Tag Archives: It Follows

This Little Pit Stop of EVIL Doesn’t Have Gumdrops and Lollipops. “Candy Land” reviewed! (MVD Visual / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Visit “Candy Land” On Blu-ray. Purchase Here!

Candy Land is the bestowed designation of a truck stop at one of the last exits through Bible Belt country.  The monikered hotspot is home to four prostitutes, Sadie, Riley, Levi, and Liv, who work for ends meet, servicing all the needs of commercial truckers, those passing through, and even the local sheriff as long as they can cough up the cash.  The only ones not seeking pitstop sex worker services at Candy Land is a religious cult trying to spread the world of the lord around the same stretch of space.  When one of the members, a young and naïve Remy, shows up ostracized from the zealot sect, the sex workers take her in, treat her with kindness, and convince her to be worked into their profession.  Shortly after, gruesomely murdered bodies are found in and around the truck stop turning the once desired Candy Land into a life-threatening place to work, and enlightening the lot lizards that Candy Land is more seedy than once believed.

Shot in the foreground of the scenic Montana mountains, John Swab’s “Candy Land” is a lewd offering that screams the ugly part of something beautiful.  The 2022 USA horror-thriller is a written-and-directed by the “Run with the Hunted” and “Body Brokers” filmmaker Swab in the director’s first go at fringe horror that involves sex work, crazy cults, and hidden knife sheathed inside a large wooden cross.  Swab’s script takes a path less trodden perspective to most similar narratives and pulls inspiration heavily from the 70’s grindhouse era with lots of skin and lots of blood.  Swab produces his own film alongside fellow “Run with the Hunted” and “Body Brokers” producer Jeremy Rosen (“I Am Fear”), with Robert Ogden Barnum (“31”) and Michael Reiser (“Abandoned”) as executive producers, under the production banner of Roxwell Films.

The ensemble cast is comprised of Hollywood veterans, up-and-coming actors, and even a famous last name.  The latter would be then 29-year-old Eden Brolin, daughter of Josh Brolin (“No Country for Old Men”) and granddaughter of James Brolin (“The Amityville Horror”), who is quickly paving her own path having landed as a season regular on the widely popular modern western series “Yellowstone.”  The “Blood Bound” actress is joined by equally young and hungry talent of Sam Quartin, a multi-time John Swab collaborator with roles in “Run with the Hunted” and “Body Brokers,” Virginia Rand (“I Am Fear”), and Owen Campbell (“X”) who are definitely not shy showing of their bodies, simulating explicit sex acts, and step into a compromising prostitute’s shoes as “Candy Land’s” unashamed lot lizards, or that’s what they portray for their characters on screen.  Together, a bond is formed between the working stiffs of sex workers, leaning on each other for support while seemingly living a free and uninhibited life with a good chunk of change in their pocket, but their profession is no walk in the truck lot as taxing moments in sidestepped affairs of the main plot show the darker side of prostitution, mostly involving Owen Campbell’s Levi as a straight man willing to anything for cash in a male dominated over-the-road trucking industry.  Their chimera’s end of the beginning is when Remy strolls into their lives like a lost puppy.  “It Follows’” Olivia Luccardi plays the meek and underestimated cult girl turning tricks as a way get a foot-in the door to cleanse damned souls to send to Gods’ pearly gates in Heaven and while Luccardi has the substantial feign madness well set in her eyes and actions, her story slips below that of the original four truck stop hookers as much of Luccardi’s backstory or even her perpetual motion through her perspective loses to the arbitrary wanes of killing for the sake of killing when the chance is at hand.  Cast rounds out with Guinevere Turner (“American Psycho”), Brad Carter (“The Devil to Pay”), Bruce Davis (“Agnes”), Billy Blair (“What Josiah Saw”), Mark Ward, and another famous last name from William Baldwin (“Flatliners”) as the daunting, downlow Sheriff Rex who has a strong, affectionate thing for Levi. 

