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កំណើតអរូប / Ritual: The Black Nun (2023)

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កំណើតអរូប / Ritual: The Black Nun (2023)

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An expat in Cambodia accidentally causes a pregnant woman’s death, leading her husband to curse him and his family. Years later, the curse afflicts his daughter-in-law who must undergo a ritual to give life to the unborn child.

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A vengeful spirit stalks an isolated college, drawn by the school’s grim history of sexual violence and one student’s mysterious ties to the past.

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Amara’s mistake awakens Madame Koi-Koi. Now she and Mr. Mustapha must stop the vengeful spirit before it’s too late.

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Seven years after the death of his wife, widower Shigeharu seeks advice on how to find a new wife from a colleague. Taking advantage of their position as a film company, they stage an audition. Interviewing a series of women, Shigeharu is enchanted by the quiet Asami.

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Den stygge stesøsteren / The Ugly Stepsister (2025)

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Den stygge stesøsteren / The Ugly Stepsister (2025)

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In a fairy-tale kingdom where beauty is a brutal business, Elvira battles to compete with her incredibly beautiful stepsister, and she will go to any length to catch the prince’s eye.

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Accused of the genocide of Mayan people, retired general Enrique is trapped in his mansion by massive protests. Abandoned by his staff, the indignant old man and his family must face the devastating truth of his actions and the growing sense that a wrathful supernatural force is targeting them for his crimes.

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This film felt like a Lisa Frank fever dream except, it was painfully boring....

I'm going to chop this review up by simply saying, this film just wasn't for me. I don't think it was necessarily bad, but holy horseshit was it rough to sit through. The plot isn't so much complex as it is just hard to get into, atleast for me.

If you like fantasy, mystical creature type films with disturbing backstories then this may be a film for you. I knew about 15 minutes in that I was in for a brutal 1 hour and 40 minute purgatory session.

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Rita, a 13 year old girl, runs away from her abusive father to the big city. She finds solace until she's placed in a safe house run by the State. Rita and her cellmates plots an escape that ends in a shocking act of violence.

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The story takes place in the Republic of China and revolves around a shady wedding paper bride in a deep house where a curse that spans ten years unfolds.

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A combination of ‘found footage’ and ‘mockumentary’, Bodrog is a delirium, a visual labyrinth about sacrifices, forgotten legends revived with a shot of brandy and mythological creatures from the depths of Mureș.

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Watched on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHV-UOdBek0

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"Pulgasari" is a 1985 fantasy epic film directed by Shin Sang-ok. At face value it holds some heavy kaiju looking energy, like a makeshift "Godzilla" (1954) which "Pulgasari" holds a very similar candle to in appearance, but as some Kaiju destruction is in this film, it easily takes a backseat to a romanticized, verging on propagandic, fantasy folk telling story in primary energy. Why is that, well because this is a notorious film in history that was a production of North Korea. Birthed in a bizarrely laden tale of strange aspirations circling around the country looking for new ways to gain global revenue and resorting to literal kidnapping to achieve their goal, "Pulgasari" holds more weight in the annals of...

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In feudal Korea, a group of starving villagers grow weary of the orders handed down to them by their controlling king and set out to use a deadly monster under their control to push his armies back.

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地獄の警備員 / The Guard From The Underground (1992)

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地獄の警備員 / The Guard From The Underground (1992)

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A former sumo wrestler, now working as a security guard, goes on a murderous rampage.

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In different parts of Tokyo, four young and seemingly healthy people suddenly die of heart failure at exactly the same moment. Reporter Kazuyuki Asakawa decides to investigate the deaths, and discovers that the four had stayed at a rural inn together just a week earlier. At the inn, he comes across a strange video that ends with a message saying that anyone who watches it will die exactly seven days later. Now the clock is ticking for Asakawa. Can he break the curse in time?

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妖怪百物語 / Yokai Monsters: 100 Monsters (1968)

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妖怪百物語 / Yokai Monsters: 100 Monsters (1968)

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A greedy developer, in league with a corrupt Shrine Magistrate, brutally tries to drive people out of a tenement building and destroy the shrine in back. But he makes the fatal mistake of hosting a 100 Ghost Stories ceremony without the closing cleansing ritual, opening the door for the Yokai Monsters to punish the wicked.

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Yasuko, a housewife, lives in an urban high-rise apartment with her husband Satoru and her son Takuto. Annoyed by spam calls and door-to-door salesmen, Yasuko slams the door on a salesman’s hand when he tries to squeeze a flyer through the apartment’s chained front door. He leaves, but the next day, her nightmare starts.

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While investigating the horrifying death of her boyfriend, Mai Takano learns about a videotape haunted by the spirit of a disturbing girl named Sadako, which kills anyone who watches it exactly one week later. When her boyfriend’s son, Yoichi, starts to develop the same psychic abilities as Sadako, Takano must find a way to keep the boy and herself from becoming the next victims.

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A woman in the midst of an unpleasant divorce moves to an eerie apartment building with her young daughter. The ceiling of their apartment has a dark and active leak.

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Taking its title from an archaic Japanese word meaning “ghost story,” this anthology adapts four folk tales. A penniless samurai marries for money with tragic results. A man stranded in a blizzard is saved by Yuki the Snow Maiden, but his rescue comes at a cost. Blind musician Hoichi is forced to perform for an audience of ghosts. An author relates the story of a samurai who sees another warrior’s reflection in his teacup.

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A mysterious video has been linked to a number of deaths, and when an inquisitive journalist finds the tape and views it herself, she sets in motion a chain of events that puts her own life in danger.

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This rewatch revealed queer subtext which I can't believe I hadn't picked up on previously. The whole "gal-pal" chemistry between the leads is one thing (though that alone merits discussion) but the fact that the house eats "unmarried women" struck me in a new way this time around. That's a euphemism I shouldn't need to explain, though I think it was typically cast at men.

Anyway, it ties into the way that the film casts post-war Japanese conservatism as a monster in itself. These women are consumed and subsumed by the elder generation in the name of a traditional ideal of love. Seeing Gorgeous in the wedding dress -- and the WWII-era attire in the final scene -- seemed so...

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Hoping to find a sense of connection to her late mother, Gorgeous takes a trip to the countryside to visit her aunt at their ancestral house. She invites her six friends, Prof, Melody, Mac, Fantasy, Kung Fu, and Sweet, to join her. The girls soon discover that there is more to the old house than meets the eye.

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March Around the World 2024 #6 🇲🇾

In this dark and remote jungle, the children need not fear tigers, for there are none. Only Crocodiles and Lizards live here, although if legend be believed there are other more sinister beings out there. Hunters of hearts, shifting among the shadow of night.

Roh plays to its Malaysian folk horror roots, with crackling fires and moody notes playing to a host of unnerving ghostly machinations that greedily feed on the soul. Darkness and fear, children in harms way, a lone parent caught in the middle of this dread fuelled drudgery.

Typically steady and devoid of urgency, the film lulls its viewer into a trancelike state before releasing its camouflaged payload. Creepy indeed, and a great example of the 'hairs standing up on the back of your neck' style of horror for which this part of the world is renowned.

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Cut off from civilisation, a single mother puts her children on high alert when they bring home a young girl caked in clay. She tells of spirits and spirit hunters, but these are not mere superstitions. As more strangers show up on her doorstep, she quickly finds another reason to fear the forest.

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Four friends ensnared in a village, haunted by a ghost because of their sins in the past. They are forced to confront the malevolent specter that hungers for retribution, a horrifying Ronggeng dancer ghost determined to unleash its vengeance upon them.

