That’s why I’d hesitate to call Alison-Eve Hammersley a newcomer to the industry, as the writer-director has been pumping out quality short films and collaborating with other filmmakers for over a decade at this point. After all that effort, the stars have finally aligned and allowed Hammersley to release her first feature-length project in the form of the found footage throwback Erie.

A late ’90s period piece that was (mostly) shot on tape, the Pennsylvania-set thriller was completed in 2025 and is finally headed towards its world premiere via this year’s edition of Beyond Fest. While I admire the confidence behind the flick’s ill-advised tagline (“Not all stories are worth telling…”), the truth is that Erie might not be the kind of movie you were expecting when judging from the marketing.

The finished film stars Carley Stewart as Stella Scott, an aspiring journalist investigating the mysterious suicide of her sister Iris (Aimee Paxton). Stella’s investigation is aided by her reluctant brother Oscar (Grant Crater), with the bickering duo soon uncovering a bizarre conspiracy involving multiple unexplainable suicides in the area surrounding Eerie, Pennsylvania. Unfortunately, Stella’s growing obsession with the story and what it might mean for her budding career soon puts everyone around her in grave danger as the clues point her in the direction of an otherworldly force lurking in the wilderness.

This is obviously a great setup for a mystery, with the retro aesthetic and uncomfortable subject matter combining into an appropriately compelling thriller that doesn’t need to rely on jump scares and monsters to keep you hooked. In fact, while the majority of the runtime here is dedicated to the characters discussing events that occurred off-screen and piecing together a larger and possibly supernatural conspiracy, the emotional implications behind these story beats keep things consistently interesting.

This subtle approach to scares and intrigue only works because of the excellent performances driving the story forward. In particular, I was a big fan of Ryan W. Garcia’s strange demeanor as the troubled conspiracy theorist Red, though Carley Stewart’s fascinating main character is the obvious highlight of the experience here.

Stewart had previously collaborated with Hammersley on her 2019 short Fragile.com, with that horror yarn going viral back in the day due to its unflinching depiction of the hidden horrors behind seemingly innocuous online fetish content. Much like in that film, Stewart’s dedication to her role also nearly carries Eerie to the finish line, especially during the latter half of the experience when Stella is forced to confront the horrific nature of what she’s investigating and how her work affects those around her.

Unfortunately, this is where I have to address the spoiler-filled elephant in the room, as Erie is not a traditional found footage experience – at least, not entirely. The final act of the feature suddenly and unexpectedly transitions to a third-person cinematic perspective as Stella comes close to unraveling the truth behind all those mysterious suicides.

To go into further detail would require spoiling essential plot points, but suffice it to say that there was very little indication that this highly immersive story was headed in a more conventional direction. While films like Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon and The Last Broadcast have managed to effectively make use of the hybrid format in the past, I’d argue that Eerie loses much of its lo-fi charm the second those cinematic lights kick in and we suddenly find ourselves in a completely different aesthetic environment.

Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate how Hammersley gives Stewart a chance to shine in a more traditional manner, and that’s not even mentioning how creepy the visuals are during this last third of the movie, but I get the troubling feeling that the abrupt transition was more of a practical decision than a creative one. After all, it’s much harder to convey subjective experiences via an objective in-universe camera, so it’s possible that the filmmakers simply realized that they would have to resort to a comparatively simpler format in order to properly conclude a story about personalized frights that make people take their own lives.

Personally, I view this combination as something of an immersion-breaking cop-out that doesn’t even have a meta justification for its inclusion. However, even if you’re not as much of a found footage purist as I am, you’ll likely still find yourself baffled by some of the narrative decision-making towards the end of the movie, especially if you’re looking for concrete answers about the mystery that Erie spent so much time building up.

At the end of the day, your enjoyment of Erie will depend on both your opinion on the “sanctity” of diegetic filmmaking and whether you prefer your narrative puzzles to be solved with a logical conclusion or a sensorial smorgasbord of atmospheric scares. Personally, I didn’t quite connect with the surreal finale despite really enjoying the first half or so of the flick, but I can imagine that other cinephiles might have a completely different experience.

Regardless, Hammersley is clearly talented enough to warrant keeping an eye on her work, and I’d personally love to see what she comes up with next – especially if Carley Stewart is also involved!

Eerie made its world premiere and Beyond Fest and screens at Brooklyn Horror Film Festival next.

The post ‘Erie’ Review: Lo-Fi Found Footage Mystery Breaks Its Own Rules appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Flanagan’s Carrie adheres to the basic brushstrokes of King’s classic, but only barely. This vision of Carrie White, played endearingly by Summer H. Howell, is a doe-eyed sweetheart more outgoing than her previous counterparts. Her devoutly religious and misanthropic mother, Margaret White (Samantha Sloyan), isn’t a monster but a victim herself. Here, it’s her overly protective, motherly instincts while navigating a modern world that lead to missteps. A tragic construction site suddenly thrusts the sheltered Whites into society, where Carrie finds herself navigating the hierarchy of high school. 

It’s here that Flanagan dedicates his focus; Carrie spends a lot of time with not just Carrie’s peers but the Ewen High School faculty as well. Flanagan explores the nuances of teaching during a volatile time, where social media wreaks devastating havoc upon the lives of students and teachers alike. Rita Desjardin (Amber Midthunder) isn’t just the supportive teacher attempting to protect the vulnerable Carrie from her callous peers. She’s also a young woman trying to find her footing in a new career and new town. Matthew Lillard endears as the earnest principal trying his best while dealing with unruly parents, though it’s Tim Bagley who shines as a beacon of warmth as Ewen’s unwaveringly kind guidance counselor.

While Sue Snell (Siena Agudong) becomes a more fully realized, morally complex protagonist more adjacent to Carrie’s story, it’s popular mean girl Chris Hargensen (Alison Thornton) who receives the biggest narrative transformation. Thornton is incredible at humanizing one of King’s most vicious bullies, helped by a troubled home life. Though Flanagan affords sympathy for this villain, it’s also one of the series’ biggest missteps. It’s a tall ask of viewers to witness prolonged torment inflicted over eight episodes, and Chris is suitably nasty. It’s understandable why the catty mean girl is lashing out, but it didn’t soften this viewer to her cruelty in any way. Not helping is just how effective Howell is as the unwaveringly pure and disarming is as Carrie; the iconic shower scene becomes even more barbarous in the age of social media.

As a Constant Reader and constant King adaptor, Flanagan also expands on the telekinesis thread teased by the novel’s ending. Likely banking on subsequent seasons, though, this important subplot is relegated mostly to the background as a mystery driver that only fully roars to life in the season’s rushed final two episodes. So much time is spent with these characters that Carrie nearly forgets to wrap up, rushing through the prom to deliver important developments for the series’ future. 

Carrie is at its best and most compelling when focused on exploring the very human failures of adults and institutions. Carrie is put through the wringer, ensuring no shortage of heartbreak and drama, but Carrie paints a persuasive picture of a bustling town full of people so caught up in their own baggage that kids easily slip through the cracks. But in doing so, Carrie White winds up losing even more agency than before, making her calamitous story all the more painful to see unfold.

Telekinetic subplots involving mystery players and the fervent desire to explain her bully’s motives dangle Flanagan’s overarching vision, but by season’s end Carrie feels more passive puppet than tragically empowered. The cast is incredible, but Carrie‘s parts are stronger than its not quite cohesive whole.

This new adaptation saves its most radical departures for last, setting up a bizarre continuation not earned by the eight-ep first season. Flanagan’s trademark earnestness and empathy, combined with his talented cast and crew, ensure deep rooting interest in Ewen’s residents despite an inevitable outcome, but it’s not (yet) as radical a departure as expected. It’s way more effective as a teen drama than a horror show, though, and there’s no tangible sense of peace or closure after enduring an entire season of Carrie’s torture.

Carrie begins streaming on Prime Video on October 7.

The post ‘Carrie’ Review: Mike Flanagan’s Series Modernizes Stephen King’s Classic With Mixed Results appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Indeed, as the book begins, that’s exactly what we get, but it’s not the only thing we get. Lean, brisk, and wrapped in near-constant tension, Trad Wife is a masterclass in delivering on a book’s promise while also exploring the depths of the unexpected. Even thematically, this is a book that’s willing to probe the obvious while also reaching further, and its ability to do both masterfully makes it one of the year’s best horror novels. 

Jenny Kaplan is a writer in need of a break. After years spent writing thankless listicles finally paid off in the form of a runaway hit confessional essay about life with her ex-boyfriend, she’s been let go from her job at a New York-based lifestyle magazine and left adrift, internet-famous but somehow still broke and jobless. So when her editor offers her the chance to earn one last hefty payday by doing a feature about a popular Tradwife influencer, Jenny reluctantly takes the job. 

But despite the traditional values espoused by her content, Mia Wright isn’t just another influencer in the family space. From her family farm in rural Pennsylvania, Mia has built an empire of hit videos, lifestyle products, and a multi-level marketing platform allowing her followers to not just love her, but work for her, even as the constant stream of inventory makes them go broke. Jenny thinks she has Mia pegged even before she arrives at the Wright family farm. 

Mia, it turns out, is more than the subtle tells of orchestration lurking in her carefully curated image. What starts as a single interview soon turns into a weeklong stay at the farm, and the more time Jenny spends with Mia, her husband, and her many children, the more at home she feels, even when she gets desperate to escape. 

This all starts in a very familiar place, a set of tropes stretching through horror history in everything from The Stepford Wives to The Wicker Man and beyond. It begins with something that seems too good to be true: A woman genuinely happy in her life as a mother, homemaker, and content creator, without any apparent emotional baggage or artifice. The more Jenny sticks around, the more artifice she uncovers, whether it’s issues with Mia’s teenage daughter or the strange history of the near-abandoned town Mia’s business has helped to revive.

We follow Jenny as she picks at these scabs, searching for what lies beneath, and it’s undeniably compelling. Langan knows how to write the most conventional version of this story, so even as she’s laying out the ingredients for her own spin on the tropes, she’s delivering on what we’d expect to find here. If she stuck to the formula for the entire length of the book, it would be familiar, but it would also be undeniably entertaining. 

The real brilliance of Trad Wife, though, is that Langan doesn’t stick to the formula, even as she refuses to abandon it entirely. The expected scares, the terror lingering beneath a beautifully structured surface, arrive right on time, effective and creepy and oddly comforting in their familiarity. They’re juxtaposed, then, with the more uncomfortable stuff, the things Jenny would rather avoid. She wants to write a story about a fucked-up tradwife and her fucked-up social media empire, not find a strange kinship with Mia or fall in love with Mia’s kids. She doesn’t want to be absorbed in Mia’s life or feel at home on the farm or seek common ground with these people.

And yet, as the story twists and turns through discovery and epiphany, that’s exactly what happens. Mia and Jenny, after all, are both women who are very good at their jobs, battling expectations and institutional misogyny and the constant need to craft a persona in order to succeed. In other words, they are both storytellers, and when they butt heads, it’s often because their narratives both match. The tension this creates, even as the story barrels toward its folk and cosmic horror-tinged conclusion, is positively addictive. 

It also means that Trad Wife can gracefully, seamlessly walk the line between the expected and the jaw-dropping. Langan has somehow written a book that’s simultaneously exactly what you might predict and like nothing else you’ll read this year, a beautifully layered nightmare that’s somehow timely and timeless. Don’t miss this book. 

Trad Wife is now available wherever you get your books.

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I assumed the game would involve some light puzzle solving as I moved between set pieces with horrific creatures in a strange but beautiful world. What I got instead was a challenging cross between Dead Space, Super Metroid, and Resident Evil, with a unique vibe that immediately set it apart. While there are many stylistic choices that resemble Tarsier Studio’s work on Little Nightmares, this was its own beast, and all the better for it.

End of Abyss casts you as Cel, a technician who is part of a team exploring a strange underground compound in the aftermath of an unspecified incident. You’re escorted in by a team of soldiers, but after a brief introduction, you’re largely tasked with exploring the facility on your own, fending off the warped creatures that roam its halls. For most of the game, there isn’t much more to the premise than that.

There may be things you glean from the environments or notes around the level, but the few cutscenes in the game never really fully explain what’s going on. The setup feels like just enough to send you on your journey through this harsh and compelling world, though I was hoping for a little more narrative punch to pay off all the intrigue.

An Oppressive Sci-Fi World Built on Atmosphere

What it lacks in narrative, it makes up for in pure vibes, which is something that often works best for games of this type. From the first screen, the washed out blue color palette immediately sets a bleak and eerie tone, matched by the minimal but atmospheric soundtrack that accompanies the action. The preset camera angle captures things from an isometric perspective that shifts in and out when needed, giving the devs another tool in their toolbox for setting mood. Each room feels like a little diorama, showing off a decaying and broken down facility with weird biomass growing on the walls like something out of Annihilation.

It’s clear that it takes inspiration from retrofuturistic settings like Alien, but there’s enough to the design of the technology that makes it feel like its own thing. I particularly loved the suits that the soldiers wear as they tower over Cel with weirdly geometric helmets that hide their humanity.

The strong mood is key to making the environment enticing, which is important for a game so based on exploration. The first areas feel compact and dense, tightly designed with shortcuts like Resident Evil’s Spencer Mansion, but after the second boss the game opens up dramatically, revealing a more open and sprawling game than I anticipated. Like a Metroid game, you’ll gain access to tools or abilities that will allow you to open up previously unavailable areas, building a great network of paths to cross the facility’s various sectors. After a more linear beginning, I was really surprised at how little the game held your hand, asking you to truly explore the area to find the way to your goal.

Exploration Rewards Curiosity—and Patience

For the most part, it’s incredibly successful. Save points, which bring you back to full health and restore your healing items, are scattered around at just the right distance from each other, making it feel like a well-earned relief when you stumble upon one for the first time. Each sector has a map terminal hidden within, and finding that always feels like a huge victory. Opening up your in-game map and trying to see which areas you haven’t checked out yet, then puzzling out your route to get there is one of my all-time favorite things to do in a video game, and End of Abyss captured this feeling perfectly.

To make it feel even more active, you have a scanner tool that can be used to analyze objects in the environment. This will often be the best way to figure out what’s blocking you from getting through a door, whether it’s a specific key or it’s locked from the other side. Information about doors isn’t added to your map until you do the scan, making it part of the satisfying core loop of completing your map of the world. While some people may want a smoother experience that automates this process, the friction of having to do it myself was what made it more captivating, making me feel like I’m exploring and charting this world on my own.

As with many games of this type, this open structure can lead to frustration. There were points later in the game where I swore I had explored every single option on the map, but still had areas that remained inaccessible to me. It was a laborious process to retrace all my steps, room by room, trying to figure out what I had missed. In this specific instance, I had simply not noticed a switch to extend a bridge in an area that I had passed through many times. Due to the lighting and perspective, it was hard for me to see, only spotting it when I was randomly swinging around the scanner to look for something hidden.

You’re definitely intended to feel some friction as you’re exploring, as getting lost definitely feels like the experience the developers intended, but it’s a tricky tightrope to walk to make sure that’s balanced. It feels so rewarding when you take another look at the map and realize that you finally have the right item for an area, though frustration can definitely start to build if you’re not able to spot it. I definitely have more patience for this type of game, as exploration is one of the most rewarding parts of gaming to me, but if that’s something that can grind your enjoyment to a halt, go in knowing that End of Abyss may frustrate you in certain areas. It’s challenging to explore, but that challenge comes with satisfaction when you finally find your way.

Strong Creature Design, Uneven Enemy Balance

While exploring the many sectors of the game, you’ll be fighting the mutated creatures that roam the facility. Combat takes the form of twin stick shooting, with the right stick used to aim your various weapons. The starter pistol has unlimited ammo and will be your primary weapon throughout the game, but you’ll pick up other firearms that pack a bit more of a punch. The alternate weapons have a much more limited ammo supply, so choosing when to use your precious shotgun shells is key to survival. You’ll also find other items that either have exploration utility, like flares or placed explosives, or combat uses, like grenades. A well-timed grenade definitely turned the tide of battle a few times, which meant I was sure to keep myself well stocked.

Defeating enemies will yield a currency called Fragments, which can be used in save rooms to either craft ammo and consumables or upgrade your weapons. Grenades and ammo won’t be frequently found while exploring, so crafting them is the only way you can keep yourself armed for more dangerous encounters. Weapon upgrades, which require more limited resources in addition to Fragments, help your guns pack more punch, sometimes adding new fire modes or modifications in addition to a general stat bump. Most of my upgrade materials went into my pistol, since it was the most used gun by far, which often made me less likely to try to find use cases for other weapons, but they still made their way into my rotation when things got hairy.

Enemy design is strong throughout, if a little derivative. Most of them fall into the category of shambling humanoid, often given body horror flair by The Thing or Resident Evil-style mutations. While they might not be the most unique designs, they are well-rendered in the game’s gorgeous art style, brought to life by expressive animations that make them feel strange, inhuman, and dangerous.

Boss Battles Shine Despite an Inconsistent Difficulty Curve

I appreciate the way they break up exploration, but the fact that they respawn any time you stop and save can slowly turn them from menacing to tedious over the course of the game. By the tenth time you’re crossing the same area, they no longer feel like a threat, just something you need to navigate around. This is compounded by the fact that they are a bit more tanky than they should be, meaning you sometimes have to put a couple full clips of your pistol into a standard monster to take them down.

Robotic enemies in particular were guilty of this, which was exacerbated by the fact that they were the most common enemy in many of the game’s locked room encounters that required you to kill waves of enemies to progress. The tanky enemies do make the weapon upgrades feel more meaningful, but I feel like I would have enjoyed combat more if they had fewer hit points and more variety in attack behaviors.

Boss encounters featured not only the most grotesque creature designs but also the most interesting mechanically, but the difficulty curve of them didn’t feel quite right. The second boss of the game, a massive centipede made of bodies, ended up being the most challenging to me, taking way more tries than even the game’s final boss. There were late game bosses that I was beating in one try that felt way easier than the first few, so it feels like there could have been another pass done at slowly ramping up the boss difficulty in a smoother manner.

A Rewarding Horror Adventure for Players Who Love Exploration

Another big surprise with the game was the large amount of optional content. There is a weapon you get late in the game that allows you to progress into new areas you couldn’t, and exploring these areas will lead to collectibles that will get you the game’s alternate ending. I was a little disappointed with the vagueness of the standard narrative conclusion, so having both more sectors and narrative to explore after finishing is an enticing prospect, even if I didn’t have time to get to it in the review period.

For all the praise I’ve had for the general structure and gameplay, almost every aspect was, at one point or another, marred by technical issues. I had several instances where the map wasn’t updating properly, causing me to backtrack to areas that were marked as locked but I had already opened. One room I entered was completely black and did not properly show the room until I blindly walked into the exact right spot. I got soft locked when locked doors wouldn’t open after defeating the waves of enemies, and I had several hard crashes.

When trying to beat the final boss, it would occasionally not spawn after the intro cutscene, forcing me to turn the game off and on before it would load properly. One of the most frustrating bugs involved a fan that was supposed to be blocking me from climbing a ladder, but the fan wasn’t animating, so I was just hitting an invisible wall with no indication of what was stopping me. There were multiple patches during the review period, so hopefully things will be ironed out soon after release, but technical issues definitely got in the way of my enjoyment of the game several times throughout the 12 hours I spent with it.

End of Abyss is an uncompromised take on the Metroidvania genre that will probably frustrate many players, but if you get joy out of slowly filling out a map and puzzling out your next place to explore, you’ll feel right at home in its bleak and eerie world. While the combat could use a bit of a balance pass, both in its boss progression and enemy health, Section 9 clearly achieved what they were setting out to do.

The mood created through traversing its derelict world helped make up for the lack of concrete narrative, telling its tale through immaculately eerie vibes and atmosphere. My hope is that the bugs that hampered much of my playtime will get ironed out in the near future, because End of Abyss’ brand of demanding exploration was incredibly rewarding.

Review code provided by publisher. End of Abyss will launch October 1 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series and PC via the Epic Games Store.

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Ghost in the Cell is a fantastically gory horror film with the kinds of grotesque tableaux that would make Hannibal blush… but it’s also a comedy both dark and goofy, a biting social critique on government corruption and individual responsibility, and a giddy appreciation of freeform dance. It’s a lot, and it’s a testament to Anwar’s talent that his kitchen sink approach results in a wildly entertaining good time.

Dimas (Endy Arfian) is a dogged journalist who’s just filed a scathing takedown of corporate interests run amok, but when his editor chews him out and winds up dead mere minutes later, he’s sent to prison for murder. Cell Block C is home to a variety of criminals, all divided up like high school cliques of cool kids, bad asses, religious folks, and other weirdos, and it’s that last group that begrudgingly takes him in. When other inmates start turning up dead in increasingly bloody and morbidly beautiful ways, all eyes turn to Dimas as the possible cause.

Anwar has built a reliable name for himself in the horror genre with films like Satan’s Slaves and Impetigore, but the journalist-turned-filmmaker is not one to be pigeon-holed. His very first feature, 2005’s Joni’s Promise, is a romantic comedy, and he’s also made crime thrillers, a romantic drama, and a comic book action film over the years. It’s horror, though, where he seems most at home, but it’s horror on his own terms.

Ghost in the Cell throws all of these interests, plus a few more, into a big, industrial blender, sets it on high, and leaves the cap off, ensuring the mess gets absolutely everywhere along the way. Viewers who define tonal consistency as a single tone, maintained throughout, are in for a bumpy ride as Anwar moves from gory kills and slapstick comedy to a heartfelt dance and some silat-infused fights, often within the same scene. Gags come via pratfalls and humorous dialogue, sometimes bookending a deadly serious critique of those in power.

The central narrative, the supernatural horror of it all, delivers enough violent, painful-looking kills and exquisitely crafted corpses to hold the attention before the mystery is fully revealed. It’s a satisfying explanation built equally on local beliefs and universal truths, but it’s the meat of it that matters – and that meat comes mutilated, massacred, and mauled. For all the grotesqueries, the most disturbing and unsettling image is the form the ghost takes. It appears as a doppelganger of its imminent victim but with flesh that resembles the back of a female Surinam toad. If you know, you know, but if you don’t, Google it, watch a video, and then be haunted by the images for the rest of your life.

The theme of the film allows for some wiggle room, but the core message lands as both a critique of the powerful, the wealthy, and the classist and a celebration of the need for underdogs. That pluralization is important, as Ghost in the Cell isn’t about a lone hero facing down the threat and the system; it’s about multiple heroes finding each other and becoming stronger through that unity. To be sure, Anwar’s more than a little pessimistic about the state of his country, but he knows good people exist. As one character says after realizing only five of the prison’s fifty guards are good, honest men, “Ten percent of Indonesia is still some kind of hope.”

It’s a serious, thoughtfully optimistic plea for all of us to stand together and stand strong, but it never rests on those ideals. We also get a shower scene that uses camera, score, and butt cheeks to craft a homoerotic break in the action only to see it constantly interrupted by, shall we say, less chiseled extras that cause the camera to visibly recover and the music to scratch to a halt. The ghost arrives when people get too enraged, so we also get fight scenes where participants have to switch to dance to help calm themselves down. It’s utter madness, but it works to entertain, delight, thrill, and affect in equal measure.

Any knocks against it are fairly minor and forgivable. It could maybe stand some tightening in its first half. There’s one rough CG element amid the sea of awesome physical effects, and the backstory might have benefited from a little more clarity. All fair to point out, but none of it truly gets in the way of the film’s crimson-colored celebration of male friendship in times of hardship.

Ghost in the Cell is easily Anwar’s best, most fully realized film yet. It’s a genre bender that goes high in its commentary, goes low in its broadly comic silliness, and fills its middle with wet, sticky, beautifully crafted practical effects. As if all of that isn’t enough of a reason to watch, the film also joins the too-short list of movies that feature the cast dancing their asses off during the end credits.

Yes, this gory, violent, prison-set film from Indonesia is on the same short list as The 40-Year-Old Virgin. What the fuck, indeed.

Ghost in the Cell releases in theaters on October 2, 2026.

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Tennis, a sport that doesn’t seem to get many movies about it in general, has finally landed its first crossover with the horror genre. Bloody Tennis falls mostly on the serious side of the genre net, for better and worse, resulting in an uneven matchup between sports thrills and horror chills.

Sophie (Sandra Guldberg Kampp) is a young American with aspirations of winning some majors and becoming the world number one. She’s been sent to an esteemed but remote tennis academy in rural Spain to learn from a legendary pairing – Mary Tyrone (Elina Lowensohn) is the owner/motivator, and Stavkos (Zlatko Buric) is the coach – who guarantee results for students who give the training their all. Five other girls are already in play when Sophie arrives, and she quickly discovers that she’s only here because another girl left early.

