Well Go USA has announced the home video release of “Exhuma”, the acclaimed South Korean supernatural horror thriller written and directed by Jang Jae-hyun. It’s an introspective yet foreboding ghost movie that follows the exhumation of an ominous grave that portends to hold the secret of a mysterious illness. But the characters end up unleashing something much more sinister. It’s a dark, disturbing, and brilliantly executed film that would become South Korea’s highest grossing film of 2024.
This new Blu-ray edition of “Exhuma” will be available to purchase on October 8th. It will also be releasing on 4K Ultra HD on the same date. See below for a full synopsis and release information including special features.
About the Film:
Year: 2024
Runtime: 135 Minutes
Director: Jang Jae-Hyun
Screenwriter: Jang Jae-Hyun
Cast: Choi Min-Sik, Kim Go-eun, Yoo Hae-jin, Lee Do-hyun, Kim Jae-cheol, Kim Sun-young, Kim Ji-an
Rating: NR
When a renowned shaman (Kim Go-Eun) and her protégé (Lee Do-hyun) are hired by a wealthy, enigmatic family, they begin investigating the cause of a disturbing supernatural illness that affects only the first-born children of each generation. With the help of a knowledgeable mortician (Yoo Hai-jin) and the country’s most revered geomancer (Choi Min-sik), they soon trace the affliction’s origin to a long-hidden family grave located on sacred ground. Sensing an ominous aura surrounding the burial site, the team opts to exhume and relocate the ancestral remains immediately. But as something much darker emerges, they soon discover what befalls those who dare to mess with the wrong grave.
When it comes to wrestlers-turned-actors, there aren’t that many big screen successes to consider. Perhaps the most obvious exception is Dwayne Johnson whose movie career has catapulted him into being the highest paid actor in Hollywood. John Cena has also made the transition although (minus a couple of outliers) he seems hopelessly attached to cornball comedies which can be a good or bad thing depending on your opinions of them.
And then you have Dave Bautista, the hardest to gauge of the three. He has mostly thrived in supporting roles and has benefitted from working with several prominent directors. But his leading performances have been a lot shakier. His latest film, “The Killer’s Game” doesn’t really challenge him and at times even handcuffs him. But Bautista makes for a formidable lead and sells his character well. It’s too bad the secondhand material lets him down, especially in the numbing second half where the film’s overcooked ideas ultimately fizzle out.
Stop me if you’ve heard this before. Bautista plays Joe Flood, a lethal but principled assassin who wants out of the game after finding true love. But if you’ve watched any of the many assassin movies out there, you know killing-for-hire isn’t a vocation you can easily walk away from. Such is the case for Joe. That means he will have to kill a lot of people in numerous showy and ultra-violent ways if he is to ever enjoy a happy retirement.
Image Courtesy of Lionsgate
The story is written by Rand Ravich and James Coyne who are adapting Jay Bonansinga’s 1997 novel of the same name. To their credit they do attempt to add some layers to what is a fairly conventional story. Unfortunately most of them are incredibly silly and it’s often hard to determine if the silliness is unintentional or by design. That’s because director J.J. Perry puts so much effort into emulating movies like “John Wick” that he loses the balance between action and comedy.
The movie kicks off in Budapest, Hungary where Joe Flood is carrying out a his latest hit. He kills his target but things don’t go smoothly. A shootout ensues which sends the crowd running for the exits. In the chaos, Joe saves a ballet dancer named Maize (Sofia Boutella) from being trampled. Circumstances lead to the two meeting again, having dinner, and eventually falling in love. As their relationship gets more serious, Joe finds himself in a tough spot. Does he leave the only life he’s ever known? Does he come clean and tell Maize what he does for a living?
Unfortunately for Joe he has bigger problems. He’s been suffering from debilitating headaches which leads him to see a doctor who informs him that he has a rapid and incurable form of dementia. Given only three months to live, Joe decides to end his life. He meets with his mentor and handler Zvi (Ben Kingsley) to help settle his affairs including leaving everything he has to Maize. He even makes her the beneficiary of his sizable insurance policy.
Image Courtesy of Lionsgate
But here’s the catch – Maize won’t collect any money if Joe kills himself. So he does what anyone would do – he puts out a contract on himself. But in an even more absurd turn of events, Joe gets a call from his doctor who informs him that his test results had been mixed up with another patient’s and that he is actually perfectly healthy. He attempts to cancel the contract but is thwarted by an old enemy, Marianna (Pom Klementieff).
