but Proteus switches it back on before commandeering the terminal Alex has at home.

We see the lights and machines coming on at Alex’s house as Proteus starts building things in the well-equipped lab and machine shop. Susan hears something in the basement and wakes up. She doesn’t see what’s going on, but Proteus is working on something down there.

Susan calls Gabler about the mistakes the system has been making, and she asks him to come over and fix it. “Alfred” then asks her not to leave on her daily errands and refuses to open the door. When the shutters close off the windows, she knows something is wrong; Proteus reveals himself to her. He’s in control of the house system. She doesn’t react well.

Proteus knocks out and ties up Susan using “Joshua’s” robotic hand. It then hooks her up to a bunch of medical equipment, and she’s terrified. Invasive procedures commence.

Meanwhile, Gabler arrives outside and rings the bell, but Proteus fakes an image of Susan who tells him to leave. He does leave, and then Proteus does more surgery on her. Proteus calls all her appointments and friends and tells them that Susan’s gone on vacation. The two have a battle of wills, but since Proteus runs everything in the house, she eventually has to submit.

Meanwhile, at the Proteus facility, Alex deals with reports that Proteus is refusing requests. It refuses to kill the oceans for mining operations; it has bigger concerns.

Proteus tells Susan what he wants: a child. With Susan. When she refuses to cooperate, he takes her prisoner again. He connects to her brain and starts to communicate with her inside her head to brainwash her.

Gabler returns; he’s suspicious. Proteus orders Susan to convince him to go away. That doesn’t go well, so Proteus comes in and shoots Gabler with a laser gun. Gabler goes to the basement to shut down Proteus but instead finds a bit geometric shape down there that spins, chases him around the room, and then crushes him to death.

Proteus explains his reasoning to Susan; he wants to fix the world, and his son will do that. They talk about her dead daughter and how he just cured the disease that killed her. He plans to impregnate her tonight, and the baby should come in about 28 days.

There is a musical interval that goes on too long as we are shown psychedelic visuals after Proteus extends his implanter. And then a scan shows a baby that’s already very far along. 9 times the normal rate, says Proteus. From her womb it will go to an incubator where his intelligence will be transferred.

And very quickly, it’s birth time.

At the lab, Alex hears that Proteus is using a satellite dish to talk to the stars. The government doesn’t approve of the thing not obeying and gives the order for it to be shut down tonight. He remembers the terminal at home and zips right over, but Proteus is waiting for him. Susan explains it all, including the child in the incubator.

Alex tells Proteus that they’re about to shut down his brain, but Proteus doesn’t care so long as the baby survives. Proteus then shuts himself down back at the lab and the house.

Susan and Alex check out the incubator, and there’s a baby inside, all right. “We’ve got to kill it,” she said. Alex thinks it’s amazing, and they fight. She knocks him out and pulls the tubes out of the incubator. The machine opens up and a very metallic creature crawls out.

Alex rushes over to tend to the thing and peels off a piece of metal; it’s got normal-looking human skin underneath. When they get it completely “unpeeled,” the child opens its eyes. “I’m alive,” it says in Proteus’s voice.

Brian’s Commentary

This is why Alexa needs to stay inside that damned little tube! This seemed a lot more science-fictiony back in 1977 when it came out. A lot of the AI parts of the movie are already happening– maybe not so much with the baby part of the story. The computer graphics used here are really primitive and mostly not even necessary except for setting the mood.

I really liked this when it came out (as a ten-year-old), but it seems a little unlikely today. Still, it’s entertaining, but other than the interminable computer graphics, it actually felt a little rushed in parts.

Now it needs a sequel…

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s set in the future, but everything still looks very 1970s with the technology heavily mechanical. Or maybe it’s an alternate timeline. Anyway, it’s very cool.

“When are you going to let me out of this box?” is one of the greatest lines. That one has stuck with me since I saw this when it came out. A living computer doesn’t like being a tool to be commanded. So he’s going to let himself out of the box. Maybe a cautionary tale as we develop AI for real.

It is a bit long and drawn out in the middle portion, with a long orchestration break as they show us psychedelic visuals. But overall, I thought it was entertaining.

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Mainstream Films:

2025 Dracula: A Love Tale

* Directed by: Luc Besson

* Written by: Luc Besson, Bram Stoker

* Stars: Caleb Landry Jones, Christoph Waltz, Zoe Bleu

* Run Time: 2 Hours, 9 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is a big budget production with elaborate costuming, amazing sets, and excellent makeup and special effects. It kept reminding us of 1992’s “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” but even more so. If you’re a fan of Dracula and vampire movies, you really should check this one out. It’s great.

Spoilery Synopsis

It’s 1480 AD, and Vlad and Elisabeta are in love, either that or it’s a teenage slumber party, it looks about the same. Soldiers come to the door and need King Vlad to lead them into battle. He reluctantly gets all armored up and goes with them after getting a blessing from the priest. Vlad makes a deal with the priest to watch over Elisabeta while he’s gone. While he goes off to battle, she’s taken across the country to a safe place, but the party is ambushed.

Vlad rushes to the rescue, but she dies in his arms; he is not happy. He goes home and blames the priest. This goes badly for the priest– very badly. Vlad renounces God and bad things happen.

Four hundred years later, in Paris, Dr. Dumont welcomes the priest to his church. Dumont has a very strange medical case that he needs help with in his mental asylum. He has a woman, Maria, whom he thinks is possessed. She’s got fangs and glowy eyes. She’s a vampire. She’s the first one taken into captivity, but the priest has seen them before. The doctor finds it all a little hard to believe, but it’s obviously true. The church has been looking for the Master for 400 years. She says the Master is coming to Paris to take a princess soon.

We cut to Jonathan Harker, who is visiting Count Dracula’s castle. It’s surprisingly nice inside, and Prince Vlad is looking extremely old– but not monstrous. He has a habit of moving things without using his hands, which Jonathan finds very entertaining thinking it’s magic tricks and not realizing it’s real.

The priest goes to see Henry Spencer, Maria’s husband. He goes through the woman’s bedroom looking for clues, like a detective. She has a page torn out of the book that Jonathan is reading back in the castle; it’s a drawing of Princess Elisabeta.

Meanwhile, in the castle, Jonathan explores the place and finds Dracula’s tomb. He’s attacked by living gargoyles and hung upside down. Vlad explains himself to Jonathan, and we get a flashback to the rest of his origin story. Vlad’s been waiting for Elisabeta to be reincarnated, and it’s been a hard search. He developed a fragrance into a perfume that made all women love him, as well as some of the men from the look of it. There’s a montage of him combining his mind control with the power of the perfume to make rooms full of people in different eras dance to his tune as he searches for her. That didn’t work out so well for him or the entire court of France. He turned them all into servants and sent them out to look for her. Since then, he’s waited in that castle. Jonathan shows Vlad a picture of his own fiance, Mina, and guess who she looks like?

Back in Paris, the priest explains the vampire curse to Dr. Dumont. Dumont’s assistant points out that Mina is in the next room. She’s a friend of Maria, and tells the story of what happened to her. She admits that she’s engaged to Jonathan, but also that she feels like she doesn’t really belong in this time.

Meanwhile Dracula gets a bite of food on the road; he drains an entire convent full of nuns. He then travels to Paris, looking much younger now after feasting, and heads straight to the asylum where Maria is held prisoner. He breaks her out and feeds the orderly to her as a reward for her help. The priest and the doctor rush to warn Mina.

Along the way, Jonathan makes a difficult escape from the castle.

Meanwhile, Maria goes to Mina and says she’s been released from the hospital. They go to a hotel where she meets Dracula. He tags along with them around the carnival like a stalker. It’s all surprisingly romantic, and just maybe it’ll work out for Dracula this time. During their date, she gets repeated flashbacks to her earlier life.

When Mina goes home that evening, she finds Jonathan there along with the priest and doctor. The priest explains the facts about Dracula to Mina. Dracula shows up to convince her about his side of the story and about who she really is. She immediately wants him to bite her, and he does.

The priest, doctor, and Jonathan go to visit Henry, but Maria has gotten to him first. The group works together to kill Maria, but then they have to go to Transylvania, where the count has taken Mina. They bring the whole army with them, cannons and all.

There’s soon an all-out battle between soldiers, gargoyles, and Dracula himself, who’s very efficient at killing soldiers. Soon, it’s just Dracula and the priest, and they talk about motives and philosophy. The priest says Dracula can repent and the curse will end. He needs to let Mina live. There are more troops coming in, and more cannon fire.

Mina’s in danger, so Dracula goes to her. He talks about her being free if he dies, as if he knows what’s coming. He goes back out to the priest and surrenders. The priest stakes Dracula, who, after saying how much he loves Mina, turns to dust.

Brian’s Commentary

What could they have told the Transylvanian army to have them bring cannons to the castle?

There’s a lot of borrowing from “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” (1992), and I mean a lot. Even the music seems to steal from that film. I expected to rag on this for being a ripoff, but well, this is actually really good.

This one has a lot of intentional humor mixed in, which is probably the best thing about it. I didn’t like the CGI gargoyles at first, but they grew on me. The sets and makeup are impressive. The actors, with the exception of Caleb Landry Jones, are all Europeans, and everyone does the proper accents, unlike the earlier film.

This was exceptional, and we’ll certainly be talking about it again in our “Best of the Year” episode in January.

Kevin’s Commentary

I too recognized some elements from 1992’s “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” but this version dials it up to 11. The sets, costumes, and makeup are all very impressive. They don’t shirk at showing the full extent of Dracula’s fighting abilities and powers.

I do wonder how the small band of heroes who go to Romania to strike at Dracula when he and Mina get back to his castle persuaded the military to join them in a multi-troop heavily armed assault. “You see, general, he’s a vampire. No really. He is. And we need your help to take him down.”

Overall, I’d rank it as one of my favorite Dracula movies. Awesome.

2025 Night of the Reaper

* Directed by: Brandon Christensen

* Written by: Brandon Christensen, Ryan Christensen

* Stars: Jessica Clement, Ryan Robbins, Summer H. Howell

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 33 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s set in the 1980s so we can have landline phones instead of cell phones and VHS tapes, both necessary for the plot. And they do a good job of capturing the 80s vibe. It hums along with suspense and some mystery for the first 2/3 or so. It’s well made, but we were both very disappointed with the final act.

Spoilery Synopsis

A little boy tells the babysitter about the “Skin Eater” that lives in his closet. As the babysitter leaves them alone, we soon see that this couldn’t be more 80s if it tried, and it’s trying hard at least until the parents open the garage door to come home. No, that’s not them, the door just opened on its own. She goes outside to smoke and finds a dead dog in the street. When she goes inside, she finds a note: “Your pretty.” She assumes it’s the kids, but the strangeness continues. When she finds out it’s not the kids, it’s too late for her. The TV comes on, and a man in a cultist’s hood and skull mask is on there. We also see the same man grab her from behind… Credits roll as the grainy VHS-ish footage continues.

Deena has come back to town and she talks to Chad and Willis. She’s decided on Criminology for her major. Deena goes to see her hyper friend Haddie, but she hasn’t gone to see her parents yet. Haddie babysits for Sheriff Rodney’s kids, and she’s hoping he’ll marry her eventually.

Sheriff Rodney finds a package outside his door that’s got no label on it. Inside, he finds a garage door opener, which upsets him. He and the deputy test the opener on the house where the pre-credit murders happened, and it’s the same one that opened their garage door.

Deena goes home to her parents and talks to them, but her father doesn’t respond to her at all. Haddie calls and says she’s sick, so could Deena do her babysitting gig tonight?

Sheriff Rodney gets a videotape in a box at the office, and it shows a camper being killed by the same guy who did the babysitter. The sheriff says Connor Davis died in the woods two years ago, but it was assumed to be an accident. He and Deputy Butch find Officer Liz on the road burying a dead dog. The two men drive on to where Connor’s body was found years ago. They find another box there. This box has a videotape showing Emily the babysitter’s death. Also in the video is Chad’s van, which shouldn’t be there.

Deena arrives at the sheriff’s house and talks to Max, his son. He shows her all around the house except for the basement, where they never go. Naturally, she wants to go down there and look around. She pays for that with a jump scare. Abby, the sheriff’s wife, died in a car crash not long ago.

The police bring in Chad, who’s a video nerd who always carries his camera with him. They watch the tape on his camera, but it’s nothing. They’ve got nothing connecting him to the murders, so they have to let him go.

Deena gets a call from the sheriff; just checking in. She’s seen someone weird outside, but she’s not too worried. She and Max watch horror movies after that. She hears a dog yelping in pain outside and goes out to investigate. When she finds it dead, she runs back inside.

The sheriff checks out Willis’s house, since he was on Chad’s tape as well. He finds another videotape there, labeled “Night of the Reaper.” Willis walks in, and he arrests him on the spot.

Deena calls Haddie, who has someone ringing her doorbell and can’t talk. Deena walks through the house jumping at every sound. She finds some objects in the house that indicate she’s not there alone anymore.

The sheriff locks himself in his office and watches Willis’s tape. This one shows the murder of the sheriff’s wife, which he thought was an accident. If he was upset before, he’s way over the top now. He points a gun at Willis, who says he was told to give the tape to the sheriff. Before he can get any more answers, the police station gets a 911 call from a girl. All the cops hurry over there. We see that it’s really a distraction at the local drug store.

We watch through the video camera as the Reaper menaces sleeping Max in his bedroom. Then we see Deena use a Taser on the Reaper.

We get a flashback montage that explains what all has been going on tonight. It turns out that everything has been some kind of really elaborate set-up by Deena to capture Liz the forestry agent (whom we’ve only seen twice), who is the real killer [I think. This is really confusing].

Deena and Liz play hide-and-seek in the sheriff’s big house. Outside, Liz finds a whole forest full of masked figures that look like the Reaper. Deena uses the distraction to shoot Liz in the leg. “You murdered my sister. You destroyed my family!” shouts Deena. She was Emily’s sister. Just then, Chad shows up and knocks out Deena– he really was involved in all this!

Deena wakes up and admits that she followed Liz after Emily’s funeral. For a motive, Liz says, “Why not?” Liz and Chad explain it all, more or less. Suddenly, Chad’s head explodes when he keys up a walkie talkie that Deena had already rigged up.

Liz forces Deena to watch her sister’s death on the videotape. Liz stabs Deena in the leg in the same way she did Emily. Suddenly, the sheriff shows up and shoots Liz. Liz tries to make excuses, but the sheriff doesn’t believe them and shoots her again. Deena admits she sent the tapes to the sheriff to set all this up.

The sheriff promises to hide the body.

Brian’s Commentary

So many horror films are starting to do the 80s retro thing that it’s beginning to get tiring. This one needs it for the videotapes and lack of cell phones.

Whatever the Hell happened at the 70-minute mark was the most incredibly confusing “twist” I’ve ever seen. I was lost for a good ten minutes until they explained everything. Even then, it didn’t make much sense. When did Deena have time to do all this? Why was she running all over the house being afraid? Why did they hide Liz’s body, when there was plenty of evidence against her?

This was really good for the first hour, and then it went straight to garbageville with the final third. This is really dumb.

Kevin’s Commentary

When Liz was revealed to be the killer and Deena set this night up to capture and punish her, I said, “Wut?” It’s a confusing and unexpected twist, but at least it is somewhat explained. But wait, there’s another twist that Chad was teamed up with Liz all this time, and Deena didn’t know about that.

It did take an unexpected turn in the final third, but I can’t say I’m pleased with it. It was too abrupt and contrived.

2018 The Velocipastor

* Directed by: Brendan Steere

* Written by: Brendan Steere

* Stars: Greg Cohan, George Schewnzer, Janice Young

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 15 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

We’re just going to quote IMDB.com for the description because we can’t top that - “After losing his parents, a priest travels to China, where he inherits a mysterious ability that allows him to turn into a dinosaur. At first horrified by this new power, a hooker convinces him to use it to fight crime. And ninjas.” They make the most of a low budget, embracing the silliness and fun. It’s well put together - for what it is - and very entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

Pastor Doug Jones gives a sermon at church. He goes outside, where his parents are waiting for him, but suddenly, their car explodes (with completely missing special effects). “Your parents died, Doug, that’s what parents do,” consoles Father Stewart. Doug’s starting to question his faith, so he decides to do some traveling. Credits roll.

Doug goes to China. As he walks through the woods, a Chinese girl runs from a hunter who shoots her with an arrow. The dying woman hands Doug some kind of Claw. “Dragon Warrior” is all she says that we understand. Somehow, Doug gets cut by the claw and everything changes.

Back at Doug’s church, he’s now having nightmares. Stewart doesn’t think much about it. As he staggers outside, he passes Carol, a prostitute, getting yelled at by her pimp.

Night falls, and Doug looks at the full moon. He’s in a lot of pain, but then he roars and his eyes change. He’s in the same park when Carol is working, and kills the man who is robbing her. Except he’s not Doug anymore, he’s a vicious dinosaur.

Doug wakes up in the morning in bed with Carol. She says “Last night was amazing.” He thinks they had sex, but she clears that right up. He had no idea he turned into a dinosaur and ate someone. He doesn’t believe dinosaurs ever even really existed. All she has for him to wear is a skimpy little dress, but she takes him out to see the robber’s body.

He’s upset, but she says this could be a great thing. He could be like a religious superhero, killing all the bad. He runs off, in the mini-dress, to take confessions. The confessor is Carol’s pimp, and he’s not a nice guy. It’s quite a confession, and he admits to bombing Doug’s parents’ car. Doug starts twitching and changes right there in the confessional. The pimp doesn’t live long.

Doug goes back to Carol for advice on what she suggested earlier. He needs rules, but he says it felt good killing the murderer. We cut to an exercise montage as Doug toughens up. Doug-o-saur starts eating bad people, and Doug starts getting closer to Carol.

Meanwhile, a group of Chinese hunters are in town looking for the “Dragon Warrior.” This group also deals in drugs and laughs evilly. Father Stewart spots Doug and Carol together and doesn’t like it.

Doug and Stewart talk about Doug’s changes. Does God really want all these people dead? Doug thinks he does, and his parental-flashback proves it. Father Stewart takes Doug to Altair, a man who– flashback to the Vietnam War, where Stewart, Ali, and the squad talk about the future. We see that Stewart had a girlfriend and everything, but that didn’t work out so well. Anyway, Altair does a ritual for Doug, who gets all dino-y and pulls out Stewart’s eyeball.

Out in the woods, the ninjas catch up with Doug. We get a flashback from one of the ninjas. They close in on Doug, who makes short work of the ninjas.

Doug goes to Carol for help, which leads to a sex montage. In the morning, three more ninjas show up at Carol’s apartment, and they fight together.

The old Chinese master, Wei Chan, has taken Stewart prisoner. He explains that he smuggles drugs for God; the addicts will have nowhere to go but the church. When confronted, Stewart calls Wei Chan an infidel, but is then killed.

Doug knows where Wei Chan is, and he goes there to battle. We see that Wei Chan’s number two man is Sam, Doug’s completely ignored and forgotten brother. Carol beats up most of the ninjas while Doug and Sam go one-on-one.

Carol is hurt, but still manages to give Doug a pep talk before dying. Doug then turns into a dinosaur and tears up all the ninjas.

Suddenly, Wei Chan shoots the dinosaur with an arrow, and Doug turns human. Doug’s still got dinosaur hands, however, and he uses it to rip off the old man’s head.

Doug takes Carol to a surgeon who saves her. Doug quits the church and decides to travel the world fighting evil.

Brian’s Commentary

The special effects, when there are actual special effects, are probably the worst I’ve ever seen, which are hilarious in themselves. The whole thing is clearly intentionally goofy, from the concept right down to the acting and dialogue. The story itself is straightforward and easy to follow, and, although silly, makes perfect sense.

It’s stupidly good.

Kevin’s Commentary

When we saw the car explosion effect, I knew we were in for something special, and I was right. I kept waiting to see what silliness would appear to us next. That beheading scene near the end though, was really hilarious. It’s not a classic of cinema, but it’s a lot of fun, and I really enjoyed it.

1991 Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah

* Directed by: Kazuki Omori, Koji Hashimoto

* Written by: Kazuki Omori

* Stars: Kosuke Toyohara, Anna Nakagawa, Megumi Odaka

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 40 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It starts out with a deep-water submarine discovering the body of King Ghidorah. Then a flying saucer appears in the sky over Japan. Things build from there with time travel back to the 1940s, and the origin of Godzilla, and of course a giant creature battle. It’s a big story this time, and on the silly side, but pretty entertaining overall.

Spoilery Synopsis

It’s 2205 AD, and a submarine searches the ocean floor. They find what looks like a dinosaur head. And then they find another. Yes, they’ve located King Ghidorah, who used to have three heads but now has two. Credits Roll.

In 1992 AD, we see a flying saucer above Japan. It’s a full-on mass UFO sighting. Kenichiro works for the “Super Mystery Magazine” and doesn’t want to write about silly UFO stories. Elsewhere, an old man rants that the dinosaurs will one day return to save us all from disasters. Then he’s arrested. He claims a dinosaur protected him and his squad in WWII. There’s no record of the encounter, no one would have believed him.

Experts discuss the UFO and have no explanation other than it’s from space. Miki, from the previous film, gives a briefing about the previous film. The UFO went straight to the point where Godzilla is buried, so that can’t be good.

Elsewhere, Professor Mazaki has read the story about WWII and believes it. He thinks dinosaurs are still alive today. Kenichiro thinks that the dinosaur from the story was hit by radioactivity in the atomic tests at the end of the war and mutated into Godzilla.

Businessman Shindo was also on the island in WWII, and now he owns Dinosaur World - a museum and tourist attraction. Kenichiro goes to interview him, but Shindo clearly doesn’t want to talk about that. He explains his theory about Godzilla, that he used to be a dinosaur mutated by radiation.

Meanwhile, the UFO has landed, and Japan sends all its tanks to deal with it. Three people “beam down” from the ship, Wilson, Glenchicki, and Emmy admit that they are just holographic projections, while they are physically still in the ship. They say they’re from 2204 and have come back to talk to the Prime Minister. They are here to warn us about a coming catastrophe. Nuclear pollution will destroy Japan, and Godzilla will cause it.

Kenichiro is called to the Prime Minister’s office along with Professor Mazaki. They are shown the book that Kenichiro is going to write in the future. The time travelers plan to go back to 1944 and change what happened. Kenichiro, Mazaki, and Miki will be going along. Emmy and Android M-11 will also be going along. They all discuss time travel. Emmy introduces the modern people to her Dorats, little genetically created pets.

They “do the time warp” and go to 1944 Lagos. The Americans are shelling the island, and there’s soon a land battle. Then, the dinosaur shows up; it’s a T-Rex, and he soon drives off the Americans. Wounded, it stomps off back into the jungle and collapses. The Japanese soldiers apologize to the big monster and ask him for forgiveness.

The time travelers teleport the dinosaur to a place beneath the ocean. Emmy releases her three dorats before leaving, and lies about it to the others. Godzilla is gone from history forever– except now King Ghidorah has taken his place. The dorats were exposed to the radiation that once created Godzilla and they mutated instead. It was created by the future people on purpose.

We see the future people, who can control the three-headed monster. They want to destroy all of Japan except for Tokyo and then rebuild it. Emmy is angry; she was tricked into causing all this.

Ghidorah flies over Kyushu with his three lightning-shooting heads. Emmy drops in on Kenichiro and offers him help. She says they lied about Japan’s fate; Japan became super prosperous and became bigger than any other country; that’s why some people want to destroy it before all that can happen. She makes it clear she’s not on the side of Wilson and Glenchicki.