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Kromoleo / Kromoleo: The Haunting (2024)

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Kromoleo / Kromoleo: The Haunting (2024)

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Zia heads home for her mother’s funeral. Little does she know that her arrival triggers the haunting of spirits seeking revenge for her father’s death.

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Working in an orphanage, Alia meets teen Nadia, who says she hears a strange voice in the walls. When they try to find the source, things go very wrong.

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Seeking to become a wife, a conservative Farah marries Wahab. But terror engulfs her life as she realizes he may not be who he seems.

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After an accident that killed both of Tara’s parents, Tara now only has a younger brother named Gian as a member of her family. However, the accident traumatized Gian, so Gian chose to end his life.

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A mother uses her deceased daughter’s doll as a medium to communicate with her, but the consequences are chilling.

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A group of kids agree to explore an abandon house in order to win a reality show contest, which requires them to prove that the stories of the evil Kuntilanak are real. They soon discover that the ghost is very much real when it appears from an old mirror and starts haunting them.

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Kuyang: Sekutu Iblis Yang Selalu Mengintai / Kuyang (2024)

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Kuyang: Sekutu Iblis Yang Selalu Mengintai / Kuyang (2024)

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A couple moves to a remote village for work only to find themselves hunted by a supernatural entity out to claim their unborn child.

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diajak nonton dan jujur filmnya lucu wkwkwk karena ada rida sih definitely stole the scene! all in all, ya udah ngga serem tapi cukup menarik

this is probably my favorite awi suryadi film by far

kisah tanah jawa : pocong gundul tells the story of hao who has the ability of retrocognition and has to face an evil shaman named walisdi who turns into a pocong gundul figure accompanied by his little friend rida in order to eradicate cruel terror every 10 years at a school

the first act is incredibly blend and uneventful. but as the runtime moves along, tension builds, and the finale is great

overall, kisah tanah jawa : pocong gundul is a scary and gripping horror film with top-notch technical quality as well as strong characterization and a solid story. especially some jumpscares which the audience will definitely not expect

Nonton ini berasa lagi liat Awi Suryadi bermain dengan kamera nya. Segala macam shot, movement dan angle dia gunain disini dan gue yakin equipment nya mahal mahal karena semua rig dipake dia. Hasilnya? Gahar banget! Gak ada satu celah pun di film ini bisa ngebikin kita ngerasa bosen sama setiap adegannya, tampaknya ada yang belajar dari kesalahan nya di KKN sih ya.

Selain itu, atmosfir seram yang dibangun film ini bener bener berhasil banget coi. Gue bener bener suka dan takut. Ada mainin jumpscare tapi emang kepake. Mostly film kita sekarang jumpscare ya cuma buat kagetin aja gak ada konteks buat apa guna nya jumpscare ini, disini semuanya secara efektif dipake.

Iwa K sama Della Dartyan paling bener bener menghidupi dan jadi nyawa film ini. Deva Mahenra mungkin belum sih, tapi mungkin kalo lanjut bisa lebih maksimal lagi mengingat Om Hao ini karakter yang cukup unik.

I was having an intricate emotion watching this film, on one side I had high expectation about this movie, knowing this movie is based on real story with real entity, imagining that the story, the scare, and the characters would be fascinating. To some degree, all those aspects were quite entertaining, but overall this movie was a touch disappointing to me.

Let's start with the positives, I like the characters, the protagonist, Hao and Rida were match made in heaven. The were funny, charming, and perfect couple to start this "Kisah Tanah Jawa" franchise, dare I say they are almost as Ed and Lorraine Warren in Indonesia horror cinema.
The story, from the beginning had great pace, funny dialogue, and...

Awi Suryadi said, "Make B-Horror Movie Great Again"

Kisah Tanah Jawa: Pocong Gundul is, surprisingly, an effective horror film. It manages to be steadily increasingly intense without ever being slow-moving, the keen eye for tension-building, and the patient buildup, also the final act is nail-biting, nerve-wracking, and gripping. Sure, it is still feel very familiar to all of his works. This isn't something groundbreaking or cutting-edge in the slightest, but it uses old-school techniques and top-notch sound design incredibly well, delivering a no-frills, all-chills horror experience. Della Dartyan is a welcome addition. This has given me hope that future films in this franchise have the potential to be good. A crowd-pleaser for horror fans!

susah-susah retrokoknisi lawannya sama voldemort jawa bjir

sereman sebelum jdi pocong dah wkwkw

Lumayan oke juga ternyata. Gw suka sih sama atmosfer film ini, terutama di act pertama. Sayangnya menuju akhir kurang nyes.. masih bagus kok, cuma horornya gak semengerikan di awal-swal.

Hal lain yang gw suka dari film ini adalah sinematografinya. Permainan kameranya itu enak banget ngeliatnya. Plus scoringnya juga mantep di denger di Dolby Atmos. Sayang color gradingnya masih agak kuning.

Soal plot ya masih okelah. Masih perlu diperbaikin lagi, tapi masih enjoyable. Sayangnya ada subplot yang kerasa terlupakan.

Soal akting, gw suka banget sih sama duo Deva dan Della. Chemistry mereka di sini beneran dapet.

Pas ending setannya Kisah Tanah Jawir ternyata juga bisa ngeluarin jurus The Force dari Star Wars 😭😭😭.

Ok, untuk masalah teknis gw akuin cinematography dan lightingnya cakep, bisa dibilang diatas rata-rata film indo, terutama dalam genre horror (kecuali buat bagian cgi nya masih kurengg). DP dan tim gaffernya berhasil membuat scene yang moody disertai dengan banyak kabut yang bikin set nya lebih kerasa atmospheric. Dah itu aja sih sisi positif yang bisa gw tangkep dari film ini, untuk masalah story B banget, standar film indo pada umumnya yang ngandelin jumpscare buat nakutin penonton. Jumpscarenya juga gitu-gitu aja, gampang ketebak kapan munculnya. Dimana suara ambience nya tiba-tiba ngilang, disitulah jumpscare akan muncul. Struktur storynya serasa kek horor indo pada umumnya, pasti...

Pocong gundul nya udah kek Monster gitu make up-nya. Kurang serem sih tapi seru liatnya.
Dava Mahenra sebelum main di film Ipar adalah maut.

Aktif sekali kameranya ya, Bun.

Untung yang nulis naskah bukan Lele Laila, kalau dia yang nulis kasihan kameramen ngidupin filmnya susah payah.

"Kita harus kalahkan si gundul jelek itu."
What if your soul can travel to the past and find what happen there? It's not astral projection, it's called retro-cognition. Yep, also you can find someone's missing through the catalist. This bald creature is literally from the bald person. At some point, I think horor film with this powerful ghost should give the main character extra power too, just to be fair.
🔮 🧘‍♂️ 👻

Lagi lagi soal pocong, sepekan ini nontonin film horor Indo kayaknya persoalan pocong semua deh, bener-bener tekenal dan jadi langganan favorit film horor ini hantu. Bedanya, di film ini pocongnya gundul, alias botak!

Ini film kalau gaada karakter Rika pasti flat banget jir. Kayak cuma dia yang...

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HAO has retrocognitive ability, an ability to see past events. With his ability, Hao helps SARI, a vocational school student, who was kidnapped by 'Pocong Gundul' - a evil pocong figure with a bald head. Together with his best friend RIDA, Hao manages to save Sari, but Hao's actions ignites anger from the Pocong Gundul.

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Anya and Daniel just moved to their new house in Bandung. Daniel brings home a doll from his workplace. Anya, who is a dollmaker, welcomes the doll happily to their house. They later learned that the doll belonged to a little girl named Uci, who died when she and her family were brutally murdered in a robbery. Strange things begin to happen..…

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When her little sister claims she sees the dead, Alia consults a psychic, who opens her own eyes to the vengeful ghosts haunting their childhood home.

