MFF Quick Reviews – Hard Truths, MadS, Gladiator II, Memoir of a Snail and Evil Does Not Exist
With Awards Season in full-effect I’ve been watching a lot of the contenders to make sure that my ballot for the Georgia Film Critics Association is as thorough as possible. In a perfect world it would be great to write 1,000 words about these films, but since I don’t have the time I wanted to write some quick reviews to share my thoughts about some cool movies.
Hard Truths – Grade – A
In a year of excellent performances, Marianne Jean-Bapiste’s performance as a tormented and depressed woman named Pansy – may be one of the finest. She’s already been nominated for a plethora of awards and I hope the momentum continues all the way to the Academy Awards (Her first Oscar nomination came in 1997 for the Mike Leigh directed film Secrets & Lies). Hard Truths works because of the humanity it finds in Pansy as she’s stuck in a world of grief and distress that’s articulated with outbursts towards family, friends, clerks, strangers and pretty much everyone else. Between Jean-Bapiste’s performance, Mike Leigh’s (Secrets & Lies, Happy Go-Lucky, Vera Drake, Mr. Turner) direction and writing, and Dick Pope’s cinematography (Mr. Turner, The Illusionist), Hard Truths feels alive and vibrant. Jean-Bapiste’s is at her best when she’s verbally berating her husband Curtley (David Webber), harping on her son Moses (Tuwaine Barrett) and becoming somewhat human while interacting with her kind-hearted sister Chantelle (Michele Austin). You need to watch Hard Truths before putting together your 2024 “best of “ list.
Evil Does Not Exist – Grade – B+
Directed by Ryusuke Hamaguchi, this beautiful film features one of the best scenes of 2024 and builds towards an ending you won’t forget. Like Hamaguchi’s Oscar nominated Drive My Car, Evil Does Not Exist excels during its quiet moments that showcase the gorgeous Japanese mountain village of Mizubiki, and inhabitants who call it home. The movie focuses on the hubbub around a glamping (glamorous camping) site that will potentially be built on the mountain. The highlight of the movie is a town meeting between the local residents and two developer representatives who constantly say “We’ll take that into consideration.” Evil Does Not Exist focuses on what happens when companies don’t respect what they send downstream and the effects it has on people who rely on the steam’s clean water. If you’re looking for a patient and beautiful film, I totally recommend that you watch this movie.
MadS (2024) – Grade – B+
If you’re looking for a thrilling French film about a zombie apocalypse that is filmed in one take you will love MadS. Directed and written by David Moreau (Them), this madcap thriller focuses on what happens when a college kid named Roman (Milton Riche) comes across a heavily bandaged woman who hops into his car and promptly kills herself. This kicks off a wild night of infection spreading as Roman drives to his house to hide the body, and then goes to a party with his girlfriend Anais (Lucille Guillaume). In a fun turn of events, the narrative shifts its focus to Anais as she succumbs to the zombie infection and starts rampaging all over her town. Guillaume deserves some sort of award because she delivers a free-wheeling performance that is loaded with wonderful tics, screams, and twitches as she rides around on a bicycle looking for prey. The great thing about MadS is that it’s all about chaos and simply wants to revel in the insanity of a zombie apocalypse. It’s an audacious and wonderfully acted experience and I really hope more people watch it and enjoy the insanity.
Memoir of Snail – Grade – A
Directed and written by Oscar winner Adam Elliot (Mary and Max), Memoir of a Snail is a tragicomic exploration of loneliness that is equal parts bleak and hopeful. The story focuses on twin Australian siblings Grace Pudel (Sarah Snook) and Gilbert Pudel (Kodi Smit-McPhee), who are separated after the death of their paraplegic alcoholic father (who loved his kids dearly). The book-loving and melancholic Grace is sent to the city of Canberra where she’s adopted by a kind married couple (who are also swingers), and the pyromaniac Gilbert is sent to live with hyper-christian apple farmers in Perth. Things are bleak for both of them, but Grace finds solace in her hoarded collection of snails and her friendship with Pinky (Jackie Weaver), an eccentric woman who takes Grace under her wing and provides needed companionship. It all leads to a heartwarming finale that’s most welcome after 90-minutes of abuse heaped on the central characters. For a film that’s loaded with abuse, death, melancholia, theft, fetishes, electric shock punishment, arson, and Alzheimer’s, Memoir of a Snail manages to leave the audience uplifted – which is quite a beautiful feat.
