Tag Archives: 2020

SALEM HORROR FEST: Origin Unknown (Sin Origen) (2020)

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Pedro del Toro, a family man and drug trafficking ally, is ready to get out of the crime life. But is the crime life ever ready to be done with you? As Alan, one of his henchmen, asks him to make one last deal to protect themselves from a rival family, a young girl shows up out of nowhere, just as a small team of Romanian killers known as the Arcana decimate every one of Pedro’s guards.

Lina explains to the survivors that the Arcana are after her because she’s a vampire a part of the Cuervo clan. But while Pedro wants to give in, Alan is going after the Dreadnok-looking army of killing machines.

 

This movie has quite the cocktail: young vampire vs. warrior caste of Romania bloodsuckers + Mexican mov drama + home invasion thriller. Shake it all up, throw some cool fight scenes, an arrow through the mouth and glowing vampires into the mix and you have a pretty full drink.

Director Rigoberto Castañeda and writer Michael Caissie have combined nearly every movie on their DVD shelves — a little John Carpenter stuck in a fortified place against the odds here, some of The Raid martial arts there, some post-apocalyptic movie looking villains here — and plenty of little hints as their source material, naming the family del Toro and the young girl Lina after Let the Right One In.

I had a blast with this, as its really intriguing to see vampires not be slow moving creatures of the night but instead ninja-like fighting machines. Making cocktails of disparate ingredients is always challenging; here’s to a film that pulls it off.

I saw Origin Unknown as part of Salem Horror Fest, where you can watch several shorts and features with their virtual pass now until the end of October. You can learn more about this film on the official web page.

SALEM HORROR FEST: Parallel Minds (2020)

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On the verge of the release of Red Eye 2, a contact lens that can record data and resurface the buried memories of its wearer, a researcher named Margo finds the lead programmer has been murdered. That leads her to Thomas, a detective who has his own past to deal with, all to find out exactly what’s going on.

In his second full-length film, Benjamin Ross Hayden is really trying to tie so many things into one movie: a software company that has all the worst parts of the social media companies that we deal with every day; a detective with an abusive past and a stalker following him; a cool punk hacker named Jade; the monster that looks way cool on the poster.

This really reminded me of a 1990s cyberpunk movie — and I love those movies like three-legged dogs, so you may not — but even I have limits as to how much narrative incoherence I can deal with. This movie looks gorgeous, however, all cool blues and future gleam. And I think there’s a great movie inside here. It just needs to not have so many layers.

I saw Parallel Minds as part of Salem Horror Fest, where you can watch several shorts and features with their virtual pass now until the end of October. This movie is also on Tubi.

2021 Scarecrow Psychotronic Challenge Day 27: Nobody Sleeps in the Woods Tonight (2020)

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27. ARTIFICIAL LIMBS: Robot arms, wooden legs or even a transplanted thing… whatever grabs you.

Never go home again and never go to an abandoned tropical island with a coke-using film crew and never swim in the ocean and never go to camp. This camp has a reason, I guess, as the kids are addicted to the internet and must go phone free, which is a great way to future proof this slasher, as so many times you just wonder, “Why not just use your phone?”

So while there’s Iza, the character that knows the rules of horror movies, no one else listens and has sex in the woods, as they always do, and then a set of massive twin meteorite mutated monsters start killing people, as these things happen, and then everyone is really in for it.

The film has some beautiful locations while planting its soul firmly in the 80s slasher world, although the science fiction backstory for the killers is really fun, as is the makeup.

Since this got added to Netflix — and did quite well — its been confirmed that a sequel is coming, reuniting director Bartosz M. Kowalski and most of the crew the film’s lone survivor.

Someone said to me the other day, “What did you expect, it’s a slasher,” and then I was like, “You realize that’s like slapping me and not expecting me to fight, right?” And that was about a bad slasher. This is a decent one.

