I love films that surprise me, where the journey is completely unexpected and not entirely spoiled by the trailer. You might think you know what Kurtis David Harder's Shudder Original Influencer is about but it's so much more fun than you expect.
Californian influencer Madison (Emily Tennant) is on a solo trip to Thailand. It wasn't meant to be a solo trip but her boyfriend Ryan (Rory J. Saper) dropped out the last minute. It doesn't take long for local expats and hotel guests to notice that Madison is alone, and she soon finds herself the target of unwanted attention. Enter CW (Cassandra Naud, Snowpiercer): enigmatic and care-free, CW shows Madison how to really let go of her insecurities and enjoy the beautiful country around her.
When Madison's room is broken into and her passport stolen, Madison realises she will need to spend weeks more time in the country before her passport can be reissued. CW offers Madison a place to stay with her and Madison begrudgingly accepts, not wanting to be a burden. What can possibly go wrong?
Be careful who you follow
In the tense and chilling scenes that follow, we learn that you can't always trust what you see online and that there will always be people who want a piece of the influencer bubble.
Besides, when you have millions of followers, people will definitely notice when you're gone, right?
Influencer is a very clever film and offers multiple twists and turns, with new characters popping up and muddying the waters for our cunning antagonist. There is an appearance from mega-influencer Jessica (Sara Canning), who surely isn't as naive as Madison, and a surprise arrival that threatens to derail the entire plan.
I love a well-written baddie and Influencer definitely delivers. CW is creepy and cunning, with a long game that is as terrifying as she is evil. As a frequent traveller myself, Influencer was the epitome of horror: unwanted attention, over-friendly travellers, imposing people, my room being broken into. That's all nothing compared to what CW dreams up for her victims.
Of course, my wanderlust was definitely piqued by Influencer which features some exquisite locations and luxury villas. Surprisingly, for a film set in Thailand, you see criminally little of Thailand itself and that shows the shallow lens of the influencer, how little they actual enjoy of the world around them.
I enjoyed every minute of Influencer and enjoyed falling victim to the twists. Cassandra Naud was superb as CW and she's definitely on my list of young actors to watch. Emily Tennant, Rory J. Saper and Sara Canning also deliver excellent performances and you'll be wondering to the end who the real star of this film is.
I give Influencer an excellent five out of five stars and recommend to horror and Shudder fans, especially of the rising influencer genre. After his success with Shudder original Spiral and now this, I'm definitely keen on seeing what Kurtis David Harder does next.★★★★★
A Shudder Original, Influencer premieres on Friday 26 May. Streaming Exclusively on Shudder and AMC+
Influencer (2022) Trailer, dir Kurtis David Harder
Unscrupulous landlords are nothing new. I mean, how difficult is it to admit that the water in a house has two settings - arctic and third-ring-of-hell? Or to say, you know, Sorry About the Demon that you've made an unholy deal with?
Will (Jon Michael Simpson, Scare Package) is having a bad time. He's a talented baker, awesome at his job as a customer service agent for a toothpaste brand, but not so good at turning up for his girlfriend when she receives a major promotion at work. Frustrated with his tendency to be a feckless shut-in with many ambitions and few successes, Amy (Paige Evans, (Paranormal Nightshift) dumps Will and kicks him out of their shared apartment.
Lucky for Will, he manages to snag a massive house for an extremely low rent where he can bake and answer customer calls to his heart's delight. Unlucky for Will, the slightly creepy family that leased him the house forgot to tell him about the super aggressive house demon that happens to be looking for a new host.
Can our feckless man-child save his relationship with Amy and save the world from a dangerous demon? Well, maybe. He should really just leave the house but he technically has nowhere to go. Armed with toothpaste, cakes and a sceptical best friend, Will decides that he can definitely try.
Written and directed by Emily Hagins, Sorry About the Demon is laugh-out-loud funny which is why it was surprising that it is also scream-out-loud scary. Featuring the most middle-class seance ever seen on screen and an unholy puddle of blood and goo, this film is fun from the very first minute and I liked it a lot. There are also loads of very creepy moments in the film and the makeup / effects on the possessed humans was done really well.
Visually, Sorry About the Demon is a feast for the eyes with a really great setting in a kooky, quirky house. Many scenes were oozing colour, practically eye candy, with a focus on interior design and increasingly garish cakes.
