Festivals Reviews
FrightFest 2026 Review: ODDITIES, Adrienne Barbeau Gets the Wicked, Substantial Horror Role She Deserves
When two self-destructive best friends accidentally kill their drug dealer, they have to flee town. Stopping at a roadside antique shop, they quickly discover that the older woman running the place isn't as sweet as she seems.
FrightFest 2026 Review: HOME BODIES, Sibling Tension Rises in a Smart Home Trap
Two children, raised in total isolation by an automated house, begin to confront the mysteries of their existence after an enigmatic stranger arrives from outside.
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FrightFest 2026 Review: ITHAQUA, A Chilling Western Gothic Nightmare
Set in a harsh 1821 Canadian winter, the folk horror film Ithaqua follows the starving residents of an isolated fur-trading fort as they turn against each other and face a primordial, hunger-inducing creature.
FILIPIÑANA Review: Rafael Manuel's Feature Redefines Must-See Filmmaking
There’s a moment in writer-director Rafael Manuel’s often brilliant, always enthralling feature debut, Filipiñana, an expansion of his award-winning 2021 short, where Clara (Carmen Castellanos), the American-born-and-raised niece of a wealthy Filipino businessman, Renato (Carlitos Siguion-Reyna), refuses to bend —...
FrightFest 2026 Review: In Korea-Set Horror NERVOUS, Sara Bolger Loses the Ability to Hear Men
The opening film at this year’s Tubi Frightfest London, Nervous is an ambitious psychological thriller set in the South Korean countryside. Irish actress Sarah Bolger reunites with director Abner Pastoll after the success of 2019’s A Good Woman is Hard...
Locarno 2026 Review: THE RIVERBANK Turns Queer Desire Into a Defiant Neo-Noir
Brazilian filmmakers Enock Carvalho and Matheus Farias make an atmospheric feature debut with a slow-burning queer neo-noir that pits intimacy and solidarity against the murderous politics of the militarized religious right.
Locarno 2026 Review: DESTROY ALL GIRLS, Freewheeling Skate-Punk Rebellion, With an Expiration Date
Erin Vassilopoulos' sophomore feature is a retro-styled skate odyssey whose authentic subcultural energy invigorates a familiar story.
Locarno 2026 Review: ROMA ELASTICA Cannibalizes the Myth of the Movie Star in a Delirious Cinephile Phantasmagoria
Marion Cotillard stars in Bertrand Mandico's a surrealistic tribute to golden age actresses, celluloid cinema and Italian culture.
Locarno 2026 Review: BLOODY TENNIS Serves Up a Blood-Soaked Sports-Horror Satire
Nikias Chryssos serves up a blood-soaked, darkly funny sports horror in which an elite tennis academy trains its aspiring champions through ritualized brutality.
Fantasia 2026 Review: THE GLORIOUS DEAD, When it is The End of The World But You Still Have to Clock in
On a cold, winter day, in rural America, It was supposed to be Sheriff Deb’s day off. But one of her deputies, Mikey, is knocking on her door early in the morning. The power is out. No one else has...
Fantasia 2026 Review: THE SPECIALS, A Crowd-Pleasing Yakuza Subversion
A yakuza member named Kumashiro hires four independent, rival assassins to eliminate Boss Honjō, the powerful leader of the rival Honjō-gumi syndicate. Executing the hit has always been complicated because Honjō frequently uses body doubles, leaving constant doubt regarding his...
Fantasia 2026 Review: RUBBERHEAD: THE LIFE AND MONSTERS OF STEVE JOHNSON A Hilarious and Humbling Portrait of a Chaotic Genius
There’s something mesmerizing about watching car crashes. We know it is dangerous, often even deadly; we know that for all of the sparks flying around as an out-of-control car meets its fiery fate, there’s usually someone inside who is in...
Fantasia 2026 Review: TOKYO BURST: CRIME CITY, Trades in Solo Grit For Buddy-Cop Chaos in a Worthy Expansion of THE ROUNDUP Universe
Welcome to Kabuki-cho, an entertainment district in Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan. Called the "Sleepless Town", it is home to a sprawl of host and hostess clubs, love hotels, nightclubs and yakuza hangouts. Shiro Aiba, the Shinjuku Central Police Station’s newest,...
Fantasia 2026 Review: RECLUSE, Screenwriter Henry Chaisson Conquers Visual And Sonic Terror in Neo-Gothic Horror
Joan is dragged back to her childhood home. There has been an accident and she has received an ominous call from her ailing, disfigured father. She is a sound engineer by trade, he is a famous artist and long...
Fantasia 2026 Review: CHERRY AND VIRGIN, A Nervous and Experimental Work of Genius
I was 18 years old when an adult friend I met at a summer factory job recommended that I see Federico Fellini's 8 1/2. I could not make heads or tails of the movie, in Italian, in black and white,...
Fantasia 2026 Review: CAPTURED! Of Ghosts And Growing Up
Misaki is a bright high-school senior who has the grades to get into a good university. Misaki’s reservation is that she lives alone with her mother, who works a night shift to make ends meet. She is more or less...
Fantasia 2026 Review: VILLAGE OF EIGHT GRAVESTONES, Takashi Shimizu Proves Traditional Murder Mysteries Are Better With Ghosts
When Tatsuya’s estranged mom suddenly passes away, he is forced to head out to her old, isolated village and meet the family he has never known, the Tajimi Family. On the way there, he bumps into private detective Kosuke Kindaichi,...
Fantasia 2026 Review: THE LAST HORROR, Myanmar's First Found-Footage Film Forced to be Too Safe With The Scares
The Last Footage starts with a collection of videos from life loggers, users recording daily experiences using wearable tech. We see the Burmese peoples out jogging along lakefronts, playing concerts with their bands, riding the backseat of a motorcycle which...
Fantasia 2026 Review: CORPUS, Languid Queer Thriller Delivers a Killer Horror Payoff
Sayo photographs New York’s nightlife, dealing drugs to partygoers at clubs and generally stays out of trouble with the owners of those clubs with free samples. Life takes a spin when he learns that Vince, an old friend whose star...
Fantasia 2026 Review: OUR EFFED UP WORLD, Alice Maio Mackay's Hang Out Movie... With Aliens!
Australian wunderkind Alice Maio Mackay returns to the director’s chair for her eighth feature film, Our Effed Up World, celebrating its Canadian premiere at this year’s Fantasia. A science-fiction story about a group of young adults fighting off an alien...