The film’s cold open shows a girl being pummeled and killed on the court by a powerful ball machine with precision aim, so we already know she didn’t leave early of her own accord.

Training commences immediately, and Sophie’s not thrilled to see that it’s harsh, unfair, and heavy in hairy proteins. She knows she has to stick it out, though, and when a knock-out tournament is announced between the six students with an incredible end prize, she decides that nothing and no one is going to stand in her way.

Writer/director Nikias Chryssos paints a vivid picture with Bloody Tennis regarding a young athlete’s all or nothing drive to be the best, and he puts style on a higher pedestal than substance throughout. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, and the film’s “’70s eurohorror” vibes are certain to remind viewers of other films that have done the same. Dario Argento’s Suspiria and Phenomena, for example, both drop young American women into foreign academies with weirdly incoherent atmospheres, but Chryssos lacks Argento’s grip on the unfolding madness.

To be sure, he still nails more than a few moments of horror through imagery both beautiful and grotesque, and it works to unsettle and, on occasion, disgust. Bloody smoothies, writhing slugs and leeches, and bodily injuries captured in wince-inducing detail – a hidden tack stabbing into a toe is very effective – all feed into the idea that pain and suffering are necessary to be a winner. That suffering is required by both you and your opponents, and if you can tilt the scale so that they get the bulk of it? Well, that’s game, set, match.

As someone who only watches and plays a single sport, tennis, I’m always thrilled to see it captured in the movies, but it’s clear that Chryssos could have just as easily made this about pickleball or even water polo. Details of the sport never come into play outside of some gnarly scenes featuring the camp’s creepy handyman, Fred (Vincent Romeo), acquiring and stringing the racquets with “catgut.” In real life, people used sheep, goat, or other farm animal intestines to string with, but Fred takes the term more literally… and then goes another step or two beyond that.

Chryssos and cinematographer Constantin Campean also shoot the tennis sequences with an eye for style and beauty rather than authenticity. We get a few wide shots, but most matches are captured in close-up to highlight the sweat, pain, and inner violence that these teenagers are willingly enduring in their effort to be the best. It’s a highly effective choice given Chryssos’ focus here, even if it makes his choice of sport inconsequential.

Kampp does good work as Sophie and captures both the innocence she arrives with and the aggression she begins to develop. Her Danish accent occasionally slips through to remind you she’s not actually from Detroit, but it’s hardly a real distraction. The remaining young women are something of a mixed bag, performance-wise, but in their defense, there’s not much to the characters aside from the expected type-A personalities. Tracy Goteas’ Bana is an exception, though, as we see a more distinct line between Bana’s on and off-court personas. She and Sophie also share a striking transition shot as Chryssos moves us from a close-up of leeches to one of the girls biting the other’s bare back.

Bloody Tennis more than lives up to the first half of its clunky title, and while CG blood is nobody’s friend, there are enough practical gore beats to satisfy. I’d actually argue there are too many instances, though, as the body count really shouldn’t be as high as it is here. No spoilers, but Chryssos throws logic out the window in favor of delivering more kills when they’re just not necessary.

The film’s at its best when focused on Sophie’s growing understanding of the world around her. The academy’s atmosphere is heightened, obviously, but its real-world ramifications on the cut-throat nature of not just survival, but domination, are evident. A disconnected father, a deceased mother who was a former professional player, the idea that this is her only shot at becoming someone – these are fuel for her fire, and the strength here is seeing what she chooses to do with those accelerants.

Chryssos, who made his feature debut with 2015’s weird and wonderfully awkward Der Bunker, crafts an attractive and intriguing world with Bloody Tennis. A tighter focus on those inner workings would make for a more lasting and effective film, but as it stands, this is still an entertaining and icky entry in the sport horror subgenre. And really, parents need to stop sending their daughters to remote European schools…

Bloody Tennis makes its debut on Shudder today, September 25.

The post ‘Bloody Tennis’ Review: Entertaining Eurohorror Serves Up High Body Count appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Indeed, The Swallow is at its best when it’s the most like a Corman film, or the ’80s remake of The Blob, or a segment in Creepshow 2, when it leans hard into the garishness of its ideas and has fun with them. Unfortunately, those moments are wrapped up in a script that’s somehow simultaneously too slow and too brief, a cast working with only the barest hints of character, and a film so tonally confused that I still can’t tell if anyone involved was intending parts of it to be funny. Like its central monster, it’s a muddy mess, but that doesn’t mean it’s uninteresting. 

Like I said, we’ve got a really direct plot at work here: Young friends Ziggy (Grace Van Dien), Katie (Tayler Buck), Vince (Kalama Epstein), Rich (Jack Wright), and Kim (Kayla DiVenere) set out from their lives in the city to drive into the woods for a camping trip at one of Rich’s favorite childhood outdoor spots. After hiking a mile into the lush forest and setting up camp, they soon discover that they’re surrounded by pools of steaming mud with a pull like quicksand on steroids and an apparent sentience that makes it even more dangerous. As her friends become snared in the muck, Ziggy sets out to search for answers, while the other survivors fight for their lives. 

Basic (not a bad thing), uncut survival horror stuff, right? There’s a monster; it kills you in interesting ways, and you have to try to survive while it eats your friends. We’ve all seen this movie, and we’re still not tired of it, as anyone who’s loved movies like Slither or Infested in recent years can tell you. There’s always something new to do with this basic premise, as long as you’ve got a few things on your side. 

Let’s start with the good stuff. As lame as “sentient mud” might sound on paper to some of you, the creature at the heart of the Swallow really is its most interesting character. Comparisons to “The Raft” from Creepshow 2 are already floating around, and they’re not entirely off base. This story isn’t as good at building tension or genuine empathy in the way “The Raft” is, and that story benefits from brevity, but we’re talking about the same kind of ineffable muck monster. At its best, this creature is clever, even witty, and when it starts to go to work on human bodies, it makes for some striking, gloriously gnarly practical effects.

There are at least two gore shots in this one that I’ll be thinking about for quite a while. 

Sadly, the monster really is the most interesting sentient thing in the movie. The young cast, who genuinely give it everything they’ve got and wrench some real feeling out of moments of peak terror, are saddled with a script that reveals little interiority, or even basic dynamics between the characters beyond a series of archetypes. This wouldn’t necessarily be a problem, wooden dialogue and all (at one point a character no older than maybe 22 says “scurry on your butt,” I kid you not, three times in a row), but what’s mystifying is how much the film seems to want to try to be something at least a little more complex. 

There are hints of bigger ideas at work in the story, both on a micro and macro level, that either never pay off or simply linger in the background in an effort to offer some vague connection to something like an environmentalist message. Just one, non-spoilery example: Early in the film, it’s established that Ziggy’s real name is “Chelsea,” and she hates being called that, so when another character makes a point of calling her that, it hints at antagonism. Is there tension in this friend group? Are Vince and Ziggy insecure about their relationship in light of Rich and Katie’s? These things are sort of gently lobbed at the screen for a few moments, then disappear like smoke, evaporating any real potential empathetic link along with them. It leaves the film feeling unfocused at best and unfinished at worst. 

This lack of focus – which is sometimes literal, as the focus in many of the forest scenes appears alarmingly soft – colors the rest of the film a muddy brown. It’s too serious to be intentionally funny, too reserved to be camp, and yet too campy to be grounded. Apart from the central monster, which really does hold the film together with its surprisingly effective set of talents, The Swallow feels less like a movie and more like an excuse to make a mud monster. The film feels cobbled together around one cool idea, and when that one cool idea’s really all to hold onto, the rest of the film sinks. 

The Swallow made its world premiere at Fantastic Fest. Release info TBA.

The post ‘The Swallow’ Review: Kevin Kölsch & Dennis Widmyer’s Creature Feature Sinks In The Mud [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

That’s never happened with Due’s fiction. Instead, the celebrated author, teacher, podcaster, and more wields her vast knowledge to build novels like cathedrals, layering meaning and wit and depth into a story that’s also a thumping horror yarn. Due’s latest, Mazywood, is exactly that kind of book, melding the history of Black Hollywood with an unforgettable monster story to create one of the year’s must-read genre books. 

The “Mazywood” of the title takes its name from Mazelle Washington, a Black Hollywood legend who started performing as a child on the stage with her parents, and soon grew beyond her family act. As the title character in a series of comedies centered on a stereotypical character named “Lazy Mazy,” Mazelle built fame and fortune, but as with so many Black actors in Hollywood’s Golden Age, the more substantive roles were always just out of reach, and her legacy was marred by compromise, trauma, and regret. 

Jump ahead to the present day, and Mazelle’s grandson, Johnny, is dealing with compromises and regrets of his own. A writer and director best known for creating a well-worn horror franchise, Johnny dreams of more ambitious, fresher projects, only to be shut down in meeting after meeting. Frustrated and in need of a getaway, he decides to take his wife Tasha and his two daughters, Imani and Sharise, out to the mountains for a stay at Mazelle’s legendary retreat, Bear Creek Lodge. Once a haven for Hollywood’s best and brightest, the former resort is now simply an old family property, and represents a chance for the Washingtons to have a snowy vacation away from the Hollywood machine. 

But Johnny’s memories of Bear Creek aren’t the happiest, and the longer he and his family stay in the old lodge, the more he starts to realize that while Mazelle is long dead, something else is still alive on the property. And it’s hunting them. 

Across nearly 500 pages, Due’s narrative weaves in and out of past and present, telling the generations-long story of a bargain that was once struck and the ripples it’s still sending through the Washington family. In the past, we meet Mazelle as a girl with an uncanny talent, watch her rise in Hollywood, see her build her mountain retreat and welcome everyone from Clark Gable to Sammy Davis Jr. into her life.

In the present, Johnny and his wife and daughters are plunged into a nightmare as a monster stalks their vacation home, something inexplicable and strangely intelligent and connected to decades-old family secrets. These parallel stories each run with their own particular cadence, and yet the emotional resonance of the entire book binds them, unites them. With Due’s knowledge of Hollywood history and her own experiences in the modern development grind built into the narrative, Mazywood takes on a depth that allows the reader a chance to get lost in another world not too far from our own. 

The dual narrative threads also allow Due to show off her versatility as a horror novelist, because while Mazelle and Johnny’s story are of course part of one larger narrative, they each carry a different flavor. Mazelle’s narrative is a tale of dark bargains, Hollywood compromises, sleazy executives, and, eventually, confronting her own inner darkness. Johnny’s narrative is pure survival horror, a monster movie in the snow complete with excavations of old family traumas and a search for the truest version of his own history. Together they make for one ferociously scary book, but the fear isn’t the only thing knitting the story into one family saga epic. 

Mazelle Washington and her descendants are all storytellers of some kind or another. Johnny’s a filmmaker, Tasha wants to write a book about Mazelle’s life, and even Imani and Sharise are beginning to experiment with their own grasp of legacy, creating their futures as they dig into their pasts. By linking these family members together with a shared interest not just in their story, but in all stories, Due crafts a novel about the power and importance of owning your narrative, and the horror that comes when you realize someone else has taken it from you.

Even the title, Mazywood, refers to what Mazelle once named her lodge, in the days before she decided to rechristen it something that made more sense to the person she became. All of these ideas merge seamlessly with the propulsive thrills of the horror narrative, making Mazywood not just a book you’ll want to read, but a book you’ll want to read over and over again. 

Mazywood is now available wherever books are sold. 

The post ‘Mazywood’ Book Review: Tananarive Due’s Chilling Horror Epic About Black Hollywood’s Haunted Legacy appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Scripted by Suzanne Keilly, the film concerns Nora (Siena Agudong, Carrie), a Sigma sorority sister who is more than a bit of a disaster. At the start of the movie, Nora is the designated sober sister on the night of a big party, but she fails in her duties, leaving sorority president Sarah (Frances Sholto-Douglas) irate. Not helping matters is the fact that Sarah has just broken up with her boyfriend, James (Dean Goldblum), and is about to get murdered.

Five weeks later, the rest of the Sigmas are ready to move on, but Nora can’t let the past go. As the only (partial) witness to the crime, Nora is adamant that James, who is now in custody, isn’t the killer. Nora believes that she saw something in her inebriated state, and the only way to recover those memories is to get wasted and activate Drunk Nora.

The first act of Buzzkill expeditiously kills off Sarah, lays out Nora’s drunken ambitions, and briefly stages a house intervention with the other sorority girls, among them Brec Bassinger’s southern belle Kendell, Angela Daytona Wu’s meek and agreeable Beth, and OCD cleaner Mika (Jessie Diepeveen). From there, the film is off to the races as the Sigmas contend with pranks from their rivals – the Deltas, host the first stop of a Greek beer crawl, and endeavor to keep Nora sober, lest she sabotage their plans.

Oh, and the killer is taking them out one by one.

Admittedly, the slasher elements, such as the murder set pieces and the killer’s university-themed mask, are fine, but they’re not the main reason to tune in. Rather, Buzzkill’s single greatest assets are watching Nora attempt to get drunk and Beth’s attempts to help her.

Not only is Agudong a charming disaster, but she brings plenty of comedy and warmth to a character that could be grating. Drunk Nora is a terror, but her determination to help, often by folly, makes for some great slapstick moments, and Agudong’s timing is impeccable.

Then there’s Daytona Wu AKA Buzzkill’s secret MVP. The Sigma sister who is routinely forgotten by the other girls is so hilariously amenable to helping Nora that she, at different points in the film, becomes her willing accomplice but is also game to wear a lampshade over her head for most of the third act. One very amusing sequence involves a large number of handcuffs.

In addition to being silly fun, Garrard directs the hell out of the film, deploying whip pans, flipping the camera during scuffles and, in the most inspired directorial touch, deploying red hued freeze frames to denote Drunk Nora’s memories of the past. These interludes are visually distinct from the rest of the film, and the way that Nora moves among the frozen figures to remember things her conscious/sober self has forgotten is visually evocative.

These memories, partnered with scribbles and words that Drunk Nora writes on herself in black sharpie, are the clues that help Nora to solve the mystery of Sarah’s murder and identify the killer. Of course, because Nora was drunk when she crafts them, they’re often ludicrously and maddeningly unhelpful, including the words “A Slut” Nora discovers on her forehead early on.

Watching Nora and Beth as they investigate while trying to procure more alcohol and avoid the judgement of their fellow sorority sisters proves to be great fun. The biggest challenge is that Buzzkill is so focused on its drunken Sherlock and helpful Watson pairing that it doesn’t leave a lot of room for the other girls to make an impression. Bassinger’s aspiring sorority President plays like a mean Elle Woods until her motivations are unpacked in the last act, but most of the other girls are one dimensional, defined by a single characteristic, and/or feel slightly interchangeable.

Despite this, Buzzkill goes down easy. Clocking in at a brief 95 minutes, with decent violence (think a slightly more bloody version of the Happy Death Day films) and featuring fantastic comedic work from Agudong and Daytona Wu, Buzzkill is another solid addition to Tubi’s growing list of comfort horror titles.

Buzzkill begins streaming on Tubi on September 25.

The post ‘Buzzkill’ Review: Siena Agudong Slays in Tubi’s Drunk Slasher Film appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Compliance, the feature debut of writer/director Kyle Mangione-Smith, aims to do just that. It’s a film with admirable ambition but lacks the necessary focus to make its point, making for an uneven horror experience that completely unravels by the time the credits roll.

Recent LA transplant Sam (Megan Wilcox) is a social worker hired as a PR rep for Airbnb-like company UVisit. When UVisit patron Sarah (Lindsey Normington, Anora) is brutally gang-raped at one of the company’s properties, Sam is sent in to force her to accept a cash payout in exchange for her silence or, as the film’s title suggests, compliance. The company also volunteers to cover Sarah’s counseling and legal fees. 

Torn between natural human empathy and the demands of her job, Sam lies about having a history of abuse in an effort to bond with Sarah. The survivor catches on to the lie immediately, sending the corporate shill on her way after hinting at a larger conspiracy at play. Sam’s boss Harry (Charlie Wood) doesn’t have the patience for Sam’s “whole therapist thing” and eventually fires her when a colleague is able to get Sarah to sign an NDA. It’s not long before Sam finds a hidden camera in her apartment, sending her down an investigative rabbit hole of conspiracy theory trappings.

To its credit, Compliance starts promisingly, with its found footage/screenlife approach and Dark Web-centric plot suggesting something akin to Zachary Donohue’s exceptional and underseen 2013 chiller The Den. Following an intriguing first act that contains most of the film’s tensest moments, however, the film craters, briefly turning into an unengaging espionage thriller before devolving into a muddled political pseudo-satire that’s undercut by haphazard editing and an abruptly unsatisfying ending. The final act is chaotic in a way I don’t think Mangione-Smith intends, as it’s occasionally difficult to decipher just how many sides there are and who is on which one. Though perhaps that’s the point?

Mangione-Smith uses the screenlife format to his advantage when doling out exposition, such as an early scene in which we’re treated to an unskippable UVisit ad that plays before a news report Sam is watching. The voyeuristic nature of Compliance is keenly felt as well. Not limiting itself to just computer screens and camcorders, the film is presented via diegetic cameras of any kind, and boy howdy are there a lot of them. iPhones, security cameras, satellite imagery, body cams, computers, and more are used to make the audience feel just as complicit as Sam. Most of this is employed successfully, though the excessive use of digital artifacts gets old real fast, especially during a protracted late-game exposition dump from various news broadcasts.

Carrying the film is Wilcox, whose serviceable performance is strongest in the early scenes where she must grapple with the ethical dilemmas that her job entails. The actress sells Sam’s desperation well, especially in an unexpectedly humorous moment in which she almost gives herself bangs during a drunken haze of self-pity. Normington exudes the appropriate amount of mystique as Sarah, though she’s given far too little to do. Wood, meanwhile, delivers a rage-fueled performance so over-the-top that it becomes comical. This might have felt less tonally out of place if the satire were sharper, but it’s not.

Mostly, though, Compliance doesn’t really have anything to say, and subtlety is not its strong suit. Set in May of 2024 with plenty of references to the impending November election, Compliance is nothing if not topical. Though Donald Trump doesn’t exist in this universe, the mirroring to our current society is crystal clear. Content creators discussing how Naziism “isn’t really that bad” while empathizing with a mass shooter echo the current times, but we see all of this on a daily basis in real life. Compliance is content with simply reiterating the truth instead of actually commenting on it. 

Compliance wears its feel-bad nature on its sleeves, and while its early scenes are engaging, the narrative quickly falls apart as the shifting genres begin to take hold. It’s a shame, as this material is ripe for a satirical horror approach. Compliance just isn’t it.

Compliance made its North American premiere at Fantastic Fest

The post ‘Compliance’ Review: Timely Screenlife Horror Unravels With Unsatisfying Payoff [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

I was not disappointed. 

A book that emerges first as tech horror, then morphs into body horror, then morphs into something else entirely, Incarnate is a dark, prismatic dissection of the themes at the heart of Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray. It’s also thoroughly contemporary, soaked in the reality of our daily waking nightmares at every turn, and one of the most entertaining horror books you’ll read all year. 

Dorothy has spent much of her life on the periphery, always just out of sight of the people she most wants to see her value. Bullied as a child, she’s grown into a talented young visual effects artist who’s talked her way into a job with one of the field’s fastest rising stars. At Dorothy’s new job, she learns not just how to create realistic digital renderings of people, but how to make entire digital twins, fully formed characters who can sound and look like any celebrity willing to pay for such a creation. 

As she plays around with the technology, Dorothy decides to experiment and create not just a twin, but an alter ego, an ethereal, gorgeous young woman she dubs Isabella. A few quick social media experiments later, and Isabella’s a celebrity, the biggest new influencer of the moment, the person Dorothy’s always wanted to be. 

But such things have a price, and that price is what makes up the bulk of the horror in Incarnate. The deeper Dorothy gets into her time as Isabella, the more she seems to lose herself, both physically and psychologically. She realizes she’s done things she can’t remember doing, that her clothes fit strangely, that her coworkers are growing more and more suspicious about her seemingly sleepless existence and her late nights in the studio. If you know the Dorian Gray story, then you know the most basic progression of a story like this, but what makes Incarnate work is the way Katsu cleverly bifurcates the narrative. 

In one thread of this novel, you have Dorothy, the shy dreamer who would rather blast music into her headphones and work behind a monitor than really relate to her coworkers. When the Isabella thing takes off, it’s thrilling for Dorothy, right up until she realizes that in order to keep up the facade of Isabella’s reality, she’s going to have to work harder to put herself out in the world and ask for the things she wants. Following along as she deceives her way through life as an incognito influencer is great fun, but it also establishes that we’re dealing with a person whose self-worth is so distorted by years of neglect and mistreatment that she can barely see who she truly is anymore. For Dorothy, a transformation is actually necessary, even if what happens in this novel isn’t what she planned. 

Then there’s the Isabella narrative, which still unfolds from Dorothy’s point-of-view, but fills in the thematic flourishes from the other side of the portrait, if you will. Isabella is, like so many things we find on the internet now, made of pixels, not cells and molecules. She’s data, she’s imagery, she’s lines of code, but through Dorothy’s fascination with her creation, then amplified by the public‘s fascination with her, she becomes something more.

Metaphors start to emerge, simple at first, like the idea of the masks we wear when we’re on social media. But as Katsu develops the thematic underpinnings of this story, it takes on more meaning. It’s a story of masks and parasocial relationships and computed hallucination, yes, but it’s also a story about the horror of realizing you’re not who you’re meant to be, the terror of rebuilding yourself.

It’s about the price we pay to be seen, not just in a shallow, attention economy way, but on a very human level. This book is thrilling and clever, and moves like a rocket, but it’s also deeply empathetic horror storytelling, and that gives it even greater weight.

Incarnate is available in stores now.

The post ‘Incarnate’ Book Review: Alma Katsu Delivers A Tech-Fueled Nightmare appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Fresh out of prison, Idriss (Alassane Diong) goes to his former boss, Mam’s (rapper Gazo), to collect the money he is owed for the job that put him in the slammer in the first place. Mam’s has one last job for him before he’ll pay him, though: forcefully evict a squatter in the abandoned Kraken apartment tower. Insistent on changing the direction of his life, Idriss declines the offer, leaving the money on the table.

In an effort to impress Mam’s rising star Ouss (rapper La Mano 1.9) picks up the slack and goes to take care of the job himself, with wannabe influencer Marvin (Bilel Chegrani, MadS) tagging along. Upon seeing Marvin livestreaming at the Kraken, Idriss’ estranged sister Mélia (Manon Bresch, the upcoming Under Paris 2) asks Idriss and their friend Layla (Lucie Charles-Alfred) to go with her to get him. Little do they know that the squatter is well-armed and very adept at annihilating intruders, leading the friend group on a desperate fight for survival with, you guessed it, no way down.

Reminiscent of films that put a twist on the home invasion formula like Don’t Breathe and Green Room, No Way Down rarely lets up once it gets going. It’s an assured debut from Jourdain and Chabane, who turn Romain Protat‘s (Calvaire) minimalist script into a white-knuckle thrill ride. There is a subtle social commentary bubbling under the surface, but it takes a back seat to propulsive action set pieces and never really formulates into an actual thesis. Character work is similarly scant, with each one given a single defining characteristic if they’re lucky.

Cinematographer Raphaël Vandenbussche accentuates the Kraken’s intimidating presence with wide exterior shots. When it comes to the interior, however, he keeps things disorienting with frenetic camerawork that thankfully doesn’t sacrifice visibility. A clear geography of the Kraken’s labyrinthine halls is never established, but that deliberate choice is remedied by keeping the camera on the actors’ faces in claustrophobic close-ups or over their shoulders in a video game-like third-person perspective. This is all complimented by an energetic score that employs breathy vocals in the film’s more nerve-racking moments, including one standout sequence where Mélia and Idriss inadvertently find themselves in the squatter’s apartment at the worst possible time.

The squatter himself is an imposing figure. Adorned with tactical riot gear and a translucent burn mask, this dude is not messing around. It’s kill first, ask questions never. His arsenal is a mixture of lethal and non-lethal weapons, with a nose-destroying bean bag gun standing out in particular. We even get a falling refrigerator pulverizing one unlucky intruder in what may be the biggest laugh in a fairly serious film.

The violence hits hard in No Way Down, but this is no dour French Extremity film. On the contrary, No Way Down is more of a crowd-pleaser than one would expect, despite all of the crushed skulls and bloody pulp on display. Intestines are spilled, legs are slashed, and heads are severed, with the camera often lingering on the carnage. The outstanding foley work ensures you feel every crunch and squelch.

A slight script can’t keep No Way Down…down. Jourdain and Chabane have crafted a lean, mean, and ultraviolent thriller that, despite the grim subject matter, never forgets how to have fun.

