Margot (Natacha Amal) has come back to Parma to get revenge for being raped when she was younger, working with her former love, Giulio (Kaspar Capparoni) and Judge Bocchi (Robert Hossein). Those men who attacked her are the wealthiest and most powerful people, yet she’s very determined.

This was directed and written by Alberto Bevilacqua and is based on his novel. He also wrote Atom Age Vampire, Black Sabbath, Planet of the Vampires and the Italian version of Witchcraft ’70.

Everyone in Parma is corrupt and a pervert, so when Margot uses her body against them, she can’t help but win. Look out for Brontis Jodorowsky — yes, the son of the great director — as a journalist. Nearly every review of this refers to it as made-for-TV-level giallo or that the only good parts are the softcore moments; Amal is well-considered for what she brought to the table, which is her body.

This is part of when giallo became erotic thrillers; it has a glossy aesthetic common to late-90s European thrillers. If we compare it to the classics of the 70s, as always, it will pale.

You can watch this on YouTube.

Directed by Mino Guerrini, who wrote it with Fernando Di Leo based on “Tempo di massacro” by Franco Enna, this has an American detective, Vince Dreyser (George Ardisson), as its hero. He meets up with an old friend, Walter Dempsey (Hans von Borsody), who soon goes missing. This feels as much Eurospy as giallo, but Guerrini helped script what many consider the first film in the genre, Evil Eye. Bava’s influence is on this movie, thanks to handheld cameras and a long dummy drop that follows the body as it descends into the pavement.

Also known as Agent 3S3 setzt alles auf eine Karte (Agent 3S3 Bets it all on One Card),* Omicidio per appuntamento (Murder by Appointment) and Rendezvous met de dood (Rendezvous with the Dead), this has our hero get another job guarding the daughter of a rich man, Fidelia (Halina Zalewska, An Angel for Satan and the half-sister of Ely Galleani from Emanuelle In Bangkok), who ends up being a lot to deal with. She also has some baffling hairstyles in this, ones that would cause Princess Leia to say, “Really?” I love her.

While not a full giallo, this does have a wild club where everyone dresses up, drinks and races slot cars. Were slot cars a hot night out in Rome in 1966? 

*Ardisson played Walter Ross, Agent 3S3, in two movies: Massacre In the Sun and Passport to Hell.

You can watch this on Tubi.

Mankind has been terraforming Mars, knowing the Earth won’t be livable for long. Yes, pre-Elon Musk, this was a movie. 

When the air levels start to go wrong, Mars-1 is sent to investigate. The team includes Mission Commander Kate Bowman (Carrie-Anne Moss), co-pilot Ted Santen (Benjamin Bratt), science officer Bud Chantilas (Terence Stamp), mechanical systems engineer Robby Gallagher (Val Kilmer), bioengineer Quinn Burchenal (Tom Sizemore) and terraforming expert Chip Pettengill (Simon Baker). 

On the surface, things start to fall apart. As the group runs out of oxygen, Chantilas is critically injured, Petengill pushes Santen off a cliff, and their robot AMEE is damaged and begins to take them out one by one. But as they learn that they can breathe Mars’ air, perhaps they can find something that can save Earth.

While Tom Sizemore and Val Kilmer had been friends, much like the antics on Mars, they soon came to blows. Kilmer was mad that the production had paid for Sizemore’s elliptical machine to be shipped to the set, and he screamed, “I’m making ten million on this. You’re only making two!” Then Sizemore threw a weight at him. Things were so bad that body doubles were used for many of their scenes together. Kilmer reportedly refused to say Sizemore’s character’s name, saying instead, “Hey, you!” Eventually, they fought, and Sizemore would later file a restraining order against Kilmer.

Directed by Antony Hoffman and written by Chuck Pfarrer and Jonathan Lemkin, this film — along with The Saint, The Island of Dr. Moreau and a few others — started the idea that Kilmer was box office poison.

The Arrow 4K UHD release of this film includes extras such as interviews with visual effects supervisor Jeffrey A. Okun and helmet and suit designer Steve Johnson; a brand-new visual retrospective with film critic Heath Holland; deleted scenes; and a trailer. It comes inside a reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Matt Griffin with an illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Mark A. Altman. You can get it from MVD.

