HEY ALL!
WELCOME!!! Happy Holiday season y’all.
I know I’ve been gone for a minute…since June actually, where I ranked all “Black Mirror” episodes. I finally just updated that article with my thoughts on S6, so click back on that article if you’re interested.
So, when I first launched this newsletter, I did a half-year check in for 2022 in the genre (horror/thriller/dark comedy) space, where I talked about my favorites, least favorites and middle-of-the-road picks. I never actually updated the list for the last half of the year, hence why I wanted to just wait until the end of the year to do the list for 2023. I actually committed to it!
Keep in mind, I didn’t see EVERY genre film released this year, so if a film is absent off this list, middle-of-the-road list or the best list: I didn’t forget, I just didn’t SEE it yet. I’ve seen over 80+ so let’s get this list poppin’!
Also, reminder: I HATE BEING NEGATIVE. I actively hated writing my worst of 2022 in genre list, I felt guilty after writing it because I never like to put someone’s work down, especially when the work was ACTIVELY put in. I’m just being honest and keeping it accurate to how I felt about the films. No work is immune to criticism, which is (mainly) what my list is. I don’t like being a hater and I do want to like EVERYTHING, however there’s just so many films that make that not a possibility. I will say I’m not as heated about anything this year as I was last year (Thank goodness “Jeepers Creepers: Reborn” did not come out until near the end of the year cause I would’ve written the most hateful shit about it) so I shouldn’t be TOO harsh on anything in particular.
Alright, now let’s get started for real!
THE PUPPETMAN (dir: Brandon Christensen) Shudder
“The Puppetman, a convicted killer on death row always maintained his innocence saying that it was an evil force controlling his body as he slaughtered his victims. Now Michal, the killer’s daughter, begins to suspect that there may be some truth to her father’s claim when those around her begin to die in brutal ways. She must try and break the curse of The Puppetman before all her loved ones are killed.”
Whew…the worst horror film I’ve seen this year. I understand the appeal of it, ‘oh it’s like “Final Destination” but with a more traditional supernatural twist’ and the gimmick of the titular entity literally controlling your body like a puppet to make you kill yourself is pretty fun. That’s where the fun ends.
This really isn’t a hard film to write, the expectation for this film is just to be a fun and delightfully over-the-top ghastly spectacle. Unfortunately, the film takes itself quite seriously and has some of the most horrifically written characters I’ve seen in a minute and…you know what. Instead of just writing everything out, you can just read my spoiler-filled review of the film, it’s jumbled and not well-written out, but I go over every problem I had with it.
Again, I don’t wanna spend too much time writing about the stuff I didn’t like this year so moving on:
MALUM (dir: Anthony DiBlasi) Welcome Villain
“In this reimagining of the 2014 cult hit ‘Last Shift’, a rookie police officer willingly takes the last shift at a newly decommissioned police station in an attempt to uncover the mysterious connection between her father’s death and a vicious cult.”
…Why? What was the point of this?
I’m just scratching my head at this whole film. Why not offer DiBlasi an original project? Why would you want him to remake his well-regarded indie? This is so much worse than I ever would’ve expected. I’m genuinely surprised this is the same man who directed “Last Shift”.
“Last Shift” is no masterpiece by any means, but it’s one of those films that exceeds the low expectations you probably had before watching. It’s actually a pretty good time! Look, I understand someone coming to you and offering you a bigger budget to add in all the scenes that you never got to due to budgetary restraints but..come on man, it’s like you didn’t even try!
Horrendous acting, no suspense or any sense of tension built, surprisingly shitty effects work and…just fucking boring. A big L.
RUN RABBIT RUN (dir: Daina Reid) Netflix
“Sarah is a fertility doctor with a firm understanding of the cycle of life. When she is forced to make sense of the increasingly strange behavior of her young daughter Mia, she must challenge her own beliefs and confront a ghost from her past.”
What a boring ass start to my Sundance back in January!
I’ve been doing the virtual Sundance option since it’s started back in 2021 and I absolutely love it. So many wonderful films I got to see back in January…and also some bad ones. There will be another one I saw from Sundance later in this newsletter.
But anyways, Sundance is in late-January and my birthday is in late-January as well! So back in January, on my 21st birthday I finally decided to watch the first of many Sundance movies I had on my radar and…what a shitty start.