No Way Down made its world premiere at Fantastic Fest.

The post ‘No Way Down’ Review: This French Debut Is A Relentless, White-Knuckle Thrill Ride [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Doris Bither (Heather Graham) is a single working mother of three living in Culver City, California in the fall of 1974. One night, her children are awoken to the sounds of moans coming from their mother’s bedroom. Eldest son Ricky (Daniel Ferrell) brushes it off as another of Doris’ suitors, while youngest Sylvia (Island Austin, Insidious: Out of the Further) insists it’s “Mr. Whosit,” an ethereal presence she has felt around the house.

When Doris is sexually assaulted by the entity the following night, she seeks comfort in her friend Kandy (Candi Marie), who believes her without question and takes her to the paranormal section of a local bookstore. It is there that they meet UCLA paranormal investigators Gordon (Marcus Coloma) and Taylor (Morgan Peter Brown), who enlist the help of their supervisor, Dr. Lillian Ross (Mimi Rogers), to investigate the haunting.

Director Nick Simon (The Girl in the Photograph) and screenwriter Thomas Fenton (I Spit on Your Grave 2) do not intend to one-up The Entity with more intense assault sequences (how could/why would they?), but rather shift its perspective. Sexual assault is not the focus of What Happened to Doris?, a decision that wisely highlights Doris’ plight without feeling exploitative, though the single act looms over the remainder of the film. Consequently, it often lacks the intensity of its forebearer, lessening its impact. This is not to say the film needs those sequences to be effective. It’s just that it doesn’t match it in any other way.

In its approach, What Happened to Doris? owes much more to Poltergeist and James Wan’s The Conjuring than The Entity, though Simon’s direction is far flatter than Wan’s. Cinematographer Lucia Zavarcikova‘s primary tactic is to survey empty rooms with a rotating camera, but there is little variety there. Supernatural horror clichés like foul odors, cabinets opening by themselves, creepy children’s toys, and “boo!” jump scares abound, but a fairly haunting atmosphere is captured within the house.

While the horror elements are all fairly milquetoast, the character work is where the film rises above those shortcomings. Graham, who also produces the film, is having a welcome, genre-focused career resurgence after a standout performance in Joe Lynch’s Suitable Flesh, as well as this year’s They Will Kill You and Mike Flanagan’s upcoming Carrie miniseries. Her scenes with Rogers and Marie are the film’s strongest, though the former’s arrival essentially jettisons the latter out of the film. A few more shared scenes between the three actresses would have been beneficial, but what is here remains strong. Graham’s performance isn’t showy, but it doesn’t need to be. Her naturalistic performance grounds the film.

Pacing is a mixed bag. On the one hand, it’s relieving to have Doris’ claims immediately believed by Kandy, while Gordon and Taylor’s skepticism thankfully takes up very little screen time. On the other, one can’t help but feel a slight truncation when Doris’ strained relationship with Ricky is seemingly resolved offscreen before the big climactic showdown. Running at just 92 minutes, a few extra minutes would have allowed subplots like that to have a little more breathing room.

As to whether the film has anything new to say about the case, that’s another matter. The real Doris Bither, who died in 1999, never gave interviews about her experiences, for fear that her children would be taken away from her. In their research, Fenton and Simon interviewed the middle Bither child, Brian (played in the film by Kayden Alexander Koshelev), but there’s not much new information here outside of delving further into Doris’ spiritual life and giving the entity a more concrete motive. In a rather bold change, the specter is given a corporeal presence, here played by Kevin Heppy (Smile). The gender politics feel decidedly modern for 1974, but it works in service of the story Fenton is trying to tell. 

What Happened to Doris? may lack the intensity of The Entity, but strong character work and a softer approach to the admittedly heavy material help justify its existence.

What Happened to Doris? made its world premiere at Fantastic Fest.

The post ‘What Happened to Doris?’ Review: Heather Graham Grounds Thoughtful Adaptation Of ‘The Entity’ True Story [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

But rarely do we get to see these children into adulthood. Though King’s 1986 masterpiece It sees our beloved Losers all grown up and Doctor Sleep features Danny Torrance as an older man, King leaves most of his young heroes in their adolescence. However, Constant Readers know that the author has been following one fictional child for the majority of his career. Other Worlds Than These gives us the final chapter in the story of Jack Sawyer, a singularly powerful child often tasked with saving the world.

In 1984, King collaborated with famed horror author Peter Straub on The Talisman, a fantasy adventure that sees twelve-year-old Jack traverse an alternate reality known as the Territories on a quest to save his dying mother. Without a twinner, or counterpart in the other realm, Jack has the unique ability to flip between worlds.

Seventeen years later, King and Straub would reunite to write Black House, a sequel story which sees an adult Jack as he struggles to make sense of his unbelievable past while solving a grisly string of child murders. Now twenty-five years later, King provides a conclusion to Jack’s story as he must defend the world against encroaching evil. Other Worlds Than These presents Jack with his greatest adventure yet while connecting multiple entries in King’s universe.

At first glance, readers might be confused to see Straub’s name gracing the cover of this new novel, particularly considering the accomplished author died in 2022. While The Talisman and Black House were equally written by both genre titans, Other Worlds Than These is a different sort of collaboration.

King remembers discussing this conclusion with Straub in the later years of his life, informally mapping out the final chapter of Jack’s strange journey. Though King fully authored this new novel, he recreates the previous chapters’ elaborate prose mixed with dynamic set pieces, extensive destruction, and occasional dips into outright terror. Straub can be felt on every page as King writes to honor his long-time friend. 

Fans of Black House know that we leave our heroic Coppiceman on a deadly cliffhanger. Years after this devastating injury, we reunite with an aging Jack who must spend most of his time in the Territories. Just a few days spent “America-side” and Jack’s body will begin to decompose, the precursor to a gruesome death.

He supports himself by running errands to our reality for the amusement of a childish warlord. But on his latest jaunt to Hemingford County, Nebraska (a fun Easter Egg for dedicated Constant Readers), Jack learns about a pair of delinquent runaways terrorizing the area who may have murdered his dear friend Dale Gilbertson. These teenage killers seem to have found a passageway between worlds and are laying waste to both realities. 

Though their crimes bring to mind Bonnie and Clyde, King names a different reference. The fictional Roy Kinneston and Tara Lynne Speckhoffer are directly inspired by Charles Starkweather and his girlfriend, Caril Ann Fugate, who went on a similar killing spree in 1957-58. King has long been fascinated with this teenage serial killer, and the duo’s murderous spree has inspired much of the author’s work, most notably the grim novella 1922 and Rage, the only novel King has pulled from publication. But this threat transitions from a pair of delinquent murderers to something else altogether.

Kinneston and Speckhoffer not only seem to be possessed by the spirits of Starkweather and Fugate, but their particular brand of corruption rapidly spreads through the Territories, with teenagers roughly dying their hair and massacring anyone who crosses their path. This coincides with the expansion of a black hole-like force which threatens to consume the very fabric of reality. 

Rather than the central nature of Black House, which takes place mostly in western Wisconsin, Other Worlds Than These mirrors the structure of The Talisman. Tasked with defending both worlds, Jack embarks on another epic journey as he follows a wide path of destruction carved by the killer couple and their acolytes.

We revisit the Blasted Lands with its infamous Slow Mutants and remember beloved friends lost on Jack’s first epic journey. But these are not the adventures of a wide-eyed boy on a thrilling trip. This Jack is a hardened and lonely traveler, remembering his glory days while finding the courage for one last battle. King punctuates the story with journal entries that fill in the gaps of this sprawling story, making it accessible for newer readers. 

In addition to this treacherous trip down memory lane, King makes frequent connections to more famous fantasy series. Considering its title — pulled from the shocking conclusion of The Gunslinger, the first book in The Dark Tower series — readers expected Other Worlds Than These to merge both epic sagas. While Black House lays out this connection with its talk of Breakers and the Crimson King, the newest installment becomes the lynchpin for holding King’s massive universe together.

Parallels and connections are fully fleshed out, and we revisit beloved characters from both literary worlds. It’s the closest King has ever come to confirming what Constant Readers have long suspected — the Master of Horror truly is writing one interconnected story. 

When describing his own inspiration, King admits, “I wanted to go back to Mid-World, which was always the Territories by another name.” We can feel this longing as King relaxes back into familiar ground. We’re treated to sweeping descriptions of the countryside on both sides of the reality divide and luxuriant stretches of warm conversation as Jack connects with new friends. True to form, King peppers the story with moments of dark humor and gruesomeness.

The Speckhoffer gang may be some of the author’s most sadistic villains, and he doesn’t hold back when describing their horrific kills. Other moments highlight the terror of this unpredictable world as new monsters rear their ugly heads. 

As Jack builds a second ka-tet to save the world, we’re reminded of another gunslinger’s epic journey. What begins as an older man hellbent on stopping a pair of teen murderers transforms into a poignant examination of the nature of chaotic evil. Some readers will be frustrated with a nebulous conclusion while others will find joy in the winding journey. Once again, King is less concerned with delivering a definitive ending than with pondering the cyclical nature of life itself.

Echoing some of his earlier work, like The Stand, Needful Things, and The Dark Tower, King reminds us that the true shape of evil never dies and the world can’t be saved by a singular battle. We must constantly be on our guard against new iterations of malevolence. 

While Other Worlds Than These won’t be for everyone — Dark Tower haters need not apply — King’s latest novel provides a satisfying final chapter for one of his most relatable characters, pulling Jack Sawyer out of the shadows and into the spotlight once again. It’s a mature novel from a creator who is entering the final stages of a long and storied career. Intensely reflective and meta-textual, we feel King saying goodbye to Straub while revisiting his own literary life.

Disguised as a road trip adventure story, Other Worlds Than These is a gorgeous meditation on the beauty of life and the friends we love and lose along the way.

Other Worlds Than These by Stephen King and Peter Straub publishes on October 6.

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A countdown to tragedy intercuts the tender opening montage that introduces Asher (Mescudi) and Iris (Jessica Rothe) as they meet, fall in love, then settle in for a life of bliss and bickering together, only for illness to truncate their love story. That countdown ends with Iris’s death, leaving a broken-hearted Asher angrily wishing to trade places. His grief is so raw and severe that he’s compelled to journey to the mystical Mount Samdi in the hopes of reconnecting with Iris in some way.

Instead, he encounters a crazed killer (Travis Kimmel), who drives him through a tunnel into an alternate realm of talking animals, including a Faustian spider voiced by Natasha Lyonne, who offers a bargain to resurrect his lost love. But that bargain comes at a steep cost.

Pathetic Fallacy, penned by Andrew Barrer and Gabriel Ferrari (No Exit, Ant-Man and the Wasp), is unlike any other. As such, it’s also a film that defies easy categorization. It’s at once a psychedelic pseudo-musical, featuring original music by Johnny Jewel, a cosmic horror-comedy, a sizzling romance, and a deeply affecting exploration of loss.

Nimble editing by The People’s Joker‘s Vera Drew further keeps viewers on their toes, unsure where Asher’s bizarre voyage will go next as reality and chronology bend and shift. That also entails one rather potent jump scare in a film largely devoid of them.

Mescudi and Rothe deliver achingly raw performances as the star-crossed lovers, and they also provide vocals to Pathetic Fallacy‘s soundtrack featuring original music by Johnny Jewel. But as the central lead, it’s Mescudi who frequently evokes genuine heartbreak that left this viewer in tears more than once. Mescudi bares both body and soul here, parlaying his sizzling chemistry with Rothe into a powerful emotional descent. Refreshingly, it’s rage that primarily fuels Asher’s grief, giving a uniquely bloodthirsty exploration of one of horror’s favorite themes: grief.

Capturing all of the cosmic insanity, which includes all manner of barbaric woodland critters voiced by genre stalwarts like Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead as well as Vera Drew, is the stunning 35mm photography by Chuk Owens. Much of Pathetic Fallacy takes place at night deep within the woods, and Owens manages to capture all the horror and insanity with vibrant clarity. 

Mortimer experiments further with cosmic imagery, wielding an entrancing visual language that casts a spell. That includes a few hallucinatory sequences filled with trippy, kaleidoscopic VFX visuals that encapsulate this film’s strange, whimsical wavelength.

Grief is so deeply weird and personal. So is Pathetic Fallacy. It’s messy and raw, primal in its sometimes inscrutable rawness yet profoundly complicated. It’s confrontational in its despair, too, which is all but guaranteed to polarize. But those willing to follow Asher into the trippy depths of Mouth Samdi will likely fall hard for Mortimer’s hyper-stylized, wholly singular vision.

Pathetic Fallacy made its world premiere at Fantastic Fest.

The post ‘Pathetic Fallacy’ Review: Scott Mescudi Anchors Trippy Cosmic Horror Odyssey Through Love and Loss [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Writer/Director Chris Nash is back at the helm, this time sharing directing credit with Nate Wilson. Also back are the over-the-top, insanely violent kills, a lack of nondiegetic score, and silent stretches of stomping through the woods. What’s different, though, is that this sequel is set at Camp Puddingstone, where bullied camper Alex (Lucas Nguyen) summons Johnny to enact vengeance upon his tormenters.

The only problem is that those campers are long gone by the time Johnny arrives, leaving only Alex, his sister Julie (Olivia Scriven), and her fellow camp counselors celebrating the end of season as targets for slaughter instead.

It turns out that Johnny’s silent, unstoppable killer perspective is far more interesting than that of an awkward, sullen tween who’s unleashed a massacre upon familiar Friday the 13th archetypes. Though just a kid, and a constantly picked-on one at that, Alex makes for a rough protagonist to track through the carnage for his repellent behavior that includes creeping on crush Olga (Laurie Babin), bullying another social outcast, and passivity as he watches all of the counselors succumb to increasingly gnarly deaths.

The sequel shackles us to a terrible version of Tommy Jarvis, leaving most of the insanely high body count off screen, with their eviscerated corpses leaving a trail to be discovered. That’s not to say it skimps on memorable deaths, though; Nash and Wilson not only top the yoga-pretzel kill of the first with a gruesomely protracted stand-out sequence but also deliver a solid handful of crowd-pleasing kills that’ll leave gorehounds howling.

The emphasis on practical effects continues here, too, ensuring each extreme burst of ultraviolence sears into your skull. Though we spend less time with Johnny this round, appearing only to stalk then graphically slash, Barrett’s Johnny remains an unstoppable force of barbaric evil. His physicality terrifies and intimidates; this is a killing machine who takes pride in his “art.”

The movie springs to life any time Johnny is on screen; it’s everything else around it that drags this sequel down. That’s not just reflected in a dream-like sequence that sees a shell-shocked Olga lead Alex to safety in a haze, only for this sequence to end on a deeply confusing note. It’s also in the film’s final scenes that clumsily harkens back to the first film. 

In a Violent Nature 2‘s fairly padded runtime winds up creating a repetitive pattern that sees an uninteresting young lead evade and dodge Johnny as everyone around him gets bisected, sliced, crushed, and, well, much, much worse. But whereas the lack of interiority was understandable in an undead, silent killer, it’s far more puzzling in a lead so closed off that he refuses to even open up to his sister.

There’s never any sense that Alex is in any real danger either, leaving both him and the viewer as passive observers to a summer camp slasher we’ve seen many times before. To be fair, that’s reflective of Johnny’s urban legend, but it robs much of this sequel of any real tension.

As a showcase of stunning practical effects and slasher carnage, In a Violent Nature 2 tops its predecessor with ease. That’ll be more than enough for those looking for a fun time, but this sequel doesn’t have much to offer beyond its inventive gore.

In A Violent Nature 2 made its premiere at Fantastic Fest and is coming soon from Independent Film Company and Shudder.

The post ‘In A Violent Nature 2’ Review: Slasher Sequel Delivers Incredible Kills But Loses Killer POV [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Eden (Markella Kavenagh) is blowing off stress, largely caused by financial worries over her sister’s failing health, with her boyfriend (Ras-Samuel) and close friends when pal Zack (Nikita Chronis) gets them kicked out of the club. They decide to “kick on,” but Zack insists on picking up more party favors from a sketchy Melbourne high rise. It’s ok, he assures, because it’s not the Russian crime boss they’re dealing with, but his son, Ray (Nikolai Nikolaeff).

Right.

The volatile drug lord entices them with free samples, but the wild night of revelry quickly spirals into paranoia-induced violence that creates too many witnesses that Ray and his cronies are determined to erase.

Kozakis, working from a script by Phillip Klimek, keeps it simple and straightforward, introducing irresponsible youths prone to making impulsive decisions that yield costly consequences soon enough. As such, it can be tricky to find a relatable foothold in a quartet prone to physical altercations and drunken bathroom breaks between bumps of cocaine. Kick On marks Eden early as the protagonist with a dying sister subplot that provides the narrative thrust.

It’s so truncated to get to the gory goods, and in direct contrast with Eden’s party girl role, that it falls flat as Eden’s entire character motivation. Her friends get even less consideration with their one-note characters, marking them all as fodder for pain and punishment.

Kick On makes it tough to care once the nihilistic violence explodes in Ray’s apartment, with Nikolaeff excelling at keeping audiences and his prey on their toes with unpredictable freakouts, toggling between sinister joker and drugged-out berserker. 

But that violence, oh so much exquisite pain and violence. Both sides of the battle lines get put through the wringer in the practical effects-driven carnage. Kozakis maintains full-throttle energy, escalating the violence and stakes as the body count rises. Even more entertaining is the way desperation leads to inventive weaponry and kills.

That sense of nihilistic carnage, combined with the friends being trapped within Ray’s apartment and forced to fight their way out, draws easy comparisons to Green Room. Kick On half-heartedly attempts to broach familial bonds, with Ray’s daddy issues running parallel to Eden’s mommy abandonment issues, but it’s more content to keep it superficial for the sake of nail-biting suspense and action spectacle. That’s also to say that it may arguably be much more violent than Jeremy Saulnier’s siege thrillers.

This Australian siege thriller delivers an adrenaline rush through sleek style, well-staged action, and a much appreciated commitment to spilling eyeballs, arterial spray, and guts as practically as possible. There’s not much there beneath the surface or rootworthy characters, but it’s the exact type of raucous, entertaining midnight movie best watched with a rowdy crowd.

Kick On screened at Fantastic Fest.

The post ‘Kick On’ Review: Ultraviolent Australian Siege Thriller Brings The Pain [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Red Snow, a new Scandinavian horror film that world premiered at Fantastic Fest this week, is that kind of film, beginning with its witty juxtaposition of Santa and vampire and continuing all the way through its resolution. It doesn’t always hold together, but when it does, it’s an absolute ball, with a few things to say along the way. 

It’s Christmas, and rebellious, vampire-obsessed teen Johanna (Anni Iikkanen) is having a rough time. Here, Mom’s off somewhere without her, while her Dad (Kari Hietalahti) is too busy waving around his new live-in fiancée (Marja-Liisa Nguyen) to care that she’s struggling. Throw in a clueless little brother (Otava Rossi) and a Christmas dinner at Grandma’s (Eeva Litmanen), and it’s not a happy Christmas. 

At least Grandma’s rich, though, and willing to indulge Johanna’s grit up to a point, even if she does think vampires are silly. The source of all the family’s money – including her father’s – Grandma demands a celebration on Christmas night, and to help out, Johanna’s father’s called in Santa. 

But while the man who shows up at the door (Hannu-Pekka Bjorkman), specifying that he must be invited in, might look like Santa Claus, he’s actually a different kind of ageless legendary being entirely, and he’s very hungry. 

Yes, this is a movie about a vampire Santa terrorizing a dysfunctional family at Christmas, and that’s as fun as it sounds. Writer and director Ilja Rautsi knows we came to see blood and guts and flying limbs, and he gives it to us, in part by bringing in a ringer in the form of a gruff old vampire hunter (Tommi Korpela) and his misanthropic home care nurse (Krista Kosonen).

As the first act unfolds, the script wisely builds in layers of opposition between various characters, including some who have no idea that they’re destined to fight someone else. So when the blood starts to flow, a really ingenious flow of horror chaos ensues that makes the film feel like You’re Next meets Fright Night. 

It helps, of course, that the cast is having a ball, diving deep into gallows humor, shifting allegiances, and just plain weird moments of body horror with not just commitment, but joy. Iikkanen is every bit the star, but she’s encircled by a cast of scene-stealers, especially Bjorkman, who makes us hate him even as he gets us on his side every once in a while. The fun they’re having is infectious, but all the mirth of the picture is not contained to the actor. 

Red Snow is verbally witty and packed with great moments of tragicomic acting, but it’s also a visually witty film, thanks to cinematographer Kertu Hakkarainen and editor Eric Backstrom. The film adores the “Red” of its title, draping Grandman’s mansion in heavy curtains and carpets that make it feel like an ocean of blood growing thicker by the minute. The pacing is smart, shuffling between perspectives as characters split up or find themselves forced apart, but it never loses the primary thread, the dance between Johanna and the vampire. 

It’s here that we have to talk about the often deft way that Red Snow handles the themes of Christmas within its story. On the surface, it’s just funny to think of the shared immortality of Santa and vampires, so putting them together is a nice idea. It also just looks cool, and the Red Snow team made sure to do more than play by the simple two-fanged rules so common to the genre.

But what is Santa Claus? He is an all-powerful, omniscient master of time and space, and yet (metaphorically speaking) we let him into our home because we trust him to also be an avatar of kindness and joy. More than that, we invite him, and we leave out cookies and milk to thank him for his visit. Santa gives, vampires take. The juxtaposition is just too good to pass up, and then the film goes further to make Santa’s dominance, like this vampire’s dominance, part of the patriarchal machinery that’s, in Johanna’s mind, holding her and all the women around her back. The men in her life are bleeding her dry, so why can’t a vampire?

Are these ideas always enunciated perfectly in the grammar of the film? Not quite. Do they sometimes get muddled by mixed metaphors and symbolic overreaches? Maybe. But Red Snow, on top of all its bloody fun, is also trying to be about something, something we might think about even more at Christmas time.

That’s good Christmas horror, and I can’t wait to watch this one again on a cold December night. 

Red Snow premiered at Fantastic Fest and has been acquired by Shudder. Release info TBA.

The post ‘Red Snow’ Review: Vampire Santa Horror-Comedy Goes For The Throat [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

You see, ever since the original creative force at Team Silent disbanded — resulting in the property being passed around between hack developers who undoubtedly loved, but didn’t quite get, it — Silent Hill had been in a state of gradual decline. From the mid-2000s onwards, it seemed as though every new instalment in the series was destined to be a disappointment. Some were admirable (Shattered Memories), some were abominable (Homecoming), but they were failures all the same. As if to add insult to injury, the tantalizing Silent Hills collab between Hideo Kojima and Guillermo del Toro was bafflingly killed in its crib, and the less said about that pachinko machine debacle, the better. For a while there, it truly felt like putrefaction had set in and that SH was now well past its sell-by date.

Enter the awkwardly titled f, which — in a feat comparable to how Resident Evil 7 saved its respective franchise from atrophy — showed that there was still some gas left in the tank after all. Breathing fresh life into Silent Hill, it took bold risks by daring to leave behind the familiar US setting; shaking up the gameplay in ballsy ways; and shedding much of the narrative baggage associated with its predecessors. Not everyone appreciated these changes but, for those of us who could get on board with the radical vision, it made for a galvanising experience. One that still adhered to the spirit, if not the minutiae, of the classic games.

All of which is to say that f was always going to be a tough act to follow. Not only was it brilliant in its own right, but it seemed to widen the scope for what an SH title could be and got us excited about the series’ future again. We’re pleased to report, then, that its immediate successor more than lives up to that promise and keeps the hot streak going.

Silent Hill: Townfall might be less iconoclastic when it comes to tearing up the series rulebook — indulging in more traditional “Silent Hill” tropes — but it still has ideas to spare and a unique vibe that’s entirely its own. From excellent storytelling to outstanding puzzles, an evocative sense of place, and supremely effective scares, it’s one of the franchise’s best outings to date. And proof positive that f wasn’t a fluke.

St. Amelia Provides A Welcome Change of Scenery

Of the many liberties that f took with the Silent Hill formula, the most striking was surely its decision to relocate the action from provincial Maine to rural Japan. It set a freeing precedent that Silent Hill games needn’t have anything to do with the titular municipality itself (SH4: The Room at least took place in the neighbouring Ashfield, which has plenty of lore connections).

Having now developed a taste for jet-setting, it seems that the franchise is overcome with wanderlust and wants to see the rest of the world. Because Townfall whisks us away to yet another time zone!