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Life at a boarding school descends into chaos when a teacher instructs his students to perform a forbidden ritual that summons their doppelgängers.

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Do You See What I See: Cerita Horor #64 - First Love / Do You See What I See (2024)

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Do You See What I See: Cerita Horor #64 - First Love / Do You See What I See (2024)

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After Mawar falls for her very first boyfriend, her friends’ joy turns into suspicion as they realize he may not be who he seems.

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Ambar & Dika have just begun with a new chapter of life when years-old grudge of a malicious entity unfolds before their eyes. With a gift she unwillingly has, Ambar is now forced to finish the vengeance of the entity, a headless Dutch spirit, Ivanna.

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A toy manufacturer and his wife are terrorized by a demon after their orphaned niece tries to call her late mother’s spirit.

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After being abducted and taken to a desolate house, a girl sets out to rescue her friend and escape from their malicious kidnapper.

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Sebelum Iblis Menjemput: Ayat 2 / May The Devil Take You Too (2024)

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Sebelum Iblis Menjemput: Ayat 2 / May The Devil Take You Too (2024)

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Two years after escaping from demonic terror, a young woman is still haunted by unnatural vision. The dangers that await her and her friends are increasingly threatening.

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Badarawuhi di Desa Penari / Dancing Village: The Curse Begins (2024)

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Badarawuhi di Desa Penari / Dancing Village: The Curse Begins (2024)

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Dancing Village: The Curse Begins (2024)

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Mila must return a mystical bracelet to the “Dancing Village,” unaware that Badarawuhi - a mysterious, mythical being who rules the village - awaits her.

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KKN di Desa Penari / KKN: Curse of the Dancing Village (2022)

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KKN di Desa Penari / KKN: Curse of the Dancing Village (2022)

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KKN: Curse of the Dancing Village (2022)

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Six students were terrorized by a mysterious dancer while running a community service program in a remote village. Apparently, one of them violates the most fatal rule in the village.

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Ratu Ilmu Hitam / The Queen of Black Magic (2019)

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Ratu Ilmu Hitam / The Queen of Black Magic (2019)

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Families were terrorized at the orphanage. Someone wants them dead, apparently with black magic that is very deadly. She has a grudge and she was also born because of the sins of the orphans who formed her into the queen of black magic.

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Sebelum Iblis Menjemput / May The Devil Take You (2018)

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Sebelum Iblis Menjemput / May The Devil Take You (2018)

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Hoping to find answers to her estranged father’s mysterious illness, a young woman visits his old villa and uncovers a horrifying truth from the past.

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When a violent act kills her parents, Sita vows to debunk the idea of supernatural torment after death — a fixation that leads her on a dark quest.

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Tebusan Dosa / The Redemption of Sin (2024)

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Tebusan Dosa / The Redemption of Sin (2024)

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When the police halt their search, a troubled mother works with a podcaster to find her missing daughter but faces a dark force that haunts her.

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When Eun-soo gets lost in a country road, he meets a mysterious girl and is led to her fairytale ike house in the middle of the forest. There, Eun-soo is trapped with the girl and her siblings who never age. Eun-soo finally discovers a way out which is written on a fairy tale book. But the book tells a story of none other than himself!

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Combining political machinations/feuds, the plague and a creature feature managed to work. Sadly, a lot of the Korean films I've viewed in the past few years (new or old) after Parasite were ones I didn't care for, nevermind the popular consensus of said films. The fact that I gave this 3 stars is a relief. It was a film I liked and it did not cause anger or disappointment. While it would have been more interesting thematically if there wasn't actually a monster, the film does in fact have a hairy creature which at least has an interesting look and lore attached to it.

On the Korean peninsula in the 16th century, someone was put into power then almost immediately...

Like crying wolf, if you keep looking for sympathy as a justification for your actions, you will someday be left standing alone when you really need help.
- Criss Jami
Monstrum is a combination of a history thriller and a creature feature and succeeds in the first category while the latter isn't more than decent.
The first half is really good because the movies starts a mystery and if it weren't for the trailer, I would have loved it.
A lot of people are dying and they all say it's because of the monstrum.
A former officer of the korean army investigates it and discovers more than he can bargain with.

The focus on the mystery and the violent results...

Replace the zombies in Netflix's Kingdom with a CG monster beast & you basically have this movie.

This B-movie creature-feature co-stars Choi Woo-Sik aka teenage son from Parasite as a royal guard enlisting the help of a retired general commander to investigate the appearance of a mysterious creature roaming the country.

Pretty much follows the Kingdom formula almost beat-for-beat; you've got the Joseon era setting, exciting swordplay, a female character as a medical healer, political intrigue conspiracy complicating matters & quite possibly one of the silliest villain agendas I've ever seen.

Wisely keeps the monster hidden for the 1st half by focusing on stirring intrigue & curiosity abt the monster's existence & the hunting effort after. There's sufficient character development & momentum to keep things...

↓ English version below ↓ Im Programm der Fantasy Filmfest White Nights 2019
Monstrum nimmt sich der Facetten des Aberglaubens inmitten einer politischen Intrige der Joseon-Dynastie an. Dabei mixt er Martial Arts, Abenteuer und blutige Action zu einem temporeichen und unterhaltsamen Cocktail zusammen. Sympathische Darsteller und tolle Kulissen tragen ebenfalls dazu bei. Die Qualität der Effekte schwankt allerdings etwas und die Kamera während der Kämpfe ist oft sehr anstrengend mit ständigen Zooms und Wacklern.

Monstrum ist durchgehend sympathisch, besitzt ein zügiges Pacing und die Zeit vergeht dabei wie im Fluge.

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Part of the Fantasy Filmfest White Nights 2019
Monstrum takes on the facets of superstition in the midst of a political intrigue of the Joseon dynasty. He mixes martial...

After the dino dud that was Jurassic World Dominion, I was still craving some proper creature feature thrills and Monstrum completely delivered. You could describe this as Kingdom or Rampant with a hulking plague lion instead of zombies, but Korean Brotherhood of the Wolf would be just as succinctly accurate.

The first half commits to court conniving, plague-ravaged villages, and folk myths, building up dual plots of palace conspiracy and gorily mauled bodies scattered throughout the woods. Not the most exciting stuff and lacking the brutal cynical intrigue that really elevated Kingdom, but the script and characters are entertaining enough. It all elevates to a kinetic eruption of swordplay that in turns kicks off Monstrum's action-packed second hour.

When the...

Filled with action, vile politicians, the plague and fear of a Monstrum eating up all the food.

I love a girl that can kick ass, and I'm a sucker for a BEAST! Even a pus riddled one. I enjoyed immensely, at the same time was sad for the beast.

Someone set up a beast hospital. What a beautiful wee pup left abandoned to survive on its own with only plague scraps to eat. Bless its wee milky eyes.

It's creature feature time baby!

MONSTRUM

In 1506 a king is dethroned in Joseon South Korea. Many villagers are massacred by the military in fear that the deadly plague might spread, among other reasons. A new king Jungjong ( Park Hee-son ) takes the throne. But the high ranking officials that were responsible to Jungjong's rise in power eventually turn against him. As a result, the nation Korea is in dire straits with a most uncertain future.

Fast forward to the next scene in 1522, are two humble brothers Yun-gyeom ( Kim Myung-min ) Seong-han ( Kim In-kwan ) and Yun-gyeom's daughter Myung ( Lee Hye-ri ) in the country side. Food is scarce there as they just try to...