Gladiator II – Grade – B
Gladiator II is a lot – and I love it. While talking to fellow film critic Aaron Neuwirth he told me that it’s a “perfect Mark movie,” and I agree. The following list breaks down why it’s a perfect Mark movie.
- The opening battle scene features dozens of catapults and trebuchets that are catapulting rocks and explosives at two opposing armies. An added bonus is that some of the catapults are attached to Roman boats that are about to smash into the large city walls of the North African kingdom of Numidia. This makes me very happy.
- SHARKS! There is a naval battle in the coliseum between gladiators led by Lucius Verus Aurelius (Paul Mescal), and a boat of unlucky Romans who are swiftly defeated. The best thing about this fight is that the Romans were able to transport hungry sharks to the coliseum. These hungry sharks eat the unlucky combatants who fall in the water during the fight. It’s insane – and I love it.
- Denzel Washington delivers a front kick to Paul Mescal. I don’t want to say much more, just know that it’s awesome.
- I’m a big fan of Aftersun, so seeing inde-darling Paul Mescal battling Pedro Pascal in a $200+ million budgeted film is incredible.
Overall, Gladiator II is an ambitious and chaotic mess that works because of the solid performances (Denzel Washington is the best) and bombastic battle scenes.
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Bad Movie Tuesday: Girls School Screamers (1985), it’s not the kind of movie the crappy title suggests…
MY CALL: A totally forgettable, but totally serviceable selection for a bad movie night. The gore is weak, the effects are infrequent, but the acting and story are surprising not terrible and there are a few effects scenes that are almost worth the very discounted price of admission. MOVIES LIKE Girls School Screamers: For more campy horror dropping a cast of victims in a haunted mansion, consider The Legacy (1978), Spookies (1986), Doom Asylum (1987), Spellcaster (1988), and Cthulhu Mansion (1992).
First things first. With a title like Girls School Screamers, you’d probably expect a raunchy horror loaded with sex scenes and gratuitous nudity. These elements are completely absent here, and this title is clearly doing this capable campy horror movie a disservice. I almost didn’t watch this based on the title alone! Moreover, this is not the kind of movie that typically dons the Troma label. Truly, this movie is classy when compared to its title and Troma association.
This clunky flick opens with a ghostly woman’s voice luring a preteen deep into her haunted house. Upon cackling revelation, she has a gooey flesh-melty face with writhing worms and all manner of grossness—for low budget b-horror, it’s actually pretty cool. Truth be told, this very screen grab lured me to watch this movie.
The haunted house, along with millions of dollars’ worth of art and other contents, has been willed to the Trinity Girls College. But before they can take custody of the estate, the top seven students and one nun chaperone have been selected to stay there for a weekend and inventory its contents.
A brief séance leads to the discovery that one of the girls shares an uncanny likeness with a long-dead resident of this mansion. Now fascinated by her connection to the house, she reads her historical doppelganger’s old journal and learns more about the history of the mansion’s old family. It seems her wealthy uncle was obsessed with her and was grooming her for eventual seduction and marriage! She rejects his advances and is shoved down the stairs to her death. So what then happened to the incestuous uncle, now also a murderer, you might ask? No clue. Perhaps the end of the movie will tell us.
After the pretty cool and gross opening scene, essentially nothing remotely interesting happens for the next 45 minutes. It’s as if it’s not even a horror movie for this duration. But the movie isn’t so bad that I’m hating life in this absence of horror. I’m just wondering what’s up.
