Category Archives: Like It

Movies I liked but likely won’t watch again. Something was off that I wish had been done differently.

All Movie Reviews, Drama, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words), Romance

No Rest for the Wicked — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review

No Rest for the Wicked is screening as part of the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival.

The headline of Kalle Skovsbol’s No Rest for the Wicked may as well be: beautiful men drenched in fog. I would not have thought that to be a strong enough attribute to carry a feature-length film, but I probably would have been happy watching nothing but haunting shots of men walking through dense fog. When it is shot this expertly, why not?

Of course, Skovsbol and screenwriter Rasmus Birch have much more on their minds than this cool (in terms of color temperature and slang) aesthetic. The slowly simmering Continue reading No Rest for the Wicked — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Animation, Comedy, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Blaise — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review

Blaise is screening as part of the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival.

Blaise opens with the eponymous character, an awkward teen who struggles socially, in a meeting between his parents and the school counselor. His mother asks if he is having troubles connecting due to being gifted, to which the counselor resolutely answers, “No.” This is Blaise (Timeo), a remarkably unremarkable young man with little direction and no desire to mingle with his peers. When forced to attend a party, he wallflowers until a woman named Josephine (Nina Blanc-Francard) inserts herself into his space.

The film follows these characters as they navigate their individual insecurities. Blaise’s father (Jacques Gamblin) is described (by someone he considered a friend) as a moron without a political consciousness. The film’s political consciousness comes with a tone of curt acidity. Class divide is presented as Continue reading Blaise — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Comedy, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

The Peril at Pincer Point — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review

The Peril at Pincer Point is screening as part of the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival.

The low budget fantasy comedy The Peril at Pincer Point follows a film industry sound engineer named Jim Baitte (Jack Redmayne), who is on the verge of getting sacked off the latest project from big shot director P.W. Griffin (Os Leanse). To save his job, he must travel to the remote island of Pincer Point and capture a sound so special that it has never before been recorded in human history. Directed by Noah Stratton-Twine and Jake Kuhn, Pincer Point is an imaginative and idiosyncratic film with a DIY aesthetic and its heart on its sleeve. As such, it is sure to win over the festival audience.

The film has a specific sense of humor, and one’s mileage will vary. There is something intriguing about the long-winding, antagonistic conversations that the protagonist is continually pulled into. These conversations will sometimes drone on for minutes on end, circling around illogically and ending in a place that Continue reading The Peril at Pincer Point — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Documentary, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

The Seoul Guardians — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review

The Seoul Guardians is screening as part of the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival.

The Seoul Guardians follows journalists who, on the ground and in real time, documented the events following the imposition of martial law in South Korea by President Yoon Suk Yeol. The viewer is dropped into the urgency of the situation. Within minutes of the announcement, the journalists are scrambling for cameras and leaving for the National Assembly, where lawmakers are required to go and vote on whether to uphold the President’s action. When the journalists arrive, a protest has already formed outside, and it will only grow as the film continues. It is demonstrated to the viewer, without the need for didactic narration, that the country responded with immediacy to the situation.

What the film does make clear through didactic narration is the illegal nature of Yoon Suk Yeol’s attempted coup. Lawmakers are meant to assemble and vote on the martial law order. Outside of the National Assembly, however, we see armed military and police actively Continue reading The Seoul Guardians — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Drama, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Godhead — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review

Godhead is screening as part of the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival.

On the eighth day, God went away. This is what the priest (Al Warren) tells his son (Luke Speakman), before strapping on a gas mask and leaving their home. “God left us,” the father says, because Man didn’t respect God. This is why the son can’t go outside. It isn’t safe out there. Or so he’s told.

Except for the fact that the father’s gas mask serves no purpose outdoors. The first thing he does when he leaves the house is take the mask off. Later, he puts on a fake air raid siren so his son believes something dangerous is going on outside, where he can’t see.

If this was the only unusual thing about Godhead, that would be enough for a film (a sort-of riff on Dogtooth). But if this unusual thing is true, then…

Enter two siblings (Sarah Coffey and Kimball Farley) to the church. They aren’t there for prayer or for communion. They are there to ask for judgment; the judgment of the priest. The siblings believe that one of them is akin to God. The Holy Spirit, to be precise. To know for sure, they must be judged with a bullet. If the one who is shot is truly the Holy Spirit, they will Continue reading Godhead — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Horror, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words), Sci-Fi/Fantasy

Home Bodies — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review

Home Bodies is screening as part of the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival.

