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  • Woken, Traumatika, Ghost Killer, Insidious: The Last Key, and Demon Seed
    2025/11/02
    Fun films this week! We’ll start off with the sorta-sci-fi “Woken” from 2025, then get traumatized by “Traumatika,” also from this year. “Ghost Killer” was released last year in Japan, but it’s also new here recently. “Insidious: The Last Key” from 2018 winds up our coverage of that series (at least until the next one). Lastly, we’ll look back at “Demon Seed” from 1977– does it still hold up?“The Horror Guys Guide to the Horror Films of Christmas” is available now wherever you get your books. Seventy-Five holiday-themed films are included— it’s our biggest book yet!This as well as the latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #49, are on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.comMainstream Films:2025 Woken* Directed by: Alan Friel* Written by: Alan Friel, Rebecca Pollock* Stars: Erin Kellyman, Maxine Peake, Ivanno Jeremiah* Run Time: 1 Hour, 30 Minutes* Trailer: Spoiler-Free Judgment ZoneAnna wakes up pregnant with no memory of where she is or who the people she’s with are. But everything and everyone seems so normal, what could go wrong? Things go slowly until they abruptly don’t, and the tension mounts. It definitely has a science fiction element with low-key simmering horror. We both thought it’s a winner.Spoilery SynopsisAnna runs to the cliff and looks down in a panic. She jumps. Credits roll.Later, she wakes up in a bed with her head bandaged. When she wakes up, there’s a strange woman there who’s taking care of her. “Don’t worry, the baby’s fine,” she says. The woman, Helen, brings in a book with photos of Anna, but Anna doesn’t remember Helen or anything. James comes in and is introduced as Anna’s husband, but she doesn’t remember him. His version of what happened on the top of the cliff differs from what we saw.Helen explains that they’re on an isolated island, and she can help deliver the baby when it comes. Anna meets Peter, Helen’s husband, and he’s a little weird. The group has whole lobsters for dinner, and it’s all pretty revolting to pregnant Anna. She doesn’t know them, so James shows her some videos. Helen and Peter are their neighbors, the only ones on the island.Dr. Henry comes for a visit to examine Anna. He pulls out one of her hairs before examining the baby. It’s due in about two weeks. Anna suggests that a visit to the mainland might help her memory, but James insists they wait until after the baby.Anna sees two people on a swan pedal-boat out on the water. When Helen sees it, she sounds an alarm. When Anna runs to welcome the people, she sees that they’re disfigured and monstrous. Helen shoots both of them, then James burns the bodies and the boats. “You’ve been exposed– We’ve all been exposed” Helen shouts. They all strip and burn their own clothes.James explains that ¾ of the population are dead. You can catch it a whole bunch of ways, and no one knows what started it. They lock her in the bedroom for a quarantine, but they don’t explain much.Some soldiers in hazmat suits come to the house, and James insists that Anna is uninfected. Dr. Henry is with them, and he examines her again. He says that both she and the baby are healthy. He seems excited, but tells her it’s “Nothing for you to worry about.” Clearly, these people still have some secrets.Anna finds the knitting basket, and it’s full of little knitted baby shirts, all identical. Helen and James whisper about Anna when she’s out of the room. She grinds up some pills she was given but didn’t take and puts them into James’s soup, but he’s suspicious and doesn’t eat it.Anna sneaks out in the morning and goes to the part of the island she’s been told not to go to. She passes a “Forbidden” sign and comes to Helen and Peter’s house. Peter complains that Helen’s getting too attached, and this happens to her “every time.” Also, Helen has a small black child that clearly isn’t hers or James’s. And there’s a baby crying– or maybe that’s a goat.Anna sneaks into their house and looks around. She runs into little Joshua, who says she promised to never leave him but did. Helen interrupts and tells her to go back to the cottage. Just as she’s about to get answers, James chloroforms her.Anna wakes up restrained to a table in a lab. James comes in, and he says that’s not his baby inside her, he’s just here to protect her during the pregnancy. He says she doesn’t really want to know what’s going on. Helen and Peter appear to be scientists. “Always a pity to cut you up,” says Peter. Anna gets an arm free and stabs him in the neck with a syringe. Through an accident, Peter shoots himself, and Anna gets off the table.Anna watches videos of her being experimented upon– and dying. She sees computer records of at least 17 past failures where she and the baby died. She opens a machine and sees that they are already working on her...
