Rate the Last Film You Watched

31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XVI: Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989, Shinya Tsukamoto), Tetsuo II: Body Hammer (1992, Shinya Tsukamoto), Tetsuo: Bullet Man (2009, Shinya Tsukamoto)

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TTIM is an unhinged work of art, taking body horror and giving it an industrial extreme, with effects that remain impressive and brutalist to this day. TII:BH was a very solid follow-up, but doesn’t quite hit as hard as its predecessor, whilst T:BM, made decades later, was an underwhelming feature all around. 4.5/5, 3.5/5, 2/5
 
31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XVII: A Nightmare on Elm Street Sequel Marathon: A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy’s Revenge (1985, Jack Sholder), A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987, Chuck Russell), A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (1988, Renny Harlin)

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I’ve owned these films for a while now thanks to the 2010 boxset but those transfers show their age nowadays, so when the UHD collection was announced, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to get the Steelbook set.

FR is often noted for its homoeroticism (which though allegedly unintentional in hindsight are very overt) and bringing Freddy into the real world with his kills. Considering this was the first sequel it’s interesting to see new ideas tried, and I enjoyed having a male lead that was a more vulnerable in Mark Patton’s Jessie, though he’s admittedly stuck in what is still a middling sequel overall, despite it trying something new.

DW is often regarded as the best ANoES sequel and I can see why with an engaging storyline which brings back Heather Langenkamp’s Nancy into the fold, guiding a gang of troubled teens to take on Freddy, who’s trying to wipe them out in their dreams.

TDM is also one of the better sequels in my book, with Renny Harlin taking the helm for an insane entry with a hilarious resurrection of Freddy to boot. 3/5, 4/5, 3.5/5
 
I'm not one to rate movies but over the past 2 weeks I've kinda been finally catching up with movies ive missed out on including the likes of......

-KPop Demon Hunters (yeah its that good!)
-Atlantis The Lost Empire
-The Emperor's New Groove
-Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Mutant Mayhem
-The Rocky Horror Picture Show (less missed out on more finally watching it start to finish)
-The Road To El Dorado
-The Haunted World Of El Superbeasto (animated movie from Rob Zombie)
-The Machine (Mark Hamill's in that so it was a definite watch!)
-The City Of Lost Children
-The Nightmare Before Christmas
-Mirrors (horror movie with Keifer Sutherland)
-Mirrors 2 (currently in the middle of watching, has Kim Possible herself Christy Carlson Romano in it and she has a shower scene.........really its the only thing people even know about from this movie)
 
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Night of the Living Dead (1990)

After an unexplained phenomenon causes the recently deceased to apparently return to life and attack the living, seven people find themselves trapped in an isolated house besieged by ghouls in rural Pennsylvania, in this remake of George A Romero’s horror classic.

A troubled production that saw sfx man-turned-director Tom Savini struggle to get all his ideas on screen, this is still an enjoyable, well-acted twist on the original, whose relative lack of shocking gore seems to allow for greater emphasis on the human drama unfolding between the survivors. The most notable change however, is that protagonist Barbara (Patricia Tallman) now has a full character arc, quickly learning to cope with the situation at hand, while hero Ben (Tony Todd) is undone by his increasingly violent arguments with the obstinate Harry (Tom Towles).

Unfortunately, the film is all but completely lacking visual flair, with the deep shadows of original giving way to flat, even lighting that has something of a made for TV movie about it. My only serious complaint though is that I think it fumbles the ending, with heavy handed and unnecessary images obscuring what should have been a powerful shock, while Barbara’s ‘We’re them and they’re us’ line comes across as particularly laboured.

It may leave gorehounds and ardent fans of the original cold, but this is a fine update that plays well to the strengths of its new cast.
 
31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XVIII: A Nightmare on Elm Street Sequel Marathon: A Nightmare on Elm Street: The Dream Child (1989, Stephen Hopkins), Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991, Rachel Talalay), Wes Craven’s New Nightmare (1994, Wes Craven)

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This is sadly where the sequels begin to wane in appeal, as both TDC and FD are easily the worst of the lot, with TDC being middling and forgettable compared to its predecessors, excepting the Tetsuo-esque motorcycle death (presented uncut for the UHD release). FD, meanwhile, feels worn out and overly silly, almost completely taking away the scare factor of Freddy Krueger and ending the string of sequels on a sour note. The new UHDs were solid though from an AV perspective.