The first death scene is a total throwaway where we don’t see anything juicy… not until they find the ho-hum bloody body. Deaths #2-4 are equally lackluster, involving a meat hook, a worm-covered zombie arm (no clue what’s going on there), and an unmanned car (no clue what’s going on there either). The pitchfork death scene (#6) is equally throwaway bad. The electrocution death (#5), however, was fun, gooey, gross and graphic. I had no idea that being electrocuted could result in melting flesh, facelessness, and dismemberment. That’s a PSA for all you do-it-yourselfers at home.
So who’s doing the killing here? Well, it turns out to be the ghost or somehow undying incestuous uncle! And like Dracula stalking his lost love’s reincarnation, he wants to marry the college girl who bears the likeness of his long-dead niece who had rejected him, using her dead co-eds as bridesmaids that he literally dressed up for the occasion. So… he had the bridemaids’ dresses this whole time?
And how does our reincarnated co-ed defeat this perhaps undead, undying incestuous uncle…? She just pokes him in the eyes with her fingers. That’s it. And now with five of her classmates dead and a confused, tired, elderly nun chaperone, what does she do? No clue. The movie ends with her ominously looking out the window as if she planned on staying there forever. These and so many of the aforementioned details herein make this, in my humble opinion, a delightfully bad movie worthy of any bad movie night. Just be patient between the first awesome scene and the next 45 minutes.
Writer and director John P. Finnegan (Blades) delivers a campy, enjoyably bad movie with pleasantly unawful acting and somewhat decent storytelling.
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The Movies, Films and Flix Podcast – Episode 593: Ghosts of Mars, John Carpenter, and Space Gibberish
You can download or stream the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker (or wherever you listen to podcasts…..we’re almost everywhere).
If you get a chance please make sure to review, rate and share. You are awesome.
Mark and Jonny Numb discuss the 2001 action horror film Ghosts of Mars, directed by John Carpenter, and starring Ice Cube, Natasha Henstridge, Jason Statham and some ill-tempered ghosts, the movie focuses on what happens when an elite force of space cops battle a group of unintelligible ghost people. In this episode, they also talk about trampolines, John Carpenter’s filmography, and space gibberish. Enjoy!
If you are a fan of the podcast, make sure to send in some random listener questions (we love random questions). We thank you for listening, and hope you enjoy the episode!
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John’s Horror Corner: Azrael (2024), a post-apocalyptic, folk horror, pseudo-zombie-demon movie.
MY CALL: This film spans various subgenres and encapsulates a lot of intensity. It’s very violent, very graphic, and goes very unexplained. I thought it was great and, frankly, a noble step up for the writer and director involved. PS—don’t trust the trailer. It doesn’t represent the movie well. MOVIES LIKE Azrael:. For more horror films that make good use of silence, try The Descent (2005), A Quiet Place (2018), or The Silence (2019).
“Many years after the Rapture… among the survivors, some are driven to renounce their sin of speech.”
For reasons unknown to us, Azrael (Samara Weaving; Mayhem, The Babysitter, Ready or Not) is captured by her mute fellow locals as if she were a criminal. She is bound and left to be sacrificed to a bloodthirsty forest demon that is summoned by ritualistic, trance-like, heavy-breathing. This demon seems to be drawn to blood, and may very well be blind (I wasn’t sure at first)—hence the mute behavior.
Early on, I’m feeling some Mad Max(1979-2024) meets The Village (204) vibes. Everyone’s clothes are ragged, patched and discolored, encampments are rough and salvaged, guns and vehicles are few; but the setting is in woods where nature is in charge, and the people are steeped in superstition. While not so dialogueless, I’m especially reminded of The Shrine (2010), a film which leaves its protagonists (and we the audience) in the dark as all around them speak another language which is not subtitled for the audience. As such, the motives of their antagonists are unclear, leaving a lot to the imagination.