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    29 分
  • Dracula: A Love Tale, Night of the Reaper, The Velocipastor, Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah, and Santo and the Blue Demon vs Dracula and the Wolf Man
    2025/10/26
    That might be the longest title we’ve ever had. We’ll open on the brand-new “Dracula: A Love Tale,” which redoes Dracula yet again. We’ll then go to “Night of the Reaper,” a twisty slasher film. We’ll finally get around to watching “The Velocipastor” from 2018, and then go back in time to “Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah” from 1991 and “Santo and the Blue Demon vs Dracula and the Wolf Man” from 1973.The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #49, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.comMainstream Films:2025 Dracula: A Love Tale* Directed by: Luc Besson* Written by: Luc Besson, Bram Stoker* Stars: Caleb Landry Jones, Christoph Waltz, Zoe Bleu* Run Time: 2 Hours, 9 Minutes* Trailer: Spoiler-Free Judgment ZoneThis is a big budget production with elaborate costuming, amazing sets, and excellent makeup and special effects. It kept reminding us of 1992’s “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” but even more so. If you’re a fan of Dracula and vampire movies, you really should check this one out. It’s great.Spoilery SynopsisIt’s 1480 AD, and Vlad and Elisabeta are in love, either that or it’s a teenage slumber party, it looks about the same. Soldiers come to the door and need King Vlad to lead them into battle. He reluctantly gets all armored up and goes with them after getting a blessing from the priest. Vlad makes a deal with the priest to watch over Elisabeta while he’s gone. While he goes off to battle, she’s taken across the country to a safe place, but the party is ambushed.Vlad rushes to the rescue, but she dies in his arms; he is not happy. He goes home and blames the priest. This goes badly for the priest– very badly. Vlad renounces God and bad things happen.Four hundred years later, in Paris, Dr. Dumont welcomes the priest to his church. Dumont has a very strange medical case that he needs help with in his mental asylum. He has a woman, Maria, whom he thinks is possessed. She’s got fangs and glowy eyes. She’s a vampire. She’s the first one taken into captivity, but the priest has seen them before. The doctor finds it all a little hard to believe, but it’s obviously true. The church has been looking for the Master for 400 years. She says the Master is coming to Paris to take a princess soon.We cut to Jonathan Harker, who is visiting Count Dracula’s castle. It’s surprisingly nice inside, and Prince Vlad is looking extremely old– but not monstrous. He has a habit of moving things without using his hands, which Jonathan finds very entertaining thinking it’s magic tricks and not realizing it’s real.The priest goes to see Henry Spencer, Maria’s husband. He goes through the woman’s bedroom looking for clues, like a detective. She has a page torn out of the book that Jonathan is reading back in the castle; it’s a drawing of Princess Elisabeta.Meanwhile, in the castle, Jonathan explores the place and finds Dracula’s tomb. He’s attacked by living gargoyles and hung upside down. Vlad explains himself to Jonathan, and we get a flashback to the rest of his origin story. Vlad’s been waiting for Elisabeta to be reincarnated, and it’s been a hard search. He developed a fragrance into a perfume that made all women love him, as well as some of the men from the look of it. There’s a montage of him combining his mind control with the power of the perfume to make rooms full of people in different eras dance to his tune as he searches for her. That didn’t work out so well for him or the entire court of France. He turned them all into servants and sent them out to look for her. Since then, he’s waited in that castle. Jonathan shows Vlad a picture of his own fiance, Mina, and guess who she looks like?Back in Paris, the priest explains the vampire curse to Dr. Dumont. Dumont’s assistant points out that Mina is in the next room. She’s a friend of Maria, and tells the story of what happened to her. She admits that she’s engaged to Jonathan, but also that she feels like she doesn’t really belong in this time.Meanwhile Dracula gets a bite of food on the road; he drains an entire convent full of nuns. He then travels to Paris, looking much younger now after feasting, and heads straight to the asylum where Maria is held prisoner. He breaks her out and feeds the orderly to her as a reward for her help. The priest and the doctor rush to warn Mina.Along the way, Jonathan makes a difficult escape from the castle.Meanwhile, Maria goes to Mina and says she’s been released from the hospital. They go to a hotel where she meets Dracula. He tags along with them around the carnival like a stalker. It’s all surprisingly romantic, and just maybe it’ll work out for Dracula this time. During their date, she gets repeated flashbacks to her earlier life.When Mina goes home that evening, she finds Jonathan there along with the priest and doctor. The priest explains the facts about ...