The very first opening scene and montage of a sandy-blond Sadie going truck-to-school bus-to-bathroom stall to give a sense of what to expect and the down-and-dirty daily workload for our principal prostitutes sets the tone of Swab’s lickerish thriller with grindhouse endowments.  “Candy Land” is more than just a nutso cult film with all the hallmarks of sordidness as the interpretation received from the story is this temporariness in these characters’ lives.  From the transient paying clients of a truck stop, to living in the impermanence of a hotel room, to even the things they ingest, such as the smoke of incessant drags of cigarettes as a brief coping mechanism and the food they eat with the Hostess Snowballs that have fleeting substance in them to stave off hunger for a little while and only provide negligible nutrition, the temporarily speaks volumes toward the plot of a killer under the influence of a radicalized cleansed ideology wasting away those in provisional moments.  Swab finely sets up character quirks, an unsavory, realistic world, and distinct dynamics to enmesh the characters in a life they attempt to put a pretty face on only that pretty face is a pig wearing lipstick, forcing them into uncertainty and wearing them down to a point they can’t face what’s important and dangerous right in front of them – a young, confused girl led astray and looking for answers.  Instead, that girl, teetering on the edge of purity and dissolution having nowhere to call home, is not safeguarded and is folded into their own licentious lives and, like a Trojan horse, she ultimately become their downfall. 

For “Candy Land’s” inaugural home video release, VMI Distribution and MVD Visual releases the John Swab horror onto Blu-ray.  The AVC encoded, high definition 1080p, BD25 conscripts not a single compression issue in the breathtaking, mountainous landscapes of Montana, affixing great distance between Candy Land and the rest of the world to describe the troubled brief getaway from reality without actually saying it. Presented in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio, details are greatly appreciated here with the graphic and vulgar markings inside the restrooms, skin tones fair a natural coloring, and a good amount of the whole film is lit naturally with the occasional greenish-yellow gel work to enhance the dinginess of a seedy truck stop. The English language, lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 surround track settles the best fidelity that it can muster, reining in unbridled tracks for a more subdued approach that befits more the lowkey motel suspenser than a fueled high-rise stimulator. Dialogue is clean and clear enough; a few instances cause for mumbling concern but quickly pass and that link is quickly made in the off word that’s missed. Soundtrack contains well-blended, well-intermingled snippets of classic rock, alternative and R&B from the 90s, and a quaint Christmas selection. Yes, “Candy Land” could be considered a Christmas movie! English subtitles are optionally available. Special features are limited by the disc capacity that houses only John Swab’s commentary track and retroesque, in-character stills of a digital zine. The standard Blu-ray Amaray snapper case for this limited-edition release is nothing short of pedestrian with a homage cover art that, I must admit, made me suspect Candy Land” was more a vampire film than a cultist’ coup of truck stop sex workers because of my lack of doing any kind of film prep for any of the screeners I receive – keeps me objectively aligned. You’ll find the same image pressed on the disc itself with no insert accompanying. Not rated and locked on a region A playback, this release has the film clocked in at 93 minutes.

Last Rites: “Candy Land’s” sweetness derives from its in-your-face sexual audacity that rings a certain truth inside the unsavory cash-making aspects of the oldest profession and Swab takes us out from the game’s usual vivarium of the darkened streets and the dingy underpasses into the brightly lit and very populated desert with a different breed of the species. The instilled cult angle feels more slapdash in comparison that sunders the acts more acutely and without a clear reason, leaving the finale unsatisfactory like a $20 handy.

Visit “Candy Land” On Blu-ray. Purchase Here!

Always Wear Protection From EVIL! “It Follows” reviewed! (Second Sight Films / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“It Follows” You Home on Blu-ray and 4K Home Video!  

After sleeping with a young and handsome man in the back of his car, Jay wakes up strapped to a wheel cheer in an abandoned and dilapidated Detroit warehouse.  The panicked and apologetic man explains that having sex passed something to him and now he has passed it to her.  What it is is a supernatural force, a shapeshifter, always walking toward the last person implanted with an imperceptible sexually transmitted beacon.  Slowly but surely, the entity continues with a steady pace until reaching the infected person and brutally murdering them.  The only way Jay can unload this burdensome curse is to pass it along to someone else, but her tightknit group of friends aim to help her despite not being able to see the entity and drive her out beyond the stretches of her Detroit suburb home.  Yet, no matter how far Jay travels the entity eventually catches up to her, endless following her to wherever she goes, leaving her and her friends without options to alleviate her paranoia and fear.

