gytrash

"Regardless of how many folks decry that there are too many remakes these days, the horror genre has been remaking the same films and stories since the era of silent film. Despite popular belief, a lot of horror movie remakes are pretty damn great, but an unfortunate truth is that when it comes to Americanized remakes of international works, the track record isn't quite as impressive. For every "The Ring" or "Funny Games," there are at least a dozen cash grabs that completely lose sight of what made the original film great. Oftentimes, it's because American sensibilities and the relationship with threats of danger just don't meld well with the story at hand. This is why when we see the various security cameras of various countries in "The Cabin in the Woods," the style of horror differs greatly from the horror shown in the American cabin.

Which means "Eden Lake" and "Black Mirror" director James Watkins had his work cut out for him with Blumhouse and Universal's remake of "Speak No Evil," the 2022 Dutch hit from Christian Tafdrup that exploded in popularity after IFC Films and Shudder released the film stateside. The intensely bleak psychological horror film was declared by many as one of the very best of the year, and Blumhouse wasted little time snagging the remake rights. Lovers of the original were understandably skeptical, but "Speak No Evil" (2024) joins the ranks of the rare Americanized horror remakes that get it right. Instead of rehashing the same story beat by beat, Watkins — armed with a stellar ensemble cast led by a career-best James McAvoy — takes the central conflict of the original and explores how couples from different cultures would react under the same circumstances. The result is an assault of relentless tension and the best possible outcome for an Americanized remake..."

"Another high-ranking government official who investigated UFOs/UAPs is ready to tell their story.

Jay Stratton, the former director of the U.S. government’s secretive Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force, has struck a memoir deal with HarperCollins. Stratton represents the most senior former U.S government official yet to go public about their direct involvement in the investigation of UAP and non-human intelligence.

For over 16 years, Stratton worked as a senior intelligence official, leading countless U.S. government investigations of UAP and non-human intelligence, including the “Tic Tac” UAP encountered by Navy fighter pilots and the USS Nimitz Carrier Strike Group in 2004. While much of Stratton’s work is classified, the memoir promises to reveal “all that can be lawfully disclosed, providing a first-hand account of the shocking discoveries, challenges and breakthroughs that have marked the U.S. government’s investigation and understanding of UAP and non-human intelligence, as well as the effects on Stratton and his family.”

In a statement to The Hollywood Reporter, Stratton said, “We are at the beginning of a new chapter for humanity. The process of disclosure is complex but it has begun"...

"Mike Flanagan is no stranger to giving people nightmares, thanks to a filmography that includes The Haunting of Hill House, The Haunting of Bly Manor, Midnight Mass, and Gerald’s Game. (His 2011 feature debut, Absentia, haunts me anytime I see a sidewalk that enters into a tunnel.) With a new Exorcist film on his list of upcoming projects—something he recently told the Hollywood Reporter he views as “an opportunity to make the scariest movie I’ve ever made”—he was asked which movies he personally finds terrifying, and his answer was surprising.

Speaking to THR in the same interview, he gave special props to 2008 New French Extremity entry Martyrs (“There’s a lot of gore, but it’s gore with a point. I generally don’t love splatter”) but saved his highest praise for another movie, also from 2008: “The last one that truly frightened me into getting up off of the couch was an Australian movie, Lake Mungo. It chilled me to the bone...”

"It’s fair to say that, in recent times, horror movies have become some of the most popular cinematic offerings. For whatever sociological or psychological reason, the audience seems to love the experience of being scared, and the result has been that many horror films are enjoying unprecedented commercial and critical success.

Over the last few years, films from the likes of Ti West, Robert Eggers, and Ari Aster have captivated horror fans’ attention, but that doesn’t mean that every single horror movie is capable of delivering quality. In fact, history has proven that horror films frequently arrive without being able to make good on their promise.

There are several reasons that a horror movie might fail even though it seems that, on the surface, it should succeed; a brilliant cast might fall victim to a poor script, or the scares of a film just might not land. Whatever the reason, though, it’s always a disappointment when we watch a shitty horror film that we hoped would do the real business.

We’ve compiled a list of ten horror movies that ought to have been better considering their premises, casts or origins. So, from completely overhyped supernatural offerings to dodgy remakes and sequels, here is a selection of admittedly terrible horror films that had so much promise..."

"... the film works because Hsu and Kun-Lin expertly deploy these (often heartfelt) conventions to great effect. They know exactly how to get audiences to invest emotionally in the characters’ relationship and the ending of the film is a genuine crowd pleaser in large part because we care so much about this ragtag team.

The other reason the film is such a success is because it is a textbook execution of a horror comedy: it is laugh out loud funny and surprisingly gory...

... Then there’s the film’s use of comedic sound effects, which includes cartoon boings and other Looney Tunes-esque audio cues. These elements effortlessly reinforce the film’s inherent silliness. Then add in a not-surprising but deliciously spot-on karaoke backstory for one character, a gag with a removable mustache, and the satire of the industrial work complex that rewards youth, ostentatious behaviour and a large social media following above all else. Dead Talents Society is plenty of fun, but it is also making some astute political commentary.

All of this is delivered in a highly energetic package by Hsu, who easily balances the film’s heartfelt character beats with the zany comedy. There are several sequences that play like a heist film as characters must execute their con on the living in order to successfully pull off a scare. The direction, sound effects and Shieh Meng Ju’s editing lends the film a zippy, high octane energy.

Overall Dead Talents Society is a genuine crowd-pleaser: it’s fun, funny, extremely clever and filled with lovable characters. It’s an instant horror comedy classic and one of the best genre films of the year..."