They’re Outside (2020)

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The longline for this says, “While filming a documentary about an agoraphobic woman, a celebrity psychologist is drawn into supernatural events.” But I was surprised that I liked this movie, in spite of my aversion to found footage films, as it plays with time and perception and moves who is the protagonist of the film several times.

One of the directors of the film, Airell Anthony Hayles (who was joined by Sam Casserly) has an uncle with agoraphobia and wanted to explore that condition through a movie influenced by The Sixth Sense and Picnic at Hanging Rock. The dup asked themselves, “What if a person’s agoraphobia was linked to supernatural events rather than being a purely psychological condition? And what if nobody believed them?”

Sarah Sanders (Chrissy Randall) is the patient and she’s been unable to leave her home since the death of her daughter and the sighting of something she calls Green Eyes. Enter YouTube therapist Max Spencer (Tom Clayton-Wheatley), who wants to fix her for the entire world to see.

Max may not be the best therapist or the best person or even the best anything, but he’s determined to fix things even if it means angering his patient, the spirits in the woods and getting to cosplay The Beyond until the end of time.

There’s also a great opening with a stuffy academic — Nicholas Vince, the chattering cenobite from Hellraiser — taking us on a folk horror journey through the woods and what they mean.

They’re Outside surprised me — I ended up liking it way more than I thought when it started. It’s available on October 29 on digital from Terror Films.

The Crickets Dance (2020)

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Angie Lawrence should have it all. She has a great job — she’s an attorney — and she’s gorgeous. But she’s trapped by her past and soon, moves into the past as she inherits an antebellum mansion that has a diary detailing the slavery and injustice that happened in the house.

This is Veronica Robledo’s first full-length movie and it was based on the book by Deborah Robillard. The movie is largely based on her own life and experiences growing up in the deep south.

I’m always happy to see Bill Oberst Jr. show up in a movie and he’s suitably sinister in this, as he always does best. I’m usually not one for romantic historical tales, but hey, I can be open every once in awhile.

The Crickets Dance is available October 26 on digital and on demand platforms, including iTunes, Comcast, Dish, Verizon, Prime Video, Google Play, Vudu and Telus in the U.S and Canada. You can learn more on the official Facebook page.

Seek (2020)

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Estranged sisters Heidi (Allisyn Snyder, A.P. Bio) and Jordan (Claire Grant) have been driving all night when they come across a roadside park and rest stop. Inside, they both find the mysterious Lonely Child who demands that they play a game.

Seek is a short that looks gorgeous thanks to practical effects by two-time Academy Award nominee Arjen Tuiten (Wonder, Pan’s Labyrinth and Ghostbusters: Afterlife) based on concept designs by WETA Workshop plus VFX by Rogelio Salinas and Todd Perry (Black Panther, Avengers, Doctor Strange).

Steve Agee makes a brief appearance and Sarah Anne Williams plays the Lonely Child. The filmmakers say that this is just a small part of a much larger mythology, with the goal of telling the full and terrify

You can learn more at the official site and watch the short here:

SALEM HORROR FEST: Meta (2020)

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During senior prom, Artie is excited to see if he’s won prom king — despite not believing that his school would vote in a transguy — just as he gets his period. And then, well, he transforms all over again in order to deal with bullies.

I’m somewhat fascinated that the prom scene in Carrie gets referenced in transgender narratives. Someone asked me the other day why so many in the LGBTQ world love horror so much and my assumption — I’d love to learn more — is that the fear of the other is something dealt with every day. Enjoying a world where the other is everyday and often triumphs against normalcy seems way better than normal life.

That said — this is an interesting film and it’s great to see so much representation within Salem Horror Fest. Directed by Sydne Horton and written by Savannah Ward, it has the right tones of humor, horror and understanding.

I saw Meta as part of Salem Horror Fest, where you can watch several shorts and features with their virtual pass now until the end of October. You can read more about Meta at the official site.

