"Undertone" - Right Through the Night...

Evy (Nina Kiri) runs a horror themed podcast as a skeptic where, alongside her London-based believer friend Justin (Adam DiMarco), she receives, debunks and discusses various supernatural phenomena and media. Currently she lives with her dying mother (Michele Duquet) and the timezone difference is compounding her stress, so when Justin forwards her an unusual email loaded with audio files - she leaps at the opportunity to take her mind off of things. Then the night takes a turn...

I have watched a lot of horror films.
I've proselytised their wonders, their power and their effectiveness with a zeal bordering hagiographic.
I've seen the great ("It Follows", "The Thing", "House of the Devil", "The Blair Witch Project") the fairly spooky and good fun ("Insidious", "The Changeling", "Haunting of Hill House"), the bloody ("Rabid", "From Beyond", "Society"), the downright fucking dreadful ("Fear Dot Com", "Cry Wolf", "Imaginary"); horror movies of all stripes, every creed, every colour, every type. I've been in the trenches of dogshit. I've been the proclaimer of greatness, I've been the champion of atmosphere, of unique ideas, of gimmicks and flair; I've been a celebrant of trash, a connoisseur of crap, and that guy who will sit down and mock the dreadful and dissecting the good and the bad. I've had contrary opinions, I've had controversial takes, I've stuck by my guns. I like a good spook, I like a good scare, I meet movies halfway, I'll forgive a lot of junk. I think my credentials are on full display here, I'll chat with anybody about what works, what doesn't, what I enjoy, what I don't, and am generally a jaded, methodical, clinical cynical bastard when it comes to horror fimls.
My partner met me 2 minutes after I left the screen.
My hand was shaking.
I needed a drink to calm my nerves.

"California Schemin'" - Title Contender of the Year

The year is 2003 and Dundee natives Gavin (Seamus McLean Ross) and Billy (Samuel Bottomley) work at a call centre alongisde the latter's girlfriend Mary (Lucy Halliday) but aspire to become the next big thing in hip hop. After an audition gets them mocked for their Scots accents, an insecure Gavin and more outgoing Billy get the idea to act American on their demos, send them in, get signed and expose the whole charade live on air at first opportunity to humiliate and expose the labels. But when their demos start taking off as "Silibil and Brains", they take to the life of fame and success...

(Photo credit: Rolling Stone)
A sweet little working class ode to Scotland and hip-hop (I like the frequent shots of the estates and skylines, and the graffiti) which uses the heist (I like the introduction of Jimmy pulling up in a car to rescue his friend: a true heist movie staple in addition to introducing this guy as a loyal free-wheeling friend) and backdrop to weave an interesting spin on the politics of identity and stage personas in hip-hop; and has an affection for its two characters. They're lovable scamps, and carry the film well. Seamus McLean Ross is the child of Ricky Ross and Elaine McIntosh, making him maybe the most Scottish man - though he does look like Sam Lake. It's a pleasant enough film, and the period piece setting is a sucker punch to me. It loses steam in the 3rd act almost entirely due to the nature of the story being told (which has been done a lot) but it's well acted - in particular the film really suffers when Lucy Halliday is not in it. She is one hell of a fucking find and absolutely steals the show. The true flex, however, is that James Corden shows up for some fucking reason, but James McAvoy manages to wrangle an acceptable performance from him. Kudos Jim.

"They Will Kill You" - Remar or Not...

Fresh out of prison and looking for her younger sister, Asia Reaves (Zazie Beetz. Also: har-har) gets a job at a high-rise apartment complex named "The Virgil" (har-har) as a maid. But it soon becomes apparent that she is intended as the sacrifice for the wealthy residents and their Lord Satan, and she must battle her way out.

(Credit: The New York Times)
It's an action movie knock-off of "Ready or Not", and not just from the trailer and basic premise of rich people being demonic and embarking on a "Most Dangerous Game": beat and moments occur pretty much in the same place (from a 3rd act betrayal and a helper amongst the rich, to a hand stabbing and a dark revelation), there is a comedic emphasis on the incompetence of the violent rich (here with the additional twist that they are immortal and come back to life) and their tomfoolery, and even some contract law towards the end. Holy shit, it even does the "what happened?" and a retort of "rich people"...
It's all done with an action movie bent, however, so despite some of the more glaring flaws (some superfluous repetitive dialogue for the second screens, a rather shallower cast of characters) the overly stylised and Samurai-adjacent shots which would otherwise be distracting are done in service to some fairly fun and well-choreographed fight sequences: I particularly enjoyed the sick as fuck burning axe sequence.
Meet it halfway on its own trashy terms and you'll enjoy it as an uneven but fun enough film just the right side of camp: Patricia Arquette is given a rather flat villain but makes her memorable with a dodgy Irish brogue; Paterson Joseph gets 4th billing (huzzah!) and James Remar shows up as a pig man, meaning that I am legally obliged to watch it; Tom Felton also shows up and is just dreadfully bland and forgettable.
Weirdly, however, there's a bizarre little foot fetish in the film. At first I thought it a little "Die Hard" homage, what with the towering building and the pursuit, but when the cult were introduced with a lingering licking of them, and then a large part of the film was Zazie Beetz in vents being followed from behind, and then fight scenes with frequent lingering kicks and pinning/stomping people (her shoes were destroyed, see, and the film makes a point of showing us this), I started to wonder... You do you, man, no shame here, but really? Is it necessary?