That is, until Wes Craven, director of the first ANoES film returned with a self-aware and winning sequel which pokes fun at the aforementioned silliness Freddy as a character had become entrenched in, whilst allowing for a darker and scarier Freddy to return. This film also feels very much like a precursor to the Scream franchise with its self-awareness and tone, and this in turn would affect other horror franchises throughout the late 90s, old and new, who tried to capture this vibe - overall this was my favourite of the sequels. 2/5, 2/5, 4/5

Overall series rating:
A Nightmare on Elm Street
Wes Craven’s New Nightmare
Dream Warriors
The Dream Master
Freddy Vs. Jason (waiting for this one to get a UHD)
The Dream Child
Freddy’s Dead
 
31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XIX: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003, Marc Nispel), The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning (2006, Jonathan Liebesman)

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It was perhaps an inevitability that Tobe Hooper’s seminal horror classic would be remade eventually and though divisive the 2003 remake was a decent if unremarkable viewing experience overall that adjusted the storyline for its own path but lacked the atmosphere and sheer horror of the original.

The Beginning, meanwhile, was a film I enjoyed more so for its story aiming for something new, fleshing out the world of the remake and giving R. Lee Ermey the opportunity for an even more unhinged performance. I wouldn’t say it’s on par with either TCM/TCM 2, but the new UHD Arrow Video releases for both films were nice upgrade from the old DVDs I had. 3/5, 3.5/5
 
31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XX: Village of the Damned (1960, Wolf Rilla), Wolfen (1981, Michael Wadleigh)

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I picked these entries from my HMV Premium Collection backlog for this evening.

VoTD is a British horror film that also got remade by John Carpenter 35 years later (I’ll get around to that eventually), which sees a small English village become embroiled in a strange phenomena wherein the town’s women all birth children with the same haunting appearance and a seeming connection to one another. It was solid enough with some suitably creepy moments.

Wolfen is a werewolf feature set in New York City, with Albert Finney playing the lead investigator trying to track down the culprit behind a series of grizzly murders. Though not the strongest Werewolf feature I’ve seen it was worth adding to the marathon. 3.5/5, 3.5/5
 
31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XXI: I Vampiri (1957, Riccardo Freda), Count Dracula (1970, Jesús “Jess” Franco)

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Two vampire focused films this evening. IV was an Italian horror feature with a very familiar plot of young women being drained of their blood and the culprit unknown. Some of the set work was very nice but this was otherwise a middling watch.

CD sees Christopher Lee as the titular Dracula in a feature that is altogether more faithful to the original novel than other adaptations. As is it was a slow burner but altogether the stronger of the two. 3/5, 3.5/5
 
31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XXII: Panic in Year Zero! (1962, Ray Milland)

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A survival film focusing on a post-nuclear devastation of Los Angeles and a family trying to find safety. As the characters become more and more desperate to find safety they take drastic measures like setting a fire on the highway or shooting some thugs trying to rob them. The film does end on a more optimistic note but for the time period it did go to some darker places, and I can see why Radiance chose this for their catalogue. 3.5/5
 
31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XXIII: Blood Tide (1982, Richard Jefferies), Dream Demon (1988, Harley Cokeliss)

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Two British horror films released by Arrow Video to add to the marathon.

BT focuses on a young American couple visiting a Greek island in search of a missing person and despite having James Earl Jones was another middling film. DD, however, was the better film despite a familiar plot, with a cast of (then) lesser-known actors like Jemma Redgrave and Timothy Spall, plus Jimmy Nail too. The actual horror elements worked fairly well too, with some good special effects to boot, but it was otherwise still nothing too special. 3/5, 3/5
 
A House of Dynamite
If you want something to scare the hell out of you this halloween season, forget horror movies and watch this instead. It's a tense political drama that plays out almost in real time as a nuclear missile of unknown origin heads towards the US, and then we see the same timeframe repeated twice from the perspectives of different characters. That structure may sound a bit jarring, but it's absolutely necessary. Each time we see those last 20 minutes play out, the tension ratchets up to a level that's almost unbearable, and the way it periodically resets the clock back to the beginning helps to bring the anxiety back down for a while. This is the most tightly edited movie I've seen from Kathryn Bigelow, pared down from the meandering structure of The Hurt Locker or the broad scope of Zero Dark Thirty. It may also be her best.

The focus remains firmly on the people at the centre of the decision-making process. There's no voyeuristic depiction of destruction. No easy answers. No cathartic resolution to help you sleep at night in this world where our leaders have decided the best way to utilise the atom is a global Mexican standoff. It's all about the disbelief, fear, confusion, anger, and despair of a scenario where there is no safe, sane, or moral response.
 
31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XXIV: Coffin Joe Marathon: At Midnight I'll Take Your Soul (1963, José Mojica Marins), This Night I'll Possess Your Corpse (1967, José Mojica Marins), The Strange World of Coffin Joe (1968, José Mojica Marins), Embodiment of Evil (2008, José Mojica Marins)

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The Coffin Joe films, starring José Mojica Marins who also directed the films, and spawned from Brazil’s first horror film ATITYS, were finally given the all-out treatment by Arrow Video so I picked up the boxset earlier this year to watch as part of this marathon.

ATITYS has the titular Joe terrorising a small fictional town only to get his comeuppance which leads to the events of TNITYC, wherein he enlists a servant in Bruno to kidnap local women so he can sire a son and carry on his bloodlines.