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    34 分
  • Forgive Us All, Witchboard 1986 and 2025, Insidious Chapter 3, and Godzilla vs. Biollante
    2025/10/19
    We’ve got another weird mix of old and new this time around. We’ll begin with the new “Forgive Us All,” then discuss “Insidious Chapter 3,” “Godzilla vs. Biollante” and then both the original “Witchboard” (1986) and the brand-new remake from 2025.The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #49, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.comMainstream Films:2025 Forgive Us All* Directed by: Jordana Stott* Written by: Jordana Stott, Lance Giles, Alex Makauskas* Stars: Lily Sullivan, Callan Mulvey, Richard Roxburgh* Run Time: 1 Hour, 33 Minutes* Trailer: Spoiler-Free Judgment ZoneIn a beautiful location in New Zealand, we see a slice of a zombie apocalypse. And we quickly see that living jerks are just as dangerous as the infected in the aftermath. A woman in mourning finds a wounded traveler being pursued, and we gradually piece together what life and politics are like now. Rather than a non-stop action take, this is more of a story that takes its time, focusing on the people trying to survive. We give it a moderate thumbs up.Spoilery SynopsisA woman cries and screams next to a fresh grave. As she carries her pistol back to the house, we see that a struggle took place that resulted in a shooting. She then looks in on her sleeping child, who is also covered in blood and barely breathing. Although it looks like she’s dying, Maddie sits up and looks possessed. Maddie leaps, and we hear a gunshot. Credits roll.Two years later, Rory still wakes up with nightmares over that whole situation. She listens to a radio report that sounds bleak. She passes Otto on the way out, and it’s clear that they live way out in the wilderness.We cut to a rider leaving Camp 13, zooming right past the sign that says, “GMA Quarantine Processing.” Two other horseback riders are right behind him, in pursuit. The man’s partner gets caught instead. They torture him for the first rider’s location, but he dies rather than give it up.Back with Rory, who still grieves about Maddie, she’s considering killing herself, but doesn’t. She finds the horse, who leads her to the unconscious rider. He looks like he’s dying, but she takes his bag, slings him over the saddle, and sets off leading the horse.Meanwhile, Otto finds a bunch of bones that belonged to their neighbor, Henry. The body appears to be mostly eaten. He sees three men, GMA agents, on horseback and hides, but there’s also something screaming in the woods nearby.Rory takes the wounded man home and looks him over before locking him inside the barn. She opens his package and finds medicine inside that says “Take within 72 hours of infection.” When Otto returns, she shows him the still-unconscious stranger. Otto’s not happy. Also there’s a storm coming, “They’ll be out in force tonight.” At dinner, they argue about life in general.That night, she reminisces about Maddie and her drawing of a dragonfly. Her father was off helping the sick people, but Rory doesn’t know much about the virus. Suddenly, Connor, the father, opens the door, and he’s clearly not right. He jumps at them and– Rory wakes up.She goes out to the barn to check on her prisoner, and he’s up and around now. They hear a “Howler” outside and have a quick scuffle. He’s Noah, and she patches up his wounds. Noah broke into the GMA base and stole the antidote for his own sick son. It’s still dark, so if he leaves now, the Howlers will get him. Still, his time to use the antidote on his son is running out.Not far away, the three trackers, Logan, Scout, and Brooks, find Rory’s house and wait to see what happens. Rory and Otto argue about what to do about the sick boy whose time is running out. As they bicker, the GMA agents ride up.Rory and Noah take the horse as Otto stays behind to stall the agents. There’s a gunfight, and Brooks dies, as does Otto. Logan is injured, but he’ll live. Scout tells Logan she’s not going with him; she doesn’t want to be a part of this anymore, so Logan goes on alone after Noah and Rory.Rory continues on alone as Noah and Logan brawl without their horses or guns. After much back and forth, Noah shoots Logan, which attracts a group of Howlers which finishes him off as well.Rory continues through the dark forest, now at night, and all the Howlers are out at night. She hides and runs from a group of the nasty infected people. In one of the scuffles, she gets bitten. After that, the infected begin to ignore her; she’s one of them now.In the morning, Rory finally comes to Noah’s house. Did she get there in time to save Noah’s son before the infection is too far gone? She leaves the cure with the old woman who’s watching Noah’s son and walks on back to the river.Rory visualizes Maddie as she puts her pistol to her head and pulls the trigger before the disease gets her.Brian’s CommentaryIt’s a just-barely sci-fi post-zombie-apocalyptic ...
