J*A*S*M

A new comic-book toilet flush from Marvel, or maybe even worse, DC, who coincidentally feature the Predators. You piss me off, Hollywood. Why is it that there are almost no good adult films produced anymore? Why is it that when studios pour a lot money, what comes out is uniform, sterile infantility? There is plenty of blood and it does fuck things up all the way to 11, but it has the mental level of a six year-old kid. The characters must utter stupid one-liners and jump 10 metres up in the air, even is nothing is happening, and fearlessly balance on a moving bus and a flying spaceship (!!!). Plus a cute clever boy and a domesticated predator dog. Did we fucking need any of that, really? In a Predator film? In the first half, at least the humour works sometimes, but in the second half, absolutely nothing. It falls apart to such extent that you can even see massive editing mistakes, when there isn’t a fundamental continuity between two consecutive scenes. It is as if parts of it were missing (I got scared at the transition from the barn to the helicopter, I thought I had fallen asleep for a moment). Shane Black deserves nothing but hell from this. And maybe people will start retroactively appreciating Antal’s well executed Predators.

Three stars, grudgingly. The screenplay must have been written by an automatic horror generator and it’s surprising that Warners can’t manage their dark universe better on this aspect, but for the consumers it’s enough, I guess. What scared me the most about The Nun is that the same person is credited with the screenplay of the second part of It. I hope they do a better job there. If there’s anything that deserves praise in The Nun is the choice of location and the setting in an old castle as a whole (the Hunedoara castle in Romania); the ancient corridors, cellars, chapels and graveyards do create atmosphere. Unfortunately, the creators were incapable of doing much more with it. Which quite surprised me, Hardy’s previous film, The Hallow, was brilliant. Overall, it’s just fat and salt-free, with a plot that fails to be engaging (not that there is much of it anyway: the characters come, then hang around for while and walk in circles, then one of them literally explains what’s going on, which is followed by a chase with the evil nun, the end), the characters are uninteresting; a scary movie for kids. In a year when we’ve already seen a fairly above-average number of well-made horror films of various sub-genres, these mainstream flicks need to be better. If you’re looking for a good tribute to the old Hammer films, better go for A Cure for Wellness or The Woman in Black.

It’s frustrating that nobody has tried to develop this seriously, because it’s core concept, the nature of which isn’t revealed until the end, is superb. Boarding School could’ve been a new horror classic, crushing and socially relevant, but for that it needed to have been conceived a little differently. Yakin’s film ends up being nothing but a cheesy B-movie drowning in many rich motifs (many of which come out empty; there are lots absolutely pointless scenes – there are even Nazis and the Holocaust, I’m not kidding!), a shallow screenplay and flat performances. There are also a couple of truly awful things, like the make-up of the burnt boy, for instance. Fortunately, it’s bizarre and WTF enough to keep me interested in how things turn out (sometimes it’s so bizarre that I felt the creators were taking the piss). The resolution, as I’ve already mentioned, gets another point. But still, the feeling of a wasted opportunity.

Just like all the previous films by Chris Sun: a cheap imitation of a more famous model without a single contribution or style of its own. The pig looks stupid, it can appear out of nowhere in the middle of a meadow without anyone noticing, but it does know how to make a mess.

Zahler’s name attached to the screenplay teased, the names of two clumsy Swedes in the direction scared. In the end, the film neither satisfied nor did it disgust me. It works quite well in the gore scenes, but after some of the foreign reviews, I was expecting something crazier. The jokes here and there are fun, but the incompetent directing duo are unfortunately unable to sell those moments and the film breaks down into single funny microsequences and cotton wool filling, which the viewer always has to endure. I don’t have a fully positive experience from this.

I have a basic distrust of films that in the trailers boast about being from the same producers as the Twilight saga, but this was one alright, given the expectations. It’s an elegant gothic-horror film for older kids, well shot, with decent performances and an unusual premise. I’m actually sorry that the creators chose to take the way of mainstream harmless horror, because the premise could easily be the basis of a gem at the level of Suspiria. The wasted potential is a shame, but as a genre snack, I won’t throw shit on it.

That was something! You don’t have to be an idiotic islamophobe, graduated from the University of Life and with an SPD badge to recognise that this film is relevant. It takes a look at the problem of the integration of immigrants without any rosy glasses, showing how keeping the traditional customs and morals of the first generation can lead to terrible consequences, even in the case of a family that, at first sight, seems integrated (in the sense of a comfortable life free of crime).

A fairly technically competent snack with a likeable hero and a charismatic villain. But the author, Brandon Boyce, will certainly not compete in the Oscar for screenplay – the story really goes off the rails.

Engaging provocation by Noé which to a great extent tests the endurance and patience of the viewer. I’m not sure I would want to watch it at home on the PC, but in the main theatre of Hotel Thermal, at the KVIFF, thumbs up. Already at the beginning, when Noé serves the closing scene and the opening credits of the film that is about to follow, it is clear that this is not something that plays strictly by the rules. The dancing number at the beginning is brilliant. The following garrulous passage lost me, but then Climax got me back once the Sangría with LSD started to hit. The last half hour is a stress test for the senses of the viewer; a descent into utter darkness and a state of altered consciousness that made my head spin. The experience, in the strict sense of the word, is pleasant, but heavy.

This one is very underrated. The first half is solid fun, especially for fans of outdoor war-games or horror scape rooms, like me, for example. But then Ruin Me gets serious and delivers a pretty WTF twist and also comes to a surprising and meaningful conclusion, which in the genre waters of today isn’t very common, I’d say. Certain apostate members of the public here are proof that, for many viewers, making an imaginative film is counterproductive.