It’s really a shame since I found the premise intriguing and I’ve been following the inception of this project since the summer of 2020, when it was announced Elisabeth Moss was gonna originally star in it for a now-bankrupt studio. Blessings to Moss and the now-bankrupt studio cause wow…how did y’all read this script and decide it was a project you wanted to do?
This film is incredibly lame. Boring, drab and sleepy. A shame, since I had hope for the first 15 minutes we were gonna go somewhere interesting and we just…never did. This is a film with pretty much only one “twist” that’s so predictable and the film takes such a long time building it up and when we finally get this twist we knew about from damn near the start of the whole thing there’s only 5 minutes left. Dumb as fuck ending too.
Every actor here is trying their best, it’s competently shot and edited but..ugh. That sums up my thoughts, just ugh. It has some shades of other Australian horror that blends drama and supernatural horror like ‘The Babadook’ and ‘Relic’ but in the worst way possible. Please just watch those two over this.
I’ll end this by a snippet of my little review I posted back in January after watching:
“Overall, I can totally see why Netflix picked this up. It would completely bore a wide theatrical audience, it's not very marketable (good luck to whoever has to cut a trailer without giving everything away) and they can throw it on their platform in the fall with little promotion and watch it stick in the top 10 movies for a few days before fading into the ether with their other sea of titles.”
FEAR (dir: Deon Taylor) Hidden Empire Releasing
“A group of friends gather for a much-needed weekend getaway at a remote and historic hotel. Celebration turns into terror as one by one, each guest faces their own worst fear.”
This is just a bad film on nearly every level. Bad performances, bad writing, bad directing, bad editing, bad lighting, bad effects, bad score, just…bad.
It sucks cause the premise sounds semi-interesting, there’s a lot that could’ve been done there but it just continuously takes the worst, uninteresting and strangely overthought route. Deon Taylor isn’t known for making great films, I at least had fun with “The Intruder”, so I think he needs to stick to projects like those and not…whatever this was.
THE OUTWATERS (dir: Robbie Banfitch) Cinedigm
“Four travelers encounter menacing phenomena while camping in a remote stretch of the Mojave Desert.”
*Sigh…Where to begin with this one?
I first heard about this film sometime mid-to-late 2022 when the film was doing a little festival circuit and some people REALLY loved it. It was being compared in the same vein to ‘Skinamarink’ a very divisive film, one that I personally really enjoyed (I saw it back in 2022 so it won’t be on my favorites list this year). After watching this film…those two do NOT deserve to even be uttered in the same sentence.
As someone who actually loves found footage and experimental horror this should’ve been right in my wheelhouse but it’s just so actively not good. Every time I would try to love it, it would just do something…frustratingly, mind-numbingly dumb.
Conceptually it has some really cool ideas but it has the worst possible execution of those ideas. I think Banfitch has potential to be a good writer or producer but he’s just not a good director…or actor. This film didn’t make me feel anything. Hopefully, Banfitch’s next film will do enough to make me at least feel lukewarm on it.
JAGGED MIND (dir: Kelley Kali) Hulu/20th Digital Studios
“When Billie finds herself reliving different versions of the same first date, she must break out of a series of loops created by her manipulative ex-girlfriend.”
For those who aren’t aware, Hulu/20th Digital Studios have a little original series titled ‘Bite Size Halloween’, that’s pretty self-explanatory. Short horror/spooky films with different styles and tones. It was announced in late 2021 that they would make nine feature-length adaptions of some of the shorts. Six of them have been released.. ’Grimcutty’ was the first, released in 2022 and was terrible! The second, “Matriarch”, also released in 2022, was also bad! The other four you will see scattered across these lists, starting with this one.
So what’s the verdict on “Jagged Mind”? Clearly you know what list you're reading, it’s not good!
Although, unlike the ‘Grimcutty’ and ‘Matriarch’, it isn’t offensively bad, just EXTREMELY forgettable. I forgot about this movie almost immediately after viewing. It features fine enough performances I guess, it’s just not very investing or interesting or intriguing. It could almost put you to sleep.
ELEVATOR GAME (dir: Rebekah McKendry) Shudder
“Follows socially awkward teenager Ryan, who discovers that the night his sister disappeared she had played ‘The Elevator Game’ — a ritual conducted in an elevator in which players attempt to travel to another dimension using a set of rules that can be found online. Ignoring warnings, he resolves to follow and find her.”
Woof, I also forgot how bad this one was.