What made this film most enjoyable is that it has great performances all round. Simpson and Evans are great as Will and Amy, a couple on the edge of relational collapse. Jeff McQuitty is brilliant as Will's increasingly-sceptical-yet-surprisingly-supportive best friend Patrick and Olivia Ducayen is very good as the eccentric-yet-somehow-completely-serious Aimee. Special mention has to go young Presley Allard in her role as Grace Sellers, the demon's intended victim. I haven't seen that scary of a performance of a possessed child since The Exorcist.
I give Sorry About the Demon an excellent five out of five stars. Comedy horror is not always my favourite type of horror but I had a lot of fun with this one and will be tracking down other works by Emily Hagins.★★★★★
A Shudder Exclusive, Sorry About the Demon, premiers Thursday, January 19, 2023
It's early January and I'm sitting on a train, travelling through County Wicklow to Dublin. The rain is beating against the windows, the landscape outside is frigid and grey. Now is the perfect time to watch independent horror Bring Out the Fear, written and directed by Richard Waters and filmed in this very part of Ireland.
Bring Out the Fear should be a tale of cosy, winter bliss. Rosie (Ciara Bailey) and Dan (Tad Morari) take a long, outdoor walk to reconnect with nature and with each other. The only problem? Things are far from ideal between them and in a bad case of missing-all-cues-to-the-contrary and the worst-timing-ever, Dan decides to propose to Rosie on a romantic lookout point.
It does not go as planned.
Desperate to escape their increasingly awkward situation, Dan and Rosie rush to leave the forest and soon find themselves walking in circles. Could it be that someone is watching them? Does the forest not want them to leave?
Before long, the ghosts of their relationship begin to haunt them: the idea that things might not be as idyllic as Dan likes to believe, the spectre of Rosie's infidelity, Dan's inability to outrun the embarrassment of his failed proposal.
The question is: who will survive this impossible ordeal?
Bring Out the Fear was filmed almost entirely in a seemingly infinite forest in Wicklow, Ireland. The endlessly verdant background feels ever more claustrophobic and ominous and director Waters uses this setting to maximum effect. As Dan begins to blend more and more into the foliage, Rosie is a beacon of colour in her yellow raincoat.
The film is tense from the beginning and the horrors to come are heavily foreshadowed in both the opening scenes and title. That means little though, because the viewer is still piecing together the real source of evil here long after the credits have rolled.
An allegory for the humiliation and pain of a crumbling relationship, Bring Out the Fear is well-acted throughout with both Bailey and Morari enticing the viewer to share in every cringeworthy interaction between their characters Rosie and Dan. And just when viewers think they’ve got it all worked out following that rollercoaster of a climax, the final scene causes them to reconsider everything they thought they knew.
I give Bring Out the Fear an excellent four out of five stars and recommend to fans of claustrophobic folk horror. I'll be interested to see what Richard Waters brings to the Irish horror scene next. ★★★★☆
There were three things I loved as a kid: Tim Burton, The Addams Family and the colour black. I can’t even begin to explain how happy it makes me that the three have collided in splendid serendipity on Netflix’s Wednesday.
About
If one thing is true about Wednesday Addams (Jenna Ortega), it’s that the only person allowed to pick on her brother Pugsley (Isaac Ordonez) is Wednesday. When she finds out that the school bullies have picked on Pugsley yet again, Wednesday reacts in the only reasonable way a big sister can: she puts piranhas in the school swimming pool, while the bullies are swimming in it.
Unfortunately for Wednesday, she manages to get caught
Her parents, the besotted duo Morticia (Catherine Zeta-Jones) and Gomez (Luis Guzmán), decide that it is time for Wednesday to attend the school where they met. Designed to be a home and finishing school for young outcasts, Nevermore Academy is the place of Wednesday’s nightmares, and not the good ones either.
As a brilliant, independent and terminally cynical young person who just happens to be allergic to colour, Wednesday is horrified to discover that she must room with the bright, cheerful and colourful Enid (Emma Myers). This is not going to turn out well for anyone.
Things do take a turn for the better however when Wednesday discovers that there is a vicious monster lurking in the woods, targeting both townspeople and students at Nevermore. With her emerging psychic abilities providing dark glimpses of the future, Wednesday realises there is a place for her at Nevermore and a mystery to solve.
Now if she can only get the messy business of making friends and forging alliances out of the way before she becomes the monster’s next victim.
What Wednesday is Really About
Wednesday is about friendship and trust, about how there is always a lot more to people than their appearance and insecurities will betray. Wednesday is not a hugger and emotions are definitely not her strong suit, but over time she learns that team activities and school dances are not so bad after all absolutely the worst thing ever.