Check out my Korean Cinema and Historical Period Dramas list

Korean period drama meets a ferocious monster.

Directed by Huh Jong-ho, 물괴 (Monstrum) is set in 1506 during the Joseon Dynasty in ancient Korea, the tyrannical King Yeonsan-gun is overthrown by his half-brother Jung-jong. With a violent beginning of his rule, the new King Jung-jong faces numerous traitors plotting against him over the years, causing nationwide disorder. During the horrific plague, rumours spread out about a mysterious Monstrum feeding on animals and humans alike. In order to secure his throne, the King seeks help from a trusty former general.

The backdrop of the Joseon dynasty thriller perfectly weaves the plague that kills people, with the monstrum that devours flesh. At...

You may have heard this one before: a creature terrorizes the countryside, with the threat needlessly complicated by political machinations. Is there really a fabled monster chowing down on villagers or is this a hound of the Baskervilles scenario - with smaller fangs aided by smoke and mirrors? This looks like a case for Kim Myung-min who essentially does his Detective K shtick, attempting to solve the mystery through deductive reasoning... or failing that, general asskickery. Owing to his usual K subordinate Oh Dai Su being an unscrupulous creep IRL, our hero gets an upgrade in the comic sidekick department courtesy of Kim In-kwon. The entourage continues to grow with the character's surrogate daughter, portrayed by Lee "Nation's Little Sister"...

This movie was great! I watched it to see " the Monster". But what I got was amazing. It was a story about Korean tradition and their king and family and a made up monster. A man had a puppy . But filled it with bad stuff and anger. He created Monstrum. Half the people thought Monstrum was not real. So they hunted Monstrum. It was awesome! The Monstrum wasn't huge like King Kong. And it had no special ability. But he scared the villagers. It has a storyline too. But no spoilers here. Please watch this. It's really good!

Fantasy Film Fest White Nights 2019: Film #5

Pretty uninspired combination of period martial arts drama and monster film, the fight scenes are poorly shot and the monster is just a big dog.

🎃👻💀 Schocktober 2022 💀👻🎃
Film Nr. 16
Monstrum
Regie: Huh Jong-ho
Erstsichtung

Damit auch das asiatische Kino vertreten ist, gab es gestern noch den südkoreanischen Monster-Film Monstrum.

Der Film beginnt mit einer interessanten Prämisse und spielt anfangs noch mit der Frage, ob die Bedrohung wirklich existiert oder alles nur als Vorwand der Regierung dient.
Diese Frage wird dann relativ schnell beantwortet, dafür überzeugt der Film dann mit einem guten Creature-Design und auch einer sehr guten Optik und Effekten.
Die Chemie zwischen den unterschiedlichen Figuren ist großartig und sorgt für einige sehr unterhaltsame, ja fast schon witzige Momente.

Zwar schafft es der Film nicht wirklich eine echte bedrohliche oder anspannende Atmosphäre zu erzeugen, dafür gibt es aber einige echt gute Monster-Szenen....

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Ancient Korea, 1506. The tyrannical King Yeonsan-gun of Joseon is overthrown by his half-brother Jung-jong, whose reign begins with a blood bath. Over the years, traitors plot against him, sinking the kingdom into chaos. In 1528, frightened rumors come to royal palace, regarding a mysterious creature, known as Monstrum by the peasants.

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A respected priest volunteers for an experimental procedure that may lead to a cure for a deadly virus. He gets infected and dies, but a blood transfusion of unknown origin brings him back to life. Now, he’s torn between faith and bloodlust, and has a newfound desire for the wife of a childhood friend.

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Two sisters return home after a stay in a mental institution, only to face disturbing events and a strained relationship with their stepmother. As eerie occurrences unfold, dark family secrets begin to surface, blurring the line between reality and nightmare.

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This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

Reuniting With My Daughter After 15 Years GONE WRONG

oh dae-su: licks lee woo-jins feet
tarantino: god i wish that were me

the final 20 minutes of this movie make me want to vomit every single time

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

the lesson here is that you shouldn't gossip! if you see something, keep it to yourself

One of the most shocking & disturbing stories of revenge you are ever going to come across, Oldboy is a genre-defining contemporary classic that didn't just set an all new benchmark for revenge-thrillers to follow, which as of today still remain unsurpassed, but continues to be arguably the best film to come out from the South Korean film industry.

The story concerns Oh Dae-su who is abducted on the night of his young daughter's birthday and is held captive in an apartment prison for fifteen years without any explanation for why he is there or who imprisoned him, only to be suddenly freed in the same inexplicable way. The remainder of the film follows him trying to uncover the identity & motive...

This happened to my buddy Eric

I don't talk to him anymore

I guess we know who got the last laugh uh?

No one. Absolutely no one.

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

Why did Woo-jin imprison me for 15 years? This a wrong question. Why did Woo-jin imprison me with a tv in my room for 15 years and then release me? This is the right question.

This time around I saw Oldboy in a totally different ray of light and I could really grasp the underlying, satanically cruel scheme of sadism of why Oh Dae Su is provided with a television. That simple inanimate object is his only liaison with the world for 15 arduous years. The world is right in front of his eyes. He can see but now touch it. He can listen but not feel it. He can witness it but cannot live it. He is provided the...

Loved this movie, but all the real joy of its plotting was stolen from me by college kids who found it off a list of "underrated mindfuck" movies in the '10s and delighted in detailing all the "most epic" parts to anyone who was willing to listen. And boy, was I!

Really funny to imagine an American producer watching Dae-su pop on screen and going "Ohhhhhh yeah. That's Josh Brolin."

Hammer to the face. Before Parasite was the Korean film adored by the West, there was Oldboy. Nothing can prepare someone for their first viewing of Oldboy. For those who ever revisit it, they forget how darkly comic so much of it seemed at first. It's as if the memory is erased.

Oldboy is a nightmare. Not only because it is so deeply disturbing, but because its black void of evil is so insidious we relate to pain we cannot have gone through. When Oh Dae-su begs by the end, truly the most pathetic of sights, the nightmare is that you understand why. Oldboy has layers of revenge, vengeance pointed in opposite directions, but what's hard to pin is why....

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More This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth. Reuniting With My Daughter After 15 Years GONE WRONG oh dae-su: licks lee woo-jins feettarantino: god i wish that were me the final 20 minutes of this movie make me want to vomit every single time This review may contain spoilers.

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In pre-famine Ireland when poverty and magic were rife, introverted farm girl Maura discovers a magical world of the imagination through the mysterious wanderer Scarf Michael. When her isolated rural community accuses her of witchcraft, she turns to her own supernatural powers for protection.

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"We work for 12 hours - for eight hours we get 202 pesos (approx £2.88) and then the next four we get 49 pesos for each hour. We have no benefits but the company deducts our supposed benefits from our wages. We know because of the payslips that there is deduction but we don't receive those benefits." - Jobert Canino, one of the workers of Kentex factory, where 74 of its workers got caught in the fire and burned alive in 2015. The primary inspiration for the film.

This one hits home for me. I just worked an 8-hour shift job with 3 hours of overtime daily for 6 times a week. This just shows the struggle of every working class in third-world countries like the Philippines.

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A fashion designer suffers from a mysterious illness that puzzles her doctors and frustrates her husband until help arrives in the form of a Filipino carer who uses traditional folk healing to reveal a horrifying truth.

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As Father Severino Mallari, a 19th century priest during the Spanish occupation, descends into madness, his life and work as a parish priest in Pampanga is recounted, where he reportedly murdered 57 people to aid his ailing mother.

