John Chandler

She put a spell on me. Conceived by writer-director Anna Biller, 'The Love Witch' is an overloaded circuit of color and costumery that came from Granny’s hippie trunk. The dazzling Samantha Robinson portrays Elaine Parks, a lonely witch looking for love in all the wrong places, who’s literally left a string of dead bodies behind in her quest to find a soulmate. Elaine has a junkie-like need to be wanted, but quickly tires of her assorted suitors when they become pathetically dependent on her. Paradoxically, this astoundingly gorgeous creature who looks like a sex-crazed Diana Rigg, relies on hallucinogenic potions that enslave her victims to the point where they become a nuisance and she must remove their hearts! There are cops, nosy neighbors, Satanic cultists, tampon magic, and psychedelic sex interludes, but don’t worry about keeping track of characters, they’re not that important. It’s Elaine’s world and her needs must be attended to, even if it seems she’s doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over. Biller shoves the look and feel of the movie to centerstage, as saturated hues of pink, purple, and red create a landscape that’s vividly anachronistic, as if based on feverish memories of I Dream of Jeannie and Bewitched. Even the dated film stock looks like leftovers from a groovier time. Can a movie that contains scenes of human sacrifice still be wacky? "The Love Witch' pulls it off with style and wit. Anna Biller emerges as a filmmaker to invest some interest in, one with a bold aesthetic point of view and a sly sense of humor.

It’s a clever touch. 'Blood Vessel' is obviously a movie about vampires on board a ship, but the title also refers to the doomed crew’s containment effort to stop a terrible blood-borne infection from reaching port. Nutshell: A veritable United Nations of lifeboat survivors from a torpedoed hospital ship are hopelessly adrift somewhere in the water during the waning days of World War II. There’s two Australians (Nathan Phillips, Alyssa Sutherland), a whiny British spook (John Lloyd Fillingham), a taciturn Russian (Alex Cooke), and a pair of Americans: a useful black sailor (Lydell Jackson), and a surly Italian cook (Mark Diaco) from the mean streets of Central Casting. The improbable company hops aboard a derelict German ship and spends about 45 minutes exploring its innards, discovering burned, mutilated sailors, priceless art treasures, and an anemic child (Ruby Isobell Hall). I realize that seems like quite a bit of action, but when spread over the entirety of the running time (a tidy 93 minutes), the pace is almost geologic. As written and directed by Australian special effects maestro Justin Dix, Blood Vessel is mostly stuff we’ve seen before, wrapping Nazis in occult robes for another spin around the block. Despite a fondness for familiar tropes, Dix has some inspired moments. His depiction of an Old World vampire clan that does most of its damage from a distance by psychically manipulating the infected sailors, is a fresh idea. The hands-off approach to slaughter however, somewhat dilutes the impact of these powerful undead beings, though the creature concept and monstrous makeup are on point. It’s too bad the vampires don’t get more screen time. Instead we learn personal details about members of the doomed crew so that past tragedies can still inform the present—especially when the bloodsuckers start messing with their heads. And with all the bad accents flying around, we’re having enough trouble remembering the parade of nations on display. Fortunately, the Australian speaks German, and the Russian understands Romanian. With a structural resemblance to Aliens, minus the tension, spendy effects, and brilliant cast, Blood Vessel is serviceable entertainment at best, which doesn’t mean there’s no fun to be had. There’s just not enough to go around.

