Like Cats, the Twilight Saga and Movie 43 –I’ve put myself through some real shit haven’t I – I only watched 365 Days because of the bad reviews, with some calling it a worse version of 50 Shades Of Grey. Curiosity slowly grew on me until I figured I’d better make my own judgement to see why people were shitting on this so hard.
Turns out it’s a rape fantasy and that might be why.
In 2007, the Romanian drama film, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days won the Palme D’or at Cannes and brought the topic of abortion to the forefront of European cinema. It’s a film I love but have rarely revisited due to it’s cold, uncomfortable aesthetic, now 13 years later the English language equivalent has arrived with Never Rarely Sometimes Always bringing teenage abortions to the center stage of America and shows just how messed up the situation is.
In recent years, my reviewing habits have slowed down more than I would’ve liked, since entering the workforce it’s been hard to watch, think and write about films whilst also balancing work and personal lives. I’ve started to pick it up again in the last few months and the reason for this was The Lighthouse, because when I walked out of that first viewing I knew I wanted to write down my thoughts on this film and explain in great detail why it’s a goddamn modern masterpiece of isolationist horror.
Which given our current climate, this film hits a little closer to home now than I realized.
In keeping with what I’ve said beforehand, every year seems to have one standout horror film that’s a critical darling if a little iffy with audience; The Babadook, The VVitch, and Hereditary. For 2020 that horror film – aside from the obvious plague that’s screwing us all over – seems to be Saint Maud, and since the majority of these critically acclaimed horrors I’ve absolutely loved, I wanted to see if this would be a winner. And by God it was, this is a chilling, disorienting, and disturbing look at faith and the dangers of unchecked insanity.
When I saw the trailer for Netflix’s new film, The Devil All The Time, I was surprised that I hadn’t heard a lot about it given the cast, but a dark tale of pre-Vietnam Americana bolstered by some big names, I was interested. Having not read the book, I can’t say how it works as an adaptation but on its own merits, this is a pretty damn good flick if a little bit heavy on the grimness.
Nolan films are their own event at this point, and given the situation around Covid and the complete overhaul of the yearly release schedule that’s even truer this time than ever. While Interstellar and Dunkirk didn’t quite hit the mark for me I was still interested in Tenet, Nolan’s earned my butt in seat for interest as well as quality and with the cinemas finally reopened I was definitely in for this one. Thankfully Tenet proved to be worth the wait, it’s the clever blockbuster we’ve come to expect from Nolan and his time-travel take on the spy genre proves to work a lot better than it really should. Continue reading
Let me start off this review with a confession; I have not seen the original Creepshow. I’ve seen clips from it, mostly regarding cockroaches and country bumpkin accent, but I’ve never found the opportunity to see the full film. That being said, I’m aware of its cult status and when news came about of an anthology series from Greg Nicotero, I took interest. I’ve been familiar with Nicotero’s work on The Walking Dead and with TV often outclassing films for production values, the Creepshow series had a lot of promise.
I’d not heard of Skin when it made it’s way to me, but the topic of a reformed white supremacist in today’s racially charged world with the backing of A24, I was interested to see how it played out. While I can see what the film is going for, I think it’s missing a few key steps in making the whole thing work properly.
Going into Booksmart, I’d had the film on the edge of my radar, mostly due to it being the directorial debut of Olivia Wilde, the strong reviews and was being touted as the female Superbad. This was a description I later found out was more apt than I initially thought with one of the lead actresses being Jonah Hill’s sister – but had I not been given a free ticket to see the film early, I might have waited before checking this one out. Instead, I’m going to use this platform to tell people to go out there and see this film because it’s a hilarious, dirty, and an unclichéd look into female friendships and the life of a modern high-school student that deserves more than just being called the female Superbad.
For obvious reasons, this review is going to spoil Infinity War, so if you haven’t seen that yet get on it. I’ll try my best not to spoil Avengers: Endgame, but a lot of shit happens in the set-up that I can’t talk about so consider this a MILD SPOILER WARNING, just in case I let anything slip.