SALEM HORROR FEST: Hall (2020)

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When a hotel hallway is ravaged by a mysterious virus — yes, if you’re looking for COVID-19 escapism, perhaps this is not your movie — pregnant tourist Naomi (Yumiko Shaku, Lt. Akane Yashiro from 2002’s Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla and Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.) and Val (Carolina Bartczak) bond over more than just their bad marriages. They’re also stuck in a hallway filled with victims, all to find Val’s daughter Kelly and perhaps get through the horror.

Made as an ode to 70s and 80s horror — obviously, this Canadian project that tells of an isolated building dealing with a disease within is going to get a Cronenberg association — the guiding question behind this film was “What would happen if vaccines were created intentionally for purposes of government control and for the profit of the pharmaceutical industry, not necessarily to cure viruses?”

Director/co-writer Francesco Giannini first full-length feature shows a confidence many won’t have five movies in. This is a claustrophobic and dark movie that just plain works.

Hall is now playing Salem Horror Fest where you can watch several shorts and features with their virtual pass now until the end of October. You can learn more about Hall at the official site.

The Night House (2020)

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The Night House may not be perfect, but it takes some chances and has a nice puzzle at its heart that makes sense the further you go into the movie. It fits nearly into that sub-genre of a genre, the giallo where a woman is either gaslighting herself, being gaslit or going slowly insane (for more, see Footprints on the Moon, The Perfume of the Lady in Black, The Psychic and Lizard In a Woman’s Skin).

It also would work well within the seventies style of film — Let’s Scare Jessica to Death is a high mark, but it shoots for it — where things happen slowly and then the end races you through the conclusion. Once the puzzle box is opened, things get wild in a hurry.

I first took notice of Rebecca Hall in Christine, a movie I didn’t like but loved her in it. She anchors this movie and makes it work, often through the sheer determination of her commitment to the activities around her. Sure, she’s dealing with the suicide death of her husband, but she’s also pushing against the ridiculousness of it all, such as students pushing for better grades and fellow teachers wanting to know details but too ashamed to ask. Some of it becomes humor to her. And yet, so much more of it is horror, as a mirror house seems to exist in the woods by her home.

Her husband’s phone keeps texting and calling her. Music randomly blares. Dreams are filled with his image and voice. And when she finds his phone, she finds pictures of women who are not her, but look exactly like she does.

The sound design is incredible. The editing is perfect. The effects and the way they work hand-in-hand with the cinematography is what others films should aspire to. And the plotting and the maze it leads you down can be forgiven when it loses its way sometimes, because unlike the glut of Blumhouse dreck, this movie will not overly explain itself to you. And that ending, as the two houses come together and time gets played backward? Wow.

The more I think about this movie, the more I like it. I’m used to being let down by endings and modern horror falling apart by the end. This one hits the landing and effortlessly brings in a very human story of grief without hammering home its point and remembering that at heart, this is a horror movie, and horror movies are supposed to scare us, not just preach at us.

Director David Bruckner is going to be making the new Hellraiser and if this is any indication, that movie is going to be interesting.

SALEM HORROR FEST: Iskioma (2020)

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Kostas Gerampinis hasn’t made a full-length feature as of yet, but this short proves that he has strong storytelling skills, an eye for powerful visuals and confidence beyond his experience.

When a veterinarian is called in to treat a mysterious disease in a remote farm in Greece, he determines that all of the animals on the farm must be put to death to keep any chance of an infectious disease outbreak to a minimum. The farmer argues that no one will compensate him for his troubles, but then a storm breaks out, leaving the animal doctor no choice but to spend the night.

Between the visuals and the score, this seems like it’s ready to be a full-length film. It kept my attention the entire way and I kept looking at the clock. Usually, that happens when a movie bores me. With this, I was hoping that it would play longer.

Iskioma is now playing Salem Horror Fest and you can watch this short and all of the features with their virtual pass now until the end of October. You can learn more at the film’s official site.