I really feel bad for director Rebekah McKendry here..her last film was 2022’s ‘Glorious’, also another Shudder original and while it wasn’t a great film, it was surprisingly enjoyable and a good portion of the Shudder community + genre critics seemed to like it well enough that you would think McKendry’s next film would get her a lot more to work with and instead we got this…
I also have to say the Elevator Game urban legend is already one of the weakest and most tedious creepypasta’s ever, so there was really no way this was gonna turn out good. Maybe enjoyable if you altered the legend a good bit, but they don’t really do that here.
25 year old teenagers, Disney Channel ass dialogue, forced confrontation scenes, weak makeup effects, just dull.
BAD THINGS (dir: Stewart Thorndike) Shudder
“A weekend getaway for a few friends at a snowy hotel becomes a psychological tailspin and bloody nightmare.”
Premise makes the film sound significantly more fascinating than it is.
Don’t worry tho, I know it looks tough for Shudder originals right now, but they weren’t ALL bad. You’ll definitely see some on the other lists.
Truth be told, there was legitimate potential here. A modern, darkly comic riff on ‘The Shining’ but with none of the imagination, wit or fluidity. It has meh performances, poorly written characters and a slow pace that does NOT match or enhance the final act of the film.
Also, seems like the director was not a fan of people laughing during some scenes near the end in the screening and it just had me like ‘This is very ridiculous and poorly executed, you can’t expect people NOT to laugh’. If I was the director, I would try my best to encourage people to view the film as a dark comedy, it would at least brush away some criticisms of the more laughable scenes.
CAT PERSON (dir: Susanna Fogel) Rialto Pictures
“Based on the New Yorker short story, we follow college sophomore Margot, who goes on a date with the older Robert and finds that IRL Robert doesn’t live up to the Robert she has been flirting with over texts.”
Here it is, the other film I saw at Sundance to make this list!
Fewer films at this past years Sundance was quite as divisive as this one. The short story its based off of was already a topic of discourse and discussion when it was published in December of 2017 and most people were dreading a film adaption. They were right to do so.
So because this film is based off of a short story, they get to the end of the story by the end of the second act and just completely wing the final act and…it’s not great. This movie so BADLY wants to be a conversation starter and blend multiple genres together including dark comedy and thriller and it doesn’t do a good job at either one. The movie is almost two hours long and I felt it. There’s deadass fifteen minutes of screen time I can think of to remove that wouldn’t affect the film in the slightest.
There’s a whole POC best friend subplot that follows her being extremely online and it does NOT fit the movie at all, and she’s only there so the lead can get into a fake fight with her to set up the final act!
The writers straight up admitted that they decided to make it an almost horror film after seeing the success of ‘Get Out’ and I don’t know why that was the path you chose! You also take away from the ambiguity and effectiveness of the short story by deciding to just do a custom final act! Also, it was recently revealed that the author of the short story Kristen Roupenian actually STOLE the idea of the story from someone she knew in real life! The woman revealed that the whole story was actually inspired by her life and a date she had with an older man when she was 20 and Kristen admitted it! That’s really fucked up, we should be talking about how to stop Kristen from getting more of her short stories adapted!
The movie is SO jumbled that the financiers couldn’t find a distributor for it! Netflix offered to pay $5M with no theatrical component and they declined because they wanted it to be theatrical. The only other offers they got for theatrical were for $1M and $1.5M when the movie cost $12M to produce! The head of StudioCanal said that this was the biggest loss they’ve had for a film in YEARS!
StudioCanal is not a U.S. company so they gave the movie over to their specialty U.S. brand ‘Rialto Pictures’ who does revised and updated copies of old movies! They don’t even distribute movies! It was released with no noise back in October and literally no one has talked about it since. It should stay gone.
Funnily enough, before the films premiere back in January, the star of the film Emilia Jones and director Susanna Fogel already shot a new movie together which is a darkly comedic biopic about whistleblower Reality Winner…and it’s premiering at Sundance…They’re coming back to terrorize! Don’t ever do another project together!
HAUNTING OF THE QUEEN MARY (dir: Gary Shore) Vertical Entertainment
“When photographers Erin and Patrick are brought aboard the ship with their young son Lukas, they unleash a series of events that entwines their family with the ship’s dark past. As the terror unfolds around them they begin to realize there is more to this sumptuous ocean liner than meets the eye: its remarkable legacy masking violent secrets.”
A dud. A two-hour movie that feels like eight.