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During a return to his provincial home, a young man gets involved with a woman who is ultimately possessed by her sister’s spirit, paving the way to revealing the painful truth about her unsolved disappearance.

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A childless woman adopts an abandoned infant but when disturbing events begin occurring around her, she gets a feeling that the baby is a demon in disguise.

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A bad story can sink a film no matter how much money is spent on production design and special effects. When I was 8, I wrote a story as ridiculously nonsensical as this. I knew it, I should have been a filmmaker at 8 years old.

Note: If you really want to see Anne Curtis this holiday season, subscribe to Netflix and watch Buy Bust instead. Other good Filipino titles that are currently on Netflix are Metro Manila, Kita Kita, and Heneral Luna.

#MMFF

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The passenger ship Aurora mysteriously collides into the rocky sea threatening an entire island. A young woman and her sister must both survive by finding the missing dead for a bounty.

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When a remote village is plagued by a deadly curse, one brother must fight to save his family from a terrifying supernatural threat.

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When two siblings stumble on a strange hole in the wall of their grandparents’ house, horrifying incidents reveal sinister secrets about their family.

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This movie- 😂. Horror is the genre and this movie gets very slightly creepy at times. But then- the horror that's present in this movie consists of forced and illogical jumpscares and cliches which feel much more forced.
The acting is mediocre, the writing is lazy. The idea- let's just call it creative for the time being.
The dialogues and dubbing is cringe worthy at the very least.
Character development is non-existent in the first half and barely progresses from a point in the second half.
The pacing is on and off. It doesn't matter either way because of how flawed the editing and scares are. The visuals are also really dated.
The backstory of the stereotypical ghost might just bring an ounce of sympathy within the viewer. In simpler words, the death of the young woman is fucked up.
But the backstory is just as flawed as the rest of this messy film which barely scares.
20 % 🤢

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Akira and her band as they go into the dense forest to research on the sounds of nature. Akira celebrates her birthday there with her band mates and receives a gift of a beautiful Cinderella gown. But when she wears the gown, her behavior starts to change, as if she has been possessed.

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The plot is set in Mumbai, a city of dream and land of opportunities. The psychological crime thriller showcases an intriguing chase between a serial killer with a distinctive fetish and CBI officer named Gulshan. In the serial killer’s point of view, the film explores the fugitive’s darkest desire for momentary pleasure.

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When a restless spirit curses a Punjab village that has a history of female infanticide, the town’s fate lies in the hands of a 10-year old girl, Shivangi.

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After a series of deaths in Orbit Wildlife Park are attributed to a man-eating tiger, wildlife reporter Krish Thapar decides to investigate the incidents for a magazine article. But something deadlier than tigers hunts in the forest.

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एक विलेन रिटर्न्स / Ek Villain Returns (2022)

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एक विलेन रिटर्न्स / Ek Villain Returns (2022)

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When a singer goes missing amid a serial killing spree, a cabbie and a businessman’s son cross paths in a twisted tale where good and evil is blurred.

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A Mumbai businessman and his wife are looking for a new flat. Apartment 1201 has been vacant since its previous occupant jumped to her death. Undeterred, the couple still decides to move in, but before long, the wife starts to have visions.

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Set in a village named Rudravanam in 1990’s, Surya along with his mother, visit there after a long time. Suddenly a series of mysterious deaths occur due to an unknown person’s occult practice and whole village is scared. Will Surya find the person causing the deaths and save the village?

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Kabir and his family’s fun weekend retreat takes terrifying turn when an intruder takes over the control of the body of his teenage daughter, putting her at the mercy of his increasingly sinister orders.

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In the depths of an ancient forest, something has been growing. Something older than humanity itself, and perhaps greater too. When a park ranger discovers a man and his son living wild, she stumbles onto a secret that is about to change the world.

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In post-apartheid South Africa, Tsidi, a single mother, is forced to move in with her own estranged mother Mavis, a live-in domestic worker caring obsessively for her catatonic white ‘Madam’. And as Tsidi tries to heal her family, a sinister spectre begins to stir.

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An old man, fated to collect souls for eternity, seeks atonement after trading his daughter’s soul.

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Strange attacks plague the township’s women, leaving the town leaders at a loss to defend them. At the same time Mthnuzi, a shrewd businessman, is becoming wealthier and more popular with the ladies - something is amiss. The local reverend, Simon Nkosi, learns that Mthunzi is controlling a Tokoloshe to fulfill his greedy desires. In his greed he breaks a golden rule of maintaining control over the beast and it goes on a rampage. Now its thirst for blood is strong and comes after Mthunzi’s women, saving the one he loves for last. Together with Reverend Simon they must take on a mythical beast that has never been defeated, to try and save.

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Blue Demon: El Demonio Azul / Blue Demon (1965)

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Blue Demon: El Demonio Azul / Blue Demon (1965)

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Wrestler vs mad-scientist with werewolf serum.

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This rendition of La Llorona is best known for being the first horror film produced in Mexico. As the title suggests, the film provides a spin on the famous Mexican folklore and here focuses on a family suffering from a curse which foretells that the first born will die at four years old. The film begins with a framing story that makes the best of the legend and of cinema's new use of sound, as The Crying Woman literally screams a man to death. From there we move into a story bolstered by two extended flashbacks, which tell of the story of the title monster and connect it to the present day. The film is very well shot with great...

Hooptober 9.0, pt.23- A brief review on a brief film

9/6 Countries (Spain, UK, Japan, USA, Canada, Poland, Hong Kong, Russia, Mexico) (COMPLETE)
10/8 Decades (1970s, 1980s, 1960s, 2020s, 1990s, 2010s, 1920s, 1910s, 1950s, 1930s) (COMPLETE)

1st Ramón Peón

More visually baroque than the 60s adaptation of the same subject but significantly more muddled and slow paced, so it all settles in the middle. The opening image of a man collapsing in fright, his face contorted in horror, is a beautifully powerful piece of filmmaking that uses the strangely cumbersome nature of the early sound equipment to make a stilted atmosphere of mystery and tension. The figure of the hooded assassin, garbed in black with prominent eyeholes, is a gorgeously...

I'm guessing this is the first ever film treatment of the La Llorona folktale. I think it was Mexico's first ever horror film, a genre which that particular industry certainly took to heart in later decades. Over those years, Mexico has tended more to the cheap and utilitarian than to the classy, polished film, and this film is a sign of things to come. The sets look a little impoverished, the acting is stagey, and the direction and especially the editing are a little... agricultural. There's one scene of adoring parents watching their son at his birthday party, and the sequence spends so long showing a bunch of adults grinning down at a group of kids eating their lunch in silence...

🎃 Hollow's Eve SPOOKAVAGANZA! 2022 🍂👻
MEXICAN GOTHICS

Given the honor of Mexico's first true horror film, this earl 1930s picture tells the tale of a wealthy family being tormented by the spirit of LA LLORONA. A monster who's a staple of Latin American culture.
The film has it's fun moments, such as the wailing of the ghost and the super-imposed special effects to represent the ghost and the film goes out of it's way to present historical flashbacks going far back to the colonial times when the Spanish came to torment.
Malinche is even a character in this which was something I did not expect.

The movie shows it's age heavily, however. It's slow and sometimes silly and sometimes...

🇲🇽💀Méjico Macabro💀🇲🇽 #1
Mi propósito del 2022 es ver el mayor número de películas de horror mexicanas posibles e irlas rankeando. Cualquier número menor a 100 sería una pequeña derrota, pero a ver qué pasa.