David Robert Mitchell’s breakout horror success “It Follows” is the 2014 released supernatural teen terrorizer with an immutable edge of not only absolute apprehension but also with a distorted real-world dreaminess not based in vague abstraction.  Mitchell, who not only directed by wrote the film as well, is the sophomore feature from the “The Myth of the American Sleepover“ director who persists in the unravelling of apparent teenage problems, dramas, and sensations in the metro area and in the suburban borders of Detroit, Michigan, the state in which Mitchell was born.   “It Follows” barely scratched a significant budget for production but managed to succeed expectations earning domestically here in the U.S. 13x the film’s budget amount plus the additional international box office revenue and at-home media sales saw Mitchell’s indie horror a major sleeper amongst surprised genre fans who couldn’t get enough of the sexual transmitted spook.  Mitchell, along with Erik Rommensmo, Roby K. Bennett, Rebecca Green, Laura D. Smith Ireland, and David Kaplan, produced the venture under production companies Animal Kingdom and Two Flints with Northern Lights Films presenting.

At the center of a parentless predicament are a group of friends with the nucleate being the followed Jay under the performance of Maika Monroe, who also saw simultaneous and unexpected success in another 2014 thriller, “The Guest.”  Monroe’s slow burn sauntering becomes hit with complete shock when her lover betrays her, sends her spiraling in post-trauma harm, and instills a paranoia that can’t be ignored.  Jay no longer floats in life’s little wonders of love and romance; instead, she finds herself on the other side of the idyllic fantasy with the repercussions of her choices amplified by the supernatural spin.  At her side is her sister Kelly (Lili Sepe, “The Intruder”), childhood friends Paul (Keir Gilchrist, “Dead Silence”) and Yara (Olivia Luccardi, “Kappa Kappa Die”), and the across the street cool guy Greg (Daniel Zovatto, “The Pope’s Exorcist”).  Each play a role in Jay’s post-sex paranormal plight, some are a conductor of relief, such as providing a comforting presence as bodyguards per se or even become the next person to pass along the curse while others project future spurs of ominous ambiguity without the direct intention of doing so.  Though Mitchell might be invoking a dream state of events that may play into the following, I still found the groups’ idle hands to be concerning, especially during a school period from which we see Jay and Greg sitting in class together in one scene.  The cadence of time and responsibility doesn’t exist and that can be really jarring to our sense of natural order where school is an afterthought, juvenile attention is an afterthought, and the only thing that really matters is Jay’s imperceptible anxiety without any other exterior consequences pressuring their decision making.  “It Follows’” complete cast consists of Jake Weary, Bailey Spry, and Leisa Pulido.

Many of the film critics and analysts deconstruct and piece “It Follows” as an allegory for the sexually transmitted disease that will always be with you and how easily, or naively, it can be spread amongst friends and peers in casual intimacy and while that point can be seen as valid, there’s definitely merit behind that theory, I have come to an alternate conclusion of what the entity might represent that has been following me much like the entity has been following Jay. Since parents, or adults in general, are faceless, absent, or represented as attackers, Jay and her friends represent teens having to deal with the peak problematic adolescence with suggestions of suicide, drugs, neglect, abuse running rampant without ever having to be laid out in exposition or be straightforward and evident. The entity represents time running out in their youth dwindling quickly with every adult choice that they make, sex being the main sample of a larger grouping. No matter how hard the teens try to run from their issues, time never ceases and will eventually cause their mortal coil to succumb at an early age. Mitchell’s weirdly timeless set productions and props add systematic value in what has been longstanding through the decades of wriggling deviant teenage behavior. The indifference adult caregivers in themselves can be much scarier than the entity itself, a lack of experience and control often turns wild, unpredictable, and irrational, and set the story’s backdrop as the tatterdemalion surroundings of a once booming Motor City and you have a complete and total degradation of city to soul in one tailgating terrifier.