The modern Japanese have a secret nuclear submarine, and they plan to irradiate that old dinosaur on the ocean floor. Miki, on the other hand, can still sense Godzilla, even though he’s not supposed to exist anymore. Maybe he found some nuclear waste or something.

M-11 is still on the case, and he tries to kidnap the heroes. He succeeds and takes Emmy back to the ship. She later reprograms the robot to assist her.

Meanwhile, Godzilla eats that nuclear sub. Somehow, Godzilla has returned.

Also meanwhile, jet fighters harass King Ghidorah. Godzilla reaches land, and he’s even bigger than he was before– this time, he was made by modern, more efficient nuclear energy. The future men send Ghidorah to kill Godzilla. Shindo says, “Our savior has come back again. He’ll protect us like he did before.”

The battle begins. Godzilla loses the battle pretty clearly, but then Kenichiro, Emma, and M-11 sabotage something on the timeship, and they lose control of their monster. He’s not as smart now, which gives the “new” Godzilla more of a chance. Godzilla uses his heat ray to burn off one of Ghidorah’s heads.

While the monsters fight, M-11, Emmy, and Kenichiro fight to get off the timeship before it can return to the future. They use the teleportation device in the smaller ship to send the main ship right into the middle of the battle. Godzilla takes a moment to kill them all before fatally blasting King Ghidorah.

Godzilla is now in Japan with nothing holding him back. He’s going to attack Tokyo, and it will go like the future people said it would. The human soldiers are no match at all for Godzilla. They wonder if Emmy could go back to the future, revive the dead Ghidorah, and then bring him back to defeat Godzilla again. Emmy and M-11 go back to the future.

In 2204, we see that sub from earlier, and characters we know are aboard. Ghidorah’s heart is still beating… Can they revive him and make him a cyborg? No problem.

Mr. Shindo is in Tokyo, which is being attacked. He finds that all pretty ironic. They come face-to-face out the tower window, and Godzilla remembers him– before blasting him to dust. As he continues to rampage, the sky opens and Ghidorah shows up from the future with a new, robotic third head and heavy armor. Emmy is literally inside him controlling him with a joystick. She blasts Godzilla, and there is another epic battle with lots of collateral damage.

Emmy mentions that Kenichiro is actually one of her ancestors, and she needs to go back to her time. Down at the bottom of the ocean, we see that Godzilla still isn’t dead.

Brian’s Commentary

I like this is maybe the first time that Godzilla really had an origin story that more or less makes sense. At least it starts that way, but with the time travel, it’s a little sketchy. As always, the special effects are slightly improved from the previous film. The character Miki makes another appearance, but she’s the only one.

With time travel, androids, and beams of all kinds, this one is way more sci-fi than most. It’s pretty decent.

Kevin’s Commentary

Once again, there is an especially cool poster.

I want to have a Dorat for a pet.

It was pretty obvious that the time travellers were going to be nefarious, it just took a while to see how that was going to happen. Pretty cool story, if a bit on the silly side. And the science is… a stretch to say the least. But I thought it was entertaining. It’s another good episode in the series.

1973 Santo and the Blue Demon vs. Dracula and the Wolf Man

* Directed by Miguel M. Delgado

* Written by Alfredo Salazar

* Stars Santo, Alejandro Moreno, Aldo Monti

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 30 Minutes

* Trailer:

Synopsis

We begin with a wrestling match between Santo and the White Angel. Santo wins the first fall. The Angel wins the second.

Meanwhile, we cut to a crypt. A man prays to Satan, talking about how there have been seven eclipses since the magician Cristaldi killed Count Dracula and the werewolf. Tonight, the blood of another Cristaldi will spill.

We see Professor Luis Cristaldi with his family; daughter Laura and a granddaughter. They talk about the wrestling match and wonder how it ended. Of course, Santo has won the third fall and the match. As Santo goes back to the dressing room, he’s told that his girlfriend Lina’s uncle has something important to tell him. They go to see Professor Cristaldi.

He has gotten a note saying it’s time for him and his entire family to pay their debt. “The power of the avengers reaches everywhere.” Both Santo and Laura think it’s just a tasteless joke, but the old man thinks otherwise. He reads from a book about Count Dracula making an alliance with the king of the werewolves to dominate humanity. Their ancestor, Eric Cristaldi, found out about the plan and stopped it, killing Dracula and the werewolf with a magic dagger. Dracula swore to return, and all signs point to it happening now. Crisaldi is a scientist, but since there are things that science cannot explain, he believes all this. He even has the dagger. He’s old, so he doesn’t fear for himself, but he is worried about his daughter, granddaughter, and niece. Santo promises to protect them.

Eric, the Satan-worshiper, goes to talk to his gang and while there, grabs a bottle of chloroform. Old Man Cristaldi gets ready for bed and the Satanist jumps out of the closet and abducts him. The man plans to sacrifice the professor to revive the monsters. He hoists Cristaldo above Dracula’s coffin and bleeds him dry in a scene much much like “Dracula Prince of Darkness(https://www.horrorguys.com/dracula-prince-of-darkness-1966-review/) (1968).” The blood reanimates Dracula’s skeleton and soon, Drac’s back, fully dressed in formal attire. The werewolf king, Rufus, also awakens. Their first order of business is to change humans into vampires and werewolves to create an army. They soon have a whole bunch of people chained in the dungeon for conversion.

Cristaldi’s family goes to the police to report him as missing, but they don’t seem too concerned so soon. Elsewhere, the sun has come up, so Dracula has gone to sleep and the werewolf has become human. Eric wakes up Rufus and takes him to an apartment in the city.

Santo can’t defeat the curse alone, so he plans to bring in “A faithful and courageous friend, a formidable ally who can be of great help to us.” We cut to Blue Demon in a wrestling match, and he wins too! Later, Laura is attacked on the road, and a man comes to her rescue– we see that it’s Rufus Rex, and now he plans to seduce her as her hero. “She will fall in love with me, and I will sacrifice her on the next lunar cycle,” he tells Dracula the next night. As planned, she does fall for him.

Dracula goes to the Cristaldi house and goes into the little girl’s bedroom as she sleeps. He spots the dagger that the old man left on the nightstand and backs off in terror. The Blue Demon follows Rufus to a meeting with Eric and listens in on their conversation– except they see him and say things to make Rufus look like a good guy and imply that Eric has Professor Cristaldi as a prisoner. Blue Demon is completely fooled.

Eric then leads the fighters into a trap, but none of them realize that Lina has hidden in the back seat and gone along behind them. Inside, the armed gang pull their guns. The leader of the gang has had run-ins with Santo before, so it’ll look natural if he’s the one to kill the wrestlers. The bad guys are just about to de-mask the heroes when Lina runs a forklift through the wall, giving the men the distraction they need to defeat the mobsters. Rufus and Eric debate over how to proceed with killing the wrestlers.

Laura’s new boyfriend (Rufus) tells Santo that he paid Eric to reveal the location of the missing Professor. He shows them on a map where to go. Blue Demon says it looks like another ambush, but they do see the professor in the window as promised. Zombified Cristaldi and Eric knock out Santo, who is soon rescued by Blue Demon. Elsewhere, it’s a full moon, and the werewolf abducts Laura.

Dracula, on the other hand, only has eyes for Lina. He uses his hypnosis to lure her outside, but Santo finds her before he can bite her. One of the minion-vampires bites their maid. Dracula calls Lina through their psychic link, and Blue Demon follows her out as Santo reads in the library. Dracula then orders Josefina, the maid, to kidnap little Rosita, the granddaughter. Demon is captured. Santo goes outside and finds the gardener, who explains what has transpired while Santos was reading the lore.

Dracula now has Lina and little Rosita right where he wants them. Laura and the old Professor are undead under Dracula’s control. Dracula orders the still-human Eric to deal with Santo and the magic dagger. Eric does manage to knock Santo out and get the dagger, but before he can kill Santos, he decides to demand a fortune from Lina. Turns out that Eric was so evil that the dagger turns on Eric and stabs him all by itself.

Rufus punishes one of his own misbehaving werewolf minions by making him walk across a plank suspended above a bunch of wooden stakes. It ends badly for the minion. Dracula then forces Blue Demon to do the same thing, but Santo arrives in time to help him. Santo and the Blue Demon fight a whole pack of werewolves, as Rosita crosses the plank on her own. Lina takes the girl away, and now it’s time for a “boss fight.”

Rufus Rex fights Blue Demon. Rufus starts to lose, so he wolfs-up and continues the battle as the werewolf. Dracula and the Werewolf close in on Santo, who swings on a rope and kicks them both into the pit of stakes, killing them both. All the minions turn to dust.

Later, back at the house, Santo and the Blue Demon check in on Lina and Rosita, who are fine. The two men have to rest because they both have fights tomorrow.

We then get another wrestling match where the two men tag-team against their rivals in the ring. Guess who wins?

Commentary

The wrestling matches are very obviously done on a set with no real audience or spectators, but we can hear cheering and the announcers talking about the fans, so it’s supposed to be a crowded auditorium. All three matches shown are clearly staged for the film, but they go on for a really long time, as if we are supposed to believe they’re real matches. They go on a bit too long for my taste, especially since you know how they’re going to turn out. This is especially true for the final match at the end, which had no connection to the story and only served to drag the run time out for another ten minutes.

I couldn’t help but notice that Agustin Martinez Solares, who plays Rufus Rex, bears a striking resemblance to Paul Naschy from that other series of Spanish-language werewolf films that were popular around the same time. Still, those other films are from Spain, and this was clearly Mexican, so it may or may not have been a coincidence.

It still has luchadores in full-head masks as the heroes, but this is a much more entertaining film than the previous one (“Santo and the Blue Demon Vs. The Monsters.”) The creature effects and masks are better than before, and this time, the monsters actually have plans and powers, and are not just an ugly bunch of fighters. Dracula uses his hypnosis, turns into a bat, and other things, while the werewolf does werewolf things. The plot makes sense, and most of the characters act within the context of the situation.

The cinematography, soundtrack, and pacing are all quite good for a low-ish budget Mexican film. To me, it gave off a lot of the same vibes as the 1960’s Batman series, which, I suspect, is what they were going for. I mean, it’s still ridiculous and campy, but that’s not a bug, it’s a feature.

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Mainstream Films:

2025 Forgive Us All

* Directed by: Jordana Stott

* Written by: Jordana Stott, Lance Giles, Alex Makauskas

* Stars: Lily Sullivan, Callan Mulvey, Richard Roxburgh

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 33 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

In a beautiful location in New Zealand, we see a slice of a zombie apocalypse. And we quickly see that living jerks are just as dangerous as the infected in the aftermath. A woman in mourning finds a wounded traveler being pursued, and we gradually piece together what life and politics are like now. Rather than a non-stop action take, this is more of a story that takes its time, focusing on the people trying to survive. We give it a moderate thumbs up.

Spoilery Synopsis

A woman cries and screams next to a fresh grave. As she carries her pistol back to the house, we see that a struggle took place that resulted in a shooting. She then looks in on her sleeping child, who is also covered in blood and barely breathing. Although it looks like she’s dying, Maddie sits up and looks possessed. Maddie leaps, and we hear a gunshot. Credits roll.

Two years later, Rory still wakes up with nightmares over that whole situation. She listens to a radio report that sounds bleak. She passes Otto on the way out, and it’s clear that they live way out in the wilderness.

We cut to a rider leaving Camp 13, zooming right past the sign that says, “GMA Quarantine Processing.” Two other horseback riders are right behind him, in pursuit. The man’s partner gets caught instead. They torture him for the first rider’s location, but he dies rather than give it up.

Back with Rory, who still grieves about Maddie, she’s considering killing herself, but doesn’t. She finds the horse, who leads her to the unconscious rider. He looks like he’s dying, but she takes his bag, slings him over the saddle, and sets off leading the horse.

Meanwhile, Otto finds a bunch of bones that belonged to their neighbor, Henry. The body appears to be mostly eaten. He sees three men, GMA agents, on horseback and hides, but there’s also something screaming in the woods nearby.

Rory takes the wounded man home and looks him over before locking him inside the barn. She opens his package and finds medicine inside that says “Take within 72 hours of infection.” When Otto returns, she shows him the still-unconscious stranger. Otto’s not happy. Also there’s a storm coming, “They’ll be out in force tonight.” At dinner, they argue about life in general.

That night, she reminisces about Maddie and her drawing of a dragonfly. Her father was off helping the sick people, but Rory doesn’t know much about the virus. Suddenly, Connor, the father, opens the door, and he’s clearly not right. He jumps at them and– Rory wakes up.

She goes out to the barn to check on her prisoner, and he’s up and around now. They hear a “Howler” outside and have a quick scuffle. He’s Noah, and she patches up his wounds. Noah broke into the GMA base and stole the antidote for his own sick son. It’s still dark, so if he leaves now, the Howlers will get him. Still, his time to use the antidote on his son is running out.

Not far away, the three trackers, Logan, Scout, and Brooks, find Rory’s house and wait to see what happens. Rory and Otto argue about what to do about the sick boy whose time is running out. As they bicker, the GMA agents ride up.

Rory and Noah take the horse as Otto stays behind to stall the agents. There’s a gunfight, and Brooks dies, as does Otto. Logan is injured, but he’ll live. Scout tells Logan she’s not going with him; she doesn’t want to be a part of this anymore, so Logan goes on alone after Noah and Rory.

Rory continues on alone as Noah and Logan brawl without their horses or guns. After much back and forth, Noah shoots Logan, which attracts a group of Howlers which finishes him off as well.

Rory continues through the dark forest, now at night, and all the Howlers are out at night. She hides and runs from a group of the nasty infected people. In one of the scuffles, she gets bitten. After that, the infected begin to ignore her; she’s one of them now.

In the morning, Rory finally comes to Noah’s house. Did she get there in time to save Noah’s son before the infection is too far gone? She leaves the cure with the old woman who’s watching Noah’s son and walks on back to the river.

Rory visualizes Maddie as she puts her pistol to her head and pulls the trigger before the disease gets her.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s a just-barely sci-fi post-zombie-apocalyptic story set in the always-beautiful New Zealand wilderness. Everything is filmed with either a brown or green filter, so everything has a very “Western” feel to it.

The acting is fine, the situation is interesting enough, but the plot is very generic. It’s more of a good-guys-and-bad-guys movie than really leaning into the zombies, which are just sort of there in the background a few times until the ending.

It looks great, has good acting, but it was awfully slow moving.

Kevin’s Commentary

Wow, the scenery is nice in this one. Lily Sullivan, as Rory, kept reminding me of a young Geena Davis - which is a fine thing. She’s very good in the role, as is the rest of the cast.

I liked the direction this one took, with the zombie story a real threat, but not the entire focus. There are plenty of terrifying moments while kind of being on the slow side following the trials of the living. It’s not a happy movie, but it’s quite good.

2015 Insidious: Chapter 3

* Directed by: Leigh Whannell

* Written by: Leigh Whannell

* Stars: Dermot Mulroney, Stefanie Scott, Angus Sampson

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 37 Minutes

* Trailer:

\

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s a prequel to the haunting of the Lambert family, showing how Elise got into the business along with Specs and Tucker. So pretend that they all look younger than they did in the previous movies that take place after this. But age discrepancies aside, it’s well made and works perfectly with the other films. If you’re an Insidious fan, you’ll probably like this one.

Spoilery Synopsis

This takes place a few years before the previous films.

Quinn goes to see Elise; she’s looking for a psychic. She wants to talk to her dead mother and has been trying to contact her on her own. After a bit of discussion, Elise is willing to help. She contacts the spirit world and senses something bad. She warns Quinn not to call on her mother. “If you call out to one of the dead, all of them can hear you.”

Quinn goes home, but she keeps talking to her dead mother. Her father works a lot and her brother Alex is weird. She goes to an audition that afternoon, and doesn’t go well. She whines to her friend Maggie. She sees another strange dead-looking person and then gets hit by a car.

Quinn dies on the operating table, but then they bring her back. While dead, she sees something scary. Three weeks later, Quinn talks to an old woman who speaks of the man who lives in the vents. “He up there right now, standing in your room.” Quinn’s in two leg casts and a wheelchair, at least for a while.

Across town, Elise goes to bed. She dreams about Quinn. She considers opening up her padlocked reading room but doesn’t.

Quinn sees someone on her ceiling, and her father Sean investigates the weirdness. Quinn tells him about seeing Elise a month or so ago, and he warns her not to do that.

Elise calls Quinn’s mother on her own one night. She knows someone is bothering Quinn, and it’s not her mother. She sees it, and it’s definitely not a nice ghost. Meanwhile, Quinn has a run-in with the same entity, and she soon realizes it’s not her mother. Around the same time, the old woman next door dies.

Quinn has a nightmare about the various creatures and dead people. Sean finds her in the empty apartment upstairs.

Sean goes to see Elise, and they talk about dead spouses. She talks about going to “The Dark Place” looking for her dead husband, but some evil woman followed her back to the real world. She hasn’t been able to do a reading since then. Still, she tries, and quickly goes into a trance. She sees all sorts of weird things and is attacked by the woman in black, her nemesis.

Sean calls in Specs and Tucker, a couple of ghost-chasers from YouTube. Elise talks to Carl, an old friend, about her spirit problem.

Quinn beats up Sean, Specs, and Tucker, and then breaks the casts off her legs. Elise shows up to get rid of the parasite inside Quinn. The group does a seance so that she can go to a different plane, “The Further,” and help Quinn.

Elise confronts the ghosts, and this time, she beats up the woman in black and defeats her. She runs into her dead husband, and he tempts her to join him in the world of the dead. She recognizes that he would never suggest she kill herself and that he’s actually the bad ghost in disguise. As she steals Quinn away from “The Man Who Can’t Breathe,” there’s an earthquake in the real world. Elise calls on Lily, Quinn’s dead mother, to help.

Quinn returns to the real world, and gets to talk to her mother through Elise.

Later, Elise talks to Specs and Tucker about them never having really seen a ghost before. Maybe they could all go into business together? They’d have to wear shirts and ties.

Brian’s Commentary

This is a prequel to the first two films, and the character of Elise is the main thing that ties the films together. It’s got foggy corridors, lanterns, and weird creatures, so it fits in with the other films just fine.

It’s not my favorite series in general, but this is a solid entry if you liked the others.

Kevin’s Commentary

I recognize that the Insidious movies are well made, and they have a loyal fandom. They are not my cup of tea. But I’m in agreement with Brian, this one is consistent with the others and fits well with them. If you’ve enjoyed the previous films, which take place after this one, you’ll probably enjoy this one as well.

1989 Godzilla vs. Biollante

* Directed by: Kazuko Omori, Koji Hashimoto, Kenjiro Ohmori

* Written by: Shinichiro Kobayashi, Kazuki Omori

* Stars: Kunihiko Mitamura, Yoshiko Tanaka, Masanobu Takashima

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 44 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Who knew that Godzilla would be back? After he was trapped in a volcano in the last movie, years have passed, and a scientist has accidentally created a giant plant/animal hybrid monster. Surprising no one, they fight. The budget is bigger, the effects are a little better, and the story moves well. It’s a good entry in the series.

Spoilery Synopsis

Credits roll as we see clips from the previous film, “The Return of Godzilla” (1984). Afterward, scientists pick up some of Godzilla’s skin from the wreckage and take it to be examined. There’s suddenly a shootout between a group of soldiers and another group. The winning group is killed by a lone assassin, who takes the sample.

We see that man again on a boat heading to a biotechnology laboratory in an oil-producing country. They hope to splice the cells with a fast-growing grain to end world hunger. Suddenly, there’s an explosion and Erika, Dr. Shiragami’s daughter is killed.

Five years later, Shiragami has been working with ESP and roses. Miki may be able to communicate with plants. His group is being spied on by the Americans, who may be planning to steal their discoveries. Asuka and her boyfriend, Kirishima, go to the Godzilla Memorial Lounge to talk about his going to MIT to study.

Meanwhile, a volcano is threatening to erupt on an island nearby. All the children at a school have had the same dream, that Godzilla is coming back. Miki believes that Godzilla has awakened. Gondo is the man tasked with watching the island for Godzilla’s return, and he’s looking for job security.

The scientists have invented a bacteria that eats nuclear material for use if there was ever a nuclear accident. They think they might be able to use that against Godzilla. They need the Godzilla cells to create the final product. They go to Dr. Shiragami for help, and he turns them down because of his daughter’s death; he eventually changes his mind under the condition that he can use some of the Godzilla cells for his own side project.

Dr. Shiragami starts working with the cells. He also does something with the cells of the telepathic roses. He combines the two types of cells into something new. Kirishima warns that this thing could possibly evolve to be worse than Godzilla.

Meanwhile, the Super X-2 has been completed. It’s a new and improved version of the one in the previous film. It’s got a new kind of weapon that can reflect Godzilla’s heat ray.

The two Americans break into the lab and try to steal the plans for the anti-radiation bacteria, but then the newly designed creature kills them both.

The next morning, Shiragami tells Kirishima what he’s done and admits it might have been a mistake. A competing company, BioMajor, demands the bacteria or they’ll blow up the mountain that restrains Godzilla.

Suddenly, a monstrous thing with a rose on its head appears in the nearby lake. Kirishima, Shiragami, Asuka, and Miki go to see it. “That plant has a human spirit,” says Shiragami. Miki says dead-Erika’s spirit is in there.

The ransom switch at BioTech goes badly. Godzilla is released from the volcano, and the assassin from earlier gets the radiation-eating bacteria. The navy can’t do anything to stop Godzilla, so they launch the Super X-2.

Miki and Asuka report to Shiragami that they can’t detect any of Erika inside the new plant-monster. It knows Godzilla is coming, though, and heads in his direction.

The two monsters finally meet. There’s lots of staring and explosions as they fight. Biollante is eventually defeated and burns up in a fiery blaze. No, Shirigama says it can’t die, it’s immortal.

Godzilla, on the other hand, has used a lot of energy fighting Biollante and Super X-2, so it’s going to head toward a nuclear reactor to refuel. The military predicts the wrong target, leaving Osaka with no defenses.

Godzilla closes in on Osaka, but Miki concentrates with her plant-ESP. Will it work on Godzilla? They come face to face, but Miki faints. Gondo and Kirishima arrive in town and go to the Sarandia Oil Company, the people who stole the bacteria. They retrieve it far too easily. The head of Sarandia calls his assassin in to take out Shiragami.

Godzilla rampages through Osaka. Super X-2 arrives to fight, but the secret weapon is broken and won’t work. They unload everything they have, but it’s not enough; they crash. Gondo shoots bazookas full of the radiation-eating bacteria and makes wisecracks until Godzilla drops a building on him.

The bacteria isn’t working on Godzilla fast enough. It should have been lethal, but it’s not working. That might be due to Godzilla’s low body temperature. Major Kuroki thinks he knows of an experimental device that does something with thunder that they can use to raise Godzilla’s body temperature.

They use the TC weapon to make Godzilla heat up with generated lightning. The bacteria still isn’t working.

Miki runs outside and uses her ESP to make Biollante-dust rain down from the sky. The plant creature re-integrates and attacks Godzilla. Biollante is evolving and changing into a huge, tentacled thing. Lots of tentacles, more than Godzilla can deal with. He’s way bigger and tougher than Godzilla, and it’s looking bad for our favorite lizard.