She finds friendship in places she doesn’t expect and learns to care about people in ways that she couldn’t have imagined in her worst nightmares.
Throughout it all, Wednesday is plagued by an innate sense of right and wrong and will always choose to stand up for others in the face of bullying and injustice. It’s the story of her life: if anyone is going to make people’s lives a misery, it is Wednesday.
Wednesday Has All the Original Characters
The enduring appeal of The Addams Family lies in its cast of kooky, spooky characters dating back to the original black-and-white series. They all return for Wednesday including Gomez, Morticia, Pugsley, Lurch (George Burcea), Thing (Victor Teodor Dorobantu) and even Uncle Fester (Fred Armisen).
Ten Times Wednesday Addams Spoke the Absolute Truth
Wednesday is full of one-liners that remind me of how witty and punny the original material was. Here are ten times Wednesday Addams spoke the truth.
I find social media to be a soul-sucking void of meaningless affirmation
Editors are short-sighted, fear-based lifeforms
We all die alone
Dead people are notoriously bad at returning calls
Emotions are a gateway trait. They lead to feelings which trigger tears
I don't hold seances very often. I can barely tolerate the living, why would I want to commune with the dead?
Every day is all about me. This one just comes with a cake and a bad song
I don't bury hatchets. I sharpen them
The dead can be just as annoying and unreliable as the living
Ultimately, thieves turn on each other
Six Pet Names for Wednesday Addams
Adorable as she is confounding, Wednesday gets under people’s skin and provokes a variety of pet names, some more fond than others and many undeniably spot-on.
“My little death trap” – Gomez
“Grim Reaper Barbie” – Tyler
“Exhausting” – Principal Weems
“Velma” – Sheriff Galpin
“My little rain cloud” - Morticia
“My pig-tailed protégé” – Uncle Fester
Of course, she prefers to think of herself as different, an original thinker and an intrepid outlier.
Verdict
Like any good Tim Burton production, Wednesday is fun, irreverent and has a whole lot of heart. It’s full of one-liners, delivered with superb timing and there were times when I cackled maniacally out loud. Wednesday has the best facial expressions and Jenna Ortega gave a brilliant performance as the sardonic little burned cupcake.
Just like with my favourite Burton films Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands, Wednesday has you caring for characters you did not expect to care for, always rooting for the outcasts and being surprised by the actions of supposedly good people.
Honestly, the only disappointment was me because I absolutely did not guess who the monster was. I was shaken, I tell you, so much so that I had to rewind that scene and witness again how it all fell apart.
I thoroughly enjoyed watching Wednesday navigate the minefield of human connections and friendship. A great example was her unexpected rapport with Sheriff Galpin (Jamie McShane) and how the two came to grudgingly respect the other.
It was extremely refreshing for a teen, paranormal series not to only focus on romance. There were definite interests amongst the characters and exploration of identity, including an LGBTQI+ storyline with a character at risk of conversion therapy, but it was more an exploration of character depth than a plot point and I appreciated that a lot. I also appreciated the message that it’s okay not to be interested yet, if at all.
If I had to compare Wednesday to my Netflix favourites I would say that it's got the heart of The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina but not the diversity, and it doesn't have the plot depth or quality of writing of The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself. Nevertheless, it's a lot of fun, has excellent acting all round and I hope we see a second season.
★★★★☆
WEDNESDAY premieres globally November 23, only on Netflix
The problem with reviewing television shows before they release is that there is a point in time where you're not even allowed to talk about them. All I could do after finishing episode six of The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself was post a vague quote tweet of the Netflix promo, saying 'this is everything'. Because this show is everything. Based on the Half Bad trilogy by Sally Green, The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself lands on Netflix on 28 October 2022. I think fans of the books are going to like this adaption a lot but so will viewers unfamiliar with the series.
About The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself
In modern-day Europe, two warring factions of witches live amongst humans. The Fairborn witches have power in England after expelling most of their rivals, the Blood witches, to mainland Europe. Wanted by no one and hated by all, sixteen-year-old Nathan Byrne (Jay Lycurgo, The Batman) lives with his grandmother and half-sister in England. He is the illegitimate son of a Fairborn mother and Marcus Edge, the most notorious, violent Blood witch in history. The Fairborn Council is terrified that Nathan will follow in his father's footsteps and Nathan is monitored constantly.
How Are You Sleeping At Night? Do You Ever Have Violent Dreams Do You Have Fantasies About Hurting People? Do You Find Yourself Getting Quick To Anger? Do You Ever Have Negative Feelings About Other Witches? If You Listen Carefully Can You Hear My Heartbeat?