Follow Second Sight Films for a special release of David Robert Mitchell’s “It Follows” on an AVC encoded, high-definition 1080p, United Kingdom Blu-ray with an anamorphic widescreen aspect ratio of 2.39:1. Looking sharp and retaining original grading, this particular new Second Sight product, the standard Blu-ray version of the two-part deal along with a 4K UHD release, doesn’t hinge on perfecting or upgrading the digitally record video. Still, image quality renders like definite de facto distinctness that separates objects with delineated depth and a realistic color palette while the master of the slow pan, Mitchell, keeps scenes alive with an ever-moving camera shooting alternative, odd angles. Backside of the Blu-ray suggests a bitrate decoding at 23 Mbps but I had clocked it higher at low 30s that better suppresses any kind of compressions issues on the more than adequate BD50. The release comes with two English audio options: a Dolby Atmos produced by Second Sight and a DTS-HD 5.1 master audio surround sound. The Atoms provides a pedestal for the original composed score by Disasterpiece aka Richard Vreelord with his note firmly pressed on the slasher pulse while keeping a discordant arm’s length away from being too terribly catchy; instead, we shrill in fear with ever crescendo in letting us know the entity is here and near, foot-over-foot toward the target. Depth and range fathom well to create space and provide more than just a dialogue robust narrative with suburban ambiance as well as the exertion surrounding motivation to stay alive or to be followed and killed. Though not an A/V level up, Second Sight pours all their love and respect in new special features including new experience and opinion-laden interviews with Keir Gilchrist Chasing Ghosts, a new interview with Olivia Luccardi Following, a new interview with produce David Kaplan It’s in the House, new interview with composer Disasterpiece (Rich Vreeland) Composing a Masterpiece, and a new interview with production designer Michael Perry A Girl’s World that focuses on the out of time and oddly placed set dressings for era ambiguity. There’s also new commentary by author Joshua Grimm, an archived commentary with authors/film scholars Danny Leigh and Mark Jancovich, and a Joseph Wallace video essay surrounding “It Follows” Architecture of Loneliness, providing a deep-dive look into Mitchell’s curation of isolating loneliness in all areas of the cinematic story. The green Blu-ray casing has new simple, yet effective, artwork of Maika Monroe floating head bathed in small strips of rainbow glints contrasted against a dark background. No reversible cover or insert inside the Blu-ray but the disc pressing contains an equally color arrangement to the front cover with Monroe bound to the wheel cheer from a plot point moment. The region locked B release plays at a 100-minutes and is UK certified 15 for strong threat, sexualized nudity, violence, gory images, and strong language. Architecturally sound to be great horror movie of originality and inspiration, “It Follows” never succumbs to the frustratingly breeziness with when the entity enters the picture as director David Robert Mitchell is able to keep us ever vigilant with high suspense, stunning visuals, and keep characters from wandering too far off path.

“It Follows” You Home on Blu-ray and 4K Home Video!  

Dan Stevens. The New Face of EVIL? Freakin’ Love It! “The Guest” reviewed! (Second Sight Films / BD-R Screener)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Recently hospital discharged combat soldier David Collins visits a fallen brother in arms’ family, The Petersons, to convey their son’s last moments of love for his family.  Taken immediately in by the grieving mother, David stays for a few nights at the Peterson home, quickly befriending the family of four with his military “yes ma’am” charm and good looks.  When a string of accidental and homicide related deaths begin to flare up in what’s typically a quiet rural town, eldest daughter, Anna, suspicions turn to David.  As Anna digs deeper into David’s past, nothing can stop the elite special forces soldier from taking steps to protect his identity and his mission, even if that means turning the Petersons’ hometown into a deadly warzone. 

One part action, one part slasher – Adam Wingard’s “The Guest” is a hot take on the infiltrator horror subgenre.  The “Pop Skull” and “You’re Next” director, who went on to helm the epic clash of the two biggest creatures in all of creature feature history with this year’s “Godzilla vs. Kong,” directed “The Guest” to challenge the slasher narrative with an atypical, slightly campy, American indie thriller with an unanticipated and surprising twist that’s more than just your run-of-the-mill snapped war-traumatized soldier gone shell-shocked rogue.  The script reteams “Dead Birds’” writer Simon Barrett with Wingard for their eighth collaboration that pits all the story’s action into the rural confines of an unnamed small town in America while the actual shooting location takes place in New Mexico.  “The Guest” is a production of the UK based HanWay Films, which also oversaw the production of Wingard’s “You’re Next,” and Snoot Entertainment of the zomedy “Little Monsters” from the producing management team of Keith and Jess Wu Calder.