Azrael escapes her ritual sacrifice and is now hunted like an escaped convict, sought after by the villagers and the elders (including Vic Carmen Sonne). Some of these encounters get brutal, with sufficient gore and graphic violence. Likewise, the zombie mob-like gore and biting and flesh-rending of our Rapture demons is very stereotypical—but not in any unsatisfying way. Hehe. These demons behave much like those flesh-eating troglodytes from The Descent (2005). This essentially shifts from folk horror to a bloody zombie movie to folk horror again… with a dash of very bloody post-apocalyptic action movie and religious horror in there. The long finale action sequence is dire upon mean upon dire!
This film, with not one word of comprehensible dialogue, leaves a lot to the imagination both in terms of the villagers’ beliefs, their reasons for pursuing Azrael, and the harrowing ending. Those of you who like explanations may be bothered by this; whereas those who appreciate the occasional mystique of being left in the dark will likely celebrate this. I fall among those pleased with this film. Director E. L. Katz (Cheap Thrills, ABCs of Death 2, Teacup) and writer Simon Barrett (Dead Birds, You’re Next, V/H/S 1-2 & 94, Blair Witch) have moved up a weight class in my opinion. This is a beautifully shot, atmospheric, intense, very cool film!
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The Movies, Films and Flix Podcast – Episode 592: Insidious, James Wan and Blumhouse Horror
You can download or stream the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker (or wherever you listen to podcasts…..we’re almost everywhere).
If you get a chance please make sure to review, rate and share. You are awesome.
Mark and David Cross discuss the 2010 horror film Insidious. Directed by James Wan, and starring Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Lin Shaye and a real jerk of a demon, the movie focuses on what happens when horrible creatures attack a nice family. In this episode, they also talk about Blumhouse horror, Leigh Whannell, and why Insidious helped spark a horror renaissance
If you are a fan of the podcast, make sure to send in some random listener questions (we love random questions). We thank you for listening, and hope you enjoy the episode!
You can download the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker.
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John’s Horror Corner: Body Bags (1993), a light but gory, “Tales from the Crypty” horror anthology.
MY CALL: This was pretty fun. There’s no clever writing or inspired ideas to be found here. The stories are pretty basic. Just plain old-fashioned, simple murderous fun in the form of some silly horror shorts. This would be great for introducing a young person (like an early teen with a dark sense of humor) to the genre.
MORE HORROR ANTHOLOGIES: Dead of Night (1945), Black Sabbath (1963), Tales from the Crypt (1972), The Vault of Horror (1973), The Uncanny (1977), Screams of a Winter Night (1979), Creepshow (1982), Screamtime (1983), Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983), Stephen King’s Cat’s Eye (1985), Deadtime Stories (1986), Creepshow 2 (1987), From a Whisper to a Scream (1987; aka The Offspring), After Midnight (1989), Tales from the Crypt Season 1 (1989), Tales from the Darkside: The Movie (1990), Grimm Prairie Tales (1990), The Willies (1990), Two Evil Eyes (1990), Necronomicon: Book of the Dead (1993), Hellraiser: Bloodline (1996), Campfire Tales (1997), Dark Tales of Japan (2004), 3 Extremes (2004), Creepshow 3 (2006), Trick ‘r Treat (2007), Chillerama (2011), Little Deaths (2011), V/H/S (2012), The Theater Bizarre (2012), The ABCs of Death (2013), V/H/S 2 (2013), All Hallows’ Eve (2013), The Profane Exhibit (2013), The ABCs of Death 2 (2014), V/H/S Viral (2014), Southbound (2015), Tales of Halloween (2015), A Christmas Horror Story (2015), The ABCs of Death 2.5 (2016), Holidays (2016), Terrified (2017; aka Aterrados, a pseudo-anthology), Oats Studios, Vol. 1 (2017), Ghost Stories (2017), XX (2017), All the Creatures Were Stirring (2018), The Field Guide to Evil (2018), Nightmare Cinema (2018), Blood Clots (2018), Shudder’s series Creepshow (2019-2021), Scare Package (2019), The Mortuary Collection (2019), Xenophobia (2019), V/H/S/94 (2021), Netflix’s series Cabinet of Curiosities (2022), V/H/S/99 (2022), V/H/S/85 (2023) and V/H/S/Beyond (2024).