I’m so baffled by this screenplay and the narrative choices. It’s so strangely hard to follow and gets so, so uninspiring. It sucks because the production value is actually quite good! There’s some gory moments that are executed well and that’s what pisses me off most! I hate seeing good production value go to waste on a bad script.
A waste of two hours, don’t bother.
PET SEMATARY: BLOODLINES (dir: Lindsey Anderson Beer) Paramount+
“In this prequel to the 2019 film, we go back to 1969, following a young Jud Crandall who has dreams of leaving his hometown of Ludlow, Maine behind, but soon discovers sinister secrets buried within and is forced to confront a dark family history that will forever keep him connected to Ludlow.
I don’t think there is a more pointless or safe film on this list than this.
I don’t believe we’re following a young Jud, I don’t believe in the friendships that are supposed to be the beating heart of the film as we have to brief introductory scenes and no-dialogue flashbacks before jumping right into the Sematary shit. If you’re gonna do a prequel, make it hundreds of years ago, no one gives a fuck about young Jud!
Terrible jump-scares, cheap gore, tropes galore, no heart or care put into this…skip it, I’m serious.
WINNIE THE POOH: BLOOD AND HONEY (dir: Rhys Frake-Waterfield) Fathom
“Christopher Robin is headed off to college and he has abandoned his old friends, Pooh and Piglet, which then leads to the duo embracing their inner monsters.”
Obviously, this whole movie is a joke. It was announced right after Winnie became public domain and everyone knew it was gonna suck and shocker, it did!
I had sporadic fun with some parts of this, I do love shitty slashers after all, but it’s definitely nowhere near fine. It’s even more poorly acted than you think, even more terribly written and directed than you think and it has one of the most head-scratching endings to any horror film this year. I won’t be watching the sequel (at least I’m not planning on it) but its the exact type of trash you think it is and it’s probably worse.
CHILDREN OF THE CORN (dir: Kurt Wimmer) RLJE Films
“A psychopathic twelve-year-old girl in a small town in Nebraska recruits all the other children and goes on a bloody rampage, killing the corrupt adults and anyone else who opposes her. A bright high schooler who won’t go along with the plan is the town’s only hope of survival.”
Interesting tidbit: this movie was filmed during COVID. Lockdown happened mid-March 2020 while they were a few days into filming and they just straight up kept filming, they did not stop. No one got sick on set or anything like that but it’s just so funny cause you did all that for…this?
Terrible movie on nearly every level, but I did have some fun watching it. It’s only kinda fun for a one-time watch but…yeah this shit is BAD.
I will say, at least there’s more of an explanation for why the kids are rebelling against the adults and that’s the best thing I can say about it.
The ‘Children of the Corn’ franchise is not known for being good to begin with, but I would just stick to the OG. That’s a fun fall watch.
CONSECRATION (dir: Christopher Smith) IFC Films & Shudder
“After the alleged suicide of her priest brother, Grace travels to the remote Scottish convent where he fell to his death. Distrusting the Church’s account, she uncovers murder, sacrilege and a disturbing truth about herself.”
This movie is just so boring y’all. So mundane. So forgettable. So cliched. Jena Malone deserves a better horror vehicle. Especially since “Nun/Catholic” horror is getting more and more popular.
I will say, there’s a revelation in the final act that I thought was cool, but the whole journey getting there is confusing and tiresome, I can’t in good conscious recommend it solely for doing something cool in the final act.
CLOCK (dir: Alexis Jacknow) Hulu/20th Digital Studios
“On the eve of her 38th birthday, a woman desperately attempts to fix her broken biological clock.”
This had an alright start. Interesting idea, serviceable direction, some potential. By the end I was just so over it. ‘Rosemary’s Baby’ really is so influential isn’t it? This reminded me exactly of, coincidentally, Hulu’s “False Positive” which was released in 2021 that was a slightly more absurd version of this movie, and that was also heavily inspired by “Rosemary’s Baby”. It doesn’t say anything that you haven’t seen or heard before, particularly when the execution is this lackluster.
Surprisingly, for being the lead Dianna Agron gives the worst performance in the film. The ending was also just silly as well. Don’t recommend.
FOLLOW HER (dir: Sylvia Caminer) Quiver Distribution
“An aspiring actress responds to a mysterious classified ad and finds herself trapped in her new boss’s twisted revenge fantasy.”
Ok, this and these next few aren’t necessarily bad, but they are definitely closer to it than not and are just overall forgettable.
