(Click here to read my full review from Friday’s Arkansas Democrat-Gazette)

South African filmmaker Neill Blomkamp made quite the memorable splash with his 2009 debut film “District 9”. The heady and perceptive sci-fi thriller set itself in an alternate 1982 and explored themes of xenophobia, class and income inequality. In addition to being a box office success, “District 9” was well-received by critics and it went on to earn four Academy Award nominations. His next two films weren’t quite as engaging, but both had big ideas to explore.

Now Blomkamp is back with “Demonic”, his first feature film in six years and one that sees him dipping his toes into a new genre. This low-budget and self-financed horror project was written in two months and shot over 24 days in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic. You have to appreciate the filmmaker’s ambition in crafting his own unique vision and bringing it to life on screen.

Unfortunately “Demonic” ends up being a dry and toothless horror experience; one that’s never as captivating as it could be or as chilling as it needs to be. The mostly scare-free story introduces plenty of fun and crazy ideas, but it never fully embraces the sheer nuttiness that it teases. So we end up with a movie that can’t quite muster the frights and that isn’t willing to let loose and go full gonzo.

The story centers around Carly (Carly Pope), a woman haunted by nightmares of her incarcerated mother Angela (Nathalie Boltt) who she hasn’t spoken to in nearly two decades. Out of the blue, Carly is contacted by her former best friend Martin (Chris William Martin) who wants to meet up. Martin is a bit of a crackpot; the kind of guy who pushes all kinds of nutty conspiracies. He reveals to Carly that her estranged mother is in a coma and is part of an experimental study ran by a medical company called Therapol. Carly visits the company where an ambiguous “physician” named Michael (Micheal J. Rogers) and the head researcher Daniel (Terry Chen) let her in on the cutting-edge work they’re doing.

It turns out Therapol has developed a technology that allows them to enter a comatose person’s subconscious and communicate with them. During their recent simulations, Angela has been calling for her daughter. So they convince Carly to let them send her into Angela’s mind where she quickly learns that it may not be her tortured mom doing the calling. It might be something demonic.

The film’s budget constraints are hard to miss both inside and outside of the simulation. It’s especially noticeable in the final act. Aside from some clever lighting, we’re ushered through the surprisingly unremarkable finale without a single eye-catching visual touches to speak of. It’s much the same with the fizzling story as Blomkamp tries to bring everything to an exciting crescendo but instead lands it with an uneventful thud.

So what we’re left with is a bewildering movie – one with demons and possessions but not a scare to be found. One with goofy stuff like militarized Catholic exorcism squads and an ancient weapon called “The Holy Lance” yet it can’t squeeze out a single laugh. It’s really a shame because “Demonic” is the kind of movie you want to root for – a small independent film made outside of the big studio machine. But there is only so much you can look past and “Demonic” never delivers on its early promises. “Demonic” is in select theaters now.

VERDICT – 1.5 STARS

In 2016’s “Don’t Breathe” Stephen Lang introduced us to Norman Nordstrom, a blind Gulf War veteran with uncompromising survival instincts but also a pitch-black violent side. Now five years later we get an unexpected sequel that thrusts the far-from-heroic Norman into the role of protagonist. That may (and should) have fans of the well-received first film scratching their heads. But don’t worry, the damaged ex-Navy Seal still has his gruesome mean streak.

Going in it’s tempting to ask why make a sequel? Do the filmmakers have something new up their sleeves? Are they expanding on the first film? Well, not really. In fact, a big chunk of “Don’t Breathe 2” is more or less a rinse-and-repeat of its predecessor. Yet there’s fun to be had with this simple yet fleet-footed sequel that plays like a blood-soaked 70’s grindhouse flick. If you look at as anything other than that you can expect to be disappointed.

Rodo Sayagues directs from a script he co-wrote with Fede Álvarez. Both worked together on the first film and bring the same grisly edge to this one. Part two also casts its audience into the same moral muck as the first film, luring us into rooting for an unsavory character and then questioning ourselves for doing so. But the freshness of “Don’t Breathe” 2016 doesn’t find its way into the follow-up, and rooting for Norman leaves you feeling icky. Then again, as Álvarez made clear to his Twitter followers, it’s supposed to.

