Category: Horror

18Sep

[FILM NEWS] SHUDDER Announced As MONSTER FEST Sponsor

Posted in Film, Film Festivals, Film Genre, Film News, Home Page, Horror, News | Leave a comment

Australia’s premier genre film festival, MONSTER FEST, is excited to welcome the world’s premium genre film streaming service, SHUDDER, onboard as an official sponsor of 2020: MONSTER FEST.

MONSTER FEST is also pleased to reveal that this year’s festival will host the Australian Premieres of two exciting new features from the SHUDDER Original library, ahead of their 2021 release on the platform.

Fresh from its World Premiere at Montreal’s Fantasia International Film Festival where it was met with universal critical acclaim is THE DARK AND THE WICKED. This gravely unsettling and genuinely terrifying feature is the latest work of writer/director Bryan Bertino (THE STRANGERS) and follows two siblings who are at odds with an entity that is determined to end their bloodline.

Heralding from Belgium and having also premiered at this year’s Fantasia International Film Festival is HUNTED, an unrelentingly brutal and throughly refreshing take on a classic fairytale. Written and directed by Oscar-nominated filmmaker Vincent Paronnaud (PERSEPOLIS), this wild reimagining subverts a childhood fable into a game of cat and mouse where the mouse proves to be far more agile and intelligent than the cats may have anticipated.

Once again in partnership with EVENT CINEMAS, MONSTER FEST returns to Sydney, Brisbane, Perth & Adelaide from Thursday 29th of October to Sunday 1st of November for 2020: MONSTER FEST – WELCOME TO THE APOCALYPSE.

Having launched in Australian in mid-August, SHUDDER is brought to you by AMC Networks and is an experience unlike any other. SHUDDER has the largest human-curated selection of high-quality, spine-tingling, and provocative films, TV series, and originals– there’s always something new and unexpected for Shudder members to explore.

 

THE DARK AND THE WICKED
Bryan Bertino | United States 2020 | Australian Premiere

On a secluded farm, a man is slowly dying. Bedridden and fighting through his final breaths, his wife is slowly succumbing to overwhelming grief. To help their mother and say goodbye to their father, siblings Louise (Marin Ireland) and Michael (Michael Abbott Jr.) return to their family farm. It doesn’t take long for them to see that something’s wrong with mom, though—something more than her heavy sorrow. Gradually, as their own grief mounts, Louise and Michael begin suffering from a darkness similar to their mother’s, marked by waking nightmares and a growing sense that something evil is taking over their family.

 

 

HUNTED
Vincent Paronnaud | Belgium/France 2020 | Australian Premiere

Eve (Lucie Debay) meets what she thinks is a charming guy in a bar. Yet things go terribly wrong once she realizes she’s come across a psychopath and his puppet accomplice. They engage in a death chase until she decides to fight back. The forest will be her ally.

WHEN:
Thursday 29th of October – Sunday 1st of November, 2020

WHERE:

ADELAIDE: Event Cinemas Marion
BRISBANE:
 Event Cinemas Myer Centre
PERTH: Event Cinemas Innaloo
SYDNEY: Event Cinemas George Street

TICKETS:

VIP Passes (14 films) $224

Event Cinemas Ticketing

VIP Passes are strictly limited, with the initial allocation being 20 per location, with no guarantee of further VIP Passes being available at a later date. The VIP Pass gains all-access to all Monster Fest screenings and events from Thursday 29th of October to Sunday 1st of November.

5 Film Passes & Individual Session Tickets will go on sale upon final program launch.

Website: http://www.monsterfest.com.au

17Sep

[FILM INTERVIEW] CULT GIRLS – Mark Bakaitis Interview

Posted in Film, Film Genre, Home Page, Horror, Interviews, Thriller | Leave a comment

 

One of the best films to screen at last year’s Monster Fest was Australian director Mark Bakaitis’ film Cult Girls. Starring one of Australia’s most underrated actresses Saara Lamberg (Innuendo) alongside a cast that includes Jane Badler (V) and Dean Kirkwright (Charlie’s Farm). As an added bonus for heavy metal fans the film also features a very special performance from Swedish death metal band Tribulation.