If you have any understanding of the internet, you will very easily be able to poke a million and one flaws about this film. It’s a movie so focused and heavily reliant on social media, influencer culture, etc. The budget is also so low that they can’t do much with the technological graphics and social media aspects so everything looks cheap and almost laughable.
I will say, the final act did not go in a direction I expected it too, however I would’ve almost preferred if it went in the predictable route. I don’t know, I’m not mad at it too. I just truly haven’t thought about this since watching it. It’s silly, very pick-apart-able and not strong enough to make it to the middle-of-the-road list.
THE THIRD SATURDAY IN OCTOBER (dir: Jay Burleson) Dark Sky Films
“A lost slasher film from the golden age of the slasher genre. October 1979, Ricky Dean Logan is a man on a mission. Years ago, he lost a child at the hands of a psychopathic killer named Jakkariah Harding. When Harding escapes Death Row, Ricky Dean throws himself into the line of fire to stop him from killing again as Harding preys upon a group of friends gathered to watch a college football game.”
Interesting project, this is filmed and shot to look like a lost slasher film from the late 1970s. This was made back-to-back with ‘The Third Saturday in October Part V’ which is supposed to be a lost sequel to this but with 1980s sensibilities resulting in a much sillier and gorier film as most fifth entries in a slasher franchise are. Spoiler alert: I enjoyed that film a lot more than this.
This wants to be a serious franchise-starter in the vein of most 1970s slashers and it just doesn’t work. It has a slower pace than Part V, intentionally so as most 1970s horror has a slower-burn pace. The problem is, it’s not effective as a homage piece and it’s not effective as a slow-burn slasher. The villain is boring, the characters are boring even by cheesy slasher standards and it’s just a disappointment after watching the pretty fun Part V.
Part V won’t be on this list thankfully!
IN THE FIRE (dir: Conor Allyn) Saban Films
“A doctor from New York travels to a remote plantation in the 1890s to care for a disturbed boy who seems to have inexplicable abilities. She begins treating the child, but in doing so, ignites a war between science and religion as the local priest believes the boy is possessed by the devil and the cause of the village’s woes.”
This movie is unfortunately gonna be review-bombed to hell and back because of its star, which is a shame cause the acting is not the problem here.
The lead character talks incredibly modern for the 1890s and this slow-burn “mystery thriller” is rarely intriguing or thrilling and when it tries to be thrilling, particularly in the last act it’s actually pretty funny and completely ruins the mystery aspect.
It’s beautifully shot and every one is trying their best, it’s just a boring screenplay. Simple as that.
ALL FUN AND GAMES (dir: Eren Celeboglu & Ari Costa) Vertical Entertainment
“A group of Salem teens discover a cursed knife that unleashes a demon that forces them to play gruesome, deadly versions of childhood games where there can be no winners, only survivors.”
What a shame. A really talented cast and a really fun sleepover horror movie premise gone awry. Features one of the most half-assed opening & ending narrations I’ve seen in a minute.
Also, interesting is when the film was first announced the premise was completely different, it was supposed to be about a sadistic cousin who forces the cousin they’re babysitting to play a twisted board game, unleashing a monster called ‘The Skarrow’. NONE of this was in the final product. I wonder if there were heavy reshoots or rewrites, it honestly looks like it. There’s only like one sequence in the film I would call fun. Feels like one of the worst ‘Fear Street’ novels at times.
Unfortunately, it’s a skip for me. Cool poster tho.
IT’S A WONDERFUL KNIFE (dir: Tyler MacIntyre) RLJE Films
“Winnie’s life is less than wonderful one year after saving her town from a psychotic killer on Christmas Eve. When she wishes she was never born, she finds herself magically transported to a nightmarish parallel universe. With the murderous maniac now back, she must team up with a misfit to identify the culprit and get back to her own reality.”
What a slog! I write down every problem I had with this movie here!
Long story short, Michael Kennedy is my new worst enemy in the slasher space. Man cannot come up with anything unique or different in the slasher space without ripping off ‘Scream’ and a “WHAT IF IT WAS SCREAM MEETS *insert sci-fi/fantastical time travel movie here*. Just to be clear, I love those types of movies! I love “The Final Girls”, “Happy Death Day”, “Totally Killer”, etc.
What should’ve been a slasher fans dream becomes…this.
OH THANK GOD WE’RE DONE!!!!!
Merry Christmas, everyone! Hope that you enjoyed my return to covering the genre space. I’m hoping to have the middle-of-the-road section out before the end of the year!
Thanks for reading!