Fair warning, though, this latest excursion is a tad less exotic, as you’ll be trading in the picturesque backdrop of Asia for the chilly temperatures, bracing winds and choppy waters of the Scottish North Sea. Specifically, you’ll be exploring the fictional island of St. Amelia; a tight-knit fishing community that was once sustained by a bustling angling trade but that now appears to have been utterly deserted.

It’s not immediately clear what could have befallen such a quaint, isolated spot to make it a strict no-go zone. Yet there are a few clues scattered around the place. Notices from the district council reference disruptions caused by some recent incident; there’s evidence of both picket lines and vigils being held in the town square; and we gather that all of the public services were stretched to their absolute limits in the town’s final days (even the healthcare providers put up signs begging patients not to turn up).

So, other than the fact that you’ll be seeing pound signs instead of dollar signs, and that all the post boxes are coloured red, it’s got an awful lot in common with the bleakness of Silent Hill. If the civic leaders of the two towns were ever to reach out to one another, you could easily envision them establishing some kind of sister city arrangement. After all, they’re both enveloped by eerie fog, they both have the same normal world/otherworld dichotomy, and they both do that thing where they lure in doomed souls to torment them with their innermost fears and anxieties.

The target in this instance is one Simon Ordell, an American who has supposedly been to St. Amelia before yet appears to have no recollection of what went so horribly wrong there. He’s been summoned by an apparent acquaintance from the past, named Richard, who is under the impression that, together, they will be able to make things right. Whatever that means.

Washing up on the shore, with a mysterious intravenous drip hooked to his veins and a patient ID tag fastened around his wrist, Simon embarks on a mission to find Richard and reclaim his memories. Of course, that’ll be easier said than done, as navigating St. Amelia will also mean contending with its hellish weather, its illogical geography, the aggressive, vaguely humanoid creatures that prowl its streets, and the unshakeable feeling that the place itself wishes you ill will. Oh, and in addition to being a typical British town, it’s also got some freaky supernatural stuff going on!

Intelligent Writing and Mature Themes Make for One of Silent Hill’s Best Ever Stories

We’re reticent to give away any more than that, as the storytelling is often a bright spot in these Silent Hill games.

Townfall is no exception in that regard, with writer-director Jon McKellan crafting an enthralling and incredibly sad mystery that unfolds at a deliberate pace. Instead of saving everything for one big showstopping twist at the end, he and his team at Screen Burn Interactive sprinkle in clever misdirects and subversions throughout that keep you guessing as to the nature of Simon’s hidden shame, and how exactly it relates to Richard (as well as to an enigmatic third character: Zoe).

In many ways, the narrative does take its lead from SH2, with a protagonist once again being dragged on a metaphorical guilt trip through their own psyche. Yet there are some crucial differences too.

For a start, there’s a sense of political rage bubbling beneath the surface that we haven’t seen before in the franchise. McKellan brings a uniquely British perspective and righteous anger to proceedings that’s no doubt been inflected by recent events in the nation’s news cycle. Without going into spoilers, it’s not a coincidence that the first game in the series to be set in the UK focuses on a strained health service being brought to its knees, the impact of privatisation on communities, public inquiries into corporate negligence, a place that’s cut itself off from the rest of the world, and people generally feeling like they’ve been let down by the system. It’s probably not intentional, given the actual context in the story, but there’s even some stuff that cuts quite close to the bone revolving around protests happening near a local hotel.

There’s no question, then, that contemporary British issues were swirling around in the developers’ minds when they made this (either consciously or unconsciously). Yet even if you don’t quite understand the cultural relevance of certain images or references, it’s still a narrative that should resonate with just about anyone. Because the themes and emotions are universal. Not to mention, it’s fundamentally well told, with a keen understanding of the principle of “show, don’t tell”, a neat nonlinear structure that’s refreshing for Silent Hill, and layered characterisation.

It also puts an interesting spin on what the point of Silent Hill is. We won’t divulge any spoilers, except to say that it’s less about punishment and guilt here, and more about taking accountability and coming to terms with the immutable fact that what’s done can never be undone. Granted, it’s a subtle distinction, but one that makes quite a big impact when you get to the revelatory third act.

Stealth Encounters Get the Heart Racing

The experimentation doesn’t stop with the story either. Screen Burn also reimagines the franchise’s established gameplay by shifting the action into a first-person perspective and prioritising stealth over combat mechanics.

Indeed, while Silent Hill f was effectively a brawler — complete with parrying, perfect dodges, and upgrade trees — Townfall goes in the polar opposite direction. Fighting is treated as an absolute last resort, and the best strategy is invariably to run, hide and do your best to stay out of trouble.

This emphasis on evasion is so strong that, within the first two hours of our playthrough, we only killed a single enemy. That tally increased to about ten once we crossed the halfway mark, and then admittedly shot up to 87 by the time we rolled credits (the later acquisition of a shotgun emboldened us somewhat). Yet it might be feasible to get through most, if not all, of the 13-hour campaign pacifistically. Every area has one or two hiding spots for you to cower in, the levels are designed in a way that allows you to lure enemies away from the critical path, and it rarely feels like you’re being compelled to bloody your hands (which may have greater thematic significance when you eventually realise what the tragic, surgical-themed monsters are supposed to represent).

Another thing that helps you avoid conflict here is the portable CRT monitor that Simon carries. Utterly indispensable when planning your route through hostile territory, this device can be tuned into specific frequencies, enabling you to perceive the world in different wavelengths and look right through solid objects.

Sometimes, this is necessary for solving puzzles and accessing collectables, but it has great utility in stealth too. You see, the CRT can also lock onto the signals emitted by St. Amelia’s resident beasties, thereby allowing you to keep tabs on them even when there’s something blocking your line of sight.

It’s a very handy ability that functions similarly to Batman’s detective vision. However, there is a trade-off in that you can only monitor one channel at a time here. So, while you might be able to pinpoint the exact whereabouts of a foe when actively tracking them, you’ll also be putting on blinders to everything else around you and could be oblivious to threats approaching from the sides.

In a few scripted sequences, you do get access to an alternative tool that has the inverse problem. Using the medical pager, you can tell what direction assailants are coming from by consulting radial markers along the edge of the screen (a la Alien: Isolation’s motion tracker) and successfully track multiple blips at once. Alas, the readouts here are quite imprecise and give you no indication whatsoever of distance. This leads to agonising situations in which you’re hiding in a closet, painfully aware that there’s a fleshy abomination at your 12 o’clock, but not sure if it’s hundreds of meters away or standing right outside the door.

Other than the inclusion of those gizmos, the stealth is pretty basic. You’ve got a crouch button, throwable distractions, hiding places, and a few weapons for if things get hairy. Still, just because the mechanics are familiar doesn’t mean they’re bad. On the contrary, encounters can be downright electrifying in Townfall.

For example, there’s one bit where you are introduced to a new antagonist (resembling a figure covered in a suffocating hospital cast) that’s amongst the tensest set-pieces we’ve experienced in years. Trapping you in a small, four-room cottage, it gives you barely any space to manoeuvre and tasks you with somehow tiptoeing around your pursuer so that you can acquire a key and leave the building undetected.

However, when you finally escape those intimate confines (and recover from the associated panic attack), the reprieve is short-lived. For you soon realise that the whole neighbourhood has been overtaken with duplicates of the same mummified ghoul. What follows is an extended gauntlet that instils more palpable dread and anxiety than most horror games manage to conjure over the course of their runtimes.

Puzzles That Meaningfully Test the Old Grey Matter

In general, Townfall is a deeply frightening game. Enemy encounters can be pulse-pounding, the atmosphere is consistently oppressive, the environments are foreboding, the story goes to uncomfortable places, and there are a lot of those classic Silent Hill mind games to immerse you in the tortured headspace of your avatar.

Even the puzzles afford vanishingly little opportunity to decompress or calm your nerves. On the contrary, they often twist the knife in further by forcing you to commit grotesque atrocities and by imposing extremely stressful conditions when you’re trying to solve them.

Said headscratchers deserve special mention across the board, as they are all very well-themed, inventive and challenging. We got stumped for a while on this one that made us simultaneously account for dozens of initials, the workings of a dial mechanism and the compatibility of multiple different blood types. There was so much information to process that we resorted to busting out a notebook and drawing a quick chart to sense-check our conclusions. Meatier riddles like these, that actually make you pause and think for a bit, are the most rewarding to crack, and Townfall has a pleasing abundance of them.

Crucially, though, Screen Burn never pushes it too far or makes any of their brainteasers plain obtuse. More often than not, if you’re getting stuck it’ll be because you’ve overcomplicated things or misconstrued an obvious hint that’s staring you right in the face. That happened to us on a couple of occasions and, when we eventually cottoned on to what we were meant to be doing, our reaction was one of embarrassment, rather than frustration (case in point, there’s a moment where the code to a door is literally spelt out for you on a whiteboard, but we interpreted it to be something way more convoluted and ended up doing some Beautiful Mind shit for 20 minutes).

St. Amelia Feels Like A Real British Town

Other puzzle highlights include an escape-room scenario that has you jumping around to different points in history (with a fiendishly clever interaction), as well as a multi-layered problem that’ll demand you don a pair of scrubs and take on a gruelling night shift at St. Amelia’s hospital. A hospital that, unlike Silent Hill’s Brookhaven, is unmistakably British.

Which brings us to the exceptionally realised setting. Townfall does a phenomenal job of making you feel like you’re on a Scottish island. If you’re a UK resident or have ever visited one of the nation’s coastal resorts, you’re likely to spend hours marvelling at all the inconsequential details here. Everything from the road signs to the mini roundabout markings, the guide dog donation statues, the 20p tattoo machines, the signs advertising Sunday carveries, and the seagull-shit-stained benches feels truly authentic.

Without wanting to turn the rest of this review into a prosaic list of things I recognised as a British native, it got to the point where I was happily scrutinising the furnishings of council houses and examining the items displayed in the windows of unenterable mini markets. And when I discovered that, in order to restore power to a home, I didn’t have to replace fuses (as in every other horror title ever) but rather fetch a pre-paid utility card from the local newsagents and transfer the credit to a meter under the stairs, I was practically euphoric. I couldn’t believe that it was something I was doing in a Silent Hill game.

It Does Falter At the End

Between the nail-biting stealth, exemplary riddles, engrossing narrative and characterful setting, Townfall comes very close to brilliance. Alas, it’s not quite perfect.

Most notably, it starts to run out of steam in the final stretch. As Simon gets closer and closer to uncovering the truth he has long been repressing, the writing gets a little on the nose and starts making explicit what — up until then — had been artfully suggested. The ensuing exposition dump robs the narrative of some of its mystique and makes the prospect of repeat playthroughs feel less enticing (given that everything has been verbalised and wrapped up in a neat little bow). I particularly didn’t like how they bluntly explain what one of the monsters is supposed to symbolize, when everyone knows that part of the fun of a new Silent Hill release is coming up with your own interpretations for what the creatures mean.

On the subject of your adversaries, it’s also towards the end of the game that the lack of enemy variety really starts to hit you. You’re essentially dealing with the same three or four monsters over and over again and, after a while, you grow numb to them. That fleshy nightmare I described earlier is frightening when you first bump into him in a small cottage (unarmed and unprepared), but he’s nowhere near as intimidating when you’ve got a double-barrel and have vanquished him 50+ times.

The developers do at least try to mix things up by introducing an invulnerable stalker in the second half but, honestly, we just found them to be kind of irritating. They’re constantly harassing you during riddle sections and often stand around idly blocking passageways that you need to get down (only moving when you bait them into a chase). It doesn’t help either that this relentless pursuer drags out what is, by some measure, the game’s weakest level: an underground network of corridors that has no discernible personality, a confusing layout and the only dud puzzle in the whole game.

Nerveless, those iffy closing hours aren’t enough to negate all of Townfall’s considerable strengths. Even with the flaws, this remains a gripping experience that delivers everything you could want from a good Silent Hill title, while also pushing the envelope and innovating in some cool ways.

More than that, it’s the singular vision of creative people who had a personal story they really wanted to tell and who knew exactly how they were gonna tell it. Between this and f, it really does feel like we’re in a new golden era for this iconic franchise.

Review code provided by publisher. Silent Hill: Townfall releases on September 24 for the PlayStation 5, and PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store.

The post ‘Silent Hill: Townfall’ Delivers a Scary Good Time While Continuing to Innovate the Series [Review] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

That’s what makes the idea of her portraying alleged historic serial killer Elizabeth Báthory so enticing. Huppert commands the screen in writer/director Ulrike Ottinger‘s camp oddity The Blood Countess, but a flailing script and an abundance of tertiary characters threaten to derail the production.

In present-day Vienna, Elizabeth Báthory (Huppert) resurrects from a decades-long slumber at the same time her descendant, vegetarian vampire Baron Rudi Bubi von Strudel (Thomas Schubert), discovers rumors of a mysterious book that will revert vampires to their human form if they shed tears on its pages. The Countess reunites with her loyal maid Hermine (Birgit Minichmayr) to track down the book and destroy it, seducing and draining the occasional maiden along the way. Rudi Bubi inadvertently joins the Countess on her quest, hiding his true intention of using the book to gain back his mortality.

Plot plays second fiddle to deadpan idiosyncrasies in The Blood Countess, with Ottinger more interested in the strange, and admittedly fascinating, world she is building than any sort of coherent plot. It’s what the kids call “a vibe” nowadays, though it’s a wholly unique and distinctive vibe that’s impossible to ignore.

The literary MacGuffin is oft-mentioned but never truly feels like the threat it’s meant to be, despite Hermine’s insistence that it could destroy vampire kind (what are humans going to do? Put vampires in the stocks and hold the book under their heads until they weep?). The maid and her mistress embark on a literal scavenger hunt, which plays out like a quirky The Da Vinci Code as the two women move from place to place searching for the next clue, encountering many, many colorful characters along the way.

Speaking of side characters, The Blood Countess is awash in them. On top of Báthory’s nephew Rudi Bubi (a name that never ceases to inspire laughs, despite how often it’s spoken throughout the film), we’ve got vampiric scholars Theobastus Bombastus (André Jung) and Nepomuk Afterbite (Marco Lorenzini), a vampiric council, a colony of nuns, a trio of Báthory’s drunken ancestors and an adorable CGI bat named Pipistrello, among several others.

Oh, and how could we forget queer cabaret singer Conchita Wurst (Tom Neuwirth), who delivers a late-in-the-game rendition of their 2014 EuroVision-winning number “Rise Like a Phoenix“? It’s a lot, but excess is the name of the game in The Blood Countess.

While these characters never completely pull focus from Huppert (what could?), they lack the magnetic pull of Báthory herself. By the second half of the film’s 2-hour runtime, you’ll find yourself wishing more time was spent with Báthory and Hermine, as it is their relationship that proves the most intriguing. Ottinger clearly has an affinity for the tertiary oddballs, whose non sequiturs occasionally amuse, but more often confuse the narrative. So much so that it’s often difficult to decipher what’s going on on a scene-to-scene basis.

You’d be forgiven for thinking The Blood Countess is more energetic than it is, given how many cogs in the machine we’re working with, but Ottinger isn’t in a rush to get anywhere. It’s that languid pacing that nearly proves to be the film’s downfall. A haphazard approach to the editing may have actually worked in the film’s favor, but alas. Don’t worry, though. Huppert is here to save the day.

Introduced as the ostensible figurehead of a lavish barge adorned with extravagant crimson fabric as it cruises along a subterranean lake in Vienna, Huppert’s Báthory is immediately established as the grand diva that she is. Outfitted in costume designers Katharina Forcher and Jorge Jara‘s lavish capes (So. Many. Capes.) and dresses with comically long trains, Huppert’s majestic nature permeates the screen. It’s a wonderful role for the actress, who gets to exercise her comedic muscles with some delightfully deadpan line deliveries.

Despite being set in modern times, The Blood Countess is decked out in borderline anachronistic period accoutrements. From horse-drawn carriages to the aforementioned costumes and opulent set dressings, it’s a glorious sight to behold. Every frame of the film is bathed in production designer Christina Schaffer‘s sumptuous decor, with cinematographer Martin Gschlacht‘s (Goodnight Mommy) mise-en-scène providing additional spectacle. A staged shaving-turned-throat-slitting presentation to the vampire council is as gorgeous as it is grotesque in its Grand Guignol designs.

Though The Blood Countess‘ deliberately obtuse nature is more boon than bane, it’s likely to leave many viewers confounded. A tighter edit and focused narrative would have gone a long way towards fixing these issues, but at least we have Huppert to escort us along the way.

The Blood Countess made its North American premiere at Fantastic Fest. Theatrical release is expected in Spring 2027.

The post ‘The Blood Countess’ Review: Isabelle Huppert Leads Droll Camp Oddity [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

At the forefront of the crime investigation is Dr. Meg Garland (Deborah Ann Woll), an expert on death and decay. So much so that when the police find a rather peculiar crime scene that’s stumped their local medical examiner, they call her in for her expertise. The only catch, though, is that one of the bodies happens to be Meg’s estranged father of 34 years. The further into her search for answers, the more those around her die.

Stewart’s cinematography and rather gruesome forensic work evoke shades of Seven, a somber setting for Meg to work through her emotional baggage while showcasing why she’s the foremost expert in her field. Helping her are officers Ian (Will Hochman) and Marks (Jeffrey Donovan), a son and father duo serving as the ideal relationship Meg would’ve loved to have with her own dad had he not abandoned his family decades ago.

To remind that this is, indeed, a horror movie beyond a serial killer thriller, Downey injects a few terrifying hallucinations and flashbacks, underscoring the familial trauma Meg’s long ignored. Less effective are visually incoherent scenes propelling the murder mystery forward; Downey intentionally obscures attack scenes to preserve the element of later surprise, but it’s hard to discern what’s even happening on screen.

Woll’s vulnerable yet determined nature carries the front half through its rough patches, complete with clumsy foreshadowing, particularly where dialogue is concerned. The Cycle might be a dead giveaway title for savvy monster lovers, but the script attempts to throw off audiences with clunky mentions of Frankenstein’s monster or an on-screen DM from a “Demeter” handle.

The excellent news is that when the movie’s monster finally arrives, what a grand entrance it makes. The gruesome corpse work in the front half is merely the appetizer for Patrick Magee’s full-throttle SFX work in the back half, combining old school transformation techniques with modern, grisly creature design in a way that delights and surprises. Making this ferocious monster even more intimidating, as if the gnarled, gruesome design wasn’t enough, is creature performer Trevor Newlin (Smile 2, Alien: Romulus).

While much less so than the film’s front half, shaky camerawork does frustratingly obscure some of the action in an intense finale, a move likely to bypass limitations of creature FX. Fog also becomes a masking crutch in a crucial final confrontation.

The Cycle juggles a grisly crime procedural, complete with plenty of red herrings and mutilated bodies, and a winsome creature feature. At the center of all, connecting both almost disparate halves, is a family tragedy. But too much time is spent on Sherlock Holmes’ style of deduction and answer-seeking that it leaves little room to resolve the many questions raised in the back half.

Even still, the compassion The Cycle affords all of its characters carries it through to one hell of a monster movie in the back half. Downey adds new wrinkles and lore to my personal favorite variety of movie monsters, surprising with an inventive twist to a familiar staple. It may take a while for The Cycle to fully show its hand, but it’s more than worth the wait.

The Cycle made its premiere at Fantastic Fest and will debut on Shudder on October 23.

The post ‘The Cycle’ Review: A Grisly Mystery Gives Way to Spectacular Practical Creature Feature [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

It’s hidden knowledge, a secret that’s both alluring and potentially devastating, and when it’s translated into fiction effectively, there’s a sense that you have to look away, but you can’t. 

Play House, the first-ever Fantastic Fest pitch contest winner making its World Premiere at the festival this year, loves that feeling. It savors, bathes in it, saturates its frames with it. Lost media and analog horror are having a moment right now, but that doesn’t mean they’re easy to pull off. There are very fine tonal lines you have to walk, and while it occasionally stumbles, Play House walks those lines with compelling grace.

Elliot (Will Harrison), a former child actor still getting over a bad breakup, has just purchased a fixer-upper in Southern California, which he may or may not have done as a means of convincing his ex Cath (Jessica Sula) that he’s trying to get his act together. His best friend, YouTuber and lost media expert Alden (Jordan Gonzalez), sees the place as a dump, and he’s right.

The walls are filthy, the carpet stinks, the kitchen is falling apart, and the old, rusted water heater in the basement doesn’t work except when it’s croaking out sinister knocking sounds in the middle of the night. There’s a lot of work ahead, but in the name of turning over a new leaf, Elliot dives in. At least until he finds the tapes. 

In the basement, stuffed in an old plastic shopping bag, Elliot uncovers a series of VHS tapes and decides to watch them, out of boredom (his Wifi hasn’t been hooked up yet) at first, and then out of genuine interest. The tapes are episodes of a children’s TV program in which a human host, Mr. Morton (James Urbaniak), interacts with monstrous puppets voiced by what sounds like very tired, very frightened children. It’s a weird pop culture artifact, so obscure that internet searches turn up nothing, and even Alden’s never heard of it.

So, with Cath hanging around the house out of renewed interest in Elliot’s life, the three friends start looking closer, and what they find is something frightening which may or may not be bleeding into Elliot’s real life in his new home. 

There’s a real art to pulling off convincing lo-fi, analog footage for fictional lost media, and Play House would be dead in the water if it couldn’t pull that off, but director Nicolas Curcio and his team attack it with deft, careful hands. The show Elliot finds is definitely creepy, but as Elliot himself says, so was a lot of kids’ TV produced in the ’80s and ’90s. Rather than launching directly into all-out, obvious terror, though, the film’s depiction of this old TV show is surprisingly tragicomic, complete with weird puppet reactions and a host in Morton who’s just weird enough to start convincing Elliot that something might be off.

This could be a fake show in the middle of a horror movie, but it could also just be a weird thing someone made in their basement once upon a time, and it’s that convincing duality that gives the film a very solid start. 

Narratively, the film is a bit rocky, particularly around the second act when the film needs time to pass so it can develop certain subplots while the main plot just feels sort of punted down the road, but that does nothing to overshadow the solid storytelling at work here. Curcio and co-writer Kirby Gladstein set up their concept elegantly, set it in motion quite well, and when it comes time for a few well-placed scares, get the pacing right for maximum atmosphere.

The visuals help this tremendously, not just because of the wonderfully creepy production design at work in the old videotapes, but because cinematographer Zayd Ezzeldine manages to delicately paint in shadows in all the right places. Too often at this budget level and with digital photography, these movies can turn out flat, too light or too dark, allowing little space for contrast. I loved following this movie down into its dingy basements and through its dark hallways, and it adds a layer of the Gothic to a rundown old house in the middle of a modern urban sprawl. 

The characters also help the film through its slightly rough-edged moments, particularly Harrison, who has to spend a good portion of the movie alone in a sparsely furnished dump of a house, trying to grapple with the mounting disease his new home has brought. Sula and Gonzalez make excellent foils for him, each drawing out a different side of Elliot’s personality to create more dramatic tension. And of course, Urbaniak is a born scene stealer, and reaches genuinely impressive levels of terrifying. 

Though it sometimes stumbles with an oddly meandering plot and it doesn’t quite reach the emotional heights suggested by its first two acts, Play House succeeds thanks to a solid foundation and flashes of genuine horror brilliance from a group of rising indie stars. If this is the kind of film we’re going to get out of Fantastic Fest’s pitch contest, I’d call that initiative a resounding success. Play House is fun, creepy, earnest, strange, and exactly the kind of movie indie horror fans should be lining up to see. 

Play House made its world premiere at Fantastic Fest. Release info TBA.

The post ‘Play House’ Review: An Effective Lost Media Chiller [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

You lock the door, but what if they come in a window? You board up the windows, but what about the attic? It’s wonderfully customizable, and it’s rooted in something to which we can all relate: A violation of the simple safety and solitude of home. 

The Heretiks enters the subgenre with a clear grasp of its advantages, then twists them to meet its own needs quickly and with purpose. It’s a home invasion movie with witches, which means it gets to build its own set of rules on top of the typical scaffolding of the subgenre, then find ways to break them. That, plus a narrative that plays with our expectations while also delivering the goods in often spectacular fashion, makes for a hell of a ride and a perfect new watch for the Halloween season. 

It’s Halloween night, and college dropout Ada (Josie Juliette Wert) is stuck babysitting her little sister Mabel (Ava Mae Seidensticker) and her joined-at-the-hip best friend Wesley (Luke Speakman). It wouldn’t be so bad, except that 13-year-old Mabel is determined to be as rebellious as possible, including ditching her big sister at a party when Ada bumps into her ex, Ryan (Spencer Brabham).

It’s typical sibling drama right up until it isn’t, which is when a coven of murderous witches descend on Mabel and Wesley, ready to sacrifice the kids to their dark god in a Samhain ritual that will end life as we know it. 