This anthology essentially feels like three Tales from the Crypt episodes were strung together into a movie. And like the Tales from the Crypt series, this is a who’s who of major cameos both in terms of actors and major horror filmmakers. The stories may be a bit gory at times. But the tone is rather light and playful. This is clearly meant more to amuse, and not to scare.
Hosted by a kooky coroner (John Carpenter) who cuts his steak with a bonesaw and sips formaldehyde martinis, we are introduced to each anthology segment with Crypt Keeper-esque style. Between anthology segments, we enjoy some dark humor and corpse shenanigans. Tom Arnold (Freddy’s Dead) and Tobe Hooper have cameos as coroners in this wraparound segment called The Morgue.
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Gas Station
The story of a new employee, an unlucky homeless guy, her employer, her employer’s murderer, and a hero who forgot his credit card. Anne (Alex Datcher; Netherworld) starts her first graveyard shift at a gas station the night a murder takes place in Haddonfield. She encounters a ragged creepy customer (Wes Craven; Wes Craven’s New Nightmare), gets locked out of the attendant’s box trying to help a customer (David Naughton; Amityville: A New Generation, An American Werewolf in London), a creepy homeless man turns up dead in the garage… and so does her co-worker (Sam Raimi; Intruder). The highlight is when a guy is crushed under the car lift and spews out gouts of blood.
Hair
Despite every bit of support and assurance his girlfriend Megan (Sheena Easton) can muster, Richard (Stacy Keach; Children of the Corn 666, Class of 1999) is incredibly insecure about losing his hair. His fear of balding is driving Megan mad, and away from him.
Richard contacts a hair-rejuvenation doctor (David Warner; Waxwork, Necronomicon: Book of the Dead, The Company of Wolves, The Unnamable II, Ice Cream Man) from a TV ad, and after his treatment he instantly has a ridiculous head of long, rock star locks. Unfortunately, he keeps growing hair—it continues to grow rapidly and from places it shouldn’t… including his face. It turns out there’s more to this hair treatment than he thought.
Eye
A baseball (Mark Hamill; The Guyver, Child’s Play) player suffers a gory, career-ending eye injury in a car accident. After undergoing an experimental eye transplant, he begins to see things that slowly drive him mad. With the eye of a murderer in his head, he begins to see past victims and behave like a complete psychopath. It gets a bit stressful (from a domestic violence perspective) and culminates in him stabbing out his new eye to free himself of his madness.
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Directors John Carpenter (Gas Station, Hair) and Tobe Hooper (Eye) deliver three light horror segments in the vein of Tales from the Crypt. The audience is graced with some great chonky wound, latex and blood work, as well as numerous cameos including Greg Nicotero (The Walking Dead), Debbie Harry (aka, Blondie; Tales from the Dark Side: The Movie, Videodrome), ex-model Twiggy, and producer Roger Corman.
There’s nothing special to be found here. It’s just something nice to watch with a lot of familiar faces for films fans of the era.
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John’s Horror Corner: The Lift (1983; aka, De Lift), a brutally boring “elevator horror.”
MY CALL: This incredibly boring Dutch horror has no merits. This is only for devourers of the most bad of bad movies. MORE MOVIES LIKE The Lift: The obvious choice is Devil (2010), which is fantastic. The Platform (2019) is not really “elevator horror,” but it would still make a decent themed double-feature. There’s also The Shaft (2001; aka, Down), Thang Máy (2020) from Vietnam, and Elevator Game (2023).
After lightning strikes a high-rise, the elevator malfunctions and literally heats up its occupants nearly to death because… well… it’s evil?
