Ethan Luce

A smart, witty satire of Hollywood. The Comeback Trail is filled with sharp dialogue, funny, well-timed jokes, and great performances. Robert De Niro excels as a fast-talking, sleazy Hollywood producer, Tommy Lee Jones brings his trademark stoic charisma alongside surprising vulnerability as the fading star roped into shooting the movie, Zach Braff is funny as all get out as De Niro's dim but good-natured nephew an unwitting sidekick, and Morgan Freeman goes to town as a friendly but ruthless mobster with a love for cinema. It's a cast filled with great actors playing colorful characters, and all-around entertaining. I highly recommend giving it a watch.

A classic, chilling horror film, Dark Night of the Scarecrow is light on gore but is nonetheless a suspenseful, creepy slow-burn that cultivates an aura of dread. Frank DeFitto's direction and cinematography gives the setting a sense of desolation and eeriness, capturing the late fall feeling of emptiness. There are some great set-pieces here, the stand-out being where one of Bubba's murderers investigates a noise in the rafters of his barn, all while hanging precariously above a wood chipper… The performances are great across the board. Larry Drake is utterly heartbreaking as Bubba Ritter, establishing a great sense of sympathy for him in only 15 minutes of screentime. Jocelyn Brando too is great as Bubba's mother, a fundamentally good but stern woman who refuses to tolerate injustice. The standout is the legendary Charles Durning as Otis Hazelrigg. Durning is utterly spine-chilling as the narcissistic bigot, shifting between genial at one moment and cold and cruel at the next. He makes the character truly repugnant, making the audience root for him to get his just desserts.

The Night of the Hunter is a great, unsettling thriller, providing a ton of suspense and tension and disturbing imagery. Backing this is Charles Laughton's great direction, incredible lighting and cinematography, and of course, Robert Mitchum's menacing yet charismatic performance as Harry Powell, which simply must be seen to be believed, with character actress Lillian Gish providing a similarly brilliant performance as his nemesis Rachel Cooper. The only real criticism is that the ending drags on for far too long, but otherwise The Night of the Hunter is a masterful, slow-paced classic that does a great job at creeping the audience out, while providing some subtle but piercing satire on society's ugliest tendencies.

The Empty Man is not a cult classic as it is often paraded to be. It is simply a genuine classic. It is an ambitious tale of cosmic horror, with countless creative, intriguing, and of course terrifying ideas that are all pulled off brilliantly. The film establishes its tone with a 20 minute long prologue which has a slowly building sense of tension, good acting, and of course, scares. Once the prologue finally ends, you feel like you've watched a whole movie. But nope, that's just the beginning. The Empty Man then shifts into focusing on a retired police detective trying to find his friend's missing daughter, and stumbling across such Lovecraftian staples as an evil cult, an ancient evil from beyond time and thought, and tons of slowly building dread. David Prior's direction is simply excellent, with some brilliant camera work that heightens the audience's fear while also providing beautiful (and horrifying) visuals and helps convey our hero's increasing desperation. The scares are all well-crafted and thought-out, and the film has some subtle dark comedy that balances out the tension while never ruining the mood. The performances are also brilliant. James Badge Dale gives a truly great performance as the detective James Lasombra, making a nuanced and flawed, but still likeable and generally amiable character where another actor would have done a generic anti-hero. He has his flaws, but is still a good person, and Dale wonderfully captures his descent into madness over the course of the film, making it tragic and horrifying. Stephen Root is magnetic as a sinister cult leader, Samantha Logan is believable and down-to-earth as a dispirited teen haunted by the Empty Man, Sasha Frolova gives her another electrifying performance as the missing daughter (to say more would be to spoil the ending), and Robert Aramayo is both creepy and funny as a Neal Cassidy-esque cultist. All of this is capped off with an absolutely brilliant twist ending that you will not see coming, and is just the cherry on top for an excellent film that certainly has my recommendation. Watch it… if you dare.

Capricorn One is a great action thriller with a great sense of fun and a subtle, satirical edge. Peter Hyams' direction is both inspired and slick, giving the film several creative and exciting action sequences while also making sure the film just courses with energy. Aiding this is Jerry Goldsmith's terrific score. The cast is full of great actors playing some memorably quirky characters. Standouts include Telly Savalas as a somewhat unhinged cropduster pilot, Elliot Gould as an over-the-hill journalist who figures out the conspiracy, Karen Black and David Doyle as his skeptical colleagues, Hal Holbrook as the cynical and manipulative G-Man behind it all, and Sam Waterston as a sardonic astronaut. The emotional core of the film lies with James Brolin as one of the astronauts who feels guilty about his role in the conspiracy and Brenda Vacaro as his wife. The two turn in quiet, poignant performance that anchor the film, and it helps the audience have an emotional investment in the story that is satisfyingly paid off in the ending. Capricorn One is a fun, clever movie that's bound to give you a great time.