Author: Paul Wooldridge
The Ugly Stepsister (2025) is Norwegian writer and director Emilie Blichfeldt’s debut feature that combines a reworked fairytale with stomach-churning body horror while satirising the appalling steps women must take when gaining a wealthy husband is the highest aspiration a woman could have. This Cinderella tale is shown from the point of view of Elvira
MadS (2024) introduces us to a group of affluent French teenagers as they prepare for an evening of local house parties on the rural edge of an unnamed town. Romain (Milton Riche), dressed in shorts and an unbuttoned designer shirt, is seen visiting his dealer, snorting some unknown red powder, before jumping into his father’s
Back in 2014, Jennifer Kent not only brought us a wonderfully tense, but now overused, metaphor for traumatic grief in her debut feature, The Babadook (2014) but also heralded the now arguably more overused and misunderstood concept of “Elevated Horror”. Ever since the mid-2010s the idea that a certain type of horror film was somehow
The best science fiction is always built upon interesting ideas, and the best horror lives and dies with its ability to scare or unsettle. Possessor (2020), against both measures, is a fantastic piece of modern sci-fi horror! Directed by Brandon Cronenberg, Possessor (2020) is set within a slick Ballardian near-future, where corporations have moved on
Jonathon Glazer’s latest directorial offering, The Zone of Interest (2023) is an understated, yet powerfully urgent warning of how easily humanity can be lost if we are allowed to lose ourselves to unquestioned, hateful dogma, at the exclusion of all else. On the face of it, if the viewer knew nothing of history or the
Coming in at under 90 minutes, Cobweb (2023) is a relatively star-studded little gem, perfectly suited for an entertaining bit of Halloween indulgence. Directed by Sam Bodin (who has Netflix TV Series Marianne to his name) Cobweb stars Cloverfield’s Lizzy Caplan and The Boys’ Anthony Starr, as oddly overbearing parents to a sensitive pre-teen named
Dark Windows is a 2023 American horror written by Ulrvik Kraft and directed by Alex Herron in his first feature-length film. Three teenagers, who were all involved in the fatal car accident that killed their friend, head to a remote farmhouse to grieve and overcome their recent trauma. It quickly becomes clear, however, that someone holds
The Latent Image is a 2022 British gay horror mystery, written and directed by Alexander McGregor Birrell with additional writing from the film’s main star, Joshua Tonks. Beginning his career in 2010, Alexander began directing the feature-length sci-fi horror Braincell (2010) and has since directed a number of short films. Whereas the film’s writer/main star
“I came out early, I couldn’t take it”“I hated it”“I loved it and won’t have a word said against it!”– Quotes overheard in the foyer, after having seen Skinamarink. Written and directed by Kyle Edward Ball and shot on a micro-budget at his childhood Canadian home, Skinamarink (2022) is inspired by a childhood nightmare. Pirated,
Having just landed on Shudder UK, The Final Wish (2018) is director Timothy Woodward Jr’s third film and boasts a story from Jeffery Reddick, writer of the first two Final Destination films; a fact that is emblazoned across the film’s trailer. Micheal Welch plays Aaron, a young law graduate who’s failing to make a living