Annihilation (2018)

March 23rd, 2019

Directed by: Alex Garland

Written by: Alex Garland, James VanderMeer

Starring: Natalie Portman, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tessa Thompson

Budget: $40,000,000

Quote: "Then, as a psychologist, I think you're confusing suicide with self-destruction. Almost none of us commit suicide, and almost all of us self-destruct. In some way, in some part of our lives. We drink, or we smoke, we destabilize the good job... and a happy marriage. But these aren't decisions, they're... they're impulses."

Trivia: The snake tattoo that appears on Lena's forearm is not there before she enters the Shimmer. It also appears on the arm of Anya (Gina Rodriguez), as well as on the body of the soldier killed on the wall in the building they enter. The tattoo is a symbol of a snake eating itself, which ties into the film's theme of self-destruction.


Sometimes science fiction and horror are a perfect pairing. The almost endless expansion of possibilities and cerebral qualities that science fiction provides compliments the bleak, sinister, and macabre elements of human existence that horror highlights. H.P. Lovecraft capitalized on this nearly a century ago and filmmakers have been capitalizing on this since, from Kubrick's 2001 to Event Horizon. Annihilation is one of the newest entries into the "Science Fiction Horror" subgenre and while it was a box office flop that left many critics disappointed, I personally loved the film and felt it was both a uniquely beautiful film and had an engaging story. Beyond the highly celebrated visual effects, the film is also able to capture humanity on the micro and macro levels. The film is part exploration of the inner turmoils that a group of women live with and part inquiry into the frailty of the human species as a whole. Well acted, well directed, and uncompromising, Annihilation is a movie that forces the viewer to question both existence and reality.

Brain Damage (1988)

March 17th, 2019

Directed by: Frank Henenlotter

Written by: Frank Henenlotter

Starring: Rick Hearst, Gordon MacDonald, Jennifer Lowry

Budget: $900,000

Quote: "Then don't worry about it. You don't need to worry about anything ever again. I'll do all your thinking for you. Just put me on the back off your neck, and everything will be fine."

Trivia: During the fellatio scene the crew walked out of the production refusing to work on the scene. A similar incident happened during the shooting of Basket Case (1982).



My friend Andy told me about this flick a few months ago when we were heading to L.A. to see Nick Cave (show was awesome... but that's another story... I'm trying to avoid going off on tangents). I thought he was talking about Brain Dead (the one with Bill Pullman) which has a similar plot. No, he assured me, it's by the guy who did Basket Case. He said something about how it's about a parasite that causes people to hallucinate while it eats people's brains. He also said it was fucked up. Both of Andy's synopses are correct. The movie is fucked up.... particularly the fellatio scene... but I'll get to that later. The movie is the love child of Frank Henenlotter, the guy who brought us the Basket Case movies and Frankenhooker. True to his 42nd Street Grindhouse roots, Henenlotter delivers another bizarre and gore-filled movie. It is weird, violent, trippy, disgusting, and heartfelt. It is a brutal warning about drug addiction while simultaneously being a good movie to get high to (if that's you thing).

mother! (2017)

November 19, 2018

Directed by: Darren Aronofsky

Written by: Darren Aronofsky

Starring: Jennifer Lawrence, Javier Bardem, Ed Harris

Budget: $33,000,000

Quote: "You never loved me. You just loved how much I loved you. I GAVE YOU EVERYTHING. You gave it all away."

Trivia: Throughout the entire movie, no one's name is ever mentioned and not a single character is ever referred to by any name, the way they are listed in the end credits is by their given role in the story.



My friend recommended this one to me having thought the trailer looked like "something I'd be into." He was right. And I can say without a doubt, this is one of the best movies I have seen in a long time! Like many of Aronofsky's films, it is not specifically a horror movie, but has so many horrific moments that the horror label is not totally incorrect. Director/Writer Darren Aronofsky is an absolute genius when it comes to creating disturbing visuals and building tension in his films and this film is probably his best (much more intense than the finale to Requiem For a Dream even). There are two scenes in particular that reach such an intensity that they made me physically anxious just watching them (One involves the ripping apart and eating of a baby). While the movie itself is nothing more than an allegory for another very familiar story, it is told from a new perspective and with such potency that the allegory was missed until the story had been almost completed. Many of the characters' identities and the film's metaphors also don't sink in until later. I won't get into what the film is an allegory for until after the synopsis, other than to say, this is my favorite version of this story. Some critics, Rex Reed in particular, seemed to have missed the point of the film, but I'll address them at the end of this review.

When a Stranger Calls (1979)

June 22, 2018

The first twenty minutes of this film are some of the greatest twenty minutes in horror movie history! In these twenty minutes the babysitter, played by Carol Kane, keeps receiving calls form a man asking her if she's "checked on the children?" and "why haven't you checked on the children?" Their is an especially scary moment when the killer states that what he wants is to be covered in the babysitter's blood. Her fear intensifies until the climax where she finds out the calls are coming from inside the house. We see the killer's shadow moving towards the stairs right as she opens the front door and a police officer is there to rescue her. Kane's performance is amazing and this scene would be the inspiration for the Drew Barrymore scene from Wes Craven's Scream. We learn that the killer had been upstairs with the children dead covered in their blood for hours .