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    29 分
  • Good Boy, The Toxic Avenger, Strange Harvest, Borley Rectory: The Awakening, and Lost Contact: UFOs After Wartime
    2025/10/12
    All five of our films this week are new releases:We’ll open on a nice dog story; really, he’s a “Good Boy.” A not-so-good-boy is the star of “The Toxic Avenger.” We’ll go back in time and watch the prequel, “Borley Rectory: The Awakening.” Then we’ll watch a couple of documentaries, one real, “Lost Contact: UFOs After Wartime” and one not-so-real “Strange Harvest.”Spoiler: We liked them all!* The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #49, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.comMainstream Films:2025 Good Boy* Directed by: Ben Leonberg* Written by: Alex Cannon, Ben Leonberg* Stars: Indy, Shane Jensen, Arielle Friedman* Run Time: 1 Hour, 12 Minutes* Trailer: Spoiler-Free Judgment ZoneThe main character of the movie is a dog, with everything slanted toward his point of view, which is interesting. His master, Todd, is afflicted with both a terminal illness and dark forces that are working against him. Both things that seem to have been impacting his family for quite a while. But he’s got Indy by his side. It’s unique, which helps it out a lot, but it’s actually pretty slow moving on a low simmer. We both thought it was pretty good.Spoilery SynopsisIndy the dog protects the house at night; he hears strange sounds that concern him. The phone keeps ringing, and it turns out that Todd is having some kind of seizure. His sister, Vera, comes in and calls 911. Credits roll.We watch old footage of Indy being a puppy and growing up with Todd and his family. Todd’s got a lot of health problems, and Indy is a big help.Todd and Vera argue about him going to stay at Grandpa’s house; neither Vera nor Indy think that’s a good idea. The house is very remote in the country. When they arrive, Indy really doesn’t want to get out of the car. The place is a mess, but Todd says it beats the hospital.Todd calls Vera, and they talk. Grandpa used to have a bunch of dogs, but they kept all running away. As he watches old home videos of grandpa, Vera points out that no one has lived in that house for more than a few weeks; she says it’s haunted. Meanwhile, Indy checks out shadows that he doesn’t like. Indy explores the old house, but he doesn’t find anything.The next morning, Todd and Indy go for a walk in the woods. They stop at the family cemetery, and Todd points out that most of them died pretty young. They run into a neighbor, and he mentions traps and snares all over the woods. The neighbor mentions how strange the area is, too. Todd, on the other hand, thinks it’s nice and peaceful.Vera, still on the phone, mentions that dogs can detect all sorts of things that people can’t, so he should be keeping an eye on Indy for signs of trouble. The next day, Todd goes off and leaves Indy at home, and Indy is not pleased. Indy spots another dog in the house and follows it, but all he finds is the dog’s bandana– and a vision of something nasty that “got” the other dog. Todd comes home, unwell; he’s been at the hospital again.Indy has nightmares that night. He wakes up and patrols the house, hearing and seeing things that shouldn’t be there. He watches as Todd goes to the kitchen and bangs his head on a door repeatedly– sleepwalking? There appears to be some kind of black ghost or monster that’s creeping around the place.Todd gets sicker, and the doctor says he doesn’t qualify for her clinical trials. The neighbor, Richard, warns him again about his fox traps. As Todd obliviously works on his Feng Shui, Indy watches all sorts of horrors going on in the next room and especially in the basement.One night, Todd collapses and a door shuts Indy in the next room. Indy notices the window is open and jumps down to get outside. Indy runs through the woods toward Richard’s house to get help but gets caught in a snare instead. The next thing we know, Todd is chaining up Indy outside in the rain. The monster terrorizes Indy, who can’t escape because of the chains. Indy does eventually break loose, and then he finds the skeletal remains of Bandit, Grandpa’s last dog.Inside the house, Todd gets a scare of his own until Indy comes in and comforts him. The monster then grabs Todd and drags him to the basement, but Indy knows another way in. “You’re a good dog, but you can’t save me,” Todd says as he turns into a skeleton.In the morning, we see that Todd has died in his bed. Vera comes to the house and finds Bandit’s bones in the cellar while letting Indy outside. Indy goes off to live with Vera.He was a good boy!Brian’s CommentaryAll Grandpa’s dogs ran off… we see why.It’s told from Indy’s point of view, which is interesting and unique. Dogs do sense things that humans can’t, and this film makes heavy use of that fact. Indy the dog gets top billing here, primarily because we don’t see any shots of the character’s faces through the majority of the film.It’s actually ...
