4.5 Movie Review: Saint Maud Simon Fitzjohn October 6, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews How many horror films can you count on that left a lasting impression on you – sort of like a nasty scab that just won’t heal, no matter how much you want it to? That’s how I feel...
3.0 Fantasia Review: Sanzaru Simon Fitzjohn August 30, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews In many ways a filmic companion piece to recent offerings Relic and Saint Maud, Sanzaru is another slow-burn horror flick that elects to focus on the relationship between carer and patient. And when I say...
4.0 Fantasia Review: The Oak Room Simon Fitzjohn August 25, 2020 Movie Reviews Boy, you’ve got to love films that come along, catch you by surprise and leave you grinning from ear to ear as the credits roll. Cody Calahan’s The Oak Room is one such film, a movie I took...
4.0 Fantasia Review: Detention Simon Fitzjohn August 25, 2020 Movie Reviews A potent mix of political rebellion, loyalty and unrequited love, told through the prism of supernatural horror, Detention is an eye-catching piece of work. Impressively put together by writer/director...
3.0 Movie Review: Random Acts Of Violence Simon Fitzjohn August 18, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews Almost certainly best known for his comedy roles, Jay Baruchel elects to take a severe genre turn for his second directorial outing, switching to no-holds-barred horror. And no-holds-barred it certainly...
3.5 Movie Review: Unhinged Simon Fitzjohn August 13, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews ‘All I want is for you to say sorry…’ A breakneck, violent, kinetic throwback of a movie, Unhinged harks back to that time in the 90s when psycho-thrillers were all the rage. That is...
4.0 Movie Review: Volition Simon Fitzjohn July 10, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews ‘You mean like deja-vu?’ ‘No, it’s more fragments than that. I see pieces. When they happen they happen – but they always come true…’ Can we outrun our...
4.0 Movie Review: 7500 Simon Fitzjohn June 22, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews Taking the well-worn ‘terrorists on a plane’ format but giving it at more thoughtful slant rather than gung-ho action heroics, 7500 (debuting on Amazon Prime) is a welcome return to the screen...
3.0 Movie Review: Driven Simon Fitzjohn June 15, 2020 Movie Reviews Basically a genre take on Michael Mann’s Collateral (with a very big twist and a ton of comedy), Driven is one of those movies that gets by on sheer verve. Tongue in cheek, but with plenty of heart,...
3.5 Movie Review: A Little More Flesh Matthew Hammond June 5, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews In A Little More Flesh, director Sam Ashurst pushes his metatextual technique to explore the behaviour and brutality of male abuse and rape culture through a twisted blend of critique and horror. Like his...
4.0 Movie Review: We Summon The Darkness Simon Fitzjohn April 14, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews Tapping into the current 80s nostalgia craze but going down the route of the ‘Satanic Panic’ hysteria rather than neon colours and arcade games, We Summon The Darkness is a bloody blast of...
2.0 Movie Review: Fantasy Island Simon Fitzjohn March 9, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews There’s stupid – and then there is Fantasy Island. A ham-fisted, nonsensical, bewildering mess of a film, seeing this mere days after Blumhouse’s stunning The Invisible Man left me...
4.5 Movie Review: The Invisible Man Simon Fitzjohn March 6, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews One of the beauties of the horror genre is its canny ability to reinvent itself, time and time again. Sure, the genre is awash with sequels, retreads and reboots that do nothing more than slavishly follow...
5.0 Movie Review: Parasite David Watson February 4, 2020 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews So poor they live in a subterranean hovel that regularly floods or fills with toxic fumes courtesy of the local exterminators, the Kim family live desperate lives, working low-paid, menial jobs to try and get...
5.0 Movie Review: The Nightingale David Watson November 25, 2019 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews Gang raped and left for dead, her husband and baby murdered, when the local authorities refuse to take action against the gang of soldiers responsible, Irish convict Claire (Aisling Franciosi) swears...
4.0 Movie Review: Judy & Punch David Watson November 22, 2019 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews In the medieval town of Seaside (nowhere near the sea), puppeteers Professor Punch (Damon Herriman) and his wife Judy (Mia Wasikowska) are a sensation, their rowdy theatre show playing to packed audiences who...
2.0 Movie Review: Last Christmas David Watson November 15, 2019 Movie Reviews Cute-as-a-button flibbertigibbet Kate (Emilia Clarke), a talented singer with West End dreams who just can’t seem to catch a break, is stuck in something of a rut. Adrift in London, she’s...
4.0 Movie Review: A Good Woman Is Hard To Find David Watson October 28, 2019 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews Arguably one of the best film’s at this year’s FrightFest, it’s Closing Night film Abner Pastoll’s A Good Woman Is Hard To Find feels even more ferocious now that it’s being...
3.0 Movie Review: The Village In The Woods Simon Fitzjohn October 10, 2019 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews As a lover of film, as well as a critic of sorts, there can be very few more frustrating things than sitting through a film that has plenty to offer – and clear talent on display – but that just...
4.0 Movie Review: Ready Or Not David Watson September 23, 2019 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews An orphan who’s bounced from foster home to foster home while growing up, Grace’s (Samara Weaving) dreams of being part of a loving family seem finally to be coming true when she finally marries...
4.0 Movie Review: Memory – The Origins Of Alien David Watson September 4, 2019 Editor's Choice, Movie Reviews Released back in 1979, Alien represented as much of a seismic shift in sci-fi and horror cinema as Jaws and Star Wars did to the Summer Blockbuster or the French New Wave did to the Movie Brat generation,...