“Originally we were looking to do a documentary about this Australian cult called the family,” says Bakaitis when we sit down to talk to him about the film’s home entertainment release. “We started to do some research into that and we realised that it was going to be pretty heavy doing interviews with victims and survivors and I don’t think we had the temperament to approach that subject really. So with the research I started to think that perhaps we could do something more fictional.”

Something more fictional is exactly what Bakaitis and his team did and the result was something phenomenal. A film that looks at home in an artistic cinema but contains the suspense normally reserved for a Hollywood blockbuster.

“We then had the opportunity to travel to Europe and go to Lithuania,” says Bakaitis as we begin to chat about how the film further developed after it was decided to go with the fictional angle. “We spent a few days in Germany and i was really inspired by the folk horror films of the late 1960s and the 1970s. I was inspired by films like Blood On Satan’s Claw and those classic folk horror films. I managed to weave that in some of the Lithuanian mythology that had been in my blood and came up in the film.. and we threw a little bit of black metal in there as well.”

You can listen to the full interview in our audio interview above.

Cult Girls is available on DVD now through Umbrella Entertainment.

11Sep

[MOVIE NEWS] FREAKY Trailer Released

Posted in Comedy, Film, Film Genre, Film News, Home Page, Horror, News | Leave a comment

 

The trailer for brand new film Freaky has just dropped.

repare to get Freaky with a twisted take on the body-swap movie when a teenage girl switches bodies with a relentless serial killer. 

 

Seventeen-year-old Millie Kessler (Kathryn Newton, Blockers, HBO’s Big Little Lies) is just trying to survive the bloodthirsty halls of Blissfield High and the cruelty of the popular crowd. But when she becomes the newest target of The Butcher (Vince Vaughn), her town’s infamous serial killer, her senior year becomes the least of her worries.

 

When The Butcher’s mystical ancient dagger causes him and Millie to wake up in each other’s bodies, Millie learns that she has just 24 hours to get her body back before the switch becomes permanent and she’s trapped in the form of a middle-aged maniac forever. The only problem is she now looks like a towering psychopath who’s the target of a city-wide manhunt while The Butcher looks like her and has brought his appetite for carnage to Homecoming.

 

With some help from her friends—ultra-woke Nyla (Celeste O’Connor, Ghostbusters: Afterlife), ultra-fabulous Joshua (Misha Osherovich, The Goldfinch) and her crush Booker (Uriah Shelton, Enter the Warriors Gate)—Millie races against the clock to reverse the curse while The Butcher discovers that having a female teen body is the perfect cover for a little Homecoming killing spree.

 

The film also stars Alan Ruck (HBO’s Succession), Katie Finneran (TV’s Why Women Kill) and Dana Drori (Hulu’s High Fidelity).

 

From the deliciously debased mind of writer-director Christopher Landon (Happy Death Day, the Paranormal Activity franchise) comes a pitch-black horror-comedy about a slasher, a senior, and the brutal truth about high school. 

 

Freaky is written by Christopher Landon and Michael Kennedy (Fox’s Bordertown) and is produced by Jason Blum (Halloween, The Invisible Man). The film is produced by Blumhouse Productions in association with Divide/Conquer. The executive producers are Couper Samuelson and Jeanette Volturno.

 

06Sep

[GIVEAWAY] DREAMKATCHER Giveaway

Posted in Film, Film Genre, Film News, Giveaways, Home Page, Horror, Thriller | Leave a comment

 

Thanks to our good friend at Defiant! Screen Entertainment we have 5 copies of the brand new horror thriller Dreamkatcher to giveaway.

Dreamkatcher stars Radha Mitchell and Lin Shaye and has already received rave review from some of the top horror outlets.

For your chance to win a copy simply like our Facebook page and then through private message tell us what your favourite Lin Shaye film is and why.