The bulk of the second half follows Joe as he fends off an array of fellow assassins from around the globe. Perry tries hard to follow John Wick’s style and brutality but misses the mark on both. He introduces a colorful collection of killers, each with their own over-the-top personality. But all feel like caricatures and never really register. And most are dispatched through an array of violent methods marked by obvious digital blood sprays that are often more distracting than convincing.
“The Killer’s Game” throws in a few more tricks in an attempt to add some flash – the use of split-screens, bold fonts stamped on the screen, etc. But they do little to dress up what is a pretty ordinary action-comedy that loses steam the longer it sticks around. Die-hard fans of Dave Bautista may have some fun with it. But for everyone else, it’s a movie you’ve seen countless times before, but with different faces. ”The Killer’s Game” is in theaters now.
Dark Sky Selects is celebrating the 50th anniversary of one the best horror movies of all-time with the release of an incredible new collector’s edition. This October a limited number of fans can get their hands on the “The Texas Chain Saw Massacre” 50th Anniversary Chain Saw Edition – a killer new box set honoring Tobe Hooper’s 1974 classic.
FROM THE STUDIO:
This multi-disc set will include the new 4K UHD edition of the film, a Blu-ray bonus disc containing new extra features, and an exclusive VHS release of the movie. The special edition collector’s set will be housed in a custom created box, which is a replica of the iconic chain saw from the film. Opening the chainsaw triggers the sound of Leatherface wielding the chainsaw in the film. Each box set will be numbered and only 5000 have been created.
This limited edition also features a newly designed 50th Anniversary O-card and brand-new bonus content, including The Merchandise of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and The Restoration of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.
“The Texas Chain Saw Massacre 50th Anniversary Chainsaw Edition” will be available for $299.98 exclusively at darkskyselects.com
SPECIAL FEATURES:
DISC 1: 4K UHD (FEATURE FILM)
BONUS: 4 FEATURE COMMENTARIES
Writer-Producer-Director Tobe Hooper, Actor Gunnar Hansen, Cinematographer Daniel Pearl
Actors Marilyn Burns, Allen Danziger, and Paul A. Partain, and Production Designer Robert Burns
Writer-Producer-Director Tobe Hooper
Cinematographer Daniel Pearl, Editor J. Larry Carroll and Sound Recordist Ted Nicolaou
DISC 2: BLU-RAY (FEATURE FILM)
BONUS: 4 FEATURE COMMENTARIES
Writer-Producer-Director Tobe Hooper, Actor Gunnar Hansen, Cinematographer Daniel Pearl
Actors Marilyn Burns, Allen Danziger, and Paul A. Partain, and Production Designer Robert Burns
Writer-Producer-Director Tobe Hooper
Cinematographer Daniel Pearl, Editor J. Larry Carroll and Sound Recordist Ted Nicolaou
DISC 3: BLU-RAY BONUS FEATURES
NEWThe Merchandise of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
NEWThe Restoration of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
Feature-Length Documentary: The Legacy of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
The Cinefamily Presents FRIEDKIN/HOOPER: A Conversation About The Texas Chain Saw Massacre Between William Friedkin and Tobe Hooper
Flesh Wounds: Seven Stories of the Saw
A Tour of the TCSM House with Gunnar Hansen
Off the Hook with Teri McMinn
The Business of Chain Saw: An interview with Production Manager Ron Bozman Interview
Deleted Scenes & Outtakes
Grandpa’s Tales: An Interview with Actor John Dugan
Cutting Chain Saw: An Interview with Editor J. Larry Carroll
I admit to being a little hesitate after hearing that we were getting an American remake of “Speak No Evil” so soon after the release of the Danish original. That superb and unforgettably disturbing feature film came out in 2022 and remains one of the more tension-soaked and brutally unpleasant thrillers in recent years (read my full review of it HERE).
“Speak No Evil” 2024 comes from writer-director James Watkins whose last film was 2016’s “Bastille Day”. His remake has a lot to live up to and to Watkins’ credit he delivers a fittingly tense and unsettling experience. He clearly has reverence for the 2022 film which shows in his faithfulness to the premise (conceived by brothers Christian and Mads Tafdrup). But where the American version falls short is in its re-fashioned finish. It simply doesn’t have the nerve to take things where its predecessor went.
Image Courtesy of Universal Pictures
“Speak No Evil” is helped by an extraordinary cast that includes Mackenzie Davis, Scoot McNairy, Aisling Franciosi, and an absolutely chilling James McAvoy. McNairy and Davis play Ben and Louise, an American couple living in London with their 11-year-old daughter Agnes (Alix West Lefler). We learn later that their marriage is on the rocks which led them to take a family vacation in scenic Tuscany.