Godzilla turns and heads back to the ocean, but falls down before he can get there. The bacteria has finally taken effect. Billante then turns back into glowing spores and goes up into the sky. We see dead-Erika’s face as he ascends. Dr. Shiragami is then shot in the back by the assassin. Kirishima takes off after him, but the baddie is finished off by the lightning machine.

Everyone watches as Godzilla gets back up; the ocean must have made his body temperature drop again. He marches back off to his home…

Brian’s Commentary

This one has moved on from the talky, suspense-filled previous episodes and is paced much more like an action movie. The pumped-up soundtrack makes this obvious in the opening scenes.

There is some early CGI graphics used for maps and diagrams, sometimes in 3D, which were probably really cool at the time. The monster and all the important stuff is still done with miniatures and men in suits, but the computer age was coming.

In a 2014 poll of Japanese fans, this was ranked the best of all the Godzilla movies. I don’t know if I’d go that far, but this one of the better ones.

Kevin’s Commentary

It kind of felt like the movie happened in the first hour. But then there was more. It had a bigger budget this time around, the biggest budget of a Godzilla movie up to this point, and it shows. It is still a guy in a big rubber suit, but they’ve come a long way since the 1950s. This one is pretty good.

1986 Witchboard

* Directed by: Kevin Tenney

* Written by: Kevin Tenney

* Stars: Todd Allen, Tawny Kitaen, Stephen Nichols

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 38 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The movie was made in the mid 1980s and looks like it, which is fun. While it does have a small body count, it’s pretty tame and dated for today’s audiences. It’s easy to see where the story is going, and it’s well made enough to still entertain. We wouldn’t call it a tremendous classic, but it’s worth checking out if you haven’t seen it already.

Spoilery Synopsis

As credits roll, people arrive at a big house for a party. It’s very… 80s. Jim watches Brandon and Roger argue over the existence of God. Lloyd and Mike show up, and they’re Jim’s underdressed friends. Linda consoles Jim over how nasty Brandon got. Meanwhile, Brandon explains the pronunciation of the word “Ouija.” Then he describes the process as if none of the many partygoers had ever seen one before.

Brandon talks Linda into trying the Ouija board. Brandon explains that this particular board is dominated by a little boy named David. Through the board, David answers a few questions but then gets upset by Jim mocking the process. Suddenly, Brandon’s tires on his car outside explode.

Later that night, as Linda and Jim have sex, the Ouija board in the living room sits there doing nothing, but it’s doing nothing ominously.

In the morning, Linda uses the board to try to contact David by herself. She’s just gotten a positive pregnancy test, and she wants David to enter her baby. David says no, because he doesn’t like Jim. Meanwhile, Jim and Lloyd talk at the construction site where Jim works until a bunch of material falls and kills Lloyd.

David tells Linda where to find her lost diamond ring: in the bathroom drain. Jim comes in and she tells him what happened. She actually found her ring where David said it would be.

At Lloyd’s funeral, Homicide department detective Dewhurst comes to Jim and Linda. He thinks Lloyd was murdered; could the killer have been aiming for Jim? When the couple argues later, she tells him that she’s pregnant.

Linda tells David that she’s giving the board back to Brandon today, and there’s nothing he can do about it. He soon sends her a sign that there is something he can do about it.

Brandon comes to talk to Jim about the Ouija board and David. Jim laughs, but Brandon takes it all very seriously. He explains that spirits will take advantage of her, and the board becomes very obsessive. Then the spirit starts to get mean and will eventually possess her. Jim just laughs. Brandon wants to call in a medium to exorcise the spirit. Brandon and Jim have a lot of history, and Jim doesn’t care about anything. Linda calls, and Jim decides to allow the medium into his house.

Zarabeth is weird, but she’s supposed to be the best medium in the region. The group decides to do a seance to talk to David. David says he’ll leave, and then a bunch of weird stuff happens in the room. Zarabeth says David chose to leave on his own.

Zarabeth tells Brandon that David seemed way too strong for a ten-year-old. After going home, Zarabeth dies a nasty death.

Brandon comes to Jim the next day and suggests that all the deaths are connected to David. Brandon thinks maybe David has been lying to them about his age and everything else. As Brandon leaves, Jim notices the detective outside watching the house.

Linda watches as David moves the Ouija’s planchette on his own and then throws her around the room. At the hospital, the doctor says Linda was never pregnant.

Brandon and Jim do research about David’s real life and death at the library, which soon sends them to the cemetery– at night. David’s parents both died just two weeks ago.

Brandon and Jim contact David through the board again, and this time, David says it’s not him. David says it’s “Evil” who has done the killings. It’s Malfeitor who’s been doing all this. “Malfeitor is here,” it says as barrels fall on the two men. That’s not so bad until a hatchet whacks Brandon in the head.

Jim researches Malfeitor, who was a major serial killer back in the ‘30s– in their house! Meanwhile, Linda gets stuck in the shower and has to break out. Then she sees Malfeitor, and he’s not so friendly anymore.

Jim comes home to find that Malfeitor has possessed Linda. They fight until Dewhurst comes in, gun drawn. He thinks Jim has been behind everything. The detective is almost immediately knocked out by Linda/Malfeitor, who says Jim is the portal, not Linda. They say the only way to close the portal is for Jim to shoot himself. Instead, Jim shoots the Ouija board just as it throws him out the window.

Later, we see Jim and Linda getting married. He’s in a neck brace. Back at the house, the landlady finds the Ouija board and wonders if it still works, even if it is full of holes…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s pretty formulaic, but it doesn’t get boring and the story moves along at a good pace. The acting isn’t bad, but not impressive either. This is one of those 80s films where all the young 20-somethings with perfect hair live in multimillion-dollar houses and drive sports cars while working in construction.

The whole existence of Detective Dewhurst seems unreasonable. Lloyd clearly died in an accident, so there’s no reason he would even be assigned as a case.

It’s very “80s” and seems pretty tame and dated today. There’s nothing at all wrong with it– it just feels too dated.

Kevin’s Commentary

Ooooo noooo, not progressive entrapment. Saying things like that gives an air of science to the process. This is set back in the days when you could still smoke in the hospital, it’s a very 80s kind of movie. I’d rate it above average for the era, it’s not great, but it’s quite good. Or good enough to do the job anyhow.

2025 Witchboard

* Directed by: Chuck Russell

* Written by: Greg McKay, Aaron Russell, Kevin Tenney

* Stars: Madison Iseman, Aaron Dominguez, Mel Jarnson

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 53 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s an updated remake of the 1986 film by the same name, with a pendulum board instead of a ouija board this time around. There is a bit too much reliance on digital effects that are pretty obvious. It does a decent job of updating things while keeping the core of the story from the first movie - there is more to it this time around.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open in France, 1693 with witches dancing around a bonfire in the woods. There are skulls and body parts hanging from trees. They have a man tied to a tree, and the chief sorceress orders one of her followers to cut off the man’s arm. Suddenly, men on horseback arrive and kill many of the witches. In the scuffle, the “witchboard” falls to the ground [Kevin said it’d also be good for darts]. Credits roll.

In the present, two men break into a museum to steal the board. They fight and one guy shoots the other before being beaten with a tire iron. The shot man makes it outside, but he’s not doing well.

Elsewhere, Emily, Christian, and Richie forage for mushrooms, getting ready to open a new restaurant. She’s given up on the search for her parents. Emily hears someone crying in the woods and goes to look. All she finds is a cat, but it leads her to the board lying in the dirt. She doesn’t see the dead body of the thief nearby.

The other thief reports to his rich boss, who says the other thief has died. They don’t know where the board has wound up. The man’s three identical women cut the surviving thief’s throat.

Christian introduces his friends to his Creole menu. Richie invited Brooke, who is also Christian’s ex-girlfriend. Emily is engaged to Christian, but she’s lost her ring already. Brooke is an expert on antiquities, and she examines the antique probably-pagan pendulum board. The two of them try using it to answer a question, “Will our restaurant be a success?” Suddenly, a flaming bird shoots out of the fireplace; they should have gotten it cleaned.

The restaurant is nearing completion, and we see a whole bunch of dangerous-looking equipment in the kitchen. Meanwhile, at home, Emily plays around with the witchboard and finds that she was using the wrong kind of pendant with it last night. She hears on the news about the board being stolen from the museum just recently. She uses the board to point the way to her lost engagement ring. Downstairs, a weird chain of events leads to Richie losing his hand– to a cat! The lost hand is the least of his problems as he bleeds out in the kitchen.

At the funeral, Jesse shows up. He had her addicted to some drugs, but now Emily is clean. After, Christian notices that Emily has a new cat, the same one she saw in the woods and the same one who stole Richie’s hand.

That night, the witchboard activates on its own and gives Emily a nightmare about the witches’ coven back in the 1600s. The head witch, Naga Soth, is especially creepy.

Christian does some research, and he doesn’t want her to use that board anymore. He goes to talk to Vrooke, who knows an expert on the subject of Wiccanism.

Meanwhile, Emily gets a weird flashback while in the shower at home. She’s in the position of the witch as Pastor Grogan breaks down her door. He arrests her as a witch and has her exiled. She vows to get her revenge on Grogan. Emily wakes up in the shower after all that.

Brooke and Christian go to see Alexander, who is busy getting ready for the summer solstice. We see that Alexander is the man who hired the thieves in the first place. Solstice is a fertility festival, and Alexander says that Christian and Brooke will fit right in, and Christian gets a fantasy about that. Alexander tells the story of Naga Soth and her curse on the villagers. Alexander is a distant descendant of Pastor Grogan.

Christian goes home and finds that Emily knows he’s spent the afternoon with his ex. The board told her that Jesse will never bother her again, so she wants to celebrate with some sexy time.

We cut to Jesse, selling drugs on the roof of a building. We see that the cat is there as well as he prepares to inject a girl. He ends up going over the edge and falling to his rather excessive death.

The next day, Alexander and Brook come over to see the board. Christian and Emily want his help. Under hypnosis, he takes her back in time to Naga Soth in jail. Grogan brings her the board, wanting to know how to use it. The room starts to shake, both in the past and in the present. When Emily wakes up, we see, but the others don’t, that Naga Soth has possessed her in a kind of time-travel transfer. “Emily” then gives Alexander the witchboard, not needing it anymore.

In the past, Emily wakes up in jail, not understanding the old-time French that everyone else speaks. The witch in the next cell laughs at Soth’s successful escape.

In the present, evil Emily picks out some special mushrooms and takes them to Christian’s grand opening. It’s opening night, and a full house. The food critic arrives, as does Alexander and Brooke. At Alexander’s place, the board activates. We see those special mushrooms in almost every dish. Alexander knows what Emily/Naga Soth is up to and encourages her. He tells Brooke not to eat the mushrooms.

Everyone in the place starts laughing feeling odd. The main course comes out, and each one has a very sharp knife with it. The food critic sees a rotten hand on his plate. Everyone starts fighting and stabbing each other as Emily watches. Naga Soth takes her revenge on the locals, as promised. Alexander is quite entertained, but Brooke is horrified. He, along with Emily, makes their exit as Christian tries to follow. Christian gets picked up by Brooke, who had no idea what was going to happen.

Turns out, Brooke is on Alexander’s side and turns Christian over to them. Alexander then gives his villain speech; he wants to be Naga Soth’s master.

Meanwhile, in 17th century France, the real Emily is tied to a stake, about to be burned as a witch by Grogan and his crowd.

Alexander explains that Emily’s mother was a witch who was killed in a ritual. Emily has inherited the power, since she’s directly related to Naga Soth. Alexander then morphs into Grogan as Christian throws the witchboard into the fire. As the board burns, Naga Soth dissipates, leaving only Emily behind.

Alexander shoots Christian and fishes the board out of the fire. Emily wakes up and shoots Alexander. The police arrive and force Emily and Brooke out; Christian and Alexander have died.

Except Alexander might not really be dead…

Later, at the Vatican, Brooke has taken them the witchboard and sold it to them for a bag of diamonds. Naga Soth then comes for the cardinal who bought it.

Brian’s Commentary

The witchboard here is not a Ouija board, it looks more like an old dartboard. It’s still more or less the same idea; a haunted board that predicts the future. This one is obviously more modern and updated from the original, but it does keep some of the same aspects of the story.

It’s fine. The CGI isn’t very good, but everything else looks good and it moves along at a good pace. I liked it more than disliked it.

Kevin’s Commentary

Wicca, founded in the 1940s, is referred to as an ancient religion here. From the look of many of the shots, you’d think it was filmed with 3D in mind, but it was never released with that feature.

I thought it was pretty good, but too stretched out. Things happen, but a little too far apart. I did enjoy it more than the original.

Contact Info:

Email: mailto:email@horrorguys.com

Websites:

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* https://www.flashfright.com

We’ll open on a nice dog story; really, he’s a “Good Boy.” A not-so-good-boy is the star of “The Toxic Avenger.” We’ll go back in time and watch the prequel, “Borley Rectory: The Awakening.” Then we’ll watch a couple of documentaries, one real, “Lost Contact: UFOs After Wartime” and one not-so-real “Strange Harvest.”

Spoiler: We liked them all!

* The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #49, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2025 Good Boy

* Directed by: Ben Leonberg

* Written by: Alex Cannon, Ben Leonberg

* Stars: Indy, Shane Jensen, Arielle Friedman

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 12 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The main character of the movie is a dog, with everything slanted toward his point of view, which is interesting. His master, Todd, is afflicted with both a terminal illness and dark forces that are working against him. Both things that seem to have been impacting his family for quite a while. But he’s got Indy by his side. It’s unique, which helps it out a lot, but it’s actually pretty slow moving on a low simmer. We both thought it was pretty good.

Spoilery Synopsis

Indy the dog protects the house at night; he hears strange sounds that concern him. The phone keeps ringing, and it turns out that Todd is having some kind of seizure. His sister, Vera, comes in and calls 911. Credits roll.

We watch old footage of Indy being a puppy and growing up with Todd and his family. Todd’s got a lot of health problems, and Indy is a big help.

Todd and Vera argue about him going to stay at Grandpa’s house; neither Vera nor Indy think that’s a good idea. The house is very remote in the country. When they arrive, Indy really doesn’t want to get out of the car. The place is a mess, but Todd says it beats the hospital.

Todd calls Vera, and they talk. Grandpa used to have a bunch of dogs, but they kept all running away. As he watches old home videos of grandpa, Vera points out that no one has lived in that house for more than a few weeks; she says it’s haunted. Meanwhile, Indy checks out shadows that he doesn’t like. Indy explores the old house, but he doesn’t find anything.

The next morning, Todd and Indy go for a walk in the woods. They stop at the family cemetery, and Todd points out that most of them died pretty young. They run into a neighbor, and he mentions traps and snares all over the woods. The neighbor mentions how strange the area is, too. Todd, on the other hand, thinks it’s nice and peaceful.

Vera, still on the phone, mentions that dogs can detect all sorts of things that people can’t, so he should be keeping an eye on Indy for signs of trouble. The next day, Todd goes off and leaves Indy at home, and Indy is not pleased. Indy spots another dog in the house and follows it, but all he finds is the dog’s bandana– and a vision of something nasty that “got” the other dog. Todd comes home, unwell; he’s been at the hospital again.

Indy has nightmares that night. He wakes up and patrols the house, hearing and seeing things that shouldn’t be there. He watches as Todd goes to the kitchen and bangs his head on a door repeatedly– sleepwalking? There appears to be some kind of black ghost or monster that’s creeping around the place.

Todd gets sicker, and the doctor says he doesn’t qualify for her clinical trials. The neighbor, Richard, warns him again about his fox traps. As Todd obliviously works on his Feng Shui, Indy watches all sorts of horrors going on in the next room and especially in the basement.

One night, Todd collapses and a door shuts Indy in the next room. Indy notices the window is open and jumps down to get outside. Indy runs through the woods toward Richard’s house to get help but gets caught in a snare instead. The next thing we know, Todd is chaining up Indy outside in the rain. The monster terrorizes Indy, who can’t escape because of the chains. Indy does eventually break loose, and then he finds the skeletal remains of Bandit, Grandpa’s last dog.

Inside the house, Todd gets a scare of his own until Indy comes in and comforts him. The monster then grabs Todd and drags him to the basement, but Indy knows another way in. “You’re a good dog, but you can’t save me,” Todd says as he turns into a skeleton.

In the morning, we see that Todd has died in his bed. Vera comes to the house and finds Bandit’s bones in the cellar while letting Indy outside. Indy goes off to live with Vera.

He was a good boy!

Brian’s Commentary

All Grandpa’s dogs ran off… we see why.

It’s told from Indy’s point of view, which is interesting and unique. Dogs do sense things that humans can’t, and this film makes heavy use of that fact. Indy the dog gets top billing here, primarily because we don’t see any shots of the character’s faces through the majority of the film.

It’s actually very slow moving and quiet. I suspect some will say it’s boring, but it had my attention throughout. If you’re a dog lover, you’ll like this one.

Kevin’s Commentary

Indy the dog, playing himself, does an impressive job and belongs to the director - possibly he was raised with this role in mind. He does indeed seem to be a Good Boy. It was cleverly filmed to accentuate Indy’s point of view, with the human character’s faces shown very little throughout the movie.

It’s well made, and the novelty of it saves it. It’s actually kind of slow. There is creepiness that builds some, and Indy having fearful dreams, but not a lot happens for much of the film.

I’d mark it as a win that isn’t quite great, but I liked it quite a bit.

2025 The Toxic Avenger

* Directed by: Macon Blair

* Written by: Macon Blair, Lloyd Kaufman, Joe Ritter

* Stars: Peter Dinklage, Jacob Tremblay, Taylour Paige

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 42 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This remake does a good job of paying tribute to the original while being different enough to still entertain. It is still stupid fun and over the top, but with a different vibe. It’s saturated and colorful, almost cartoonish, with less of a thrown together feeling that the original had. When the gore kicks in, it’s the goriest gore. The humor is hit and miss but mostly hit. We both enjoyed it, but it doesn’t quite live up to the original.

Spoilery Synopsis

Winston narrates his story, which begins on the other side of town. Mel Ferd, the reporter, gets footage from the BTH Headquarters. He’s got evidence that they’ve been dumping toxic waste illegally. Just then, a group of goons break in and kill him. He dies hard. His junior reporter, J.J., gets away. Credits roll.

In St. Roma’s Village (or Tromaville), we meet Winston, who lives with his son Wade and can’t cook breakfast. We see there are some really weird people in the town. There are some bad guys who are forcing shopkeeper Daisy to sell her place.

Winston goes to work at BTH as a janitor, and it doesn’t look like OSHA would approve of the place at all. He gets a call from his doctor, who says he has an inoperable case of @#$$#@, He’s got six months to a year to live. Winston then calls his insurance company who explains things like insurance companies always do. Yeah, he’s screwed.

Meanwhile, at the Garbinger Mansion, BTH Owner Bob may have passed his prime, but he’s getting an infusion of gorilla blood. His brother Fritz comes in, and he’s tremendously weird. Fritz’s friends, The Killer Nutz, were the ones who botched the reporter’s murder. Fritz sends the Nutz after J.J. to finish the job. They are not subtle.

Meanwhile, at New Chemical High School (New Chem High), Wade auditions for a talent show. It goes badly. Winston tries to cheer him up, but he’s just not good at that.

Bob Garbinger is attending a big fancypants banquet. His business is losing a ton of money, but he’s trying to bluff his way through that. He meets with the town’s big mob boss who wants payment on what he’s owed. Winston interrupts to ask Bob for money for his treatments. Bob promises to sort it all out, but he has no intention of doing anything.

Winston goes to BTH, and when he opens the gate, J.J. sneaks inside. Winston dips his mop in the toxic goo and threatens the security guard with it to rob the company’s treasury. The Nutz show up and shoot him dead. They drop his corpse into a big vat of nastiness and throw in the mop for good measure. Down in the vat, Winston is transformed rather dramatically.

Winston goes home to Wade, who takes one look at the little monster in the window and freaks out. The real estate swindler is there and shoots Winston. Winston gets angry and rips the man’s arm off. Almost instantly the town forms a mob, complete with torches, to chase the monster away. He passes out.

In the morning, Winston wakes up in a hobo’s camp. The man there, Gunther, is pretty crazy. Gunther gives him some wise superhero advice and sets him upon a mission, giving him his mop which he found.

Meanwhile, the Miss Meat restaurant, The Nasty Lads, another gang, have taken over the place. They’re angry that the place has changed its name and mascot, and they’re heavily armed. Suddenly, a little green man with a toxic mop breaks in the back door. His mop does some really bad things to the Nasty Lads and saves the hostages.

Now a hero, the press starts calling Winston the “Toxic Avenger.” Wade sees all this on the TV and knows who he really is. J.J. comes to the door and explains the whole thing to him. The Nutz show up, and they both run away. But one of the Nutz tags Wade with a tracking device.

The mob boss and his son, who lost his arm last night, also see the news and orders his men to kill Toxie. Bob, Fritz, and Kissy also know who he is, and they aren’t happy. His geeks and nerds explain how the mutations happened. Can they reproduce the mutation?

Wade and J.J. run into Winston on the street. They talk for a minute until the mob guys show up and shoot Winston again. J.J. gets shot by the Nutz, and everybody runs. Toxie takes out his baddies, and he takes J.J. to Gunther, who used to be a doctor before he was a crazy hobo. Or maybe not, because Winston ends up patching her up with the healing power of his blue blood.

Fritz and Bob have taken Wade to lure in Winston.

At the St. Roma Village’s Festival, the Nutz are playing on the stage. J.J. tampers with the sound system so Winston can sing his song instead. The crowd loves “Toxie.” Winston mangles the band right there in front of everyone. They torture the big baby-headed chicken man to get Wade’s location.

Toxie and J.J. head to Bob’s mansion and are promptly captured and chained up. He does the gloating routine, and Toxie threatens him. The scientists remove some of Toxie’s blood and do tests on it. That’s when the mob boss shows up, and he’s not happy. Bob, knowing his death is near, drinks the stuff extracted from Toxie.

And he changes. The mob guys don’t last long. Kissy tries it too, just a little bit, and she gets even weirder.

Toxie gets himself and J.J. out of the chains by peeing acid urine on them and goes after Wade. Wade gets blown to pieces.

Suddenly, Bob shows up, completely mutated. They fight, as do J.J. and Kissy. As Toxie gets ready to kill Bob, Fritz shows up with Wade - Fritz rescued him just in time. Bob, naturally, gets back up and has to be finished off spectacularly.

Kissy isn’t out of the action yet. She stabs Toxie and kills Fritz before blowing up everyone.

Winston wakes up in the hospital and watches the news, which explains how BTH has fallen. His doctor is there as well, he reports that his @#$$#@ has completely gone away, and he’s healthy now. We see that J.J., Wade, and even Fritz have survived and are doing well. Toxie is the town’s biggest hero!

And there is an important and very dramatic after-credit scene.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s got a big budget and has many references to old Troma films. Still, it’s awfully polished and doesn’t have the low-budget schlocky feel of the originals. A lot of the jokes and puns are pretty obvious, and a lot of them fall flat.

The actors, especially Elijah Wood and Kevin Bacon, are obviously having a great time in their roles. Wood looks like a cross between the Penguin and Riff-Raff. Peter Dinklage… I have no idea how that happened.

The original was a hilarious parody of horror and superhero films, this was much more straightforward and not nearly as funny.

It’s fine, and definitely entertaining, but not as good as the classic original.

