Special Guest Review of the CHILD’S PLAY Series, Part 2
By Frank Pittarese Bride of Chucky (1998) After three movies with the same basic plot, this one takes the series in a (mostly) new direction. Charles Lee Ray’s lunatic girlfriend (played by Jennifer Tilly) gets hold of Chucky’s remains and magically…
Special Guest Review of the CHILD’S PLAY Series, Part 1
By Frank Pittarese Child’s Play (1988) Serial killer Charles Lee Ray (a.k.a. the Lakeshore Strangler) is shot in a toy store by a detective — but before dying, he transfers his soul into a Good Guys doll using a voodoo spell.…
Mini-Reviews: COUNT YORGA, THE SIGNAL, THIRTEEN WOMEN, and WHITE NOISE
Count Yorga, Vampire (1970) This slick production is one of the more satisfying vampire films of the ’70s. Robert Quarry is first-rate as the Hungarian Count Yorga who, shortly after immigrating to Los Angeles, starts mingling and then preying on…
Mini-Reviews: Found Footage Edition – “No, sir. I didn’t like it!”
Aliens: Zone of Silence (2017) A young woman (Sarah 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…
Mini-Reviews: THE STRANGERS and PREY AT NIGHT
The Strangers (2008) An annoying couple (Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman) returning home late at night from a wedding are terrorized by three masked sociopaths who try to get inside their house. Writer-director Bryan Bertino does a good job at…
Mini Reviews: REAL CASES OF SHADOW PEOPLE, JUNE 9, and SHOPPING TOUR
Real Cases of Shadow People: The Sarah McCormick Story (2019) Overlong found footage movie about three friends who disappeared while making a documentary on the subject of shadow people. There’s some interesting interviews with relatives of people who’re seemingly abducted…
Mini Reviews: SAINT MAUD, THE CAVE, and THE WITCH
Saint Maud (2020) A victim of false advertising, this was marketed as some kind of supernatural horror film in the vein of Hereditary but is instead a psychological character study about a young nurse (Morfydd Clark) who, after experiencing a…
URBAN LEGEND and URBAN LEGENDS Mini Reviews
Urban Legend (1998) One of the better post-Scream horror offerings with enjoyable shades of ’80s slasher tropes about a college tormented by a hooded ax killer who uses famous urban legends as their modus operandi. Good characters and excellent atmospherics…
DERANGED and ED GEIN Mini Reviews
Deranged (1974) Hysterically OTT Psycho dupe (that predated Texas Chainsaw Massacre by several months) about an Ed Gein-like simpleton (Roberts Blossom) whose obsession with his mother spirals out of control after she dies, resulting in him stealing her corpse and…
Found Footage Roundup
If you’re in the mood for some POV action this steamy summer you should check out these found footage titles currently streaming on Amazon Prime and Tubi. First up is Horror in the High Desert (2021), a nice slow burner,…
