Posts by Brent Lorentson

This Memorial Day weekend, Netflix dropped the new horror film Fear Street: Prom Queen. For those who may not be familiar with the Fear Street brand, it was a series of horror stories penned by RL Stine for his readers who were aging out of his Goosebumps series but were not quite ready for the heavy hitters of horror like Clive Barker and Stephen King. These stories were fantastic as a gateway to horror, typically filled with gruesome deaths, but still not crossing the line with too many adult themes. In 2021 Netflix first released a trilogy of Fear Street films. Personally, I only liked the first two, and the third was relatively forgettable. Now Netflix has released Prom Queen, and while my expectations weren’t exactly high, I still was hoping for something better than what we got.

The film is set in 1988, and Shadyside High is getting ready for prom, and this year the race for prom queen is fiercer than ever. Lori Granger (India Fowler) is a bit of an outsider at her school, mostly because of town gossip surrounding her mother, but she’s decided make a mark at her school and become prom queen. Unfortunately for Lori, the other girls in the running are a group of “mean girls” who call themselves “The Wolfpack”. Their pack leader is Tiffany (Finna Strazza), and it is safe to say they are not happy about having Lori competing for the crown. At least Lori has her best friend Megan (Suzanna Son) as support, even though Megan is just as much of an outsider because of her obsession with horror and pulling harmless yet gory pranks at the school.

From the moment I saw the first trailer for Sinners, I was totally sold on this film, it looked like it was going to be From Dusk Till Dawn, only set in the Jim Crow era, and I was absolutely excited for it. As an added cherry on top, the film was shot on film and with large-format cameras. This was a film that easily was one of the films I was most looking forward to seeing this year, and it broke my heart having to miss out on seeing it opening weekend because I was sick. Now that I’ve finally seen it, did it live up to my expectations? The hype surrounding this film is insane, especially when you see the box office numbers this film is bringing in and people already wanting to call this the best horror film of the year, and despite it only being May, people are talking about this getting some awards nominations. It’s not surprising when you consider the writer and director is Ryan Coogler, who managed to get Black Panther an Oscar nomination.

The film takes place in the early 1930s and follows Smoke and Stack, (Michael B. Jordan does double duty playing the twins). They are brothers who have fled Chicago to return to their home in the south in the Mississippi Delta to open up a juke-joint. They come to town with cash and purchase an old mill from a man they suspect is a member of the Klan but hope that their money is good enough to not cause any trouble. Too bad it seems trouble seems to always find Smoke and Stack, as we discover that the brothers don’t exactly have a squeaky-clean reputation.

With the end of the year upon us, I felt this was the best time to talk about what I feel was the best film of 2024. First I want to start by saying that this hasn’t been my favorite year for cinema, especially when you look at the kind of films you see at award shows, mostly all those films were forgettable and not anything I feel will become cinematic classics. That being said, when it comes to the horror genre, this has been a pretty great year. For a while I would have said Late Night with the Devil was going to be my favorite horror film of the year, but then The Substance came out, and that just floored me, and I’ve kind of become a bit obsessed with the film. It’s the only film this year that has stuck with me for days and just had me wanting to watch it again so I could savor its visuals, whether they be beautiful or grotesque.

It’s no secret that Hollywood is obsessed with beauty and youth with many of the aging stars performing surgeries and injecting themselves with chemicals to remain “beautiful” so their status can continue to shine. This has spilled over into social media and has fostered this notion of needing to attain unreasonable levels of beauty. This is exactly what The Substance is shining a light upon, and though many things are exaggerated in the film, it does come from a place of truth, and that’s only one of the elements of horror in this film: just how far people are willing to go to hold onto their youth.

For just about the past decade I feel Samara Weaving has earned the title of scream queen in the horror genre. She may not be a box office name like Jenna Ortega, but I feel Samara Weaving has a more impressive resume of cool and fun horror films, and she just consistently delivers. Ready or Not in a lot of ways is the film that best showcases her talents, and I thought for sure she’d level up to A-list status, but it seems the movie gods have other plans for her. Thankfully she is still cranking out some fun films for genre fans. Azrael is Weaving’s newest dip into the horror genre, a film that was written by Simon Barrett, who previously wrote the horror gems You’re Next and The Guest, and to sweeten this ghoulish cinematic pot, it is directed by E.L. Katz, who directed the 2013 dark comedy Cheap Thrills. Does this all add up to another genre hit, or is this a dud?