17Aug

[FILM REVIEW] THE HUNT Review (2020)

Posted in Action, Film, Film Genre, Home Page, Horror, Thriller | Leave a comment

Summary: Two women face off as a deadly game called The Hunt goes completly off track.

Year: 2020

Australian Cinema Release Date: TBA

Thailand Cinema Release Date: 12th August 2020

Australian VOD Release Date: 9th April 2020

Country: USA

Director: Craig Zobel

Screenwriter: Nick Cuse, Damon Lindelof

Cast: Hannah Alline (Flight Attendant/Not Stewardess/Kelly), Usmine Ally (Crisis Mike), Alexander Babara (Bojan), Walter Babington (Bandana Man), Ike Barinholtz (Staten Island), Christopher Berry (Target), Reed Birney (Pop), Macon Blair (Fauxnvoy), Steve Coulter (The Doctor), Sylvia Grace Crim (Dead Sexy), Wayne Duvall (Don), Ariel Eliaz (Dino), Betty Gilpin (Crystal), Glenn Howerton (Richard), Jason Kirkpatrick (Rannnndeeee), Jim Klock (Captain O’Hara), J.C. MacKenzie (Paul), Amy Madigan (Ma), Steve Mokate (Sgt. Dale), Kate Nowlin (Big Red), Vince Pisani (Peter), Emma Roberts (Yoga Pants), Sturgill Simpson (Vanilla Nice), Charlie Slaughter (Young Crystal), Ethan Suplee ((Shut The F**k Up) Gary), Hilary Swank (Athena), Dean J. West (Martin), Teri Wyble (Liberty), Tadasay Young (Nicole)

Running Time: 90 mins

Classification: MA15+ (Australia), 18 (Thailand)

 

 

OUR THE HUNT MONSTER REVIEWS & RATINGS:

 

Dave Griffiths’ The Hunt Review:

In a year where people have learnt to embrace films in ways that they haven’t previously the one genre that seems to have topped all others has been the horror genre. While The Wretched topped the US Box Office just before the lockdown Leigh Whannell’s The Invisible Man found itself scoring five star reviews from some of the world’s top film journalists.

While those two results seemed to surprise fans of the genre the film they were eagerly anticipating was director Craig Zobel’s (Compliance) The Hunt. The excitement around the release was hardly surprising – Zobel’s post-apocalyptic thriller Z For Zachariah is one of the most under-rated films of the last decade while The Hunt was the latest film to come out of Blumhouse stable, a production company who rarely produce a dud.

The film itself is basically an adult version of The Hunger Games with some extra quirk thrown in for good measure. The opening scenes of The Hunt pretty much The Hunger Games but do quickly establish that characters like Crystal (Betty Gilpin – Stuber) are involved in a deadly game that has been set up by the mysterious Athena (Hilary Swank – Million Dollar Baby) But what exactly is the game that Crystal has found herself in? And why the hell has Athena set something up some vicious and cruel?

Those are the questions that the audience are asked to explore, but to be honest the road to getting those answers is un-original and at times plain boring. While the screenwriting team of Nick Cuse (Watchmen) and Damon Lindelof (Lost) try to give the film its own originality with some quirky Kevin Smith style black humour it does nothing to lift any interest in the film’s plot at all.

While the idea of losing characters on mass and at a whim throughout the early stages of the film may have made the script look like a horror film with a difference it just doesn’t work on the screen. Introducing characters and then having them killed or disappearing straight away makes it nearly impossible for the audience to get a vested interest in the film. It is also does nothing but waste the talents of quality performers like Emma Roberts (We’re The Millers).

While the film does gain a little bit of traction when it becomes a battle between Crystal and Athena even that comes to a crashing end with a lacklustre finale that any decent horror fan will have seen close a film a million times previously. To be honest that little battle royale comes a little bit too late for the interest of the audience as well. The film’s inability to engage its audience early on really does mean that you never really care for Crystal the way you should and again there are a lot of scenes throughout the film that are just too similar to other recent films like Peppermint.

