Movies
Priest 3D
“‘Priest,’ the second directorial effort from ‘Legion‘ helmer Scott Stewart, is yet another apocalyptic action/horror film that’s heavy on breathless spectacle and light on just about everything else that matters.”
Priest, the second directorial effort from Legion helmer Scott Stewart, is yet another apocalyptic action/horror film that’s heavy on breathless spectacle and light on just about everything else that matters. Like Legion, the setting is again a dust-covered desert wasteland, albeit this time around on a parallel Earth that’s been decimated by both nuclear war and a centuries-old battle between humans and a race of vicious animalistic vampires.
Very loosely adapted from the TokyoPop comic book of the same name created by Hyung Min-woo, the movie tells the story of a Jedi-like warrior Priest (Paul Bettany), who along with his former comrades has been relegated to the fringes of society – their prominent crucifix facial tattoos a permanent signifier of their role on the front lines of the war against the vampires. In an early scene we witness the effects of their social ostracization when a young boy is quickly ushered away from Priest by his mother, who casts wary glances back at him amid frantic whispers of “we don’t talk to Priests”.
After a brief animated prologue depicting the history of this alternate reality (hand-drawn by Samurai Jack creator Genndy Tartakovsky), we are quickly thrown into the story when we witness a teenage girl and her parents being attacked by an army of vampires at an isolated outpost. The adults slaughtered as their horrified daughter takes refuge in a cellar, we cut away just as her hiding place is discovered and the shadow of an imposing figure engulfs her cowering frame.
It turns out that the girl is Priest’s teenaged niece Lucy (Lily Collins) and her kidnapper a powerful half-vampire/half-human known as Black Hat (Karl Urban), who is leading a new crop of the animalistic bloodsuckers in a rebellion against the human race. Receiving news of her capture from a hotheaded young lawman named Hicks (Cam Gigandet) – also Lucy’s boyfriend – Priest springs into action over the protestations of his superiors, a corrupt group of steely-eyed monsignors who exercise an almost Orwellian grip over the remaining human population.
Dispatched by the monsignors to hunt him down (“dead or alive”) along with three other warrior priests is the beautiful Priestess (Maggie Q), who summarily defies the monsignors’ orders and joins up with the two men in their quest to save Lucy from becoming one of the “Familiars” – a word used for half-human/half-vampires who are kept as pale-eyed slaves by their full-blooded counterparts in the quarantined areas to which they have been relegated.
Thankfully, Stewart and Legion co-writer Peter Schink aren’t responsible for the script this time around, which was instead penned by newcomer Cory Goodman (Apollo 18). Given the former pair’s tendency toward both narrative illogic and expository dialogue spew in Legion, this is definitely a step in the right direction (“When I was a shawty” may go down as one of the most ill-advised bits of dialogue ever written for a mainstream film), though it’s not to say that the script here is necessarily good – it’s still rather prosaic and dispensable. Nevertheless, it possesses a welcome sense of forward momentum that was largely absent from Stewart’s previous effort.
Also on the positive side, Priest is yet another potent demonstration of Stewart’s considerable strengths as a visual stylist. While I could’ve done without the CG-rendered vamps (the utilization of practicals in the close-up shots would’ve gone a long way in making them feel like actual threats rather than the diaphanous video-game baddies they come across as here) and the post-converted 3-D, there are several sequences of kinetic, beautifully-composed action in the film – particularly in the third act speeding-train showdown – that are a five-star feast for the eyes. The widescreen vistas concocted by Stewart and cinematographer Don Burgess are also truly stunning, giving the proceedings a Leone-esque scope that is ultimately betrayed by the relative dullness of what actually happens.
Indeed, all the eye-popping visuals in the world can’t paper over the hollow core that lays at the heart of Priest. Though the cast is fine and does more or less what the shallow script requires of them, the character moments are rote when they should have been redemptive. There are of course the requisite romantic elements here – both between Priest and Priestess (their barely-apparent “sexual tension” hindered by his oath of celibacy) and Hicks and Lucy – but rather than elevate the film’s emotional stakes, they instead land with a resounding thud that would no doubt echo far and wide across the film’s cracked and magnificent dystopian landscape.
Ghostface is back on the big screen this weekend… well, sort of… with the release of Scary Movie, which marks the Wayans brothers’ return to the horror spoof franchise for the first time since Scary Movie 2 back in the day. It’s likely to be the talk of the horror community for the weekend, but don’t overlook the other six genre movies that were freshly unleashed today.
Here’s all the new horror that released on Friday, June 5, 2026.
The horror spoof franchise is back with Scary Movie now playing in theaters!
Marlon Wayans (“Shorty”), Shawn Wayans (“Ray”), Anna Faris (“Cindy”), and Regina Hall (“Brenda”) reunite for the new Scary Movie, with the cast also including Dave Sheridan, Lochlyn Munro, Cheri Oteri, Chris Elliott, Jon Abrahams, Damon Wayans Jr., Gregg Wayans, Kim Wayans, Benny Zielke, Cameron Scott Roberts, Heidi Gardner, Olivia Rose Keegan, Ruby Snowber, Savannah Lee Nassif, Sydney Park, and Felissa Rose.