This old flick is incredibly tedious from the start. It’s a rigidly written movie with way too many characters that have way too much dialogue that is completely inconsequential. It’s as if the director is trying add to the running time at any boring cost—which sadly, may indeed have been the case. Many entire scenes could be deleted from this movie and go completely unnoticed. For example, I didn’t need to know the blind man’s extremely mundane backstory before he died immediately after we learn about him. And why did I need to know how sentimental his pen was before he had a completely off-screen death falling down the elevator shaft? Not good writing; that’s not the reason.
Now I must admit that death #2 was quite entertaining as the victim’s head is caught in the elevator doors as the lift cage lowers and severs his head (like in Final Destination 2). That was a good laugh and well done for lower budget 80s horror. But overall, the death scenes are incredibly too few and far between to suggest enduring this movie. There isn’t really any non-death horror either.
Elevator repairman Felix Adelaar (Huub Stapel; Saint) teams up with a journalist (Willeke van Ammelrooy; Doodzonde) to try to get to the bottom of these mysterious deaths, which his boss doesn’t like him sniffing about. This is all written more like a bad crime thriller than a horror movie. I’m not sure the director could decide which of the two genres this even was.
Eventually there are somewhat interesting revelations regarding recent technological advances and how they may get out of hand. But I just don’t care. This movie made me suffer too many painfully boring scenes before it ever threatened any point or allegory. At this point, I was just waiting for it to end. Sigh. Yeah, don’t watch this.
Writer and director Dick Maas (Saint, Prey) apparently remade this under the title The Shaft (2001). I’m such a glutton for punishment that I just might watch it… it actually has a decent cast.
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The Remarkable Life of Ibelin (2024) – Review
Quick Thoughts – Grade – A – The Remarkable Life of Ibelin is a sensitive and intimate look into the remarkable life of a young man who found a community of friends while playing World of Warcraft
The best thing about documentaries is how they are able to explore secret worlds and focus on the legacy that a young man from Norway left behind. They can focus on a very specific piece of humanity and dive deep into special lives that would probably never be explored. When Mats Steen passed away at the age of 25, he left behind a secret legacy that was soon to be uncovered by his parents Robert and Trude. Mats was born with Duchenne muscular dystrophy, which left him unable to walk, play sports or participate in any type of outdoor activity. Because of this, he retreated into video games and spent thousands of hours playing World of Warcraft under the name “Ibelin.” His parents were supportive, but they never thought that their lonely child had cultivated a group of friends online. This changed when Robert discovered Mats blog after he had passed away, and he decided to write a blog post to let Mats’ gaming friends know that his son had died. What followed was totally unexpected as Robert and Trude received dozens of responses letting them know how much “Ibelin” had meant to them.
The Benjamin Ree documentary (which you can watch on Netflix) does a fine job exploring Mats’ life and it will also make tears explode from your eyes. One of the most tragic moments of the documentary occurs when Robert and Trude wish they would have talked to Mats more about the game and how they should’ve played World of Warcraft so they could’ve spent more time with their son. It’s tragic stuff, the story is told through interviews and game recreations that rely on transcripts to show what Mats was up to during the 15,000 to 20,000 hours he was online. Mats was a part of a guild called Starlight, and they provided the transcripts which gives the audience an interesting look into why Mats loved WoW so much. On his blog, Mats wrote “”There my handicap doesn’t matter, my chains are broken and I can be whoever I want to be. In there I feel normal.” Another tear-inducing moment comes when one of his online friends talks about how whenever Mats logged in he would spend at least 30 minutes running around the forests, towns, and cities that populate the Eastern Kingdom of the game that he loved so much. In his later years, Mats was isolated in his wheelchair, so the freedom of the open world of WoW must’ve felt like a release as he could walk, talk and flirt with pretty elves.
The Remarkable life of Ibelin is loaded with humanity and does a fine job explaining why parents and friends should be interested and curious about what their family and friends enjoy.
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The Movies, Films and Flix Podcast – Episode 591: The Gate, Cult Classic Horror Films, and Split Scream Vol. 6
You can download or stream the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker (or wherever you listen to podcasts…..we’re almost everywhere).