Empecé con La llorona de 1933 que según una breve investigación sería la primera película de horror mexicana de la historia. La cinta de Ramón Peón es ingeniosa en su recontextualización del mito, dividiéndose en dos partes. Una de ellas dedicada a sus orígenes y la otra a un misterio actual que podría (o no) estar relacionado con la leyenda. Lo malo es que Peón parece apoyarse en la llorona solo para tener un buen gancho en el título, porque no logra apegarse de manera...

Hooptober X: Encounters of the Spooky Kind
Spooky Encounter #27
A creaky artefact from a bygone era, but a fascinating one with some still-thrilling spooky moments. As the first major Mexican fantasy horror film it seems entirely appropriate that the story should centre on a character drawn from a specifically Hispanic myth. La Llorona - the wailing ghost of legend who mourns the loss of her young child - has various different origin stories, and several of them are incorporated into this 1933 film's time-hopping narrative. The action takes place across three distinct timelines: the present day (1930s Mexico) for the wraparound narrative, colonial times (1521-1821) for the first flashback, and the Spanish conquest (1519-1521) for the second. The effect...

This film version is my introduction to the mythical figure of La Llorona and what a lovely introduction it was!

Pacing is one of the big elements which holds it back, but 1933's version is mesmerising -- the gothic atmosphere, the wails, the superimposed ghostly images, the dramatic stabbing (the actor forgot there was no room to fall back on, and her dress, which was caught on the set piece, saved her from falling to some serious injuries)!

La Llorona is a fascinating figure. She reminds me of Candyman, where social injustice returns with a supernatural and twisted vengeance. This time, the injustice is the colonising of indigenous people by Spanish conquistadors. La Llorona is perhaps borne of projected guilty...

Horror Gives Back 2022 Unsung Horrors Podcast Horror Gives Back Challenge
Day 11: Mexico

I'm a bit surprised by the rather low star rating on this one. I do not typically gravitate toward these films at the beginning of cinematic history. I get their importance. I appreciate the people who laid the foundation cinema as we know it today (or at least knew it before these recent years--today's movies also generate little interest for me overall). But I just do not generally get excited to watch movies closing in on 100 years old. Maybe I should, because I really liked this one.

Sure, the scariest part is during the wedding scene where they ask if anyone has any reason why...

Qui aurait cru que ma scène préférée, dans le tout premier film d'horreur de l'histoire du Mexique, serait une fête d'enfants filmée de la perspective du gâteau au milieu de la table?

The kids sitting around the circular table for a birthday party with candles look like they're ready for a seance.
The look and the vibe are like a mix of UN CHIEN ANDALOU and Tod Browning's DRACULA, but not as surreal as that sounds. But it would fit right in with the early Universal horror cycle.

NOTE: More sword fighting than I expected.

That opening sequence was the best thing for me but I found the rest of the film to be uninteresting with only the visuals keeping me entertained.

Watched in Spanish

Powerhouse/Indicator has had a real downward trend in the quality of the films they're releasing recently. This one has nothing beyond historical significance as the first Mexican talkie horror film. It's clear they were still learning how to make sound films when this was made because it's rife with technical issues. Long, lingering shots of nothing much, such as various slow pans of entire rooms of people before the plot continues (what little there is); pregnant pauses in the dialogue; repeated lines and actions from one shot to the next... And that's not to mention the stilted acting. The story is awful, too. They take the most fascinating superstitious myth in Mexico and turn it into a dull, pedestrian mystery,...

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Llorona is a figure unique to Mexican folklore -- the wailing spirit of a woman who lost or killed her child and now returns to seek revenge and haunt the living. With its framing story and flashback structure, this film sets forth a couple of variations of the story.

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Alucarda, la hija de las tinieblas / Alucarda (1977)

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Alucarda, la hija de las tinieblas / Alucarda (1977)

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Directed by Juan López Moctezuma

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A young girl’s arrival at a convent after the death of her parents marks the beginning of a series of events that unleash an evil presence on the girl and her mysterious new friend, an enigmatic figure known as Alucarda. Demonic possession, Satan worship, and vampirism follows.

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Directed by Issa López

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Haunting, devastating, poetic.
Not attributes for a usual Friday movie on Joe Bob I'd say.
Regardless, A powerhouse of a film that toes the line between SIN NOMBRE & DEVILS BACKBONE (actually would make a great double with either.)
The cast is a gift.
The locations are beautifully decrepit.
LOVE the VFX in it too.
An amazing piece of cinematic art for sure.
Just...not a drive in movie, guys.

As seen on Joe Bob Briggs The Last Drive In on Shudder.

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A dark fairy tale about a gang of five children trying to survive the horrific violence of the cartels and the ghosts created every day by the drug war.

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El laberinto del fauno / Pan's Labyrinth (2006) 

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El laberinto del fauno / Pan's Labyrinth (2006) 

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Directed by Guillermo del Toro

Studios

Estudios Picasso Esperanto Filmoj Tequila Gang Telecinco Cinema

Countries

Mexico Spain USA

Language

Spanish

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97

Fantasy shaken by bullet fire and the agony of tired souls cut short, Pan's Labyrinth is a genuine marvel of storytelling, craftsmanship, design, and pure theatricality within cinematic boundaries. Skillfully told and heartrending in its mixture of warfare anxiety and childhood imagination, Guillermo Del Toro (master of understated drama and boisterous action) constructs a fluid vision that layers its "segments" with distinct separation. As each particular story (every subplot is important) eventually collides by the end of such a rich and engrossing tapestry, reality and illusion embrace in the most cathartic way.

It's a film that thrives because of its cumulative end, but Pan's Labyrinth succeeds so miraculously because each moment is plotted in line with Del Toro's storybook...

Guillermo Del Toro's obsession with the child's perspective is often the death blow of many films that have been produced with his name attached to it. He should stop producing them and he should start making them again because he has proven time and again that he is a fantastic storyteller and Pan's Labyrinth seems to be the film that blends together everything he values in film and stories.

This film is terrifying. Not so much because it is scary or filled with gore, no it is terrifying because we are scared for someone. Ofelia is a fantastic protagonist. She is a girl you automatically want to protect from the horrors around her and that investment is where this film...

holy shit i had seen the pale man a million times but that motherfucker is TERRIFYING in motion. also- Vidal is one of the best villains I've ever seen and the ending is one of the most satisfying I've ever seen.

(i wonder if I would've liked the shape of water if i'd seen this movie, with a LOT of the same trademarks, first)

apparently the faun guy in this film was inspired by a lucid dream Guillermo del Toro used to have where he would wake up and a faun would step out from behind a grandfather clock and walk towards him,, ugh his mind!!... literally

Gotta revisit. My sister is moving in to college tomorrow, I just uploaded a video, and I also am in the middle of editing another video so needless to say...I didn't really give this my full attention. But with how little time I have to plow through the remaining 8 movies I'm gonna review it anyway.

Beautiful cinematography, loved the set design, and Guillermo del Toro just knows how to make you get emotional over shit you normally wouldn't get emotional about. Again, deserves a rewatch.

97
(35mm)
"You'll meet her, she's very pretty, even though sometimes she's sad for many days at a time. You'll see, when she smiles, you'll love her."
A detail noticed on re-watch: how its transitions usually take root in obstructed frames, switching from reality to fantasy through sudden environmental formations and shapes. Trees, emblematic of nature's stability and the security of make-believe (in stark contrast to the agony of the real world), provide an aesthetic gateway to lands of quests and temptations, areas of objectives and unreal - yet no less horrifying - consequences. There's magic bursting at the seams within this tapestry, but danger also abounds, and Del Toro builds a formal language to show how staying on either side of the spectrum can yield individual ramifications.

