While it had some gnawing inconsistencies and questionable logic, Zach Cregger’s 2022 home share horror film Barbarian, was so artfully creepy it signalled the writer/director as an exciting new force in the horror genre. His latest film, Weapons is even better. There are a few stumbles but this bizarre, disturbing mystery thriller is so cleverly constructed and so well performed
Read moreGuaranteed to fascinate and infuriate, the Australian/ Irish co-production The Surfer, which stars Nicolas Cage and Julian McMahon is an impressively strange beast. Frequently shifting gears between Wake In Fright-style ‘civilised foreigner meets Aussie ferals’ drama, surreal Twilight Zone-esque moral fable and a critique of the idiotic ‘manosphere’ culture, it constantly challenges our expectations. Fans of the criminally overlooked 1968
Read moreThe inventive, witty, energetic and occasionally gory Companion from writer/ director Drew Hancock is an early instalment in what will no doubt be a growing movie subgenre, the ‘personal robot thriller’. Iris (Sophie Thatcher) is a young woman who we see at the start of the film in a ‘meet cute’ at a supermarket with the goofy Josh (Jack Quaid,
Read moreOften creepy and thought provoking, The Heretic is almost one of the year’s best thrillers but some loose story threads and a third act descent into cliché diminish this film’s overall impact. The set up is a familiar one in the horror/ thriller genre: unsuspecting and apparently vulnerable people unwisely enter the ominous looking home and encounter an intimidating weirdo.
Read moreTodd Phillips’ Joker (2019) reimagined the supervillain origin story as a study of a fracturing mind with the beaten down incel Arthur Fleck transforming into the weirdly charismatic murdering psychopath clown of the title. In this age of superhero/ villain obsession it was an ambitious and subversive take on an iconic character but not always a riveting one. For those
Read moreStrange Darling is guaranteed to be a favourite of those who enjoy blood-soaked cinema. While it’s certainly violent and confronting, it’s also inventive in the way it gleefully plays with the conventions of the serial killer film and with audience expectations. Written and directed by JT Mollner, the film cleverly goads us into thinking in a certain way about the
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