Black Phone (2022)

Director: Scott Derrickson
Starring: Ethan Hawk, Miguel Cazarez, Mason Thames, Madeleine McGraw, Jeremy Davies USA. 1h m

Black phone does all it can to NOT be the typical horror movie, and what it achieves is something not only beautifully crafted but it will keep fans puzzling over the finer details for decades.

Initially kicking off with the troubled life of 13 year old Finney Blake (Thames) , he’s shy and spends his days avoiding bullies and amusing his adorable little sister Gwen (McGraw), their father is constantly at his wits end and often beats the kids more from anger than from being a tough parent but the family get along in their own troubled way, Finney’s best friend is the toughest kid in school, Robin a kid who’s got a mean right hand but needs Finney’s help with his math homework so they look after each other.

Resurrection (1999)

Director: Russell Mulcahy
Starring: Christopher Lambert, Robert Joy, David Cronenberg, Leland Orser .USA. 1h 48m

With a recognisable cast and no budget, there’s a clear distinction between Resurrection and the movies it’s imitating, but despite its imilations it’s still a fun watch, but one which could have been extraordinarily gruesome and chilling if put in the right hands.

Christopher Lambert and Leland Orser team up as a bmovie Mills and Somerset as they hunt a deranged killer who’s emabring on a pet project to construct the body of christ, much like John Doe in Se7en this twisted mastermind is incredibly intelligent and masterfully deviant. There’s a huge strive to match the dark oppressing cityscape that Se7en is based in, but having the main officer, John Prudhomme (Lambert) painted as a superstitious cajun there’s a lot of hoops to jump through for a mainstream audience.

The Raven (2012)

Director: James McTeigue
Starring: John Cusack, Alice Eve, Luke Evans, Brendan Gleeson,Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Sam Hazeldine, Dave Legeno. USA. 1h 51m

Journalism and celebrity are the subjects of this Victorian clad detective story. Fictionalising the final days of Edgar Allen Poe, giving him some majesty while being down and out in Baltimore 1849. No one wants to publish his iconic flavour of the macabre anymore and his life is in tatters.

The only one who can stop a serial killer is the man who inspired him

Monster Preacher (2021)

Directors: Solita Hanna, Shannon Sears-Rivera
Starring: Josefina Rivera, Jacqueline Askins .USA. 1h 32m

Over the years, a majority of the serial killer cinematic adventures have always been a total let down. Not giving enough of the gory insights for hardcore fans, or trying to make excuses for killing patterns that we may never understand as the killers have been long gone or don’t wish to talk. In stark contrast Monster Preacher manages to almost circumnavigate the killer himself and tightly focuses on two victims, two brave women who survived an horrendous ordeal the killers hands, and yet somehow had never reunited until this documentary.

My Friend Dahmer (2017)

My Friend Dahmer (2017)

Director: Marc Meyers Starring: Ross Lynch, Alex Wolff, Anne Heche, Zachary Davis Brown. USA. 1h 47m

After the massive success of the indie graphic novel, this disturbing film steps into the shoes of the adolescent, much “loved” serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer. A highly attuned retro aesthetically driven adventure, does what a lot of serial killer films avoid, it dives right into the beginning and shows that a killer was born and wasn’t nurtured into his sadism. Obviously there were shitty aspects to his childhood but the strange obsessions with dead flesh seemed to always be in him.

Chicago Massacre: Richard Speck (2007)

Director: Michael Feifer
Starring: Corin Nemec, Andrew Divoff, Tony Todd, Debbie Rochon  .USA. 1h 32m

This was Michael Feifer’s first, bold attempt to retell the bloody history of a serial killer. Chicago Massacre follows the childhood and killing spree of one of America’s most deranged individuals, Richard Speck. This debut saw Feifer pair up with Corin Nemec, playing the lead role of a prominent killer. A year later the two would reunite for Bundy: A Legacy of Evil (2008). This could have continued with Nemec playing Gacy, Gein and even Kemper if the duo had the desire but it seems this is all we’re getting folks!?