The only winner out of this film is the star Betty Gilpin. While everyone falls around her her performance as Crystal is enough to at times back you forget the clichés that is holding the film back. She brilliantly delivers whatever is thrown at her – action, gore and black comedy. Her scenes with Hillary Swank are at times the only things making the film watchable and for that Gilpin deserves a lot of credit.

The Hunt never really lives up to the hype that came before it. Fans of genuine horror will give it a wide berth after just one viewing while it’s quirkiness and gore is probably enough to put off the casual cinema goer. If you’re looking for a decent gorey, catch-me-if-you-can horror then bypass The Hunt and try to find a way to watch Tony D’Aquino’s The Furies instead.

 

The Hunt is rated 18. It is available on a number of streaming services and will open in select Thai cinemas on August 12th.

 

 

 

 

 

Average Subculture Rating:

 

 

IMDB Rating:

The Hunt (2020) on IMDb

Other Subculture Entertainment The Hunt Reviews:

Nil.

 

Trailer:

15Aug

[FILM NEWS] MONSTER FEST 2020 First Wave Films Announced

Posted in Film, Film Festivals, Film Genre, Film News, Home Page, Horror, News, Sci-Fi / Fantasy | Leave a comment

 

Australia’s premier genre film festival, MONSTER FEST, returns to Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Perth & Adelaide from Thursday 29th of October to Sunday 1st of November for 2020: MONSTER FEST – WELCOME TO THE APOCALYPSE.

Once again in partnership with EVENT CINEMAS and CINEMA NOVA, 2020: MONSTER FEST will see all five cities play host to four days of diverse and highly imaginative film programming; a celebration of the latest and greatest genre cinema from around the world.

Following its World Premiere at the Sundance Film Festival where it was met with universal praise, we are pleased to announce that the sci-fi/horror POSSESSOR will be our Opening Night Film of the festival, in its Australian Premiere. Abstract, immersive and unflinchingly brutal, POSSESSOR is the sophomore feature of Brandon Cronenberg (ANTIVIRAL) and is a truly remarkable work of cinema that reaffirms Brandon’s status as a visionary filmmaker. Christopher Abbott (IT COMES AT NIGHT) and Andrea Riseborough (MANDY) give exceptional performances in this sophisticated story of a corporate assassin who may have inhabited the wrong body in which to enact her next mission.

For the first-time in MONSTER FEST history, we are excited to announce that we will host the World Premiere of OCCUPATION: RAINFALL simultaneously across all five festivals. Filmmaker Luke Sparke‘s highly anticipated follow-up to the 2018 Aussie sci-fi blockbuster sees Ken Jeong (THE HANGOVER Trilogy) and Daniel Gillies (THE ORIGINALS) join a returning cast that includes Temuera Morrison (AQUAMAN), Dan Ewing (BEAST NO MORE) and Trystan Go (THE FAMILY LAW). Picking up two years after the events of OCCUPATION, the war for earth rages on, however the alien invaders are no longer our only threat as factions form between survivors and the race to save mankind is on.

Steven Kostanski, formerly of Canadian film collective Astron-6, follows up his acclaimed 2016 Lovecraftian love letter THE VOID with the light-hearted and ultra-violent slice of cosmic comedy/adventure, PSYCHO GOREMAN, making its Australian Premiere. This small-town tale of intergalactic proportions follows two kids who are in possession of a highly coveted magical amulet that allows them the ability to control an ancient alien overlord.