TSWoCJ changes up the formula by instead being a series of three vignettes merely hosted by Joe, who doesn’t otherwise appear in them but they were reasonably solid stories otherwise.

Finally, EoE was the official third and final entry in the CJ trilogy, and a good one at that, focusing on the titular character getting out of prison, reuniting with his assistant and discovering a cult dedicated to his teachings.

The boxset had a couple of other films that were tangentially CJ related that I’ll get to eventually, but as is José Mojica Marins was a unique auteur with a deserving legacy worthy of a great boxset that’s worth seeking out. 3.5/5, 3.5/5, 3/5, 3.5/5
 
Last Quarter (English subbed) - This was a beautiful, touching adaptation of the excellent Ai Yazawa manga which I also highly recommend, it's got lovely cinematography, compared to the manga it has just two schoolchildren rather than four and puts the emphasis more on Tomoki, Mizuki's cheating (but clearly regretful and still very much in love with her) ex-boyfriend. This is now probably my favourite live-action Japanese film that I have seen and does a much better job of adapting the source material than many other book-to-film efforts, Chiaki Kuriyama (Kill Bill) is great as Mizuki and the other actors are of a high standard too, I really enjoyed this immensely and I loved the ending so much! 10/10 would reincarnate to watch again :)
 
RadFemHedonist said:
Last Quarter (English subbed) - This was a beautiful, touching adaptation of the excellent Ai Yazawa manga which I also highly recommend, it's got lovely cinematography, compared to the manga it has just two schoolchildren rather than four and puts the emphasis more on Tomoki, Mizuki's cheating (but clearly regretful and still very much in love with her) ex-boyfriend. This is now probably my favourite live-action Japanese film that I have seen and does a much better job of adapting the source material than many other book-to-film efforts, Chiaki Kuriyama (Kill Bill) is great as Mizuki and the other actors are of a high standard too, I really enjoyed this immensely and I loved the ending so much! 10/10 would reincarnate to watch again :)
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31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XXV: The Church (1989, Michael Soavi), The Sect (1991, Michael Soavi), Cemetery Man (DellaMorte DellAmore) (1994, Michael Soavi)

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Three features from Michael Soavi this evening, two of which were also produced by Dario Argento. TC was a slow burn that gradually went more bonkers as it neared the end, whilst TS focused on a group of Satanic worshippers and was equally weird though not perhaps as strong as TC. Finally, CM was easily the strongest of the three films, and arguably the strangest Italian horror to boot, especially thanks to Rupert Everett’s central performance. 3.5/5, 3/5, 4/5
 
31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XXVI: The Stuff (1985, Larry Cohen), Return of the Living Dead (1985, Dan O’Bannon), The Brain (1988, Ed Hunt)

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Three horror comedy entries tonight. TS sees the premise of a new sweet desert spread-type substance becoming all the rage after it was discovered in the arctic, and a former FBI agent tasked to find its secret formula as it remains under lock and key. This was ridiculous fun and didn’t outstay its welcome.

RoTLD is a horror comedy focused on the undead and it was very good indeed and had some memorable performances to boot. Finally, TB sees a television cultist manipulate his viewers with some alien assistance, uncovering a deeper plot as a teenagers life is dragged into the mess - this was the weakest of the three but still worth a look. 3.5/5, 4/5, 3/5
 
31 Days of Halloween 2025! Day XXVII: In the
Mouth of Madness (1994, John Carpenter)

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This film from John carpenter was both humorous and also unsettling, resulting in a great film that was well-worth picking up the recent Arrow Video release for. 4/5
 
Superman (2025)
Oh dear. This movie is exactly what I didn't want. When James Gunn was handed the keys to the entire DC universe, I hoped he might rein in some of his quirks, but this is as dumb as I feared. He seems to think it's important to answer questions like, "What if there was a Superman movie made entirely for dog lovers?" and "What if there was a Green Lantern even more obnoxious than the Ryan Reynolds version?"

Gunn may not have cast Chris Pratt as Superman, but certainly seems to have written the role with him in mind, and David Corenswet plays him that way. Some aspects of this work. Writing him as a big blue boy scout whose attempts to do the right thing place him out of step with what others expect of him is fertile ground. Some early scenes capitalise on this, especially in a heated interview with Lois, but this aspect of the plot starts to feel overshadowed by the end. A lot of that comes down to the action, which can be fun in its excesses, but often feels like watching a little kid running around playing with his DC action figures. It reaches for grandiose stakes towards the end, but just can't nail the drama behind them, so it falls flat. Toss in far too many scenes that get derailed by the dog, a version of Lex who feels petty (admittedly a frequent problem for the character), and a groan-inducing preview of Gunn's vision for Supergirl, and I don't have any hope for how this rebooted DC universe is going to pan out.
 
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