The film takes place several years after the rapture, and with most of the world’s population decimated, the few who remain no longer speak. When the film opens up, we see Azrael (Samara Weaving) and a male companion in the forest just enjoying their life until it is interrupted by a group of marauders who capture Weaving. Azrael is then restrained at a shrine in the woods and is left as a sacrifice to these charred undead creatures, but Azrael manages to escape, and what follows is a long cat-and-mouse game through the forest as she tries to elude the creatures and the marauders who initially captured her.

There is something about how the French make their horror films that I find a bit hard to resist. Films like High Tension, Inside, and Martyrs are films I go back to time and time again and just have a blast with, and with the release of MadS I was a bit optimistic that this could also be a film to add to my rotation when I’m on a French horror film kick. What really gave me hope for this film is seeing that it was directed by David Moreau, who gave us the criminally underappreciated home invasion horror film Them (2006). If you are a fan of home invasion horror and you’ve missed on Them, I highly recommend checking it out. As for MadS, it seems Moreau was going for something a bit different, this time doing a one-shot horror film about a virus outbreak that causes those infected to go “mad” and violently attack people. Sure, we’ve seen it before, but is the one-shot approach a fresh enough take to make this an experience worth sitting through?

Romain (Milton Riche) is a teenager who is celebrating his birthday and before heading to a party meets up with his drug dealer and partakes in a questionable substance. Everything seems fine till on his way home he comes across a woman who appears to be in distress, and things quickly spiral out of control from here when she savagely stabs herself. High out of his mind and with a presumed dead woman in his car, he continues to go home and leaves the girl with his car in the garage. Now early on with this film I felt maybe this is all some kind of bad hallucination this guy is on, and perhaps that is all this film is meant to be, but the film does shift gears by following other characters till it reaches its bleak conclusion.

It seems it would be easy to do a film about the urban legend where a driver picks up a woman in white who turns out to be a ghost. We are all familiar with this story, though the details of the urban tale can vary from one storyteller to the next, and it really seems like something so straightforward that it would be hard to make a mess of it. I at least thought so until I watched Black Cab. The film at first glance just seemed like something in my wheelhouse that couldn’t go wrong; it was a ghost story starring Nick Frost, whom I’ve been a fan of since first seeing him in Shaun of the Dead and Spaced, but despite how likeable he is, there is just nothing much that could have saved this movie, which was mostly dead on arrival. Anne (Synnove Karlsen) and Patrick (Luke Norris) are a recently engaged couple. After a night of celebration turns sour, they attempt to take a cab ride home, but instead their night is about to go from bad to worse as they discover their driver is a bit unhinged. As for their cab driver, Ian (Nick Frost), his plans for the couple remain ambiguous for a good portion of the film, but it is safe to say from the start that he is up to no good. The start of the film isn’t necessarily bad, but it gets off on the wrong foot, because while this couple is supposed to be celebrating their recent engagement, Anne is clearly miserable about this announcement, and we quickly find out that Patrick has a history of abuse and that Anne is pregnant. Right from the start it is hard to believe the scenario that sets up the story, and it isn’t even introducing the paranormal elements yet.

As Ian is on his way to drop off the unhappy couple, we start to see his unhinged behavior, and before we know it he’s using a cattle prod on Patrick and kidnapping the couple while occasionally pulling aside to make some phone calls. It’s while inside the car Anne starts to see the woman in white … As for an explanation behind the lady in white and why she’s haunting the black cab, we have to wait till the third act to get these answers, and by then I was well past checking out on this film and was ready for it to be over. Sadly the third act is the best part of this film, but it is still riddled with flaws and contrivances that can’t save this film.