"Ready or Not: Here I Come"

Moments after surviving a bloodsport with her now very dead in-laws The Le Domas Family, blood-drenched bride Grace (Samara Weaving) awakens cuffed to a bed with her emergency contact, estranged sister Faith (Kathryn Newton) pissed at her ridiculous story of demonic cults. Before they can bury the hatchet, however, both are kidnapped for a "double or nothing" game for a seat at the table which rules the world from the shadows. Now hunted across a golf course by the wealthiest families on Earth, the siblings must bury the hatchet... into the blue-blooded necks around them...

(Source: Film Yap substack)
This was a fucking excellent time.
There was never really a need for a sequel to the rip-roaring bloodbath of "Ready Or Not" and its tale of how the rich really are demonic, vile losers; but as far as unecessary sequels go this is the most fun I've had in years. The makers (the seemingly always great collective "Radio Silence", behind the first film and the absolutely magnificent "Abigail") double down on the humour and throwbacks to the original (corpse pit, explosions of blood, and primal screaming from the always-excellent Samara Weaving. Watch her in "Mayhem" and "Guns Akimbo"), with the added twist of a fun buddy-cop framing with the ever-excellent Kathryn Newton. By the way: having both her and Kevin Durand (here playing a coke fiend knife-maniac called "Bill Wilkinson", perfection) alongside Weaving means that the lovable folks at Radio Silence are starting to form their own stable of fun fiends, and I am all for it. I just want Dan Stevens in it...
The movie was fun, extremely enjoyable stuff: we get a blind fistfight in a wedding hall to "Total Eclipse of the Heart" ( a highlight of the movie, great stuff which had me howling with laughter), suitably ludicrous bloody gibs, swords and rocket launchers, Nestor Carbonell bumbling around with a sniper rifle, Sarah Michelle Gellar dressed like a member of the landed gentry as she cavorts with an excellent Shawn Hatosy and a handgun on a quadbike, and Elijah Wood weaselling his way through it all. It's great fun, and the stakes keep getting slipperier and slipperier as Wood's unnamed Lawyer rattles off more by-laws, clauses and demonic caveats the families must abide if they are not to explode into ludicrous gibs.
The makers could not have predicted the arrival of the Epstein Files, however.
So this film is a perfectly timed, snarling indictment of the vampiric upper classes: pathetic bickering losers who were born into privilege, revel in sadistic depravity, and would kill entire bloodlines for a grasp as more power, but couldn't be trusted to guide piss up a wall. It's immensely satisfying watching them squirm and die, and there is no more apt visual for the time we live in now than the wealthy scrabbling within a pit of the rotting corpses of their sacrifices for a token of power, whilst the very world they have created burns and dies around them...
It's fantastic fun. Great time.
Oh yeah, David Cronenberg is in this! Hell yes!

"Arco"

In the distant future, when humanity lives in houses among the clouds, a young boy named Arco (Juliano Krue Valdi) defies his parents by stealing his sister's time-travel rainbow cape and crystal and flies back in time, despite being too young to do so. He ends up in the year 2075, a world of increasingly extreme weather, robot assistants and a young girl named Iris (Romy Fay), who finds him injured in the woods and brings him home. With her parents away, the two bond. But this peace cannot last: Argo must return to his own time, a strange trio of brothers (Andy Samberg, Will Ferrell and Flea for some fucking reason) are converging on them, and a wildfire looms.

