Movies
Deadgirl (V)
“DEADGIRL is something that has never been done before and it will leave you shocked (or jealous – if you’re a freak). A twisted turn of events make DEADGIRL an immediate indie classic and one of the best teen horror thrillers in years. This will be one to talk about over a long cup of coffee…”
*Spoiler Warning
Probably one of the most challenging films at this year’s Midnight Madness (TIFF) is Marcel Sarmiento and Gadi Harel ‘s DEADGIRL, which takes a dark and dreary trip into the underworld of teen adolescence. This indie coming-of-age horror film is guaranteed to divide audiences with its intense subject matter, and what will make-or-break the film for most audience members is whether or not they find the film believable.
In DEADGIRL, which was scripted veteran actor/writer Trent Haaga, Ricky (Shiloh Fernandez) and JT (Noah Segan), two 17-year-old high school students, discover a girl (Jenny Spain) chained to a table behind closed doors at the bottom of an old abandoned hospital. The characters are immediately established as JT immediately has dark intentions, while Ricky will have none of it. JT later catches up with Ricky, who is furious with his friend, until he is shown JT’s uncanny discovery… JT shoots the girl, showing Ricky that it wields no results – the girl should be dead, but she’s surely alive (not so) well.
Now this is where audiences will divide, since it’s obvious something is “off” with the girl. She just lies there with her teeth showing and no reaction. She’s either vacant or just waiting… for what, you should all know. JT decides that they should keep her as their own – a “sex slave” if you will. From here on out everything spirals out of control…
DEADGIRL takes great pride in attempting to remain in reality, even though naysayers will claim that no boy in their right mind will f*ck a “kinda corpse”, while others would say, “have you been on the internet lately?” Try searching for necrophilia and bondage, some results are guaranteed to pop up.
DEADGIRL, while taking cues from films like SAW and HOSTEL, more so resembles STAND BY ME and RIVER’S EDGE. The creepy and dark premise, molded around a group of “innocent” teens, has its main focus on the coming-of-age story than the brutal treatment of the “deadgirl”. While this girl is brutally raped on more than one occasion, most of the film is spent filling scenes with heavy exposition, projected mostly by the delightfully evil Noah Segan. His counterpart, Shiloh Fernandez, puts on one of the best Joaquin Phoenix impressions, while overusing the word “man”, adding to the teen-speak dialect implemented by Trent Haaga. While the film (thankfully) isn’t trying to be hip and cool, Haada still overwrites a bit as some of the exposition becomes a tad too heavy – why JT is f*cking a corpse doesn’t really need to be explained. Even so, Haaga impresses by keeping the metaphors subtle and flipping the cliché segments on their ass. In one scene, the teens decide to kidnap a random woman from a gas station, and after attempting to beat her into the trunk she turns on them and kicks their little asses. It is one of the most predominant and delightful moments of the film, so uncomforting that it gives you a second to breath.
One of the guiding lights in the film is the score, which was very reminiscent of DONNIE DARKO. It sets not on the tone of the film, but also the pace. The look of the film was stunning being that it was HD, shot on a Viper cam, the same used in David Fincher’s ZODIAC. While projecting sharp and crisp, it still gave off a low budget, green/blue creepy edge – it was quite simply stunning.
DEADGIRL is not a zombie movie per se, or maybe it is? Either way, the word should be banned from use when converging over the film, as it’s something quite different. DEADGIRL is something that has never been done before and it will leave you shocked (or jealous – if you’re a freak). A twisted turn of events make DEADGIRL an immediate indie classic and one of the best teen horror thrillers in years. This will be one to talk about over a long cup of coffee…
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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