To put things simply, Dan Stevens is scary good.  The “Downtown Abbey” star plays the titular troublemaker and, now, I will never look at Matthew Crowley the same way again.  Stevens trades out the proper aristocracy of British English with a slight American English Southern draw, a heavily used trope portrayed with U.S. troops in cinema, but Stevens does more than just talk-the-talk.  The Surrey born actor who once played the Beast in Disney’s live-action version of “Beauty and the Beast” plays a different kind of monster that’s akin to a wolf in sheep’s clothing with David, adorning his physically fit character with a clandestine depth in his ambiguous background and sociopathic tendencies that makes him very much a mysterious maniac much in the same fashion as iconic slasher villains.  Trying to stop David’s undermining reign of controlled carnage is Anna Peterson, played by Maika Monroe (“It Follows,” “Independence Day:  Resurgence”).  Ana’s a levelheaded, yet rebellious, teenager adverse to being told what to do to much of her parents chagrin from dating a pot dealer to her objection in David’s stay with them.  Monre puts angsty effort behind Anna Peterson’s eyes, but the character herself is rather flimsy willing to put her trust in an unsponsored secret organization agent, “John Wick” films’ Lance Reddick, and his request to get into his car urgently without hesitation, but has a difficult time swallowing at her own pace her dead brother’s fellow soldier even with the stamp of whole heartily approval from her parents and little brother and photographic evidence of her brother’s relationship with David.  Yet, Barrett’s openly oblivious characters play into the slasher/thriller campiness of accepting everything at face value without ever an inkling of doubt.  Perfect examples of this would be 3/4th of the Peterson family: the mother (Sheila Kelley, “A Passion to Kill”) trust him with handling routine tasks like picking up her son from school or laundry, the father (the great supporting actor Leland Orser, “Alien:  Resurrection,” “The Bone Collector”) trusts him with personal secrets, and even the school outcast brother (Brendan Meyer, “The Color of Space”) desperately believes David is his friend.  Tabatha Shaun, Joel David Moore, Ethan Embry, Chase Williamson, and Steven Brown co-star.

Pulling loads of admiration and inspiration from the “Halloween” franchise, “The Guest” not only rocks as an action thriller but also mimicking a retrograded slasher in a subgenre slapped with a label I like to call the infiltrator subgenre.  David Collins is no mindless, walking and not talking, killing machine like The Shape, but instead gains trust, backdoors problems, and has the quick confident moves to see the job through with hand-to-hand combat and other more visceral merciless methods.  Barrett and Wingard purposefully leave much to the imagination with David’s past, turning what would usually outcome as frustrating ambiguity for an essential character to more of an enigmatic antagonist allure similar to the way we don’t have a clear-cut motivation why Michael Myers or Jason Voorhees shish kabob horny teens without a second thought.  Sure, there are sequels that try to enlighten reasons, such as being pure evil, but abstract is not concrete.  Same with “The Guest” with a control spoon feeding of just enough backstory to wet one’s thirst for more on David’s ruthless sociopathic behavior.  David’s also a very likeable with the impression that his good deeds done in violence speaks to a justice-driven character, but what’s brilliant about David, and enhanced profoundly by Dan Stevens, is that when he does kill someone in cold blood for this first time, the impact is tremendously unreal because it’s unexpected and off brand from the Barrett and Wingard’s buildup of him being a standup and do-what’s-right soldier.

Second Sight Films invites you to be their guest for their limited edition 4K Ultra Hi-Defintionand Blu-ray of Adam Wingard’s “The Guest” that hit retail shelves this month on October 25th.  The stunning makeover of this cult favorite, limited to 5,000 copies, offers a brand new color grading for both formats supervised by Wingard with 4K UHD presented in Dolby Vision HDR.  Since a BDR was provided, commenting on the exact audio and video quality of the release isn’t possible, but rest assured, knowing the care and attention Second Sight Films put into their releases, “The Guest” will surely not overstay it’s welcome in the image and audio department.  The film has runtime at 100 minutes and a UK 15 certification; however, there is much more to this 3-disc release that includes the film’s 80’s inspired soundtrack on a compact disc.  Special features include new Adam Wingard and Simon Barrett commentary plus an archive commentary track from the two filmmakers, a new interview with actor Dan Stevens The Uninvited Guest, a new interview with actress Maika Monroe A Perfect Stranger, a new interview with Wingard and Barett By Invitation Only, a new interview with producers Keith and Jessica Wu Calder Producing the Guest, a new interview with director of photography Robby Baumgartner Light and Fog, a new interview with production designer Tom Hammock Lightning Strikes, a new interview with composer Steve Moore The Sounds of The Guest, and deleted and alternate including an outtake gag with optional director commentary.  With this limited release comes a rigid slipcase with new artwork by Adam Stothard, 160-page booklet with new essays by script to screen storyboards and extracts, behind the scenes photos, Wingard’s soundtrack notes, and new essays about the film, and, lastly, 6 collector’s art cards. In a time when modern horror desperately needs a solid sequel, “The Guest” is a good candidate with it’s captivating villain with so much story still left to tell. Hopefully, Second Sight Films’ irrefutable powerhouse release will ignite step-taking action amongst the rumors.