Eight years after the events of the first film, Norman is still living in the rundown abandoned suburbs of Detroit. But this time he’s not alone. He has taken in and raised an 11-year-old girl named Phoenix (Madelyn Grace) who lost her family in a house fire eight years earlier. Now Norman poses as her father, teaching her survival drills and drowning her in his own paranoia and cynicism.

Just like in the first film, a group of hoodlums target his house, except this time it’s not for a large stash of hidden cash. Instead they come for Phoenix which pushes Norman right back into the savage killer mode he had worked hard to suppress. With his heightened senses and an assortment of gnarly blunt instruments at his disposal, Norman turns into the little girl’s protector leaving plenty of carnage in his wake.

As you make your way through the film’s first half you might swear you’re watching a segment from the 2016 movie. With the exception of some opening table-setting, Phoenix’s presence and one terrific long take inside Norman’s dark thug-infested house, everything in the opening 40 minutes or so seems cut from the same cloth as the original.

But then you get to the second half where things begin to slide off the rails (in a good way or a bad way, depending on how are you look at it). The story takes a wacky turn and throws in a macabre twist which is where the gonzo grindhouse vibe really kicks in. If you take it too seriously you’ll have a hard time digesting how bizarre things get. But if you take it lightly, like most of the crowd I saw it with did, you may find yourself having a pretty good time, wincing at some of the gorier moments and chuckling at the unexpected shots of subtle black comedy.

Even with fun to be had, “Don’t Breathe 2” doesn’t really leave much of an impression. Minus some fairly entertaining final act shenanigans, the movie basically rides the formula that made the first film an unexpected surprise. The little girl does add a new wrinkle, but she’s not quite enough to make us fully buy into Norman’s transformation. But now I’m breaking my own rule and putting too much thought into it. Stick to viewing “DB2” as a schlocky B-movie. That’s the way to go. “Don’t Breathe 2” is now showing in theaters

VERDICT – 2.5 STARS

It’s great seeing Eric Bana not just getting a leading role, but getting a really meaty one in a movie that lets him show why he’s such an underrated actor. “The Dry”, an Australian thriller from director Robert Connolly, marks Bana’s first feature film appearance since 2017. Written by Connolly and Harry Cripps, it’s an adaptation of Jane Harper’s 2016 crime novel of the same name about a man unexpectedly thrust into the middle of a brutal crime case and forced to reckon with a buried mystery from his past.

Connolly begins by locking us into his setting – the once thriving farm town of Kiewarra now decimated by a crippling drought (we learn it hasn’t rained in 324 days). What’s left of the economically depressed community now lives among dried-up riverbeds, sun-scorched fields, and the ever-present threat of bushfires. DP Stefan Duscio opens the film by panning over the dry barren landscape, his camera slowly moving across the cracked earth and endless acres of dusty parched wheat before honing in on a remote farmhouse. As the haunting cries of a baby echoes in the background, Duscio takes us inside where we make a gruesome discovery.

Bana plays Aaron Falk, a federal agent living in Melbourne who returns to his hometown of Kiewarra for the first time in over twenty years. He’s there to attend the funeral of a childhood friend named Luke (played in flashbacks by Martin Dingle-Wall). The story goes Luke murdered his wife and young son but left his infant child alive. He then went out near a dried-up pond and shot himself. No one in town questions it save for Luke’s grieving parents (Bruce Spence and Julia Blake). After the funeral they plead with Aaron to look into the case and see what he can find. He reluctantly agrees.

Aaron begins working with jittery and inexperienced local police sergeant Greg Raco (Keir O’Donnell) who is happy to have some help with the case. Aaron also reconnects with an old friend Gretchen (Genevieve O’Reilly). But not everyone in Kiewarra is happy to have him back. Not only do they resent him digging around in what they believe is a cut-and-dry double murder-suicide, but Aaron’s presence rekindles old suspicions that he was responsible for the death of a classmate named Ellie (BeBe Bettencourt) twenty years earlier.

This two-pronged story actually flows together nicely thanks to Connolly’s moody slow-burn approach which gives plenty of time to the characters and to sorting out the dual mysteries. On one hand the struggling townsfolk are still reeling from the present day tragedy. On the other you have the hard feelings and animosity rooted in the town’s troubled past and exacerbated by twenty years of lies, deception, and buried secrets. For some locals Aaron’s return causes those old wounds to fester. Meanwhile Aaron has to finally deal with the circumstances that led to him to leave Kiewarra in the first place.

