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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

‘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...

‘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...

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...

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,...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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,...