When I first heard Anna Kendrick was stepping behind the camera to direct her first film, I kind of expected it to be another Pitch Perfect film … but to find her instead doing a thriller about a real life serial killer and rapist who appeared on a game show in the 1970s was a curve ball I wasn’t expecting. But this isn’t simply a true crime story but instead is about how women were marginalized and heavily objectified. But the biggest takeaway I had while watching this was simply how dangerous things were back then and just how easily a serial killer could be prolific and walk the streets while no one suspected a thing. To get it out of the way, my major gripe with this film is that we meet Rodney Alcala (Daniel Zovatto) in the very beginning, and we see that he’s a vicious serial killer who lures his victims with charm while posing as a photographer. I feel this reveal could have been done better and would have added more tension when the film gets to the game show portion. Perhaps there is another edit of the film out there that does this, or at the very least they could have shown the killer in action and not reveal his face.

Then we meet Sheryl Bradshaw (Anna Kendrick), a struggling actress who moved out to LA to become a star but hasn’t had much luck.  As fate would have it, her manager gets her a spot on the game show The Dating Game as a way to get her face out in front of the public, and as it turns out one of the potential suitors on the show happens to be Rodney. In the audience there Laura (Nicolette Robinson) is attending the taping, and she recognizes Rodney, and she attempts to do what she can to stop him. When it comes to the portion of the film surrounding the game show, I was absolutely loving this. I love the spunkiness that Kendrick gave the character, seeing how they brought the set to life, and then the tension surrounding Laura; all of this worked so well until it didn’t.

I always found it a bit funny when Hollywood churns out movies that have similar plots to compete against each other. Back in the 90s Armageddon dueled the same year with Deep Impact, when disaster films were all the rage. 2024 had the same situation, though not in the form of big blockbusters, but this time in the form of two horror films about nuns and strange pregnancies taking place within the confines of the convent. The prequel to The Omen was better than I had anticipated, and when Immaculate was released, I just never got around to seeing it … at least until now. While The First Omen is a slow burn that actually pairs well with the first film, Immaculate I feel is the more bloody and popcorn-friendly romp that I feel fits into the sub-genre of nunsploitation (something I wouldn’t object to seeing more of).  So is this film worth congregating in front of the television for 90 minutes, or is this a hard pass in a year that seems to flourish with quality horror films, but not much of anything else?

Cecilia (Sweeney) is travelling from the States to live in Italy, where she is going to take her vows to the church. She’s been devout to her faith ever since she survived falling through the ice and nearly drowning. We don’t really get much more about her life back in the States, and that’s fine. The film does a good job of quickly establishing who Cecilia is. She’s sweet but naïve; you know, basically catnip for those with bad intentions in a horror film. The first friend Cecilia makes at the convent is ironically a nun with a bad-girl streak who joined the church more out of convenience than out of faith. Of course there are other members of the church. Most are just used to be ominous figures, but mostly the focus is on Cecilia and the main priest at the convent, Father Sal Tedeschi (Alvaro Morte).

With it being December this is when all the critics and groups start to announce their picks for best films of the year. This year has been a bit of a lackluster year in my opinion, but there have been a few gems that have managed to surprise me. A Real Pain, the directorial and writing debut for Jesse Eisenberg, is one of those few gems that crackles with great dialog and impressive cinematography, but most importantly is anchored by the performances of its two leads, played by Jesse Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin. On a surface level, this is a story about two cousins going on vacation together, but really it’s about two young men struggling with their own pain. You’d think a film like this would be a drag or even a chore to sit through, but instead it is engaging and heartfelt throughout and has moments that will have you laughing and crying.

After the passing of their grandmother, Benji (Culkin) and David (Eisenberg) are cousins who decide to take a trip to Poland not just to reconnect, but to see their grandmother’s homeland and get a glimpse into what her life was like during the Holocaust. Right from the get-go we see that Benji and David are a bit of an odd couple, Benji is prone to emotional outbursts and a bit of a free spirit, while David is more timid and serious. As for the tour the boys have signed up for, it’s with a group of four other travelers who have made the pilgrimage, each with their own personal reasons. What I wasn’t expecting is how the other travelers integrate into the story and are more than just background characters, but are there for the journey and help the cousins in their own way.