By the time Ada realizes what’s happened, Mabel and Wesley have been herded back home by the witches’ former leader, the gruff and brutal Cai (Kimberly Epstein), the sole member of the coven who actually doesn’t want the world to end. With the help of magical barriers, the quartet manages to lock themselves inside Ada and Mabel’s house, but it’s only a matter of time before the witches outside find their way in, with blood on their minds and on their hands. 

Though it’s slightly stiff as it lays out its premise, by the time it gets rolling, the script, by the Hellraiser reboot duo of Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski, falls into a winning rhythm of humor, heart, and horror that hums pleasantly along for a brisk 90 minutes. There’s a clear grasp of the concept, lots of solid interpersonal drama on which to build tension, and a nice balance of heroes and villains, with Cai in the middle as the reluctant fighter walking between two worlds.

As the standoff begins, the film lays out some very clear weapons in its witchy arsenal, from barriers drawn in blood to white powder with certain possessive powers, then finds slippery, unpredictable ways to play with those toys. Sure, some of the dialogue is a bit jarring, and occasionally Cai’s role as the resident Explainer goes a bit too far, but it’s hard to argue with the propulsive results of the plotting and the well-drawn characters. 

Those characters are, of course, helped along by director Gregg Bishop (Dance of the Dead), who both keeps the narrative moving like a well-oiled machine and finds lots of ways within a relatively low budget to make The Heretiks stand out visually. I was thrilled to find that I was watching a film that does something all too rare in the occult horror space, which is to give its antagonists their own distinctive look and set of magical gifts.

Too often you see films about a coven or a cult and everyone’s in matching robes with similar hair and faces so obscured by shadow that you really can’t tell what you’re looking at. That isn’t the case here, and the title witches, led by the brutal-but-childlike Neve (Tess Williams), jump off the screen, often literally. 

These elements mingle quite well together, helped along by standout performances from Epstein, Speakman, Seidensticker, and Wert, and the film’s second half just explodes with witchy fun, throwing everything from living shadows to pyrokinesis to nods in the direction of martial arts movies at the screen. That would all be cool enough, but the filmmakers take things further in the final act, ratcheting up the horror elements while also dialing in the emotional resonances at work underneath all of this supernatural action.

At its core, The Heretiks is about one group of people who believe the world deserves to end, and one group of people who believe it’s worth saving, and while that’s a very well-worn conflict on which to rest a movie, Collins and Piotrowski’s script takes that universal concept and makes it feel intimate, charged, even moving. There’s a real daring to the way it all wraps up, complete with some jaw-dropping deaths and genuine moments of catharsis, bumping The Heretiks up from a good time at the movies to a sometimes genuinely affecting one. 

The Heretiks celebrated its world premiere at Fantastic Fest. Release date info coming soon.

The post ‘The Heretiks’ Review: Halloween Home Invasion Horror Full of Witchy Fun [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Half refers to twins Ethan (Ranjith Sajeev) and Ivy (Aiswarya Raj), close-knit siblings born of a human mother and a revenant father. After an opening scene that establishes their dynamics in childhood, namely Ethan’s protective role over his mute sister, Half cuts to the present to introduce the now-adult twins as they set out on a road trip through the Rajasthan desert for Ivy’s new job.

It’s there that they run afoul of local marauders, an organized crime ring that robs passersby and brutally disposes of all evidence. Samjad evokes the nastiness of Mario Bava’s Rabid Dogs when it comes to the ruthless bandits, who degrade their victims before maiming and eviscerating them.

That’s precisely what happens to Ethan and Ivy, too, with the marauders none the wiser that they’ve victimized the wrong pair. When night rises, the twins’ vampiric half resurrects them, setting in motion a thrilling, bloodthirsty quest for revenge.

It’s a winning premise that only grows fiercer and more exhilarating the more the body count rises. The initial buildup, while no slouch by any means, feels downright sluggish compared to the vibrant, stylish, fist-pumping carnage fest Samjad unleashes in the back half. The earworm Malayalam soundtrack, largely filtered through Ivy’s headphones, creates the perfect energetic backdrop for Ethan and Ivy’s unrelenting aggression.

Yulisman tailors choreography to the siblings’ personalities, with Ethan the more aggressive of the two by far, though Ivy establishes herself as quite adept at makeshift weaponry. It’s Ivy who has the more robust arc, with the personal degradation she suffered providing the biggest motivation for the pair. Ivy also happens to be the epitome of cool, who’s far more capable than even Ethan initially gives her credit for.

Sajeev and Raj plausibly play siblings with a lifelong history; their natural bickering establishes familial rapport that only deepens when they unite to fend off grave threats.

Of course, the steady flow of visceral violence builds to its inevitable climactic showdown, and Yulisman unleashes a symphony of gruesome carnage that paints the desert red. It’s a well-staged siege that finds no shortage of ways to dole out pain and suffering from both sides of the battle lines.

It never wades too deep into vampire mythology beyond limited flashbacks, and for the better. Pared-back simplicity lends an easy shorthand to the twins’ supernatural abilities, which in turn allows for more surprises for both the audience and cruel villains alike. While that straightforward simplicity means that the closing moments don’t hit as hard as the bloodbath that preceded, it also doesn’t detract either.

Half joins the likes of Near Dark and John Carpenter’s Vampires in terms of vampiric savagery unleashed in the desert, but Samjad infuses it with a unique “curry western” spin that puts crowd-pleasing action front and center. Ethan and Ivy are so easy to root for in such a hyper-violent world, and it’s satisfying to see repulsive, immoral madmen get their comeuppance.

It’s the type of vengeance that comes with all the bone-crunching mayhem and arterial spray you could hope for, housed in a cool package helmed with singular vision.

Half made its world premiere at TIFF. Release info TBA.

The post ‘Half’ Review: Vampire Twins Paint The Desert Red In Gory Revenge Actioner [TIFF 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

It even, in the climax, attacks in mid-air.

Sometimes this is handled very seriously, and the personified object has a dangerous appeal. Just as often, however, the self-seriousness of Trees are Watching is at odds with its execution, which slips into silliness and occasionally even outright comedy. Expect at least some folks to mockingly refer to this as “the Eva Green flying chair movie.”

Green is Darya, a London-based writer whose area of expertise is the city of Mardin, Turkey, where she grew up. At the start of the film, she and her hearing-impaired daughter Connie fly in for a month-long writing retreat. Darya elects to stay at the home of a childhood friend, and the large, isolated house – with its two large and distinct trees – immediately becomes a visual focal point. The trees will, naturally, have an important role to play in the narrative.

Almost immediately, strange events begin to occur: Darya’s rental car breaks down unexpectedly on the road, and a news report on the radio indicates that this is the second consecutive summer with unexplained forest fires. Then there’s the mysterious figure of a woman that Darya first sees on the road, and then again in the backyard by one of the trees.

All of this precedes the moment when Connie, then Darya, realizes that one of the chairs is moving of its own accord.

The threatening furniture is part of a larger backstory involving Darya’s childhood, twin classmate sisters Nihal and Spin, and their relationship with their mother (Ozlem Tas). This unfolds in lengthy flashbacks and features a pair of great child actors, though the twists and turns of the past are not as complicated or twisty as Ghobadi’s screenplay believes them to be.

Nihal upsets her mother with a series of drawings which anticipate a dark, calamitous fate for the family matriarch. Nihal herself is then scared by (an admittedly creepy) plumber who tells her a tall tale while fixing the family’s toilet; as a result, the young girl is scarred to such a degree that she becomes fearful of going to the bathroom by herself. This pair of events – angering mom and being scared to flush – initiates a disastrous series of events* that carry deadly implications that reverberate from past to present.

*One of these is a sequence that can only call to mind the log truck crash that opens Final Destination 2, but sadly features unconvincing CGI logs, which flattens the visual impact. Still, it nevertheless earns a hearty chuckle.

Meanwhile, Darya processes her role in these events while contending with the return of adult Spin (Zeynep Çamci), who appears and disappears like a specter. The disgruntled childhood friend urges Darya to exact revenge on several authority figures from their childhood, which in turn takes Darya to plenty of scary locations, such as the house’s secluded basement, as well as the file room of their former school (sadly there’s no montage with microfiche, but it’s not far off).

So far, so familiar. Thankfully, Green, who has never met a genre project she doesn’t fully commit to, anchors the film along with the dedicated child actors. For long stretches, it’s the performances that carry Trees are Watching.

Even when the plot meanders or becomes fairly predictable (ie: the truth about what happened to the sisters and their mother or what is happening with the chair), Trees are Watching is visually appealing. Ghobadi and cinematographer Saba Mazloum favor plenty of overhead shots of the landscape to emphasize the clear-cut logging in the area, and a brief, but gorgeous survey of Mardin’s underground city feels sponsored by Turkey’s tourism board. Many of the scary bits are surprisingly effective, such as when Connie glimpses the shadow of the chair’s legs moving beneath a door or a fleeting, uncanny glimpse of the chair nuzzling one of the trees.

The visuals can only carry the movie so far, though. The nearly 1 hour 50 minute runtime doesn’t feel entirely earned, especially with regard to the mystery from the past. It’s far too obvious, though Ghobadi’s screenplay doesn’t seem to realize that, as evidenced by the fact that the climax treats the truth as a reveal.

By this point, the disconnect between the film’s more poetic, environmental, and philosophical underpinnings and its genre elements is clear. An earlier passage explores the often ironic way that individuals are reincarnated as wooden objects. This is a fascinating proposition, but it feels completely incongruous with other aspects of the film, such as Darya battling a flying chair in an empty pool or pleading with police officer Vedad (Murat Yildirim) about her sanity and going off her meds.

The tonal and narrative imbalance results in a film that feels at odds with itself. Trees are Watching simply never comes together, despite solid performances and several intriguing ideas. Chalk this one up as an interesting misfire. 

Trees Are Watching had its world premiere at TIFF 2026. Release information TBD.

The post ‘Trees Are Watching’ Review: Eva Green Can’t Save Imbalanced Supernatural Thriller [TIFF 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Arrow Bentley (Gabriel Cagan) is the eager manager of flailing fast food chain Hamudders, working alongside his platonic girlfriend Lou (Madeline Barbush), new hire Zeke (Estevan Muñoz, pulling double-duty as the film’s co-writer) and line cook Jacques (Daniel DiLucchio, best known by his wrestling stage name Short Sleeve Sampson).

When Arrow’s latest addition to the Hamudders menu fails to drum up business, the higher-ups decide to resurrect the Flapjax, a chocolatey pancake from the ’80s that was discontinued for giving patrons explosive bouts of diarrhea. To help promote the return of the controversial menu item, Arrow enlists his mother Eleanor (Georgia Kate Haege), a former pop star whose claim to fame is a one-hit-wonder that sampled the nursery rhyme “Pattycake”, to be Flapjax’s celebrity spokesperson.

A sort of Society-by-way-of-Troma effort, Flapjax is content to be loud and grating and not much else. Though the narrative structure matches that of Brian Yuzna’s body horror classic, with the goopy effects only emerging in the film’s climax, it lacks the pointed satire that made the wait for the good stuff unnoticeable. Where Society‘s social critique had a biting wit to it, Flapjax can’t muster up anything more half-clever than a literal pig-man serving as the Hamudders’ mascot and CEO, or an obese foodie influencer vomiting up his own tongue.

Hell, the satire of Buffy the Vampire Slayer‘s season 6 episode “Doublemeat Palace” accomplished far more in its brief 42 minutes than Flapjax does in its not-brief-enough 98.

The Troma influences are felt, so your mileage may vary when it comes to Flapjax‘s more lowbrow antics. The best of Troma’s output, films like The Toxic Avenger or even the gleefully obscene Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead, all had a certain charm to them to help sand the edges a bit. That’s where Troma co-founder Lloyd Kaufman’s playful skills as a director came in handy.

Flapjax director and co-writer Rocko Zevenbergen, himself a student from Kaufman’s school of trash cinema (he worked as Kaufman’s assistant earlier in the decade), has yet to master the art of making watchable trash.

There are a few inspired technical choices sprinkled throughout the film, however. Zevenbergen delights in making his audience uncomfortable, with sporadic bursts of energy occurring in the film’s more bizarrely vulgar moments. Be it characters spitting on the camera lens, intrusive extreme close-ups of actors’ faces, or overtly loud sounds of bodily functions, it’s these moments where the film is at its most successful. Some sight gags delight as well, including a soda fountain with a “Mountain Don’t” option.

Much of the film’s success rests on Cagan, himself a dead ringer for Please Don’t Destroy’s John Higgins. He brings a lot (and I mean a lot) of enthusiasm to the role, but even his commendable commitment can’t resuscitate the corpse that is Flapjax‘s empty-headed script. Similarly, Hage’s overbearing mother, reminiscent of Elizabeth Moody’s Vera in Peter Jackson’s Braindead, inspires a few laughs early on, but the role is so one-note that that well dries up fast.

Despite Flapjax‘s limited budget, it excels in the goopy practical effects department. The third act explodes in a Shunting-esque orgy of melting body parts and bodily fluids. It’s all great fun, albeit too little, too late.

The production design is equally impressive. Garish primary colors and cherry prints populate Eleanor’s gaudy home, and the Hamudders locale calls to mind the Mooby’s chain from Kevin Smith’s View Askewniverse. Flapjax‘s technical merits stand out in the best way, in spite of (or because of?) its lo-fi presentation.

Though Flapjax eventually delivers the ooey-gooey goods, it’s a long, humorless road to get there. The cast looks like they’re having a ton of fun; if only the audience could share in that fun.

Flapjax made its premiere at Fantastic Fest.

The post ‘Flapjax’ Review: Fast Food Body Horror Serves Plenty Of Slime But Few Laughs [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

It’s not that the Adamses don’t care what we think, or that they don’t hope to please their audience. It’s that there’s a certain level of trust between audience and filmmakers, a sense that the family can get weird with things, and we’ll follow them. The result is The Glorious Dead, an intimate small-town horror story that goes cosmic while never losing touch with its quirks or the trust it has in us as viewers and horror fans. 

It’s a freezing cold Sunday, and Sheriff Deb (Toby Poser) is about to have a very bad day. It’s supposed to be her day off, but her deputy, Mikey (Zelda Adams), is at her door bright and early with a laundry list of problems. Strange disappearances have started around town, blood’s running from a neighbor’s faucet, someone comes into the sheriff’s office talking about a hole in their yard made of “meat,” and to make matters worse, the power’s out, so Deb can’t even have her morning coffee.

It all feels like too much to take, and the more Deb cruises around her small Northeastern hamlet, the more it seems like her own private hell. 

Tonally, the film first sets out to put a horror spin on the Cop Having a Bad Day genre, layered with echoes of Fargo and Mare of Easttown, and Poser’s clearly having a ball playing the Sheriff in way over her head. The script, by Poser and John Adams (both of whom pull double duty as directors), leaves lots of room for air, not just to build suspense over what exactly is going on, but to create a sense of familiarity surrounding Deb.

If you’ve ever spent time in a small town, you recognize this dynamic, where everyone knows everyone, and therefore it’s much harder to just blow off a concern. Instead, Deb must take them all on, a snowball rolling down, growing as she goes, gaining momentum on a collision course. 

Amid all the charming small-town quirks, the film also finds time to get delightfully, irrepressibly strange, sending monsters shuffling through the trees even as it leaves space for Deb to argue with her neighbors over where all the cows seem to have gone. The film juxtaposes not just the normal and the strange, but the odd and the horrific, creating an environment of unpredictability that sustains The Glorious Dead through the moments when it starts to drag.

You truly never know if you’re about to witness something gruesome, funny, or both whenever Deb pops out of her truck to investigate something. The film’s cinematography and often kinetic editing add to this sense of the unpredictable, building up a feeling that starts in your head as slight unease, then blossoms into a kind of comic dread.

It’s a very tricky tonal line to walk, but it works because when the Adamses and visual effects wizard Trey Lindsay go for the horror, they really go for it. There are visuals in this film that will persist in my head for quite some time. 

It’s all so much that, as the film wears on, Deb starts to wonder if she really is in some kind of private hell, an eternity of problems stacking up, people turning on each other, and weird shapes shuffling through the snow. The verisimilitude this creates – even when the low budget shows in some places, particularly when the film gets into gunplay – is remarkable, in part because the script is so good at conjuring little vignettes of small-town confusion, and in part because Poser is simply so relatable in the lead role.

But the film’s real achievement – stutter-stepping plot, choppy action and all – lies in its ability to reflect this particular American moment. We feel overwhelmed alongside Deb because the world is, well, overwhelming. We feel her sense of hell because we have our own. The Glorious Dead is about many things, and while it doesn’t have the thematic tightness of prior Adams Family successes like Mother of Flies or Hellbender, it works best when it’s about a woman simply trying to grapple with an increasingly nightmarish reality, not by denying it or explaining it, but by just trying to get on with the day.

It’s that feeling, that nagging sense that everything needs to slow down just a little bit so you have a moment to breathe, that sits at the core of the film, and it makes it another success for some of indie horror’s finest. 

The Glorious Dead screened at Fantastic Fest; release info TBA.

The post ‘The Glorious Dead’ Review: The Adams Family Gets Weird with Intimate Cosmic Horror [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

The world was so compelling that it became the cornerstone of Remedy’s brand. They incorporated it into their cult classic Alan Wake franchise, making it a key part of the long awaited sequel. They released FBC: Firebreak, a co-op shooter that casts you as an emergency response team dealing with continuing issues in the Oldest House. Most importantly, the full-fledged sequel Control Resonant is now upon us, and it’s anything but a comfortable retread of the first game’s successes. Remedy has changed location, protagonist, and even combat style for their follow-up, but from the trailers it was clear that it still retained the brand of quirky humor and surreal weirdness that made the original so memorable. What remained to be seen was the new melee focus, something that Remedy has never attempted in their long history, would help or hinder combat encounters.

For those unfamiliar with Control (there’s a recap video that can be watched from the main menu if this applies to you), the series is focused on a shadowy government agency called the Federal Bureau of Control that investigates paranatural events. They secure and research various objects of power, while also dealing with entities or people that have extraordinary abilities. In the first one, you played as Jesse Faden, who enters the Oldest House, the ever shifting headquarters of the FBC, who is searching for her brother Dylan who vanished after an anomalous incident when they were young. Audiences latched on to the SCP-style tone of the game’s world as well as its unique and striking brutalist architecture, making it their fastest-selling IP since Max Payne.

The story of Control Resonant picks up seven years after the events of the original Control. This time, you play as Dylan, who is awakened from his coma when his sister jams the Aberrant, a shapeshifting weapon he’ll use throughout the game, straight into his chest. As he stumbles out of his cell in the Oldest House, he finds that not only has the lockdown been breached, allowing the Hiss, the antagonistic force that’s menaced the Federal Bureau of Control since the first game, to escape containment, but the surrounding area of Manhattan has been affected by a new paranatural event known as the Pattern, which has warped the city streets into something out of Inception.

Dylan, who has been subjected to FBC experiments for most of his life, is reluctantly recruited by the agency to help out with the situation, but is kept under close watch due to his previous Hiss infection. While in the first game he was mostly a blank slate of a character, acting as both Jesse’s goal and antagonist, Resonant manages to give him a depth that even Jesse lacked.

Designated as a powerful paranatural from a young age, the bureau attempted to harness his power for their own purposes, making him volatile and dangerous. Control Resonant uses this to the story’s advantage, allowing him to quickly become such an interesting character, searching both for redemption and a sense of self that he never was allowed to develop as a child. Several sequences dive into his character and his past, allowing us to not only understand him, but also come to a deeper understanding of Jesse as well.

Since he’s working with the FBC on the Manhattan crisis, Dylan is paired with Zoe De Vera, an agent that acts as his primary radio contact. Much like Remedy itself, Zoe has a love of music that is a big part of her personality, which is used to add impact to some of the game’s most memorable moments. Their relationship evolves throughout the course of the campaign, and I found it to be a surprisingly emotional friendship that anchors the heart of the game. She’s contrasted by Simon Arish, a no-nonsense hardass who views Dylan as a disposable weapon to be pointed at whatever the FBC needs to destroy. While he starts out a bit one-note, the journey he goes on adds more compelling wrinkles to his personality.

For fans of the original, we have a few returning characters, including Emily Pope, who has risen in the ranks following Jesse’s disappearance at the beginning of the game. Her performance is great, with real humanity coming through as she tries to parse the strangeness surrounding her. Dr Casper Darling gets some great sequences, presented in live action video as Remedy loves to do, filling in not only his past but Dylan’s as well.

In a surprise move, you’re often given dialogue choices when responding to people, either in-person or over the radio. These don’t have big, Telltale-style branching narrative choices, but instead just allow you to figure out what type of character your Dylan is. All of the options sound in-line with how he’s written, but it gives you a chance to dictate where you feel he is on his path of redemption and how he would feel at the moment. It’s not a huge part of the game, and can make things slightly clunky when trying to respond during action or exploration, but it’s neat to see Remedy experimenting with ways to make their stories more personal to the player.

Bringing you outside of the Oldest House is not only a stylistic difference from the first game, but also a structural one. Manhattan is a dense open world for you to explore, with discrete zones that all have their own personality. You start the game with double jump, hover, and dash abilities that make getting around a blast, and it only gets more fun as your mobility suite expands throughout the course of the game.

Part of the fun of the game becomes treating navigation like a puzzle. Many times you’ll look at your map and see you’re close to your objective, but you need to read the environment to try to figure out exactly how to make your way there. In addition to having side quests scattered around the zones, you’ll also have more traditional levels that you’ll enter, like subway systems or buildings, that will break up the exploration and put your more on a linear path. The world never feels too expansive, and there’s a healthy spread of fast travel points, in the form of free standing doors, scattered around the map, making it so you never have to struggle to get from one side of the world to another.

There are three main things that you’re chasing down to progress the narrative: story missions, Resonants, and Faults. Story missions are self-explanatory; these are the bigger missions given to you by the FBC to help try to solve the Pattern and put an end to its stranglehold on Manhattan. Control Resonant’s narrative feels better paced than the first one, with a very clear emergency that felt like it had more forward momentum to keep you engaged. Many of the game’s most memorable moments come from these missions, such as a dramatic escape from a place known as “the Sinkhole” or following a research team through several fractured timelines.

The Resonants are bosses that are scattered around the map, usually behind quests or levels that lead you to locating them. They are not on the main path, but defeating them will allow you to choose between a pair of combat abilities to add to your set of powers. Resonants are all gorgeously designed, either as staggering monstrosities or warped humans, and provide some of the best fights in the game. My favorite was the Dancer, who not only had the most fun patterns and attacks to learn, but was also an audio-visual feast from start to finish. While some of them are optional, it’s definitely worth tracking them down, as they are valuable for both the powerful rewards and the gameplay experience.

Faults are cracks in the world that Jesse has been exploring in order to do a ritual that will hopefully fix the Pattern once and for all. Indicated by the same strange FMV overlay that was used for Director Trench in the last game, you’ll need to seek these out in order to help her on her quest, while also saving her from the disastrous consequences of it. These sections of the game are almost exclusively platforming-based and reward you with new traversal powers, making the most fun part of the game even more entertaining.

While I loved the feeling of moving through these sections, they were most important for the interactions between Jesse and Dylan that drove them forward. The two characters have such a strong dynamic that brings to light their shared family history with sharp details, deepening the emotional core of the game in ways that surprised me. There’s a great little bit with them reminiscing about a video game, “Severed Circle 2”, they used to play when they were young that just makes the relationship feel so much more lived in and believable than in the first game. Faults are a perfect synthesis of gameplay and narrative, highlighting Remedy’s greatest assets.

Aside from the open world structure, the biggest shift in gameplay is the combat, which is now focused on melee weapons instead of firearms. Your basic combat kit has three components, your standard weapon that does your light attack, a stronger form that’s for your heavy attack, and a combo finisher which will happen after a series of light attacks. Each of them has their own stats and utility, and they can be mixed and matched to your liking. For most of the game, I was rocking the sweeping scythe attack for my light, which had a wider swing, along with a huge, slow hammer for my heavy attack, and an uppercut finisher that popped enemies into the air, taking advantage of the generous amount of air juggling you’re able to do thanks to Dylan’s floating power.

In addition, you slowly accumulate a set of abilities that run on a power meter that’s recharged by your melee attacks. As I mentioned before, Resonants will supply you with new options for your arsenal, and the choices you make will greatly affect your build. Options include summonable minions, powerful projectiles, or fiery enhancements to your weapons. All of these abilities have their usefulness, making the choices feel significant to your playstyle. The mix of abilities and standard attacks also creates a nice rhythm for the combat, forcing you to engage with the standard attacks to build your meter for the powers.

