Tag Archives: The Ugly Stepsister
Fright Club: Best Horror Movies, First Half of 2025
It is not that time!
It is! It most definitely is time to celebrate how great the first half of 2025 has been for horror. Indeed, easily the best film of the year so far (and a tough contender for the balance of the year) is a vampire movie! Here are our favorite horror films of the first half of 2025.
10. Dead Mail
Filmmakers Joe DeBoer and Kyle McConaghy’s thriller Dead Mail builds on a wildly unrealistic concept: smalltown post offices with super-secure back rooms where pains are taken and spies may be accessed to solve mysteries behind lost mail. And yet, their analog approach to this period piece gives it a true crime feel you never fully shake.
The bulk of the film is carried on John Fleck’s shoulders. As Trent, the seemingly harmless organ enthusiast who has a man trapped in his basement, Fleck’s delivers magnificent work. There’s a beautiful loneliness in his performance that makes the villainous Trent irredeemably sympathetic.
Filmmaker and cast investment pays off. Dead Mail is clever, intriguing and wholly satisfying little thriller.
9. Final Destination: Bloodlines
Final Destination: Bloodlines is the best since James Wong’s clever 2000 original, if not the best in the whole franchise. And the presence of genre beloved Tony Todd in his final role seals the emotional deal.
The Rube Goldberg of Death franchise boasts many clever, nasty kills and the sixth episode does not let us down. Smart, nutty and goretastic with some of the most impressive comic-beat editing of the year, the bloody mayhem in this film is giddy with its power.
Plus we all get to spend a few more minutes with Tony Todd.
8. Hood Witch
Co-writer/director Saïd Belktibia examines the muddy difference between a religion’s acceptable magic and harmful witchcraft. However similar the practice, the differentiator seems to be based primarily on whether a woman benefits.
Though Hood Witch is far more a drama/thriller than an outright horror film, it does follow a longstanding genre tradition of using witchcraft to point out religions’ hypocrisy and misogyny. But the filmmaker goes further, complicating characters by implicating capitalism as being equally dangerous—particularly to the desperate and easily manipulated—as religion.
Hood Witch is a tough watch, as misogyny and apathy play out in the film the same way they play out every miserable day, infecting each generation like a poison.
7. Companion
It’s not to say that writer/director Drew Hancock is saying anything new, exactly. Most of the ideas are borrowed, and even the look of Companion feels cribbed from more insightfully stylized films. But the way he puts these ideas and images into play and keeps them playing guarantees a mischievously, wickedly good time.
Lars and the Real Girl meets Revenge meets AI meets maybe twenty other movies, but damn if Hancock and this sharp ensemble doesn’t make it work. Turns out it’s kind of fun to be on the side of AI for a change.
6. Freaky Tales
Look, I’m not saying I didn’t expect someone to make a Sleepy-Floyd-as-a-ninja-assassin horror comedy. I am saying I didn’t expect it to be Boden and Fleck.
Eric “Sleepy” Floyd played thirteen years in the NBA, making the All Star team in 1987 as a member of the Golden State Warriors. Freaky Tales makes him the heroic centerpiece of a wild anthology that loves the late 80s, Oakland, and Nazis dying some horrible deaths.
Let’s party!
Buried under all this blood and camp, the film displays a genuine love of time, place and genre that you cannot ignore. These Freaky Tales are truly off the leash, usually in the best possible way.
5. Bring Her Back
Filmmakers Danny and Michael Philippou drew attention in 2022 for their wildly popular feature debut, Talk to Me. Before releasing the sequel, due out this August, the pair changes the game up with a different, but at least equally disturbing, look at grief.
It’s a slow burn, a movie that communicates dread brilliantly with its cinematography and pacing. But when Bring Her Back hits the gas, dude! Nastiness not for the squeamish! Especially if you have a thing about teeth, be warned. But the body horror always serves the narrative, deepening your sympathies even as it has you hiding your eyes.
Australia has a great habit of sending unsettling horror our way. The latest package from Down Under doesn’t disappoint.
4. The Monkey
Why is it that so many kids’ toys are creepy? Not that you should call The Monkey a toy. You should not, ever. Because this windup organ grinder monkey, with its red eyes and horrifyingly realistic teeth, is more of a furry, murder happy nightmare.