In Home Bodies, directed by Casey Walker from a script by Marcus Sullivan and Adrian Murray, two children live alone in a small, two-story home that simply doesn’t look right. Dark, cavernous hallways have an industrial quality to their architecture. The appliances in the kitchen, or “food room,” as the kids call it, are out-dated, yet they produce hot food instantly. The children watch VHS tapes that re-run episodes of a single, low-budget children’s television show set on a farm. If things don’t read as peculiar by this point, the children speaking to a disembodied voice anthropomorphized in the form of a pulsing white light, a voice they refer to as “Father,” leaves no room for debate. These siblings are being held hostage in some sort of psychological experiment.

On premise, Home Bodies is very Twilight Zone slash Black Mirror adjacent. It has one central, fantastical sci-fi concept that it rides for 95 minutes. The answers to its questions Continue reading Home Bodies — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review →

Action/Thriller, All Movie Reviews, Drama, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Sicko — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review

Sicko is screening as part of the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival.

“New day. New opportunities.”

These words open Sicko. It is something of a tagline for Aitore Zholdaskali’s film, in that what the viewer finds as they step into the world of the two central characters—the married couple Azamat (Ayan Utepbergen) and Tansholpan (Dilnaz Kurmangali)—is a rapidly warping sense of what the word “opportunity” means.

Another keyword here could be “desperation,” as the two characters find themselves in desperate need of money. Aza, a ride-share driver, crashes his car the same day Tancho finds out that she is unexpectedly pregnant. In order to keep the baby, pay off Aza’s debts, and continue affording basic necessities, they need to find cash somewhere. Unfortunately, this comes in the form of a knee-jerk lie that Aza tells to ward off his mother (one of the multiple individuals to whom he owes money). Aza lies to his family about Tancho’s health, claiming she has stage 3 cancer. Tancho goes along with the lie, and the two concoct a social media campaign to raise funds for her (nonexistent) cancer treatment.

Sicko’s is a story that would be diabolical if it weren’t for the characters involved in the creation of the grift. And without spoiling anything, diabolical things ultimately occur. At first, however, Continue reading Sicko — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Comedy, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

After School (Straf) — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review

After School is screening as part of the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival.

“We’re men, but we also have a little boy inside of us … a little baby inside.”

After School is something of a comedy of errors, in which the prime error is leaning into all the wrong ideas about masculinity. It is not a satire, per se, but its characters present as exaggerated versions of what the “manosphere’ produces and invites. Edwin (Rutger de Bekker) is a schoolteacher who has no control over his classroom. This is a metaphor for his life in general. His coworkers mostly step over him. His wife left him for a shaman peddling hallucinatory drugs. His daughter is embarrassed of him. His students have made him an internet lolcow, posting classroom pranks to the point where his viral status causes him to lose a promotion. He is the perfect candidate for a midlife identity crisis.

When alcohol, boxing, and male camaraderie combine, Edwin is inspired to stand up for himself in the classroom. The next time his students prank him Continue reading After School (Straf) — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Comedy, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words), Sci-Fi/Fantasy

You Are the Film — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review

You Are the Film is screening as part of the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival.

Madoka (Marika Ito) is going to see a film. It is not a popular title, and it is playing at a tiny theater attended by no one but herself. But it is a film shot locally, so she decides to give it a try. In the film, Kazuma (Kai Inowaki) is going to see a film. What he sees on that cinema screen is Madoka. Madoka is a playwright for a small theatre troupe, Kazuma is the frontman of a fledgling rock band that’s going nowhere. Their lives not only share similarities, but they are seemingly operating in direct parallel—a parallel they are able to physically see through the apparatus of the cinema screen. They see each other through the screen and can communicate to one another, and both want the other to leave the theater so something interesting can happen in their respective film.

Madoka, upset to hear from the synopsis of the “film” in which she is starring that some of her actors want to drop out of her new production, is the first to leave the auditorium. Kazuma watches as, Continue reading You Are the Film — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Comedy, Drama, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Dance Freak — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review

Dance Freak is screening as part of the 2026 Fantasia International Film Festival.

Obie (Robbie Rackleff) wants to build a birdhouse in his birdhouse-building class. Obie’s girlfriend Dorty (Megan Koester), who’s a popular candidate in the mayoral race, just dumped him. The Salad Boys (Allen Cordell, Adam Enders, Sarah Sherman) recently force-fed Obie a concerning amount of salad. Obie has been told that a man dancing freakily out in the parking lot—a Dance Freak, if you will—has made himself “available” to Obie. Obie is being investigated for murder.

Thus is Dance Freak, the debut feature film from Alan Resnick and Robbie Rackleff. It is a surrealist comedy with horrific undertones, although these descriptors do little to describe the feeling and atmosphere of the film.

Rackleff (who also writes and stars) and Resnick were previously members of the Baltimore-based arts collective known as Wham City. Resnick is perhaps best known for Continue reading Dance Freak — Fantasia Festival 2026 Movie Review →