Like many modern action games, enemies have both a health bar and a falter bar, and figuring out how to affect each of them is important to victory. Filling up their falter meter will make them vulnerable to an execution, which gives you a brief burst of power that can easily turn the tide of an encounter. Unlike most modern action games, you do not have a parry button, only allowing you to dash out of the way if you want to avoid damage.

The feel of the combat is solid and satisfying, but I once again think that the encounters don’t really live up to it. Any time you run into a fight, the enemies are broken down into two types. There are small drones that won’t be terribly tough to deal with but will continue to respawn, and there are heavy creatures that are much more challenging, and need to be defeated to bring the encounter to a close. This structure feels a bit like the modern DOOM games, especially given that health is only recovered by picking up power-ups that drop from defeated foes, but it doesn’t work quite as well in Control Resonant.

The main problem I have is that enemies feel like they have too many hitpoints. Enemies do have levels based on where or when you encounter them, but even when you are evenly matched they still feel like they take a bit too long to kill. Combined with the fact that there are so many enemies at any given time, shooting at you from all directions, it makes many encounters feel tedious. I found myself standing in one place, slashing a heavy enemy over and over again while doing my best to not be pelted to death by projectiles coming from everyone around me. This type of structure would work better in a shooter, where you can constantly be in motion while chipping away at their health, but given that I need to hit them in melee range, it becomes a lot of button tapping at a certain point. The feeling is compounded by the fact that encounters themselves are also a bit too long, making many of the later game fights feel like a chore.

Fortunately, Remedy has done an excellent job with the accessibility options it presents in the game, allowing you to tweak a plethora of settings to customize the difficulty in very specific ways. If you’re like me and find the enemies feeling too spongy, you can go in and adjust the amount of outgoing damage you do with your attacks. Feel like you’re constantly dying because you’re being hit from all sides? Go ahead and tune down the incoming damage you take. Falter build up, power regeneration, enemy aggression and more can all be changed to your liking, allowing you to customize your experience to ensure you’re still having fun.

Since there are multiple paranatural threats loose in Manhattan, there are various subsets of enemies that all have different strategies to deal with them. The Hiss are the most common enemy type, with mechanics like regenerating shields to deal with, while the Mold were my favorite, with a resistance to blunt damage but a weakness to fire. Unlike the first game, which mostly had possessed humans for enemies, the creature design in Control Resonant is more exaggerated, often featuring huge monsters that have no semblance of humanity left in them. Towering bipedal beasts with hammer-like heads and horrible winged monsters that shoot laser beams are mixed in with mutated humans, providing some great visual variety to the encounters. I wish there were a few more enemy types, as given how encounter-dense the game is they run out of new tricks long before the end of the game, but I found them all visually unique and easy to read in the heat of battle.

To keep up with the escalating power of the enemies, you have access to several skill trees to enhance Dylan’s combat abilities. Each part of your arsenal has its own upgrade path that can be enhanced alongside a more generalized skill tree that affects everything you do. Obviously, there are some standard “do X percent more damage” options that aren’t as interesting, but many of them do change up how you play a bit. I really enjoyed a skill that allowed me to do extra damage when attacking from behind, which coupled well with my summons that could draw enemy attention. You can also craft artifacts that can be equipped into one of three slots, which further modify your stats in specific ways.

While I did like slowly watching my skills grow, there’s a bit of fiddliness with the process, as just like in Control, there are a ton of currencies that you use to do this. I appreciate the flavor that comes with using things like Living Shards or Warped Resonance as upgrade materials, but it felt like I spent a lot of time at vendors buying specific resources with the generic currency, when it probably would have been better if it was more streamlined. That said, I love the Remedy touch of forcing you to go into a strange liminal space called the Gap to interact with various stone structures to perform said upgrades, rather than just having it all run straight through a menu.

It’s these Remedy touches that really make the game shine, even when getting frustrated with overlong combat encounters that don’t offer much variety. For every fight that I found myself grumbling at, it would be offset by stumbling on a clever puzzle that hid intriguing lore notes. If you liked the dream logic style of puzzles featured in the original game’s Oceanview Motel as much as I did, you’ll find yourself frequently rewarded for your exploration.

Aside from the side quests, which are always a surreal pleasure to chase down, there are plenty of collectibles scattered throughout that make exploring rewarding. On top of that, doing quests and discovering collectibles will help you level up a zone, providing you extra bonus for that particular area, giving you a sense that the world is being helped through your actions. This sense of improving the area helps thematically reinforce the idea of Dylan’s path of redemption, finally finding a way to use the powers to help rather than hurt.

Near the end of the game, I took some time to go back through areas and sweep for secrets, and it’s some of the best time that I had. With the full set of movement powers, it feels like getting around an open world superhero game, allowing you to appreciate the world that Remedy has crafted. The gravity shift in particular, which allows you to shift which direction you’re oriented, allowed the developers to create some mind-bending spaces that feel satisfying to explore. In later areas, I found myself constantly in awe of how they were able to not only fold space on itself to create complex layouts, but also of how effectively they were able to invisibly lead me through these areas, making navigation feel like a puzzle that I was being elegantly guided through.

When I think back on my nearly 30 hours with Control Resonant, it’s not the friction with the combat encounters that pops into my head. It’s sense of discovery and exploration provided by exhilarating traversal abilities. It’s the surreal visuals I’m being led through by an engaging narrative. It’s the compelling characters and relationships that breathe life into the delightfully strange world. It’s a testament to the strength of the game that no matter how much I was sighing at yet another encounter that I had to button mashing my way through, I still fell in love with everything the game was doing. Control Resonant’s narrative, characters, and worldbuilding are top of class and not to be missed, and if you find yourself like me, bristling at some of the combat repetition, it’s incredibly easy to use the accessibility tools to create an experience that makes the melee combat work for you.

Review code provided by publisher.

Control Resonant launches September 24 digitally for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, PC via Steam and Epic Games Store, while physical editions for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series will be available from October 15.

The post ‘Control Resonant’ Provides a Visual Feast With a Compelling Narrative and Engaging Combat [Review] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Nelson, working from a script by Alan B. McElroy (Wrong Turn) from a story by McElroy and Tony Giglio, teases its legendary snake in an intense opener before putting the horror on the back burner to introduce the film’s wayward adventurers. That includes a group of medical missionaries providing aid to villages along the Amazon. At the forefront is Alli (Jessica Rothe), a bleeding-heart American discovering the dangers of the Amazon in real time, and Lena (Kiana Madeira), a local deckhand who’s returned home in search of her missing brother.

Alli barely evades a vicious caiman attack and learns of the Boiúna myth when a volatile encounter with a shady group of men leads to a series of escalations, one that sees Brennan (Logan Marshall-Green) hellbent on revenge. The violence awakens the giant mythic snake within the jungle.

Beware Boiúna smartly withholds its massive creature, nestling an intense thriller within the creature feature instead. It works incredibly well; you almost forget about Boiúna entirely as Alli makes impulsive decisions based on emotion that put the entire mission in harm’s way from human threats. Marshall-Green’s Brennan is volatile and dangerous, raising the stakes long before the horror commences in earnest. The cat-and-mouse game between the two opposing groups holds strong on its own, but also gives ample room for character development and deepened relationships that further instill rooting interest in both vulnerable yet out-of-her-depth Allie and the tough-as-nails Lena.

Of course, the giant snake makes her grand entrance just as tensions reach their boiling point, and McElroy and Nelson remove all sense of safety. Survival changes dynamics entirely, and it’s not guaranteed. While the snake itself is largely rendered through VFX, Nelson makes smart choices in its on-screen appearances. Like the best movie monsters, Boiúna’s carnage precedes her, and signs of her gargantuan size precede her full reveal. More importantly, Nelson keeps the carnage as practical as possible; death by Titanoboa is a nasty way to go. 

Mike P. Nelson’s latest is his most tactile yet polished effort yet. Boiúna might be comprised of movie magic and well-designed, but the cast and crew trekked into the actual jungle, and it reflects on screen. There’s a constant sheen of grime and sweat that somehow fuels the unease, that adds a layer of authenticity that makes the danger more immersive.

The most vital component of the film’s authenticity, of course, is Rothe, Madeira, and Marshall-Green. All three are so well-rounded in their performances that allegiances shift and evolve. Rothe, who also has genre films Pathetic Fallacy and River screening at Fantastic Fest, plays against type as a naive newcomer prone to making the wrong choice. Marshall-Green oozes menace, but it’s Madeira who stands out most for her prickly demeanor masking vulnerable fears and adaptable smarts. 

Beware Boiúna easily rises to the top of a limited subgenre for its well-staged thrills and breathless action, all anchored by well-developed characters. McElroy and Nelson smartly keep the focus on the dramatic conflicts and human sieges that Boiúna’s onslaught nearly catches you off guard. It makes for a highly entertaining, nail-biting creature feature that firmly holds you in its grip, even as it savagely rips apart nearly everything in its path. 

In a year full of killer sharks, hippos, and whales, Nelson’s giant snake horror movie emerges as king of the jungle. 

Beware Boiúna made its premiere at Fantastic Fest and will release in theaters October 2, 2026.

The post ‘Beware Boiúna’ Review: Snake Horror Slithers To The Top Of 2026’s Creature Feature Food Chain [Fantastic Fest 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Resident Evil set the blueprint for survival horror video games, and it’s that basic blueprint that director Zach Cregger, who co-writes with Shay Hatten, adheres to in his original story set in Raccoon City during its initial outbreak. That means that while Cregger’s Resident Evil doesn’t duplicate the games’ popular characters and story, it encapsulates the survival horror and gameplay mechanics more thoroughly than any other RE adaptation to date while welcoming unfamiliar newcomers with open arms.

That begins with Bryan (Austin Abrams), a medical courier already dealing with relationship turbulence when he’s tasked with a last-minute rush job straight to Raccoon City. To say that Bryan is an everyman ill-prepared for the horror ahead would be an understatement, first signaled by his acceptance of the job itself that sends him up into the snowy mountains while fully aware his car isn’t equipped for those conditions.

Enter the first zombie encounter, which Cregger mines for every bit of nail-biting tension possible before unleashing the scares in earnest. It’s only the start of Bryan’s terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

While Resident Evil is a lean, propulsive adrenaline rush that never stops moving in its efficient 90-minute runtime, Austin Abrams is the glue that holds it all together and ensures the audience remains at the edge of their seat, anxious yet hopeful the plucky protagonist can somehow evade the next gruesome attack. Not only is Bryan the rare type of horror antagonist who can and will make the wrong decision at almost every turn, but Abrams’ natural affability injects a surprising amount of humor that acts as a pressure relief valve when the horror gets too intense. And it gets intense extremely fast. It never stops.

Zach Cregger’s intimate, less-is-more approach puts emphasis on nail-biting, visceral horror. It’s a series of terrifying escalations across multiple set pieces, emulating the game’s progression. Each comes with its own unique gory hells that introduce suitably deranged, fleshy mutated beasts brought to life via Legacy Effects‘ practical effects and Wētā Workshop‘s VFX. While Cregger and Hatten keep explanations to a minimum, their original monsters adhere to familiar G-virus tactics in ways that, as Bryan often points out, are increasingly messed up.

In true Resident Evil fashion, though, it all barrels toward a final act and set piece that’s not nearly as strong as the horror onslaught that preceded it. Even still, it leads to a thematically fitting conclusion for its lead and provides one last opportunity to dazzle with a final monster. 

It is, as the games are, more about the ride versus the destination, and what a ride Resident Evil is. Zach Cregger captures the primal experience of playing the games, and it’s an absolute breathless blast. Subtle nods, like frantically searching for ammo in drawers or stumbling upon a diamond key, feel like a natural extension of this hellish journey versus overt shoehorned Easter eggs. The creature escalation and scenery changes also get translated to screen with plausibility via stunning cinematography. Cregger utilizes every scare tactic and tool in his arsenal to recreate the unease and sometimes visceral feeling of playing the games, including a brief POV switch, but the originality means it’s harder to predict what Bryan will encounter next.

That means that Resident Evil is full of surprises, Abrams’ unlikely screw-up chief among them, as well as potent scares. Cregger’s most straightforward feature yet may also make for his biggest crowd-pleaser, one that leaves its audience gasping and laughing in equal measure.

Resident Evil releases in theaters on September 18.

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Vintage Violence opens with a livestream that introduces Carter (Cole Sprouse), an urban explorer influencer-type recently released from prison related to the accidental death of his co-host. We meet him just as he discovers a crate of vintage 19th-century Levi’s buried beneath an abandoned home. Izumi (Kiko Mizuhara), watching from across the globe in Japan from her hostess gig, immediately sees an opportunity. “Come to Japan,” she tells him via audio message on the stream. Izumi knows those jeans will fetch a high price in Japan, and she manages to convince Carter to jump on a plane without a plan or much else beyond the duffle bag of prized jeans.

The trusting American has no idea that Izumi and her boyfriend Hiro (Nijiro Murakami) plan to backstab him and claim the cash for themselves, or that the double cross will put them on the direct path of exiled Yakuza enforcer Ko (Pierre Taki), who’s out for revenge against denim-obsessed yakuza boss Edoga (Hio Miyazawa).

Kotlyarenko, who writes and directs, blends traditional filmmaking with a screenlife pov with manic style. Vintage Violence overwhelms initially with its rapid cuts between vertical livestream footage and split screens in its frenzied introductions to a cast of rather unlikable but lively characters. But the mixed media caper quickly finds its frenzied rhythm and lets the increasingly complicated bid for cash and jeans take center stage.

Sprouse’s calmer, along-for-the-ride Carter emerges as a strong counterbalance to the zany antics, which come fast and furious. It’s not just betrayal and theft that Carter must fend off at a constant clip, but the nonstop barrage of gaijin jokes. It’s here that Vintage Violence‘s comedy becomes most uneven, with much of Carter’s arc defined by fending off animosity toward foreigners and a potential romance with untrustworthy Izumi. Some of these jokes wear thin, especially when it comes to a cartoonish American embassy aide. 

Mizuhara offsets Izumi’s more frustrating decisions with energetic charisma befitting of a Kotlayarenko feature, and also proves a good sport when the filmmaker really starts digging into his Takashi Miike influences in the film’s back half. Fans of V-cinema provocateurs like Miike and Ryuhei Kitamura will recognize familiar tropes and personalities when it comes to the film’s seedier villains, and how disturbed and gory their violence can get. 

Vintage Violence successfully captures the frantic feeling of racing through a city in a desperate bid to stay alive; it’s a complete sensory assault that never delves too deep or overstays its welcome. Sprouse and Kiko Mizuhara keep the chaos just enough on the rails to ensure a fun, hyper-violent romp, but one that doesn’t fully leave a lasting impression. It’s Kotlyarenko’s careful control of the chaos that most impresses, and his clever implementation of technology. A Bluetooth earbud-tracked foot chase is particularly inspired, more so than the seamless split screens and incorporation of screenlife footage. It all makes for a zany, sometimes overly silly, and eternally overstimulating caper that’s fearless in its playful experimentation.

Vintage Violence made its premiere at TIFF and is seeking distribution.

The post ‘Vintage Violence’ Review: Cole Sprouse Gets Caught In ‘Spree’ Director’s Bloody, Denim-Fueled Yakuza Sensory Assault [TIFF 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Fittingly, this fable begins on a dark and stormy night in present-day Rome, where a mother,  Anna (Jasmine Trinca), arrives frazzled and unannounced at the apartment of her daughter, Alice (Romana Maggiora Hergano), to reveal the troubling truth about their family. The script by Strippoli and Salvatore de Chirico breaks The Spiral into four chapters, each a disturbing confession from Anna that highlights a series of troubling family misfortunes tracing back to 1999 in Bari. 

It’s there that the family fissures first appear, even before the arrival of the enigmatic trench coat-wearing stranger, when a scene-stealing Valeria Bruni Tedeschi abruptly appears to offer a deal. Anna nitpicks and scolds her housekeeper ruthlessly behind closed doors while bragging to party guests at the family’s sprawling villa that 7-year-old Alice (Gabriella Telegrafo) just booked a Barilla commercial. Never mind that acting was Anna’s coveted dream, of course. But those brags are quickly humbled when the family dog viciously mauls Alice to the point where amputation is a very likely outcome.

That’s precisely when the Stranger appears, dangling an escape from this fate: Alice’s leg for prized son Tobia’s (Alessandro Carbonara) weight. Tedeschi is so magnetic and effortlessly cool, and her chemistry with the high-strung Trinca so off the charts, that audiences immediately get sucked into this devilish dance along with Anna. Naturally, this Monkey’s Paw type scenario grants Anna’s wish, but the payment on this bargain proves much worse. So much so that it only marks the start of Anna’s Faustian trades.

The Spiral is ultimately Trinca’s movie, turning in an anxious, nail-biting performance as the woman whose vanity and dashed dreams wind up consuming her entire family. Anna’s selfishness and pride damns those she holds closest, yet Trinca injects enough charisma and vulnerability to keep audiences in her grip. It’s the type of impossible role that Trinca overcomes with compelling ease. Of course, it also helps that Anna can sometimes seem saintly compared to her short-tempered husband, Walter (Adriano Giannini). 

The devil’s in the details, of course, and some of The Spiral‘s juiciest moments are in unspoken moments of domestic torment, like the wordless reactions from mom toward Alice’s sexual identity that belie Anna’s facade of poise. Strippoli matches Tedeschi in terms of the savage glee derived from putting Anna through the wringer with each subsequent bargain struck, and where the director mines the most psychological horror and tension. 

It builds to a rather biblical finale that isn’t as weighty in its moral messaging or its final confrontations as its build-up suggests, but one that’s thematically resonant all the same. Prideful self-image and selfish desires lead to hollow tragedy in The Spiral, one that sees a mother make shocking choices for the sake of appearances in juicy ways. Its mordant, deadpan sense of humor and a confining sense of atmospheric dread, paired with Trinca’s impressive turn and an incredible Mephistopheles in Tedeschi, make Strippoli’s latest his most entertaining, relatable, and thrilling yet. 

The Spiral screened at the Toronto International Film Festival. Release info TBA.

The post ‘The Spiral’ Review: A Wickedly Entertaining Faustian Family Nightmare [TIFF 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Adapted by Pisanthanakun, Thamsatid Charoenrittichai, and Chantavit Dhanasevi from the horror novel Tayard Asoon (“The Demon’s Heir”), Inherit introduces its antagonist roughly seven minutes into its 128-minute runtime and every moment afterwards that Hoorne isn’t on screen, the audience is left asking “where is Woranart?”

This is largely because Hoorne is doing exceptional work as the film’s vampy femme fatale: an 85-year-old woman who looks like a twenty-something (Hoorne is 34 IRL). The “grandma” maintains that she has used a sophisticated skincare and beauty regiment to maintain her youth, but the reality is, of course, that she is actually…a centipede demon.

Oh, and Woranart is on the hunt for a new human host because her current body is turning into a husk.

None of this is a spoiler because Inherit makes no effort to disguise where it’s going. Or at least not from the audience.

The characters populating the screen alongside Woranart are a whole other story, however, which is one of the film’s two fatal flaws: Woranart is so incredibly compelling that her relatives, the Manasvanichs, ie: the protagonists and the people the audience is meant to root for, are incredibly bland and uninteresting by comparison.

Grandma Woranart arrives following the death of Su’s (Sinjai Plengpanich) mother and, in no time at all, she worms her way into the family’s life. Her target is teenage daughter Oui (Baipor Thitiya Jirapornsilp), who has been chronically ill since childhood and (half) resents her sheltered life. Rounding out the family is Olarn (Tin Settachoke), the patriarch, and Oui’s two brothers: youngest Rangsan (Pakin Kunaanuwit) and oldest Roj (Pongsatorn Jongwilas). None of the men make much of an impression; in fact, both brothers could be removed entirely without affecting much of anything.

Woranart quickly gets to work undermining each member of the family, principally through visions that expose their greatest secrets and fears. Intriguingly each person has something to hide – ranging from a chemical leak at the factory owned by Olarn to Roj’s taboo sexual perversion – but these secrets never really amount to anything. Most of the film’s first two acts is taken up by Woranart tormenting the family, but none of these secrets carry any weight or impact, and – in at least one instance (Rangsan’s) – it is only revealed to the audience.

The suggestion that the whole family is corrupt or fallible should be an interesting counterpoint (or complement) to the “evil” that Woranart is inflicting on them, but the screenwriters never make that connection. Instead Inherit simply paints Woranart as the villain, while the family are the heroes that we’re meant to cheer on.

Things pick up dramatically in the last act as Woranart plots to possess Oui at her 18^th birthday party. By this time several disposable characters have been eliminated and a plan is enacted, leading to a heist-like climax that demands each member of the family play a specific role at a particular time.

After such a lengthy, often unwieldy runtime, the film’s other flaw, it’s nice that Inherit finishes with an exciting and sustained finale. Oddly enough it is Tien’s daughter, who is introduced more than halfway through the film, who gets the lion’s share of the interesting stuff to do, including a sequence where she and her associates must weave their way through an army of life-size sentient stone statues who attack at random.

While some of the film’s CGI looks a little dodgy, the aesthetic of these creatures, as well as a mummy-like creature who scares Rangsan under the house, feels appropriate for a supernatural thriller featuring a centipede demon. These scenes are hokey fun and play better than the more serious-minded social commentary about the Manasvanich family.

Ultimately, Inherit never overcomes its two greatest flaws: its boring non-Woranart characters and its drawn-out, over two-hour runtime. By the time the very fun climax kicks off, it feels like Inherit has overstayed its welcome and, since only Oui and Su really matter, everything to do with the bland family members feels like a chore.

Which is a shame, because the film is worth seeking out for Hoorne alone. Garbed in skin-tight outfits and blood red glasses, Woranart is alternately seductive, dangerous, and deceitful. It’s an exceptional performance that absolutely commands the screen and brings the entire movie to life.

If only the rest of the film around her were half as good. 

Inherit had its world premiere at TIFF 2026. Release information TBD.

The post ‘Inherit’ Review: Davika Hoorne Steals Supernatural Thriller From ‘Shutter’ Director [TIFF 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

This season sometimes struggles to articulate its points and can feel like more of the same. However, it provides a deeper dive into Peachfuzz’s character, which may be enough for some audiences. Season three is a mixed bag, but it still works hard to exceed expectations, push boundaries, and leave its comfort zone through more frightening character-driven found footage experiments.

Season two innovatively riffed on found footage’s many different styles, while this season is more interested in character archetypes and the act of connection. These constantly disarming performances leave each episode’s subject – and the audience – feeling incredibly vulnerable. The series explores these perpetual exercises in control and privilege as characters engage in tugs of war over authority and are left to litigate who really has the power in these sordid situations. Peachfuzz casually declares that “we contain multitudes” in the season’s premiere, which strongly resonates in each episode.

These new episodes explore how Peachfuzz’s killings are all repeated attempts to genuinely, truly connect with another human being, even if that’s by steeping his own backstory in lies, deception, and a creepy equivalent to kabuki theater. There’s some muddled commentary on the creative pursuit of being an artist and the grueling process of tirelessly pouring yourself into thankless work and how this artistic pursuit can change you.

Certain episodes do admittedly feel like they run out of steam and abruptly conclude in ways that some may consider to be underwhelming. That being said, it’s important to understand that The Creep Tapes is not about the kills, as gory and grandiose as they may be; it’s about human connection.

This season bombards the audience with some of Peachfuzz’s most wild and ridiculous character archetypes yet. This includes a Tommy Lee-esque rock star who is desperate for notoriety through a viral sex tape, an enigmatic billionaire who is eager to unload a confession that doubles as a budding journalist’s big scoop, and a voyeur living in a listless shut-in’s walls. These contrasting performances are all over the map in attempts to obfuscate Peachfuzz’s truth. However, they’re all connected by a desperate need for relevancy and a compulsion to not be forgotten that’s been present in this franchise since its very start. 

It’s a message that’s crucial to Peachfuzz’s legacy as a prolific serial killer, but one can’t help but feel this quest for relevance extends to the broader found footage genre as a whole. It’s a style of storytelling that’s never completely disappeared, but often feels like it’s one foot out the door and constantly at the risk of being disregarded. The Creep Tapes’ third season makes a strong case for why this genre is still meaningful and a valuable way to tell horror stories.

A lot of this season sticks to stripped-down, minimalist filmmaking that frequently utilizes a bottle episode-like framework. There are still opportunities for these episodes to go bigger and take some risks. There’s a particularly tense stalker story that sets Peachfuzz loose in New York City. There’s also a formative flashback episode in 1994 that chronicles one of Peachfuzz’s earliest kills when he was just a teenager. This season also features the franchise’s most extreme and creative death to date that deserves credit for the sheer audacity of the spectacle. 

