Tag Archives: Hope Madden

Nightmares Film Festival

The Wheel of Heaven

Leave a comment

by Hope Madden

The Wheel of Heaven delivers oddball charm and horror in equal measure.

What’s it about? That’s an excellent question, and not a simple one to answer. We seem to be stuck on late night, all access TV, which is running through a wild set of programs and sponsors. (My favorite sponsor is Rad Abrams, Skateboard Attorney.)

And my favorite show is undoubtedly The Uncle Bobbo Show, which was also the focus of director Joe Badon’s 2021 short, The Blood of the Dinosaurs.

Kids’ TV host Uncle Bobbo (an eerily unblinking Vincent Stalba) wants to teach us where oil comes from. With assistance from his vampire puppet co-host Grampa Universe (voiced by John Davis) and his young helper Purity (Stella Creel), he seeks to enlighten and entertain. And misinform. It’s sort of a Pee-wee’s Playhouse for sociopaths. If that does not seem like a ringing endorsement, you’re not reading it correctly.

So, we’re watching highly local TV programming. Or are we? Maybe each story is a little diorama dreamt up by local artist Margaret Corn (Kali Russell)? Or perhaps we may instead be reading along with Marge the Mechanic (Russell again), who picked up a “choose your adventure” book at a thrift store.

Russell plays at least half a dozen distinct but related characters, each a fully formed and often bizarre individual. Her range and effortless skill with characterization ground the segments in something tangible, however goofy the character.

Whether these characters are part of a book, TV programming or one artist’s imagination is irrelevant. Badon’s upended the concept of a framing story for what is essentially an anthology of short films. Every tale, including the framing stories, morph and mutate and as each folds in on itself, Badon and his crew appear to emphasize the illusion versus reality of this absurdist storytelling.

What else does Badon hit on? Birth. Death. Choice. 3D glasses. Kitch. Homage. Dinosaurs. Storytelling. But mainly creation and how the act of creating is linked to all of these. The Wheel of Heaven throws a lot at you and not all of it hits, but Badon’s instinct for the bizarre, humorous and horrific generate a wonderfully oddball effort.

Nightmares Film Festival

Departing Seniors

Leave a comment

by Hope Madden

With her feature debut, director Clare Cooney skates some familiar ice but tweaks the high school slasher enough to produce a charming, compelling and strangely fresh slasher with Departing Seniors.

Jose Nateras’s script centers on Javier (Ignacio Diaz-Silverio), a high school senior who loves his best friend Bianca (Ireon Roach) and his gig on the high school paper, and maybe new guy William (Ryan Foreman). Otherwise, high school blows, but it’s almost over and then – even if Ginny (Maisie Merlock) steals his slot as valedictorian – he and Bianca will be out of this Podunk town and on to better things.

Graduation can’t come soon enough, though, because Ginny and her letter-jacket buddies have amped up the bullying. Things are so bad Javier barely even notices when the first of the popular jock dumbasses dies in the pool of apparent suicide.

At its best, Departing Seniors breathes life into the tropes of coming-of-age horror films. Cooney has gathered a truly talented and memorable group of young actors to elevate a clever if somewhat predictable take on the high school slasher. This cast, top to bottom, impresses and Nateras writes characters that they can sink their teeth into.

Diaz-Silverio reimagines the bullied teen with tenderness, resilience and humor. An exceptional, empathetic central figure, it is impossible not to root for Javier. 

Roach continues her streak (after Jennifer Reeder’s Knives and Skin and Perpetrator as well as Nia DaCosta’s Candyman) of carving memorable characters regardless of screen time. She brings a relatable, cynical humor that also emphasizes Javier’s kindness.

The traditional plotting eventually limits the film’s creative success and the speechifying undoes a lot of the nuanced storytelling that preceded it, but you never stop caring about the characters. Departing Seniors subverts every one-dimensional high school slasher cliché to deliver a startlingly empathetic and effecting thriller.

Fright Club

Fright Club: Hats in Horror

Leave a comment

Hats! They tell you a lot about a villain. Norma’s lightning bolt hat in Carrie tells us that she lacks fashion sense. Leprechaun’s golden buckled hat tell us that he’s sassy. Art the Clown’s tiny little hat lets us know that he doesn’t take himself too seriously. The Wicked Witch of the West wore the greatest, most iconic villain hat of all time, but The Wizard of Oz is not horror, so she didn’t make this list.

Who did make our list of best use of hats in a horror movie? Let us share with you.