Modern takes on the works of William Shakespeare were all the rage in the nineties with films such as Baz Luhrmann’s highly-stylised ROMEO & JULIET, the Heath Ledger breakout hit 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU and of course the dirty granddaddy of them all Lloyd Kaufman‘s TROMEO & JULIET. If you thought that TROMEO & JULIET was the greatest Shakespearean adaptation ever committed to celluloid (yes, even above Kenneth Branagh), prepare yourself for #SHAKESPEARESSHITSTORM, as Lloyd and the Troma team go back to the Bard for their latest outing. #SHAKESPEARESSHITSTORM is a modern retelling of Shakespeare’s THE TEMPEST but with the drier aspects removed and/or improved upon by the inclusion of excess bodily fluids, hyper-violence, gore and in fact anything that could potentially be deemed offensive, in fact we’ll be surprised if this film isn’t #cancelled before its Australian Premiere at MONSTER FEST.

Following up an instant cult classic like ROBOCOP is no mean feat but filmmaker Paul Verhoeven is no ordinary filmmaker, not only did he rise to the challenge, he crushed it with his fearless, subversive and visionary take on legendary author Phillip K. Dick’s classic tale of caveat emptor. Join Arnie and the gang as we go a vicarious vacay to Mars to celebrate Quaid’s divorce and of course the 30th Anniversary of this sci-fi/action classic with the Australian Premiere of an all-new 4K Restoration of TOTAL RECALL.

 

POSSESSOR
Brandon Cronenberg | Canada / UK  2020 | Australian Premiere

From the mind of writer/director Brandon Cronenberg, POSSESSOR is an arresting sci-fi/horror about elite, corporate assassin Tasya Vos (Andrea Riseborough). Using brain-implant technology, Vos takes control of other people’s bodies to execute high profile targets. As she sinks deeper into her latest assignment Vos becomes trapped inside a mind (Christopher Abbott) that threatens to obliterate her.

 

OCCUPATION: RAINFALL
Luke Sparke | Australia 2020 | World Premiere

OCCUPATION: RAINFALL occurs two years into an intergalactic invasion of earth, while survivors fight back in a desperate ground war. As casualties mount by the day, the resistance and their unexpected allies uncover a plot that could see the war come to a decisive end. With the alien invaders hell-bent on making Earth their new home, the race is on to save mankind.

 

PSYCHO GOREMAN
Steven Kostanski | Canada 2020 | Australian Premiere

Siblings Mimi (Nita-Josee Hanna) and Luke (Owen Myre) unwittingly resurrect an ancient alien overlord (Matthew Ninaber). Using a magical amulet, they force the monster to obey their childish whims, and accidentally attract a rogues’ gallery of intergalactic assassins to small-town suburbia.

 

#SHAKESPEARESSHITSTORM
Lloyd Kaufman | United States 2020 | Australian Premiere

Prospero (played by director/co-writer Lloyd Kaufman), a brilliant and generous pharma-scientist, has had his life and career ruined by blind, greedy, perverted pharmaceutical execs, causing him and his very hot daughter Miranda to flee from NYC to Tromaville, New Jersey. When the evil execs and their elite guests take a celebratory luxury cruise to North Korea, Prospero uses his science, magic, and a load of whale laxative to create the titular Shitstorm, wrecking the cruise ship and causing its execs to wash up on the shores of Tromaville. Prospero’s planned a brutal revenge – with all the sex, mutations, musical numbers, and violence that Shakespeare always wanted but never had!

 

TOTAL RECALL – 4K RESTORATION
Paul Verhoeven | United States 1990 | Australian Premiere

Haunted by recurring dreams of another life on Mars, Douglas Quaid (Arnold Schwarzenegger) is drawn to Rekall Incorporate to implant virtual vacation memories of Mars, using a special program with the identity of a secret agent. Something goes wrong and the procedure is interrupted. The life of Douglas turns upside down, and he travels to the red planet trying to discover who he is.
WHEN:
Thursday 29th of October – Sunday 1st of November, 2020

WHERE:ADELAIDE: Event Cinemas Marion
BRISBANE:
 Event Cinemas Myer Centre
MELBOURNE: Cinema Nova 
PERTH: Event Cinemas Innaloo
SYDNEY: Event Cinemas George Street

TICKETS:

VIP Passes (14 films) $220 – $224

Cinema Nova Ticketing
Event Cinemas Ticketing

VIP Passes are strictly limited, with the initial allocation being 20 per location, with no guarantee of further VIP Passes being available at a later date. The VIP Pass gains all-access to all Monster Fest screenings and events from Thursday 29th of October to Sunday 1st of November.

