A Blog about movies, music and pop culture.
Dead of Winter is a thriller/horror from “Bonnie and Clyde” director Arthur Penn. It is written by Marc Shmuger and Mark Malone and is a loose remake of the film noir movie “My Name Is Julia Ross“. The movie stars Mary Steenburgen in three roles. Primarily as aspiring actress “Katie McGovern”. Katie has been hired …
“A Dark Song” is an Irish independent horror from writer/director Liam Gavin. This was Gavin’s feature debut having only worked on shorts previously and is his only movie credit. Mike Flanagan (Netflix’ horror series guru) was obviously impressed enough with his work to bring him on board as a director for his second series “The …
“One Dark Night” was the directorial debut of Tom McLoughlin. The director is perhaps most famous for providing one of the best Jason Voorheese movies, “Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives” (1986). The screenplay was put together by McLoughlin and Michael Hawes. The pair had been trying to sell the script for about four …
If you’ve followed my past October Challenges you know I always give a few days over October to checking out some golden age horrors. This year is no exception and I’ve decided to finally check out the American independent film that predated and influenced “Godzilla” (1954). That is “The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms”. Directed by …
Shortly after I was born, the world was introduced to the ultimate devil child. Not me though, this was 1976 and June (November in the UK) of that year saw the release of one of Richard Donners masterpieces of cinema, “The Omen”. A movie that terrified me as a child (Not sure how old I …
Many horror films have been made based on true stories. Usually these are embellished and sometimes end up having very little in common with the true story. In the case of 10 Rillington Place from 1971, an attempt was made to present the story of serial killer John Christie as accurately as possible. The focus …
The big debate about this film is if Hannibal Lecter should ever have had an origin story/prequel movie. The answer in my view is: Probably not. That said, an origin for the character is absolutely consistent with Thomas Harris’ writing style. Every other character in his novels have their motivations and psychology examined closely. Often, …
Over the years there have been many versions of the alien body snatcher idea. The 1951 Robert Heinlein novel “The Puppet Masters”, may well be the earliest entry in this sub-genre. However the movie adaptation comes very late to the party following in the footsteps of three versions of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” (1953, …
Is there any director more all over the place in quality than M. Night Shyamalan? Most of his movies are divisive with the audience, rejected by most but loved by a solid number. Some of his movies are universally panned and some are universally loved. It could be argued that he is doing exactly what …
Legacy Sequels are a difficult nut to crack. The success rate is under 50%, however when the director and most of the cast returns the odds increase significantly. Today I’m reviewing legacy sequel “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice”. Let’s see if this will wind up a winner or a loser!