Twenty-six years after outrunning a suspiciously familiar masked killer (“Ghostface”), the Core Four are back in the killer’s crosshairs and no horror movie IP is safe…
Scary Movie will slash through reboots, remakes, requels, prequels, sequels, spin-offs, elevated horror, origin stories, anything with the word legacy in it, and every “final chapter” that absolutely isn’t. A whole lot has changed in the horror genre since the Wayans Brothers were in charge of the franchise; their involvement ended with Scary Movie 2 back in 2001!
Michael Tiddes (A Haunted House) directs Scary Movie 6 from a script written by Marlon Wayans, Shawn Wayans, original Scary Movie director Keenen Ivory Wayans, Craig Wayans (Scary Movie 2), and Rick Alvarez (A Haunted House).
From IFC, shark attack movie Chum is now available on Digital.
Alice Eve (Haunting of Queen Mary) stars in shark attack movie alongside Eric Michael Cole, Jim Klock, Elle Haymond, Lisa Yaro, Johnny Gaffney, and Sarah Siadat.
This one sounds very similar to last year’s Dangerous Animals…
Here’s the plot: “A newlywed couple joins friends on a Mediterranean yacht excursion, only to find themselves caught between a predatory shark and a psychopathic killer in their midst-transforming a sun-drenched escape into a fight for survival.”
Jonathan Zuck directs Chum, from a script by Jonathan Zuck and Joe Leone.
Samara Weaving (Ready or Not 2: Here I Come) and Kyle Gallner (Strange Darling) come together in Carolina Caroline, a sexy crime thriller now playing in theaters.
It’s not a horror movie, mind you, but it’s worth a mention here all the same.
Kyra Sedgwick (Family Movie) and Jon Gries also star in the romantic crime thriller.
Director Adam Carter Rehmeier’s film stars Samara Weaving as Caroline Daniels, whose desire to leave her small Texas town brings her into the orbit of a charismatic con man (Kyle Gallner), and together they weave a path of crime and passion across the American Southeast.
Adam Rehmeier previously directed the films Dinner in America and Snack Shack.
Tom Dean wrote the screenplay for Carolina Caroline.
Similar to Steven Spielberg’s upcoming big screen blockbuster Disclosure Day, Signal One explores humankind’s enduring question: what if we aren’t alone in the universe?
The sci-fi thriller is now available on Digital.
Isabelle Fuhrman (Orphan), Josh Hutcherson (Five Nights at Freddy’s), David Thewlis (Harry Potter), Raoul Bhaneja (Possessor), Emma Ho (“The Expanse”), and Dennis Quaid (The Substance) star in Signal One from director Jonathan Sobol (The Art of the Steal).
When tech billionaire Sam Houston (Quaid) hires the brilliant computer scientist Annika (Fuhrman), she ventures to an isolated facility run by the brilliant, nihilistic creator of LITTLEMOUTH, a machine which can communicate with alien intelligence.
Annika soon learns some humanity-altering facts: that we are not alone in the universe, that alien intelligences are communicating around us at every moment, and that we are likely too primitive to even remotely understand what they are trying to tell us.
When the goal of the endeavor shifts from listening to talking back, the project rapidly devolves into chaos. With contact comes consequences, and soon Annika and the team must work to ensure the very survival of our species.
A schoolyard dare becomes an urban legend in the creepypasta-inspired horror anthology The Summoning. The indie film is now available on Digital from Brainstorm Media.
“A babysitting gig becomes a nightmare of urban legend when three teens summon Baby Blue. Survival depends on uncovering the past to escape a mother’s wrath from beyond the grave.”
Felipe Vargas (Rosario, Hive), Sergio Gonzalez, Brandon Piskorik, Corey Benson Powers, and Brian Sepanzyk direct the segments. Valeria San Martín, Justina Ceballos, Daniela Flombaum, Nannu Spannauss, Agustín Olcese, and Giovanni Onetti star.
The Summoning is written by Camilo Zaffora.
Happy Death Day actress Jessica Rothe stars as a mom struggling to keep her grip on her sanity and memory in the mind-bending Affection, now available on Digital at home.
In Affection, “Afflicted by a mysterious condition that resets her memory, Ellie becomes trapped in a cyclical nightmare with a man who claims to be her husband. She soon must uncover the horrifying truth of her existence—before she forgets it all again.“
Joseph Cross (“Big Little Lies”) and Julianna Layne (“Chicago P.D.”) also star in the sci-fi horror thriller. Affection marks the feature debut by writer/director BT Meza.
Daniel Kurland wrote in his review out of the film’s premiere, “Affection is steeped in existential questions and fears that plague modern society, while it embraces the ethos of the ’80s through bold body horror. Add to that Rothe’s revelatory performance, and Affection is a hidden gem that will connect with your mind, body, and soul.”
Lucile Hadžihalilović’s latest dark fairy tale, The Ice Tower, loosely reimagines Hans Christian Andersen’s fable “The Snow Queen,” and it’s now streaming on Shudder.
In the ’70s set film, “Jeanne, a 15-year-old orphan, witnesses the shoot of a film adaptation of the fairy tale The Snow Queen, and she becomes fascinated by its star Cristina (Marion Cotillard), an actress who is just as mysterious and alluring as the Queen she is playing.“
Clara Pacini stars as Jeanne. August Diehl and Marine Gesbert also star in The Ice Tower, and look for a cameo from director Gaspar Noé (Climax, Irréversible).
“For me, The Ice Tower solidified Lucile Hadžihalilović’s place amongst the most fascinating creators of fairy tales today,” said distributor Yellow Veil Pictures co-founder Joe Yanick.
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