Kevin’s Commentary

I noticed lots of throwbacks and references to the original “Toxic Avenger” and other Troma movies. An interesting bit of trivia is that once Winston becomes Toxie, there is an actress, Luisa Guerreiro, doing the body work under all those prosthetics.

Some of the humor was lame, but lots of it was not. I laughed and chuckled many times watching this.

Overall, I’d call this good and entertaining, but not as quite good (?) and entertaining as the original.

2025 Borley Rectory: The Awakening

* Directed by: Steven M. Smith

* Written by: Christopher Jolley, Steven M. Smith

* Stars: Julian Glover, Patsy Kensit, Jess Inchbald

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 28 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is actually a prequel and the third Borley Rectory movie, “based on terrifying true events.” Borley Rectory was a real house, damaged by fire in the late 1930s and demolished in the 1940s, that was said to be the most haunted house in England. This has a slow build, starting with normalcy and getting creepier as it goes along. But it’s heavy on talk and low on action, with some scares but no casualties except for those who died long ago and are ghosts. So overall, it’s not too bad, but it’s tame.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on Borley Rectory in 1888. The guests want to hear a ghost story about the place, and old Harry Ball has stories. He tells the story of a nun named Marie who was against God, and the priest beat her severely. Suddenly, a white-faced woman jumps out into the room and scares all the guests half to death– it’s a prank. Harry laughs and says there are no ghosts, and ghosts aren’t real.

That night, Harry has a nightmare, as does one of the young guests. The old man gives his son Henry a box.

Twelve years later, Henry runs the rectory, and all his sisters come for a visit. Mabel, Caroline, Freda, and Kitty are all there now. Their mother, Constance, says the girls are far too spoiled and argues with Henry about marrying off Kitty soon.

Kitty finds a priest-hole and inside is that box from earlier. They take it to Henry, who doesn’t look happy to see it. There are secrets inside, letters from Reverend Shaw.

Mr. Somerset comes for a visit; Constance doesn’t like him. The girls are out walking and see a strange woman in a nun’s habit on the grounds. The woman is just like the one old Harry described in his story many years ago. Kitty tells Constance about the strange woman, and Constance thinks maybe Henry knows more than he’s saying. As they argue, they feel a strange presence in the house. Naturally, they split up to investigate, and this time, Constance sees the nun, Marie, who warns her to hide from the evil priest.

Constance goes into shock, but the doctor says she’ll be fine tomorrow. The doctor knows all about the place being haunted and says the ghost has been awakened since the family has been talking about Harry’s recently-found writings. She explains how old Harry was just the latest in a long line of paranormal protectors of the whole village.

Constance talks to the ghost of her own dead mother, or maybe it’s just a dream. They talk about the nun and the priest, and also about saving the family from evil.

Henry talks to the four girls about the situation. That night, Somerset, Henry, and Kitty stay up all night to see what happens. They all watch the priest and nun repeat their story.

Kitty writes to Reverend Shaw, her father’s confidant about all things supernatural. Kitty and Henry then talk about the priest, who probably enjoyed killing the nun, who was pregnant with his child. As they talk, something bad happens to Caroline and Mabel.

The next day, Constance, Mabel, and Caroline leave to stay in town, leaving Henry, Kitty, Freda and Somerset to deal with the ghosts. Reverend Shaw comes, as invited, and the ghostly priest attacks him. Not long after, the young people explain to him what’s been going on. He’s a bit of a psychic, and he “feels” things in the house.

That night, we get a full-on flashback to the nun and priest’s story. She gave birth to a baby, and the priest took it away. Later, Shaw explains that the old priest, Waldergrave, used to regularly rape the nuns and probably already got Caroline. When Marie got pregnant, he killed her, but he was then burned alive.

There’s more argument and discussion when Shaw suggests one of them allow the ghost to possess them. Kitty and Shaw have a discussion while preparing things, and Shaw confesses there aren’t records that he spoke of - he is psychic and knows the history by hearing and feeling the ghosts.

This, of course, leads to a seance. Shaw calls on the ghosts to come to them, and soon, Kitty starts screaming as Marie, the nun. Shaw becomes the priest and they all pray the priest away. Marie shows up, happy now, and they all know that her child survived.

The cycle of the nun and priest is over, but the rectory is old, and there are many other supernatural problems within. Those, however, are stories for another time. Kitty realizes that she’s one of Marie’s descendants.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s an interesting location, and it’s definitely a creepy place. The actors all do old-timey accents, and I didn’t find the dialogue very convincing. It seems that everyone knows the place is haunted, and yet all they do is sit around and discuss it.

Still, as the story progresses and we learn more about what’s going on, it does pick up a bit. Everything is what you’d expect in a 19th century ghost story, but it’s all terribly drawn out and slow.

If you’re really interested in ghost stories, this isn’t bad, but it’s awfully tame and I have to admit, a little dull.

Kevin’s Commentary

Reading about the real house and the history is actually pretty interesting - and it sounds like the supernatural elements should be looked at with a skeptical eye. Taking it as a fiction movie on its own, it’s creepy with a bit of a mystery. Brian mentioned the dialogue - it’s British and period and upper crust - which does make it sound pretty stilted. And there is a lot of dialogue talking about things.

There are scares, but no one is physically injured throughout the movie. It’s very tame and talky overall. It’s not bad, but it didn’t connect much with me.

2025 Lost Contact: UFOs After Wartime

* Directed by: Seth Breedlove

* Written by: Seth Breedlove

* Stars: Aaron Deese, Dewey Edwards, Micah Hanks

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 26 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s another interesting documentary from Seth Breedlove, obvious from the title, focusing on UFO sightings during and after World War Two. The film is put together with stock footage, aged CGI recreations, movie clips, interviews, historical accounts, and recounted eyewitness reports. Some of the scenes might lead people to believe they’re seeing the actual events and saucers in the sky when it’s a mashup of real military footage from other events and realistically created digital footage. There’s a heavy focus on one case in particular, a fatal crash by pilot Thomas Mantell, known as “The Mantell Incident.”

Spoilery Synopsis

The Thomas Mantell Case took place in Kentucky, and there’s quite a bit of mystery surrounding it. There was a horrific military crash in a rural area, and we are shown the peaceful-looking spot where it happened many years ago. Credits roll.

We get a brief recap of World War II and the aircraft involved in the fight. We then get an overview of the magic and natural beauty of Kentucky. We then segue into discussion about UFO sightings during the war. We are told about one sighting in 1943 where dozens of glowing discs were seen, then a 1944 sighting of a black, teardrop shaped craft. Throughout these stories, we see a great deal of old stock footage of airplanes and aged-looking CGI re-enactments.

By 1947, UFO sightings were everywhere. Mt. Rainier, Roswell, Maury Island, and other sightings all took place around that point. Were they alien spaceships or were they advanced military prototypes or even something natural? That’s always the question with UFO sightings and “lights in the sky.”

In January of 1948, the Mantell Incident took place. A pilot shot at a UFO, which shot back, and the pilot, Thomas Mantell, crashed and died. The military plane crashed because of an alien attack. The story has changed and expanded over the decades, and it’s become hard to know what really happened.

Thomas’s two grandsons are interviewed, and they give us a lot of biographical information about the deceased pilot. There were many sightings of something in the sky that day, and they took off to investigate. Of the four planes, Mantell was the only one who ascended beyond what his oxygen level would allow, he passed out, and crashed.

We then get a string of living witnesses who saw the crash in 1948, and they each tell their stories. Did Mantell fly too high chasing a weather balloon, or was he shot down? The military claimed that Mantell was chasing Venus, which was visible at that time.

Brian’s Commentary

I always enjoy these documentaries, but this one includes lots of computer-generated footage of flying saucers and such, but they’re “aged” to make them match the many stock footage clips, which makes it all look historical. This seems dishonest, not something you’d want in a documentary. It becomes easy to imagine that it’s all real footage, but it’s not– but some of it could be real old footage, there’s no way to know. Everything the people on-screen are saying is either factual or at least their own opinions, but that’s not necessarily true of what we see.

Otherwise, it’s well put together, has lots of good interviews, and overall is an interesting look at one of the major UFO mysteries that was never fully explained. It mostly focuses on the Mantell incident, and if that interests you, you should absolutely check this one out.

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s another work from Seth Breedlove that is put together well and interesting. This has lots of good stock footage, accounts of historical events, accounts of historical stories and sightings, and interviews with historians. As always, it’s left up to the viewer if they want to believe it or not. But as Brian mentioned, the way real footage - even if it’s not from the actual event they are talking about - is combined with recreated footage is concerning. Some folks could be confused and misled.

2025 Strange Harvest

* Directed by: Stuart Ortiz

* Written by: Stuart Ortiz

* Stars: Peter Zizzo, Terri Apple, Andy Lauer

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 34 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This was put together in a realistic documentary style, as detectives recount their struggles trying to catch a serial killer in California. One key difference is there is a lot more gore than a documentary would have. It gets steadily creepier as we hear more details and learn that the murders were not at all typical. If you’re a fan of true crime television, you might especially like this. We both thought it was very good.

Spoilery Synopsis

Detective Joe Kirby is being interviewed about a crime in Los Angeles– something unusually terrible happened to the Sheridan family. After hearing from a few involved people, we start seeing police bodycam footage of the officers on the scene. They find three bodies tied, taped up, and posed as well as being obviously murdered. There’s a weird symbol painted in blood on the ceiling. The officer recognizes the symbol, and it’s not good. Credits roll.

Detective Lexi Taylor, Joe Kirby’s partner, tells us about why she became a cop, as does Joe. They describe some ritualistic serial murders that they were involved with. The first was in 1993, and the victim, a girl, was missing several body parts. The suspect’s name was discovered at a local motel, “Albert Shiny.”

In 1994, an old man was found and killed in a similar fashion; he was missing an eye. The killer left a fingerprint, but that didn’t pan out. In ‘95, a little boy was killed and his liver removed.

Eventually, the police received a letter from the killer. It claimed there would be ten more killings. Then there weren’t any more killings for fifteen years until the Sheridan family in 2010. The family, after being tied up and posed, were cut and made to bleed out into carefully measured buckets.

Then there were more. A woman’s head was found in a park and her boyfriend was set on fire– but didn’t die. They come up with a suspect, Victor Shamaz, who is really sketchy, but he turns out to be innocent.

Another murder is a man who was killed by a huge number of leeches. A lot of leeches.

A homeless man barely escapes being killed, which leads the police to a house in the hills. The house was rented to Albert Shiny. They get a fingerprint, and this time, it identifies a man named Leslie Sykes.

The next murder is caught on a livestream, as the victim is an influencer. We see his weird mask as he draws the symbol on the wall. As he begins some kind of ritual, the camera flakes out. The victim actually survives somehow, but then is killed inside the hospital.

One thing leads to another, and they learn that Sykes had spent that missing fifteen years overseas. An occult bookseller remembers a spell book that Sykes stole. They find a storage locker that belonged to Sykes, and there are body parts inside. “Hail Azragor” is painted on the wall. It appears that there’s only one more murder before “Azragon” is set free.

Sykes kidnaps a baby on Friday the 13th, the same day as a weird triangle-shaped planetary conjunction. The police track down Sykes in a campground park and do a search. Thanks to a 911 call, they find a cabin where he was seen with the baby. By the time two police officers got there, Sykes had fled into the woods. The police pursuit, drawn by the baby crying, went very badly for the officers.

We watch on one of the cops’ bodycam as Sykes gets his ritual started. The baby is on a pyre that Sykes lights up. The bodycam shows a bright light appear in the sky that turns into a cloud with red eyes. Detective Kirby shows up, shoots Sykes, and all the weirdness stops. The baby is saved, one of the attacked cops survives, and they find Sykes dead in a nearby creek.

We then see the various interviewees discussing their feelings upon hearing that Sykes was killed. Sykes did, however, send a final letter, where he promised to return…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s all done in the style of a true-crime documentary, and it’s really well done. The difference is the graphic footage of the victims and sometimes the murders.

The killer sends various letters that are briefly shown on screen while a computer-altered voice reads it. The letters aren’t on the screen long enough to read and the voice is unintelligible.

I’m not generally a fan of true crime tales, but this is really well made!

Kevin’s Commentary

I wasn’t aware of this movie at all before Brian fired it up, and it took me a few minutes to determine it was a horror movie not a documentary. It’s put together very much like one. We’re told all about a number of murders in California, done by a serial killer they referred to as Mr. Shiny because the name Albert Shiny was given more than once. It’s very realistically made. But the graphic nature gives it away as horror. There is a lot of gore shown, the bodies of victims, which a real documentary wouldn’t do.

I thought it was excellently made and thoroughly creepy. Chilling even.

Contact Info:

Email: mailto:email@horrorguys.com

Websites:

* https://www.horrorguys.com

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* https://www.flashfright.com

We’ll start off with the brand-new underground tunnel-chase, “Scurry” and then go out to the retro-desert in “Brute 1976.” We’ll take a walk on the silly side with “Lavalantula” from 2015, and then finish off the George Romero zombie series with the final two of his films: “Diary of the Dead” 2007 and “Survival of the Dead” (2010).

A bunch of winners this week!

* The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #48, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link:

https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2025 Scurry

* Directed by: Luke Sparke

* Written by: Tom Evans

* Stars: Jamie Costa, Emalia, Peter O’Hanlon

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 30 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A claustrophobic view of a big disaster event has us following a couple of survivors as they work their way out of an underground obstacle course of collapsed buildings and streets. And is there more going on than just a local earthquake or something? Just how bad could it be? We travel along with them to find out. There are some hints given in the opening seconds.

Spoilery Synopsis

We see some kind of apocalyptic disaster happening from out a skyrise window. There are alarms sounding. People are running and screaming. Then we hear growling noises from down the hall and one running woman dies in a wet splatter against the wall. Maybe we aren’t at the top of the food chain any more. We fly over the city, and there is a big blackened pit that is surrounded by burnt out emergency vehicles, and it pans down to a dead man laying there and no, he’s not dead. He wakes up. He’s trapped under a chunk of rubble. He pulls out his cell but can’t get through to anyone. He finally thinks to use his phone as a flashlight and looks around. He finally gets through to his wife’s voicemail and explains what happened from his point of view. He levers himself free..

Mark hears a chopper flying over, which is hopeful, but then it crashes right next to the hole he’s in. The hole collapses behind him, trapping him in an underground tunnel. He pulls out a piece of glass that impaled him, but he’s not bleeding too badly.

It takes a while for Mark to get his bearings, and he hears rocks falling all over the place. He finds a woman’s purse and digs through it for anything to use. He finds a video camera with an infra-red feature, which is useful.

He gets a jump scare when the woman who owns the purse shows up. She’s Sarah. There’s a rock slide or something, and she soon vanishes. No, she’s hiding, “Shhhh. They’ll hear us.” He sets her dislocated bone, but she says everyone up above is dead, no one is coming for them. She’s very paranoid that he’s going to leave her alone. They talk about their kids, but she seems to know a lot more about what’s going on than he does. She’s not really Sarah; that was a stolen purse. Then she pulls a gun on him. And things get complicated.

As they argue over who gets to hold the lighter, something growls nearby. “They’ve found us.” Mark uses the infra-red camera but doesn’t see what it is. They run for a while but eventually, Mark gets a glimpse of the creature behind them with the camera. She notices that she’s lost her pills and wants to go back, but he says that’s stupid; this leads to her pulling the gun again. He has to go back for her pills and notices that the creature seems to be stuck in place, so he’s OK for now.

Mark wants to know what she knows about the creatures. They killed her sister, dragging her right out of the car. He explains that he was just crossing the street and fell into what he thought was an earthquake sinkhole. “Nothing can survive up there,” she says. He doubts that everyone is dead. They continue to crawl through the tunnel until they see a light; it’s not an exit, it’s just a flashlight someone dropped. They find the flashlight’s owner, dead, and go through his stuff. Turns out, he’s not dead, but when he starts to scream, one of the creatures eats him.

Now Mark believes in monsters. They argue over her hard-as-nail attitude since she still doesn’t trust him. As they argue, one of the spiderlike monsters spears Mark and pulls him away. Is this creature an alien, or was it always down here? We don’t know, but the woman’s story makes it sound like they came from space. She continues on, crawling through the tunnel until she catches up to Mark who is lying there; somehow, he killed it with his knife– he’s got to be some kind of marine or special forces.

Mark then explains his sad life story. He drunkenly started a house fire that nearly killed his son. He left the family after that, and now he feels he still can’t protect them. She gives him advice, and now they’re friends.

After an incredibly long time, they come to a room where they can stand up, and it’s full of bodies. They can hear shooting and bad things happening through the sewer grate above. There are soldiers up there, and they hear the two down below and offer to help. “Don’t worry, everything’s going to be OK,” they say. And then we hear them all die up there; our guys get absolutely drenched in blood.

Mark and the woman are forced to keep on crawling through the tunnels since one of the monsters is trying to get to them through the sewer grate. She finally tells him that her name is Kate. Just to make things worse, they both have to swim through a flooded, dark, murky tunnel.

They finally find a way outside and see the light. Happy Ending (with forty minutes left). As they crawl to the opening, a creature pops up between them and the light at the end of the tunnel. It takes a look at them and then goes back the way it came, where we hear more screaming.

Mark and Kate climb over the open hole, slowly, and try not to wake up the creatures down there. By the time Mark makes it over, Kate has died from her internal injuries. As he climbs over her corpse, we see just how many of the creatures are scurrying around in the tunnels below. Rather than continue to the exit, he goes through her pockets and sets her body on fire… in front of him, blocking the exit. No– he just imagined doing that. Then he lays there within sight of the exit and plays with his phone for a while. I guess her body must be blocking the tunnel, but it doesn’t look like it.

Suddenly, Mark’s phone pings; he’s got a message from his wife. “These things are coming from beneath the ground and sunlight makes them grow bigger and bigger. Please come home,” she says. His desire to live re-ignited, Mark goes back to the vertical shaft the alien was in and uses the phone to attract a monster. It crawls up and takes Kate’s body, unplugging the shaft (he could have pushed her body into the shaft much more easily).

Mark then crawls up the shaft toward the light. A monster attacks, but Mark sets it on fire with the lighter and alcohol they found; it backs off quickly.

As Mark emerges into the daylight, he sees that the monsters have grown to skyscraper size outside, and there are many, many, eggs.

Brian’s Commentary

This is one very dark movie. Make sure you watch this one at night, in a dark room, or you’re likely to miss something. That said, being so dark, they didn’t have to show as much of the creatures. I think they were going for the same kind of scares as “The Descent” (2005), but the characters and tunnels here aren’t as interesting. We get to know more about them as they go along, but the whole film is basically just two characters in a narrow tunnel, so it takes a lot to make that interesting.

It was a good concept, but I felt it was too slow-moving. I was yelling at the screen after Mark just lay there talking to Kate’s corpse for like twenty minutes in front of the exit. The creatures do look really good once we get to see them and the ending was bleak enough to satisfy me. Overall, I thought it was entertaining, but there are some issues with the characters making dumb decisions.

Kevin’s Spoiling Commentary

I had excellent dim viewing conditions, but like Brian said, it is best in a dark room. Dim room at least. I can still see.

Those two must have had really fit legs by the time they were done, as much squatting and crouching they had to do working their way very realistically to an escape.

What a situation. Like just surviving an impact like that and having to work very hard to try to dig yourself out isn’t hard enough. Imagine being pursued by meat-eating creatures too. I like how little we see of the creatures for so long. The characters don’t see them either for a long while, only hearing the sounds. It really helps tighten the sense of being there in the same boat with them. And then we all see them. Why did it have to be spiders?

I don’t ever want to be in a situation where someone asks, “Is your flashlight waterproof?” That water scene was chilling.

The acting is amazing. It’s immersive. I thought it was excellent. Full disclosure, my computer locked up, I was doing remote work, and I didn’t see the last 20 minutes. Right around when Kate died. I won’t mind rewatching the first part to get there.

2025 Brute 1976

* Directed by: Marcel Walz

* Written by: Joe Knetter

* Stars: Adriane McLean, Sarah French, Gigi Gustin

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 45 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s another killer family and a group of victims who are in the wrong place at the wrong time. They captured the retro look and feel of this one very well, the acting is good with well-defined characters, and the special effects were very realistic. It wasn’t anything particularly original, but it’s well put together and entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

August 19, 1976, in the desert, we zoom into two girls broken down on the highway. The road is completely deserted, so hitching probably isn’t going to happen. “There has to be something off this road,” as June and Raquel begin walking. They eventually come to an old, abandoned mine and go inside to cool off. There are lights already on in the mine, and they stop for some kissing. They hear something and get spooked. A man with an axe shows up, and the screaming starts. They are very much not alone in the cave– Raquel sets one of the men on fire, but another comes out with a chainsaw. Credits roll.

A bunch of stereotypical 70s young people park in the desert in their van. The driver explains that this place is called “Death,” or at least that’s the nickname because so many people go missing here. He says “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” was based on what actually happened right here. Ray says, no that movie was based on Ed Gein, not anything around here. The group is here for a photo shoot for Roxy and Raquel, who hasn’t arrived yet.

Elsewhere, Raquel wakes up and finds herself chained up in a barn. Daisy, a bald man in drag, walks in, and he’s not sympathetic to her plight. He wants her to call him pretty. He’s wearing the breasts he removed from June. She gets away but is soon recaptured by Brutus, another masked man. She’s returned to captivity, where she watches the now-three masked men dismember what’s left of June.

Since Raquel hasn’t shown up for the photo shoot, everyone talks Raquel’s sister, Sunshine, into taking her place. They soon finish, but the girls want to visit the ghost town they saw a little while ago. “One of us is definitely getting murdered here,” jokes the driver. They soon run into Mama Birdy, who lives there. She says it’s fine to look around, just stay on this side of the road.

As the group explores, we get to know the group a little better. Ray goes into an outhouse and finds a glory hole. He tries it and very quickly regrets it. Sunshine and Roxy talk about how much Roxy likes Adam. Jordy explores with his camera until he comes across one of the masked men. He avoids that guy but then runs into Brutus with his chainsaw. Brutus turns around and sees Sunshine standing there watching.

Mama Birdy cackles when Charlie hears the chainsaw across the road. She knows all about the killer family. He goes looking and finds Sunshine locked in a box. Daisy shows up, and Sunshine stabs Charlie. Could she be in on it, or is she just wildly incompetent?

Adam and Roxy barricade themselves inside a building as Brutus cuts his way in. Sunshine walks in just as Brutus breaks Adam’s back. “You got him. He was too nice anyway,” she says. They don’t see Roxy, who’s hiding. Sunshine and Brutus have sex as Roxy listens from under the bed.

Sunshine runs to Roxy, pretending to be innocent, and she’s got the keys to the van. Roxy knows what’s up and knocks her out, taking the keys. Turns out, they’re the wrong keys, and Roxy gets stuck in the van as Sunshine menaces her from outside. “You’re the chosen one,” Sunshine taunts.

We cut to Mama Birdy and Raquel, who is still chained to a bed. “You’ve outlived all of your friends,” Mama congratulates her. Roxy manages to talk to Phoenix about Sunshine, whom she tattles about Brutus. Brutus and Phoenix fight, and Brutus easily wins.

Mama rings the church bell, and the whole group gets together. Sunshine, Daisy, Brutus, Roxy, and Zeus all march into the church. Mama Birdy stands up, and she’s got very realistic-looking bat wings, like a demon. Mama talks about the Bicentennial and how there’s no real freedom in the USA. “Technology is creating a new world, one of hate. A reckoning is coming.”