The film itself is a match made in horror heaven. Osgood Perkins (Longlegs, Gretel & Hansel, The Blackcoat’s Daughter) adapts and directs the short story by Stephen King about sibling rivalry and the unpredictability of death.
Perkins surrounds deliberately low energy leads with bizarre, colorful characters—even more colorful when they catch fire, explode, are disemboweled, etcetera. The film is laced with wonderful bursts of Final Destination-like bloodletting, as the Monkey’s executions are carried out via Rube Goldberg chain reactions that quickly become fun to anticipate.
Yes, fun. And funny.
3. Invader
Lean, mean and affecting, Mickey Keating’s take on the home invasion film wastes no time. In a wordless—though not soundless—opening, the filmmaker introduces an unhinged presence.
Immediately Keating sets our eyes and ears against us. His soundtrack frequently blares death metal, a tactic that emphasizes a chaotic, menacing mood the film never shakes. Using primarily handheld cameras from the unnerving opening throughout the entire film, the filmmaker maintains an anarchic energy, a sense of the characters’ frenzy and the endless possibility of violence.
Joe Swanberg, with limited screentime and even more limited dialog, crafts a terrifying image of havoc. His presence is perversely menacing, an explosion of rage and horror. Invader delivers a spare, nasty, memorable piece of horror in just over an hour. It will stick with you a while longer.
2. The Ugly Stepsister
Writer/director Emilie Blichfeldt infuses her feature debut with an impossible-to-ignore blast of sharp wit, subdued rage, and grotesque bodily horrors.
The Ugly Stepsister (Den stygge stesøsteren) is the latest new angle to a classic tale, but don’t expect it follow the trend of humanizing misunderstood villains. Blichfeldt makes sure there are plenty of bad guys and girls throughout this Norwegian Cinderella story, punctuated by grisly violence surprisingly close to what’s in the 17th Century French version of the fairy tale penned by Charles Perrault.
It is fierce, funny, gross and subversively defiant. But is one feature film enough to immediately put Blichfeldt on the watch list of cinema’s feminist hell raisers?
Yes. The shoe fits.
1. Sinners
Best Films, First Half of 2025
If the heat doesn’t get under your skin, maybe this will: 2025 is half over! What? I guess we should get those Christmas decorations down. But it has been quite a year already in terms of movies. From Ryan Coogler’s masterpiece to a grown up spy movie, incredible indie horror to revelatory documentary, awkward buddy comedies to beautiful dramas, the year already has it all. So much, in fact, that we couldn’t stop at 10!
11. Eephus
It’s mid-October in a small New Hampshire town, and rec league teams are assembling to wrap up the season at Soldiers Field. Some bellies are a bit larger, some fastballs are a bit slower, but the cracks are as wise as ever and the love of the game has never wavered. And though what bleachers there are will be nearly empty, Franny (Cliff Blake) will be keeping the scorebook as usual, and there may even be fireworks after the final out.
Because next year, local development will bulldoze the field, and these players may have to accept a future without that diamond life.
Director/co-writer (and veteran cinematographer) Carson Lund finds the emotional pull that exists in the space between an enduring game and the souls forced to let it move on without them. The ensemble cast (including legendary MLB free spirt Bill “Spaceman” Lee on hand to perfectly illustrate the titular type of pitch) is authentic and eccentric in equal measure, and anyone who has ever spent time around the ballfield will recognize these people, and the simpler way of life that may also be slipping away.
10. My Dead Friend Zoe
Filmmaker Kyle Hausmann-Stokes impresses with his feature debut, My Dead Friend Zoe. Based on his 2022 short Merit x Zoe, the film follows Army veteran Merit (Sonequa Martin-Green, Star Trek: Discovery) as she tries to overcome some post-Afghanistan trauma.
While the title and premise may sound a tad flippant, My Dead Friend Zoe turns out to be a rewarding and earnest drama. Natalie Morales delivers a boldly funny and equally vulnerable turn, and love interest Alex (Utkarsh Ambudkar) injects the film with charming, self-deprecating humor. But the levity tends to enrich the film’s truly human quality rather than distract from its underlying tensions.