Houston, we've got a problem. There's life on the moon, and it ain't moon maidens in diaphanous gowns. Buckle up for another found-footage adventure, this one finding its way back to Earth from the cold embrace of space. "Apollo 18" reveals classified information about a secret moon landing in 1969 that was completely on the down low from the American public. Mission Commander Nathan Walker (Lloyd Owen), Captain Ben Anderson (Warren Christie), and Lieutenant Commander John Grey (Ryan Robbins) are dispatched to the moon under the direction of the Department of Defense, to set up a monitoring device to keep tabs on the Russians. That's the story, anyway. Walker and Anderson discover a derelict Russian spacecraft and the remains of a Soviet cosmonaut on the lunar surface. Shortly thereafter, Walker has a close encounter with a scuttling moon spider and the mission is pretty much FUBAR. There are many parallels to "Alien," including a critter gestation period and the inevitable expendability of the crew, a development that does not sit well with the participants. Indeed, the casual disregard for the safety of the astronauts by Mission Control is more frightening than the moon spiders themselves. With Apollo 18, director Gonzalo Lopez-Gallego and writer Brian Miller play the slow-burn card to a fault. They establish a suffocating atmosphere of dread and doom in outer space with limited sets and props—and action. There are moments when the audience feels like they're the ones lost in space, adrift in an indifferent narrative. Ultimately, it's worth the trip. There's more than enough creeping unease to keep us tuned in for the duration, as three astronauts transition from All-American heroes with The Right Stuff, to unwitting hosts with interstellar predators.

I vaguely remember seeing "The Cave" when it came out. Unfortunately, my memories of it are jumbled together with Neil Marshall's "The Descent," a scarier, similarly themed movie that came out the same year. Bad timing, I guess. Upon revisiting The Cave, I'm inclined to sing its praises as a reasonably riveting action-horror hybrid that more than adequately meets the needs of any restless cinephile. A healthy budget doesn't hurt, either. Nutshell: So there's this uncharted system of underwater caves in the Carpathian Mountains, located beneath the remains of a mysterious church that was built to contain winged demons who would periodically emerge from the netherworld. A team of macho cave divers and a few scientists suit up to explore the hole and end up trapped below the surface in a slimy, sunless world of highly adaptive parasites that cause the host to mutate into a highly adaptive cave monster. The crew is led by determined dive-master Jack McCallister (Cole Hauser), who promises a way out of the mountain tomb, even as his own transformation becomes increasingly difficult to conceal. When comparing The Cave and The Descent, it's important to remember that the latter film is generally regarded as one of the best horror movies of the 21st century. That said, The Cave is much better than I remember, and includes several harrowing scenes, none more so than spunky Charlie's (Piper Perabo) spine-tingling aerial combat with a gargoyle. Director Bruce Hunt constructs a crushing and claustrophobic underworld that pulses with genuine menace, while writers Tegan West and Michael Steinberg proffer a handful of characters worth rooting for. Take a look around The Cave. It's pretty cool, and you'll adapt in no time.

Color me impressed. What with stormtroopers, tear gas, Covid, and the most destructive wildfires in Oregon's history bidding for my anxiety contract, a pleasure cruise on the SS Lovecraft proved to be a bracing tonic for my ailing brain. So long, sanity! Pick me up after the show. Writer-director Richard Stanley deserves the positive reviews because "Color Out of Space" is pretty darn good. All the paranoia and cosmic malevolence that one associates with H.P. Lovecraft is present and looks splendid. Nutshell: Nicolas Cage stars as Nathan Gardner, a yuppie with the bright idea to move his brood from the Big Apple to rural Massachusetts, in the hopes it will prove beneficial in curbing the cancer currently loose in his wife, Theresa (Joely Richardson). Life on the Gardner's alpaca farm seems serene, till the peace and quiet is cancelled by the arrival of a small meteorite, which contaminates the environment and turns everything a lovely shade of lavender. You know the drill. Everyone and everything mutates horribly, but at least it's in a color I can tolerate. Cage plays Nathan somewhat against type, shedding the hero shirt for a doofus dad with bad glasses, and Color Out of Space is the better for it. His talent for comic madness is on full display, but stops short of cramping the action. As darkling daughter Lavinia, Madeleine Arthur gets the most screen time and does an estimable job in a performance that transcends the usual goth stereotypes, even as she proves to be the film's pivotal character. Unfortunately, her two brothers fail to rate a blip on the Interesting Scale, so it's up to Tommy Chong as (surprise, surprise) a neighboring hippie reprobate to carry some of the dramatic load. During a time of multiple crises, my movie demands become simpler as comfort carries more weight than ambiguity and nuance. With Color Out of Space, my needs are fully met. Cosmic Horror trending during an extinction event makes perfect sense, if you think about it.

