You all know I’m a chicken. Big, big-time chicken. I don’t do scary movies. I don’t do ’em. I have a preference for my urine to be either in my bladder or in a toilet, not spreading down the leg of my pants.
I made an exception for this film, however, because I thought: 14 minutes. I can survive anything for 14 minutes. I can even manage my bodily functions for 14 minutes! But about 7 minutes in, I wasn’t quite as confident. Not that the scariness starts at minute 7. It starts from minute 1, in that creepy-crawly, suspenseful, bad feelings running down my spine sort of way. But I held on, guys. Me and my Fresca, we held on.
And you know what I encountered? I’m not sure if I should say. I don’t want to ruin the ending. Although I do want to warn the 99% of you who will find this BEYOND FUCKING DARK. So let’s play charades. The kind of charades where you can’t see me. But if you must picture me: my hair is perfectly coiffed and 
not at all a week overdue for a haircut, and my chubby little knees are definitely demurely covered by my yellow floral dress and not exposed because my dress is somehow bunched up around my hips AGAIN. Now I also need you to picture The Worst Thing Ever. Not the worst thing in a horror movie. It’s not chainsaws for hands or a chain-letter that kills your favourite aunt. It’s the Worst Thing Ever. The kind of thing that, when you go to prison for it, all the other prisoners think you’re a disgusting lowlife. Stealing your Grandma’s welfare cheques? Understandable. Dismembering your wife? The dirty whore deserved it. But this? This is bad. So now imagine that this Thing turns you into a monster. Literally. Like, not just morally a monster, but actually a monster.
Yeah, it’s a little “taboo.” Unsettling? Oh, maybe a bit. Crawling with jarring, sickening imagery that will scar your brain and refuse to leave it? Um, check. But it’s well-done, the practical effects are on-point, the make-up is top notch, the score is chilling, the cast is extremely well-chosen. I can’t criticize any part of this movie making. But man: its contents really zapped me. It’s gruesome, it’s shocking, and it makes you feel like a dirty, dirty voyeur.
watch 2 shit movies called X-Men Apocalypse and whatever Divergent one is most recent. And across the lawn, in my peripheral vision, the French screen was playing Neighbours 2. Only I didn’t know what they were playing, I just knew that I’d just seen some chick throw up on some dude’s face (I generously warned Sean not to look). Since I’d already survived what had to have been the worst scene in the movie, I figured, why not give the rest a gander.
social media-fixated, instagram-obsessed, teenaged millennials who don’t know anything about the world yet. So the old folks are doing what parents do best: stopping young people from having fun.
Dear god. Is this the cutest kid in the whole wide world? Little Eddie has Olympic-sized dreams. He’s not much of an athlete but he’s always a-training. He’s got a tin to hold all his medals but so far all it holds are the glasses he breaks while working out (did I mention he’s not much of an athlete?).
screen he’s incredibly likeable and his optimism is incurable and catching. If optimism was VD, he’d be positively syphilitic. But his country’s not behind him. Heck, even his coach is reluctant at best, and a bit of a drunk (hello, Hugh Jackman!). Meanwhile, Taron Egerton as Eddie is nearly unrecognizable but instantly warms you to the role.
boating, and beers of course. But if you’re looking for a place to sit down and cool off for a bit between festivities, why not hit up your local movie theatre. The Legend of Tarzan and The BFG are sliding into theatres for your family’s entertainment, but if you’re looking for something with a little more intrigue, try these oldies but goodies on for size:
idyllic hometown after his father falls ill. But then something weird happens, because this is a David Lynch movie: he finds a severed ear. And that sets of an even weirder series of events in which he hovers between hero and villain. Laura Dern plays the girl next door, Isabella Rossellini the tempting chanteuse, and Dennis Hopper a downright psychotic. Kyle McLachlan, as innocent as he first appears, might just be the biggest pervert of all, but that’s for you to find out.
Carrie might just be a feminist horror film. Little Sissy Spacek is a shy teenaged girl who suffers cruel mortification when the ill-timed arrival of her period inspires an intensely cruel prank. Turns out, Carrie’s not just troubled, she’d telekinetic, and her classmates have just unleashed a MAJOR shit storm. It’s not just a must-watch but a must-re-watch. It’s still thrilling and frightening to this day.
Band gave their farewell concert in 1976, at Winterland in San Francisco. Lots of famous acts showed up to bid them adieu. This film is not only a documentary of that historic evening, but also a commentary on the rock world at the time. There’s tonnes of footage of The Band and their guest performers, but peppered throughout are interviews with members of the group, who thoughtfully assess their place among the gods of rock and roll.
Red (Jason Sudeikis), Chuck (Josh Gad), and Bomb (Danny McBride) only get angrier when a ship of green pigs sails out of nowhere (“But there’s no other place besides here!”) and start encouraging them to adopt pig ways. They introduce things like trampolines, slingshots, and helium gas, and I thought – these are the dumbest gifts. Birds don’t need to be hurled about, they already fly!
out in 2009, and hopefully most kids aren’t already carrying smartphones in their pockets. I know it had a hard time keeping my attention, and I have the attention span of a 3 year old (so: no). But it’s energetic and filled with primary colours, which might impress the 4-year olds but is beneath the 8 year olds. And it’s got some great one-liners that even I could appreciate, and a few sight gags that made not completely resent the film. It’s rated PG for “rude humor and action” and yes, there’s some rude humour. How do you feel about pelvic thrusts combined with sexual innuendo (I know, I know – is there any other kind). But what stopped me in my tracks was that one bird says “Shut up.” Shut up was a VERY bad word in my house, growing up. VERY bad. Awful. Huge trouble. Then again, so was vagina, so that shit’s messed up (is this just me? What was off-limits in your house?).
strained. There are whiffs of resentment. Luckily Jonathan has his father’s beautiful young nurse (Julia Koschitz) to distract him, but as the film lurches shakily through its middle third, Jonathan realizes that time is running out for his father and if the family secrets are to be unlocked, it’s now or never.
can imagine, replacing Frank’s caregiver proves to be a Challenge with a capital C. Super awkward solution: bring foul-mouthed, 59 year old Frank on a road trip with a trio of recent high school grads. It’s the perfect plan to allow Laura to continue to suppress her grief, undermine Frank’s independence, and completely ruin what was supposed to be a fun and carefree vacation. Everyone’s thrilled.
blockbuster-caliber acting. Brown deserves props but the young actresses (Rachel DiPillo, Hayley Kiyoko, Mary Kate Wiles) surprisingly don’t suck. Does that sound cynical? Well, I am. So when I come across fresh talent that actually IS talent, I’m chuffed. First-time feature director Dale Peterson is a little heavy-handed at times but otherwise keeps the actors’ chemistry in focus and lets the movie do its thing. And for a little icing on this cupcake of a film: the soundtrack is solid. Really solid.
She takes a little dating advice from a millennial and suddenly she’s adopted by a whole crowd of hipsters who fail to recognize that her “retro chic” look isn’t exactly ironic.
screen, from the very first minute to the last.
The brilliance of this film is that it makes you question what you would do, and it challenges our notions of propriety.
and Jasmine know a dark secret and are steering things to play sleuth. Billie (Jasika Nicole) and Jordan (Brianna Baker) know that something’s up but the note is the furthest thing from their minds. They’re just trying to navigate this incredibly uncomfortable encounter – and we’ve got front row seats!
ASSHOLES WATCHING MOVIES 