If you get a chance please make sure to review, rate and share. You are awesome.
Mark and David Cross discuss the 1987 horror film The Gate and also talk about David’s new book that was just released from Tenebrous Press. If you’re looking for something to read make sure to buy Split Scream Vol. 6, because it’s a great horror read.
https://store.tenebrouspress.com
Follow David at @itsmedavidcorse.bsky.social
If you are a fan of the podcast, make sure to send in some random listener questions (we love random questions). We thank you for listening, and hope you enjoy the episode!
You can download the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker.
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John’s Horror Corner: Dark Harvest (2023), a clever repackaging of Pumpkinhead for a Halloween Purge Night.
MY CALL: A lot like Pumpkinhead (1988), but also its own entity entirely, this movie is solid popcorn fun with good pacing, horror action, and creature effects. I don’t know how this escaped my radar (as something actually worth watching). MORE MOVIES LIKE Dark Harvest: Well, certainly Pumpkinhead (1988). But also things like Nothing Left to Fear (2013), not that I’m recommending it.
Steeped in urban fantasy, this is world where a small 1950s farming town is annually plagued by the supernatural, murderous, pumpkin-headed Sawtooth Jack. And in a seasonal ritual, this demon is hunted and killed, with the winner gaining local fame, financial rewards, and credit for the bountiful crops to come. This folklore fiend is common knowledge to the locals, and only the most radical of conspiracy theorists would deny it. Sawtooth regrows every year, emerges on Halloween, and must be slain to preserve their way of life… which is otherwise completely normal.
After seeing his brother (Britain Dalton) win the hunt, the accolades, and the heart of the town the previous year, Richie (Casey Likes; The Birch) is determined to do the same despite his parents’ (Jeremy Davies and Elizabeth Reaser) resistance. Richie has something to prove. Whereas most of the town’s teens have no interest in being forced to participate. Those who do are locked away and starved for three days to make animals of them, before unleashing them in full Halloween costume regalia on Sawtooth in this twister Hunger Game. Making this odd urban fantasy harder to swallow for me, is that Sawtooth’s regrowth is also part of the town’s rituals. The pumpkin head is carved and placed atop a scarecrow that eventually becomes flesh, and has Halloween candy sewn into its abdomen like a macabre pinata. Does the rest of the world know about this? Certainly not. This curse is rather clearly the town’s legacy dark secret, and this story is meant to exist in a little snow-globe microcosm of storytelling wherein we must simply decide to go along for the ride. But as ridiculous as this sounds… just go along with it. This movie is actually pretty entertaining and, I’m guessing, contains some strong allegory about superstitious small societies and government control.
The hunt turns into something of a Purge Night, during which looting and murder among townsfolk become commonplace. There’s homicidal riot violence over food, and head-splitting murder between rival teens trying to find and kill Sawtooth before he makes his way from the farmlands to the church.
Sawtooth Jack looks like a cross between Pumpkinhead (1988) and a zombified Communion (1989) grey. The monster effects are actually pretty good. Much better than I’d expect given the silliness of the premise. I was very pleased with how much we get to see of Sawtooth, and how often. And even though the gore relies heavily on CGI, it is very tactfully executed and rather creative. So I was never annoyed or rolling my eyes at the effects. Frankly, I enjoyed the kills a lot, especially the jaw-rip. After all, who doesn’t love a good jaw-rip?
This was significantly better than I expected it to be on just about every level, especially the quality of the death scenes and gore. But not those aspects alone—the general filmmaking and photography were hitting above this movie’s weight class. And despite the wildly unbelievable premise, I appreciated how “all in” the townsfolk were about their curse. Considering that I hadn’t heard of this until stumbling across it on Amazon, I’d say director David Slade (Hard Candy, 30 Days of Night, Nightmare Cinema) really knocked this under-advertised movie outta’ the park.
Movies, Films & Flix 