The lineage of this story is a rabbit hole of adaptation. While the 1965–1968 CBS series is the primary source, it was essentially a “cover version” of Gold Key Comics’ Space Family Robinson, which itself was a futuristic riff on the 1812 novel The Swiss Family Robinson. By the time director Stephen Hopkins (Predator 2) got his hands on it, the property was ready for a heavy dose of 90s techno-futurism.

By 2058 — and this movie is optimsitic — Earth is too polluted to live on. The United Global Space Force sends Professor John Robinson (William Hurt), wife Maureen (Mimi Rogers) and children Judy (Heather Graham), Penny (Lacey Chabert) and Will (Jack Johnson) on the spaceship Jupiter II with the mission of completing the hypergate launch to Alpha Prime, a planet that humans can live on. Flying them there will be Major Don West (Matt LeBlanc).

Unknown to them, the mutant terrorist group Global Sedition has already killed their original pilot and co-opted their ship’s doctor, Doctor Zachary Smith (Gary Oldman). Before long, they get trapped in a time vortex with future versions of everyone, including a spider version of Smith. Maybe Professor Robinson shouldn’t have ignroed all of Will’s time travel theories.

Original cast members Mark Goddard, June Lockhart, Marta Kristen and Angela Cartwright are welcome visions. And, of course, Dick Tufeld is the voice of the Robot. Bill Mumy (the original Will Robinson) actually had a script for a sequel movie ready to go, but when he was offered a cameo as an older Will, the production felt it would be “too distracting.” Meanwhile, Jonathan Harris gave the ultimate legendary response to a bit-part offer. As he told TV Guide, “I will have you know I have never done a walk-on or bit part in my life! And I do not intend to start. Either I play Doctor Smith or I do not play.”

Despite bad reviews, this was the movie that took Titanic out of the #1 spot.

The Arrow Video release of this film has a 4K restoration of the film from the original camera negative by Arrow Films approved by director Stephen Hopkins, two archival commentaries (director Stephen Hopkins and screenwriter Akiva Goldsman; visual effects supervisors Angus Bickerton and Lauren Ritchie, director of photography Peter Levy, editor Ray Lovejoy and producer Carla Fry); new interviews with Hopkins, Levy, Goldsman, supervising art director Keith Pai, Kenny Wilson, sound mixer Simon Kaye and re-recording mixer Robin O’Donohue; a new video essay by film critic Matt Donato; deleted scenes; archival features; a Q&A with the original cast of the TV series and bloopers. It has a reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Pye Parr and an illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing by critic Neil Sinyard, articles from American Cinematographer and an excerpt from the original production notes. You can get it from MVD.

When several important judges are murdered, Inspector Rogas (Lino Ventura) is put on the case, but what starts as a simple detective story soon becomes a conspiracy thriller.

Based on Leonardo Sciascia’s book, this was directed by Francesco Rosi (The Mattei Affair, The Moment of Truth), who wrote the script along with Tonino Guerra and Lino Jannuzzi.

When three judges are killed — during the Years of Lead, the times of great political unrest in Italy — Rogas is told not to go into the crimes that the men committed and just to solve their murders. This leads to Rogas being demoted after the murders don’t stop and told to work with the political division so that the crimes can be blamed on revolutionary Leftist terrorist groups and not Cres, a man who was set up by the judges and his wife (Maria Carta). 

Or maybe it goes deeper. Even the chief of police is in on the crimes, which leads Rogas to believe that while Cres killed the first three judges, the other murders were ordered to justify the prosecution of the far-left groups. But he’s too deep, and there’s no way he can learn this much and make it out alive.

In case you’re wondering, the title of this film is based on Cadavre Exquis (Exquisite Corpse), the surrealist game invented by André Breton. It’s when players contribute words or images to a collective piece of art without seeing what others have done.

The last line of this, when the reporter asks whether people will ever know the truth, and the answer is “Truth is not always revolutionary,” sparked widespread controversy.

The Radiance release of this film has a 4K restoration of the movie by Cineteca di Bologna at L’Immagine Ritrovata and The Film Foundation, as well as audio commentary by filmmaker Alex Cox, archival interviews with director Francesco Rosi, Francesco Rosi and Lino Ventura, an interview with Gaetana Marrone, author of The Cinema of Francesco Rosi, a trailer and an image gallery. It has a reversible sleeve featuring designs based on original posters, a limited edition booklet featuring new writing on the film by Michael Atkinson, and newly translated writing by and an interview with Rosi. This is a limited edition of 3000 copies, presented in full-height Scanavo packaging with removable OBI strip leaving packaging free of certificates and markings. You can get it from MVD.