5. The Grabber, The Black Phone (2021)

Ethan Hawke’s look for Scott Derrickson’s adaptation of the Joe Hill short story is epic. The constantly evolving, endlessly sinister mask is the push over the cliff, but it all starts with that hat. A black top hat not unlike the one that brought Frosty to life, this hat means magic.

He is a part time magician, after all! And in 1973, I guess people did not se magicians or clowns as scary. But they should have.

4. Mr. Dark, Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983)

Another dark top hat, Mr. Dark’s headwear of choice also conjures the image of magic. But somehow, even in Green Town, Illinois, Mr. Dark doesn’t look out of place with so formal a look. Sure, every other Joe wears something less fancy, but on Mr. Dark, the hat seems perfectly in place.

That’s all part of his charm.

3. Alex, A Clockwork Orange (1971)

The bowler – headwear of choice for Alex and his Droogies. You have to look sharp when on the prowl for a bit of the old in and out.

The iconic costuming in Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece adaptation of Anthony Burgress’s novel creates the mood for the piece. Somehow retro and futuristic, elegant and brutal, punk rock and Ludwig Van all come together in this one ensemble: white trousers, white shirt, white cod piece, and suspenders, black boots, one set of black lashes and that spiffy bowler. Welly, welly, welly, welly well.

2. The Babadook, The Babadook (2014)

If it’s in a word, or if it’s in a book
you can’t get rid of the Babadook.
He wears a hat
he’s tall and black
but that’s how they describe him in his book.
A rumbling sound, than three sharp knocks
you better run, or he’ll hold you in his locks.
ba-ba-ba-dook-dook-dook…
Your closet opens
and your honestly hopin’
that he won’t hear a sound
but that’s when you know that he’s around.
The book close
you have an itch under your nose
and that’s just how the story goes.
So close your eyes and count to ten
better hope you don’t wake up again.
‘Cause if it’s in a word, or if it’s in a book
you can’t get rid of the Babadook
…. you’ll see him if you look

1. Rose the Hat, Doctor Sleep (2018)

Possibly the hottest villain since Salma Hayak wrapped a yellow python around her neck, Rose the Hat (Rebecca Ferguson) will swallow your soul.

Ferguson’s performance is eerily, hauntingly believable in Mike Flanagan’s courageous take on Stephen King’s The Shining sequel. Of his many successes with this film, his villain ranks highest. Rose the Hat is savvy, strong, and more than anything, merciless.

New In Theaters

Feeling Miskatonic

Leave a comment

Suitable Flesh

by Hope Madden

I’m going to guess Joe Lynch is a Stuart Gordon fan.

Who isn’t?!

The Mayhem director returns to the horror genre with a Lovecraftian fable, but this is no garden variety Lovecraft. Lynch’s vibe and manner – not to mention co-writer and cast – lean closer to Gordon homage than outright cosmic horror.

Lynch loosely adapts Lovecraft’s The Thing on the Doorstep, writing with Stewart’s longtime collaborator Dennis Paoli (Re-Animator, From Beyond, Castle Freak, Dagon). Their tale shadows psychiatrist Elizabeth Derby (Heather Graham), who – against her own better instincts – takes on a new patient. Asa (Judah Lewis) believes his father is trying to steal his body.

Cleaving to science and yet inexplicably attracted to the young man, Derby fails to understand her patient’s claims until it is too late – an evil entity has moved from Asa’s father into Asa and is now threatening to take over Dr. Derby’s body.

Graham’s a bit of campy fun in a dual role – far more fun when she gets to dig into the hedonistic villain character. It’s a performance that lets the actor stretch a bit and she seems to relish the darker side of the role. Likewise, Lewis excels in particular when the sinister force inhabits meek and terrified Asa.

Of course, no Gordonesque Lovecraftian flick is complete without the glorious Barbara Crampton (Re-Animator, From Beyond, Castle Freak). Crampton’s Dani, Derby’s uptight colleague and best friend, becomes an ideal foil for the transformed psychiatrist. Graham and Crampton vamp it up as the demon oscillates between them, which is as much fun as it sounds like it would be.

The film feels very much like a Dennis Paoli film and fans of his Gordon collaborations have reason to celebrate. But Suitable Flesh doesn’t entirely deliver on its promise of mayhem. It never quite leaps off that cliff the way Paoli films usually do and for that reason feels a tad tame.

But a game cast and a bit of 80s inspired lunacy ensure a good time is had by all. Plus, that’s a great title.

Shudder Premiere

Night of the Penned In

Leave a comment

Night of the Hunted

by Hope Madden

Sometimes simplicity in horror is very effective. Take a very routine moment, something so familiar to viewers they realize they wouldn’t even think twice about it, and turn it into something sinister.