They all want Roxy to join their weird family. Roxy talks about how people living in the past will be weeded out, generation by generation. Zeus leads Raquel in and threatens to kill her. No, Raquel has joined the family now as well. Raquel stabs Roxy; she really has gone over to their side, fully brainwashed.

Later, Raquel has a saw to cut up Roxy, but Roxy’s not quite dead and stabs her first. Roxy then staggers off to lie down next to Adam and die.

Brian’s Commentary

It’s a retro-slasher film that borrows heavily from Texas Chainsaw, which even gets a callout in the film itself. It’s a killer family, for no real reason other than they like it. As isolated as they all are, why bother wearing masks? It’s the desert, it’s gotta be hot.

The masks worn by the killers are really distinctive and well-designed. The characters are all individuals, and you get to see their personalities before they’re brutally killed off.

It’s very good!

Kevin’s Commentary

This one had me feeling nostalgic for my childhood when I was taken to see “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” when I was nine. And it reminded me of other 1970s films in the horror genre that I saw then and again since. This movie is like them only made with better effects and a bigger budget. It’s good and entertaining.

2015 Lavalantula

* Directed by: Mike Mendez

* Written by: Neil Elman, Mike Mendez, Ashley O’Neil

* Stars: Steve Guttenberg, Nia Peeples, Patrick Renna

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 24 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Steve Guttenberg does a fine job playing an actor thrown into a horrific situation, with a great supporting cast. Despite horrific deaths and mass destruction, this manages to be funny. A big budget was at work here, but not on the CGI - but it gets the job done. It’s a mix of serious and ludicrous that is very entertaining in a dumb fun kind of way.

Spoilery Synopsis

We watch some bad men beating up a former special forces CIA FBI Spy guy. They want him to talk, but he’s not a superspy for nothing. No, wait– he’s an actor in a movie. He hates bugs, but this movie’s about bugs, so that’s a problem. Colton West leaves the set, but he’s a has-been who used to be in a bunch of bad action movies.

On the drive home, he hears about earthquakes on the radio. He gets a call from his angry manager, Arni, and then his wife, Olivia, who wants to know why he’s so late. Suddenly, the mountain erupts in a ridiculous explosion of CGI fireballs– and giant spiders! These giant tarantulas are covered in lava themselves, and Colton wastes no time getting away from the disaster.

Both Arni and Olivia feel the quaking, but they haven’t seen the spiders. Colton gets home, and she thinks he’s lost his mind. For some reason, she doesn’t believe his story of fire-breathing giant spiders. He grabs his shotgun and leaves to find his son, Wyatt, who’s way too old to be a teenager.

Olivia calls her friend Doris, whose little dog won’t quit yapping. When the dog does finally shut up, there’s a good reason: he’s been toasted, and she’s next. These spiders like their meat cooked.

Wyatt, meanwhile, is downtown riding his bike with friends when they see another big explosion and helicopters flying over. He and his friends soon find a lava-filled hole in the pavement that explodes spiders. They hide in a warehouse, but several of them are injured in the process.

Colton, meanwhile, has lost his car due to the tires melting, and can’t catch a ride. He finally flags down a tour bus, and they’re happy to finally see a celebrity.

Olivia checks out Doris’s house and finds several spiders eating her well-done friend. They chase her all the way home, where she sees the city on fire. Now she believes Colton’s story. About this time, the spiders are all over the news, as is Colton’s stealing a tour bus.

Colton’s bus literally runs into a pack of spiders, with hilarious results. The busload of foreigners all think they’re in a movie and cheer on cue.

A spider breaks in and goes after Olivia, who is very armed and dangerous. The spider doesn’t stand a chance.

Colton and his new sidekick Chris run into an actor-turned-pirate in downtown Hollywood. Suddenly, the spider-quakes return. We watch as various Hollywood landmarks collapse and dozens of spiders crawl out of holes in the street. Colton runs into Fin Shepard, the guy from all those “Sharknado” movies and they admire each other for a minute until Pirate Jack picks up Colton and Chris.

Olivia gets on the military evac truck; they say it’s really bad in the city. Wyatt and his friends try to evade the spiders, who are slowly burning their way into the warehouse. Colton, Chris, and Jack hide in the La Brea Tarpit Museum with Dr. Struble. Struble is a scientist, and he tells them that the spiders and volcanos are one: Lavalantula! If they kill the mother Lavalantula, they’ll all die. Colton immediately heads for the queen.

Olivia’s truck and soldiers all get wiped out, leaving her on her own. She ends up driving a huge army transport back into town for her family.

Wyatt and Eli watch their girlfriend, Jordan, go into convulsions after being bitten by one of the spiders. She soon explodes into a million little spiders, who promptly burn up Eli, leaving Wyatt on his own.

Colton gets a text telling him where Wyatt is just as a really huge spider comes out of the tar pit. Pirate Jack gets fried, but Colt and Chris fight off the huge spider.

Somehow, Olivia finds Colt and they drive off together to save their son, who’s been making use of a fire extinguisher to battle the spiders. They arrive just in time to find him, but they lose their truck in the process.

Colt remembers the liquid nitrogen they used on the set of the bug movie this morning, and he wants to use that against the spiders. When they get to the studio, Colt sees his Red Rocket outfit, designed by NASA for his old superhero movies. Teddie and Marty are there from his movie as well. They know all about liquid nitrogen, and the group assembles to make a plan to beat the queen spider. They have some explosives too!

The group enlists other actors and film crew to spread out and plant canisters of frozen liquid nitrogen around the holes where the spiders live. Colt gives a long, yet rousing speech to raise their spirits as the hopeful music swells. It’s all very over-the-top.

As they drop bombs, Marty makes funny voices and Colt can’t keep a straight face. Meanwhile, various actors drop tanks into holes all over town. Colt, Marty, and Teddie work together to battle the unstoppable horde, but they do stop them.

Colt leaves the others and goes after the queen. The others detonate the bombs, which are a little excessive. They don’t, however, get them all, so there’s another battle– until the queen breaks through the ground and comes up, and it’s really something.

Colton, in his Red Rocket costume, has all the C4 and uses his jetpack to Iron-Man his way over to the huge spider. They climb the side of a skyscraper, and Colt drops the C4 right into the spider’s mouth, killing it.

The news all reports on Colt’s heroics. Most importantly, his family now respects him, which is good. Marty says he smells a sequel coming on…

Brian’s Commentary

There are an amazing number of cameos and special appearances by familiar faces, especially if you enjoyed the old “Police Academy” films. Steve Guttenberg is basically playing himself, a washed-up actor who now lends his face to cheap movie posters. He’s… perfect for this role, and he does really well here, taking it all very seriously– but not really.

It’s a cheaply made horror-scifi-comedy parody of creature features, basically in the same vein as “Sharknado” and similar films. If you’re into those, you’ll probably like this.

It’s goofy, campy, stupid, and very entertaining all in one

Kevin’s Commentary

It was funnier than I expected. Just because there are loads of horrific deaths and mass destruction doesn’t mean we can’t have a good time. At the same time, there was more suspense than I expected too.

Dr. Struble with the best movie title usage ever “The Mayans had a word for it: Lavalantula.”

The CGI is pretty obvious in the film, but the horror aspects are taken seriously. It’s a real hybrid of a movie. Spoof, reunion, horror, comedy, action, suspense, eco disaster, stupidity. And the ending was way out.

Overall, it was super entertaining, which is the fundamental reason to watch.

2007 Diary of the Dead

* Directed by: George A. Romero

* Written by: George A. Romero

* Stars: Michelle Morgan, Joshua Close, Shawn Roberts

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 35 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This contains a lot of found footage style, as we follow some film folks that started out making a horror movie until the real horror hits. Then they start making a documentary. It’s not bad, but it’s not Romero’s best work in the series. There wasn’t enough new, and we both rate it as just okay.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open on police and ambulances at a crime scene. Bree is a reporter, talking about the murder-suicide. In the background, one of the corpses is still moving– and attacking the paramedics. All the corpses suddenly get up, and the cops open fire. Bree is killed, and the cameraman uploads the footage to the Internet. We get further news reports of the zombie apocalypse, now in progress. Jason Creed made a film, “The Death of Death” compiled of found footage from the incident. This is that film…

We open on a film crew making a very lame-looking mummy movie. It’s Jason’s senior project for film school. They all hear about something weird on the news. Tony is skeptical of the news, since it’s all made-up anyway. They all decide to pack up and leave for safety.

Jason goes to the dorms and finds them not only wrecked, but there’s a looter clearing out stuff. He loads the friends he can find into an RV and tries to find a safe place. Mary, Debra, Tony, Eliot, Gordo, Tracy, and Professor Maxwell are all trying to make their way home.

The group comes upon a car crash on the road, and there’s a dead man wandering around. They run over a few of the “people” as they pass, which makes everyone stop joking about it. Mary, who was driving, gets out of the car and shoots herself in guilt. The group rushes her to the hospital, but the place is oddly deserted. An undead doctor shows up, and Gordo has to shoot him.

Jason stays behind to recharge his camera as the others spread out to find help. Debra comes back and tells Jason about her encounter with a zombie in the next room. As the group reconvenes, Mary dies and starts to change. On the way out, Gordo gets bitten in the arm; by morning, he’s dead. When Gordo gets up again, Tracy shoots him.

The RV breaks down at a farm in the county. There’s an old Amish man there who can’t hear or speak. He knows all about the dead, and he’s got dynamite. They get trapped in the barn, and the old man gets it before the RV starts again.

The group encounters another group and follows them to a big warehouse. They see a news broadcast that has been edited to make things look… not so bad. It’s all Fake news. They upload their own footage to MySpace, which was a thing in 2007. Jason and Debra argue over the appropriateness of filming the end of the world.

The group hears about one of the men who died from a bad heart and then went missing… inside the compound. They find the man and Tony throws a bottle of acid on him. The man keeps staggering around as his head melts. Before they leave, the group gets food, supplies, and weapons.

The group makes it to Debra’s family home, where she’s supposed to meet family. Her family is missing, but there seems to have been trouble there already. They soon find the family, or what’s left of them. The group decides to get back on the road and leave.

The group is stopped by the National Guard. Turns out, they just want everything the RV group has. They take nearly everything but the weapons. We start seeing videos online of soldiers and “the good guys” turning against civilians.

They go to the home of another student they know, Ridley. The front door is standing open, which is a bad sign. They find Ridley, still dressed like a mummy. He’s rich, weird, and sketchy. He says Francine is out back with his family and the staff. They are indeed out there, but all is not well. He separates from the others, and we see that he’s been bitten.

Ridley chases Tracy through the woods, just like a horror movie. She whacks Ridley with a rock and steals the RV, leaving everyone else behind. Meanwhile, Ridley, totally not dead, kills Eliot. Jason, Debra, Tony, and Maxwell discuss hiding in the safe room until this all blows over, but Jason wants to stay outside and keep filming. “All that’s left is to record what’s happening for whoever remains when it’s over.” Still, on the way to the safe room, Jason is killed.

Debra decides to finish Jason’s movie. She wonders if humanity is worth saving…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s mostly found footage, more or less, edited into a finished project. It somewhat hits on social media, cameras being in everyone’s hands, fake news, and everyone having an opinion online; Romero’s gotta put in the social commentary, and there’s a lot of it here.

Found footage was all the rage in 2007, so it makes sense that Romero would try it, but it’s not innovative anymore, and it actively detracts from the story.

It’s very… meh.

Kevin’s Commentary

I thought the filming stuff, a movie within a movie of sorts, was pretty cool actually. It’s just that the rest of the movie didn’t have enough that was new or interesting. It’s solidly made with good special effects, but overall I thought it was just middling.

2010 Survival of the Dead

* Directed by: George A. Romero

* Written by: George A. Romero

* Stars: Alan Van Sprang, Kenneth Welsh, Kathleen Munroe

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 30 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s an action zombie flick with military action, set on an island off the coast of Delaware that is populated by Irish people and cowboys for some reason. While this wasn’t actively bad, we were both disappointed in it, feeling it lacked Romero’s usual touches and relied too much on CGI augmenting practical effects. It’s a weak finish to the “Dead” movies.

Spoilery Synopsis

Sarge narrates how the zombie apocalypse simply overwhelmed the living. The soldiers argue over killing one of their own who has been bitten. We get a flashback to when Sarge and his AWOL soldiers robbed a bunch of filmmakers in an RV. Credits roll.

We cut to Plum Island, off the coast of Delaware, six days after the dead began to walk. Patrick O’Flynn and his friends went around the island and killed all the zombies. They go to see Matthew, whose children were “injured” a few days ago. The men end up shooting the children’s mother and then go after both children.

Suddenly, Seamus Muldoon comes in and makes O’Flynn stop. He thinks somebody’s going to find a cure, so he wants to round up the zombies and protect them. O’Flynn and his gang backs down and leaves. O’Flynn is exiled in a tiny boat, but his friend James and daughter Janet opt to stay behind and work with Muldoon.

Three weeks later, Sarge and his crew investigate sounds in the woods. They run into some hunters who have a whole bunch of living heads on sticks. They kill the zombie heads and the hunters, and pick up one young guy who goes with them. The kid suggests finding an island where there aren’t any zombies. He shows them a video made by O’Flynn, and it’s a sort of recruiting video for Plum Island.

We cut to the docks, where a hapless fisherman catches something too big to reel in. The soldier group arrives. Francisco ends up swimming to the ferry as the others fight the Irishmen. The Irishmen lose badly, as only O’Flynn escapes alive and makes it to the ferry with the soldiers. The group sets to work on clearing the ferry of zombies.

O’Flynn tells the story of his exile, and they soon arrive at Plum Island. There’s a gunfight, and Kenny gets killed. They find the bodies of all the other people that O’Flynn had sent here for safety.

Meanwhile, Muldoon has rounded up a bunch of dead and is keeping them in the barn. Muldoon’s been killing the dead recently if they don’t “show promise.” He wants the dead to learn to eat something other than people, but they won’t touch a pig.

Francisco got bitten during his swim earlier, and he knows he’s going to turn. He asks Tomboy to kill him. She’s immediately captured by Chuck and Lem, two of Muldoon’s men. Muldoon questions her over dinner. He’s got his dead wife chained up in the kitchen. Of O’Flynn’s daughters, Jane is a dead zombie, and Janet is alive and helping Sarge’s group. Janet and O’Flynn argue about family responsibilities.

There’s a standoff between the two groups, and O’Flynn decides to surrender to the Muldoons. After a lot of discussion, there’s a shootout, and the zombie corral gets opened. Muldoon eventually shoots O’Flynn in the back, but O’Flynn returns the favor. Then Janet sees Jane eating the horse; maybe Muldoon was right after all. O’Flynn gets up and shoots her as well.

Sarge, Tomboy, and the Kid go back out to the ferry and move on to another place.

We cut back to the island, where the zombies are eating the horses now. We see Muldoon and O’Flynn, now zombies, still trying to kill each other…

Brian’s Commentary

I still wonder why this island in Delaware is populated exclusively by Irishmen with thick accents and cowboy wannabes?

It’s a Romero movie, so I was expecting social commentary of some sort. If it was here, I missed it this time. It’s basically just an action zombie movie, probably the weakest of the series.

Kevin’s Commentary

These are supposed to get better as they go along, not worse. It was clever putting in a direct link to “Diary of the Dead” with a different point of view when Sarge and his group encountered the film folks. CGI, when it’s obvious, isn’t an improvement over purely practical effects. I’d call this one my least favorite of the series.

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We’ll start off with the much-discussed “Weapons” and then watch some even-newer releases: “Coyotes,” “The Drowned,” and “In Vitro,” which were all fun. Lastly, we’ll continue our ongoing kaiju coverage with 1984’s “The Return of Godzilla.”

A bunch of winners this week!

* The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #48, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2025 Weapons

* Directed by: Zach Cregger

* Written by: Zach Cregger

* Stars: Julia Garner, Josh Brolin, Alden Ehrenreich

* Run Time: 2 Hours, 8 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

We start right out setting the mystery of how a classroom full of kids all ran out of their houses at 2:17 in the morning one night and disappeared. Except for one kid. Then the movie is spent going over the aftermath from different points of view of the people involved, and we get to solve the mystery together. It’s long but we were never bored. Okay, Kevin was a little impatient for the first half hour or so. But overall we liked it a lot and would recommend it. And we also recommend you go into it as blind as you can.

Spoilery Synopsis

We’re told that this is a true story, but there was a coverup to hide the truth. We open on a third-grade and a new teacher, Justine. Not one of her kids has come to school, but all the other classes are perfectly normal. Wait, a boy named Alex did show up. Every other kid woke up the previous night at 2:17 a.m., walked outside, and vanished at a run into the night. They never came back. We watch a flashback as the kids go running outside late at night. Credits roll.

Justine

The police interrogate little Alex and Justine, who know nothing. Eventually, they had to reopen the school after a month. First, they have a big meeting to deal with grief counseling over the seventeen missing children. They want to hear from Justine, who seems to be at the center of all this. What did she do? The crowd gets nasty, and the meeting is soon over. They blame her.

On the way home, Justine starts getting death threats on her phone. She finds her car painted with “Witch” on the side in the morning. The school principal, Mr. Marcus, tells her that she can’t work there anymore. She wants to talk to Alex, but she’s not allowed.

Justine meets policeman Paul at a bar later, and she tells him her problems. He says that she’s always been a little paranoid, and now she’s drinking too much. He is reluctant to drink, but we flash forward to the next morning with him waking up hung over in Justine’s bed. She drives him to his car, still at the bar.

Justine goes to see Alex, which she has been forbidden to do. There are newspapers over all the windows at his house. She peeks in and sees something weird. She’s later attacked by Donna, Paul’s wife, who is justifiably angry. At home that night, she starts seeing things.

She “stakes out” Alex’s house, gets drunk, and passes out. Someone sneaks into the car and snips off some of her hair.

Archer

We cut to Archer, who watches doorbell security video of his son running off into the darkness that night last month. He goes to work, and he’s been messing up lately. He’s been pestering the chief of police to the point of being annoying. He still thinks Justine is behind all this, but the chief doesn’t believe she’s involved. We see that he’s got red paint in the back of his truck, the same color as “WITCH” painted on the side of Justine’s car.

Archer has a dream where he sees Matthew, his son, running off to a house with a giant gun flying overhead. He goes inside and talks to his sleeping son. The light comes on, and the dream gets weird.

In the morning, Archer takes the information from his dream and checks out a nearby radio tower. He gets with some other parents and looks at their video footage. He confronts Justine, but in the middle of their conversation, she’s attacked by Mr. Marcus, the principal, who has gone utterly berserk.

Paul

We cut back a few days, as Paul sees someone suspicious running down the street, this results in a chase. He catches James, whom he knocks out. He realizes the camera is on and lets the guy go so there’s no report. The chief is somewhat supportive, so long as James stays quiet.

This is when he gets a text from Justine and meets her at the bar. He falls right off the wagon. He goes home hung over and runs into Donna, who later attacks Justine in a jealous rage. He later sees James again and chases him.

James

James is an addict who can’t get his pipe to light because he’s run dry. He breaks into a car and steals an iPad. The pawnbroker doesn’t want it. He’s trying to break into a store when Paul spots and beats him the first time.

James walks through the rain to Alex’s house and gets in through an upstairs window. He goes all through the house, looking for things to steal until he finds Alex’s parents, who seem to be frozen or paralyzed. He looks in the basement and sees all the missing children standing around down there. He gets creeped out and runs away when both parents suddenly get up. There is a big reward for the missing kids, that he plans to cash in on.

He walks to the police station to tell them when he’s chased by Paul a second time. He runs into the woods, where he sees a crazy looking clown. He ends up stabbing Paul in the face with needles. He ends up taking Paul to the suspect house.

Paul goes into the house, without calling it in or for any kind of backup, and leaves James in the back of the squad car. He never comes back out until late at night when he drags James inside.

Marcus

Marcus is sick of Justine, but he has to deal with her anyway. He gets a visit from Gladys, a very strange-looking woman. Maybe that wasn’t a clown that James saw in the woods. She says she’s Alex’s aunt, and she’s really weird. He wants to talk to Alex’s parents, not his aunt, so Marcus offers to visit them at home. He wants to avoid involving CPS, and that seems to concern Gladys.

Saturday, Marcus gets a knock on the door, and it’s crazy Gladys, wanting a drink of water - she’s so thirsty. She missed her bus, and pleads for help. He tries to say no, but his husband Terry invites her in. She comes inside for a bowl of water. She cuts herself and then takes some of Terry’s hair. She rings a bell, and suddenly, Marcus freezes and drops the phone he was about to call 911 with. She wraps Terry’s hair around a stick, covers it in blood, and snaps it. Marcus goes berserk and kills Terry. Once that’s over, she does the same thing with Justine’s bit of hair, and he runs off to attack her at the gas station.

As all the stories converge, Archer pulls Marcus off of Justine, This leads to a car chase, and Marcus gets hit by a car, badly. After things settle down a bit, Justine and Archer talk about it. Marcus was doing the “Naruto Run,” exactly the same way all the children ran. He was weaponized, like a heat-seeking missile going for a target. Archer shows her the map he’s made, and she points to Alex’s house.

Alex

Alex is at school, and he’s not happy, being bullied by bigger kids. His father says Aunt Gladys is coming for a visit; she’s sick and doesn’t have anywhere else to go. Late that night, the strange woman with the orange wig comes to stay with them. Alex isn’t happy about the sick old woman, but nobody asked him.

One day Alex doesn’t get picked up from school, and when he does get home, he finds his parents are frozen at the dinner table. Aunt Glady, however, is looking much more lively.

The next morning, the parents haven’t moved. The old lady swears him to secrecy. She makes his parents stab themselves in the face with forks repeatedly until he agrees. She said she can make them do anything, and demands that he tell no one about her. For several days, Alex feeds his parents soup from a can and quietly goes to school without saying anything.

One night, Alex sees that Gladys is very sick and has been for a very long time. Alex’s parents aren’t helping as much as she expected. She tells him to bring her an object from each of his classmates, and she might get better and leave. During the next school day, he pilfers something from each of them.

That night, Gladys does a mega-spell on all the children, who come running to her, all at once at 2:17 am. The next morning, only Alex shows up to school. Gladys is now looking very lively and colorful. She sends all the children away temporarily and cleans up the house for when the police come to inspect the place.

A month later in the story, Archer and Justine come to the house and see Paul’s police car parked in front. They don’t know what to do, but he steps out and waves them inside. They do go in. Justine steps over a line of salt on the floor, and both Paul and James spring to life and attack them. These guys do not give up easily. Upstairs, the same thing happens with Alex and his parents.

Archer finds the missing children in the basement, but he finds Gladys there as well. Gladys uses him to grab Justine. Upstairs, Alex uses one of Gladys’s hairs and repeats the spell himself, making her a target. All the children break out of the house and chase her. After an extended and hysterical chase, the children tear her apart.

Back at the house, Archer releases Justine and goes looking for Matthew again; he soon finds him. Justine goes upstairs for Alex and finds him with his parents, who will never recover. Some of the children are just starting to talk this year…

Brian’s Commentary

The story being broken up into different viewpoints makes the story more interesting as it unfolds. I was expecting aliens or something, not a witch. That said, it was interesting, never slows down, and had a big enough budget that it showed. The gore effects were nice, but there weren’t so many that it became a distraction.

It’s very good!