"A man in small-town Montana has captured footage of an Unidentified Flying Object (UFO) and shared the shocking video that made his wife 'cry' on Reddit.

The video was recorded on Friday between 10:10 and 10:15 pm, and showed what appears to be a blinking craft streaking across the clear night sky.

Said to have been spinning and adorned with a series of rotating lights, the apparent object flew over tiny Choteau, home to a population of just over 1,700 people.

The videos, along with the original poster's in-depth account of the sighting, reveals how the man and his wife first mistook the unknown object for a meteor.

It comes after Montana was singled out as a hotspot for UFO sightings, with visitors recording some of the most significant and well-documented footage..."

"As he branches out away from the world of horror, Mike Flanagan offers a cautiously optimistic update for Oculus 2. The 2014 horror movie served as Flanagan's first wide release and an adaptation of his short film Oculus: Chapter 3 – The Man with the Plan, centered on Karen Gillan's Kaylie and Brenton Thwaites' Tim confronting the literal demons of their past in the form of a haunted mirror that led to the deaths of their parents. Garnering largely positive reviews and grossing nine times its budget, the movie was an early step in Flanagan's eventual successful career.

While speaking with Screen Rant for the Toronto International Film Festival premiere of his new movie, The Life of Chuck, Flanagan was asked about the possibility of Oculus 2 happening. The writer/director confirmed he has "a lot of stories" in that universe that he would "love to tell", though indicated that the biggest hurdle facing development on a sequel is determining who owns the rights to the original..."

"This post contains spoilers for "The Thing."

There are several stand-out sequences in John Carpenter's cult classic "The Thing." The opening itself, where a Norwegian helicopter pursues a sled dog and attempts to shoot it, immediately sets the tone for this morbid tale enmeshed in distrust and paranoia. What initially feels like a senseless attempt at violence (or a classic case of humans behaving irrationally due to extreme isolation) is gradually revealed to be a sincere endeavor to rid the world of an evil force that can morph into people we know and trust. The inhabitants of the Antarctic research station feel helpless in the face of such a perfect organism — one that can mimic, adapt, and deceive at will — but the most cynical among them, MacReady (Kurt Russell), comes up with a litmus test to prove everyone's humanity and lure out the pretender.

The method employed is rather crude, but it accomplishes the goal anyway: a red-hot wire is dipped into blood samples on Petri dishes, with the intent to figure out if the creature's self-preservative instincts would react to such intrusion. Uncontaminated human blood would merely make the wire fizzle, but a mutated sample would respond violently to such a perceived attack ... and it does. Although MacReady's extreme (yet understandable) method doesn't quite go according to plan, resulting in some innocent deaths, the culprit is eventually lured out, thrashing grotesquely in a bid to shield itself from harm.

This tense, memorable sequence was the impetus behind Carpenter helming "The Thing," as it presented a unique opportunity to remake Christian Nyby's "The Thing from Another World" (along with adapting its brilliant source material, "Who Goes There?") while also allowing Carpenter to put his singular spin on it..."

"Two Mormon missionaries go into the woods and are sure of a big surprise when they call on a seemingly peaceful cottage in Heretic.

A24’s horror thriller — which premieres in Special Presentations at Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) on Sunday — is the latest film from ascendant writer-directors Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, and audiences will be pleasantly surprised to learn the actor playing the diabolical Mr Reed, who welcomes the unsuspecting young women into his home for a terrifying game of cat-and-mouse, is none other than Hugh Grant..."

"Watch enough genre movies and you will realise that grief is inevitably a doorway to all kinds of darkness. Daniel Kokotajlo’s creepily atmospheric adaptation of Andrew Michael Hurley’s novel is the latest in a long list of films (including The Babadook and Don’t Look Now) that harness bereavement in the service of horror.

Juliette (Morfydd Clark) and her archaeologist husband, Richard (Matt Smith), have returned to his family home in 1970s Yorkshire. But then a tragedy leaves the couple vulnerable to an ancient evil that lurks in the land. A slow-burning folk-horror, the film is a marked change of direction for Kokotajlo, whose debut, Apostasy, dealt with a crisis of faith in a Jehovah’s Witness community.

Starve Acre is steeped in arcane rituals and underpinned by the layers of pagan mythology that lurk beneath our thin veneer of civilisation. The brooding atmosphere is as oppressive as the haunted-looking wallpaper in the couple’s farmhouse. Some pleasingly icky special effects add to the general sense of mouldering menace. Where the picture stumbles, however, is in its almost total lack of effective scares."

"Observers were left puzzled after spotting a strange unidentified object floating above Whernside, one of Yorkshire's Three Peaks mountains.

The object was reportedly spotted on Saturday afternoon, with photographs taken by at least two people on the ground who were left scratching their heads about what it might be. The area in the Yorkshire Dales is often swarming with Three Peaks walkers heading up or off Whernside which stands at 736m (2,415ft).

The images were shared on the North Yorkshire Weather Updates page on Facebook, prompting a number of fanciful explanations, and a few plausible ones.

Someone said it looked a bit like the Starship Enterprise from Star Trek. Other explanations included a puff of smoke from a steam train, an afterburn trail from a jet, and a weather balloon.

Several people suggested it was possibly a swarm of bees, flying ants or midges, or maybe even starlings. One man said it resembled a 'mosquito ball' as he'd seen similar sights before.

Quite a number of people posted gifs of various spaceships, aliens, Martians, extra terrestrials, or references to War of the Worlds. Some suggested it was a 'dirty lens' on the camera but two separate photos emerged which suggested this was unlikely.

One man wrote: "The tent from Leeds Festival a couple of weeks ago, still flying...."