Grab it fast!  Liminted Edition “The Guest” on 4K UHD and Blu-ray Now at Amazon.com!

EVIL Fillets Family Strife. “Broil” reviewed! (Well Go USA Entertainment / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Chance Sinclair is a rebellious 17-year-old closeted lesbian and Catholic student.  After a couple of school related incidents she didn’t instigate, Chance’s parents send her to live with her despotic grandfather, August Sinclair, despite her parents’ reluctance.  August rules with an iron-fist not only with his grandchildren, but with his entire family of powerful elitists who have a dark secret – they’re actually soul harvesting demons preying on the malintents around the world and is headed by August.   When Chance’s parents want out of the family business and reclaim their daughter from August’s authoritative grip, they hire a culinary prodigy with a skill for assassinations for a grand dinner that’ll have the whole family in attendance.  Chance is ignorant of her family’s history and the balance of power is not the only stake served on the menu, but also Chance’s very soul hangs in the very midst of the Sinclair’s family game night of internal carnage. 

Like a Gothic storybook enclosed with deception, murder, and unhallowed demons at their last supper, “Broil” is a going to hell in a handbasket supernatural feast and an unholy coming-to-age sophomore feature from by the upcoming “Cosmic Sin” writer-director Edward Drake and co-written alongside Piper Mars.  The 2020 Canadian murder-for-hire thriller vies against the stylish similarities of the “Twilight” saga with well-groomed, well-off, and sophisticated groups of strangers bound as family from supernatural circumstances, but distills itself out the frivolous teeny-bop pulp and teen heartthrobs for a modestly R-rated cutthroat kindred melodrama by the netherworld’s most notorious soul-suckers, shot in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.  “Broil” Is produced by “Cabin Fever 2:  Spring Fever” executive producer, Corey Large, and first time producer Kashif Pasta with 308 Entertainment (“It Follows”) and Good Complex serving as production companies. 

“Broil” doesn’t denote a lead character at the heart of this story, but pinpoints principles along a chaptered structure, signifying their importance by following them with an objective point of view.  The whole setup begins with the granddaughter, Chance Sinclair, who a bit rough around the edge and doesn’t play with her schoolmates, especially having an affinity for the same sex while being a student in a Catholic school, but that factoid doesn’t blossom into thing though be noted a couple of times.  Instead, Chance, played by Avery Konrad in her first principle character role, struggles with her teenage angst and hormones like any more adolescent, but she finds her educational woes pale in comparison under her family’s archaic secret ruled by the patriarchal domination of August Sinclair, a ruthless enforcer and head of the family business brought to an autocratic fruition by Irish actor Timothy V. Murphy (“Snowpiercer” television series). While Chance and August strongly convey a presence in the first act, Jonathan Lipnicki reins in the latter acts in an unexpressed spectrum performance of Sydney “The Chef” Lawson, a calculating killer taking out the transgressional trash informed by a mentor and father-like man named Freddie Jones, “Jason vs. Freddy’s” Lochlyn Munro, who may or may not have ulterior motives in exploiting The Chef’s gift for murder. Lipnicki’s work is a culinary delight in as much as The Chef’s actually culinary expertise, braising the character to eventually be the mainstay character. There are other exigent roles that seem important, but are only keystones that hold more principles roles from crumbling, such as Chance’s parents, June (Annette Reilly “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina”) and December (Nels Lannarson “The Cabin in the Woods”) Sinclair, who initiate the murder-for-hire spark that set things in motion. Rounding out “Broil” is Corey Large, Megan Peta Hill, Abby Ross, Jenna Berman, Phoebe Miu, Alyson Bath, David Hennessey, John Cassini, and Kyra Zagorsky.