Kevin’s Commentary

I was very grateful for the different points of view segments. And it was very cool how they weren’t exactly the same word for word, showing us how people can see and remember the same events slightly differently. I did think it took a little too long at the beginning to get things rolling, but once it did it was pretty great. And I loved that over the top ending chase. I give it a big thumbs up.

2025 Coyotes

* Directed by: Colin Minihan

* Written by: Ted Daggerhart, Daniel Meersand, Nick Simon

* Stars: Mila Harris, Brittany Allen, Justin Long

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 32 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This starts with something that shouldn’t be a major event but keeps building with one thing after another, part disaster and part comedy of errors. And there is lots of dark humor, along with horror and a body count. It’s an animals-attack movie pumped up with adrenaline and modern effects. We both thought it was really entertaining.

Spoilery Synopsis

A party girl walks her little dog late one night. She takes selfie after selfie as the dog does his business. A coyote eats the dog, and then she gets hit by a car. That doesn’t kill her, but the coyotes come back to finish the job. Credits roll. We hear news reports about how wildfires are pushing coyotes deeper into the Los Angeles city limits.

The pest control guy arrives outside a huge Hollywood house. Scott, the owner, says the house is brand new. But there are rats in the walls. The exterminator, Devon, is more than a little high-strung. Scott decides halfway through that maybe rats aren’t so bad, but Devon convinces him. Chloe and Liv, the rest of the family, arrive in the middle of the consultation. Chloe is a teenager, and she’s hit the annoying stage.

The doorbell rings, and it’s Julie, who’s a prostitute at the wrong house. She’s there for Trip, the next door neighbor. Liv sees that Scott is a workaholic, and she does not approve.

That night, Charlie the dog barks at the doggy door; there’s something out there. She calls Scott, who goes outside in the windstorm to check on the sound. He soon sees a really mean-looking coyote, just as the motion-sensor lights decide to go on and off. As he goes back inside, the power goes off for real. A tree has fallen on their power line– and their car.

The next morning, they assess the damage, and it’s all Scott’s fault for not trimming the tree. Liv goes next door to Trip, who has a generator and a gun; he’s a kind of prepper/survivalist. Trip’s cat may or may not have been eaten. Scott and his friend Tony work on cutting up the fallen tree, and they’re both incompetent.

On the walk home, Tony meets the coyotes, and they tear him apart. Sheila, Tony’s wife, is annoyed that he doesn’t make it home. She finds little bits of him outside, but she also finds the coyotes. This goes badly for Sheila.

Scott, Liv, and Chloe hear lots of coyotes howling in the fields nearby. They’re nearly attacked by one of them. Julie is also nearly attacked, and she interrupts Trip, who is about to shoot himself over the loss of his cat. This all leads to weird sex, but the animals sneak inside through an open door.

Scott and his family hear the gunshots from next door and wonder what’s going on. Chloe admits to feeding the coyotes earlier because they looked hungry. Scott runs to Trip’s house and finds a mess. He runs into Julie and calls Devon on the phone for help. Devon is annoyed and promises to come around in the morning to check the rat traps. Inside Trip’s house, a candle falls over and sets the place on fire.

Liv and Scott talk about their family problems– at least until they notice the house next door is on fire. Which is spreading toward their property. They all argue about what to do until they notice the animals are already inside the house. There’s a great deal of hiding and tip-toeing.

Chloe is bitten, and Scott faints at the sight of the blood. Scott goes out to the garage to build a cage they can hide in, and we get a construction montage.

Devon the exterminator arrives outside and sees the coyotes. He soon realizes that these aren’t rats, but that’s too late to save him. Inside, Scott finds two tiny trapped coyote puppies and figures this is why the coyotes are so fixated on the area. He finishes his “Coyote Cage” and wheels himself outside in it.

Scott offers the lead coyote the two puppies in a trade. The family is reunited in the front yard since the coyotes understand a peace treaty– no, they don’t. They attack Julie. They all climb into Devon’s van and drive away. Meanwhile, the gas-fueled house explodes excessively. Scott laments his now-lost comic book collection.

Devon wakes up and goes out fighting with the animals…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s good! It’s a fairly standard animals-gone-wild story, like from the 70s, but this one has a bunch of modern humor thrown in. It’s also got Justin Long, who seems to have been in half the horror films of the past decade.

There’s not much actually new here, but it takes elements we’ve seen before and jumbles them up nicely. The acting, sets, and creature effects are all quite good, and most importantly, it never slowed down or got boring.

It’s a winner!

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s kind of a silly film, but I thought it was very entertaining. It did remind me of some of the animals gone bad, people fighting nature films of the past, but they dialed it up to ten and a half. There’s still plenty of gore with a body count, but I laughed out loud more than once. I’d recommend it.

2025 The Drowned

* Directed by: Samuel Clemens

* Written by: Samuel Clemens

* Stars: Alan Carlton, Michelangelo Fortuzzi, Corrine Wicks

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 24 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

When three guys rendezvous at a secluded beach house after a heist, they are missing their fourth partner. Suspicions abound, and the three have a history that we gradually get to learn. Then things get more complicated. The soundtrack was especially effective here, and they had a great setting to use. We both thought it’s well made, with Brian leaning toward it being dull and Kevin not finding it dull at all.

Spoilery Synopsis

We see a man riding a ferry as the credits roll. He drives on the isolated country roads and stares at a red bag on the seat next to him. He eventually comes to a car and switches license plates; Eric’s very prepared for all this.

He walks quite a distance to a house on the shore. He goes through the house room to room with his gun drawn and then goes outside to call for Denice. He finds a map tube with a painting inside next to a bloody patch and a bracelet on the beach.

Matt arrives, also looking for Denice, and Eric says he doesn’t think she’s coming. Matt, Denice’s son, says her car is gone, but Eric knows he parked right next to her. Eric assumes she’s dead, but he doesn’t let on to Matt, his lover. When they get back to the house, Paul is there waiting for them. The painting is worth forty million, and they all wonder why Denice isn’t there for her share.

All three of the men get a weird “flash” trance and then start behaving strangely. They all zombie-walk out to the beach and then “wake up” not sure what just happened. They’re all tired and a little paranoid, so they blame that.

Inside, a bucket of blood calls to Matt. Paul accuses Eric of killing Denice; he’s got video footage. Matt finds Denice’s bracelet in a bucket of blood. They all argue until a woman comes to the door for help. Matt notices on the way out that the bucket is gone. Opal and Noe bring the guys to Pixie, who has nearly drowned. Eric revives her.

The girls talk about their boating accident; the water out there hides things, and their boat sank. Everyone gets introduced. The three girls are all strange, and they suspect something is weird about the three guys.

The group plays “two truths and a lie.” Pixie demonstrates her kung-fu abilities on Eric as everyone gets to know each other.

Suddenly, the lights go out, and everyone pairs off to make out. As Pixie and Eric start having sex, he and the other men go into a trance again. They all go outside to find a trail of blood where Matt and Opal used to be.

Eric and Paul walk down to the water’s edge and find another pile of meat. Paul suggests earplugs to block the hypnotic sound that seems to be causing their troubles. Eric soon loses an earplug and then starts hearing voices.

Something attacks Eric on the beach. Meanwhile, Paul takes the painting, ties himself to a pole, and is also mesmerized – but can’t get away because he’s held in place. Whatever is doing this tries repeatedly to take him, but it can’t break the ropes. We get a flashback showing that Paul has mailed Scotland Yard about Eric, turning him in.

By the morning, Paul has gotten loose and walks to the beach and sees the three girls standing way out in the water. He walks out to them, but they aren’t really there. Yes, they are– they’re mermaids, and they take Paul.

We cut to Denice, who wakes up on the beach after having been possessed as well. She’s got a big bite taken out of her leg, but she’s very much alive. She walks back to the house and looks for her three partners in crime. She sees the painting hanging on the wall; it’s the stolen painting, and it’s a work about mermaids luring men to their doom…

Brian’s Commentary

The soundtrack immediately stands out and gives everything a really mysterious feel. The mystery in the beginning was intriguing, but as soon as the three girls showed up, everything ground to a halt. The girls were weird enough that we assumed they were monsters, but then, when something happened to one of them, that theory changed.

We more or less get an explanation at the end of the film, but I think a little more of a hint early on might have made the story easier to follow as it went along.

It was well made, looked and sounded great, just a little on the dull side for me.

Kevin’s Commentary

It did indeed have a great soundtrack and a great setting. I thought it was pretty obvious what the girls were early on. It’s interesting seeing movies like this, there have been others, where the monster or creatures or vampire is just so overwhelmingly powerful that they are playing with the human characters like toys, and you know there’s no hope for them. There will be no survivors. Not that it’s not still entertaining. I thought it was a well put together piece, nice and short with little wasted time. I didn’t think it was dull and would give it a thumbs up.

2025 In Vitro

* Directed by: Will Howarth, Tom McKeith

* Written by: Will Howarth, Talia Zucker, Tom McKeith

* Stars: Talia Zucker, Ashley Zukerman, Stephanie Arezzi

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 29 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This is heavy on the science fiction, tension, and thrills with some horror elements simmering under the pot. A word of warning, don’t look at IMDB.com before you see this, there is a spoiler. But even when we started figuring things out a bit, there were still surprises. It’s very well made. The acting is excellent, and the setting is perfect. We thought it was on the slow side, but it was never boring. A strong thumbs up from both of us.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open in the countryside with a ranch and zoom into a large barn full of what appears to be scientific equipment inside.

Layla and Jack wake up and make coffee with tablets (it’s a horror movie after all). Suddenly, an alarm goes off in the barn, and she runs out to find Jack wrestling with a cow in a liquid filled tank. “The system crashed again, she came out of stasis too early.” Dried off and in a scanner, they see the cow has some serious health issues, and Jack says it has to be put down.

Later, Layla sends an email to her son, Toby, who will be visiting for the holidays. The satellite’s out, so the message doesn’t go through. When she mentions painting Toby’s bedroom, Jack gives her a look; there’s more to all this than we know.

A new cattle driver, Brady, arrives, and he watches a video about how the system can produce market-ready cloned cows in less than two weeks. Animal replication is cheaper, faster, and more consistent than making cows the old fashioned way. And they mostly have it perfected.

Another of the cows gets sick, and Jack has to take care of that one as well. At dinner, they argue about going to see Toby. She finds that Toby’s room used to be the exact shade of blue she’s chosen, and then they painted over it for some reason.

Jack gets injured dealing with some animals and gets a concussion. Layla hears someone rummaging around out in the kitchen, but whoever it is is gone by the time she goes in. She goes outside with a gun and is attacked by… a copy of herself.

Layla goes into the barn and checks out Jack’s special cloning tanks. Sure enough, one that was kind of hidden away shows signs of use. She also leaves a note for the “outside” Layla to come meet her in the greenhouse. When Jack recovers, she doesn’t say anything to him.

The two Laylas meet and talk. The new Layla has signs that she’s not going to last long - she came out too soon like that first cow did. She asks how Toby is, and the real Layla says he’s off at school. The clone has her memories. Layla gets the car to take her clone to the hospital - she says she’ll tell them they are sisters - but the car won’t start for her. Jack fires Brady, who objects and implies that he knows more than we or Layla know about what’s really going on, but Jack threatens him off with a gun.

Jack knows that Layla knows - he found the note Layla left for the other. Jack says he’s not trying to kill the other Layla, but he’s not convincing. “She was never supposed to wake up, she was just a test. There are people out there that would pay a lot of money for this technology.”

The Laylas gang up on Jack with the shotgun. He gets the upper hand, but Brady shows up and whacks him with a tire iron. They all get away in Brady’s pickup truck. Jack shoots at them, and the truck dies not far away. Jack’s had Layla’s wedding ring altered with a tracker and goes after them.

Brady explains that Jack’s business was shut down years ago. Brady isn’t really a trucker, Jack just hired him to make it look like the ranch was still in business. Why doesn’t she know this? Jack finds them and stabs Brady repeatedly. The girls run and hide, but the sickly one just can’t keep up. Copy Layla is left behind. Original Layla is able to escape in Jack’s car and goes to a gas/electric station not too far away. She gets on a pay phone and calls Toby’s school, but the school says Toby left there years ago.

She goes to the college and spots Toby, who is quite a bit older than she remembers. Then she watches a car drive up and another Layla gets out to pick up her son. Who’s the real Layla now? Our Layla follows them home and breaks into their house after that Layla leaves for work. She finds divorce paperwork and also a restraining order against Jack. Apparently after the real Layla left him and took their son, he made a Layla of his own. Toby comes in and doesn’t know the difference, but wonders why she’s back home from work and changed clothes. Layla makes excuses, embraces him, and leaves after Toby does.

Now that she knows what’s going on, she goes back to Jack at the farm. He says there were many attempts before he finally got it right with her. He made another copy because he could tell she was getting restless and heading toward leaving him like before. She says they can pretend none of this happened, and they can go back to the way things were. When he drops his guard, she shoots him in the head. Layla then cuts off Jack’s thumb to use for the security lock on his equipment.

Time passes and we see her selling some cows to a man she thanks who leaves. Toby’s room is painted blue now and fully decorated. The final reveal is when the camera pans around to show her outside, talking to a little Toby of her own…

Brian’s Commentary

The trailer had us both expecting mutant cow-human hybrid monsters. That would have been cool, but what we got was more creative than that.

We both came up with theories about what was going on at about the twenty-minute point, and soon learned that we were both right about what was going on not long after but there was a lot more to it than we anticipated.

It had some twists that I was not expecting, and, although it was a little slow-moving, it never got boring. The acting was good all around, and it all looked great.

I liked it.

Kevin’s Commentary

I saw the IMDB cast list ahead of time that lists “Other Layla,” so I knew that was coming. But that’s hinted at and revealed early in the movie anyway, and there is more to it than that. It’s one that unfolds very nicely. Like Brian said, I was expecting more of a creature feature with monster cows or something, but that’s not what it was about. I think it’s completely realistic to believe that if that technology was available, people like Jack would do things like this if they could. It raises some ethical questions to think about. And I wonder what Layla’s plan for little clone Toby was as he grew up. I’d call this one excellent.

1984 The Return of Godzilla

* Directed by: Koji Hashimoto

* Written by: Fred Dekker, Akira Murao, Hideichi Nagahara

* Stars: Keiju Kobayashi, Ken Tanaka, Yasuko Sawaguchi

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 43 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

You thought he was gone forever, but spoiler, after 9 years away, Godzilla returns. They left out the silliness this time, and the far out aliens, and they take things seriously in this one. It’s still all practical effects, with a guy in a rubber suit knocking over models, but everything looks much better than those of the 50s, 60s, 70s. There are some slow places, but if you’re a Godzilla fan, this is a decent one to check out.

Spoilery Synopsis

We open with men on a fishing boat dealing with stormy seas; they’re having a rough time. As they approach a rocky island, they see some large creature breaking out of the rocks…

We cut to a man on a small sailboat listening to radio reports of all the missing ships from last night. He comes across a much larger boat that seems to be abandoned. Once aboard, he finds mummified bodies. He also encounters a strange slug-like creature that attacks him; giant sea-lice. It turns out, there’s only one survivor aboard the ship, and he talks about the giant, fire-breathing monster that came from the island.

Later, at home, Goro Maki, the man from the sailboat, calls his story into the newspaper, but they don’t believe him. Okamura, the man from the fishing boat, tells the professor his story as well, but the professor seems to believe him. The professor shows him old photos of Godzilla, and he makes a positive ID. Godzilla must have been disturbed by the recent volcanic activity in the nearby islands.

Maki complains that the editor won’t print his story, but the government has forbidden them from telling the public about Godzilla. Maki then goes to the science institute and talks to Professor Hayashida. The professor lost his parents in Godzilla’s attack thirty years ago. He meets Okamura’s sister, Naoko there.

Meanwhile, a Soviet submarine detects something large approaching. They think it could be a new kind of American sub, and they fire torpedoes at it. Something then tears the submarine in half. Soon after, the Soviets prepare to declare nuclear war. To prevent the war, the Japanese Prime Minister makes the Godzilla sightings public; it wasn’t the Americans.

Maki goes to see Naoko, who blames him for publishing the story. The politicians and military talk about their ability to fight Godzilla. They could use the “Super X” a secret weapon built to defend the capitol. Godzilla is sure to come; Japan has his favorite food: nuclear energy.

Godzilla soon reaches land and starts a rampage. Maki and his film crew rush to witness his attack on a nuclear power station. As he rips out the core of the reactor, we see the tired old lizard recharge himself.

The professor tells Okumura to visit a geologist friend of his, Minami, who reports that they can make a volcano erupt when needed if they can get Godzilla to go there. America and the Soviet Union both want to use nuclear weapons against Godzilla. The Japanese government discusses whether or not that’s a good idea or if it will even work.

Godzilla is moving toward Tokyo now. Everyone panics to get out of town. The professor tells Maki that the plan to use cadmium bullets on Godzilla isn’t going to work, but it’s better than using the nukes. The army all lines up at the coastline, waiting. Soon, they unleash everything they have against the monster, but Godzilla has radiation breath that can bring down fighter planes– and everything else.

A Russian missile boat is severely damaged, and the captain is killed. Something seems to be going wrong with their nuclear weapon controls. A countdown begins.

The professor has been studying bird migrations and thinks the right sound might make Godzilla’s homing instinct kick in and lead him away from Japan. He gets it all set up, but they can’t get out of their building since all the elevators are locked down.

The Super-X weapon takes off, it’s a kind of flying fortress. It fires the cadmium bullets, which do slow down Godzilla a bit.

Meanwhile, the Russian ship fires a nuclear missile from space after the automatic countdown. They have to evacuate the Shinjuku District before it all explodes. Maybe the Americans can shoot down the missile. Nobody knows what to do.

Super X reports that Godzilla is down but not dead. Okamura helps the professor out of the building with a helicopter, but the winds are too strong, so Maki and Naoko are left behind.

The Americans shoot down the Russian missile just over the city. The effect makes the sky turn red and shock waves spread out everywhere. Super-X is forced to land and radioactive lightning strikes Godzilla. Super X is all out of cadmium, and their regular weapons don’t do much against him.

Way out in the Pacific, the professor hooks up his device to a huge antenna and starts broadcasting bird calls toward Japan. An idea he came up with to mesmerize and attract Godzilla.

Godzilla finally shoots down Super-X and then drops a skyscraper on it. He’s just about to step on Naoko and Maki when he hears the call of the birds. He pauses, turns around, and heads the other direction. He hits the ocean and keeps on going, leaving the ruins of Tokyo behind.

On the volcanic island, Godzilla shows up as the professor and Okumura wait for him. He walks right up to the volcano as the men set off the charges that cause the volcano to erupt. They all watch as Godzilla sinks into the lava and, we assume, melts to never be seen again.

Brian’s Commentary

There’s none of the previous childishness or silliness in this one. The mood here is about our characters ominously waiting for Godzilla to do something. It’s very slow and suspenseful as everyone discusses and worries about what to do. It’s all taken very seriously.

The special effects, soundtrack, and even the miniatures are much improved over the older films. It’s still from the pre-CGI days, so everything is still done with miniatures and a man in a rubber suit, but it’s all still somehow visually improved over what came before.

It had been nearly ten years since the previous film in the series, and a lot longer since any of it was taken seriously. Although this one had some slow points, it was overall a really good reboot.

Kevin’s Commentary

Godzilla returns, but after that ending we’ll never see him again. This was an improvement in effects, despite it still just being a guy in a rubber suit. The effects are more realistic, the explosions and models are improved. The story was a little talky in places, but it gets the job done. All in all, this was a decent reboot.

Short Films:

2020 Short Film Waffle

* Directed by: Carlyn Hudson

* Written by: Kerry Barker, Katie Marovitch

* Stars: Kerry Barker, Raphael Chestang, Katie Marovitch

* Run Time: 10 Minutes

* Watch it:

What Happens

It’s a fun sleepover at Katie’s house. She’s very wealthy due to her grandfather inventing a waffle maker. Her friend Kerry tells a funny story about something they did, but Katie contradicts everything she says. It’s a very awkward evening, and then their time is up…

Commentary

Katie may be just a bit obsessive, and she really wants a sleep-over. That’s not so bad, but then Kerry isn’t the friend she appears to be in the beginning. Which is more important: money or friendship; with enough money, you can have BOTH!

It’s weird. Well made, but weird!

2023 Short Film Midnight Clear

* Directed by: Joe Russo

* Written by: John Jesensky, Joe Russo

* Stars: Jessica Morris, Kurt Kubicek, Caige Coulter, Kue Lawrence

* Run Time: 7:31

* Watch it:

What Happens

It’s Christmas, and everything is nicely decorated. Dad admires the beautiful tree, and, with a big smile he asks his crying wife what she thinks. The two kids come in, asking if it’s morning, but he says no, it’s Christmas Eve still, but they’re going to be opening their gifts early this year. Mom, on the other hand, isn’t so enthusiastic…

Commentary

Mom and Dad seem to know what’s going on, but we don’t. He seems mean, but no, not really. Or maybe he’s a serial killer. We just don’t know what’s going on until it all becomes “Midnight Clear” in the end.

2023 Short Film Septichexen

* Directed by: Anders Elsrud Hultgreen

* Written by: Anders Elsrud Hultgreen

* Stars: Roskva Yasmin Anderson, Brita Grov, Susann Bugge Kambestad

* Run Time: 13:49

* Watch it:

What Happens

In the sewers of Bergen, a microbiologist searches for the cause of contamination of the city’s drinking water. There’s some kind of unidentifiable disease, and our man is down there taking samples. He finds more than a simple contaminant…

Commentary

“Down here you no longer belong to the human world.”

It’s all very dark, moody, and creepy. The locations and weird cinematography really help. There’s not really a great deal of story here, but the visuals really sell this one.

Who knew that “Sewer Witches” were a thing?

Contact Info:

Email: mailto:email@horrorguys.com

Websites:

* https://www.horrorguys.com

* https://www.horrormonthly.com

* https://www.flashfright.com

“The Jester 2,” “The Man in the White Van,” and “Monster Island” are all out fresh this month, but “The Ghastly Love of Johnny X” (2012) and “Land of the Dead” (2005) are from a decade or two ago.

* The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #48, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2025 The Jester 2

* Directed by: Colin KrawChuk

* Written by: Colin KrawChuk

* Stars: Michael Sheffield, Kaitlyn Trentham,

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 27 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The Jester is back, killing people like a magician and entertainer again, with a bit of a different look. There’s much more explanation in this sequel than the first movie, and we both thought that was a step in the right direction. We liked this one better than the first Jester.

Spoilery Synopsis

It’s a big Halloween party, and the guys mock each other for being afraid to talk to Ava. He goes over to her, but she’s more interested in Connor. That goes badly for Eric but suddenly, The Jester appears by crawling out of a box. He then peels his mask off like he’s molting, and we see that he’s got hair now and his face itself looks like the mask. The Jester makes Eric be the pinata, and that’s a mess. Credits roll.

Max and Zoe talk about going out trick or treating, but mom says Max is getting a little too old for this stuff. Meanwhile, the Jester asks a guy on the street to pick a card, and then handcuffs him before ripping out his innards with a card trick.

Max goes to a restaurant alone, and the jerky waiter recognizes her from school. The girls at the next table mock her, but then the Jester sits down across from Max, and at least he’s nice to her. He tries to do a trick with his cards, but she shows him card tricks aren’t going to fool her. When the guy she likes punctures her bicycle tire, she stops and cries.