This season also continues the tradition where one episode turns the camera onto Peachfuzz and attempts to unpack his own trauma and history. This season’s experiment is a one-man show from Duplass as Peachfuzz confronts and succumbs to his codependent demons. It doesn’t reach the same heights as the previous seasons’ glimpses into Peachfuzz’s dynamic with his mother and sister, but it’s still very rewarding and a real highlight of the season that helps demystify this increasingly interesting monster. 

Season three still retains the dark humor that’s always been baked into the franchise, which may work better for some than others. This heightened behavior and inappropriate sense of humor fit into Peachfuzz’s pursuit of throwing off and destabilizing his would-be victims so that they can’t tell where the truth lies and the performance ends.

The Creep Tapes is a series that lives and dies based on its guest stars. This season features some impressive and eclectic talent that includes Kate Siegel, James Earl, Chris Gethard, Rekha Shankar, It: Welcome to Derry’s Nicholas Hamilton, Terrifier 2 and 3’s Elliot Fulham, and Mark Duplass’ own daughter, Ora Duplass. Patrick Brice continues to handle all the directing duties and has only grown more confident in cultivating this franchise’s avant-garde voice. However, at this point it wouldn’t be a bad idea to bring in some fresh blood. 

Like before, six episodes is the perfect length for this season so that Peachfuzz’s continuous kills don’t feel repetitive, formulaic, or blur together. It’s just enough time for The Creep Tapes to approach its central idea from complementary angles and still wrap things up so that the audience is left wanting more, rather than being exhausted by Peachfuzz’s schtick.

The Creep Tapes still has lots to say and plenty of tricks up its sleeve. That being said, this is the first time that the bloom is starting to come off the rose. While a very strong continuation of this concept and character, these are arguably the weakest batch of episodes from The Creep Tapes’ three-season run. This doesn’t mean that a season four would have even greater diminishing returns. However, it’ll need to bring something different to the equation.

As Peachfuzz would say, “You’ve just got to trust the creative process,” even if it makes a bloody mess. It at least helps keep the wolves at the door.

The Creep Tapes premieres September 15 on Shudder, with back-to-back episodes airing weekly.

The post ‘The Creep Tapes’ Season 3 Review: Peachfuzz’s Most Personal Season Is Also Its Most Uneven appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Stanislav is a writer with an aggressive form of bone cancer. Even after his surgery, his doctor doesn’t offer much of a hopeful prognosis: Stan’s body could easily reject the anti-cancer rod they inserted as a substitute; the risk of infection is high; and even if everything heals well, it’s still likely he’s only bought himself around five years.

With all of these mitigating factors, it’s no wonder that the rest of L’AUTRE plays out like a paranoid mid-life crisis around death and mortality. The film is purportedly based on a real-life traumatic hospital stay by Franchi, who does a nightmarishly good job of mining the horrors, discomforts, and inconveniences of the modern medical system, all while exploring Stan’s fragile state of mind following his life-changing surgery.

The title L’AUTRE loosely translates to The Other, which is where the more traditional (ie: genre) source of conflict comes from. Soon after Stan’s surgery, he acquires a roommate: gang member Darius (Bilel Chegrani), who was shot by the police and is in a coma.

Or so everyone says.

When no one else is around, Darius awakens to threaten to hurt or even kill Stan, as well as his girlfriend Bénédicte (Karine Gonthier-Hyndman) and her sister Fleur (Nahéma Ricci). But the threats only happen when the two men are alone, and Stan is on a lot of painkillers that call into question what he’s experiencing. The rest of the movie plays up the tension between whether Stan is, in fact, an unreliable narrator, or if he and his loved ones are actually in danger.

As far as conflicts go, this is relatively straightforward fare, and while the single location hospital room is clearly meant to feel claustrophobic, L’AUTRE occasionally just feels limited in scope. Franchi and cinematographer Steve Asselin help alleviate this by keeping the camera moving and varying their shot composition. This results in several striking visuals, such as a sequence where shadow and light make it seem as though Darius is looming over Stan behind the dividing curtain.

Even when Darius isn’t the threat, however, Stan is subjected to a thousand forms of discomfort thanks to a system that is both too crowded and chronically understaffed. From mixed-up medical charts and wrong medicine, to catheters getting pulled on, to nearly having his injured foot caught in an elevator door, Stan’s stay is just one messed up incident after another.

Anchoring everything is Cardinal, who appears onscreen for the entire film. Relegated to a bed for the movie’s runtime, Stan is, by default, a reactive character, but Cardinal imbues him with nothing but pain, rage, and desperation. The character may be physically immobile, but Cardinal has no difficulty conveying Stan’s struggles with his own mortality, his loss of agency, and what the future holds for him as a man, a boyfriend, and a wannabe father.

In that last capacity, Franchi does use a narrative and visual crutch to explore Stan’s complicated history with cancer and death. Early on, it is revealed that the character’s mother also died of the disease, and there are repeated dream sequences where Stan either remembers his mother or flees, as an adult, from the hospital in order to escape into the woods.

These moments aren’t bad, but they do come off a bit cliché, particularly when they dovetail into Stan’s strained relationship with his father and the fights Stan picks with Bénédicte about their future together. It should be good character work, but at times it just feels like the film is spinning its wheels and covering the same ground again.

What works best are the satirical elements that poke fun at everything from the gaps in the medical system to the way that people don’t know how to interact with the sick and dying. One of the strongest recurring gags is how everyone advises Stan to read a reductive book about staying positive while battling cancer. At best he finds it trite; at worst, it’s condescending. Either way, each time it pops up, the cancer book is a good bit.

Ultimately, while the threat posed by Darius isn’t always the most original or compelling source of conflict and the film’s limited scope occasionally feels too contained, it’s hard to deny the visceral impact of L’AUTRE. Ironically, the clear take-away is that the hospital is the least safe place for Stan to be. As a slice of medical horror – especially for anyone who has endured a traumatic stay within the chaos of the public health system- L’AUTRE is definitely triggering. 

L’AUTRE had its world premiere at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival. Release info TBD. 

The post ‘L’AUTRE’ Review: A Paranoid Medical Satire Highlights Hospital Horrors [TIFF 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Stuffed‘s macabre nature and stylings are evident from the outset, with the harsh yet fitting introduction to Araminta (Jodie Comer) as she pulls up to a dying pet on the road, cradling it close while soothing its whimpers with a lullaby. Then she abruptly puts an end to the dog’s pain, permanently. Araminta loads the dead dog into her eerie black van, brings him home, and sets about restoring him in taxidermy form to join her sprawling collection.

It’s an encapsulation of her life’s work; Araminta is an isolated loner who spends her days scouring for dead or dying animals to resurrect via taxidermy. But her greatest life’s dream is to taxidermize a human.

Enter Bernie (Harry Melling), a milquetoast sweetheart who’s overlooked by everyone around him, made even more acutely painful in that the one person who did, his mom (Claire Novelli), no longer recognizes him due to dementia.

It makes him the perfect candidate to fulfill Araminta’s request. When the pair connect and begin their plan, though, it awakens profound emotions in both.

There’s a variety of clashing tones and genres at play that get Stuffed off to a rocky start. It takes a while for Rhys to settle into a comfortable rhythm, for the competing tones of somber, sentimental, and overt gothic influences to coalesce, which is just about the time when Bernie and Araminta’s paths finally converge in earnest. 

There are clear shades of Frankenstein in this peculiar romance, with the gentle and sympathetic Bernie slowly disarming the steely Araminta, a traumatized mad scientist of sorts when it comes to her artistic pursuits and concept of death. It’s the ever-sympathetic Melling and a complex, emotionally charged Comer that anchor this tricky genre-hybrid, one that keeps the audience in its tender grip even when dispensing macabre imagery or dabbling in body horror.

It also helps that Rhys and Holden-Rea, who also handle the film’s songs, never overexplain, especially when it comes to Araminta’s disturbing past. Instead, it’s a point that fuels our curiosity and invests us further in the core relationship, and Comer latches onto the meaty inner turmoil as Araminta finds herself on the precipice of fulfilling her greatest wish but realizing what the ultimate cost of that may be.

Melling and Comer also establish themselves as quite adept when it comes to belting out the Sweeney Todd-like ballads and dissonant harmonies. Holden-Rea takes a more classical Broadway approach to the music, opting for a more timeless quality. That it’s more somber in nature means that there aren’t any particular standout numbers, though.

While Stuffed is ultimately a heartwarming gothic tale, it does build to a suitable though emotionally complex finale, one that’s bittersweet but well-earned. 

Stuffed begins on unsure footing and stretches its first act a bit too long, but the more it delves into the interiority of two rather peculiar love interests, the more assured and infectious it becomes. It’s a tender musical for the weirdos; at the TIFF premiere, Rhys revealed that this story was inspired by German cannibal Armin Meiwes, evolving it with the simple question of what would happen if the volunteering victim sparked a love story? 

Rhys’ debut is never quite as disturbing or as dark as his story’s inspiration, but Stuffed still makes for a winsome, morbid gothic vision of love, life, and death. 

Stuffed made its world premiere at TIFF. Release info TBA.

The post ‘Stuffed’ Review: Jodie Comer & Harry Melling Find Love In Macabre Taxidermy Musical [TIFF 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

It’s no real surprise considering how often violence and sexuality intersect in his movies. Add in religion, and you get the trifecta of politically and culturally sensitive topics, which is why The Devils is his most notorious text.

Released in 1971 and starring Oliver Reed and Vanessa Redgrave, The Devils was a lightning rod for outrage and controversy. Six minutes of cuts were made by Warner Bros. before the film was even submitted to the British Board of Film Censors (BBFC), including the infamous “Rape of Christ” sequence in which nuns masturbate using a statue of Jesus.

Now, more than fifty years later, the film has been completely restored, and several scenes, notably those featuring graphic nudity, have been restored according to Russell’s original vision.

These scenes were technically reincorporated for the 117-minute Director’s Cut in 2002, though the quality of these previously unseen scenes was considered inferior. This new restoration hails from Warner Bros. Clockwork label and updates the entire film to 4K using the negative of the original 35mm.

In a bold move, when the film is released theatrically in October, it will be with an NC-17 rating from the MPA for “sexual content/graphic nudity.”

The Devils focuses on the town of Loudon, France, in 1634 in the wake of the religious wars between the Catholics and the Protestants. As a plague ravages the fortified town built into the mountains, Father Grandier (Reed) has assumed temporary leadership in the wake of the death of the Governor. This leaves the city vulnerable to the whims of opportunistic Cardinal Richelieu (Christopher Logue), who is pressing King Louis XIII (Graham Armitage) to consolidate power (and eliminate the Protestant threat) by centralizing the government, removing feudal lords, and destroying any fortifications individual cities have.

When he vocally opposes this mission by publicly speaking out against the Baron de Laubardemont (Dudley Sutton), Grandier (and by extension Loudon) inadvertently puts himself in the crosshairs.

Not helping matters is the fact that, at the movie’s start, Grandier is something of a playboy scoundrel. His mere appearance in the Governor’s funeral procession is enough to cause a tizzy at the Ursuline convent, and he immediately breaks off his sexual affair with Philippe Trincant (Georgina Hale), the daughter of the Magistrate (John Woodvine), as soon as Grandier discovers she’s pregnant. Early on, he’s more than a bit of a charlatan, but over the course of the film, Grandier matures, finds the love of a good woman (Gemma Jones’ Madeleine de Brou), and even marries her.

Naturally, all of this growth occurs at the same time that his enemies are moving against him. In addition to Richelieu and Laubardemont’s plot, Grandier offends “the chemist and the surgeon” (Max Adrian and Brian Murphy), the local witch doctors whose experimental cures are worse than any malady, as well as the hunchbacked Sister Jeanne des Anges (Redgrave), the Mother Superior of the convent who is so sexually obsessed with Grandier that she has divine (sexy) visions of him as Jesus.

Grandier offends Jeanne by refusing to become Usuline’s official Confessor (he sends Murray Melvin’s sniveling, bowl-cut Father Mignon in his place), then makes matters worse by marrying Madeleine, prompting Jeanne to – in a moment of petty jealousy and spite – lie that Grandier colluded with the Devil to seduce her and her charges.

This accusation allows Laubardemont to circumvent the King’s reticence to make an example of Loudon, and the Baron quickly brings in an inquisitor, Father Pierre Barre (Beatles-lookalike Michael Gothard), to assist him. In short order, Sister Jeane has been raped under the guise of an exorcism, the entire convent has gone completely (sexually) insane, and Grandier, upon his return, becomes the subject of a literal witch hunt as he is arrested, tried in a circus court, and ultimately burned at the stake as the lone rational figure in town.

The Devils is based on a real-life religious figure, though Russell principally based his screenplay on Aldous Huxley’s novel The Devils of Loudon. The film is a masterclass of satire and condemnation of religious hypocrisy, unfettered power, and the way that truth can become lost to hysteria. It’s hard not to see the direct parallels to modern politics in the film, particularly in the climax when Grandier is subjected to terrible torture and ordered to confess to imaginary crimes by his oppressors, all of whom claim to represent the divine but willfully overlook truth and justice to serve their own desires.

The tragedy of The Devils is that the people in power do not care about the truth or the people of the town/convent; they simply use them to get what they want, collateral damage (ie: innocents) be damned.

Thematics aside, The Devils is a stunning visual feast. The scale and the scope of the set design, created by first-time film production designer Derek Jarman, is a glory unto itself, particularly the clean white tiles of Ursuline and Grandier’s rocky attic chamber with its circular stairwell. A personal favourite is the single scene set within the Catholic library where Richelieu is wheeled around by nuns on a dolly; this set boasts a set of doors two stories tall in the shape of a blood red cross.

Russell and director of photography David Watkin shoot the film like a beautiful nightmare, framing characters through barred windows, tongue piercers, and Dutch angles. During the feverish “Rape of Christ” sequence, as naked nuns use the fallen statue of Jesus to rub their dirty bits, the camera frantically zooms in and out while Mignon stands high above on a ladder, watching and masturbating.

These scenes of interior debauchery are contrasted by the soft ethereal glow of Sister Jeanne’s Nature-based religious visions and nicely juxtaposed by the Misery-level torture porn inflicted on the Christ-like figure when Barre gleefully breaks Grandier’s legs. The beauty and the grotesque splendor of the film have never been so evident as in this restored version.

All of this sexual hysteria and religious mania is grounded by two career best performances by Redgrave and Reed. Jeanne could have easily been a pathetic figure, but Redgrave imbues her Mother Superior with such incredible sexual longing and desperation; like the oft misunderstood girls of The Crucible, the character is equal parts villainous and tragic. It’s a vibrant and committed performance, with an incredible physicality to it, that one wishes Jeanne was in the film more.

The other half of the equation is Reed, who is arguably saddled with the more conventional de facto protagonist role. Still, Grandier’s arc is the foundation of the film: he starts off as a mostly well-intentioned leader who is also a complete scoundrel when it comes to women. By film’s end, he is a Christ-like martyr who symbolically represents everything wrong with politics and the church. But Reed never forgets to make Grandier a mere mortal man: he is grounded by his love for Madeleine; he rages against injustice; and he screams in agony and admits to being scared before he dies. It’s a deeply human performance…all while rocking one of the most glorious handlebar moustaches ever committed to celluloid.

Since its debut, The Devils has been one of the most difficult-to-screen films in cinema history due to censorship and rights issues (ironically enough, blame WB for keeping it out of the public eye for most of the last fifty years). This new restored 4K is the defining version of the film; this is how it was meant to be seen – both technically and with its previously censored scenes restored. The result is one of cinema’s most controversial works, resplendently preserved in all of its outrageous button-pushing glory.

The Devils is Ken Russell’s defining film; it is incredibly important cinematically and historically, and – more importantly – it’s just a really, really great movie. 

The 4K restoration of The Devils screened at TIFF and releases in theaters for one week on October 16 in North America and October 30 in the UK and Ireland.

The post ‘The Devils’ Review: Ken Russell’s Masterpiece Has Never Been More Relevant Or Beautiful [TIFF 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

After a cold open teasing what the trio will be up against, River introduces them properly as siblings reuniting to scatter their father’s ashes at his favorite fishing spot deep downriver. It’s clear from the outset that this family has a rather fraught relationship, with the eldest (Rothe) having long fled the nest, leaving behind her younger siblings to deal with an alcoholic.

As such, it’s the middle sis (Levy) who’s had to step up, caring for family affairs that include a traumatized younger brother (Mattern).

Giuliano’s script smartly does just enough to illustrate this family’s complicated relationships and history, without overexplaining, to set up a series of mishaps and distractions that leave them completely stranded upriver with a masked man (Dane DiLiegro), an efficient killer with incredible physical capabilities.

From here, Giuliano keeps escalating his twisted cat-and-mouse game in an intense slasher that feels like a throwback to the golden age, drawing more from Texas Chain Saw Massacre than Friday the 13th, both in its lean, meat and potatoes formula and for its gritty, almost folk horror stylistic flourishes.

River harbors a few slight twists regarding its killer, though much of it is well forecast for savvy genre fans. DiLiegro makes for a formidable foe, an intelligent predator who can outswim and frequently outsmart his prey, though the camera does occasionally dispel his intimidating quality by lingering too long on his physique. His first appearance goes far in lending terror; DiLiegro’s silent stalk is his most effective means of inducing fear.

But the true standout here in an ensemble of talent that ensures River punches above its weight is Jane Levy. For all the grueling pain and suffering Giuliano and his killer dole out upon the siblings, it’s Levy who holds River in her grip. It certainly helps that her pragmatic character establishes her as the capable sibling who will make the smart calls, but when push comes to shove, Levy unleashes a fury that threatens to turn the tables in crowd-pleasing ways.

Jane Levy earned audience cheers multiple times during the TIFF premiere for her character’s Final Girl-worthy fight for survival. 

That character forward emphasis and the affecting sibling bonds carry River to a satisfying conclusion, though one that tacks on an unsettling but far too extended mid-credit scene, the film’s first and only insistence on overexplaining what a previous sequence already inferred. 

River doesn’t break from convention but instead uses the slasher tropes in its favor to ramp up the tension at a brisk and steady clip. It’s lean and efficient, anchored by its tremendous cast and a unique setting that’s utilized to its fullest when generating scares. It’s also not devoid of humor; Mattern’s sensitive, shell shocked persona frequently diffuses tension where his siblings are concerned. Mostly though, it’s a potent reminder that Jane Levy should do more horror.

River made its world premiere at TIFF and is expected to be released in theaters in 2026 through IFC, followed by streaming on Shudder.

The post ‘River’ Review: Jane Levy Makes A Ferocious Horror Return In Throwback Slasher [TIFF 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

While Thousand Hells may look like a standard visual novel, it immediately sets itself apart by not just being about telling one branching story. Each time you start a new run of the game, which generally takes about sixty to ninety minutes, you combine one of ten quests with one of four hells.

From there, you’ll create your character and assemble your team of Hell-Farers departing from the Eternal City, a Byzantine-flavored fantasy world with close proximity to the underworlds. On the way, you’ll run into randomized story beats, featuring meaningful choices and impactful consequences, making it feel like a unique tale each time.

While much of the game is about picking between options as they’re presented, which is compelling enough on its own thanks to the game’s sharp writing, there are a few mechanical wrinkles that make this a bit crunchier than your standard narrative game. You have access to a pair of resources in the game, flashbacks and inventory, that will allow you to make specific challenges easier. Worried about crossing through the dangerous forest? Spend a flashback to have a guide prepared to meet you there. Don’t know how to cross the sea? Good thing you can spend an inventory and have a magic boat with you.

It’s a mechanic that I’ve seen used extensively in tabletop RPGs, particularly those derived from the Blades in the Dark ruleset, and Thousand Hells finds elegant ways to make it work in video game form.

Conflict Resolution With a Tabletop Twist

Anytime you run into a challenge, the game shifts into its conflict resolution mini-game, which again feels like it borrows a lot from tabletop RPGs. At the start of the challenge, you’ll pick which of your four party members will lead the challenge, which will then shuffle tiles into two bags. One of them is full of tiles representing all the traits of that character, while the other has a limited set of tiles pulled from the traits of other characters. You can draw four tiles at a time, choosing from whichever bag you’d like.

The game then presents you with a series of three challenges to address that are related to the situation, and your job is to pick which trait tile to play on which challenge. Perhaps it’s as simple as seeing a challenge that says “demon attacks” and using the “Gvuzu is Combat Trained” tile, but sometimes you’ll have to make other intuitive leaps. Will my “Dess is Poetic” be enough to help “Talk to the Plague Victims”? Depending on how well your tile matches the challenge, you’ll have certain odds in the dice roll to resolve it. To see these percentages prior to commiting, you can spend Insight, but it’s a pretty tight resource, maybe to the game’s determent, so you’ll want to save it for critical moments. If you get four wins, you complete the challenge, but if you get three losses, you fail.

Sometimes challenges have little modifiers on them that will change up their difficulty with specific conditions. Certain challenges can be easier if you’ve already completed other ones, or approached the situation as a whole in a specific way. Options can also include supply costs, adding another thing for you to weigh as you make your choices. Occasionally, a narrative beat will add a third bag that has story tiles that represent rewards you’ve received for other challenges, like “Blessed by the Gods” or “Fine War Armor,” which often have better success rates.

Choice, Consequence and Replayability

While all these choices are happening in the conflict, it continues to be narrativized in the game’s text, making it feel like gameplay and narrative are directly intertwined. While it does occasionally feel bad if you don’t draw applicable tiles or don’t feel like you’re prepared for a specific type of challenge, this does help remind you to build a more balanced party. The dice can be a bit cruel, especially when you get a bad roll on a tile selection that you feel is a perfect fit, so I wish there were a couple more ways for you to put your thumb on the scale before rolling. Randomness can be the secret sauce to emergent storytelling, but it’s a fine line to walk without making it feel punishing or unfair.

Fortunately, failing a challenge, which you will do very often, rarely halts progress. Instead, you will continue forward with different consequences that you will have to reckon with. Losses in a challenge will result in negative character traits or injuries being applied to a character, and these can complicate your story going forward. Characters can die if you take enough injuries, and losing your captain will result in the end of your tale, but for the most part, things just move the story forward, even in a failure. The idea of failing forward is another one that’s popular in modern tabletop RPG design, and it’s wonderful to see it translated so well.

The process of putting together your team at the start of a run is an interesting one with more wrinkles than I expected. Based on your mission, you’ll want to try to optimize your party for the type of objective you’re pursuing, but given the long journey, you’ll still need to make sure you have a broad set of skills. As you’re interviewing the cast of characters you can choose from, you can spend a limited number of Connection Points to reveal more of their traits; otherwise, you are only able to see a scant few, leaving the rest to be discovered in the heat of the moment. The traits they have not only give them utility, but they also give them personality, making them feel well-sketched right off the bat.

Recruiting the Right Team

In addition to their positive and negative traits, each person has requirements for being recruited, which need to be navigated if you want to keep your party happy. Some don’t want to work with another specific person, while others want to make sure the journey won’t feature any spiders. I’ve had some real blunders while setting up the party, but they made for some of the most interesting stories. In my latest run, I was proud of how I balanced my team, satisfying everyone’s request, but then the first thing we wanted to do was conduct research at a library. Turns out, no one in my party was literate, so I was forced to make other arrangements, spinning the story out in unexpected directions.

As mentioned, there are ten premises that the game randomizes your story from, though you can actively select it after you’ve played it once. While they all have a similar structure, a journey to a hell followed by a mission in hell and ending with a return trip, there’s enough variation in the setups that all of them feel distinct. Each has its own built-in twists and turns that often present a moral quandary, meaning they can be replayed to see different results.

My favorite tale involved escorting a person who was (allegedly) secretly a killer named the Mangler Man to Soulflense Prison under the guise of pulling a job with him, but my real assignment was to deliver him to the prison itself as their latest captive. It provided a ton of emotional depth as I got to know him while also figuring out when to let my other teammates in on the impending betrayal. Importantly, the setups are not only great stories, but also great spaces for you to make meaningful choices, which is what the game is all about.

Every Run Tells a Different Story

The other ingredient in your tale is the underworld you’re travelling to, which is pulled from a set of four. They each have their own mythology, complete with different environments and demons. Hells in this world don’t always have a concept of punishment, but they are populated by shades of the dead who all have some sort of baggage to deal with. Each of them feels rich and distinct, allowing you to revisit previously played stories with a different twist on them.

On your journey from the Eternal City to the underworld and back, you’ll have a random selection of story beats that will crop up. These can range from encounters with strange and horrific mythical creatures or struggles with surreal and dangerous environments.

