Category Archives: Long Reviews (>400 Words)

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

Ouija: Origin of Evil (2016) Movie Review

A recent early review of Ouija: Origin of Evil—the unasked for sequel to 2014’s Ouija—by the A.V. Club is entitled “Ouija: Origin of Evil is much better than it needs to be.” Indeed, critic Katie Rife describes director Mike Flanagan’s (Oculus, Hush) film as “more thoughtful and more meticulously crafted than it needs to be.”

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The remainder of the review is more conventional, about what one would expect from a horror movie review. What is most troubling about this review is Continue reading Ouija: Origin of Evil (2016) Movie Review →

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

Mascots (2016) Movie Review

Christopher Guest has made a career out of droll, talking-head mockumentary films that satirize naive, self-centered hopefuls in one career or another. While the formula has certainly worked for Guest in the past, there is a precipitous threshold over which the deadpan ensemble piece becomes reductive.

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Mascots is Best in Show with people in costumes. The ensemble of eccentric sports mascots travel to the annual mascot competition to compete for the Golden Fluffy award. Many of Guest’s go-to players return: Continue reading Mascots (2016) Movie Review →

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

Shin Godzilla (2016) Movie Review

Off the coast of Japan, a massive “anomalous” underwater volcano causes damage to the underground tunnel system and arouses the attention of the Prime Minister and his cabinet. But is it really a volcano…

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Of course, it is really the most famous of all kaiju: Godzilla. Shin Godzilla (or Godzilla Resurgence as it is being dubbed in the West) is the first Continue reading Shin Godzilla (2016) Movie Review →

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

Contracted (2013) Movie Review

STDs are inherently scary. But there are STDs, and then there are…stranger STDs. Sam (Najarra Townsend) attends the party of an old friend, reluctantly drinking as she waits for her girlfriend Nikki (Katie Stegeman) to arrive. When she doesn’t, she is instead coaxed into the car of a creepy, standoffish man. From the next morning forward, nothing is quite the same for Sam.

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Contracted takes an interesting perspective on sexuality in light of Continue reading Contracted (2013) Movie Review →

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

Krampus (2015) Movie Review

It’s Christmas in October at CineFiles, as we watch last year’s Krampus, a film about the eponymous antithesis of Santa Claus, a half-goat, half-demon who punishes naughty children during the holiday season.

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In Krampus, we meet a strained nuclear family: the workaholic father who Continue reading Krampus (2015) Movie Review →

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

The Flop House Trilogy: Castle Freak (1995) Movie Review

Caution: minor plot spoilers (for this 20 year old movie) below.

It is October once again, and that means it is time for some Halloween Horror. In this iteration, we discuss one of three B-movie horror films that are oft-recommended on The Flop House podcast by Stuart Wellington. Castle Freak may not actually feature a man who rips his own ding-dong off (spoilers?), but that does not mean it isn’t a B-movie classic by B-movie master Stuart Gordon.

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Writer-director Stuart Gordon is perhaps most well known as the director of the B-movie classic Re-Animator, his first feature film, or From Beyond. But Gordon also made a little direct-to-video movie entitled Continue reading The Flop House Trilogy: Castle Freak (1995) Movie Review →

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

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (2016) Movie Review

The preamble to Tim Burton’s latest, a fantasy novel adaptation, introduces a multi-faceted allegorical fable that mixes grief, childhood imagination, and Holocaust fears into a hideaway fantasy realm. Miss Peregrine’s (Eva Green) children’s home remains perpetually in September 3, 1943, the day when a German air raid bombed the building out.

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Jake (Asa Butterfield), a lonely boy in his own right, travels to find the home (in 2016) following the death of his grandfather (Terence Stamp), a former resident of the home. Through way of the cavernous entrance into a Continue reading Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (2016) Movie Review →

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

Goat (2016) Movie Review

Brad (Ben Schnetzer) is a college-student-to-be. His brother Brett (Nick Jonas) already attends the college he is accepted to, and Brett is a member of an elite fraternity on campus as well. Brad, still recovering from a brutal physical assault, is convinced to join the frat, where his ethical patience is severely tested.

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Goat has an introduction that is evocative of other movies of its ilk. The “wild life” is in full effect, portrayals of Continue reading Goat (2016) Movie Review →

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

The Magnificent Seven (2016) Movie Review

Antoine Fuqua’s reboot of the seminal 1960 Western The Magnificent Seven (itself a Westernization of the 1954 Akira Kurosawa film The Seven Samurai) has a distinctly modern feel to it. Bandits have been replaced by violent capitalists. The fear of the outsider has been replaced by the fear of the wealthy. Of course, there is the fear-of-the-other narrative that introduces Denzel Washington’s Chisolm that screams modern relevancy. It is, however, a commentary only hinted at.

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What we get in lieu of commentary is Continue reading The Magnificent Seven (2016) Movie Review →

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

Blair Witch (2016) Movie Review

Blair Witch chronicles the “documentary footage” of a college student and his friends as they search through the mythic Black Hills Forest for his sister Heather Donahue, who disappeared in the woods years earlier.

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From the onset, Blair Witch follows the beats of its predecessor, the surprise 1999 hit The Blair Witch Project, as if the studio and creative team believed that the audience this film is marketed toward has never seen the original film. This, or they Continue reading Blair Witch (2016) Movie Review →