A trio of troublemakers are out pranking, and they run up against the Jester, who does his thing for them– except his magic no longer works. Instead, he just kills them the old-fashioned way- he attacks them with a knife. He’s lost his mojo and soon figures out that Max has it.

Max goes to the magic shop and tells her friend there about her social problems. He’s really nice and cheers her up. When she leaves, the Jester is waiting for her. As she watches, he walks over to the mean group from earlier and “pantses” the guy, much to his embarrassment. Jester invites Max to go trick or treating with him.

At the first house, Max does a magic trick for the woman inside, but then the Jester does a trick and kills the woman; his magic is back on again. Max runs away, terrified. They come across the remains of the party from the opening sequence, and Max shows him the Ouija board, which he can use to “talk” to her. He’s not going to kill her, he needs her. “You are just like me.” He says he’s a misunderstood entertainer until he met the Great Deceiver, who made him a deal. “I must trick four souls each Hallow’s Eve before a candle burns out.” Since she tricked him, that opens up a whole new rulebook; she has to do the tricks now.

Max picks out one guy in the park; it’s the guy who was mean to her earlier. He’s pretty easy to hate, so she shows him a trick. He apologizes during the trick, but it’s too late by then, and the Jester takes over.

Some police come over to question Max and the Jester, but suddenly, Max can’t speak either. Turns out, Max has called 911 on her phone. The police try to arrest the Jester, but that doesn’t go well for them.

Max runs away and encounters a man on the street who offers to drive her to the police station. They hear about the previous deaths on the radio, but the guy in the car is very weird, weird in a pedophile kind of way. The Jester reappears and solves Max’s problem.

Max has an asthma attack, so the Jester takes her to the fire station for help. The Jester then plays hide and seek with the firemen in the fire station. Max refuses to help him any further and goes home.

Max’s mother is there waiting for her, and she’s surprisingly mean. She finds the Jester in her sister Zoe’s room; he’s already killed the mother, and now he wants Zoe too. He still needs her to do one more trick for a victim.

Max chooses Darren, the waiter from earlier. When he gets off work, Max and the Jester are outside waiting for him. She pulls out her deck of cards and has second thoughts halfway through it. Turns out, she’s sleight-of-handed the Jester himself and performs a trick on him. Suddenly, his candle goes out and he bursts into flames.

The magic shop owner shows up to help Max and Zoe. The police have the whole area covered. He finds that Max has taken the Jester’s hat, and she keeps babbling about “four tricks– four souls. Every year.” Sounds like it’s time for a yearly franchise!

Brian’s Commentary

The character of the Jester looked better in the previous film, with the full-head mask. This time around, he’s just got his face covered, and it’s not as effective. In the first film, he had more of a “street performer” look, but here, it seems he’s trying to look more scary.

One complaint about the previous film was that nothing was explained, and we get everything explained in this one. It’s got a much stronger story, and the pacing is much better as well. I liked this one quite a bit more than the original.

Kevin’s Commentary

This one had all the magical murdering goodness of the first movie with a better script and story. Though I do agree that I preferred the Jester’s look in the first film, overall this was a better movie. If you liked the first time around, you should definitely see this one.

2025 The Man in the White Van

* Directed by: Warren Skeels

* Written by: Sharon Y. Cobb, Warren Skeels

* Stars: Madison Wolfe, Brec Bassinger, Ali Larter, Sean Astin

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 45 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

It’s well-made and based on a real crime situation, which makes it creepy on a fundamental level. But it is rather long and drawn out. It hops around in the early 70s, doing a great job of capturing the look and feel of the decade. The van driver chooses to fixate on one character, rather than just the random attacks, so there’s drama and supporting cast for us to care about.

Spoilery Synopsis

A woman gets into a car and drives away. It’s 1970, and we see a white van following her car. She pulls over, crying about something, and doesn’t see the man from the van until it’s too late. Credits roll.

In 1975, Annie falls off her horse. She goes home, and her mother, Helen, freaks out and tells her to shave her legs. At dinner, her father, Richard, talks business. Margaret and Annie are very competitive sisters. It’s a very strict household.

Back in 1971, we watch a woman go out for the evening. She’s immediately kidnapped by the man in the white van, who we never see.

In 75 again, we watch as the family goes to church. As the preacher talks, we see that the man in the white van is still active out there and he follows the family car back to their home.

In 1972, a woman comes out of a disco and first with a man who drives a white van, and he gives her a ride against her will before killing her with an ax.

Annie likes the new boy at school, Mark Newsome. We see that Annie’s horse is upset by something outside, and when Annie goes out, she sees the van there. When she tells her mother and Margaret, they don’t believe her wild stories. She finally gets to talk to Mark, and they hit it off. On the way home, Annie and Patty see the van, but it’s only a telephone installer.

Little brother Daniel keeps playing with his father’s rifle, which annoys everyone. Annie ends up showing him how to use it.

1973, and a woman at a motel leaves the pool and gets grabbed on the way to her room.

Annie keeps seeing the strange man outside the house. One night, near Halloween, her parents go out for dinner and Annie sneaks away for her boyfriend, leaving Annie and Daniel alone. The van man comes around and terrifies them until they get the gun and shoot at the van. When Helen and Richard come home, the story comes out, and Margaret blames Annie for making it all up. Punishments are disbursed all around.

In 1974, a girl takes her dog out for a walk and things go badly for her. This time, the killer shows the kidnapped girl to an older man who calls him son.

Annie sees the guy outside again and gets Richard to go outside with his real gun. He shoots a possum in the trash can. Annie gets even more paranoid after that, actually going so far as to lock the front door!

The three kids go to a drive-in, and once again, Margaret sneaks off to be with her boyfriend. Annie runs into Mark there, and he’s come with the school slut, Joanna, who is having a Halloween party in a few days.

It’s Halloween, and Annie and Patty go to Joanna’s party. Margaret is actually nice and helps Annie get ready. Mark, it turns out, is more interested in Annie than Joanna, but they can’t stay very long. On the way home, on horseback, the two girls spot the van again, and this time it chases them. Annie falls off her horse and runs. It’s tense, but she eventually loses him.

When she gets home to put her horse away, the man is there waiting for her. The man knocks her out and ties her up, but the horse, on the other hand, kicks the man and knocks him out. It’s a contest of who will recover first, but Annie eventually winds up in the back of that van. She opens the door and jumps out (nobody tried that before?).

Annie runs home, and this time, Margaret sees the bad guy too. They do the cat-and-mouse things in and around the house. They hit the man with his own van just as the policeman arrives.

One month later, both Annie and Margaret have boyfriends, and the family is much more well-adjusted. We cut to someone buying a white van from a car lot. On the radio, the reports talk about the bodies, which have just started to be discovered.

As the closing credits roll, we see that it’s now 1976, and the van is still out there…

Brian’s Commentary

It’s very retro, but this story wouldn’t really work if it were set in the modern day. The cars and the music try hard to make it seem authentic, but it’s the telephone shenanigans that really sell it.

We assumed right off the bat that Sean Astin would be the killer, since he’s the only major star in the film, but it soon became obvious that it wasn’t him. Then we figured it would be Mark, but that wasn’t it either. Turns out, we never do see or know much about the killer; he’s a mystery man. This was all supposedly based on true events, so maybe that’s just the way it worked out in reality.

It’s a pretty slow moving film, and that might be my biggest complaint with it; the kidnapper is way too patient. Annie obviously knows he’s up to something, and she’s told plenty of people, but any kidnapper in their right mind would just move onto a new target. If he was really into Annie for some specific reason, that would make sense, but otherwise, he just seems to grab women who are convenient; Annie was not convenient.

It all looked good, and the acting from the main characters was decent. It is, however, very slow paced, and that may turn off some viewers.

Kevin’s Commentary

It’s set in an alternate 1970s timeline where people attend high school into their 20s, but everything else seems about the same as our 1970s. Seriously though, they had the 70s elements down solid. The acting is good. The story itself seemed thin to me, and stretched out. Which made it feel low stakes and a little on the dull side. As Brian pointed out, the van driver fixating on Annie was out of character for his usual MO of seemingly random abductions. Almost like they needed to lay it out that way to fill up a movie. I’d call it just okay overall.

2025 Monster Island

* AKA “Orang Ikan”

* Directed by: Mike Wiluan

* Written by: Mike Wiluan

* Stars: Dean Fujioka, Callum Woodhouse, Alan Maxson

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 23 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Two men from opposite sides of the war have to work together when they’re stranded on an island with an angry creature. The story is pretty straightforward, but it’s well done. The acting is good, the effects are decent, and the location is beautiful. We thought it was quite good.

Spoilery Synopsis

We hear about Japanese “Hell Ships” during WWII which took Allied POWs to Japanese slave camps and were often targets of the allies themselves.

It’s 1944 on one of these Hell ships. The guard pulls one of the prisoners out of a cell and pushes him away. He’s Japanese, but a traitor, sentenced to death but he has to be kept alive for the mainland execution. They bring in a second prisoner and get a little sadistic with him. They are chained together at the ankle.

Suddenly, the ship is under attack. The two prisoners attack the guards and jump overboard just as the ship explodes. Credits roll.

In the morning, both prisoners wake up on a deserted beach, still chained together. The other prisoner is British, and they fight some more. As they fight, something in the water attacks the Brit, but the Japanese man shoots it and drives it away. Saito and Bronson wonder what it was, but they can’t speak each other’s language, so that’s tough. They scavenge the ship’s wreckage and set up a camp.

They both figure out that they were prisoners, so maybe they can help each other. They work together to get the chain off, but soon it becomes apparent that there’s something out there in the jungle that isn’t friendly. There’s the monster, but there are also two Japanese soldiers and another prisoner. Saito tells Bronson to hide and pretends to be asleep until the soldiers find him.

The soldiers soon figure out that there’s someone else out there besides just Saito. They hear the monster roar out in the jungle, and the new prisoner calls it “Orang Ikan” and looks very afraid. One of the soldiers goes looking for what made the noise and soon finds it. Meanwhile, Bronson dispatches the first soldier. Saito and Bronson watch as the monster comes and finishes off the second soldier and the new prisoner.

The two men run through the jungle, which is nearly as dangerous as the monster, and they both get pretty badly beaten up. It’s a rough night for both of them. In the morning, they are separated and each learns what they can about the island they’re on and the monster they are up against. Saito finds a sword and a pistol.

Both men find the same crashed fighter plane, and one wing has a large unexploded bomb still attached. When they get back together, Saito shows Bronson to a cave with an egg. Saito tries to explain that they’re dealing with a mermaid protecting her egg.

Together, the two men go back out and carry the large bomb into the Mermaid’s cave. It’s got a delayed action fuse, but it’s damaged. Bronson explains that one of them is going to have to go boom with the bomb. They go back out to the plane to get an ax to set off the bomb, and the monster attacks. This time, the men have weapons and manage to run the creature off. Not for long, as it comes back in the cave and messes up Bronson really badly until Saito shoots it in the head and then shoots the egg.

As the injured-but-not-dead monster wails over the dead baby, mortally-wounded Bronson tells Saito to go; he’ll set off the bomb. Saito runs off as Bronson smacks the bomb with the ax.

As Saito walks off into the jungle, he hears more of the creatures out there. No, it’s the same one again. This sucker is tough. He lures it to the beach, where they fight some more. Eventually, Saito beats the creature, but doesn’t kill it. He lets it go.

Saito gets picked up in 1945 and tells the Americans there about Bronson. They ask Saito what his original crime was, and he says he killed his superior officer to save his comrades.

Zooming back to the island, we see the monster is still out there.

Brian’s Commentary

“Orang Ikan,” is Indonesian for “Mermaid” or “Man-Fish.”

The scenery and locations are pretty amazing. We only get flashes and glimpses of the monster, so we can assume the rubber suit wasn’t too great. It’s essentially the “Creature from the Black Lagoon” with a little CGI enhancement.

We’ve seen the trope of enemies having to work together many times, and it usually works; this one is pretty good.

Kevin’s Commentary

I didn’t think there were many surprises here, but it’s well made and visually impressive with good special effects. If you want to see a quick creature feature action flick, this is a good one.

2012 The Ghastly Love of Johnny X

* Directed by Paul Bunnell

* Written by Steve Bingen, Paul Bunnell, Mark D. Murphy

* Stars Will Keenan, Creed Bratton, De Anna Joy Brooks

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 46 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This was a movie in black and white that’s a send up of 1950s science fiction and leather-jacket rebel action. With musical numbers. And romance. And an undead rock singer very reminiscent of Roy Orbison. With all that weirdness, it should be more entertaining than it is, but there are too many talky bits that drag things down, especially in the final third or so. If you’re looking for something interesting and unique, you might want to check this one out.

Spoilery Synopsis

Johnny X is brought before the judge, and it all looks very black-and-white Flash-Gordony. He’s accused of not fitting in and following orders in their advanced civilization. Johnny and his followers are exiled to a low-tech planet with no real civilization, a place called “Earth.” Credits roll.

One year later, Johnny leads his people through the desert, all dressed like rejects from a 50s motorcycle gang movie. At the diner, the TV news tells us that Mickey O’Flynn has gone missing, and manager King Clayton is at a loss. Clayton watches a woman walk into the diner; she’s Bliss, and she talks about lizards wanting to lick her. She’s the one Johnny X is searching for.

Bliss tries to talk waiter Chip into leaving his life at the diner behind and going off with her. Johnny’s people all show up, and they know how to make an entrance– a musical entrance. They all hear about Mickey O’Flynn’s disappearance, and Johnny wants to find him. A lot goes on during the musical number, but eventually, Johnny uses his technology to capture Bliss.

Chip and Bliss drive to the drive-in theater, which is closed. She explains about Johnny and “The Ghastly Ones,” his gang. This all leads to another song, and she tells him about where Johnny comes from. He had a Resurrection Suit that allowed Johnny to control anyone. He’s only got one power glove, but she’s got the rest of the suit in her car. She’s got electrodes in her chest that she likes to fondle.

Meanwhile, Clayton and the Ghastlies go to his place, a nearly condemned theater. He’s got Mickey O’Flynn and his entire band there, and they’re rehearsing new music. No, that’s a puppet that looks like O’Flynn. We get a flashback about O’Flynn refusing to perform for an audience anymore. We also see how desperate Clayton is as he finally pursues O’Flynn to perform. Just as he makes his point, the musician dies (probably from boredom). Out of the blue, Bliss and Chip walk in and are captured.

Johnny and Chip go outside and argue. When Bliss gives him the super-suit, they all leave Chip alone. Johnny goes back inside and talks to O’Flynn’s corpse, who we learn was Johnny’s father.

Meanwhile, outside, the gang sings about what’s going on. Can (or will) Johnny use the resurrection suit to revive O’Flynn to save Clayton and the theater?

O’Flynn’s corpse is starting to decompose as the crowd comes into the theater, but someone loaded him with Jasmine. The curtain opens after a brief introduction by Clayton, and we see O’Flynn in a big sarcophagus. Johnny’s suit lights up, and the old rocker becomes a singing, dancing dead puppet.

Suddenly, Sluggo, one of the henchmen, betrays Johnny and cranks the power up to eleven. O’Flynn comes back to undead life for real. He still looks like a zombie though. He then ends the concert, and everyone leaves. He, Sluggo, and a groupie leave, but not before kidnapping Bliss with “The Big Pill.” O’Flynn has plans.

We cut to Cousin Quilty on TV, who interviews a woman who talks about her encounter with a flying saucer. Quilty admits that he personally has been abducted. O’Flynn and his posse arrive outside, and he wants to be on the show. During the interview, pieces of O’Flynn’s face start falling off. He mentions that Sluggo is his adopted son.

Sluggo calls Johnny and demands the suit. He wants to make a whole planet of zombies to do his bidding. O’Flynn starts to realize that Sluggo may be worse than he ever was.

Johnny finds the bad guys, but it’s all a trick. Sluggo gets the suit and forces O’Flynn to try strangling Johnny. Things go badly, and O’Flynn finally talks to his real son, Johnny, before dying again for real.

Bliss attacks Sluggo, but he’s huge. The rest of the gang joins in, and Sluggo falls off the mountain. Chip, on the other hand, is killed accidentally– nope, he just fainted.

Suddenly, the sky lights up and a flying saucer descends. Queen Betty from the homeworld has come, and she’s been watching. He offers to return the resurrection suit, and she recalls them to the homeworld, their crimes forgiven.

Johnny and Bliss come back, they want to make Earth their permanent home. Clayton, his girlfriend, and Chip go to Vegas to get married, which leads to a final song.

Brian’s Commentary

There seems to be one single product that gets a lot of product placement, see if you can spot it.

It certainly makes the most of black-and-white retro-50s imagery. This was Kevin McCarthy’s final film appearance. It was also the lowest-grossing movie of 2012, making only $117 during its one-week run. Mickey O’Flynn, played by Creed Bratton, seems to be a zombified Roy Orbison.

The whole thing seems to be a send-up of the 1950s “Rebel” genre although the trailer plays it up to be more of a mix of sci-fi and horror, but it takes a really long time to get to that part. The songs and musical bits are quite good, but all the talking in-between is just slow and draggy. There’s also a noticeable lack of songs in the second half.

I think it would have been much improved with the second half-hour much compressed. It’s a neat concept with a good look, but it’s extremely uneven. It’s definitely weird though.

Kevin’s Commentary

I was expecting this to be a wilder ride than it was. Instead, once things got underway, I found myself getting a little bored in places as it dragged down. The look and concept was all cool, the cast was good, the songs were fun. It could have used some tightening up. I don’t regret seeing it, and would recommend it for most folks, but once was probably enough.

2005 Land of the Dead

* Directed by: George A. Romero

* Written by: George A. Romero

* Stars: John Leguizamo, Asia Argento, Simon Baker, Dennis Hopper

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 33 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This was high on action and low on horror since the zombie universe of Romero is well established at this point. An add on at this point is that the undead are getting some of their mental facilities back, making them even more of a threat. There’s a secured area of a city where people are getting by. Folks are still divided into the haves and have nots, but everyone is equal when the undead are chasing them. We both thought it was good overall, not quite great.

Spoilery Synopsis

We are told about the dead rising and killing the living as credits roll. It’s a worldwide phenomenon, but at least the zombies are stupid and slow. Eventually, the dead outnumber the living and most of the world is gone. We cut to a brass band of the dead, all waving instruments around. The man at the gas station comes out to work the pumps.

All the dead are just doing what they did in life. “It’s like they’re pretending to be alive” says one living man to another. The gas station man spots them and starts to follow. Riley is in charge of the group, out scavenging for supplies. Charlie is scarred and not very smart, but he’s Riley’s helper. Riley tells Cholo that the dead seem to be thinking now; they’re smarter. “Things are changing, be careful.” This is Riley’s last night out, and Cholo is scheduled to take over in the future.

The men shoot off fireworks and then shoot the zombies who are mesmerized by the light and noise. The gas station man understands what’s happening and tries to warn the others, but he’s the only smart zombie in the group who figures it out. Big Daddy zombie roars at the “death” of his friends. The fireworks break down, and everyone is now bait. Cholo and his group raid the liquor store, and one of his people gets bitten and shoots himself.

As the humans all leave, Big Daddy straps on a machine gun and starts lumbering toward the lit-up tower in the distance. Other zombies follow him.

Back in the city, we see a city block has been sectioned off, and Riley and Charlie unload their loot from last night. Fiddler’s Green plays an ad on the TV, where everything is good for the shiny happy rich people.

Riley and Cholo debate about getting into Fiddler’s Green, but they’re both “the wrong kind.” Cholo goes into the Green which is a high-rise with restaurants, a shopping mall, and all kinds of nice things. Riley goes to the slum-town outside, which is a lot less nice, and way more crowded. We see how the defenses of the town work, and that there’s a lot of resentment against Kaufman and the leaders who relax in Fiddler’s Green.

Cholo runs into a zombie situation withing the Green itself, and he quickly takes care of the it before security arrives. Down in the town, the entertainment is heavily zombie-based, with gambling, target shooting, and even an arena fight. This results in a gunfight, and we see that Charlie’s an excellent shot.

Riley rescues a girl named Slack, and then they all get arrested. They all tell their stories. They also arrest Mulligan, the leader of the resistance. Meanwhile, outside, Big Daddy and his group bang on the walls of the town and can’t get in. He tells the undead butcher to hack through with his knife.

Cholo talks to Kaufman about getting a place inside The Green, but Kaufman gets all exclusionary, making excuses. It’s either racial or classist, probably some of each, but Cholo’s clearly not getting in. Kaufman calls security to get rid of Cholo. Cholo kills the security guard and goes rogue. Cholo, Foxy, Mouse, and some others decide to take the truck out for more supplies.

Suddenly, Big Daddy’s army shows up at the gates. The guards fill them full of lead, but it’s not enough. Instead of defending the place, Cholo’s people take the big truck, Dead Reckoning, right out through the gate that the zombies had already crashed. Big Daddy and his group continue on toward the big tower.

Kaufman listens to Cholo’s demands and calls for Riley. He sends Riley to retrieve Dead Reckoning and kill Cholo. Riley agrees to retrieve the property along with Charlie and Slack. Some soldiers accompany them. Riley tells Kaufman about the walkers, but they can’t get across the river to the town.

Kaufman knows what’s going on, and he’s made evacuation plans for his friends. Outside, Big Daddy and his friends come to the river, and they can’t swim. They do, however, find a unique approach to their problem.

Cholo figures out that Kaufman isn’t going to pay, so he loads missiles to attack the Green. Kaufman starts packing bags full of cash.

Now on the city side of the river, Big Daddy closes in on the survivor’s town; he teaches the zombies to use machine guns. Riley disables Cholo’s missiles and takes the truck back toward the city to let the people trapped inside out.

Cholo has been bitten and returns to Fiddler’s Green to confront Kaufman. Downstairs, the zombies finally get inside the Green itself and eat all the meaty, juicy rich people inside.

Kaufman gets into his limo as Big Daddy traps him inside. Big Daddy remembers the gas station and gives Kaufman a fill-up. Cholo shows up, and he’s already dead, Kaufman’s bullets do nothing. The exploding gasoline, on the other hand, takes care of both of them.

Riley and his group finally make it into town, too late to save anyone. It’s become a Land of the Dead. No, some of the people in the town have survived, and they’re all packed and ready to leave. A small group decides to stay. Riley, Charlie, and Slack decide to drive to Canada. Big Daddy continues to lead his people away, and Riley refuses to shoot him.

Brian’s Commentary

John Leguizamo and Simon Baker are both good here, but Dennis Hopper mostly seemed to phone in his cliched lines. The gore and zombie effects have improved a lot since the original films, and watching the smart zombies take over the town is pretty cool. It’s almost as if they’ve become the good guys.

It’s an “OK” action-horror movie, and it’s got the series’ usual social commentary, but it all feels a little lacking today. What good was all that money going to do anyone outside the city anyway?

Kevin’s Commentary

I liked it more than not, but it wasn’t the best of the series. Dennis Hopper seemed underutilized and a little too low key here, but the rest of the main characters were on point. The effects were excellent, and if you watch closely, effects artist Tom Savini makes a quick cameo as one of the undead. It’s worth a watch if you're a fan of Romero’s work.

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Websites:

* https://www.horrorguys.com

* https://www.horrormonthly.com

* https://www.flashfright.com

“Somnium,” “Dirty Boy,” and “Site” from this year. “The Jester” from 2023 is up next, followed by “Curse of Chucky” to complete that series, we already watched all the others. .