It’s late. You stop for gas. A sociopath with a high-powered rifle and good aim is hiding behind a God Is Nowhere billboard.

Franck Khalfoun’s Night of the Hunted is the latest horror to make what it can of a tiny cast, limited set of locations, and modern anxieties. Camille Rowe is Alice. She and John (Jeremy Scippio) are on their way back from a conference – their relationship is complicated – but Alice is in a hurry. And not in a great mood.

It’s 2 am. They stop for gas. The sniper makes excellent use of the well-lit, heavily windowed setting. There’s also a walkie talkie.

Any film that focuses so heavily on an exchange between two people only works when the writing and performances are strong. Rowe delivers when the script lets her. Alice is savvy and angry, recognizes her weaknesses but makes frustrating choices. Those choices are, of course, part of the character’s arc. They may also be due to the fact that all five writers and the director are men.

Night of the Hunted pulls in a lot of buzzy ideas and mixes and matches in a way that’s sometimes clever – the sniper toys with Alice, but why would Alice (or the audience) believe he means anything he says? It’s also sometimes frustrating for a number of reasons, chief among them that the monologue never ties to anything concrete in the story. No insight is gleaned – which is fine as no insight is needed, but the film behaves as if the speechifying has relevance.

There’s tension and some smart moments, although Night of the Hunted is still just another horror movie made by men in which the female lead has no purpose or value until she finds her maternal instinct.

Fright Club

Fright Club: Backwoods Messiahs in Horror Movies

Leave a comment

What is it about one charismatic leader that can cause so much devastation? Horror filmmakers have long dug into the narcissism, vanity, and downright evil that lurks within these figures. Here are our five favorite films about a backwods Messiah.

5. The Sacrament (2014)

Ti West dives into Jim Jones territory in probably his most assured film prior to X. A cast of West regulars Joe Swanberg, AJ Bowen join the great Gene Jones for a tense news event.

West mines tensions, upends ideas of safety and power, but never dismisses the vulnerability that draws people toward charismatic figures like Father (Jones). It’s this openness that creates room for the real frights in the film.

4. Jug Face (2013)

Writer/director Chad Crawford Kinkle brings together a fine cast including The Woman’s Sean Bridgers and Lauren Ashley Carter, as well as genre favorite Larry Fessenden and late-life scream queen Sean Young to spin a backwoods yarn about incest, premonitions, kiln work, and a monster in a pit.

As a change of pace, Bridgers plays a wholly sympathetic character as Dawai, village simpleton and jug artist. On occasion, a spell comes over Dawai, and when he wakes, there’s a new jug on the kiln that bears the likeness of someone else in the village. That lucky soul must be fed to the monster in the pit so life can be as blessed and peaceful as before.

Kinkle mines for more than urban prejudice in his horror show about religious isolationists out in them woods. Young is particularly effective as an embittered wife, while Carter, playing a pregnant little sister trying to hide her bump, a jug, and an assortment of other secrets, steals the show.

3. Luz: The Flower of Evil (2019)

As colorful as a dream, Juan Diego Escobar Alzate’s feature film debut Luz: The Flower of Evil looks like magic and brims with the casual brutality of faith.

Set inside a religious community in the mountains of Colombia, the film drops us into ongoing struggles with the group’s religious leader, El Señor (Conrad Osorio). No one knows the devil as he does, he reminds his daughter Laila (Andrea Esquivel).

She lives contentedly, devoutly, along with her two adopted sisters. El Señor and the villagers consider the trio angels—just as they believe the little boy chained up out back is the Messiah who will deliver the community from its recent calamities.

2. The Other Lamb (2019)

The first step toward freedom is telling your own story.

Writer C.S. McMullen and director Malgorzata Szumowska tell this one really well. Between McMullen’s outrage and the macabre lyricism of Szumowska’s camera, The Other Lamb offers a dark, angry and satisfying coming-of-age tale.

Selah (Raffey Cassidy, Killing of a Sacred Deer, Vox Lux) has never known any life except that of Eden, the commune where she lives with the sisters, the wives, and the Sheperd (Michiel Huisman, The Invitation).

Szumowska doesn’t tell as much as she unveils: Selah’s defiant streak, Sheperd’s unspoken rules, what puberty can mean if you’re a good follower. She strings together a dreamlike series of visions that horrify on a primal level, the imagery giving the film the feel of gruesome poetry more than narrative.

The Other Lamb does not simply suggest you question authority. It demands that you do far more than that, and do it for your own good.

1. Martha Marcy May Marlene (2011)

Writer/director Sean Durkin took essentially the Charles Manson story, set it within modern privilege, and swapped the point of view to create an unnervingly realistic look at the reasons people find themselves drawn to cults.