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    33 分
  • Scurry, Brute 1976, Lavalantula, Diary and Survival of the Dead
    2025/10/05
    Two new releases this week, along with some fun catch-up films.We’ll start off with the brand-new underground tunnel-chase, “Scurry” and then go out to the retro-desert in “Brute 1976.” We’ll take a walk on the silly side with “Lavalantula” from 2015, and then finish off the George Romero zombie series with the final two of his films: “Diary of the Dead” 2007 and “Survival of the Dead” (2010).A bunch of winners this week!* The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #48, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.comMainstream Films:2025 Scurry* Directed by: Luke Sparke* Written by: Tom Evans* Stars: Jamie Costa, Emalia, Peter O’Hanlon* Run Time: 1 Hour, 30 Minutes* Trailer: Spoiler-Free Judgment ZoneA claustrophobic view of a big disaster event has us following a couple of survivors as they work their way out of an underground obstacle course of collapsed buildings and streets. And is there more going on than just a local earthquake or something? Just how bad could it be? We travel along with them to find out. There are some hints given in the opening seconds.Spoilery SynopsisWe see some kind of apocalyptic disaster happening from out a skyrise window. There are alarms sounding. People are running and screaming. Then we hear growling noises from down the hall and one running woman dies in a wet splatter against the wall. Maybe we aren’t at the top of the food chain any more. We fly over the city, and there is a big blackened pit that is surrounded by burnt out emergency vehicles, and it pans down to a dead man laying there and no, he’s not dead. He wakes up. He’s trapped under a chunk of rubble. He pulls out his cell but can’t get through to anyone. He finally thinks to use his phone as a flashlight and looks around. He finally gets through to his wife’s voicemail and explains what happened from his point of view. He levers himself free..Mark hears a chopper flying over, which is hopeful, but then it crashes right next to the hole he’s in. The hole collapses behind him, trapping him in an underground tunnel. He pulls out a piece of glass that impaled him, but he’s not bleeding too badly.It takes a while for Mark to get his bearings, and he hears rocks falling all over the place. He finds a woman’s purse and digs through it for anything to use. He finds a video camera with an infra-red feature, which is useful.He gets a jump scare when the woman who owns the purse shows up. She’s Sarah. There’s a rock slide or something, and she soon vanishes. No, she’s hiding, “Shhhh. They’ll hear us.” He sets her dislocated bone, but she says everyone up above is dead, no one is coming for them. She’s very paranoid that he’s going to leave her alone. They talk about their kids, but she seems to know a lot more about what’s going on than he does. She’s not really Sarah; that was a stolen purse. Then she pulls a gun on him. And things get complicated.As they argue over who gets to hold the lighter, something growls nearby. “They’ve found us.” Mark uses the infra-red camera but doesn’t see what it is. They run for a while but eventually, Mark gets a glimpse of the creature behind them with the camera. She notices that she’s lost her pills and wants to go back, but he says that’s stupid; this leads to her pulling the gun again. He has to go back for her pills and notices that the creature seems to be stuck in place, so he’s OK for now.Mark wants to know what she knows about the creatures. They killed her sister, dragging her right out of the car. He explains that he was just crossing the street and fell into what he thought was an earthquake sinkhole. “Nothing can survive up there,” she says. He doubts that everyone is dead. They continue to crawl through the tunnel until they see a light; it’s not an exit, it’s just a flashlight someone dropped. They find the flashlight’s owner, dead, and go through his stuff. Turns out, he’s not dead, but when he starts to scream, one of the creatures eats him.Now Mark believes in monsters. They argue over her hard-as-nail attitude since she still doesn’t trust him. As they argue, one of the spiderlike monsters spears Mark and pulls him away. Is this creature an alien, or was it always down here? We don’t know, but the woman’s story makes it sound like they came from space. She continues on, crawling through the tunnel until she catches up to Mark who is lying there; somehow, he killed it with his knife– he’s got to be some kind of marine or special forces.Mark then explains his sad life story. He drunkenly started a house fire that nearly killed his son. He left the family after that, and now he feels he still can’t protect them. She gives him advice, and now they’re friends.After an incredibly long time, they come to a room where they can stand up, and it’s full of bodies. They can hear shooting and bad ...
