Movies
Monsters In The Woods
“Monsters in the Woods has its charms, though. First, the effects aren’t that bad if you take them with a low-budget grain of salt. The monsters themselves reminded me of 1960’s cold war scare films. There are effects, like the girl getting her face ripped off, that are pretty good if you don’t stare at it for too long. And did I mention the cave vagina?”
Monsters in the Woods written and directed by Jason Horton can be summed up in two words:
Cave vagina.
It’s a wonderful thing that so many filmmakers are able to make their films. It is also something to be applauded when these filmmakers try to be real and new in a very competitive world. However, it is not enjoyable when a filmmaker appears to be lazy. The opening of Monsters in the Woods caused a swarm of mixed feelings for me. At first I felt it wasn’t even trying. Then the opening credits rolled and I figured I might as well stick it out. By the end, I was sorely disappointed.
The films teeter totters through being found footage of some sort to being a normal narrative piece. Jayson Harrisford and his crew are out in the woods filming extra scenes for his amazing film that distributors said was lacking sex and violence. The solution? Shoot so much that the watchers are “’choking on blood and titties.”
So for 28 or so minutes, we follow these bland characters as they set up shots and do behind the scene interviews. The producer is some guy that looks like the host of Bizarre Foods and long story short, he has made a deal with the devil to gain greatness for this film. His ridiculous debt is to gather 12 souls to open the gates of Hell which makes little to no sense because how can he become famous if it becomes Hell on Earth?
The most remotely entertaining part of this story is the point I made above. The gates of hell are in a cave. A hole in the cave. And this slimy hole of Hell gives birth to the monsters in the woods (Psst! That’s the name of the movie! Get it?)
Now, I understand that saying to a filmmaker that their movie isn’t very good is like telling someone their baby isn’t very cute. But when the entertainment is a girl getting mutilated by a giant bug monster and her response is “They ripped off my fucking face” to which another actor responds “It’s not that bad” – I get very irritated. I don’t understand how someone can put money into a film (and this goes for big-budget, too) and not even try to make it decent. Just because it’s low budget doesn’t mean it has to suck.
Monsters in the Woods has its charms, though. First, the effects aren’t that bad if you take them with a low-budget grain of salt. The monsters themselves reminded me of 1960’s cold war scare films. There are effects, like the girl getting her face ripped off, that are pretty good if you don’t stare at it for too long. And did I mention the cave vagina? It’s not the most disturbing representation in a horror film, but it made me even more straight than I am and kind of ashamed for being female.
The quality of the production, though, differs greatly. There are moments that the quality is so fuzzy that it looks like one of my old VHS tapes – and one that got chewed by the player. Again, this is probably intentional on the filmmakers part, but it takes away from any legitimateness that the film could have had.
This week kicked off with the release of hippo horror movie Hungry at home, and four more horror movies have arrived for at-home viewing as we head into the final weekend of June.
Here are the new horror movies that released on Friday, June 26, 2026!
The Halloween season can no longer be contained to the months of September and October, with “Summerween” becoming a thing in recent years. Essentially, it allows for Halloween to bleed into the warmer Summer months, and the first ever Summerween movie has arrived.
The Asylum released Summerween onto Digital outlets today.
In the film from writer/director Ryan Ebert, “On Summerween, a former circus clown escapes a mental institution to return to his abandoned mansion and hunt the teens partying there.”
Cole Chapleski, Chase Breithoff, Logan Roe, Sophia Sabol, and Clint Morrison star.
Director Ryan Ebert is the man behind a string of recent indie horrors we’ve covered, including Shark Side of the Moon, The Jolly Monkey, Jurassic Reborn, and Predator: Wastelands.
A witchy coming-of-age story from Dark Sky Films, Camp is now playing in select theaters.
Check your local listings to find a theater near you.
Camp is from writer-director Avalon Fast (Honeycomb, The Serpent’s Skin).
“Emily is the root cause of two devastating tragedies very early in her life, and she feels the weight of these accidents as though cursed. At her father’s suggestion, she takes a position at a summer camp for troubled youth to ease her guilt. When Emily arrives, she is welcomed by the other counselors, who accept her as she is and surround her with peace and forgiveness.
“As Emily begins to believe in a new kind of life, she starts to hear a voice whispering from deep in the woods — one that urges her to go home, and one that may be impossible to ignore.”
The film stars Zola Grimmer in her screen debut alongside Alice Wordsworth, Cherry Moore, Lea Rose Sebastianis (Castration Movie Part 1 & 2, In A Violent Nature), Ella Reece, Austyn Van de Kamp (This Too Shall Pass), Sophie Bawks-Smith (Honeycomb), Izza Jarvis, and Aiden Laudersmith.
Producers Tyler Perry and Jason Blum have joined forces for Peacock Original Strung.
The film is now streaming only on Peacock.
“A talented violinist takes a prestigious job as a music tutor for the gifted daughter of an influential and enigmatic family. As she becomes entangled in their opulent world, unsettling secrets begin to surface, forcing her to question her safety, her dreams, and even her sanity.”
Malcolm D. Lee (Scary Movie 5, Space Jam: A New Legacy) directs from a script written by Alan B. McElroy (Wrong Turn, Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers).
Chloe Bailey (“Swarm“), Lynn Whitfield (Jaws: The Revenge), Lucien Laviscount (“Scream Queens”), Anna Diop (Us), Coco Jones (Vampires vs. the Bronx), Langley Kirkwood (“Banshee”), and Romy Woods star in Peacock’s Strung.
Produced by Diablo Cody, director Meredith Alloway’s Forbidden Fruits brought a new coven of witches to the big screen earlier this year, and it’s now streaming on Shudder.
Lola Tung (“The Summer I Turned Pretty”), Victoria Pedretti (“The Haunting of Hill House”), Alexandra Shipp (Tragedy Girls), Gabrielle Union (Breaking In), and Emma Chamberlain star in Forbidden Fruits, released by IFC and Shudder.
Free Eden employee Apple secretly runs a witchy femme cult in the basement of the mall store after hours. But when new hire Pumpkin challenges the group’s ‘girl boss’ ways, the women are forced to face their own poisons or succumb to a bloody fate.
“Forbidden Fruits grabbed me by the neck the very first time I read it,” Diablo Cody said. “It’s one of the craziest, most creative, beautifully bonkers projects I’ve ever worked on.”
Meagan Navarro writes in her review for Bloody Disgusting, “Forbidden Fruits may not necessarily forge new terrain in the teen satire space, but Alloway brings so much style and energy to her well-cast single-location stage play adaptation for the Gen Z crowd.”
The film is an adaptation of playwright Lily Houghton’s stage play Of the Women Came the Beginning of Sin and Through Her We All Die. Alloway and Houghton co-adapted.
This week’s new release roundups are presented by HUNGRY.
All aboard the swamp tour from hell – this hippo isn’t playing games…
HUNGRY is now available on Digital. Watch it now!
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