Tag: Horror
Island of Death (Ta Paidia Tou Diavolou) is a 1976 exploitation horror film written and directed by Nico Mastorakis. Most notable as the founder and owner of independent film studio Omega Pictures and Omega Entertainment, Nico is well-versed in film production, writing, and directing with over 40 different features such as Death Has Blue Eyes
One of the crowning glories of the horror film genre is how much can be done with so little. From budget to effects to characters, indie horror films prove time and time again that ingenuity and vision make for great fright, not a crowded screen and a high budget (although it can be magic when
Maniac Driver is a 2020 Japanese horror thriller, written and directed by Kurando Mitsutake. Mitsutake has worked in many areas of film production but is most notable as director of Samurai Avenger: The Blind Wolf (2009) and Gun Woman (2014). Following a personal tragedy, a taxi driver randomly stalks and kills his female passengers in
Eichi Sato, known better in the following years for his work on the live-action adaptations of Lychee Hikari Club (2016) and Miso Misou (2018), found his way to shock us from the very beginning with his debut movie. Let’s Make the Teacher Have a Miscarriage Club (2011) is a film with many flaws, but its
After File 01 went off with a bang, Koji Shiraishi’s Senritsu Kaiki File Kowasugi! File 02: Shivering Ghost (2012) tries something different and turns out unexpectedly good. The first episode of the mockumentary series didn’t disappoint in serving Koji’s found footage brands and Japanese myth goodness, showing how his knack for storytelling and genre
Audition (1999) is the scariest movie of all time. I say that without hesitation or hyperbole. No other director is as effective with their imagery as Takashi Miike is here, and no other film elicits fright as consistently on a tenth viewing as the first. The film is a delightful descent into madness executed nigh
Paraphrasing the words of a certain author, it is a truth universally acknowledged that a book will be almost always better than its movie adaptation. Yes, almost always because, despite the clear propensity of the written source being much more interesting and developed, sometimes flukes happen and the movie is indeed superior. That is why
It’s understandable why Japanese filmmakers focus so often on the feudal era in their horror cinema. It’s a setting so naturally horrific in the plight and pain of the peasant class that few supernatural elements are necessary to invoke dread in audiences. The stark reality of daily life alone is enough to make the viewer
It has now been 24 hours since I watched Pulse (2001), and I still find myself at a loss. It was a movie that I desperately wanted to enjoy, a cardinal sin for a reviewer who should go in with a blank slate and little expectations. The weight of preconceived notions can hang about the
If Ugetsu is what kickstarted the Japanese tradition of Edo Gothic, Kaneto Shindo may have perfected it with Onibaba (1964). It’s a horror film that doesn’t resort to horror, a ghost story with no ghosts. Its evils reside in all too familiar sources: resentment, human nature, and religious hypocrisy, all woven seamlessly through its narrative