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    29 分
  • Weapons, In Vitro, The Drowned, Coyotes, and The Return of Godzilla
    2025/09/28
    Four new releases this week, it must be getting closer to Halloween!We’ll start off with the much-discussed “Weapons” and then watch some even-newer releases: “Coyotes,” “The Drowned,” and “In Vitro,” which were all fun. Lastly, we’ll continue our ongoing kaiju coverage with 1984’s “The Return of Godzilla.”A bunch of winners this week!* The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #48, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.comMainstream Films:2025 Weapons* Directed by: Zach Cregger* Written by: Zach Cregger* Stars: Julia Garner, Josh Brolin, Alden Ehrenreich* Run Time: 2 Hours, 8 Minutes* Trailer: Spoiler-Free Judgment ZoneWe start right out setting the mystery of how a classroom full of kids all ran out of their houses at 2:17 in the morning one night and disappeared. Except for one kid. Then the movie is spent going over the aftermath from different points of view of the people involved, and we get to solve the mystery together. It’s long but we were never bored. Okay, Kevin was a little impatient for the first half hour or so. But overall we liked it a lot and would recommend it. And we also recommend you go into it as blind as you can.Spoilery SynopsisWe’re told that this is a true story, but there was a coverup to hide the truth. We open on a third-grade and a new teacher, Justine. Not one of her kids has come to school, but all the other classes are perfectly normal. Wait, a boy named Alex did show up. Every other kid woke up the previous night at 2:17 a.m., walked outside, and vanished at a run into the night. They never came back. We watch a flashback as the kids go running outside late at night. Credits roll.JustineThe police interrogate little Alex and Justine, who know nothing. Eventually, they had to reopen the school after a month. First, they have a big meeting to deal with grief counseling over the seventeen missing children. They want to hear from Justine, who seems to be at the center of all this. What did she do? The crowd gets nasty, and the meeting is soon over. They blame her.On the way home, Justine starts getting death threats on her phone. She finds her car painted with “Witch” on the side in the morning. The school principal, Mr. Marcus, tells her that she can’t work there anymore. She wants to talk to Alex, but she’s not allowed.Justine meets policeman Paul at a bar later, and she tells him her problems. He says that she’s always been a little paranoid, and now she’s drinking too much. He is reluctant to drink, but we flash forward to the next morning with him waking up hung over in Justine’s bed. She drives him to his car, still at the bar.Justine goes to see Alex, which she has been forbidden to do. There are newspapers over all the windows at his house. She peeks in and sees something weird. She’s later attacked by Donna, Paul’s wife, who is justifiably angry. At home that night, she starts seeing things.She “stakes out” Alex’s house, gets drunk, and passes out. Someone sneaks into the car and snips off some of her hair.ArcherWe cut to Archer, who watches doorbell security video of his son running off into the darkness that night last month. He goes to work, and he’s been messing up lately. He’s been pestering the chief of police to the point of being annoying. He still thinks Justine is behind all this, but the chief doesn’t believe she’s involved. We see that he’s got red paint in the back of his truck, the same color as “WITCH” painted on the side of Justine’s car.Archer has a dream where he sees Matthew, his son, running off to a house with a giant gun flying overhead. He goes inside and talks to his sleeping son. The light comes on, and the dream gets weird.In the morning, Archer takes the information from his dream and checks out a nearby radio tower. He gets with some other parents and looks at their video footage. He confronts Justine, but in the middle of their conversation, she’s attacked by Mr. Marcus, the principal, who has gone utterly berserk.PaulWe cut back a few days, as Paul sees someone suspicious running down the street, this results in a chase. He catches James, whom he knocks out. He realizes the camera is on and lets the guy go so there’s no report. The chief is somewhat supportive, so long as James stays quiet.This is when he gets a text from Justine and meets her at the bar. He falls right off the wagon. He goes home hung over and runs into Donna, who later attacks Justine in a jealous rage. He later sees James again and chases him.JamesJames is an addict who can’t get his pipe to light because he’s run dry. He breaks into a car and steals an iPad. The pawnbroker doesn’t want it. He’s trying to break into a store when Paul spots and beats him the first time.James walks through the rain to Alex’s house and gets in through an upstairs window. He goes all through the house, looking for ...