Playing out in chapters, “Broil” feels like a murder-mystery adapted from a on fleek novel written by a panache author from Switzerland, but from what I’ve researched, “Broil” is an original narrative only to be segmented to amass refined character details and redirect turn of events as they unfold. However, the chaptering aspect veers the narrative off course, careening “Broil” more toward edit oblivion that doesn’t layer the foundation properly causing as much confusion as the inhuman characters trying to decide whether the Sinclairs are either vampires, demons, witches, or some kind of incubus-succubus blend for a better part of the film. A theme that doesn’t withstand the pressures of Drake’s zigzag directional layout is the unholy atmosphere the Sinclair’s protrude into the world. Chance, who is ignorant of her lineage and of what she really is, turns crosses upside down, turns crucifix necklaces ablaze, and her family sends her unusual gifts like parceled decorated daggers as seen on sacrificial stones, but the satanic tropes cease to do little more than be hints bound to expose the Sinclair’s true selves and really nothing to do with Satan himself, leaving much of the Sinclair powers left unexplained, like their lightning speed and pulsating purple glow that illuminates in patches under the skin (another “Twilight” element?). The acting is palpable, even if it’s melodramatic and under a slew of unlikeable characters, and the story does throw a few notable curve balls, some wickedly diabolical knuckle curves involving eating a child, to intrigue an inch by inch progression of the story. “Broil” unsheathes moments of Gothic schadenfreude, but the moments are fleeting, too short and far in between, to swimmingly bask in the horror of demonic soul snatchers in the throes of a murderous coup d’état.

A delicacy unlike anything you’ve ever experienced, “Broil” is served onto a Blu-ray release as the plat de jour distributed by Well Go USA Entertainment. The unrated film is region A coded and presented in high-definition, 1080p, of a 16:9 widescreen format. Details on the image render very soft, undiscerning outlines that infuse where a person ends and the background begins, but as the lighting choices change from flared hues to more hard lighting, profiles are to take more shape. Director of photography Wai Sun Cheng, making his introduction into feature films, keeps the focus primary in the foreground, obscuring the backdrop just enough to make it still perceivable and mixes well in the extreme close ups with wide angled shots to not be a one trick cinematographer. The English language 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio has severe troubles with Hugh Wielenga’s score tremendously overpowers everything else with a profound overlap. The composition is so unbalanced and loud that the resonating LFE completely drowns out the dialogue at times. “Broil” does not contain any feature specific special features other than a static menu containing upcoming previews of other Well Go USA films. Despite the title and the infernal nature, “Broil” is a dish served too cold with an unsavory plot of a young woman’s coming of age tribulations in midst of family squabbles and treachery that Edward Drake couldn’t quite fuse together.

Pre-order “Broil” at Amazon.com

EVIL’s Fixed on Not Letting Go. “The Intruder” reviewed!

Posted by Steven Lewis on


Scott and Annie Russell have it all. Two successful millennials living and working comfortably and successfully in urban San Francisco. There’s just one issue with their life, Annie wants children to raise outside the city. Their house hunting ventures takes them more than an hour outside the city to wine country, Napa Valley, where a serene and beautiful English style cottage rests privately around a nature preserve and becomes the ideal home prospect for Annie. The homeowner, Charlie Peck, seems eager for the married couple to purchase his home that has been in his family for three generations, even knocking down the price and leaving all the furnishings to sweeten the deal. After purchasing the house of Annie’s dreams, Scott makes due with his work in San Francisco, leaving Annie home alone for most of the week, but when Charlie keeps showing up at their doorstep, a frustrated Scott knows something just isn’t normal about the former owner who develops an obsessive fascination with his wife and won’t let go of his beloved home so easily.