Mentioned by

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Living with her tyrannical stepfather in a new home with her pregnant mother, 10-year-old Ofelia feels alone until she explores a decaying labyrinth guarded by a mysterious faun who claims to know her destiny. If she wishes to return to her real father, Ofelia must complete three terrifying tasks.

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Directed by Demián Rugna

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Demián Rugna's tune-up game before pumping out When Evil Lurks. Couldn't give less of a shit that it sort of feels like a series of disjointed vignettes at times-the guy just understands what "fear" is, pure & simple.

Once again emanating those same Lucio Fulci "we've entered the doomsday realm" vibes as he masterfully does with Lurks, only this time linking more to City of the Living Dead or The Beyond in how inconsequential everything seems. Creepy shit happens in a small neighborhood, people act not all that shocked, we neither receive nor need much of an explanation, and the apocalypse subtly begins; not a terrible way to structure a film, even though I routinely count doing the same thing as...

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Police commissioner Funes and three researchers of supernatural phenomena investigate inexplicable events that are occurring in the suburbs of Buenos Aires.

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Cuando acecha la maldad / When Evil Lurks (2023)

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Cuando acecha la maldad / When Evil Lurks (2023)

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Directed by Demián Rugna

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Residents of a small rural town discover that a demon is about to be born among them. They desperately try to escape before the evil is born, but it may be too late.

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Directed by Michelle Garza Cervera

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Valeria’s joy at becoming a first-time mother is quickly taken away when she’s cursed by a sinister entity. As danger closes in, she’s forced deeper into a chilling world of dark magic that threatens to consume her.

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Esta Noite Encarnarei no Teu Cadáver / This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse (1967)

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Esta Noite Encarnarei no Teu Cadáver / This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse (1967)

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Directed by José Mojica Marins

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This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse (1967)

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Coffin Joe, the unholy undertaker, is back in town to continue his quest for the perfect woman, embarking on an even more brutal campaign of terror, aided and abetted by his hunchbacked assistant.

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sinceramente não entendi as críticas a esse filme, ele me prendeu do começo ao fim e eu gostei muito do plot twist, entendo que não é um filme pra todo mundo, quem apenas idolatra o cinema gringo realmente não vai saber apreciar essa obra prima. sabemos que o cinema nacional não tem tanto reconhecimento e investimento como deveria, por que daria pra fazer diversos filmes fodas com roteiros fodas e com um cgi legal, mas infelizmente o investimento só vai pra comédia. ah me desculpa né, mas falar que esse filme não tem um roteiro bom? pra mim não faz nem sentido, realmente tem algumas coisas que ficaram mal explicadas.

(spoilers aqui ⚠️) mas aquela cena do final "quem é...

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Davi Carvalho is a psychology professor who wrote a book about how we project traumas of our past as paranormal events. A student from out of the city, Renata, appears in his life, asking for help for his little sister, Julia.

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Directed by Navin Ramaswaran

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Ambitious, cunning, and narcissistic, Agnes is a serial killer, hiding in plain sight within a rural town while defining her own systems of sport and romance.

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Directed by Cody Calahan

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Joel, a caustic 1980s film critic for a national horror magazine, finds himself unwittingly trapped in a self-help group for serial killers. With no other choice, Joel attempts to blend in with his homicidal surroundings or risk becoming the next victim.

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Directed by Cody Calahan

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During a raging snowstorm, a drifter returns home to the blue-collar bar located in the remote Canadian town where he was born. When he offers to settle an old debt with a grizzled bartender by telling him a story, the night’s events quickly spin into a dark tale of mistaken identities, double-crosses and shocking violence.

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The Little Girl Who Lives Down The Lane (1976)

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The Little Girl Who Lives Down The Lane (1976)

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Set in USA, Maine - filmed and produced in Canada.

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The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane (1976)

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Quiet, withdrawn 13-year-old Rynn Jacobs lives peacefully in her home in a New England beach town. Whenever the prying landlady inquires after Rynn’s father, she politely claims that he’s in the city on business. But when the landlady’s creepy and increasingly persistent son, Frank, won’t leave Rynn alone, she teams up with kindly neighbor boy Mario to maintain the dark family secret that she’s been keeping to herself.

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Two children wake up in the middle of the night to find their father is missing, and all the windows and doors in their home have vanished.

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The story of two outcast sisters, Ginger and Brigitte, in the mindless suburban town of Bailey Downs. On the night of Ginger’s first period, she is savagely attacked by a wild creature. Ginger’s wounds miraculously heal but something is not quite right. Now Brigitte must save her sister and save herself.

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Directed by David Cronenberg

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Whether it's the "best" or your "favorite" Cronenberg film s one thing, but this has to be the purest encapsulation of his strengths as a filmmaker. This thing feels like it was cut out of sheet metal and fiberglass, pristine yet lifeless, its body horror presented as purely sexual yet sexless. Cronenberg understands the text and subtext of Ballard so well that it doesn't feel like mere humility that the author himself said that the director made a superior work out of the material than he did. The entire film throbs with warped lust, yet it nails the complete lack of satisfaction in indulging each urge that defines Ballard's prose, and in the scenes of Spader and Unger overlooking traffic...

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After getting into a serious car accident, a TV director discovers an underground sub-culture of scarred, omnisexual car-crash victims, and he begins to use car accidents and the raw sexual energy they produce to try to rejuvenate his sex life with his wife.

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A frustrated, angry teenage girl awakens something in the woods when she naively performs an occult ritual to invoke a witch to kill her mother.

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Directed by Kurtis David Harder

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A same-sex couple move to a small town so they can enjoy a better quality of life and raise their 16 year-old daughter with the best social values. But nothing is as it seems in their picturesque neighbourhood. And when Malik sees the folks next door throwing a very strange party, something very shocking has got to give.

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Residents in a lonely gulch of inland California bear witness to an uncanny, chilling discovery.

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On Halloween, a group of friends encounter an extreme haunted house that promises to feed on their darkest fears. The night turns deadly as they come to the horrifying realisation that some nightmares are real.

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When a man is eaten alive by an unknown creature, the local Game Warden teams up with a paleontologist from New York to find the beast. Add to the mix an eccentric philanthropist with a penchant for “Crocs”, and here we go! This quiet, remote lake is suddenly the focus of an intense search for a crocodile with a taste for live animals...and people!

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A rebellious teenage boy, struggling with his parents’ imminent divorce, encounters a terrifying evil after his next-door neighbor becomes possessed by an ancient witch that feasts on children.

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El cuerpo de Jennifer, 辣得要命, Tijelo lijepe Jennifer, Dzeniferes kunas, Zabójcze cialo, 죽여줘 제니퍼, Le Corps de Jennifer, ジェニファーズ・ボディ, Jennifer'ın Bədəni, 陰點鬼情人, 辣的要命, Jennifer's Body - Jungs nach ihrem Geschmack, Kana Susadım, Тело Дженнифер, O Corpo de Jennifer, Ördög bújt beléd, Zabójcze ciało, 詹妮弗的肉体, Jennifer's Body - Bacha, kouše!, הגוף של ג'ניפר, Το Σώμα που Σκοτώνει, Corpul lui Jennifer, Garota Infernal, Le corps de Jennifer, Telo lepe Jennifer, 죽여줘! 제니퍼, Страстите на Дженифър, Diabólica tentación, Jenniferning tanasi, Dženiferės kūnas, Тіло Дженніфер, Pozor hryzie!, Thân Xác Ác Quỷ, Опасна Џенифер, เจนนิเฟอร์'ส บอดี้ สวย ร้อน กัด สยอง

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Jennifer, a gorgeous, seductive cheerleader takes evil to a whole new level after she's possessed by a sinister demon. Now it's up to her best friend to stop Jennifer's reign of terror before it's too late.