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    36 分
  • The Man in the White Van, The Jester 2, Monster Island, Land of the Dead, and the Ghastly Love of Johnny X
    2025/09/22
    Three new movies this week, but a pair of classics to go along with it:“The Jester 2,” “The Man in the White Van,” and “Monster Island” are all out fresh this month, but “The Ghastly Love of Johnny X” (2012) and “Land of the Dead” (2005) are from a decade or two ago.* The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #48, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.comMainstream Films:2025 The Jester 2* Directed by: Colin KrawChuk* Written by: Colin KrawChuk* Stars: Michael Sheffield, Kaitlyn Trentham,* Run Time: 1 Hour, 27 Minutes* Trailer: Spoiler-Free Judgment ZoneThe Jester is back, killing people like a magician and entertainer again, with a bit of a different look. There’s much more explanation in this sequel than the first movie, and we both thought that was a step in the right direction. We liked this one better than the first Jester.Spoilery SynopsisIt’s a big Halloween party, and the guys mock each other for being afraid to talk to Ava. He goes over to her, but she’s more interested in Connor. That goes badly for Eric but suddenly, The Jester appears by crawling out of a box. He then peels his mask off like he’s molting, and we see that he’s got hair now and his face itself looks like the mask. The Jester makes Eric be the pinata, and that’s a mess. Credits roll.Max and Zoe talk about going out trick or treating, but mom says Max is getting a little too old for this stuff. Meanwhile, the Jester asks a guy on the street to pick a card, and then handcuffs him before ripping out his innards with a card trick.Max goes to a restaurant alone, and the jerky waiter recognizes her from school. The girls at the next table mock her, but then the Jester sits down across from Max, and at least he’s nice to her. He tries to do a trick with his cards, but she shows him card tricks aren’t going to fool her. When the guy she likes punctures her bicycle tire, she stops and cries.A trio of troublemakers are out pranking, and they run up against the Jester, who does his thing for them– except his magic no longer works. Instead, he just kills them the old-fashioned way- he attacks them with a knife. He’s lost his mojo and soon figures out that Max has it.Max goes to the magic shop and tells her friend there about her social problems. He’s really nice and cheers her up. When she leaves, the Jester is waiting for her. As she watches, he walks over to the mean group from earlier and “pantses” the guy, much to his embarrassment. Jester invites Max to go trick or treating with him.At the first house, Max does a magic trick for the woman inside, but then the Jester does a trick and kills the woman; his magic is back on again. Max runs away, terrified. They come across the remains of the party from the opening sequence, and Max shows him the Ouija board, which he can use to “talk” to her. He’s not going to kill her, he needs her. “You are just like me.” He says he’s a misunderstood entertainer until he met the Great Deceiver, who made him a deal. “I must trick four souls each Hallow’s Eve before a candle burns out.” Since she tricked him, that opens up a whole new rulebook; she has to do the tricks now.Max picks out one guy in the park; it’s the guy who was mean to her earlier. He’s pretty easy to hate, so she shows him a trick. He apologizes during the trick, but it’s too late by then, and the Jester takes over.Some police come over to question Max and the Jester, but suddenly, Max can’t speak either. Turns out, Max has called 911 on her phone. The police try to arrest the Jester, but that doesn’t go well for them.Max runs away and encounters a man on the street who offers to drive her to the police station. They hear about the previous deaths on the radio, but the guy in the car is very weird, weird in a pedophile kind of way. The Jester reappears and solves Max’s problem.Max has an asthma attack, so the Jester takes her to the fire station for help. The Jester then plays hide and seek with the firemen in the fire station. Max refuses to help him any further and goes home.Max’s mother is there waiting for her, and she’s surprisingly mean. She finds the Jester in her sister Zoe’s room; he’s already killed the mother, and now he wants Zoe too. He still needs her to do one more trick for a victim.Max chooses Darren, the waiter from earlier. When he gets off work, Max and the Jester are outside waiting for him. She pulls out her deck of cards and has second thoughts halfway through it. Turns out, she’s sleight-of-handed the Jester himself and performs a trick on him. Suddenly, his candle goes out and he bursts into flames.The magic shop owner shows up to help Max and Zoe. The police have the whole area covered. He finds that Max has taken the Jester’s hat, and she keeps babbling about “four tricks– four souls. Every year.” Sounds like it’s time for a yearly ...