Equally vital to the story are the flashbacks we get to Aaron’s teen years which flesh out his friendships with the bullish Luke, the tender Gretchen, and the troubled Ellie. Connolly expertly grafts these scenes into his main story, using them to feed us information and methodically fill in pieces to his puzzle. And the performances from the young cast call back to a happier much different Kiewarra. In fact even the cinematography stresses how things have changed. The flashbacks have an almost idyllic glow and highlight a time when the grass was green and muddy water reached the riverbanks. It’s a sharp contrast both physically and figuratively to the present day’s dry arid terrain.

“The Dry” isn’t a particularly original idea but it features enough fresh touches to give it its own unique identity. The whole thing is anchored by a terrific Eric Bana, weathered and stoic yet sensitive and empathetic. He plays his character at the just the right temperature, sinking into the stark backdrops and mixing well with the exceptional supporting players. He’s never been better. The story doesn’t shoot for the big showy climax and it ends a little abruptly. But for a movie that puts mood, atmosphere, and characters ahead of big twists and turns, it kinda makes sense. “The Dry” opens May 21st in theaters and on VOD.

VERDICT – 4 STARS

Well before they became major players in the superhero genre, Zack Snyder and James Gunn teamed up to remake George A. Romero’s zombie cult classic “Dawn of the Dead”. Their stylish 2004 action-horror flick set out to pay homage to the 1978 original while also appealing to a new generation of moviegoers. For the most part Snyder and Gunn succeed. Their spin on “Dawn of the Dead” lacks the sly humor and satirical bite that was a pivotal part of Romero’s movie. But it’s far from humorless and the big action, creepy setting, and snappy pacing keeps things engaging.

Director Snyder and screenwriter Gunn basically take the general idea of the ’78 movie and build their own world around it. They fill it in with their own unique cast of characters, all caught in a sudden viral outbreak that reanimates the dead, turning them into rabid flesh-eating ghouls. It drives a host of survivors from different walks of life to a Milwaukee shopping mall where they hole up inside and wait to be rescued. As with most of the better zombie movies, the story revolves around the people – their virtues and their vices; the clashing personalities and the interpersonal conflicts.

Image Courtesy of Universal Pictures

But make no mistake, this is more of an ‘ode to the genre’ than some deeper social study and the film has a ton of fun playing around in some familiar zombie territory. Over the years Snyder has shown himself to be a visionary director and a visual storyteller. “Dawn of the Dead” was Snyder’s directorial debut and though not nearly as stylized as his sophomore effort “300”, you can clearly see the markings of the visual style that would become an integral part of his storytelling. In “Dawn” he delivers several memorable shots and some exciting high-energy action sequences. And while it’s certainly a horror film, I wouldn’t call his movie scary. Yet it can get under your skin on occasions and Snyder isn’t afraid to splash on a few coats of blood.

Gunn’s script introduces an interesting array of characters who fill out his story. Without question several are closer to archetypes who turn out to be little more than zombie fodder. But most bring their own something to the story, namely Sarah Polley as a nurse named Ana, Ving Rhames as a cop named Kenneth, Jake Weber’s Michael, an electronics salesman, and Michael Kelly’s abrasive mall security guard C.J. There’s also a particularly creepy storyline with a petty criminal named Andre (Mekhi Phifer) and his pregnant wife Luda (Inna Korobkina). Characters who don’t fair as well, Ty Burrell’s Steve who is your prototypical, by-the-books scumbag and Kim Poirier’s Monica, exploited for her sex appeal rather than given anything meaningful to do.

Image Courtesy of Universal Pictures

It only takes a few minutes for the story’s survival elements to kick in and it quickly becomes a movie of who’s going to make it and who isn’t (which I admit, I’m a sucker for). But the ferocity Snyder brings visually and conceptually comes with a level of immersion I didn’t remember from when I first saw “Dawn” in 2004. It’s hard not to be caught up in the tension of the circumstances and the setting. Speaking of the setting, much of the film was shot in a completely renovated 45,000 square foot vacant shopping mall in Ontario, Canada. Production designer Andrew Neskoromny and his crew individually designed numerous stores and boutiques, developed underground parking areas, and even built a fountain at one of the entrances. It’s completely convincing down to the smallest details becoming the perfect horror movie playground.

