EvilPhoEniX

A decent directorial debut. Four high school kids are hanging out in the woods as usual, but a terrible accident occurs and one of them dies. From that moment on, it leaves a psychological impact on all of them and increasingly stranger things start happening in the town. Decently filmed, very well acted, decently suspenseful in places, and a pretty intense slasher-like ride towards the end. Not a big hit, but an enjoyable watch no doubt. 70%

The anticipated Escape from Cannibal Farm is out and we have our first bummer and disappointment of the year. A cheap rip-off of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre that does more to shame than pay homage. The film is very shoddily made, the actors are unsympathetic, overacting, screaming (the fake crying is so annoying), they don’t even get the chainsaw started, the shotgun blasts sound like airsoft, there is very little gore, mostly out of frame, and apart from one severed hand, nothing worth mentioning. And most of all it's all so boring, monotonous, uninteresting, without any idea and atmosphere, practically nothing works here. A failure from top to bottom. I miss Leatherface. 30%

One more little action flick before the end of the year, starring the excellent Max Zhang against the great bad guy Shawn Yue. Decent work for a debut. Plot-wise, it's a classic crime drama that doesn't impress with anything, but the dynamic fights definitely stand out and have some oomph thanks to the excellent protagonists. Max Zhang is a likeable guy and an incredibly fast machine. There's quite a bit of action and a lot of knife use, so for me, I'm satisfied. I had fun. A movie in an old-school style with interesting locations. 75%.

David Ayer sometimes makes me happy sometimes not, here it's about halfway through. This mix of fantasy in our world is certainly interesting, but not exploited enough. Story-wise it's very flat, Ayer doesn't know how to work with suspense much, at least he has Will Smith and an unrecognizable Joel Edgerton. The action is very decent, the elven trio perform some nice acrobatic stunts and it's pretty brutal too, but I couldn't enjoy the film to the full, there was something here that distracted me and I can't figure out which one it was. Anyway, decent work for Netflix. 65%.

Paco Plaza, the director of REC, took a break from zombies and threw himself into exorcism, which is perhaps an even more hackneyed subject than zombies, and came up with absolutely nothing new. Technically, the film is on a decent level, but that can't be taken too much as a upside considering the director, it was was par for the course, otherwise it follows the classic template. For me, this kind of horror movie is very uninteresting, if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all, and since there are no scares and no gore, I found nothing to take away from it. The look of the demon is okay and the ending is quite action packed, so it's not an outright ordeal. A tolerable and watchable affair for fans of the genre, more of a waste of time for me. 55%

The end of the year is approaching and soon I'll be sharing my top picks, which will definitely include the oddity called The Killing of a Sacred Deer. The film is definitely not for everyone and is similarly controversial to the recent Mother!, but Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos definitely has talent (his previous films Dogtooth and The Lobster are also weird). The film is very disturbing from the start and we get the sense that something is not right. The dialogue and the actors' strangely theatrical speech is already odd but effective, and from the main twist onwards the film takes a decent turn and at times is not pleasant to watch. If you have kids you'll sympathise with the main character even more. Anxiety, unease, chills, breathtaking moments, impressive performances, bold dialogue and decent technical aspects make The Killing of a Sacred Deer a unique affair that despite its artsy form surprisingly suited and entertained me a lot. For me, a great recommendation, but I can understand the negative reviews. Naked Nicole Kidman is still gorgeous. 80%.

Chinese sci-fi weirdness that tries to be cool but is unnecessarily overwrought and overstuffed. I liked the brutality and the villain, but once the main character appeared on the scene three times, I was getting pretty lost in the cloning and time travel. A strange hodgepodge that could have looked much better with a more capable director. A cheaper B-movie affair. 40%

I'm not familiar with the source material, Japanese Manga have never been my cup of tea and I'm not very pleased here either. It's typically over the top and weird in a Japanese way. There's not much action and I didn't like it, there are weird weapons, weird characters, not much CGI, at least the blood is nice, but it's mostly rather boring with an uninteresting story. Horror-wise it's also weak. Nothing for me. 45%.

Quite possibly my last visit to the cinema this year (there have been 37) and definitely a hit. Excellent nostalgic entertainment after 22 years. The concept of the play is slightly off from the original, which is perhaps the biggest criticism, but otherwise the film certainly works in every respect. The humour is once again handled by the excellent Kevin Hart and comes through for Jack Black, The Rock is traditionally entertaining and Karen Gillan's vixen has charm. Humour is plentiful and mostly successful, there's also plenty of animals (hippopotamus, rhinoceros, crocodiles, jaguars, black mamba, elephant) and there are contact fights, making the action a nice all-round treat to keep the whole family entertained. It's a bit far-fetched at times and a few scenes are ridiculous, but as long as you accept that it's actually a video game, there's no reason to get upset about the logic. 80%

Towards the end of the year, a disturbing item from Norway. Thelma, a strong believer so far unbowed by anything, gradually begins to taste the sins of high school life and falls in love with a girl, but strange and inexplicable things start happening around her. It sounds like a short story by Stephen King, something like Carrie, but the film hits more on psychology than pure horror, though a couple of scenes are definitely worth it (the ones with the baby and the spontaneous combustion on the boat). I was a bit disappointed by the open ending, which I'm not a big fan of, but otherwise undoubtedly a quality affair with a social subtext. Well made with intelligent dialogue, atmospheric, gloomy and with a lesbian touch. I enjoyed it. 80%.