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Retired cop James Lasombra is asked by a friend to investigate the disappearance of her daughter, who seemingly packed in the night and left an ominous message on the bathroom mirror - “The Empty Man Made Me Do It.” As he investigates this mysterious figure further, James begins to see and hear strange things, and is forced to come to terms with his past and what it means for his future.

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A traveling couple end up in an abandoned Nebraska town inhabited by a cult of murderous children who worship a demon that lives in the local cornfields.

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More

Definitely had a few expectations going into this knowing it was John Carpenter but dude... what the hell? I was hilariously unaware of how psychological this was. But also so fun. But also so unsettling?? Still processing but I really dig this.

John Carpenter fuses lurking Lovecraftian madness with Stephen King psychological terror, resulting in this New England nightmare tentacle jam that's, at least for me, totally perfect.

Equal parts cerebral and visceral with apocalyptic anxieties riding high, In the Mouth of Madness was a video store staple for me in my teens and very well may be my favorite horror picture of the 90's, a dreamy ride into hellish paperback nightmare rhetoric-filled with goopy KNB effects, one of my favorite Carpenter scores, Sam Neill absolutely killing it as usual, and an ending for the ages as far as I'm concerned.

"Do you read Sutter Cane?"
Part fiction, part reality, all nightmare.

The new 4K scan on Scream Factory's new blu looks damn fine and I couldn't be happier this finally got the collectors edition treatment it deserves.

92
It's exhilarating to watch Carpenter utilize his skills as a peerless craftsman against a changing world of scare tactics and an evolving horror landscape. Like an old dog teaching itself new tricks. Terrifying and utterly engrossing.

"a reality is just what we tell each other it is."
"god's not supposed to be a hack horror writer."

the original "damn my life a movie." a metafictional cosmic horror story that starts as a small town gothic conspiracy (like Dead & Buried but paperback genre novelists instead of zombies) before bleeding into a series of italian nightmare logic horror setpieces that then fold in on themselves as they struggle with the contradictory nature of trying to contain cosmic horror inside an entertainment product.

full discussion on episode 131 of my podcast SLEAZOIDS.

Sam Neill is wonderful.

The editing, especially in the final act, is superb, skillfully collapsing the distinction between the real and the dream.

Although this is obviously an homage to both Lovecraft and Stephen King, it also works as a pointed critique of American mass media, of the way we senselessly open our minds to people who do not have our best interests in mind, and leave ourselves vulnerable to poisonous fantasies and harmful delusions.

[Pauses, looks around at the millions of Americans who have embraced QAnon.]

Yeah, that checks out.

Sometimes it just seems a director is given one film in which all his unique talents come together. For Carpenter In the Mouth of Madness seems to be that film.

I feel that Carpenter is masterful at two things. Creating suspense and giving his viewer great physical gorey effects. He perfected the first in Halloween and the second in the Thing. In the Mouth of Madness is an almost perfect amalgamation of the two.

The story feels like the bizarre love child of Stephen King and Lovecraft. It deals with Lovecraftian madness and monsters, told in a narrative that seems to come straight out of a King novel. And weaving through this all is the deft hand of one of...

No idea why this isn't more highly regarded. Absolutely and completely rocks.

John Carpenter has a half dozen or so masterpieces and this one is among them.

What stuck out to me most this time was Carpenter's critique of the horror genre, but it couldn't be more different than what he was presenting in Cigarette Burns. In Burns, Carpenter wrote an obituary to the genre. The bloodlust inherent within horror was undone by torture pictures like Hostel and in Burns cinema could literally kill. It's a vicious picture completely contemptuous of the audience that ran him off. Madness is the flip-side to that cynical take as it's brimming with life.

Carpenter made a statement on the diversity and humour within the schlock genre taking cues from Lovecraft, Stephen King and his previous...

Do you read Sutter Cane?

Well. You should.

During the 90s the self-referential horror film reigned supreme. After the release of Scream practically every horror movie had teenagers mentioning how the situation they were caught in was like Friday The 13th. A lot of this commentary serviced nothing. It stopped at 'people die in horror films for doing drugs or having sex' and similar shallow observations. Criticisms that were more glib than insightful.

In the Mouth of Madness is significantly different. It referenced horror fiction, but not as cheap nostalgia bait, or as a way to point out simplistic ill-defined tropes for the sake of being self-aggrandising. It was self-critical but it wasn't self-deprecating. It's a satire of structure and...

The widescreen compositions of the middle third are obviously quite striking, Carpenter and his DP giving his subjects so much space that they're dwarfed by their surroundings. The terrifyingly towering church and even the main street of the town itself, everything is domineering and suffocating and terrifying. What bumps this up to something truly masterful, though, is the editing in the final third. The film becomes this freakish whirlwind of unnerving nonsense, time and place disappearing and reappearing in the blink of an eye. Thrilling stuff. I didn't even mind the "meta" self-reflexive narrative trappings which so often like nails on a chalkboard to me. It's all executed so well. @TheHorrorMaster indeed.

what if god was a hack horror writer?

haha, seriously, what if tho?

what if...

Sam Neill solid as a rock. Sutter Cane, the anti-Stephen King. Warped. Twisted. Demented. Trippy. A mind-fuck from the Horror Master John Carpenter.

Mentioned by

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With the disappearance of hack horror writer Sutter Cane, all Hell is breaking loose...literally! Author Cane, it seems, has a knack for description that really brings his evil creepy-crawlies to life. Insurance investigator John Trent is sent to investigate Cane's mysterious vanishing act and ends up in the sleepy little East Coast town of Hobb's End.

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Directed by Jane Schoenbrun

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I don't even know what to say

I find myself reverting to someone I never was. A feeling unburied by waves of nostalgic torment that hasn't been a part of my life

I wanna curl up in a little ball and lock away the world, I don't want to speak about what's going or process a moment

Even while writing these very words I feel shaky and cold but something is trying to bring me comfort. I feel like I've been crying for years but I haven't shed a tear

This is something I desperately need to rewatch the moment I can. I selfishly want a theater all to myself to let the screen speak to me and only me. I need this on in my room without any burden of the world

Whether this is what I'm supposed to feel or against I couldn't tell you

Thank you Jane

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Teenager Owen is just trying to make it through life in the suburbs when his classmate Maddy introduces him to a mysterious TV show - a vision of a supernatural world beneath their own. In the pale glow of the television, Owen's view of reality begins to crack.

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Ten people arrive at a secluded mountain resort to find it completely deserted. With no gas for the return trip, the visitors are forced to stay and investigate the mystery surrounding the abandoned lodge.

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Catherine Clare reluctantly trades life in 1980 Manhattan for a remote home in the tiny hamlet of Chosen, New York, after her husband George lands a job teaching art history at a small Hudson Valley college. Even as she does her best to transform the old dairy farm into a place where young daughter Franny will be happy, Catherine increasingly finds herself isolated and alone. She soon comes to sense a sinister darkness lurking both in the walls of the ramshackle property—and in her marriage to George.

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Miles from civilization, a blind teenager and the hunter he befriends are tormented by a mysterious creature lurking in the woods.

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"... Because you were home. "

The scene where Liv Tyler was smoking in the living room and you see "guy in mask" appear behind her (without her noticing) still feels so incredibly violating and effective.

I don't care how many times I watch this, it still makes me uncomfortable from start to finish.

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After a 4 a.m. knock at the door and haunting voices, Kristen McKay and James Hoyt's remote getaway becomes a psychological night of terror as three masked strangers invade. Now they must go far beyond what they thought themselves capable of if they hope to survive.