Indie Reviews
Review: OPERATION SEAWOLF, One Last Mission
Dolph Lundgren stars in a desperate World War II submarine drama, directed by Steven Luke. Frank Grillo also stars.
Review: DEAD FOR A DOLLAR, Character Actor Goodness in a B-Western Package
In his 1962 essay, "White Elephant Art vs. Termite Art," critic Manny Farber comes firmly down on the side of filmmakers and actors who are completely at odds with the zeitgeist or trends, and nibble away at the edges of...
Book Review: 10th Anniversary of HOUSE OF PSYCHOTIC WOMEN
Kier-La Janisse has long been a fixture in the genre film world, as a programmer, publisher, writer, film scholar, and more. She founded the press Spectacular Optical Publications, as well as the internationally known The Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies. ...
Slash 2022 Review: Melies d'argent Shorts, A Mosaic of Story Delights
As readers know, I'm a champion of the unsung gems of any film festival - the shorts. It's not just about filmmakers' calling cards, it's a film form too often forgotten. Given how we're inundated more with shorter forms via...
Blu-ray Review: SOUND OF METAL, The Loss of Sound and the Fury
A criticism often levelled at me when I was growing up was that I spoke too loudly; this habit made people assume that I was obnoxious, or felt what I had to say was more important than anyone else. And...
Review: SECTION 8, More Than the Sum of Its Tasty Action Parts
Ryan Kwanten, Dolph Lundgren, Dermot Mulroney, Scott Adkins and Mickey Rourke star in a potent action thriller, directed by Christian Sesma, opening in theaters and streaming on AMC+.
Review: PEARL, Style Meets Substance in Ti West's Stellar Slasher Prequel
After rededicating himself to horror with this spring’s marvelous sexy slasher X, Ti West is already back with Pearl, exploring the origin of the previous film’s deadly romantic killer. Where X reveled in the slasher aesthetic made so popular in...
Review: SEE HOW THEY RUN, Meta-Mystery-Comedy Soars on Saoirse Ronan's Performance
Over the last half-decade, Agatha Christie, one of the the 20th-century’s most prolific, popular writers, has seen something of a resurgence in interest in her work. Beginning with Kenneth Branagh’s adaptation of Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express in 2017,...
Review: BECOMING ICONIC: JONATHAN BAKER Wrestles With Filmmaking
Filmmaker Jonathan Baker opens up about the perils and pleasures of making his debut feature. Now streaming on Fandor.
Toronto 2022 Review: VIKING, Mars In Absurdia
If you follow the arc of Mars in the last hundred years of cinema, it’s representation evolves from a dreamscape utopian fantasy of early silent cinema, a place where anything was possible, to a swamp of horrors and creatures during...
Toronto 2022 Review: THE ETERNAL DAUGHTER, Mirrors and Memories
It might be something bred into us when we're in the womb, a need to please our parents. Or at least, to have some kind of effect on them. The memory of how we either succeeded or failed can haunt...
Breda 2022 Review: REVENGE RIDE Hits Some Bumps
The main theme of this year's Breda-based B-film, Underground and Trash Film Festival BUTFF was called "An Eye For An Eye", and it featured films about people taking the law into their own hands. Vigilante stories, rape-revenge, they were all...
Review: HOUSE OF DARKNESS, A Tempting Place To Hide
The eyes can grow accustomed to the dark. Still, the central theme of House of Darkness will become visible to most viewers too soon. Maybe that’s because while director Neil Labute tries to infuse a sense of mystery into...
Toronto 2022 Review: HOLY SPIDER, A Taut and Stark Social Thriller
It might be the world's oldest profession, but prostitution has always been treated with disdain, or far worse, depending on the society and time period. Prostiutes, who are mainly women, are both wanted and reviled; treated as though they are...
Review: CLERKS III, A Requiem For The Askewniverse
It’s been a long road for Kevin Smith. His 1994 low-budget slacker comedy Clerks made him an immediate star in the indie film world, status that he would harness to spend a decade making bigger and more ambitious projects. But...
Review: THE 101 SCARIEST HORROR MOVIE MOMENTS OF ALL TIME: Shudder's Countdown to Scariest of All Time
The first episode in The 101 Scariest Horror Movie Moments of All Time premiers on Shudder next Wednesday, September 7th. We’ve seen it (maybe a couple more), and here’s what we think so far. The eight-episode Shudder Original series...
Breda 2022 Review: CRABS! Is! Fun! Up To Some Point!
For one long weekend each year, the Dutch city of Breda hosts the B-film, Underground and Trash Film Festival, 'BUTFF' (or just 'BUT') for short. It's a pretty amazing festival, loaded with titles good and bad, ranging from porn, to...
Review: TINY CINEMA, Big Movie
Tyler Cornack directed the hilarious horror-comedy, best approached cold.
Blu-ray Review: Criterion Takes Us to FROWNLAND
Ronald Bronstein, longtime Josh and Benny Safdie collaborator, directed an outburst of desperation and frustration, now on Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection.
Review: THE CATHEDRAL, Keen Observation of an American Family
Ricky D'Ambrose, a micro-budget indie filmmaker whose initial series of shorts gained acclaim on the international festival circuit -- including Berlinale and New Directors/New Films -- made his feature-length film debut with Notes on an Appearance in 2017. The Cathedral,...
