The Devil in the Details

When an American research operation on Finnish soil manages to dig up the "real" Santa Claus, you’d think it be cause for celebration. The spirit of Christmas is finally alive once more and all that sort of thing, right? Well in Rare Exports, a film that proudly proclaims itself to be “from the land of the original Santa Claus,” things aren’t so simple. You see, the Santa Claus we’re dealing with here is a far cry from the jolly old fellow they use to sell Coca-Cola, far more interested in punishing the naughty than in rewarding the good. He’s a boogeyman meant to keep children in line and now that he’s been freed, there’s no telling what will happen. Our young protagonist, Pietari, is a boy who is on the cusp of young adulthood, forced by family tragedy to grow up fast yet still unwilling to let go of the familiar Christmas myths. His relationship with his father is difficult and strained, and Christmas in their empty household doesn’t seem like a great time. Things are esp...

Continuing our discussion of alternative holiday classics, let’s move on to a film that is decidedly more twisted than the last one we looked at, and one which is considerably lesser-known: 2016’s Better Watch Out. Now unlike most everything we talk about here, where I’d start out with some summarizing, I feel the need to give a special introduction to this particular film, and try my very best to avoid spoilers. This is a film that really wants you to go in totally blind, armed only with assumptions based on the poster and genre expectations, and so I feel obliged to try and discuss the film without ever venturing into spoilers or even much innuendo. It’s a losing battle with films like this, which rely on shock and surprise, when the first thing that anyone who recommends the film is going to do is spoil everything with the intent of making it sound as interesting as it is. Unfortunately, by spoiling the ‘real’ premise for viewers, you may entice them, but you also unquestionably dim...

Seeing as I got started so late this year with watching Christmas films and sharing them with you guys, I figure I’ve got about three more good ones left in me before the season has passed, maybe four at max. As a result, I’m trying to stick with real heavy hitters, avoiding guff like A Christmas Horror Story or even a few great films that are tangentially related to the holiday (Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation.) So without further ado, let’s talk about the Christmas horror film that everyone out there should have seen by now, Michael Dougherty’s follow-up to his 2007 wonderful Halloween-themed anthology film Trick 'r Treat, 2015's  Krampus. You see, Krampus isn’t just a great horror film that happens to take place over the holiday like  Black Christmas  or Better Watch Out . No, this is undeniably a Christmas film, and not even just for the obvious reasons that it features lots of Christmas music and the constant presence of familiar holiday iconography; no, t...

Well, it’s that time of the year again and you know what that means! While I would have ideally had some Christmas horror movies prepared to last the entire month of December, things just haven’t worked out that way, and so now that half of the month is already over, I’m putting my back to the grindstone and discussing with you guys an important film in the development of horror as a genre that just might be my favorite horror film to watch over the holidays. So first off, how many of you have seen Bob Clark's  A Christmas Story? Yeah, yeah, I know: it’s old and creaky and so no one watches it anymore, I get it. But for those of you who do still enjoy films with heart and a not insignificant amount of edge, especially when it comes to the holidays, rejoice! Because Black Christmas was directed by the very same man, only much earlier. And it shows too, what with all the humanity and hilarity on display in the film alongside edgy, progressive content that still feels fresh in 2022. ...

The Conspiracy is a mockumentary/found-footage horror film from 2012, a direct result of the big boom of such films following on from Paranormal Activity, at about the point when the sub-genre was being driven into the dirt by awful sequels and copycats. It's fairly obscure at the moment, seemingly existing only as a Shudder streaming exclusive, having only ever seen a long out-of-print DVD release over a decade ago and various foreign Blu-ray releases in the years since. But hey: the same is true for Noroi: The Curse, and that was one of the best found-footage films I'd ever seen, before or since. Could The Conspiracy ever hope to measure up to those lofty expectations?  Well no, you idiot, but I'm not going in with those expectations. I just want grounded horror with a shallow depth of field. I want mystery, ambiguity, more of what The Blair Witch Project and The Last Broadcast offered up, and the premise for this film seemed promising as such: two documentary filmmak...