Nathan is fast approaching his seventeenth birthday when he will receive three gifts and drink the blood of a family member, as all must witches do, in order to develop his true witch power. The only problem is that Nathan is running out of family members and his options are similarly diminishing after certain instigators manage to provoke his anger. Armed only with his friendship with Fairborn witch Annalise (Nadia Parkes, Domina) and the mysterious Blood witch Gabriel (Emilien Vekemans, Transferts), Nathan will have to outrun those who would destroy him and learn that sometimes the worst times are the best times, and that good and bad depend on what you do, not who you are.
The Cast
Characters We Love
Jay Lycurgo is Nathan Byrne
It is impossible not to like Nathan in the books, he does narrate them after all, but we grow to love him in the series as he grows from a cheeky, irreverent child into a defiant and determined teen. We watch as his innocence is eroded by the irrational, zealous hatred directed at him yet still he struggles to hold on to his humanity. He's not even safe at home and is constantly targeted by his own sister, Jessica. We'll get to her later. The casting for Jay Lycurgo was spot on and his performance is superb. There wasn't a single moment when I wasn't completely invested in Jay as Nathan.
Emilien Vekemans is Gabriel
I loved Gabriel in the Half Bad trilogy but nothing could have prepared me for much I loved every minute he was on screen in The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself. Emilien Vekemans is perfect as Gabriel, as is Charles Nicol as Young Gabriel. Gabriel is funny and sarcastic but don't underestimate him because beneath that beautiful, ultra-cool exterior lies one of the most complex, loyal characters ever written. I cannot wait to see where the rest of the series takes Gabriel.
Those We Hate
Isobel Jesper Jones is Jessica
Hate is a strong word, I wonder if there are any stronger words I can use to describe Nathan's sister, Jessica? Jessica is a study in psychopathy, the most despicable character ever seen on screen. Isobel Jesper Jones does a fantastic job as Jessica in her professional debut. I've genuinely never hated a character this much; every moment on screen, every decision, every facial expression, Jessica is horrible and irredeemable and someone needs to put her down.
Paul Ready is Soul
Soul is a Hunter, leader of the Fairborn Council Protection Unit and father of Annalise and Niall. He is also utterly bereft of any moral compass whatsoever, except that which points him in the most dastardly direction. It's difficult to describe how good Paul Ready is as Soul but he absolutely captures his weak-mindedness and blind ambition, making me want to reach through the screen and strangle him myself.
There is one other character who I hated but I fear that to mention them by name would be too much of a spoiler. Suffice to say, I'll have an entire section dedicated to them next season.
Those Who Surprise Us
Karen Connell is Ceelia
Ceelia is one of the Fairborn witches who discover Nathan and Jessica on the day their mother is murdered. She is the one who monitors Nathan throughout his childhood and the one who keeps him in an outdoor cage when he is removed from his home. Ceelia is written with incredible depth in The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself, adding so much more to her than we saw in Half Bad. It was surprising and devastating. Karen Connell gives a nuanced performance, saying more in her facial expressions and gestures than would ever need to be spoken in words. I didn't much notice Ceelia in the books but she will go down as one of my favourite characters in the series, if not ever.
Nadia Parkes is Annalise
Another very surprising character is Annalise, Nathan’s best friend and sometimes girlfriend. She exists mostly in the past tense in the first book, Half Bad, on which season 1 is based, but she is central to the story in the series. It was impossible not to notice from the very first episode how good of an actress Nadia Parkes is and how well she portrayed Annalise. Like Gabriel, I'm excited to see where the rest of the series will take Annalise and how her storyline will progress.
The Writing: From Page to Screen
The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself is one of the best page-to-screen adaptions I've seen in years. Joe Barton is the principal writer along with Ryan J Brown, Helen Kingston and Emer Kenny.
The writers made a lot of changes in the story but that is to be expected given the glacial pace at which the story moved in Half Bad. The effect was that we got to see a lot of new characters and more depth to the characters we did know than we saw in Half Bad. Sadly, that also opens viewers up to falling in love with characters they didn't expect to fall for and having their hearts destroyed by merciless writers.
There was a brief moment in the first episode where I thought that perhaps the series wasn't going to be as dark or grim as the books but I was swiftly disabused of that notion.
My favourite episodes were two of the most devastating ones: episode 6, written by Helen Kingston and episode 7, written by Emer Kenny. There will be no spoilers in this review but these two episodes represented the very best of television and its power to make you feel every emotion possible, from desolation to joy to astonishment. Yes, there was a fair bit of screaming at television screens going on.
