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The modern horror landscape is obsessed with being important. We are currently drowning in a sea of elevated genre films where every ghost is a stand-in for intergenerational trauma and every monster is a metaphor for a suppressed social anxiety. It’s all very polite, very academic, and very, very boring. The industry has become a…
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Most horror movies are built on a foundation of “why.” Why did the killer choose this house? Why does the ghost have a grudge? Why won’t the car start? We’ve been conditioned to look for a logic that validates our fear, as if understanding the monster makes the teeth any less sharp. We want our…
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When I first saw the trailer for Sam Raimi’s new film, Send Help, I was immediately excited at the prospect of another gory, fun-filled film like Evil Dead. The trailer was intense, giving the impression of extreme violence, unhinged characters, and thrilling action. What I didn’t know was that the film was about to pull…
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​The year 1942 was the the symbolic terminal point for the Classic Monster. Universal’s pantheon—the aristocrats in capes and the tragic hulks in bandages—had become safe. They were creatures of the light, their every move choreographed, their makeup kits fully visible to even the most casual observer. They belonged to the theater of the grand…
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There is a precise moment in the development of a certain kind of mind where the trajectory of one’s aesthetic life is altered forever. For some, it is a high-brow literary awakening; for others, it is the discovery of a specific, crushing guitar riff in a windowless club. But for me—at the volatile, impressionable age…
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​There are a few hills, as a writer, I will die on. For example, Ed Wood is the greatest director to ever live because he was so terrible at what he did, Sophie Thatcher can become the next big scream queen if she decides to stick it out in the genre, and The Omen remains…
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We need to stop pretending that The Exorcist is just another classic movie that you check off a list so you can feel culturally literate. I am so tired of the modern elevated horror crowd—the ones who think a movie is only good if it’s a metaphor for hereditary trauma or a deeply moving exploration…
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With the the 1919 composition of The Statement of Randolph Carter, the Cosmic Horror shifted trajectory. We are no longer sailing through the iridescent mists of the Dream-lands or witnessing the geological revenge of silent water-lizards. We are in a swamp. We are in a graveyard. We are standing over a hole in the earth…
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By 1984, two of the big ‘unholy trinity’ of 80s slasher franchises, Halloween and Friday the 13th, had already been established. Wes Craven was late to the party, but he brought with him the film that would not only complete the slasher picture but would also birth the franchise that arguably became the biggest pop…
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Uwe Boll is a fucking headcase. And I mean that in the most respectful way possible. Here is a man who doesn’t take any shit from anyone, will tear critics a fresh asshole if they so much as look at one of his films the wrong way, and believes that everything he makes is a…