9. Mickey 17
People mainly familiar with filmmaker Bong Joon Ho’s Oscar-sweeping masterpiece Parasite may not know of his remarkable skill with a SciFi creature feature. Mickey 17, then, will be an excellent primer.
Robert Pattinson is the titular Mickey. Well, he’s a bunch of Mickeys, all 17 of them. He’s a hilarious, self-deprecating charmer, a man who believes he somehow deserves his fate. Fates. Through him the filmmaker employs absurd, sometimes even slapstick humor to satirize our own current fate. Beautifully (and characteristically), all of this is in favor of the reminder that our humanity requires us to be humane.
Weaving sensibilities and ideas present in Snowpiercer, Okja, The Host as well as any number of clone movies, Mickey 17 could feel borrowed. It doesn’t. Like the best science fiction, it feels close enough to reality to be a bit nightmarish.
8. Surviving Ohio State
A searing takedown of abuse, power and heartbreaking betrayal, HBO’s Surviving Ohio State deconstructs the decades of alleged abuse of athletes by Ohio State University physician Richard Strauss. Based on the reporting of Sports Illustrated writer Jon Wertheim and directed with a patient hand by Eva Orner, the film features first-person interviews with victims that reveal the timeline of a calculating predator and shatter a pervasive myth.
Amid a backdrop of social media posts that doubt how big, strong athletes could become easy prey, the men detail just how and why they felt powerless to stop the atrocities. The only thing more heartbreaking is how the coaches they looked up to (yes, including Congressman Jim Jordan) and the university they still love refused to support them once the whispers became screams and the accusations grew too big to ignore.
The one or two occasions where the film tries to connect dots for us are the exceptions in a measured and precise exposé. Surviving Ohio State is no joy to watch, but it’s too important to ignore.
7. Sacramento
Michael Anganaro’s instincts are sharp in Sacramento, only his second feature as writer/director after decades of acting gigs. He co-stars wth Michael Cera as two men with differing challenges facing adult life who take a weird road trip down memory lane. It’s a witty combination of finely-drawn characters, consistently boasting a dry self-awareness that earns the LOLs.
Sacramento haș plenty of fun with arrested development – Cera’s desperate phone calls to one of his old buddies are awkwardly hilarious. But the film’s heart comes from those moments when boys (and girls, too) start accepting the responsibilities of adulthood. It’s far from a new story, but these characters make it one worth revisiting.
6. Friendship
Writer/director Andrew DeYoung harnesses the essence of Tim Robinson’s socially awkward comedic stylings, attached it to Paul Rudd’s impeccable comic delivery, and crafted the most profoundly uncomfortable and endlessly watchable bromance in film.
Friendship is a bizarro-world I Love You, Man, and it is so much more than what that tantalizing trailer promises. Unpredictable, absurd, cringy, perfectly cast and that coat! How priceless is that coat?!
It’s maybe the funniest film of 2025.
5. Invader
Lean, mean and affecting, Mickey Keating’s take on the home invasion film wastes no time. In a wordless—though not soundless—opening, the filmmaker introduces an unhinged presence.
Immediately Keating sets our eyes and ears against us. His soundtrack frequently blares death metal, a tactic that emphasizes a chaotic, menacing mood the film never shakes. Using primarily handheld cameras from the unnerving opening throughout the entire film, the filmmaker maintains an anarchic energy, a sense of the characters’ frenzy and the endless possibility of violence.
Joe Swanberg, with limited screentime and even more limited dialog, crafts a terrifying image of havoc. His presence is perversely menacing, an explosion of rage and horror. Invader delivers a spare, nasty, memorable piece of horror in just over an hour. It will stick with you a while longer.
4. Black Bag
What is more diabolical: enacting a global plan for widespread destruction, or pursuing a selfish agenda in your relationship, ready to twist the knife precisely where it hurts your partner the most?
Black Bag has a satchel full of fun weighing the two options, as director Steven Soderbergh and a crackling ensemble contrast the power plays in both love connections and spy games.
Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett (already sounds good, right?) are downright delicious as Londoners George Woodhouse and Kathryn St. Jean, master spies and devoted spouses. He’s emotionless and tidy, an expert cook, and a dogged sleuth with a hatred of dishonesty. She’s cool, calculating and seductive, with a wry sense of humor, a prescription for anxiety meds and a sudden cloud of suspicion around her.
Throw in a fine meal beforehand, and you’ve got a damn fine date night that just might put you in a pretty friendly mood when you get home.
3. The Ugly Stepsister
Writer/director Emilie Blichfeldt infuses her feature debut with an impossible-to-ignore blast of sharp wit, subdued rage, and grotesque bodily horrors.
The Ugly Stepsister (Den stygge stesøsteren) is the latest new angle to a classic tale, but don’t expect it follow the trend of humanizing misunderstood villains. Blichfeldt makes sure there are plenty of bad guys and girls throughout this Norwegian Cinderella story, punctuated by grisly violence surprisingly close to what’s in the 17th Century French version of the fairy tale penned by Charles Perrault.
It is fierce, funny, gross and subversively defiant. But is one feature film enough to immediately put Blichfeldt on the watch list of cinema’s feminist hell raisers?
Yes. The shoe fits.
2. Pee-wee as Himself
If there’s one thing Matt Wolf’s 2-part documentary Pee-wee as Himself does, it reminds you what a cultural phenomenon Pee-wee Herman was in the 80s. Movies to TV to MTV to toys to talk shows, he was everywhere and he was beloved by children, college kids, and adults alike.
Charmingly acerbic but often candid, Paul Reubens is openly reluctant to hand over control of his image after so many years of calculating every detail of his public life. Part of what makes the film so electric is how early and often the two butt heads over which of them ought to be in control of the documentary. This conflict itself paints a portrait of the artist more authentic than any amount of historical data ever could.
1. Sinners
Beauty and the Beatings
The Ugly Stepsister
by George Wolf
Are we done clutching our pearls about the recent Snow White update? They’re about to get plenty gooey.
Really, writer/director Emilie Blichfeldt doesn’t care either way, she’s too busy infusing her feature debut with an impossible-to-ignore blast of sharp wit, subdued rage, and grotesque bodily horrors.
Yes, The Ugly Stepsister (Den stygge stesøsteren) the latest new angle to a classic tale, but don’t expect it follow the trend of humanizing misunderstood villains. Blichfeldt makes sure there are plenty of bad guys and girls throughout this Norwegian Cinderella story, punctuated by grisly violence surprisingly close to what’s in the 17th Century French version of the fairy tale penned by Charles Perrault.
As her mother Rebekka (Ane Del Torp) is set to marry the wealthy Otto (Ralph Carlsson), braces-wearing, teenage gawk Elvira (Lea Myren, amazing) dreams of one day marrying handsome Prince Julian (Isac Calmroth). But not long after Mom, Elvira and sister Alma (Flo Fagerli) move into Otto’s manor, he drops dead and new stepsister Agnes (the awesomely named Thea Sofie Loch Næss) drops a bomb.
Otto was the one trying to marry for money. They’re broke.
You know the plan that’s hatched: Elvira has to marry Prince Julian. If she can prove herself to be the most beautiful and charming of the “noble virgins” assembled at the upcoming ball, Elvira can secure the family’s future. Neither physical imperfection nor that slut Agnes is going to get in Elvira’s way.
As Elvira learns that “beauty is pain,” Blichfeldt’s aesthetic recalls both Cronenberg and Fargeat, with wince-inducing procedures, the oozing of bodily fluids, and a proud, unflinching satirical lens. This is Blichfeldt’s reminder that these impossible beauty standards have a long history, as do slut shaming, compromised nobility and the limited options of desperation.
Plenty of ugliness to go around.
Myren carries the film with a transformational performance that parallels the impressive physical changes. Elvira arrives as a shy, impressionable child, but when she begins to resemble the required standard, the toll to keep it – while not quite as garish as in The Substance – is equally destructive.
The Ugly Stepsister is fierce, funny, gross and subversively defiant. But is one feature film enough to immediately put Blichfeldt on the watch list of cinema’s feminist hell raisers?
Yes. The shoe fits.
