It’s all horror, thrills, and overdosed mammals in August. Here’s some of the stuff I’ve been watching, in alphabetical order.

Cocaine Bear (2023)

written by Jimmy Warden

directed by Elizabeth Banks

Cocaine Bear is about a bear who finds a bunch of cocaine in the wilderness, loves it, and proceeds to kill everyone – already an awesome premise. Thankfully, this horror comedy knows it needs to be campy to work (unlike, say, 2018’s The Meg), and the gory maulings are quite fun. If only writer Jimmy Warden and director Elizabeth Banks hadn’t also tried to make an actual movie in the process, with kids lost in the woods, a bunch of criminals looking for the drugs, and a detective trying to figure it all out. Anytime Cocaine Bear lets these cardboard characters talk, the whole thing stops dead in its tracks. Just fast-forward to any scene with the bear and skip the rest.

Rating: **

El guardián invisible (The Invisible Guardian – 2017)

written by Luiso Berdejo

based on the novel by Dolores Redondo

directed by Fernando González Molina

There’s nothing I hate more than a thriller that sets up intriguing ideas, complicates them, and then doesn’t bother to find compelling resolutions. It’s a clear sign of lazy writing, and this Spanish film about a police inspector (Marta Etura) investigating a series of murders is a prime example. Not only does El guardián invisible (English title: The Invisible Guardian) make little overall sense, it also features ghosts, demonology, and even Spain’s own fucking Bigfoot as part of its “narrative,” rendering it even sillier. This is the first in a trilogy. Suffice it to say I won’t be watching the next two.

Rating: *½

Evil Dead Rise (2023)

based on The Evil Dead characters by Sam Raimi

written and directed by Lee Cronin

The secret sauce of the original Evil Dead horror trilogy is absurd humor. From the moment in The Evil Dead (1981) when reluctant hero Ash (Bruce Campbell) decapitates his possessed girlfriend and her body spews gallons of blood on his face, I was all in support of filmmaker Sam Raimi’s deliriously gruesome mash-up of horror and slapstick. And with Evil Dead II 1987) and Army of Darkness (1982) he would just up the ante, even sending Ash back in time to become a Middle Ages demon hunter. The newer movies, though? Meh. By bypassing Raimi’s trademark style in favor of straight horror, 2013’s remake Evil Dead and now Evil Dead Rise both feel pretty conventional. This latest installment moves the action from the woods to the city, as the Deadites take over an apartment building in Los Angeles. There are a couple of inventive moments – such as a final dismemberment by wood chipper – but none of it is scary or fun. Writer/director Lee Cronin even steals one of Evil Dead II‘s funniest gags, the eye flying through the air and landing in someone’s mouth. Boo, I say.

Rating: **

Greenland (2020)

written by Chris Sparling

directed by Ric Roman Waugh

A giant rock heads towards Earth, promising tons of destruction, endless computer graphics, and a handful of stereotypes trying to survive the cataclysm. You’ve seen it all before in everything from Meteor (1979) to Deep Impact (1998), plus endless variations on the mass extinction theme (my favorite is still 2009’s ridiculous end-of-the-world extravaganza 2012, because watching Woody Harrelson getting killed by a burning boulder while he screams“You heard it first from Charlie!” is pretty funny). Greenland plays it more straight and somber as a structural engineer (Gerard Butler) tries to save his family from the apocalypse, but there’s nothing here that really stands out. Pair it with Butler’s Geostorm (2017) for a double dose of impending doom.

Rating: **

Halloween II (2009)

based on the film Halloween written by John Carpenter and Debra Hill

written and directed by Rob Zombie

I thought writer/director Rob Zombie’s remake of Halloween was pretty interesting, warts and all. And even though I wanted to like this sequel, I can’t figure out what went wrong. I like that Zombie decided to shoot in 16mm, making the whole thing feel even grittier than the previous effort. There’s also an early sequence set in a hospital that echoes and subverts the original Halloween II (1978) in its entirety when Zombie reveals it to be a dream. The rest is… well, quite a mess. From Michael (Tyler Mane) and Laurie (Scout Taylor-Compton) experiencing visions of their dead mother (and a horse?), to their sudden psychic connection, and on to Dr. Loomis (Malcolm McDowell) becoming a fame-obsessed asshole, there’s no shortage of bizarre choices (at one moment even Weird Al Yankovic pops up). There’s also too much of Zombie’s grindhouse hillbilly aesthetic, down to jokes about necrophilia. I don’t know, I’m almost tempted to recommend Halloween II just for the fact that it’s so uncompromisingly bonkers. But in comparison to Zombie’s first outing, it just doesn’t flow organically. Watch and be the judge.