(The Hollywood Reporter)
A charming little film, a lot better than fellow "Best Animated Feature" nominee "Little Amelie and the Secret of Rain", it's a pleasant fable about the gulf of technology between humanity, but also how it can bridge those gaps. Iris only sees her parents (Marky Mark Ruffalo and Natalie Portman, the latter of whom produced it) through holograms, a robot with the voice of both raises her, Arco's parents sleep suspended in the air untouching and detached, and humanity is so used to climate change and how deeply they've fucked the planet that they construct biomes and bubbles around themselves for protection. There's a lot said for connection and humanity in it, be it the central relationship between Arco and Iris, their rather sweet robot protector, or even the reasoning behind the bickering trio's pursuit of them (Andy Samberg's one gets the best line, for my money, when he says that "if you love somebody, you want to make them happy even if they never know it", which leads to the soaring act of heroism for a character): it's an enjoyable enough little film, and ends a tad darkly and poingnantly, whilst never overstaying its welcome.
(Note: I only got the dubbed version)

"One Last Deal" - Dyer Another Day

On a sweltering hot day in London Town, the trial of a football superstar Matt Gravish for rape has concluded and the media awaits a verdict. None await it moreso than his foul-mouthed agent Jimmy Banks (Danny Dyer), who tries to secure a lucrative contract for his meal-ticket should he be found innocent. As he waits for the verdict and spins multiple plates, he contends with a mysterious blackmailer, his messy private life, and that client himself...

(Credit: The Guardian)
Dyer is fantastic here, genuinely great in this odious, snarling, chomping, foul-mouthed burn-out who's hitting the end of this rope. I'm elated to see him at this point in his career, subverting and aging with his audience of "lads and hard men" into something like this: Jimmy Banks is the kind of character I love follwing in that he's just an awful, empty and hollow human being doing his job really well, as the emptiness and the void slowly consume him, because without this job he's nothing. It's long overdue and between this and "Marching Powder" Dyer is proving adept at capturing that man trying to wriggle free of his own darkness, and when the movie swerves into darker elements of the story (for it is a swerve despite the set-up) he is not the problem: he aquits himself wonderfuly. It's a movie carried on the performance of Dyer, and he's fucking great here: good job there!
Plus he dances to "Football's Coming Home" shitfaced and off-the-wagon: which I read as a wonderfully dark send up of his earlier works. Context matters!
The script starts strong, it sets up the plates and juggles well for the first half, but its swerve into darkness in the second and here falters: it's all a tad too contrived and staged, aiming for a serious message and odyssey into the heart of darkness but coming across as a "message play" as a result, thus not quite earning its dark parts. I appreciate the swing, and the structure is solid and doesn't overstay its welcome or stretch, but maybe stick around for the performance of Dyer rather than the second half scripting.

"Scarlet" - Review

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
The kindly king Amlet (Masachika Ichimura, the voice of Mewtwo) is betrayed and slain by his cruel, scheming brother Claudius (A towering Koji Yakusho) in front of his kindly daughter Scarlet (Mana Ashida); and when her plan for vengeance is foiled, she finds herself in a strange realm between the living and the daughter. Single minded in her quest for vengeance, she seeks out Claudius in this dark and unusual land, and finds herself not only tracked by his minions, but stalked by a terrifying dragon, and travelling alongside Hijiri (Masaki Okada), who calls himself a "paramedic", on this odyssey into mortality and the soul...

(Photo Credit: Crunchyroll. The only context you'll see me credit them. Fuck Crunchyroll, absolute state of that fucking place.)
I have always preferred Mamoru Hosoda to Makoto Shinkai, the two big anime "auteurs" going today, and had a cracking time with "Belle". As expected: the style is rather striking. In the new world the animation is photographs and real backdrops with shimmering 3D animation over the top of them - reflecting the familiar disonance and disconnect, it's effective (though maybe not really for me in parts? A few of the early 3D shots took some getting used to and reminded me of the newer 3D anime stuff I don't really like, personal preference, though don't worry it's not as bad as shit ike "Exarm" or that incredible helicopter sequence in "Golgo 13: The Professional") and the more traditional sequences are pretty enough. Plus the dragon looks fucking awesome, and kind of terrifying and ominous too - an embodiment of dread and the darkest impulses consuming and looming over all. There's a musical sequence, which is pretty enough, and some energetic and fluid fight sequences I rather enjoy.
The central relationship is a buddy cop adventure between a "softening ice queen" and a gentle pacifist: you've seen it before but it's all fairly competently done, and I did find myself liking these two characters (Scarlet in particular was a fine line to walk, and done well), which is essential. It was fun following the various Hamlet characters and seeing how and when they turn up (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are a pair of murder clowns, whilst minor players Valdemar and Cornelius are the burly goons, for example), though the reach and grasp are a touch excessive: I wasn't quite gripped and immersed in the quest and plotline, but enjoyed the themes of vengeance (as well-trodden as they are) are sure to resonate with people, and tie well into the foreshadowing and planted imagery and ideas. It's well-constructed but didn't quite soar personally for me, though I am glad it avoided the excesses of anime peers. Beautiful to look at, and a fantastic Claudius performance from Koji Yakusho, but I wish it were bolder or less-traditional in its narrative. It's good.