REVIEWS
Cinema, Blu-ray/4K, Streaming and VOD Releases - Reviewed By Fans For Fans
THE MONKEY
Osgood Perkins follows the smash success of LONGLEGS with something completely different; a horror comedy involving a toy monkey. Laughs and gore collide in spectacular fashion in one of the darkest comedies in a long time.
HEART EYES
Blood is spilled on Valentine’s Day once more as a mismatched couple find love and fight for their lives as a masked slasher hunts them across town in bloody fashion. Read Iain MacLeod’s review to see if he was won over or left cold by Josh Ruben’s slasher/rom-com mix-up.
COMPANION
COMPANION - Get ready for your new favourite anti-rom-com/sci-fi as Sophie Thatcher faces some uncomfortable truths about her seemingly perfect relationship with Jack Quaid. Iain MacLeod reviews Drew Hancock’s directorial debut that expertly exposes harsh truths in entertaining and bloody fashion.
KRAVEN THE HUNTER
Sony’s failed attempt to make a series of Spider-Man Universe films without Spider-Man himself draws to a merciful close with KRAVEN THE HUNTER.
SPEAK NO EVIL
Now that we can all breathe a sigh of relief that James Watkins UK based remake was a lot better than expected, we can once more submit ourselves to the foreboding and nihilistic pleasures of the original Danish film.
JOKER: FOLIE À DEUX
JOKER: FOLIE À DEUX is a daring sequel that delves into Arthur Fleck's trial, and questions the cult of celebrity while defying the usual blockbuster formula. Despite its striking musical numbers and bleak, thought-provoking narrative, the film has been divisive, receiving harsh criticism while standing out as a bold, unconventional follow-up.
THE HITCHER
Rutger Hauer’s finest hour finally arrives on 4K in the most essential release of the year.
CHRONICLES OF RIDDICK
Riddick returns with this ambitious, yet much maligned sequel re-released by Arrow Video in a stacked 4K edition.
TIL DEATH DO US PART
Although credited to screenwriters Chad Law and Shane Dax Taylor, you could be forgiven for thinking TIL DEATH DO US PART might be an A.I.-generated hybrid designed to merge all our favourite moments and characters from JOHN WICK, TRUE ROMANCE, READY OR NOT and KILL BILL. If this is the case, The Machines have failed to carry over the wit, excitement, invention, and humanity. Early on, a poor rip-off of Hans Zimmer’s glorious “You’re So Cool” theme from TRUE ROMANCE (itself an adaptation of a Carl Orff piece already appropriated by BADLANDS) makes you realise just how tediously third hand all of this is.
CIVIL WAR
The otherwise familiar sight of American cityscapes is marred by plumes of black smoke pouring upwards into the sky. On the streets below, tanks sit stationary at the traffic lights, the highways are choked with abandoned cars, the shells of burnt-out helicopters lie in the middle of the JC Penney’s parking lot and the Wi-Fi keeps dropping out. Welcome to Alex Garland’s vision of a war-torn America where what once was a fantastical conceit seems disturbingly plausible through the writer/directors’ English lens, with his tale of a band of journalists and photographers travelling across a war torn dis-united states.
MONKEY MAN
One of the more surprising pieces of film news in recent months was that actor Dev Patel had made his directorial debut with an Indian martial arts movie for Netflix, only for the streaming service to drop it, supposedly for fear that the films portrayal of right-wing government figures could offend an Indian audience. Enter Jordan Peele, who, impressed after a viewing, uses his own production company Monkeypaw Productions with the help of Universal to bring the film to a cinema audience.
BRIGHTWOOD
Who doesn’t enjoy a good time loop movie? With the likes of Groundhog Day, Edge Of Tomorrow and Happy Death Day being notable examples, the dilemma of a character trying to break free from a set of pre-ordained events over and over has also in recent years become a field of interest for a number of genre directors. At the lower end of the budget scale films such as COHERENCE, TRIANGLE and TIMECRIMES helped make the name of their respective writers and directors, maybe some more than others, but the use of a limited set of events in a limited location can often prove fertile ground for the skills for a smart storyteller.
LAST STRAW
A smart compact thriller with a memorably vicious edge, Last Straw is a calling card for debut director Alan Scott Neal. Viewers expecting another low budget siege thriller, this time taking place in a roadside diner, may find themselves surprised by the surprises contained within, leading onto a film that although it does not re-invent or galvanise its own sub-genre earns more than enough in keeping the viewer gripped with its relevant and character driven edge.
V/H/S/85
The V/H/S franchise continues to transport us to random years within the video tape era, and having made a couple of stops in the ‘90s it is time for the 1980s to have a go. 1985 was right in the middle of the video tape explosion, with rental shops becoming palaces to those looking for more than just whatever the mainstream TV channels could throw at them, so this could potentially be the best V/H/S yet, right?
RESTORE POINT
This science-fiction potboiler will no doubt capture the interest of the more discerning genre fan by the film’s geographical location alone. Those expecting something wholly original and with something more to chew on thematically than most recent sci-fi films and shows may find themselves a little short changed with what is on offer here.
PEEPING TOM
It began with a Freudian script by Poe fan, playwright and cryptographer Leo Marks, who considered his role as a (famous) WWII codebreaker a highly voyeuristic one. It was such a personal project for director Michael Powell that he cast himself and his son as (abusive) father and (disturbed) child. It was famously condemned by critics of the time: Sight & Sound’s Derek Hill likened it to concentration camp atrocities, while, in 1994, Dilys Powell boldly admitted it was a masterpiece, reversing the hatred she expressed decades earlier.