Rating: **

Klute (1971)

written by Andy Lewis and Dave Lewis

directed by Alan J. Pakula

Klute is part of director Alan J. Pakula’s “paranoia trilogy,” which includes The Parallax View (1974) and All the President’s Men (1976). Both of those are better films than Klute, yet this first foray into conspiracies and surveillance (a big theme in the 70s) is still a curious watch as it tries to navigate a conventional thriller (Jane Fonda’s prostitute is being stalked by a killer) with an artsier psychological study about a woman trying to escape the numbness of her life. However, it’s marred by slow pacing, confusing writing, and Donald Sutherland as the titular PI, who’s so anemic one wonders how he can possibly get anything done. Pakula would only get better.

Rating: **½

Knock at the Cabin (2023)

based on the novel The Cabin at the End of the World by Paul Tremblay

written by M. Night Shyamalan, Steve Desmond, and Michael Sherman

directed by M. Night Shyamalan

I’ve always been intrigued by filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan, who stopped making big-budget Hollywood films around After Earth (2013) in favor of smaller B movies in a way that resembles the career of one of my favorite genre directors, John Carpenter. Knock at the Cabin follows Shyamalan’s lackluster Old (2021) with another Twilight Zone-ish premise in which a family is terrorized by four intruders who might just be the Horsemen of the Apocalypse. I know you’re shaking your head. But if you can forgive the inconsistencies of the plot, you may enjoy Shyamalan’s impeccable visuals, spatial inventiveness, and a surprisingly good turn by Dave Bautista as the leader of the strangers. It ain’t Split (2016), but it’ll do.

Rating: **½

Noah (2014)

written by Darren Aronofsky and Ari Handel

directed by Darren Aronofsky

A big-budget Biblical epic from a director known for dense psychological dramas (1998’s Pi, 2000’s Requiem for a Dream) and unwieldy sci-fi epics (2006’s The Fountain)? Yeah, definitely an odd choice. Yet it is precisely those art-house sensibilities that make filmmaker Darren Aronofsky’s Noah a bit more interesting than what we’d get from a regular director. You know the story: God has decided to wipe out human sin with a great flood, choosing patriarch Noah (Russell Crowe) to build an ark that will save his family and two animals of every kind. The first half is interesting: Aronofsky’s compositions, aided by his usual cinematographer Matthew Libatique, are beautiful; Crowe plays it subtly, and we finally understand how that huge ship could possibly be built (it involves giant fallen angels). Yet the second half suffers from a more action-based Hollywood approach, as Noah and his family face off against Cain’s descendant Tubal-cain (Ray Winstone). Still, if you’re into Aronofsky, this peculiar entry in his filmography is not to be missed.

Rating: **½

The Pale Blue Eye (2022)

based on the novel by Louis Bayard

written by Scott Cooper

It’s 1830 and the body of a military cadet has been found at West Point, his heart removed from his chest. Enter retired detective Augustus Landor (Christian Bale), who suspects rituals and witchcraft. Landor asks for help from another cadet, Edgar Allan Poe (yes, the very one), in trying to figure out the mystery. It’s all kind of ho-hum, despite the stylish atmosphere and committed performances from Bale and Harry Melling as the eventual horror writer. Where The Pale Blue Eye picks up is in its final half hour or so, when you’ll either go along with its convoluted revenge twist or not. I did, and found it to be much more compelling than the stereotypical black magic stuff that preceded it. Then again, you may be better off reading some Poe.

Rating: **½

Carlos I. Cuevas