The Pumpkin Man (2023)

The Pumpkin Man’s tagline is “Some tales are better left untold!” This movie leans dangerously toward being one such tale; on the other hand, with so many unworthy low- and high-budget horror flicks getting made and released, just to find one that doesn’t abuse CGI (or, for that matter, that hardly uses it) is in and...

History of Evil (2024)

According to History of Evil’s opening intertitle, 20 years from now the U.S. will become a “neo-fascist state known as the North American Federation.” I guess that means Trump got re-elected. Technically, the United States already is a federation (the oldest surviving one, in fact), but that makes no difference because this movie isn’t really...

Double Blind (2023)

As Nightmare on Elm Back Streets go, Double Blind is somewhat similar to Awoken. It's also smarter, although I’m not sure dog shit is the standard of intelligence against which you’d want to be measured.   Instead of a supernatural entity, the bogeyman this time is the pharmaceutical industry — because all prescription drugs are...

Gods of the Deep (2023)

Gods of the Deep is a mixed bag of Cthulhu Mythos. It starts out as yet another movie with a ‘Lovecraft in fabula’ approach; that is to say, if you speak of HPL, HPL will come. But it doesn’t work like that, especially when the script parrots words the meaning of which it is oblivious to. ...

Bermuda Island (2023)

Bermuda Island opens with a sting. Not the Sting, mind you; if anything, the movie has more in common with the Stinger’s one-time tag-team partner The Shockmaster. Two undercover FBI agents attempt to buy guns from crime boss Diego Montalban (Noel Gugliemi). On a sidewalk. In broad daylight. Diego wants to see the cash first. The...

1962 Halloween Massacre (2023)

According to 1962 Halloween Massacre’s opening intertitles, during a costume party on the titular night, “A man in a black mask locked the doors from the outside and tried to kill them all.” Ok, I’ll bite; how did he tried to kill them all “from the outside”? Sniper fire? Arson? Or maybe he attempted to...

Suitable Flesh (2023)

Suitable Flesh is ostensibly based on Lovecraft's “The Thing on the Doorstep,” but as the title change suggests, it doesn’t even qualify as a nominal adaptation. The source material has been so badly butchered, and the resulting mess so poorly executed that, even though IMDb credits him as a co-writer, about the only thing connecting...

The House of Usher (1989)

This movie introduces itself as “Edgar Allan Poe’s The House of Usher.” That’s not just for the benefit of viewers unacquainted with EAP’s oeuvre; without the clarification, even those of us familiar with the source material wouldn’t know what the hell we’re supposed to be watching — not least because you can’t attribute to Poe...

The Exorcist: Believer (2023)

I don’t hear no tubular bells. The Exorcist: Believer knows the words but not the music. The original wasn’t cursed, but the 21st century installments were all doomed to suck, and this one is no exception. Even if they had entrusted the task to, say, the guys who resurrected Candyman as opposed to the hacks...