Author: Jean Jentilet
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April Fool’s Day (1986)
Managing to satirize the dime-a-dozen slashers of the 1980s while executing a perfect rug-pull, April Fool‘s Day remains impressive after forty years. Its succeeds both on its surface level presentation and as a meta commentary, albeit with better production values than most of the films it lovingly sends up. Maybe its best feature is a…
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Together (2025)
A meditation on co-dependency, adulting, and how the consequences of bad life choices can sneak up on you. Great body horror moments and stellar performances are the rising tide that lifts the boat of a predictable story and the ham-fisted wielding of tropes in the tradition of every movie that thinks it transcends the genre.…
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Valentine (2001)
An old-school slasher beats at the heart of this post-Scream time capsule, with its stacked cast and a clear sense of purpose. Sly references make Valentine a comfort film for anyone who gets it. Our discussion: Youtube Acast
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My Bloody Valentine 3D (2009)
A soulless reimagining of the 1981 classic. Not without its fun moments, watching a movie like this and thinking about all the other movies in the genre around it at the time, there is just one question: Why? Our discussion: Acast Youtube
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My Bloody Valentine (1981)
In a market glutted with formulaic slashers in the wake of the success of “Friday the Thirteenth,” and continuing the special day bloodbath tradition, “My Bloody Valentine” stands out. The genre had not quite reached peak cynicism, and this movie captures the heart (no pun intended, really) and sense of fun that went into post-exploitation,…
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In the Mouth of Madness (1994)
The third and final installment of our discussion of John Carpenter’s Apocalypse Trilogy, complete with iconic bus ride, iconic bike ride, and Charlton Heston, is a visceral descent into insanity, goaded on by the Elder Gods. Lovecraftian in every way, the film, for all there is to recommend it, is missing that special brand of…
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Prince of Darkness (1987)
In Prince of Darkness, Carpenter successfully integrates the beats of a story that would otherwise comfortably accommodate an expansion of the Cthulhu mythos into a vision of the end of creation painted with the broad strokes of Christian eschatology and extraterrestrial speculation. The result is a dread-heavy piece of existential horror and a profoundly haunting…
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The Thing (1982)
Ennio Morricone’s score and John Carpenter’s best directorial tendencies combine for bleak re-imaging of 1951’s “The Thing from Another World.” The same oppressive hopelessness that pervades this film will be put to work again in “Prince of Darkness” five years later. Our discussion: Youtube Acast