While not as innovative or provocative as Romero’s highly revered original, this “Dawn of the Dead” remake is fueled by an admiration for the genre and a gritty visceral style that would become a Zack Snyder signature in the years that followed. It’s hardly subtle with its ambitions but in a kinetic and entertaining way that’s a real strength. Snyder and Gunn, notorious these days for their own individual and distinctly unique reasons, clearly have a ball making a zombie movie that honors its predecessors yet still plays by its own rules. It didn’t forever change the zombie horror landscape, but it did introduce us to an intriguing new filmmaker with some big projects on the horizon.

VERDICT – 3.5 STARS

In the upcoming horror thriller “The Devil Below” from director Brad Parker an abandoned Appalachian mining town holds a dark and deadly secret. Back in the 1970s the tight community of Shookum Hills was decimated by what was ruled an “environmental disaster”. As a result the town burned to the ground and as many as 1,000 miners and their family members vanished. Now it’s as if the town and the events that occurred there has been wiped off the map and from everyone’s memory.

Parker has spent most of his film career working as a digital artist and special effects supervisor. His only other directorial effort was 2012’s “Chernobyl Diaries”, a not-so-good horror film built around an intriguing premise and an eerie setting. Similarly “The Devil Below” has a setting that grabs you and Parker soaks his film in atmosphere. And while it does stumble with a couple of head-scratching character choices and some all-to-familiar genre moments, there’s more than enough mystery and fleet-footed tension to keep things fun and entertaining.

Image Courtesy of Vertical Entertainment

Will Patton has turned into one of my favorite character actors – always reliable and well-tuned to whatever movie he’s in. Just last year he brought a great presence to two of my favorite 2020 films, “Minari” and “Blood on Her Name”. Here he appears in the prologue as Paul, a foreman for the Shookum Hills Mining Company. In a brief but well shot opening, we see him lose his son to something (emphasis on THING) from deep inside the mine. Wounded and incapacitated by the creature, all Paul can do is helplessly listen to the screams of his son from the depths below.

Jump ahead to current day and we’re introduced to Ariana (Alicia Sanz), a strictly business expedition guide who scouts out hard-to-find locations and leads her paying clients to their destinations. She’s hired by Darren (Adan Canto), an Oxford-funded leader of a research team anxious to uncover what really happened at Shookum Hills. Darren is a man of science who scoffs at anything that can’t be logically explained. This causes him to butt heads with team member Shawn (Chinaza Uche), a geologist and the one member of the group who embraces the possibility of the supernatural. Other team members are Terry (Jonathan Sadowski), an annoying but skilled tech guy and Jamie (Zach Avery) who handles the vaguely defined “security services”.

Parker takes his time setting things up, spending much of the first thirty minutes or so building up atmosphere and setting the film’s tone. That’s helped immensely by DP Morgan Susser’s camera and the foreboding score of Nima Fakhrara. These early scenes follow the team as they venture deep into the Appalachian hills led by Ariana who believes she’s narrowed down the location of the now uncharted ghost town. They get no help from the cryptic locals, the kind who clearly know more than they want to share. Among them is Patton’s Paul. “I want them gone“, he grumbles about the nosy out-of-towners. “No matter what it takes.”

Image Courtesy of Vertical Entertainment

Of course the researchers don’t heed the advice of the locals, eventually finding their way to the hull of Shookum Hills. They hilariously miss evidence that the town may not be so vacant (burning kerosene lanterns, mowed green grass, etc.) and they press on until they find the mine and disturb the ghastly secret that lies deep within it. What follows is a pretty familiar survival horror formula – a group running for their lives and being picked off one-by-one. But the story is kept interesting through its brisk pacing and Parker’s ability to not only build tension but sustain it. It’s also helped by some of his visual choices. The grainy night vision and occasional handheld camera sometimes make things hard to decipher, but he nicely utilizes the setting and captures a steady sense of claustrophobia in the second half that’s pretty harrowing.

“The Devil Below” is very much a genre film which both helps and hurts. But overall Parker along with screenwriters Stefan Jaworski and Eric Scherbarth have their own vision and they hit their target, delivering a moody and absorbing horror-thriller that keeps you locked in from start to finish. Good performances fill out the under 90-minute runtime, keeping our focus forward and leaving little time to question the logic of what we’re seeing. It does leave some of the characters too thinly sketched, but the story has just enough grit and suspense to keep things entertaining. “The Devil Below” premieres March 5th is select theaters and on VOD.

VERDICT- 3.5 STARS