Time to dust off those critical thinking caps, mes amis. Film criticism isn’t just for October anymore. Now it’s for some other times as well, such as shortly after I have watched this specific French film. Zut alors! Mars Express (2023): The Plot: In the 23rd century, private eye Aline Ruby (Léa Drucker) and her…
Another Octoberween draws to a close. Ah, the passage of time. Makes ya think. As always, we had a blast getting in that holiday spirit. Second Breakfast re-visited Van Helsing, a bangin’ good time if there ever was one, and also the movie that taught me Frankenstein’s Monster could speak. Go figure. Sarah returned with…
Ah, Halloween. One of the great adult drinking holidays, yet also a powerful source of nostalgia for a simpler, gentler time. There’s only one thing I can think of that could better represent these contradictions at the heart of the human condition: The werewolf. Whether they’re running amok in Kent or setting a precedent for…
My favorite thing about Dark Harvest is how masterfully Slade uses chiaroscuro. It’s evident in 30 Days of Night as well as his “‘Hannibal” episodes, but the man is just really really good at it.
Octoberween X. We’re all feeling very old and learned, looking back on reviews we posted and opinions we had a decade ago and wondering why we had them. As I scroll through the Rooster Illusion backlog and time and memory dreg up ponderous questions about this and that, one in particular confounds me: how, in…
I do not speak Spanish, so… not sure if the title of this post actually means anything. My apologies. Octoberween is a time for monsters, and where there are monsters, there really ought to be monster-fighters. Though I have repeatedly said—and maintain—that Peter Cushing’s Van Helsing is the greater monster-fighter ever put to screen, I’d…
Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is where the wheels have started to come off the cart for me. With new series and movies seemingly every few weeks and too many of them playing out like advertisements for other series and movies (looking at you, Loki), the projects that grab hold of me these…