It feels that the movie was conceived with a lot of promise, a couple of well known names were thrown into the mix, Todd and Divoff , who seemed eager to help as law enforcement officers trying to understand and track a man who single handedly slaughtered a number of women in july 1966, but their acting expertise is often overshadowed by the need to show Speck not killing people, they could have been the B Movie versions of Somerset and Mills, however the focus is on Speck and not the people tracking him, although their scenes are quite special, but always seem like some kind of pensive Film Noir. 

What Have They Done To Our Daughters (1974)

La polizia chiede aiuto, lit. ‘The police ask for help”

Director: Massimo Dallaman
Starring: Giovanna Ralli, Claudio Cassinelli, Mario Adorf, Franco Fabrizi .Italy. 1h 30m

Genre blending can go horribly wrong be it apocalyptic horror and comedy which resulted in Sharknado or romantic comedy which results in boredom. You need to be careful how you mix and match established flavours, if dont right, it can birth a tremendous gripping film such as this stand out item from Italian maestro Massimo Dallamano, being a big contender with a host of really notable titles the classic cinematographer comes into his own with a trio of brilliant movies, for me the golden trio, for me at least are, Dorian Gray, What have you done to Solange and similarly titled, What have they done to our daughters? A film with takes a the best of the poliziotteschi movement, ultising daring police chases, shoot outs and crime sleuthing, and let’s lose a terrific Giallo serial killer, clad in leather this psycho deptaches their victims with a cleaver and rides a powerful motorbike.

The Perfect Getaway (2009)

Director: David Twohy
Starring: Steve Zahn, Milla Jovovich, Timothy Olyphant, Kiele Sanchez, Chris Hemsworth. USA. 1h 34m

There’s a lot to like about this thrilling mystery and there’s a lot to appreciate about a psycho thriller which delivers some really cool (hard to kill) characters set on the beautiful islands of Honolulu. Two couples are travelling and enjoying the Eden-like surroundings, fully aware that there are a pair of serial killers on the loose, each couple are highly suspicious of the other but it’s up to the audience to look for the subtle clues and piece together who just might be a pair of deadly psychopaths.

The Invincible Dragon (2019)

Jiu long bu bai (original title)

Director: Fruit Chan
Starring: Jin Zhang, Anderson Silva, Kevin Cheng, Suet Lam .Hong Kong. 1h 25m

The UFC is an absolute goldmine not only does it make super fighters, but it and generally if you can nurture a dynamic Hong Kong action movie with at least one big name you’ll take in cash.. But blend the two poorly and you’ll end up with this disjointed mess, that feels as if the producers knew what they wanted to do, but wrote any bull in to make it happen.

What starts as a really engaging crime thriller following a determined gun happy cop, Officer Kowloon (Jin) who opens the film boiling in a cooking pot, in a seedy backstory restaurant, Lam Suet taunting him as the two compare Dragon tattoos, fortunate that our hero has a better back story featuring an adorable (brightly coloured cgi) Dragon that he met as a child…after the bonding he shoots Lams hand off in a function room and gets suspended, this becomes a trend with Kowloon even while investigating a spate of murders targeting female police officers he manages to fudge the operation, not only letting the only suspect go, but losing his fiancee\fellow officer.

Midnight meat train (2008)

Director: Ryuhei Kitamura
Starring: Bradley Cooper, Leslie Bibb, Brooke Shields, Tony Curran .USA. 1h 38m

Clive Barker has a distinctive, personal vision and interpretation of horror, it’s a rough gory world filled with nasty monsters, visceral torture and eternal pain, this very unique selling point which, when missing causes his movie adaptions to not do so well and come across without their wholesome disgusting glory. Midnight Meat Train does have some hands-on work from Clive in the production chair but for me, it’s definitely a good horror movie but it’s not true to form Clive Barker horror at all.