![]() ![]() But for all the virtues of its story, Hellbender’s greatest feat is how gorgeous it looks.Ĭreated by a filmmaking family who produce, direct, and star in the movie, Hellbender is an early contender for 2022’s most visually striking horror film. The movie delicately balances Izzy’s perspective and her mother’s, working as a movie both about the struggles of adolescence and about the inherent terror of trying to raise a child well. Hellbender tells the story of Izzy, a teenager who lives isolated in the woods with only her mother, who says Izzy has a debilitating disease and can’t be around other people. TEĬure is available to watch on the Criterion Channel. How do you confront a horror like that, much less stop it? The answer is as simple as it is terrifying: You can’t. In Cure, violence is less an act of premeditation or passion as it is a virus, coursing its way through the bloodstream of society, corrupting innocent bystanders not unlike aberrant cancer cells attacking from within without ever understanding why they did so in the first place. When Takabe’s investigation leads him to a suspect, a student of psychology and mesmerism known as Mamiya (Masato Hagiwara), he finds himself plunged into a conspiracy that threatens to engulf anyone who gets too close. Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s 1997 horror masterpiece Cure follows Kenichi Takabe (Kōji Yakusho), a Japanese detective frustrated by an inexplicable rash of seemingly unconnected murders that nevertheless all appear to be connected, despite none of the perpetrators having known each other or having any recollection as to what possessed them to do it. PVĬhristine is available to stream on AMC+ through Prime Video, or for digital rental or purchase on Amazon and Apple TV. It’s astounding to behold decades later.įilled with great high school archetypes that are subverted just enough to keep things interesting, a haunting score by Carpenter, and a brief appearance by Harry Dean Stanton, Christine is popcorn 1980s horror at its best. The special effects team made rubber molds of Christine and then imploded it, running the shot in reverse in the film to evoke the effect of a self-healing vehicle. The car can heal itself, an effect that is shown on camera in full, glorious display. The practical effects in Christine deserve special recognition here. It’s a great time for everybody, except Arnie’s human loved ones. ![]() He also starts to dress and act more like a greaser dirtbag from the 1950s. He quickly becomes obsessed with the car, named “Christine,” and human and vehicle both become jealous of anybody who might interrupt their time together. When the two come across a broken-down old Plymouth Fury (a vehicle that we’ve already seen commit murder and mayhem in an opening sequence set in a 1950s car assembly plant), Arnie decides he must have it. BarbarianĪ high school horror movie about a nerd who falls in love with a haunted car, Christine is an extraordinary Stephen King adaptation and a standout in John Carpenter’s consistently excellent filmography.Īrnie (Keith Gordon) is an unpopular high schooler in California who has just one friend, a popular football player named Dennis (John Stockwell, who in many ways is the emotional core of the movie, as someone who cares deeply about Arnie). It is also available for digital rental or purchase on Apple TV and Vudu. Only pain can be trusted.Īudition is available to stream on Arrow Video and Hi-Yah!, for free with ads on Tubi, and for free on Kanopy with a library card. In the end, though, these are just words. The film descends into a macabre fugue state of assumptions, misdirections, and cinematic sleights of hand, with dreams that feel almost real set against a reality too terrifying to be anything but. Miike’s film holds its cards relatively close to its chest for most of its run time, unspooling its tightly wound mystery like garrote wire before peeling back its skin of meet-cute artifice to reveal a pulsing mass of horrors roiling beneath. Best known for its brutally violent finale, Takashi Miike’s 1999 horror film as a whole is a taut and gripping drama that unravels its characters’ psychological hang-ups and neuroses before plunging headfirst into a heart of darkness and unsettling imagery.Īs we wrote in the inaugural entry of this year’s Halloween Countdown,
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