Some horror franchises get further and further (no pun intended) away from their initial inspiration as they go along, but INSIDIOUS: THE LAST KEY brings perfect closure to this series by giving its most vital character deserved front-and-center status.
Looking back over the movies of the past year, one thing became evident: The horror/supernatural genre has never been more fluid and malleable than in 2017. That made compiling a list of the best scare films an intriguing challenge.
The sort of film that truly benefits from being seen with a large and enthusiastic audience, Joe Lynch’s MAYHEM was sadly unable to secure the big-screen release that the similarly themed THE BELKO EXPERIMENT achieved. That’s a shame, but now it can be enjoyed at home via RLJE’s disc editions—most cathartically after a hard day at work.
“Observant” and “picturesque” are not necessarily the foremost qualities a horror film strives for, but they’re the ones that apply to DESOLATION, in which a sensitivity to character and setting compensate somewhat for a lack of inventiveness and intensity when it comes to the fright components.
With Guillermo del Toro’s aquatic-monster love story THE SHAPE OF WATER in the midst of a successful platform release, and the Polish schoolyard shocker PLAYGROUND seeing U.S. exposure, now is a good time to return to Agnieszka Smoczynska’s mermaid romance/horror/musical THE LURE via its Criterion Blu-ray edition that came out this fall.