And then, once we relate to Martha (Elizabeth Olsen), he sets the true terror in motion.

This film – through brilliantly written and beautifully directed – benefits from perhaps the best ensemble of 2011: Sarah Paulson, Christopher Abbott, Brady Corbet, Julia Garner, Hugh Dancy. But Olsen’s fearless, vulnerable turn as the woman who just doesn’t fit is only exceeded by the great John Hawes in the most mesmerizing, blistering turn of his magnificent career.

New In Theaters

Sea’s Bounty

Leave a comment

Mami Wata

by Hope Madden

Almost Shakespearean in its scope, with a bold visual style that stands on its own, C.J. Obasi’s Mami Wata delivers a spellbinding folktale of power, of matriarchy versus patriarchy.

In the mythical village of Iyi on the West African coast of a time period that could be today, or could be the recent past, Zinwe (Uzoamaka Aniunoh) has lost patience with her mother, Mama Efe (Rita Edochie). Mama Efe is the village intermediary to Mami Wata, the sea goddess who protects and provides for them. Zinwe is eager to become intermediary.

Zinwe is not the only villager growing restless with Mama Efe. Wild, angry Jabi (Kelechi Udegbe) is calling for a revolution against the madness of the Mami Wata followers. But Prisca (Evelyn Ily Juhen) believes in her village and her people and hopes to resolve the conflict.

As is the case with most fairy tales, Mama Wati is symbolic, the story itself a simplified, magical version of life. In this case, a story of power and powerlessness is reminiscent of communities across West Africa over the decades. When Jasper (Emeka Amakeze) drifts ashore, with his outsider views and experience of war, a spark is ignited that Mama Efe will not be able to drown.

Obasi amplifies the tale’s cinematic quality with breathtaking visual instincts. The costuming and makeup – magnificently structured hairstyles, incandescent makeup and boldly patterned fabrics – give the story a hypnotic feel. Cinematographer Lílis Soares ­– whose work here earned her Sundance’s special jury prize – capitalizes on the film’s gorgeous production design as well as the expressionistic black and white to create a spellbinding vision suited to the tale.

Mami Wata is a spectacle of water and light. Raindrops on a forehead, seashells in a braid, sea spray as day turns to night – Obasi builds an otherworldly atmosphere from moments like these.

The action sequences feel a little out of place, and performances can sometimes come off as stilted. But the core themes take on heartbreaking relevance, and both Ily and Amakeze offer compelling turns. Plus, you will not see another film quite like Mami Wata.

Outtakes

Good Bones

Leave a comment

15 Cameras

by Hope Madden

There have been a lot of movies that tread the same water as 15 Cameras: true crime, new homes, unannounced cameras, creepy guys, basements – among them, Victor Zarcoff’s 2015 thriller 13 Cameras.

I didn’t hold out a lot of hope for this one, honestly, but director Danny Madden (no relation), working from a fine script by PJ McCabe (co-star of 13 Cameras and writer of the criminally underseen The Beta Test), layers themes and ideas to develop a rich picture of villainy.

There’s a little hitch to the starter home recently purchased by Sky (Angela Wong Carbone) and Cam (The Wolf of Snow Hollow’s Will Madden, also no relation to me, but he is the director’s brother). They got the duplex pretty cheap, but that’s because the former owner is the famous Slumlord from a popular true crime show (full of footage from 13 Cameras), who’d wired all his homes up with many cameras, watched victims to get their habits down, then kidnapped and killed at will.

Sky can’t get enough of the show. She binges it, finishes it, and binges it again. It’s a huge turnoff for her ignored husband, and more than a little creepy to her sister Carolyn (Hilty Bowen), who’s crashing while she tries to get a restraining order against her ex.

And there you have it: one location (duplex), a handful of characters (those mentioned plus two tenants), and a found footage/true crime sensibility. Efficient, logical, but never boring and though inevitable, rarely truly predictable.

The slyest thing about 15 Cameras is the way it shows the distance between nice guy, abusive boyfriend and all out monster in inches. By keeping us with Cam’s perspective, that continuum takes on an even more powerful feel.

Will Madden does a fine job of developing an uncomfortable, believable arc for Cam. Likewise, Carbone allows her character enough space to be occasionally unlikeable, while often quite tender.

Indeed, all the performances have texture and depth, even those that might have been considered throwaways in other horror flicks. (Shout out to a very brief but memorable turn from Jim Cummings.) And the storyteller in Danny Madden knows how this should play out.

There’s nothing groundbreaking about 15 Cameras, but what it does, it does well.