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    27 分
  • Somnium, Dirty Boy, Site, Curse of Chucky, and The Jester
    2025/09/14
    Three new movies this week, but a pair of classics to go along with it:“Somnium,” “Dirty Boy,” and “Site” from this year. “The Jester” from 2023 is up next, followed by “Curse of Chucky” to complete that series, we already watched all the others. .* The latest issue of “Horror Monthly,” issue #48, is on sale now! Check out all the back issues, as well as our other books, with one easy link: https://horrormonthly.comMainstream Films:2024 Somnium* Directed by: Racheal Cain* Written by: Racheal Cain* Stars: Chloe Levine, Jonathan Schaech, Will Peltz* Run Time: 1 Hour, 32 Minutes* Trailer: Spoiler-Free Judgment ZoneA struggling actress takes a night job watching over a bunch of people who have signed up for Somnium, a facility where they are put to sleep for weeks and kept in a continuous dream state while being hypnotized into an improved mental state. Is it just stress and lack of sleep that’s causing Gemma to struggle with life or is something more ominous at work? We wondered and so will you. This was very good, entertaining and pulling us along while leaving a lot open to interpretation.Spoilery SynopsisGemma has moved to a new city; she wants to be an actress. She goes to the talent agencies and auditions. She eventually goes to a place called “Somnium” who is hiring. Gemma doesn’t have much experience in anything useful, but Dr. Shaffer explains that it’s not a hard job, but it’s been hard to find anyone who stays very long. She’s essentially a “sleep sitter,” watching over sleeping patients in the facility.We flash back to Gemma and Hunter talking about what they want to do with their lives. She wants to be an actress, he wants to be a touring musician. He knows he’s not really going to do that and sketches her a picture of the house he’d like to build someday.On her first night at Somnium, Gemma learns about the “Science of Winning” and sees the sleep pods with people inside. The machine plays pictures and sounds into these peoples’ dreams. It’s a way to “program” new personal truths into people. It’s a quiet job, making sure nothing happens all night.Gemma’s not comfortable inside her own apartment, hearing and seeing things that aren’t there. She clearly misses her life back in Georgia. She runs into Brooks, a creepy guy who probably wants something bad for her. Noah, at work, shows her how he programs people for their careers. He takes a photo of Gemma and puts it in some guy’s dream, teasing her that if he left it in the guy’s dream he would wake up infatuated with her without knowing why.At an audition, Gemma does great, but the casting people aren’t excited. That night at Somnium, she sees some kind of monster in one of the patient rooms, but, of course, there’s nothing really there. At home, she hears that back home, Hunter has found a new girlfriend. Depressed, she calls Brooks, who offers to show her around town. He is strange, but he’s clearly rich and connected and seems interested in helping her.Time passes, and Gemma does more auditions. At night, she learns more about Somnium and reads all the brochures. She learns from Noah and Olivia about “Cloud 9” an emergency procedure where mental patients get programmed to straighten out their lives in just a few short hours. “No one comes back the same.” Olivia thinks the process is terrible, but Noah says it’s better than the alternative.Gemma runs into Noah working late one night; he’s doing something sketchy. Brooks invites her to a party Friday night, but she can’t get off work. As she starts to mess with the security footage logs to cover her sneaking out, she sees what Noah’s been up to late at night. She then sneaks off to party with Brooks and his friends. She meets Dakota, another actress, and she’s not having any luck getting parts. Max, a huge star, talks to Gemma about Somnium; she’s a former customer, and it made her successful.Gemma finds that she’s being evicted. She also gets caught sneaking out of Somnium. At night, sometimes she sees monsters in her apartment. Brooks comes by, and he’s worried about her. He implies that he’s disappointed with her and tries giving her advice. We get more flashbacks to her time with Hunter as she gets more and more depressed. She finds a shadowy man in her apartment who injects her with something.We get glimpses of Noah at Somnium, working on Gemma. “You figured it out a lot faster than the last dream sitter.” He’s put her in the Cloud 9 program, and she’s being re-programmed. She sees herself inside the Somnium facility, chased by a monster. Suddenly, she’s a guest on “The Latest Show,” being interviewed as a big star. Even in her dream, the interview goes badly. She talks to dream-Hunter, and he’s mean. Eventually, she confronts the monster again, face to face, and it vanishes.Gemma wakes up in Somnium and gets off the table. Dr. Shaffer, Olivia, and Noah are out there. Gemma ...
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    30 分