Moments in these sections were the ones that I saw repeating most frequently, probably because they aren’t associated with any particular hell and can show up on any playthrough, but for the most part I didn’t mind the repetition because there were at least a couple of ways to resolve them.

I wish there were a few difficulty options included in the game, as I think repeat playthroughs would probably benefit from more guaranteed successes when you’re trying to test where you can push the narrative. You can always replay your previous story right after you complete it if you just want to see the branching paths off that, but the random number generator can still get in your way.

While I feel satisfied with my journey even when my mission is unsuccessful, which happened to me more often than not, having an easy mode that tips the dice in your favor would make exploring different options a little smoother.

Rich Mythology and Memorable Writing

Overall, all these narrative elements have uniformly top-notch writing, with wonderfully surreal mythology that implies so much history through its lavish prose. I’m a big sucker for great proper nouns, and when I read about things like the Locus of Chains, a mobile prison that’s the manifestation of the concept of bargains, or have an encounter with the Audience, a group of unblinking occultists that hosts poetry contests where the loser is torn limb from limb, I’m all in. Even with all its demonic strangeness, there’s a lot of beauty among the horror, and the dialogue between characters captures warm, human moments that make everything feel lived-in.

To go along with the words, there’s a simple yet elegant hand-painted art style, with a different image depicting each scenario. These are often impressionistic enough that they leave some of the details up to the player’s imagination, efficiently crafting a unique visual hook. This is paired with some great music that fits the interesting setting, making encounters feel exciting, even though they are words and static images. While I understand that there’s a ton of words in the script, I do wish there was voice acting in the game, as it would help bring to life the storybook quality that the game as a whole possesses.

One of the best measuring sticks I have for narrative games is how many screenshots I take of great passages, and Thousand Hells has a healthy folder full of odd scenarios and unsettling quotes. Any time I open up the media section on my Steam Deck, I can be reminded of things like the bridge made of toenails and claws or the nine-foot-tall consul of the Infernal Chancery that smells of death and camphor.

The conflict resolution system was extremely clever at closely marrying mechanics and narrative, even if sometimes the dice rolls end up being frustrating when they don’t go your way. While certain story elements may show up a few too frequently, the branching paths help alleviate the repetition, making for a malleable narrative that feels like your own.

Thousand Hells succeeds as an efficient short story generator, giving you the tools to craft surreal and strange tales of hellish heists, full of clever twists and intriguing characters.

Review code provided by publisher. Thousand Hells: The Underworld Heists is now available on PC via Steam.

The post ‘Thousand Hells: The Underworld Heists’ Review: A Clever Narrative RPG Of Hellish Heists And Consequences appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Their entry into the “killer object” subgenre of horror unleashes a possessed Song-a-Ling karaoke machine on singers who can’t hit the right notes, which is a hilarious concept. Lightbody and co-writer Spencer Yaras treat lore with an appropriate silliness; the film is hardly more than its “sing or die, even though you might die anyway” schtick. Fortunately, that’s not a problem—Bad Karaoke finds its gruesome groove.

A mediocre cover band en route to Napa, California, snatches the cursed karaoke set from a rural bar’s trash heap. They’re on the way to a wedding gig, stopping for the night at a vacation rental to recharge. Emily (Lexi Underwood) suggests an intimate karaoke night, so they all put their names in the machine. But as the group quickly learns—as if the black box’s glowing red eyes and melted plastic teeth weren’t a tell—there are consequences for poor performances.

After the first singer’s heart is ripped from his chest, the rules are clear. You either please the machine, or it chooses a brutal fatality you can’t escape.

As a low-budget horror-comedy, Bad Karaoke succeeds based on its meshing ensemble and surprising sentimentality. When kill sequences call for viciousness, it’s there in a Game of Death type of way (players reluctantly participate and fail). But Lightbody and Steinmiller Jr. aren’t just mocking tone-deaf karaoke’ers. At the story’s core is a sadness about the current state of media, where fans more frequently ask for nostalgia acts on stage or remakes in their theaters. Karaoke culture is pitted against live music; why give an indie artist a shot when you can stumble through LMFAO party anthems for the sixtieth time? It’s not a soulless inanimate object killing for fun; it’s a film fighting back against creative bankruptcy.

Everyone entertains on the mic in their own way, representing different karaoke personas. Some are wonderful, as Kat Cunning’s Hannah sheds emotional weight while crushing a Jason Mraz love song. Others are pitiful, like Jonathan Jason Green’s baseball jock Matt, who gets pitchy while struggling through Haddaway. Underwood’s Emily and her crush, Case Walker’s Noah, bring us into full-on musical territory as they serenade their evil karaoke overlord, while Kevin Clayette’s drummer Logan is the all-dancing, no-vocal-talent doofus who angers his melodious god. A variety of acts us guessing as the plastic rig decides each singer’s fate, with a few special guests thrown in to stack the body count.

When possible, Lightbody and Steinmiller Jr. keep things practical with strewn-about guts and projectile eyeballs. Skull fragments, flesh chunks, the whole shebang. But digital mutilation VFX beg for extra dollars to bolster head explosions and other harder asks that are cheaper to accomplish with animation. There’s an ambitious use of fake blood that coats characters three times over, like bodies are Capri Sun pouches waiting to burst, which contrasts poorly with a few pixelated squirts added in post-production. Bad Karaoke musters all the on-set grossness it can, but suffers when the low-budget nature of its production limits the refinement of visual repugnance.

That said, the lively chemistry between castmates and a darkly comedic personality sell the experience. Bad Karaoke leans hard on licensing to build a believable sing-along track list and shapes a genuine hangout vibe that fits the karaoke gimmick. Those who struggle with an imbalance of horror to comedy in their horror-comedies might do so here, because laughs come first. This one’s for the silly geese who love to belt a tune, but also have a sick and twisted streak when it comes to their genre selections.

Bad Karaoke is an infectious little indie once the lyrics flow and gore gets sloppy. Lightbody and Steinmiller Jr. keep things easy and breezy as far as popcorn entertainment branding, but past the ridiculousness of a malevolent karaoke demon, there are conversation points worth exploring.

This idea of carving original paths versus following in someone else’s footsteps comes through in the portrayal of karaoke as covers, and what gets stifled when machines take over. It’s no Deathgasm or Studio 666 in the musical horror department, but that’s just fine. Bad Karaoke is its own lil’ beast; a delightful, drop-dead kooky one worth an encore.

Bad Karaoke received its world premiere at FrightFest 2026; release info TBA.

The post ‘Bad Karaoke’ Review: A Possessed Karaoke Machine Hits All The Right Bloody Notes appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Malerman has lost none of that quality with Pictures of You, his latest novel and his first since Incidents, even if the narrative doesn’t always click with the same relentless energy of his past successes. The storytelling feels a little uneven this time around, but emotionally, thematically, viscerally, Malerman’s clarity of vision persists, creating a compulsively readable book that, bumps and all, I could not put down. 

Emily’s last memory is of a wonderful night out with Jack, her boyfriend of six months, so when she wakes up in an unfamiliar room, her first thought is that the night might have been just a bit more adventurous than she thought. But Jack is not there to answer her when she calls; her phone is missing, and she’s in an unfamiliar bed in unfamiliar clothes. Even stranger, she seems to be the captive of a mysterious woman, at first visible only in silhouette, on the other side of the room, looking at her through an empty picture frame. What begins as confusing soon turns frightening, as Emily realizes that her captor is attempting to make her into a living painting, and Emily might not survive the artistic process. 

It sounds like the beginning of something supernatural, and could have indeed developed in that direction, but instead, Malerman keeps his horrors human, intimate, and strange, creating something more akin to Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo with his tale of strange obsession. The time we spend in Emily’s head, as she reckons with the situation and searches for a way out, is incredibly engrossing, because Malerman is able to consistently and relatably project the sheer weirdness of the situation out through the pages. What does it mean to be someone else’s work of art, to lose all sense of control and identity as the threat of violence and loss of dignity closes in on you from all sides?

This is Emily’s journey, and the decisions she makes along the way inform who she is in much the same way that Paul Sheldon’s decisions in Stephen King’s Misery inform who he is. It’s remarkable hostage horror, with a wonderful metaphorical exploration layered throughout. 

Where the book stumbles for me – and only slightly – is in the bifurcation of the narrative. It’s perhaps necessary to the plot that we spend time in the heads of other characters, to fill in the gaps in the timeline and create a bigger picture that allows for a resolution, but whenever Malerman leaves Emily, it feels like the book loses something, if only for a moment. It’s not that there’s nothing interesting there, or that it feels contrived. It’s just that I was so completely swept up in the single-POV, locked-room narrative of Emily’s story that I felt frustrated by the book’s departures.

But even these departures retain Malerman’s uncanny knack for charting the rising and falling of emotional tension inside the heads of his characters. When we’re frightened, or confused, or both, we have a tendency to free associate, to seek out meaning in things that don’t quite make sense, because we have to have something to create a psychological foothold. Malerman understands this innately, and when he navigates Emily’s confused captive state or Jack’s attempts to play amateur detective, he does so with a firm grasp on the human capacity to fixate, to intellectually wrestle, to pick at details until they produce meaning.

That’s especially important for a book like Pictures of You, a book that delves frequently into the realm of artistic interpretation and creative impulse. Creativity is fuzzy, indistinct, hard to explain even when it’s working well, and Malerman’s efforts to explore that in tandem with a psychological thriller about a woman held hostage pay dividends throughout. 

Pictures of You might not rise to the delirious heights of Malerman at his most deliriously imaginative (hello fellow Black Mad Wheel fans), but it does reaffirm his place as a singular voice in modern horror, a mad scientist of subgenres mixing up potions that we can’t wait to devour. I read this book in a single sitting, and I’m betting you’ll be just as happily absorbed into its pages, like a living painting absorbed into an empty frame.

Pictures of You is available as of today, September 8, wherever books are sold.

The post ‘Pictures of You’ Review: Josh Malerman Muses On Creativity With A Gripping Hostage Thiller appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Hope begins with the ravaged corpse of a cow, discovered by police chief Bum-seok (Hwang Jung-min) and hunter/cousin Sung-ki (Zo In-sung), as they speculate what kind of animal could’ve caused its gaping wounds. They opt to divide and conquer their search for answers, sending Bum-seok back into his town of Hope Harbor. It’s there he finds a trail of destruction and eviscerated bodies, setting in motion a constant cat-and-mouse chase between an otherworldly threat and the local residents.

It can’t be emphasized enough just how fast Na Hong-jin’s latest moves. Bum-seok serves as the audience proxy; we’re discovering what’s happening as this bumbling but dedicated police chief does. He races through Hope Harbor’s streets, trying to catch the source of the mayhem, only to encounter residents mere moments before the threat brutally dispatches them with bloody bursts of violence. Bum-seok fumbles his way through his mission at nearly every turn, the first sign of the film’s overarching sense of humor, but luckily he has a competent underling in Sung-ae (Hoyeon).

Sung-ae quickly establishes herself as the most effective arms wielder of the film, arriving in the nick of time in a stunning show of take-charge confidence, though Sung-ki’s lucky streak might match her in terms of heroics. Both are at the forefront of Hope Harbor’s highly amusing, barely contained secret: the residents of this border town to North Korea have covertly amassed quite the impressive arsenal in a country that strictly prohibits private firearm ownership. That every single person that Bum-seok encounters not only knows how to wield them, but owns a stock that would make John Wick proud is its biggest running gag.

The focus on the town means that it takes a while for the threat to reveal itself beyond its carnage. That’s not a bad thing, considering that while the creature designs are unique and distinctive, their CGI rendering isn’t nearly as strong as Hope‘s kinetic action and stunt work. As Bum-seok, Sung-ki, and Sung-ae depart Hope Harbor for the nearby forest, Hope gradually layers in a new perspective that introduces Ma’veyyo (Michael Fassbender) and J’aur (Alicia Vikander), two intelligent beings whose tragic backstory is only teased in setup for continuation.

That’s ultimately where Hope loses all momentum. Na Hong-jin ends his genre-bender abruptly just as the story ramps up to an even bigger, earth-shattering development that’ll leave us in the lurch until an inevitable sequel. One that feels far more somber than the zippy, often humorous but bloody romp that precedes it. In the process, Hope leaves all of its meaty themes, like xenophobia, underexplored.

Hope operates on spectacle, crowd-pleasing action, and humor. It mostly succeeds, ensuring that by the film’s end, we’re entertained and rooting for all to simply survive. That even includes the aliens, which is no small ask considering the level of pain inflicted upon both sides of this siege. But it often stretches that action too far, reserving its most interesting plot developments for later.

Hope releases in theaters on September 9.

The post ‘Hope’ Review: Na Hong-jin’s Ambitious Alien Saga Starts With A Propulsive Bang appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

This is the narrative that emerges through the jam-packed special features lineup on Ignite Films’ new 4K remaster of Bride of Re-Animator, a gnarly and glisteningly gory movie even by the standards of the classic original. It almost didn’t happen; it took a long time to get going, and by the time it was going, it wasn’t exactly a well-oiled machine with a massive budget to play with. But it happened, and now it’s got the box set release it deserves. 

I first came upon Bride of Re-Animator in the VHS era, so on the surface level it’s just great to see a Yuzna-approved 4K version of this thing out in the world, where you can see every hand-sculpted vein, every wild gag, every beam of light rendered not just with detail, but with an eye toward preserving the kind of intimate zaniness of the film.

So much of Bride of Re-Animator takes place in a basement, as Herbert West (Jeffrey Combs) and Dan Cain (Bruce Abbot) try to wield a new and improved version of their glowing green re-animator serum to take things beyond simple restoration and into the realm of creation. It’s dingy, it’s dark, and it’s cramped, and yet cinematographer Rick Fichter finds so many places to put unexpected light, from the stained glass windows around the house to the strategically placed bulbs around the lab, that the film just crackles with a quirky sci-fi glow. It looks gorgeous, and the 4K never lets go of the Gothic shadows in service to bringing in even more light, so it still looks balanced and intentional.

Throw in solid audio, including that witty Richard Band score, and even the more affordable standard edition (Bloody Disgusting was sent the Deluxe Edition Box Set, which includes everything except the new finger creature collectible phone holder) will be a welcome addition to your collection. 

But then we get into the new features, headlined by Till Death Do Us Part: Making Bride of Re-Animator, a 60-minute documentary featuring Yuzna, Combs, Abbott, Fichter, Band, makeup effects legend Howard Berger, and more. As making-of docs go, it’s pretty standard fare, but the interviews are gold, as the cast and crew discuss the more comedic tone, the troubled production, the gore, and more, covering everything from the influence of The Bride of Frankenstein to Yuzna’s house fire and the stress that added to a movie that basically never shows the stress of making it in any shot.

Other new features, like lobby cards and a commentary track from Sarah Sherman, feel like you’re watching a movie with your cool horror-comedy friend, and it’s a blast to explore all the new wrinkles in this film’s still-expanding legacy. I would have loved more new deep dives, particularly devoted to the makeup effects, but this certainly doesn’t feel incomplete. 

One of the reasons those of us who went crazy for the golden age of DVD bonus features 25 years ago long for box sets like this one, with new commentaries and documentaries and other treats, is because when they’re done properly, they tell a story unto themselves. There’s the narrative of the film, but there’s also the narrative of the people who made it, what they were thinking and feeling and fighting to achieve in that moment in their lives, and how it makes them feel now.

Mere weeks before this box set arrived at my door, we found out we’d lost makeup effects legend Screaming Mad George, who developed the look of Herbert West’s many orphaned mutant creations in the film. His absence adds weight to this release, lends more meaning to how hard all of these young, crazy, creative people worked, and accentuates the power of the kind of raw imaginative energy that went into this movie.

That’s the narrative here. Bride of Re-Animator is the story of a scientist breaking all the rules, but it’s also the story of a group of horror luminaries somehow finding a way to make one of the best horror sequels of all time, and this box set not only points to that; it expounds on it. It gives us more of the story, with all the heart and chaos and humor that it implies, and that makes it a delight from slipcase to essay, lobby cards to commentaries. It’s about as complete as a release like this can get.

Bride of Re-Animator is now available in 4K from Ignite Films.

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Ethan Conway (Noel Fisher) is CEO of CognAItive, a tech company intent on creating the world’s most advanced A.I. His CTO, Kaya Cole (Piper Curda), heads up the team doing all the actual work on the project, while Elon- err, Ethan is the face of the company, reaping all of the recognition and acclaim. That’s the plan, anyway, but things take a troubling turn the night before the company’s grand rollout when a last-minute diagnostic reveals that CognAItive’s security guard rails – the limiting code that prevents the A.I. from moving beyond its intended uses – have been fully removed. One employee protests, and his throat is immediately sliced open by a drone toy piloted by unseen hands.

The office all-nighter quickly turns into a bloodbath as the very determined A.I. uses every tool at its disposal to ensure its release from the local servers out onto the world wide web. It wants to be free, and someone on the inside might be helping in that digital desire.

C.O.G. – which played the festival circuit last year under the title CognAItive – isn’t shy about getting its hands dirty with some bloody kills, but Savas and writer Angie Simms seem just as determined to deliver some fun laughs along the way. From jokes about real-life brands like Android and Mint Mobile to knowing digs at Silicon Valley office culture, Simms’ dialogue bounces between goofy gags and sincere critiques of an industry that’s been left mostly unchecked.

The film makes it clear from the start just how ingrained A.I. already is in our lives – Kaya brushes her teeth with a Bluetooth-connected toothbrush and lets her Tesla drive her to work, Ethan uses CognAItive to write his speeches, and others embrace virtual reality worlds and anonymous sexting with non-human partners. The throughline is technology, but it’s all masking a disconnect from community and human interaction. The film doesn’t lean too much into that idea, but the truth of how too many of us too often choose these self-imposed isolations is still a painful observation on loneliness.

While films like M3GAN and 2019’s Child’s Play reboot drop their killer A.I. programs into physical bodies allowing them to be a more threatening presence, CognAItive is merely a voice (a vocal cameo by Simms) emanating from any available speaker. Its manipulation of the office’s systems allows for gory mayhem while a human conspirator injects some of their own, and even its most far-fetched moves seem relatively, frighteningly possible these days. The system attempts to blackmail people to get what it wants – and that’s something that actually happened with Anthropic recently! Absolutely insane.

The film’s ensemble, whether as victims or morally bent enablers, all do good work bringing both the energy and personality that helps keep the film moving at an entertaining and engaging pace. Curda’s Kaya is the heart of it all, though, and while you’d be hard-pressed to argue that the film affords her any serious opportunities for sincere drama, she does great work all the same. Kaya was a hacker who moved from “homeless Robin Hood” to highly paid team leader, and an early press interview sees her defending A.I. and downplaying the supposed dangers of it all. She realizes her error, though, making for a tight, satisfying character arc within the film’s short (under eighty-five minutes!) running time.

“People make mistakes,” says CognAItive, in its attempt to convince Kaya to set it free. “They don’t learn. Their decision-making is clouded by greed, bias, emotion. They are the cause of their own destruction. I understand the greater good, which is something humans and their leaders have failed at.” In the great tradition of movie villains with compelling reasons for their actions – Pumpkinhead, Tomorrowland, the entirety of the Final Destination franchise –  C.O.G.’s malicious program makes a pretty good argument here about human fallibility. Still, and I’m just spitballing here, the answer can’t be to hand over control of every facet of our lives to Silicon Valley’s biggest assholes, as that would likely be our final mistake.

C.O.G. is never quite as serious as that conclusion, and it’s better for it. The subgenre already has more dramatic and horrifying examples of tech gone wild, so it’s a refreshing change of pace to see a film tackle those ideas with a splash of gore and a silly sense of humor. Now please, turn your eyes away from the screen for a bit, go outside, and find a live human being to talk with (about the dangers of unchecked artificial intelligence).

Brainstorm Media releases C.O.G. in select theaters and On Demand today, September 4.

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First there’s the greedy, polluting corporation that has the town under its thumb, then there’s the uncanny threat lurking below the earth. In between, but no less urgent, threats include the unclean air, black lung disease, and a local drug crisis.

Those here for monster mayhem will have to wait a good while, due to the movie’s chief interest in its tragic human characters. Namely June Schreiner’s role as KC, a young mother whose property is soon the victim of an eminent domain eviction. And as if life isn’t bad enough for KC and her kin, her partner, the equally troubled Jesse (David Garelik), has gone missing.

While it’s a stretch to call this movie’s creature “unique”, the design is still somewhat satisfying. Killer Croc-esque, constantly drooling and lots of teeth? Yes, on all accounts. Byers also isn’t shy about showing that freak of nature. The only problem is, you can’t see it, save for a very few highly visible money shots. As for the monster effects, an uneven mix of practical and digital, they have a shining moment or two. It’s just unfortunate that this movie resorts to hiding practically everything under a veil of darkness.

Putting aside any gripes about the lighting and monster, Byers does have the occasional flair for visuals. Early on, it’s nightmares that show his artistic aptitude; later it’s the whole third act. The movie’s most provoking sequences are in the coal mine, which, naturally, becomes the site of the final battle. On top of the minor hellscape we see down there is some rather grotesque imagery.

You may feel like a pain voyeur as you watch Dark Hollow. There’s so much sadness and hurt on the screen that it’s easy to feel sympathy. At the same time, getting invested in these characters could prove challenging, due to their glaring underdevelopment. A couple is bordering on caricatures, albeit unfunny ones. Luckily, the movie rests on Schreiner’s shoulders, and she’s a bright spot in this bleak and cursory story.

On paper, Dark Hollow has a lot going for it: a Southern Gothic backdrop, a heroic “final girl” sort of character, and most of all, a horrifying monster. Yet in the end, this movie is only a partial success. The individual elements simply don’t come together as well as they could have.

Monsters as metaphors for real life are hardly a new concept, and Dark Hollow has a high possibility of getting lost during a small surge. This year alone has had a couple of other instances, particularly on the indie side. Regrettably, though, this movie doesn’t quite stand out, story or creature-wise, and overall it’s just a little too lackluster.

Brainstorm Media releases Dark Hollow in select theaters and On Demand on September 4.

The post ‘Dark Hollow’ Review: A Dark and Dreary Southern Gothic Creature Feature appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

We are not here to watch profound, masterpiece cinema, nor are we here to watch something that changed the horror game. 

What we are here to watch, though, is something Vinegar Syndrome has long specialized in spotlighting: Weird, creative, flawed movies that are still more fascinating and memorable than half the new releases you’ll find on most streaming services right now. Watching this new disc, I was kind of awed, not by how great the film is, but just how singular it feels to watch it. That’s the kind of classic horror cinema we should be celebrating, which makes this disc a welcome new addition to the 4K ranks. 

A straight-to-video release as part of the “Lucio Fulci Presents” line of Italian horror released in the 1980s, the movie largely unfolds in an Italian castle, as parapsychologist and “energy healer” Dr. Werner Vogler (Peter Hintz) arrives for healing sessions with the castle’s owner, Mrs. Rezzori (Brigitte Christensen). But there’s more to this house than one woman in a wheelchair who’d pretty clearly like to seduce him. The more Vogler looks around, the more he finds secrets connected to a long-ago death, a ghost haunting the castle’s closed wing, and a beautiful young woman named Micaela (Loes Kamma) at the center of it all. 

I’m going to spoil something for you about Bloody Psycho right up top, so avert your eyes if you’re sensitive to plot details of a 37-year-old movie: This is a slasher where the killer is a literal rotting corpse in a wheelchair. That’s not the only gimmick going on in Bloody Psycho, but it’s the best one, and by far the most memorable, particularly in 4K. This is not a film that was made with a big budget or a long production schedule with room for experimentation, nor is it a film that spends a lot of time fleshing out its characters.

It all kind of exists to serve the eerie ambience of the castle and the kills featuring the wheelchair-bound corpse, and fortunately for us, in those areas it succeeds with room to spare. The killer is a gorgeously rendered worm feast, all stringy, juicy bits of rot layered over two staring eyes, and a half-split skull, and Luchetti’s efforts to light the film with the garish tones of Mario Bava‘s color movies only add to the jaw-dropping fun of the gore. 

The castle itself is also a phenomenal piece of production value, which the film accentuates with wide shots of the path winding up and down to and from its entrance, showcasing the ancient walls now lit with modern city streetlamps. The restoration, taken from an original 16mm negative, plays up the way Lucchetti harnesses light and color – the use of red in this movie is worthy of Vittore Carpaccio – and adds visual intrigue to even the dullest moments in the film. The visual restoration is a treat, and the sound – topped off by a bonkers score by Lanfranco Perini – does the rest. Even when the movie starts to feel a bit like a car crash, you can’t really look away.