Malpertuis was directed by Harry Kümel (Daughters of Darkness) and was based on the Jean Ray novel of the same name. It was released in the U.S. as The Legend of Doom House, which is not as classy a title, but you know me. I like the sleaze.

Jan (Mathieu Carrière) is a sailor who has decided to leave the sea and return to his childhood home. He’s abducted during his search and wakes up in a mansion called Malpertuis and surrounded by relatives like his sister Nancy (Susan Hampshire), a taxidermist named Lampernisse (Jean-Pierre Cassel) and his occultist uncle Cassavius (Orson Welles), who forces everyone to become Greek gods and never leave under penalty of death.

As for Malpertuis, it could fit into an Italian Gothic horror movie, as it’s a maze of secret rooms, long corridors, and cobwebbed staircases.

Kümel worshipped Welles, wrote the part of Cassius for him, and made sure to get him the money he asked for. As nervous as he was to meet his idol, he was greeted by a drunk and angry Welles on set. That said, they got along, even if no one else in the film did with the legendary director. People had a way of not getting along with Welles, like writer Charles Higham, whose book Orson Welles: The Rise and Fall of an American Genius used a photo of this to show the actor’s decline. Never mind that he was made up to look older than he really was, and on his deathbed.

The Radiance Blu-ray of Malpurtis has a new 4K restoration of the film overseen by director Harry Kümel, along with a new interview with the director. There’s also an archival commentary by Harry and assistant director Françoise Levie, an archival making of documentary, a featurette on Welles, an interview with author and gothic horror expert Jonathan Rigby, archival interviews with Susan Hampshire, Michel Bouquet, Harry Kümel, Jean Ray and John Flanders, Kümel revisiting locations from the film, the Cannes cut of the movie, The Warden of the Tomb (Kümel’s early film based on Franz Kafka’s play) and a trailer. It has a reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Time Tomorrow, a limited edition 80-page perfect bound booklet featuring new writing by Lucas Balbo, Maria J. Pérez Cuervo, David Flint, Willow Catelyn Maclay and Jonathan Owen and a limited edition of 3000 copies, presented in rigid box and full-height Scanavo packaging with removable OBI strip leaving packaging free of certificates and markings. You can get it from MVD.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Joseph Perry writes for the film websites Gruesome Magazine, The Scariest Things, Horror Fuel, The Good, the Bad and the Verdict and Diabolique Magazine; for the film magazines Phantom of the Movies’ VideoScope and Drive-In Asylum; and for the pop culture websites When It Was Cool and Uphill Both Ways. He is also one of the hosts of When It Was Cool’s exclusive Uphill Both Ways podcast and can occasionally be heard as a cohost on Gruesome Magazine’s Decades of Horror: The Classic Era podcast.

Official synopsis: From writer/director SkyDirects (Run Nixon), Afraid? follows a group of high school friends whose Halloween weekend getaway spirals into a deadly game of What Are You Afraid Of? — a chilling look at how fear manifests when trust turns to survival. The film stars Kendre Berry, Teairra Mari, and features a cameo by four-time Grammy nominee Mase.

 Director SkyDirects makes a valiant attempt at crafting a throwback-feel slasher movie with mostly Black characters at the forefront with Afraid? (AKA What Are You Afraid Of?), but the result is a film that seems to try to do too much and ends up being unfocused. Its reliance on slasher movie cliches without bringing much new to the table is also a detriment.

The cast members and their performances are the stand-out in terms of positives for the film. They put their all into their roles, although the writing gives them little to work with other than bickering, flirting, or making up with one another before the kills begin. The screenplay is also heavy on cliches, from the red herring seemingly insane local to the rednecks hassling the protagonists to the standard cabin in the woods with no cellphone reception, and beyond. Also, it takes a solid hour before the slasher first strikes.

Plot points are brought up and then dropped; for example, the “What Are You Afraid Of?” game that makes up the alternate title — shown to start the end credits — is only used long enough to set up a scene for one character. Edits are also sometimes head scratchers, including one jump from the characters to seemingly stock footage.

I wish I could offer more positives to offer for Afraid?. I would recommend it for slasher movie completists and aficionados of lower budget indie horror. 

Afraid?, from Cleopatra Entertainment, received a DVD/Digital release on December 16, 2025. For more information, visit https://www.ovid.tv/.