I Saw The TV Glow should come with a warning. It’s a film you can’t prepare for, with no easy answers other than the ones you may not want to face, a film you can’t unsee. There are few adjectives more thudding when critiquing a film than ‘important’, but it’s […]
From the Festivals
Carnage for Christmas and Liminal (Salem Horror Fest 2024)(Review)
As both a transgender woman and an enthusiast in horror, folklore, and all things spooky and fortean, I find myself frequently considering the relationships that people have with places; with horror, I frequently consider the ways in which locations can be haunted (literally or figuratively) by the actions of people […]
In The Rearview (Kinoteka 2024)(Review)
When Maciek Hamela was shooting this documentary on the roads between Ukraine and Poland there was probably still hope that this would remain a relatively short-lived war. Indeed, several of Hamela’s passengers – refugees carried in his volunteer’s van from urban and rural areas across the nation – often speak […]
7 Keys (SXSW 2024): Stylish Execution of High Concept British Thriller (Review)
Receiving its world premiere at SXSW, Joy Wilkinson makes her feature film debut as writer and director with 7 Keys, having found success in theatre, television, and radio. Immediately, she shows confidence in executing her vision with the opening shots of houses and flats around London, each one tinged with […]
Horror Story – (Kinoteka 2024)(Review)
As the feature debut of writer-director Adrian Apanel, Horror Story pulls off a nice little magic trick. When fresh-faced finance graduate Tomek (Jakub Zajac), rents a room in a crumbling boarding house that’s straight out of the horror cinema interior decorating textbook, we expect things to go full-blown supernatural (or […]
In Flames (Glasgow Frightfest 2024)(Review)
Fifteen or so years ago a movie called In Flames would’ve conjured up images of Scandanavian terror, full of blacks and dark blues, probably quite nihilistic, where an unlucky group were victim to supernatural terrors from beyond. Admittedly, part of that hypothetical may be influenced by sharing a name with a Swedish […]
Danger Zone (Kinoteka 2024) (Review)
Au 8ème Jour (SXSW 2024) – Wonderfully Unique and Gorgeously Atmospheric (Review)
Doppelganger. The Double (2023) (Kinoteka 2024)
Here’s useful viewing for anyone wondering what the attitude of the Polish public towards the USSR might be almost forty five years on from the forming of Solidarity. Doppelganger. The Double is a new thriller from film-maker Jan Holoubek that’s set between the late-seventies and mid-eighties, and is currently showing […]
Birdeater (SXSW 2024)(Review)
In spite of what its title and country of origin might suggest, not a single spider appears in Birdeater (2023), the feature debut of Australian directing duo Jack Clark and Jim Weir; the webs of predatory entrapment that its characters become tangled in are of the metaphorical variety, constructed using […]