Alright, so after covering 2013’s All Hallow’s Eve, it was obvious what I needed to watch next. Thing is, as disappointing and comparatively silly as Damien Leone’s first outings with Art the Clown could be at the best of times, I still found myself quite… well, terrified to pop in Terrifier, Leone’s remake/reimagining of All Hallow’s Eve’s best segment. It has a reputation as one of the grisliest slashers around, and that’s to say nothing of the effectiveness of one Art the Clown, who was pretty well iconic from his first appearance in short films that next to no one ever watched. Needless to say, I was a little sheepish about committing myself to watching something that goes out of its way to push the boundaries of cruelty, and which also dares to tap into such primal childhood fears as “Mommy, don't let that spooky clown touch me.” But, after a few internal pep talks, I gritted my teeth, opened a beer, and gave it a whirl, determined I wasn’t going to let any low-budget indi...

Dog Soldiers is a unique blend of folk horror and military action, propped up by a structure that references The Night of the Living Dead and the many siege films of John Carpenter. The feature film debut of one Neil Marshall, who would go on shortly to direct the millennial horror classic The Descent,  it follows a squad of trained soldier bros getting torn apart by monsters in the woods as opposed to a group of spunky female spelunkers getting torn apart in a cave. Could this little film about G.I. Joes fighting mythical beasts ever hope to compare to its more popular sibling? Well, the answer may shock you *rolls eyes* Anywho, our leads are participating in what they believe to be a routine training exercise out in the woods, only to discover that things are not what they seem. The special forces squad they were initially supposed to be meeting up with is discovered mangled and mutilated by some awful creature, which leaves behind only one cleverly-hidden survivor and no bodies...

Welp, with another Halloween behind us and the year fast wrapping up, it’s time to really buckle down and start covering some of the great horror films from this year that are just now being released to home video. One such film, really the toast of the ’22 Halloween season, was Terrifier 2, an infamously graphic and spooky creepy clown film created by up-and-comer Damien Leone, writer, director, and makeup effects artist by trade. His creation, Art the Clown, has been really blowing up since its release, and for good reason: he’s an instantly iconic villain who takes the creepy clown trope in a new and unsettling direction, all thanks to his reliance on mime and violent dismemberment. Well, that and the passionate performances of the actors who have portrayed him over the years. The thing is though, it’s been a long journey for ole’ Art from his birth in a few low-budget short films to his current status as the newest addition to the slasher canon, so I thought it’d be fun to go bac...

Larry Fessenden is something of a Stan Lee-esque figure in the world of horror, appearing in countless cameos in films from those he's influenced, not to mention name-checks aplenty. It also helps that his film company Glass Eye Pix has released some of the finest independent films in the genre, many of which credit Fessenden as a producer. Here's the thing though: I'd never seen one of the man's own films until popping in this little-discussed folk horror film from '01, and boy, did it make an impression. Wendigo opens with a very grounded example of horror: an argument between two men. One angry, possibly intoxicated, and swinging a gun around the whole time; the other nebbish, quite reasonable, and yet firm, with a frightened family in the car waiting on him. It's tense, and very real. And just when you think the tension is going to boil over, everything kind of works out and we're on our way. It makes a lasting impression, though. You see, our lead and ...

The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover, besides having one of the best movie titles ever, is noted for receiving critical acclaim and accolades at the time of its release, though I personally came into contact with it as a young teen thanks to its status as an X-rated film, of which there were only so many back in its day. Despite always having an interest in seeing it, it's taken until now for a proper Blu-ray release of this film to grace the shelves of lovers of cinema everywhere. And even then, it has to lie and say on the back of the box that it's region-encoded to only play in Region B drives when that's absolutely not the case. Oh well, at least we can finally appreciate this film the way those who saw it at time of release did. This story is something of a modern fable, concerning the gangster Albert Spica and his tormented bride Georgina. You see, Albert is a bully; specifically the kind of bully who is given free rein to terrorize anybody within earshot. He...