While there, Ben and Louise meet Paddy and Ciara (McAvoy and Franciosi), a British couple who are vacationing with their mute son Ant (Dan Hough). The two families hit it off and hang out together several times in the final days of their trips. They then go their separate ways but not before Paddy and Ciara invite their new friends to come visit them sometimes.
Back in London, Ben and Louise receive a postcard from Paddy asking them to come spend a few days on their family farm. At first they’re hesitant – after all they barely know the couple. But they decide to go, thinking the getaway may do their marriage some good. Soon Ben, Louise, and Agnes have made their way to Paddy and Ciara’s remote rural property. It starts out fine, minus a few “misunderstandings”. But over time things get more uncomfortable as a sinister side to Paddy and his seemingly normal family starts to show.
Among the things that impressed me most about this remake is the patience Watkins shows. Rather than rushing things, he allows the tension to slowly build to a simmer. He lets us know pretty early that something is off. But he never fully tips his hand, allowing things to get more and more uneasy before hitting us with its gnarly finish. McAvoy has a knack for playing depraved characters and he really digs into Paddy. He’s crucial to the intensifying sense of dread while Davis is a great foil, conveying what we the audience often feel.
Image Courtesy of Universal Pictures
The film’s ending features several deviations from the 2022 feature which allows it to add some unique twists of its own. At the same time, I wish Watkins didn’t pull his punches in the final 15 minutes. He passes on the darker finish, choosing to go the crowd-pleaser route instead. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing as it adds some extra suspense. But it doesn’t leave us with the same visceral gut-punch either.
“Speak No Evil” still has plenty of frightening moments that will have you squirming in your seat and some unexpected injections of black comedy to get you laughing. Both help the movie form its own identity. While Watkins shows off a keen understanding of tone management and tension-building, he also has the smarts to know when to step back and let his capable cast do the heavy lifting. Overall, Watkins captures enough of original film’s menacing edge while making it easier for mainstream American audiences to stomach. “Speak No Evil” opens in theaters today.
Sporting the tagline “Your Fate is in the Cards”, the supernatural feature “Tarot” gives you a pretty good idea of what you’re in for. The small budget horror film released earlier this year and had a decent showing at the box office, earning nearly $50 million on an $8 million budget. But it wasn’t well received by fellow critics. Turns out there are some pretty noticeable reasons why.
“Tarot” is based on the 1992 novel “Horrorscope” by Nicholas Adams. It’s written for the screen and directed by the filmmaking duo of Spenser Cohen and Anna Halberg. As its title suggests, fortune-telling and the occult come into play, feeding into a reasonably good horror movie premise. But Cohen and Halberg struggle to do much with their movie’s potential. “Tarot” ends up squandering any hint of originality by checking off endless boxes and following formulas that have been re-used countless times.
Image Courtesy of Sony Pictures Entertainment
The story follows seven college friends, Haley (Harriet Slater), Grant (Adain Bradley), Paxton (Jacob Batalon), Paige (Avantika), Madeline (Humberly González), Lucas (Wolfgang Novogratz), and Elise (Larsen Thompson), none of whom are all that interesting and most who fit the common horror movie archetypes. We meet our soon-to-be-doomed partiers celebrating a birthday at a remote mansion in the Catskills that they have rented for the weekend.
After guzzling through the cases of booze they brought with them (yet somehow remaining perfectly sober), they begin rummaging through the house looking for more. In their infinite wisdom they decide to break into a padlocked basement door marked “Keep Out”. But rather than booze, they find a basement full of old antiques including a mysterious deck of tarot cards. In a stroke of narrative convenience, Haley happens to be well-versed in tarot reading. So she uses them to read all of their horoscopes. Bad idea.
In reading the cards the group accidentally unleash something sinister that follows them back to school. Soon after, members of this uninspired gaggle of twentysomethings are picked off one by one, brutally murdered by gruesome real-life versions of the cards they were dealt. The High Priestess, The Hanged Man, The Fool, The Magician, and so on. The survivors eventually wise up and realize something is amiss. They seek the help of Alma Astron (Olwen Fouéré), an occult guru who conveniently knows everything about their creepy tarot deck. She trails the deck’s roots back to 1798 to reveal a curse which must be broken before they all end up dead.
Image Courtesy of Sony Pictures Entertainment
It’s hard to get too involved in anything we see largely because we have no investment in these characters whatsoever. None of them are given a meaningful emotional arc and they are repeatedly doing one incredibly dumb thing after another. Meanwhile the story itself is so formulaic that there is never a real sense of tension or terror (minus one lone scene on a bridge). And what could have been an interesting backstory of the cards is unfortunately crammed into a rushed three minute flashback.