Pardon me while I spill my gushing guts. I admired the heck out of the original "Laid To Rest," but the sequel is everything the second installment of a film series should be: bigger, artistically bolder, and rife with disturbing implications. (See "Evil Dead"—"Evil Dead II." ) Like the Raimi films, LTR2 is an evolutionary leap beyond its predecessor, as it takes virtually the same story and creates a whole universe for it to live in. And like Romero’s zombie epics, "Chromeskul" has the chutzpah to place a modern horror film into the larger and more provocative context of a thoroughly corrupt and predatory society—one that bares a striking resemblance to our own. Even though writer-director Robert Hall’s sophomore effort isn’t quite in the same league as the aforementioned films and folks, it’s still a bloody good time. The second film opens just moments after the conclusion of the first: The relentless killer known as Chromeskull (Nick Principe) is apparently kaput after having his noggin pulverized by a pair of plucky survivors, but modern science can do amazing things these days. The mutilated maniac is heroically raced to a hospital and sewn back together by the finest surgeons money can buy and so embarks on a three-month convalescence. See, it turns out Chromeskull can afford top-drawer health care—he’s friggin’ rich, the CEO of his own shadow corporation. Like any successful man, he’s got disgruntled employees and ambitious rivals, or in this case both, in the person of his right-hand flunky Preston, played with gonzo panache by 90210‘s Brian Austin Green! While the boss gets his head back together, Preston entertains ideas of moving up in the company. Naturally, another woman is methodically stalked and many people are gutted, carved, and filleted in excruciating detail. A big round of applause should be directed to the special makeup effects team of Cris Alex and Joe Badiali, who seem to be cut from the same gruesome cloth as the master himself, Tom Savini. Laid To Rest 2 is a rockin’ righteous bloodbath. The kills are teeth-gritting in their unfettered savagery, as "Chromeskull" is clearly a man(?) who loves his work and has a near fetishistic reverence for his tools—which should serve as inspiration to his ungrateful underlings. Seeing the boss working the line and getting his hands dirty is an increasingly rare thing in corporate America.

OK, this bad boy rocks. If you haven’t seen anything worth inviting into your Netflix queue lately, "Frankenstein’s Army" is a brilliant remedy. What we have here is a disturbing Weird War tale with steampunk accoutrements fitted into a “found-footage” frame, with a visual aesthetic that’s bold and nightmarishly distinctive. In the waning days of World War II, Russian troops are streaming into Germany, wreaking havoc along the way. One such unit is accompanied by Captain Dimitri (Alexander Mercury), a cameraman making a documentary about these “heroic” soldiers. While holed up in a bombed-out village, the group discovers a church converted into a mad scientist’s lab and are soon set upon by the most outré pack of Nazi zombie-robot-monsters I’ve ever seen. Frankenstein’s Army is a Czech/US/Netherlands co-production filmed in the Czech Republic, which perhaps goes a long way toward explaining its unique appeal. A hearty shake of my flippers goes to director and story man Richard Raaphorst, who hits a horror home run his first time at bat. Admittedly, the lengths needed to preserve the found-footage premise become increasingly (and purposely, I think) absurd as a 70-year-old Soviet movie camera is able to capture pristine audio while getting tossed around like a Samsung at a frat party. But Raaphorst is a filmmaker with vision: his nimble mind invents extraordinary beings, and like Dr. Frankenstein (Karl Roden), he has the ability to bring them to life. He’s clearly not just another fawning acolyte of Sam Raimi or Tim Burton—if anything, his work reminds me of England’s once-reigning madman, Ken Russell. Take it from me, Frankenstein’s Army is some very fresh hell, indeed. Highly recommended.

