Category Archives: Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Action/Thriller, All Movie Reviews, Comedy, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Suburbicon (2017) Movie Review

There is a moment in Suburbicon when you realize that the closest comparison to other Coen brother films is Blood Simple, in that it is bleak with few characters to latch onto and identify with. It is at this moment, when you realize that this is not so much a dark comedy as it is merely a dark movie, that it becomes very hard to continue investing yourself in the antics.

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The film focuses on a family man named Gardner Lodge (Matt Damon) and his son, who are victim to a home invasion in the faux-idyllic, nebulous ’50s neighborhood aptly-named Suburbicon. You don’t know Continue reading Suburbicon (2017) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Halloween Horror, Horror, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Jigsaw (2017) Movie Review

Where to begin with Jigsaw, the sort of sequel, maybe soft reboot of the Saw franchise that comes seven years after the last Saw film and narratively taking place 10 years after John Kramer’s death?

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How about start with the first thing we hear. It is a revamp of Charlie Clouser’s Saw theme song: “Hello Zepp.” The song, here in Jigsaw, sounds less Continue reading Jigsaw (2017) Movie Review →

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

Creep 2 (2017) Movie Review

Creep 2 is the Patrick Brice-directed follow up to 2014’s Creep, the mumblegore sensation starring Brice and Mark Duplass. In that film, written by the two but perhaps mostly just ad-libbed on the day by them, Duplass plays Josef, a man who hires a cameraman to make a film for Josef’s unborn son.

Of course, there is much more to it than that.

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In Creep 2, Duplass is back, and his deranged character goes by Aaron this time around. Aaron hires Sara (Desiree Akhavan), the host and one-woman crew of the webseries “Encounters.” With her Youtube series utterly failing, she is willing to Continue reading Creep 2 (2017) Movie Review →

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

Loveless (2017) Movie Review

Loveless, Russian director Andrey Zvyagintsev’s follow up to the Oscar-nominated Leviathan, truly lives up to its name. Bleak in both style and tone, the epic drama follows the disappearance of a young boy (Matvey Novikov) and the effect it has on his mother Zhenya (Maryana Spivak), his father Boris (Aleksey Rozin), and their respective lovers.

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The film implicates its audience in its social commentary—the gratuity of the film’s elongated final shot makes that pretty clear. But it is Zvyagintsev’s sense of Continue reading Loveless (2017) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Halloween Horror, Horror, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Cult of Chucky (2017) Movie Review

After being terrorized over and over by Chucky (Brad Dourif), the serial killer trapped in a child’s doll, Andy Barclay (Alex Vincent) seemingly has things under control, given he keeps the head of the doll behind lock and key with a blowtorch ready to melt him out of existence.

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Meanwhile, Nica Pierce (Fiona Dourif) is held in a medium-security psychiatric facility after being Continue reading Cult of Chucky (2017) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Halloween Horror, Horror, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Saw 3D: The Final Chapter (2010) Movie Review

This review of Saw: The Final Chapter is part of the Saw Franchise Retrospective series in anticipation of this month’s release of Jigsaw.

If nothing else, the Saw franchise is consistent in its formula. A Saw film generally has two plotlines that are crosscut until a final reveal that either brings them together or brings them both to a “surprising” end.

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Saw: The Final Chapter is a different beast. Continue reading Saw 3D: The Final Chapter (2010) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Halloween Horror, Horror, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Amityville: The Awakening (2017) Movie Review

40 years after a brutal murder took place at a house in Amityville, New York, a family moves in. The mother (Jennifer Jason Leigh) wants things to be normal for her two daughters (Bella Thorne and Mckenna Grace) in spite of the medical condition of her son (Cameron Monaghan).

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Given this condition, it makes little sense that he would be in a house and not a hospital, but we can let it slide. It is the reason why the family moves to the house in the first place, and it is an excuse for Continue reading Amityville: The Awakening (2017) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Drama, Indie Films, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Anatomy of Hell (2004) Movie Review

This review of Catherine Breillat’s Anatomy of Hell is part of the New French Extremity Retrospective series.

In Anatomy of Hell, a woman (Amira Casar) pays a homosexual man (Rocco Siffredi) to watch her in her bedroom. This is after she saunters through a gay bar, committing herself to the tragic isolation of none of them wanting anything to do with her, and slits her wrist in the bathroom.

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The things she has him experience in her room are sexual, to a degree. They are pornographic only insofar as they extend to Continue reading Anatomy of Hell (2004) Movie Review →

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

Brawl in Cell Block 99 (2017) Movie Review

With a title like Brawl in Cell Block 99, one might think that S. Craig Zahler’s second directorial effort is an exploitation film filled with B-movie action. There are elements in the script and set pieces that signal toward grindhouse action, sure, but Brawl in Cell Block 99 is more than just a B-movie. It is a clever, exploitation action pastiche.

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Following Zahler’s first film, Bone Tomahawk, which seamlessly blended genres without sacrificing the artistic beauty or history of those genres, it is no surprise that Continue reading Brawl in Cell Block 99 (2017) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Halloween Horror, Horror, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Saw VI (2009) Movie Review

This review of Saw VI is part of the Saw Franchise Retrospective series in anticipation of this month’s release of Jigsaw.

It was only a matter of time before Saw went socially conscious, and it does it in the only way it knows how: by pitting a smarmy insurance company suit (Peter Outerbridge) in a warehouse full of amusement park death traps.

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Before this, however, we get the signature cold open trap, which is as silly and ridiculous as you would think. One thing to note about this scene that makes it more than merely a lazy and audience-baiting torture introduction is Continue reading Saw VI (2009) Movie Review →