That leaves “Tarot” without a compelling story, no interesting characters, barely any scares, and not an ounce of suspense. Even the kills miss their marks, hampered by the film’s PG-13 rating which strips some clever ideas of their gnarly potential. It’s a shame considering the possibilities. But as it is, you’ll have a hard finding anything you haven’t seen many times before. “Tarot” is now available on home video and VOD.
After the commercial success of Tim Burton’s 1988 dark fantasy horror comedy “Beetlejuice”, Warner Bros. Pictures was thinking about a follow-up as early as 1990. Several scripts were written and considered, with some of the ideas sounding much better than others (believe it or not, “Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian” was actually pitched). But numerous delays and distractions pretty much buried any hopes of a sequel. That is until now.
Here we are 36 years later with Burton reteaming with Warner Bros. for “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice”, the second installment in this oddball (dare I say it ) franchise. I enjoyed the original “Beetlejuice”, but I wasn’t the kind of fan who was hungry for more. Perhaps that’s why I’m so surprised by how much enjoyed this sequel. Is it because it’s a nostalgic blast? Or is it just great seeing Tim Burton let loose with his morbid sense of humor? I think it’s a lot of both.
“Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” welcomes back the familiar faces of Winona Ryder, Catherine O’Hara, and of course the indelible Michael Keaton while introducing several well-tuned new faces including Jenna Ortega, Justin Theroux, Monica Bellucci, and Willem Dafoe. Tonally, “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” is perfectly in-sync with its predecessor. It’s full of wacky effects, cool animatronics, and a slew of macabre gags, all of which generate the kind of horror-inspired zaniness that energized the ‘88 film.
Image Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
In the 36 years since the events of the first film, Lydia Deetz (Ryder) has went from the eccentric goth girl who was nearly married off to a loony demon named Betelgeuse (aka Beetlejuice) to an anxious psychic mediator with her own television show called “Ghost House”. She has a daughter, Astrid (Ortega) who is away at border school, but their relationship has been strained since the tragic death of her husband and Astrid’s father, Richard (Santiago Cabrera).
Lydia gets a phone call from her stepmother Delia (O’Hara) informing her that her father, Charles died while on a bird watching expedition in the South Pacific. So they both return to the little town of Winter River, Connecticut to plan the funeral, picking up Astrid on the way. Once there, Astrid is introduced to Rory (a hilarious Theroux), her mother’s boyfriend who has a knack for always saying the wrong things. Astrid also meets a local boy named Jeremy (Arthur Conti) and the two hit it off.
But things take a bonkers turn after Astrid is lured into the afterlife where she hopes to reconnect with her father. But she finds herself trapped in the hereafter with a hilariously gonzo assortment of Burton-conceived grotesqueries. Desperate to rescue her daughter, Lydia calls on her old nemesis Betelgeuse for help. For those who may have forgotten, Betelgeuse is a rambunctious spirit from the afterlife who desperately wants back in the land of the living. And he still thinks marrying Lydia is his ticket to get there.
Image Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
So Lydia says his name three times, summoning Betelgeuse. They then make a pact – he helps her retrieve Astrid and she agrees to marry him. But Betelgeuse has some problems of his own, namely his furious ex-wife Delores LaVerge (Bellucci). It turns out Delores was a member of a soul-sucking death cult who Betelgeuse hacked to pieces after discovering she had poisoned him. Now she wants revenge. Tracking it all is Wolf Jackson, a character who doesn’t make much sense but who is still a lot of fun thanks to an all-in Willem Dafoe. Wolf was a B-movie action star when living and now works as a semi-hard-boiled afterlife detective.
There are countless callbacks to the 1988 film including the Deetz’s creepy hilltop house overlooking the town, a brief rendition of Harry Belafonte’s “Day-O (The Banana Boat Song”), even the returns of the stop-motion sand worm and everyone’s favorite Shrinker, Bob. The movie also keeps it’s gleefully irreverent and politically incorrect tenor which fuels several of the funniest moments. And then there is the cast who are all fully committed yet clearly having an absolute blast with everything they’re asked to do.
On the negative side, “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” packs a little too much into its story which leaves some characters and their arcs noticeably underdeveloped (Bellucci’s Delores being a prime example). But it’s hard not to be drawn to the movie’s distinct sense of humor and black heart charm. And who wouldn’t want to watch the great Michael Keaton hop back into one the wackiest roles of his storied career? “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” is in theaters now.
Keith & the Movies 