What we have here is a very nifty flick that can be thoroughly enjoyed by any and all genders and temperaments. Much like A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night, Let the Right One In, or Near Dark, Spring is a deliciously dread romance, as a nice-boy protagonist gets sucked into a dangerous new friendship. Co-director and writer Justin Benson borrows a page or two from Richard Linklater’s Before Sunrise and creates an oddly pleasing hybrid; a convincing creature feature about love and acceptance, that is rendered exquisitely. After his mom conveniently kicks the bucket, Evan (Lou Taylor Pucci) decides to ditch his hayseed hometown and take a trip to Italy. His “aw shucks” demeanor and corn-fed gusto prove irresistible to lovely research student Louise (Nadia Hilker), and before you know it, charming and witty dialogue gives way to a crisp series of scenic seduction sequences. A whirlwind fling in a picturesque Italian coastal town ensues, and the star-crossed couple demonstrates palpable chemistry. Even so, there’s something a little odd about Louise. Is she a junky? Does she have a mysterious medical condition? Where did her pet rabbits go? It certainly helps that Spring gets high-caliber performances from Pucci and Hilker, as a likable couple we have no trouble rooting for. Evan and Louise seem to be having as grand a time as we are. The whole thing is almost entirely too delightful, an extremely volatile ingredient when it comes to the horror movie. But this time it works.

Two words: Deceptively simple. On the surface, writer-director Roxanne Benjamin’s "Body At Brighton Rock" is about a novice national park employee (Karina Fontes) who discovers a corpse on a remote hiking trail. Benjamin vaults from this premise into a a vast, confusing wilderness where predators lurk behind every tree, and a tenderfoot’s training is put to the test. We quickly learn that part-time park guide Wendy (Fontes) isn’t the most motivated employee, after she shows up late (again) for the daily assignment posting. Wendy’s friends waste no time in reminding her that she’s more of an “indoor” type and not really suited to the more rugged demands of national park stewardship. Shamed by her coworkers’ low opinion, Wendy swaps duties with her pal Maya (Emily Althaus), and sets out on a lengthy hike to post new seasonal signs all the way up a distant peak. As it turns out, Wendy’s posse is very perceptive. The neophyte ranger loses her map and ends up in the middle of nowhere with a dead cell phone and a walkie-talkie that looks like it came out of a cereal box. Let’s add one dead body, a vaguely menacing stranger (Casey Adams), and claw marks on tree bark to ensure young Wendy spends a sleepless night jumping at every snapped twig. Body At Brighton Rock looks and sounds like a survival situation, and it is. But Benjamin intuitively pushes a number of buttons that ramp up the tension to include Wendy’s understandable self-doubts about her ability to handle some very intense circumstances. The movie also works as an engrossing coming-of-age vision quest with a bit of Hitchcock’s The Trouble With Harry thrown in for good measure. Deceptively simple, highly recommended.

Move over, Pennywise. There’s a new clown in town, one without pity or dialogue. Ladies and gentlemen, Art the Clown (David Howard Thornton). There’s little setup necessary in Terrifier. It’s Halloween. There’s a killer clown at large. What else do you need? After a night of fending off creeps, Tara (Jenna Kanell) and Dawn (Catherine Corcoran), a couple of pickled party girls, stop off for a slice of pizza in the hopes that one of them will eventually be sober enough to drive home. While perusing the menu, they are in turn perused by the next customer, a plainly fiendish harlequin, who says nary a word. Incapable of miming his toppings, the clown gets 86’d by the brusque owner of the establishment (Gino Caferelli). And thus the fuse is lit and the carnage cannon can commence firing. Art the Clown kills people because he thinks it’s funny, explains a character identified as Cat Lady. “But it’s not funny, because people die,” she concludes. Talk about a weird sense of humor. Art the Clown doesn’t merely murder his victims, he creates gory performance art installations. He chases victims atop a wee tricycle with a little beeping horn. He stomps one guy’s head like a pumpkin (big shoes!), and removes another head to make a jack-o-lantern. For his big-finish showstopper, Art non-magically saws a woman in half. Even when he prosaically resorts to using a gun, it’s not for the sake of efficiency, but because he likes to make holes in people’s faces. Terrifier is an absurdly gruesome and bloody spectacle, and writer-director Damien Leone leaves no jugular unsevered, layering one darkly delicious death on top of another like an evil cake boss. The silently menacing clown, a sinister cross of Harpo Marx and Pagliacci, is indeed terrifying. Actor David Howard Thornton demonstrates an impressive range of skills, including dexterity and marvelous comic timing. Only it isn’t funny because people die. Fortunately, they do pass in entertaining fashion.