From Deon Taylor, the director of “Traffik,” comes the 2019 suspenseful horror-thriller “The Intruder.” Penned by David Loughery, a writer who knows a little something-something about obsession thrillers with his work on “Lakeview Terrace” and “Obsessed,” “The Intruder” becomes a trifecta completing hit of dark compulsions shot actually not in California, but in Vancouver as an alternative in filming in the sacred Napa Valley. What could be said as a concoction of the over-friendly cable guy from “The Cable Guy” mixed thoroughly through a Bullet blender with Ray Liotta’s fixated Officer Peter Davis in “Unlawful Entry” and out pours “The Intruder” with all the creepy niceties of a mania driven illness to a subconsciously dangerous idiosyncrasy set in today’s paradigms for a new generation of thrill seekers.

With a couple of exceptions, “The Intruder’s” cast doesn’t impress, especially with Michael Ealy who shutters a range of intensity and temperament as once showcased as the psychopathic Theo in Fox’s television hit, “The Following.” Ealy, who will be the lead star in the upcoming “Jacob’s Ladder” remake, designates a flat and removed performance for a rather more than ordinary husband with a checkered past with women who are not his wife. Opposite Ealy is “Saw V’s” Meagan Good as a brighter star amongst the relatively small key cast with a tighter grip on the wholesomely ingenuous Annie. Perhaps very similar to herself according to the behind-the-scenes feature accompanying the home video release, Annie’s humble positivity blooms the potential weight effect of Charlie Peck’s devious charisma that explodes to a head when Peck’s good guy mask has been removed. Like many reviews before this one, Dennis Quaid opens incredulous eyes as Charlie Peck. The then 64 year old actor, whose worked with screenwriter Loughery in the 1980’s as the star of “Dreamscape,” flaunts a muscular physique upon an inclusive depth and range of his character that really puts Quaid into a new light. “The Intruder” rounds out with Joseph Sikora (“Jack Reacher”), Alvina August (“Bad Times at the El Royale”), along with minor performances in a handful scenes or less from Erica Cerra (“Blade: Trinity”), Lili Sepe (“It Follows”), Lee Shorten (“In the End”), and “iZombie’s” Kurt Evans.

Getting through the first act without whiplash was nearly a struggle. With hardly any buildup through a speedy introduction of the Russell’s, who are the central focus of this film, one of “The Intruder’s” themes became nearly neutralized. Emotional triggers, the things and events that set us off or make us anxious, make up the very fiber of these characters, so importantly so, that their weaponized to divide and conquer the morality of their being. Annie’s emotionally deteriorating trigger is receiving a working late text from Scott because of his pre-martial affairs, verbally ripping into him when he returns home and reminding the circumstances of his last text of that nature and Scott’s traumatizing trigger stems from his youth when his brother was gunned down so every time he sees a gun, Scott’s visibly agitated and shaken. These coattail effects of these backdrop moments were implemented into the heart of the story, never emphasized initially as a flaw the character would overcome; instead, the triggers are thrown kind of haphazardly into the middle, jostled out indirectly or directly by Charlie Peck, and then revisited for the finale but doesn’t warrant a viewer appreciated response as anticipated. Peck’s trigger, of course, is losing the precious home to a relatively ungrateful couple and his trigger has been present since the start, making Charlie a more well-rounded character, even if an antagonistic one.

Screen Gems, a Sony Pictures sub-label, presents the Hidden Empire Film group production, “The Intruder,” onto DVD home video. The DVD is in an anamorphic widescreen presentation, a 2.40:1 aspect ratio, on MiniHawk Lenses digital camera as noted on IMDB. The aesthetic picture has virtually no issues, as typical digital recorded films go, but was taken aback by the lack of eloquence into cinematographer Daniel Pearl’s work. The man who began his career with “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” turned more toward his forte in the music videos, patterning sleek speedy cars with some warm neon tinting into a delicate, woven tapestry that really should have focused on the cottage itself, as a calm before the storm character in the film, but the interior and partial exterior became the game plan for Pearl. There was a scene or two where thick mist envelops the house that forebodes a menacing factor much needed throughout. The English language Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound has ample qualities and will deliver range and depth as Charlie Peck moves through a creaky old house. Dialogue is clear and welcoming. Bonus features include an alternate ending, which to be honest was about the same, deleted and alternate scenes, a gag reel, cast and crew commentary, an interview style behind-the-scenes featurette. Dennis Quaid was destined for Charlie Peck, a wolf in sheep’s clothing, who shines as an absolute emphasizer on the “The Intruder’s” belaboring shock palette worthy of an effective modern horror-thriller available July 30th. Pre-order your copy below!

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