5 Film Passes & Individual Session Tickets will go on sale upon final program launch.

15Aug

[FILM INTERVIEW] BLACK WATER: ABYSS – Andrew Traucki Interview

Posted in Film, Film Genre, Home Page, Horror, Interviews, Thriller | Leave a comment

 

When it comes to genre filmmaking Australian filmmakers have always punched well out of their weight division. The result has been a number of Australian made genre films doing well overseas while names like George Miller, James Wan and Leigh Whannell have become household names for fans of the genre art-form.

Now director Andrew Traucki is about to take that huge step with his latest film Black Water: Abyss now showing in cinemas in Phuket. The award-winning filmmaker has perfected his craft over the years with brilliant horror thrillers such as The Reef and The Jungle while his latest film is a sequel to the film that started it all for him – 2007’s Black Water.

Traucki laughs as he talks to The Phuket News about what made him want to do a follow-up to his lauded crocodile horror thirteen years later. “Well someone had to write it,” he says laughing loudly. “It is an interesting question though because my journey has never been one of instant success. Every one of these films has been a struggle to make because of the financing side of things. So, for me it was a mixture of not really knowing if I wanted to make another film because I didn’t want to be pigeon-holed as the ‘crocodile guy’ so I went on and did other things… but it does seem like people prefer my animal movies.”

And animals certainly do play an important part of Traucki’s films… or perhaps we should say creatures. Black Water: Abyss like its predecessor sees a group of cave explorers, led by Jennifer (Jessica McNamee – The Meg) and Eric (Luke Mitchell – Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D.), trapped underground in a cave system with rising waters and a killer crocodile who wants to defend his territory.

It was that mixture of the cave and the crocodile that made Traucki want to be involved after he read the initial screenplay. “That was one of the greatest appeals of the script,” he explains. “Not only do I get to play with a crocodile, which is a top apex predator which makes it pretty scary, it is also all set in the dark while the original was all set in the day. So yeah, there is nothing quite like the darkness to make the film scary. That and them trapped in a cave with rising water and that felt like a pretty scary scenario.”

Of course though filming in and around water can be an absolute nightmare for a film crew and again Traucki laughs when we point out that it seems to be something that he has done in a few of his films now. “It is hellish, I don’t know why I keep doing it,” he says again laughing loudly. “I must have been a bad person in a past lifetime and now karma is catching up with me… that must be the reason why I keep coming back to water.”

“Look, I love water. I live by the beach and I surf all the time,” he admits. “I think that it is a great texture and an element to a film but it is difficult to film with. Gear gets destroyed and all kinds of mishaps can happen, people can get really cold and they catch hypothermia. It can be really slow going because you have to go through this stuff every day. So yeah, it is not an easy thing to work with but it just so happens that sharks and crocodiles live in the stuff so we have had to make these things with that added element of water.”

As the interview goes on it soon becomes very obvious that Traucki was also very excited about being able to work with such a talented Australian cast. “Luke was pretty keen to be involved,” he says as we talk about the film’s star Australian actor Luke Mitchell who over the past few years has been working in the U.S. on shows such as Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D and Blindspot. “He wanted to come home for a bit. His mother lives on the Gold Coast and we were filming in Brisbane. I think Jess (McNamee) wanted to come home for a bit as well because she is L.A. based.

“They were both motivated by the script as well,” he says still focussing on the stars. “But they also did both want to come home, and they had seen my previous work. So that is how we got them in the end, but it is never an easy road with casting.”

The hard-work that has gone into Black Water: Abyss is obvious and this is the kind of horror-thriller that will keep its audience on the edge of their seat… while they make a mental note to never set foot in the water again.

 

Black Water: Abyss opened in Phuket cinemas on August 12th.