THE BOY (2015) Blu-ray Review

Scare-A-Thon Totals to Date:

Total Movies Watched: 15
Total First Time Views: 6
Amount raised for AMAZON WATCH: $1,184.85

The Boy (2015) d. Craig William Macneil (USA) (110 min) (1st viewing)

Far off the beaten path, the proprietor of the Mt. Vista Motel (David Morse) and his son Ted (Jared Breeze) live a disconnected, antisocial existence, forever changing linens for beds that have not been slept in, swapping out towels that have never been used. This idle life seems to severely affected them both; while the father simply sinks further into a stupor of self-pity and booze, his son develops an increasingly morbid fascination with death and dying. He dreams of collecting enough roadkill carcasses (for which his father pays a quarter each) to buy a Greyhound bus ticket out of Nowheresville, but that’s still a long way off and he’s getting impatient. One night, he lures a deer into the highway and causes a traffic accident for a potential fugitive from justice, William Colby (Rainn Wilson). With his car totaled, Colby is trapped for the foreseeable future at the Mt. Vista, and while he clearly harbors dark thoughts within his darker past, he is unprepared for the beguiling lure of this burgeoning knee-high sociopath.

FENDER BENDER (2016) Blu-ray Review

Fender Bender (2016) d. Pavia, Mark (USA) (91 min)

Following his auspicious feature debut, a much-lauded screen adaptation of Stephen King’s The Night Flier in 1997, we’ve heard precious little from writer/director Pavia until now. All the more regretful that his return to the genre is a relatively routine slasher flick, featuring a mild-mannered creep (Bill Sage) who bumps into unsuspecting motorists at stop signs, exchanges information with them, and then murders them later in their homes.

WE ARE WHAT WE ARE (2013) movie review

We Are What We Are (2013) d. Mickle, Jim (USA)

There’s a deep dark secret at the center of writer/director Mickle’s latest feature, his third following the acclaimed Mulberry St. and Stake Land. The irony is that this mystery, which enjoys its big reveal about an hour into the film, is a large part of the high concept pitch and is likely to be known to anyone who settles in to watch, especially if they are in any way familiar with Jorge Michel Grau’s original Mexican shocker. Because Mickle and co-writer Nick Damici have taken such pains to carefully unwrap this plot element, I will endeavor to do the same. But regardless of whether viewers know where the winding road leads, the experience is not diminished; this is powerful, assured filmmaking that overcomes the clunkiness of its predecessor and stands as the fiercely independent artist’s most fully realized effort to date. And – barring an excessively silly climax (thrown in to appease the gorehounds) – it’s also probably one of the finest remakes of the past two decades.