Movieline Online

Authoritarian regimes have a way of shaping art accidentally, not by what they allow, but what they forbid. Filmmakers worm their celluloid fingers into narrow cracks in the wall of what’s permitted to get their message out. So when a film finally does slips through it seems almost miraculous in its honesty, capturing a social reality the regime would camouflage behind less artful propaganda. Spain in the late 1950s was still under Franco’s thumb, yet Carlos Saura’s Los Golfos (1959) landed like a brick through a window when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, laying bare the restless frustrations of working-class youth in Madrid. The story follows a group of teenage boys, petty criminals looking for an easy score, whose friendship is glued together less by loyalty than by circumstances for survival. But that changes when they work together to steal enough money for Juan – a toreador in training – to stage a showcase of his bullfighting skills in the arena. The gang circles arou...

There are guitar solos and then there are guitar solos . You know, the sort of finger-bleeding epics that fill up half a vinyl record while the rest of the band just tries to keep pace. Free Bird, Stairway to Heaven, November Rain , they all revolve around one tremendous explosion of individual talent that goes on far longer than it should…yet somehow never seems long enough. Oddly enough, 1966’s The Betrayal , a fairly standard chambara film directed by Tokuzo Tanaka, ends with a similar display of virtuoso talent, only this time the song is played with a sword. Kobuse (Raizo Ichikawa) is a loyal samurai who agrees to take the blame for a murder rap in order to spare his clan’s reputation and – although he’s unaware of the fact – protect the son of a high official. But what began as a backdoor deal turns into a death sentence. Kobuse is hunted by both clans as he bounces from town to town, plagued by guilt over the fiancé he abandoned and ashamed of the emptiness of a samurai’s oath ...

When is ghostly vengeance justified?  I’d say pissing on someone's gravestone not once but  twice  is grounds for some supernatural payback.  And that’s exactly what happens in  Fear Cabin: The Last Weekend of Summer  (2024), a decidedly anti-A24 throwback to the ‘80s traditions of big boobs, demonic possession and low-budget ingenuity. When Cassie and company arrive at their Airbnb, they’re greeted by your standard creepy old man (played by former  Party of Five  poster boy Jeremy London), strange noises in the woods and a tattered diary full of pentagrams and incantations.  But instead of leaving a bad review, they decide to toss the old book on the fire, roast some marshmallows and get their money’s worth.  Which they  do , in blood… mwahahahaha! Written, directed, produced and co-starring Brian Krainson, an Atlanta-based stunt coordinator with credits on  Ozark  and the vampire spoof  Renfield ...

By and large “predictability” is American horror’s bread and butter.     There are always a few outliers that start a new trend and a few auteurs who don’t play by the rules, but mainstream titles stick to jump scares 95% of the time.     That’s what makes Hong Kong horror such a breath of fresh air.     Built off magic, folklore and batshit crazy practical effects, movies like 1992’s   The Cat   are nearly impossible to second guess…and almost equally impossible not to enjoy. The plot, as best as it can be wrangled into a straight line, involves an alien princess hiding out on Earth with her bodyguards, one of whom takes the shape of a housecat.  Avoiding pursuit by an amoeba-like enemy that takes over the bodies of its victims,  the princess finds an ally in Wisely, an eccentric writer who specializes in just this sort of intergalactic weirdness. There are psychic battles, slime-drenched transformations, and a final act that’...

Some indie horror films feel like they were manufactured on the assembly line, built to grab festival programmers’ attention and catch the next A24 wave.   Hellbender   isn’t one of those. It’s too raw, too handmade, too weirdly personal. Shot in upstate New York by the Adams family (yes, literally—mom, dad, and daughter, who wrote, directed, and star), the movie blurs the line between scrappy DIY cinema and blood-soaked folk horror. On the surface, it’s a coming-of-age story: a teenage girl raised in isolation with her mother discovers she’s part of a long line of witches who feed on flesh and fear. Izzy, the home-schooled hellspawn, is played with beautiful restraint by Zelda Adams (whose talent seems destined for bigger projects) while Toby Poser plays her overprotective mom.  But who exactly is she keeping safe: Izzy or herself? Where some films would pour on an overcooked mythology or FX-heavy histrionics,   Hellbender   leans into its limitations. It ...

While most of the gun-slinging ’80s action heroes were one-note performers, Chow Yun-Fat was the exception to the rule. Handsome, charming, and emotionally accessible, the Hong Kong actor could play a romantic lead and a trigger-happy badass at the same time. 1987’s  Flaming Brothers  takes advantage of both sides of his enduring appeal. Bookended by John Woo’s  A Better Tomorrow  and its sequel, director Tung Cho Cheung’s film see-saws between melodrama and heroic bloodshed, mercilessly squeezing blood, sweat, and tears out of its charismatic lead. Yun-Fat and Alan Tang play childhood friends who claw their way up from Macau street hustlers to gangsters on the rise. But their success draws the wrath of Fourth Brother Kao, who sets out to curb their ambitions by any means necessary. To make matters worse, true love complicates everything, as each man falls for a woman who makes him second-guess not just their criminal career, but their friendship. It’s no accident th...