Movies
Intruder
“Prosthetic heads abound in ‘Intruder’, and KNB never met a prosthetic head they didn’t want to squash with a hydraulic press or run through a buzz saw. The body count may be low, but every kill practically glistens with gooey KNB love. Along with the outrageous violence, the film sports a cast that includes the Raimi boys and a don’t-blink-or-you’ll-miss-it Bruce Campbell cameo. It’s certainly no horror classic, but for stalwart gorehounds, ‘Intruder’ is sweet, sweet manna.”
Once a burgeoning young horror fan stumbles across the lesser-known genre films of the early ‘80s, discovering hidden treasures like The Burning and Hell Night, he will be inevitably drawn to the shitty slasher fringe dwellers of the era. 1981’s The Prowler serves as an easy example. It’s a lackluster slasher flick about an undead soldier who sneaks around a graduation dance, bayoneting obnoxious college kids. I realize that description makes it sound sorta appealing, but as far as horror films go, it’s suspense-free, and even boring at times. Still, The Prowler is worth watching for one reason, and one reason only––the preternatural make-up skills of a young Tom Savini. Sure the movie blows, but predictably, the kill scenes totally rock. Does that immediately qualify The Prowler as mandatory viewing? Of course not: the casual horror fan need not apply. But Savini completists are happy to tag the sign-up sheet.
Similarly, 1989’s Intruder completely sucks ass as a movie. The acting, dialogue, and plotting are unbelievably lame. Writer/director Scott Spiegel (a longtime friend of Sam Raimi who’s credited with writing Evil Dead 2) attempts maximum creativity when staging his scenes and the unfortunate result is film school amateur hour. His shot selection is frequently straight-up silly, with absurd perspective shots serving as the apparent core of his directorial skill set. But this shitty-ass little film has an ace up its sleeve––some early, jaw-dropping work from KNB, the unparalleled king of contemporary make-up effects.
Although Paramount scrubbed out all of the gore prior to its R-rated VHS release, a 2005 DVD reissue reinstated KNB’s beautiful latex carnage (and the recent Blu Ray from Synapse really seals the deal). The plot is frustratingly stupid: a handful of employees closing down a grocery store for the night are whacked one-by-one by an unknown killer. There’s an early red herring in the form of a lurking ex-boyfriend of one of the cashiers, but come on, any audience worth their weight in peanuts can see right through that shit. But obviously, that’s not the draw here. It’s all about KNB and their rubbery, blood-spraying goodness.
Prosthetic heads abound in Intruder, and KNB never met a prosthetic head they didn’t want to squash with a hydraulic press or run through a buzz saw. The body count may be low, but every kill practically glistens with gooey KNB love. Along with the outrageous violence, the film sports a cast that includes the Raimi boys and a don’t-blink-or-you’ll-miss-it Bruce Campbell cameo. It’s certainly no horror classic, but for stalwart gorehounds, Intruder is sweet, sweet manna.
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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