Winner of this year’s MidWest WeirdFest Best Horror Film award, writer/director George Adams’ Lady Usher is an outré, warped modern reimagining of the Edgar Allan Poe story “The Fall of the House of Usher.” It’s a delirious psychosexual trip featuring solid performances and an auteur vision. Roderick (John Tupy) takes a break from college to […]
No matter the number of extraterrestrial contact documentaries you have watched in the past, the chances are good that you have never seen one quite like the short film Alien Abduction (2021). It hovers somewhere in the planes of the experimental, pop art, and the outré. AV Super Sunshine and Philomena, members of the Wisconsin […]
The tension between Abel (Eoin Slattery) and his wife Grace (Rebecca Palmer) is palpable, but their strained relationship takes a back seat when the titular creature comes calling in the U.K. horror short The Thing That Ate the Birds. It’s obvious from their terse interactions that the couple has had problems for a long time, […]
Writer/director J.M. Logan’s horror short The Relic starts pretty much just before where the climax of a feature film would be kicking in, dropping viewers in on a highly tense, dizzying situation. The short builds from there into a grand, breathtaking climax. Mind-bending visuals, solid performances from its ensemble cast, and suspenseful direction highlight this […]
The dreaded remake. Mention the “R” word to any horror fan and instinctively they make that face – you know the face I’m talking about. Ya – that one. It seems that at least a few times a year news breaks that a fan favorite from the past is going to get a “re-imagining” and […]
We’ve explored the world of Thomas Harris’s novel The Silence of the Lambs for decades – normally most of the attention is focused on the main bad guy – Hannibal Lector – NBC based an entire series on the man – critically acclaimed I might add but very little attention has been cast in the […]
It dawned on me while watching Willy’s Wonderland that Nic Cage has become this generations William Shatner – he has become a parody of the very acting style that made him famous and in case you’re wondering – that’s not a particularly good thing. You can probably already guess where this review is heading but […]
In the following review for syndication, director Chris Bell talks about familial horror influences, his South London ‘hooligangster’ phase, and learning new lockdown skills, ahead of the U.K. Digital release of THE HEIRESS on March 15, 2021 courtesy of the Movie Partnership, in association with Old Way Film & Television, and its U.S. and Canadian […]
Writer/director Caroline Lindy’s horror comedy Your Monster is a sharp, sweet short film that explores relationships with lovers and friends — while wryly commenting on social topics such as gender neutrality — through the eyes and mindset of a young woman and the monster that has lived in her bedroom closet since she was a […]
Welcome to HEROES & DROIDS, your guide to pop culture movies and TV! Join co-hosts Doc Rotten and Christopher G. Moore for a special HOT TAKE reaction video for episode 6 of WANDAVISION (2021, Disney+). Subscribe today! https://youtube.com/c/gruesomemagazine WANDAVISION (2021, Disney+) Episode 6 – “All-New Halloween Spooktacular!” On HEROES & DROIDS, we discuss pop culture […]
Writer/director Mark Sheridan’s Irish feature Crone Wood (2016) combines folk horror elements with stuck-in-the-woods fright-fare basics. The result is an interesting effort that doesn’t cover a lot of new ground, but does offer an entertaining 86-minute ride. The film is shot in a cinéma vérité style with multiple handheld cameras. As I have mentioned in […]
Grue-Believers, The first trailer for GODZILLA VS KONG has finally dropped. You’ve likely seen it and wow’ed at the EPIC showdown. Doc and Vanessa sit down to share their first reaction to the trailer. Welcome to the first GRUESOME HOT TAKE.
Everyone knows – I’m Gruesome Magazine’s resident Stephen King fan. I have been a fan of his written word – and the projects derived from them – since Carrie and although I love the original Mick Garris directed mini-series, like many fans I have longed for a more elaborate visual retelling of this horror classic. […]
Horror anthology film 13 Slays Til X-Mas is a barroom blitz of yuletide frights as a group of patrons swap terror tales about creatures and curses, Faustian bargains, slashers, killer dolls, crazed disc jockeys, and more in a Santa’s bagful of dark humor and gore galore. Producers P.J. Starks and Eric Huskisson know their way […]
Two young brothers drive their mother crazy in Bedtime Story (El Cuento), a Spanish horror short from cowriters/codirectors Lucas Paulino and Ángel Torres, but that’s nothing compared with what the night ahead holds for the trio. This atmospheric slice of supernatural fear fare is gripping from the beginning, and boasts an eerie, unsettling atmosphere of […]