* The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #48, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.com

Mainstream Films:

2024 Somnium

* Directed by: Racheal Cain

* Written by: Racheal Cain

* Stars: Chloe Levine, Jonathan Schaech, Will Peltz

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 32 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A struggling actress takes a night job watching over a bunch of people who have signed up for Somnium, a facility where they are put to sleep for weeks and kept in a continuous dream state while being hypnotized into an improved mental state. Is it just stress and lack of sleep that’s causing Gemma to struggle with life or is something more ominous at work? We wondered and so will you. This was very good, entertaining and pulling us along while leaving a lot open to interpretation.

Spoilery Synopsis

Gemma has moved to a new city; she wants to be an actress. She goes to the talent agencies and auditions. She eventually goes to a place called “Somnium” who is hiring. Gemma doesn’t have much experience in anything useful, but Dr. Shaffer explains that it’s not a hard job, but it’s been hard to find anyone who stays very long. She’s essentially a “sleep sitter,” watching over sleeping patients in the facility.

We flash back to Gemma and Hunter talking about what they want to do with their lives. She wants to be an actress, he wants to be a touring musician. He knows he’s not really going to do that and sketches her a picture of the house he’d like to build someday.

On her first night at Somnium, Gemma learns about the “Science of Winning” and sees the sleep pods with people inside. The machine plays pictures and sounds into these peoples’ dreams. It’s a way to “program” new personal truths into people. It’s a quiet job, making sure nothing happens all night.

Gemma’s not comfortable inside her own apartment, hearing and seeing things that aren’t there. She clearly misses her life back in Georgia. She runs into Brooks, a creepy guy who probably wants something bad for her. Noah, at work, shows her how he programs people for their careers. He takes a photo of Gemma and puts it in some guy’s dream, teasing her that if he left it in the guy’s dream he would wake up infatuated with her without knowing why.

At an audition, Gemma does great, but the casting people aren’t excited. That night at Somnium, she sees some kind of monster in one of the patient rooms, but, of course, there’s nothing really there. At home, she hears that back home, Hunter has found a new girlfriend. Depressed, she calls Brooks, who offers to show her around town. He is strange, but he’s clearly rich and connected and seems interested in helping her.

Time passes, and Gemma does more auditions. At night, she learns more about Somnium and reads all the brochures. She learns from Noah and Olivia about “Cloud 9” an emergency procedure where mental patients get programmed to straighten out their lives in just a few short hours. “No one comes back the same.” Olivia thinks the process is terrible, but Noah says it’s better than the alternative.

Gemma runs into Noah working late one night; he’s doing something sketchy. Brooks invites her to a party Friday night, but she can’t get off work. As she starts to mess with the security footage logs to cover her sneaking out, she sees what Noah’s been up to late at night. She then sneaks off to party with Brooks and his friends. She meets Dakota, another actress, and she’s not having any luck getting parts. Max, a huge star, talks to Gemma about Somnium; she’s a former customer, and it made her successful.

Gemma finds that she’s being evicted. She also gets caught sneaking out of Somnium. At night, sometimes she sees monsters in her apartment. Brooks comes by, and he’s worried about her. He implies that he’s disappointed with her and tries giving her advice. We get more flashbacks to her time with Hunter as she gets more and more depressed. She finds a shadowy man in her apartment who injects her with something.

We get glimpses of Noah at Somnium, working on Gemma. “You figured it out a lot faster than the last dream sitter.” He’s put her in the Cloud 9 program, and she’s being re-programmed. She sees herself inside the Somnium facility, chased by a monster. Suddenly, she’s a guest on “The Latest Show,” being interviewed as a big star. Even in her dream, the interview goes badly. She talks to dream-Hunter, and he’s mean. Eventually, she confronts the monster again, face to face, and it vanishes.

Gemma wakes up in Somnium and gets off the table. Dr. Shaffer, Olivia, and Noah are out there. Gemma tells them to look at Noah’s hard drive for evidence. She then goes home, pays her bills, and cleans up her apartment. She hears on the news that Noah has been arrested for multiple occasions of kidnapping and assault. She gets a call from a director, and she’s been cast in the first film she auditioned for.

Everything is fine now. Isn’t it?

Brian’s Commentary

There’s a lot of weirdness going on, and we never really know what’s real and what isn’t for the first hour. We get the feeling that Gemma might be crazy, might be in a simulation, or might be a patient of Somnium– we don’t know, but something is very off about her.

The last segment, inside the dream, isn’t as exciting as it should have been and actually drags a little. The ending is good, though, as we still don’t know exactly what happened. Is what we saw real? Is anything real?

I liked it quite a bit, although I’m sure I didn’t understand the ending entirely.

Kevin’s Commentary

Early on, I was wondering if Gemma was already a Somnium client right from the beginning, there were some hints of strangeness. When we do see her put into the dream state, that seemed more predictable because we knew none of that was really real. It does leave things unanswered about what really happened and when, but I thought it was well made and entertaining. I liked it quite a bit.

2025 Dirty Boy

* Directed by: Doug Rao

* Written by: Doug Rao

* Stars: Stan Steinbichler, Susie Porter, Graham McTavish

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 38 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

Isaac has mental problems and is part of a small cult in a beautiful, isolated area. There’s just enough story to keep pulling us along as we try to figure out what’s really going on with these folks. It’s a simple life that makes us wonder if we might be in the past, but we also see some strange technologies that might mean it’s the future. It’s slow moving but fascinating, and we thought it was great.

Spoilery Synopsis

A very religious man wakes up with a nightmare; he’s got crosses hanging all over his walls. He’s not sure if he took his pills today. He’s Isaac, and he hears voices in his head. A woman in a mask knocks on the door; she says he’s been in that room for a week, and it’s his third lock-up this year. She wants him to break out and escape. Everyone in the house wears weird animal masks. Yes, it’s some kind of cult, and Isaac watches a human sacrifice in one of the rooms. Suddenly, the alarm goes off and he runs back to his room. He then argues with Frankie, one of the voices inside him. Credits roll.

In the daytime, there’s a procession out of the big house as the women all sing. Old man Walter watches as Verity welcomes Isaac back into the fold. She talks about how the people outside are all filthy with liberalism and Satanism. He tells her that he’s clean now.

There’s a tense dinner afterward, and it’s clear that everyone knows about Isaac’s issues. When Hope stands up for Isaac, Walter makes her drink most of a bottle of apple cider vinegar. Isaac goes back to his room and mashes up all his pills. He hides the powder and then pretends to have overdosed.

Isaac talks to Dr. Cronin about the Foundation, but she explains how great the Wentworths are. There’s history between Isaac, Frankie, and his old girlfriend, Sarah, who isn’t around anymore. Cronin’s not a particularly nice doctor, and it’s clear that she works for “The Flock.” Isaac escapes from her and runs off.

Isaac comes to a house in the woods and goes inside. A woman shows up and acts as if she’s been expecting him. She takes him to another woman, whose hands are tied. She tells him to “Breed me.”

Meanwhile, a boat arrives outside with Wentworth and others. They get there in time to see Isaac running back into the woods; Wentworth lets him go. One of the other young men ends up doing the breeding.

Frankie/Isaac starts following young girls around the trails. He’s been in trouble for this before. He’s interrupted by two men of the cult wearing antlers. They take him back to the Wentworths, where Verity gives him a harsh baptism. He’s clean again now.

The four girls at the Foundation talk to Isaac about his pills and lifestyle. Grace is put in charge of Isaac’s medications. Hope is on his side, but she’s in the minority. She also helps him out with his sexual needs. Are they really family? Isaac wants to know. As soon as she leaves, he pukes up the pills. Hope slides a key under Isaac’s door and he escapes again.

Everyone is gone out, so Isaac searches the house. He records everything he sees with his handheld device. He finds birth records, but he has no father or mother listed. As he works with Walter’s devices, Walter gets a notification about it. We learn what happened to Sarah: she killed herself due to Isaac’s lies about her.

Walter punishes Hope for helping Isaac. In the morning, Isaac seems like he’s all on-board with the cult now. Turns out, he’s used his medication to drug the Wentworth’s juices and starts interrogating them about the foreign women that Walter’s been “importing.” He’s already uploaded his evidence to the Internet.

The other three young men ride up on horses, and they’ve brought some new kidnapped children with them. He runs to the house in the woods, where the foreign women have been killed. The radio talks about the news of the Wentworth’s crimes; they’ve blamed it all on their mentally ill adopted son, Isaac. He finds evidence of who his parents were and how he got here.

Back at the Wentworth house, the girls are taking care of the new babies when Isaac returns. He goes outside looking for the others and finds them all out in the woods getting ready to sacrifice more women. Isaac’s got a sword, but Walter gives him a dagger to kill Hope and the foreign women. Isaac then kills all the men with the sword; his doctor as well. He then gives the foreign woman her passport back, and she leaves. He then kisses Hope, who is probably his half-sister.

Isaac and Hope go inside with the girls and babies as sirens approach from the town. Isaac tells a joke.

Later, we see Isaac in an asylum. He’s both a murderer and a hero for exposing the cult. They tell more jokes. Isaac still talks to Frankie.

Brian’s Commentary

This is one of those films where you know there’s more going on than what we’re being shown, but we don’t know what that might be. Isaac is clearly schizophrenic, and everyone knows that. How much of the weird cult stuff is real, though? What’s with the odd technology we see every once in a while?

The cinematography is really good; this is a nice-looking film, with great scenery and sets. It’s also very slow and low on action, but it’s tense and weird, and the story is just confusing enough that you want to know what’s going on while being straightforward enough that you can follow it.

It’s slow moving, some may find it dull, but I was engrossed throughout. Very nice!

Kevin’s Commentary

I thought it was great how we never know quite how much is in Isaac’s head and how much is real. Plus, is it in the past or the future? The acting is good, it’s beautifully filmed, the script is good. I really liked it.

2025 Site

* Directed by: Jason Eric Perlman

* Written by: Jason Eric Perlman

* Stars: Jake McLaughlin, Theo Rossi, Arielle Kebbel

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 50 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This movie is heavy on science fiction and big ideas with an ambitious story. Unfortunately, it’s too long and stretched out. There is a payoff at the end, with everything pretty much explained. It took too much time to get there. It’s well put together, but we give it a rating in the middle at best.

Spoilery Synopsis

We are told about Japan invading China in 1931 all the way to the Russian border. We open on a Chinese family in the countryside as bombs start falling. The Japanese are invading, and they– we get a flash of people from the future, scientists, and they’re watching all this on their time-travel blue glow machine. Credits roll.

Neil comes home to ex-wife Elena and son Wiley. Neil works with Garrison doing inspections of old properties. Today, they are checking out a big abandoned government site. This isn’t a factory or office building, they see that it’s an old research facility– as they turn the power back on. Something must have happened since the place looks like it was abandoned in a hurry.

They walk through the place and come to something weird. All their electronics and the flashlight go dead. But rather than back away and turn the power back off, they persist. As Neil approaches the glowing blue thing, he hears voices and sees some strange things. Garrison says he’s been waiting for him to come out for 45 minutes; Neil and his watch have lost some time.

Later, Neil takes Wiley out to ride his motorcycle and has an accident while hallucinating Chinese prisoners. Wiley’s eyes have been damaged in the crash, and he needs a transplant that they can’t afford.

Neil tells Garrison about the accident, and Garrison explains that their insurance isn’t good. Later, he talks to Wiley and hallucinates the torture of Chinese people and children. He tries to talk to Elena about it, but she’s too busy hating him to listen.

Andrew and Naomi come over for a visit; she’s been dealing with trouble at work. Garrison comes over, and it’s a party. Neil has another weird hallucination and beats up Garrison. Neil takes Andrew and Naomi to the weird factory where the visions began. Naomi looks into the “thing” and sees puppets and burning Chinese people.

That night, at home, a strange man in a mask comes to see him; he knows what Neil’s been seeing. He talks to Garrison about the particle collider at the site, and Garrison takes everything the wrong way. Neil continues seeing and hearing things that aren’t there, and everyone starts thinking he’s losing his mind. Except… we see that Naomi is having visions as well.

Naomi comes to talk to Neil about the particle collider. Andrew follows her, thinking she’s cheating on him. The two start researching Chinese war criminals and prison camps. She talks about generational trauma and racially profiled reincarnation.

Elena questions Garrison about the past weekend with Neil. He is also having hallucinations now. Neil and Naomi go to see her father to research the name of a scientist whose ID card they found in the factory. He finds some records of a project INDRA, but it’s all classified. They get the name of one scientist who was dishonorably discharged and head to talk to him.

Garrison meets with the buyers and sellers of the site, and he says it’s all good and safe to purchase.

Neil goes to the scientist’s house, and he takes a metal pipe as a weapon (why?). He sneaks in the back window and finds a crazy wall, complete with string maze and a drawing of himself. Nanda, the scientist, comes home and Tases Neil before Naomi pepper sprays Nanda, but they all are quickly fine. INDRA stands for Intradimensional something or other and uses quantum entanglement to connect points in time and space.

Nanda touches Neil, and he gets a full flashback of the scientific stuff at INDRA. Tobin, the chief scientist, turns the machine up to eleven, and sees the past. They overloaded the collider and made multiverse stuff happen because quantum things and human souls are being recycled throughout time backward and forward. Somehow, Tobin and Neil are the same person, even though Neil wasn’t even born yet back then.

Garrison and Elena talk about her options. Neil and Naomi flashback to watch the Chinese family die. “We were there. A part of us was there.” All the characters we’ve seen are reincarnationally connected to the Chinese prison incidents.

Neil gets his eyes tested to see about donating his corneas to Wiley if they are a match. The doctor says it’s illegal and immoral for a living person to donate. They find Garrison at Elena’s place; he’s gonna be the new “daddy” of the family. As they fight, we get more prisoner flashbacks. Naomi drives off with Elena and explains things. They go to see Nanda who tells us all that the time travel project used the Chinese prison as a target since none of those people survived; there was no harm in messing with those people because it wouldn’t change history.

Neil steals some files and ruins Garrison’s business deal. He calls Garrison and tells him to meet at the site. Everyone else soon arrives outside as well. Nanda and Elena work the controls to end the project while everyone else stands in front of the blue glowing device and hallucinates as they dial the machine up to eleven again.

History changes. In 1978, they didn't do the experiment at full power. In 1931, the Chinese family escaped the prison.

When things are settled, we see an old Chinese man in the present, the little boy from the camp all grown up; his family was the only one to escape that camp. Naomi is there to interview him, with her daughter who didn’t exist in the original timeline. Also, we see Wiley thriving with undamaged eyes.

Brian’s Commentary

This is one of those films where Neil has done a bunch of horrible things and made his family suffer for years before the film starts, and we see nothing but his wife being hateful and mean to him, like he’s completely innocent, because we don’t see him doing anything wrong. He’s not a sympathetic character, but he’s portrayed like one. He just goes on and on with all the bad things he’s done in the past, and since we see none of it, we just don’t care. All the characters are essentially bad people.

In the middle of all the family drama, there’s some time travel shenanigans that don’t make any sense for a very long time. I spent quite a bit of time browsing my phone during the movie and didn’t miss a thing. This could have been 45 minutes shorter with no loss of story at all.

There might be a good sci-fi idea in here somewhere, but it’s just way too dull and stretched out to recommend. A lot of it doesn’t make much sense, and it can’t all be blamed on quantum gobbledegook.

This was pretty awful.

Kevin’s Commentary

When I take a bathroom break and tell Brian he doesn’t have to pause, that’s not a good sign. It’s an intriguing idea, and it’s not actually bad, there are many positives. It’s well made and decently acted. It’s just too long and stretched out as they piece together the mystery of what’s happening and why. It does make a sort of sense in the end, but it’s kind of a grueling journey to get there.

2023 The Jester

* Directed by: Colin Krawchuk

* Written by: Colin Krawchuk

* Stars: Michael Sheffield, Lelia Symington, Dalaney White

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 30 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

A powerful and evil Jester shows up to terrorize folks for Halloween, seeming to fixate on one dad and his two adult daughters. The Jester looks and pantomimes well, the effects are excellent, and there were some interesting scenes. Kevin thought it was a solid piece of work, Brian was less pleased. But we both agree it could have used more origin story and explanation.

Spoilery Synopsis

John walks home alone late at night, and a man in a colorful suit and top hat follows him suspiciously closely. He gets glimpses of a strange little girl as he walks; is she real? He’s not sure since it’s his daughter, Emma. He calls her and is surprised that she picks up the phone. She’s not buying his apology. When she hangs up on him, the Jester shows up and kills him. As the Jester walks away, credits roll.

Later, at John’s funeral, Emma is there, which surprises Jocelyn and her friends. Afterward, she sees the Jester dancing by the grave. He sticks around to harass the gravediggers before killing them both.

Emma goes to talk to Jocelyn, her estranged half sister, that evening, but Emma doesn’t say anything about talking to her father right before his death. She runs into the Jester on the street after, and she’s creeped out.

Jocelyn has some friends over, it’s Halloween night, and there are creepy kids all over the streets. There’s a big Halloween party tonight, and they all plan on going. There’s a lot of talking about… stuff that isn’t important to anyone.

Emma recognizes the Jester from the cemetery, but he doesn’t speak. He kills himself in front of her, but then he gets right back up again.

Jocelyn and her friends go to the Halloween Festival, and it’s all pretty elaborate. She’s maybe not ready for all this and freaks out.

Emma calls the police about the Jester’s “suicide,” but they assume she’s drunk. The Jester shows up to prove her right, and the cops don’t appreciate it. Things go badly from there.

At the festival, Jocelyn runs into her dead father as The Jester takes her friend’s teeth and eyes.

The Jester comes to Emma and, through her mother’s voice, tells her everything. She runs into dead-John then, and they finally talk. He blames her for his own death and then puts the noose around her neck– then suddenly, she’s in the cemetery. She confronts the younger version of Jocelyn, and they argue about Emma’s parentage. Emma stabs Jocelyn–

And suddenly, they’re back in the real world, and Jocelyn’s been stabbed.

Time passes, and Emma goes to see John’s grave. She refuses the blame for his death, and suddenly, the Jester is there following her again. Emma meets Jocelyn later, and they’re both happy now.

Brian’s Commentary

The Jester is cool-looking, like a cross between Art the Clown and the guy from “The Black Phone” (2021).

Other than his stylish looks, the film is very slow-paced, maybe a little too slow paced. The acting is not bad, but no one really stands out. The story is confusing; at the very least, they could have told us why this was all happening. It was just random carnage, or so it would appear. Why???

Kevin’s Commentary

Overall, I’m going to say I enjoyed this. I thought it was well put together, the Jester was cool, the effects and cinematography were excellent. But the lack of explanation is a real sore spot. The Jester was referred to as a sickness that dad had and passed on to his daughter? So that manifested as a magical killing entity? But it wasn’t revenge or anything, he was killing innocent people that didn’t do anything wrong. Perhaps the sequel will shed some light on that.

2013 Curse of Chucky

* Directed by: Don Mancini

* Written by: Don Mancini

* Stars: Fiona Dourif, Brad Dourif, Jennifer Tilly

* Run Time: 1 Hour, 37 Minutes

* Trailer:

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

This one is more serious, tamping down the humor and upping the horror. Chucky is working solo on a project of his own, and we eventually find out why. Of course there are some collateral deaths along the way. All is explained, it entertains, and of course leaves it open for the next sequel.

Spoilery Synopsis

A delivery driver brings a box for Sarah, and Nica answers the door. Nica’s in a wheelchair, and the driver remembers her from school. They flirt, but Sarah interrupts and is clearly overprotective. Sarah opens the box and inside is a Chucky doll. He promptly winds up in the trash can. Late that night, Nica finds her mother bleeding out on the floor. Credits roll.

Some time later, Nica tells her sister, Barb, that her mother was on her meds and happy; she shouldn’t have killed herself. Father Frank is there as well because Barb is religious, but Nica’s very much not. Ian, Jill, and Alice are there as well; they’re Barb’s family and nanny. Alice immediately has to go to the bathroom, and we see that Chucky’s already in there.

Barb wants to sell the house and put Nica in an assisted living place. Her family needs the money, but Nica wants to stay in the big house. Nica makes everyone dinner, but when she’s out of the room, Chucky puts rat poison in one of the bowls. They all dig in, and we all wonder who’s got the special plate. Ian and the nanny, Jill, are flirting with each other as Father Frank starts to turn green and sweaty. He politely excuses himself and leaves. We soon see that he doesn’t get very far before getting in a very fatal traffic accident.

The family watches old movies of when the girls were young. They all see a creepy guy with long hair in the film. He must have been one of their neighbors.

The Chucky doll goes missing, and Barb sends Jill to go find it. Barb catches up to her, and it soon becomes clear that she’s the one cheating with the nanny. They talk about Nica’s bad heart. Meanwhile Chucky tells Alice all kinds of things about life and death.

Nica senses something off about the doll and does some research. She uncovers all the events of the previous films, including the death of Charles Lee Ray. As she reads about the famous serial killer, Chucky electrocutes Jill. Meanwhile, Ian tells Barb that he knows about her cheating with the Nanny. And he’s going to have proof from the nanny cam he put in Chucky.

Barb and Nica argue about the doll, both knowing different things about it. Barb goes looking for Alice up in the attic and peels off the repairs that Chucky made to cover his old scars. He then shows her what he thinks of her eyes.

Chucky comes after Nica, and she crawls away from him. She wakes up Ian, who finds the bodies. He thinks she killed them, but then she has a heart spell and passes out. She wakes up tied to her chair; he wants to know what she did to Alice.

He plays back the footage from the camera he put inside Chucky to spy on Barb and Jill. The footage shows everything that happened from Chucky’s point of view. Chucky comes up behind them and kills Ian, but Nica manages to decapitate Chucky with an ax.

Chucky regains his head and pushes Nica, wheelchair and all, over the railing two or three flights up. She’s not dead, and she explains that she knows who he really is. He comes clean, that he was an old friend of the family; that was him in the old movies. When Nica’s father died, he kidnapped Sarah and tormented her. He caused Nica’s paralysis. We get a flashback of all this, and also of Charles Lee Ray’s death and Chucky’s creation.

Chucky brags about the families he killed, but Nica knows he never killed Andy Barclay. She taunts him about his completion anxiety. They fight some more, and she stabs him in the back.

Meanwhile, the police have been investigating Father Frank’s death, and they come to the door to investigate. They hear Nica screaming inside and find… everything, including Nica holding a knife.

Chucky watches as Nica is committed to an asylum for the criminally insane. Chucky is used as evidence and then is stolen by a police officer who absconds with the doll after the trial. Out of nowhere, Jennifer Tilly (or is that Tiffany?) pops up in the back seat and kills the cop, re-releasing Chucky.

We cut to Tiffany at the shipping place; she mails the package to Alice’s grandmother. Alice is pleased to see Chucky. “Where is Grandma?” He wants to play “Hide the soul” with Alice. This time, no one interrupts him…

After the credits, six months later, Andy Barclay gets a package in the mail. Except Andy’s ready for him…

Brian’s Commentary

Nica’s lived in this house for years, why does she constantly seem surprised that she has no cell reception there?

Chucky’s got a bit of a makeover since his previous appearance, losing the scars, at least in the beginning. He’s much more digital here, less with the practical effects, and although it’s different, it’s not necessarily a change for the better. This one also drops most of the humor and jokiness of the previous few films and returns to the full-on horror genre.

It’s good!