ALIENS: ZONE OF SILENCE (2017) d: Andy Fowler. c: Sarah Hester, Peter Gesswein, Jed Maheu. A young woman (Hester) ventures into a section of Mexican desert known as the “Zone of Silence,” a UFO hotspot where her brother was last seen before mysteriously vanishing. Written and directed by Hollywood visual FX producer Fowler, Zone of Silence is essentially Blair Witch with aliens, and even though there are a couple of creep-out moments, the end result isn’t quite worth the long build-up. C
COHERENCE (2013) d: James Ward Byrkit. c: Emily Baldoni, Maury Sterling, Nicholas Brendon, Elizabeth Gracen, Lorene Scafaria, Hugo Armstrong. In the midst of a comet’s passing, a group of friends at a dinner party begin to experience strange things they can’t explain. Upon investigating the circumstances, they discover a mysterious house down the road that has a weird resemblance to the one at which they’re having the party. A clever and twisty sci-fi yarn that works best when knowing less about the plot. The cast works well together (at times they actually feel like lifelong friends) and director/writer Byrkit wisely keeps the focus on the friends and mostly inside the house as they try to navigate the creepy nature of what’s happening. The screenplay gets a bit too wrapped up in the characters’ personal lives (simply to create drama) but the strength of the story lies in the mystery that binds them together. B
THE FLY (1958) d: Kurt Neumann. c: David Hedison, Vincent Price, Patricia Owens, Herbert Marshall, Charles Herbert. Classic ’50s sci-fi/horror about an intrepid scientist (Hedison) who invents a matter transporter and, while experimenting on himself, accidentally mixes his DNA with a housefly’s, mutating into a half-man, half-insect abomination. Modern audiences more familiar with the Cronenberg remake might be put off my this film’s slower pacing, but the structure of the original works as more of a mystery and builds to several surprises that pay off wonderfully. B
LAMB (2021) d: Valdimar Jóhansson. c: Noomi Rapace, Hilmir Snær Guonason, Björn Hlynur Haraldsson. A married couple (Rapce and Guonason) living on an isolated sheep farm in Iceland come across a welcoming discovery in their barn and are soon plunged into a world of blind reality and false happiness. A moody, intriguing fairy tale in the form of a domestic drama, Lamb teases its audience with sympathetic characters, honest situations, and beautiful Icelandic locations, slowly twisting the screws and raising the tension until the surprising truth is revealed. A quiet, mesmerizing entry in the folk horror world. B+