Episode 7 also includes the best line in television history:
Ceelia: F*ck you, Robin Hood, and your merry band of c*nts
Oh, did I mention that The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself has a lot of swearing in?
As the first season neared its heart-stopping conclusion, the stakes became ever higher and the stress of it all became palpable. Never before have I wished for an ad break just so that I could calm my heart from beating out of my chest; just thinking back on it is causing palpitations.
Cinematography, Locations and Music
As is to be expected from Netflix and production company The Imaginarium, The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself is beautiful to watch. The story moves across England from the suburbs to the City of London to the countryside Up North, before moving to Paris and the French Alps. There are bursts of psychedelic colour, panoramic vistas and scenes so gory that you might need to pause for a moment to compose yourself.
The series is accompanied throughout by an excellent score by British pop group Let's Eat Grandma and also includes great song placements. I really hope they release both the score and soundtrack for this show, because both were brilliant.
Verdict
I'd like to say I loved every minute of The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself but unfortunately I spent too much of it being devastated and having my heart broken into tiny pieces. I also spent a not-insignificant amount of time crying during the final episode. I will say that it's probably my favourite show to debut on Netflix this year and directors Colm McCarthy, Rachna Suri and Debs Paterson did a great job bringing this to life. I give it an excellent five out of five stars and recommend to fans of NOS4A2, The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Shadow & Bone and Fate: The Winx Saga or any fans of witches, horror and urban fantasy. ★★★★★
The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself launches on Netflix on 28 October 2022
There's no doubt about it, fandoms have become toxic. Yet before the infamous fallouts in the Star Wars fandom and the incessant hounding of Jodie Whittaker, there was another massive controversy dating back to the 90s: the time they decided to Americanise the Doctor and make him half-human.
It was meant to be the film event that would introduce Doctor Who to the vast USA market and reboot the BBC series that had last aired in 1989. Instead, the TV movie - simply named Doctor Who - made the Doctor half-human and committed the cardinal sin of allowing the Doctor to kiss his companion. Suddenly, the Doctor wasn't for everybody anymore, no longer a representative of every unlucky fanboy, and the backlash was immediate. It would take another 9 years before the franchise would be rebooted and even then, it would only have the faintest of links to the much-maligned film.
Funny then, when you consider that Paul McGann, eighth Doctor and star of the Doctor Who movie, is perhaps the most prolific Doctor of all with 135 audio adventures through Big Finish to date and a further 5 coming out soon. He's certainly a hit at Doctor Who conventions these days but it wasn't always that way.
There is one other person who avoided conventions for the longest time, writer Matthew Jacobs. Jacobs had been a fan of Doctor Who since childhood. In fact, his father even acted in an episode and he has memories of being on set. The chance to write the script for the film seemed like a once in a lifetime opportunity but it turned out to be a disaster.
Directed by Matthew Jacobs and Vanessa Yuille, Doctor Who Am I tracks Jacobs as he is reluctantly drawn out of retirement and lured onto the convention circuit with the promise of some easy cash.
It's an incredibly bittersweet process. You'd have to have a pretty thick skin to endure the hostility Jacobs endured and not be affected by it. Sometimes his appearances are met with friendliness and deference but often with derision too. Added to that, Doctor Who began in a very painful time in Jacobs' life. Many will recall it as the day that Kennedy was assassinated but Jacobs recalls it as the year his mother took her own life and his father began to show symptoms of bipolar disorder.
It's a lot to deal with, from the conversations with fans about the life changing aspects of the Who fandom, to the constant invisibility of the eighth Doctor. Jacobs meets with Paul McGann, star of the Doctor Who film and the two discuss their shared experience and how something more has grown out of it.
There's an especially moving moment where Jacobs addresses a near-empty room and remarks that we all regenerate after painful moments in our lives.
That's the point at which I connected most with the documentary. I've long accepted the eighth Doctor as a central and necessary part of Whovian canon. We can't get to Christopher Eccleston's marvellous ninth Doctor without meeting Paul McGann's eighth and I'm happy to forget a little kiss and a half-human fib. To be honest, it was easier to accept than the plot armour required to reset the regeneration cycle.
Doctor Who Am I illustrates the power of community and inclusion in the Doctor Who fandom and how much richer the fandom is for including Jacobs, McGann and others involved in the TV film. This is something the Big Finish producers realised ages ago and the eighth Doctor's short time on screen has allowed for a wealth of stories on audio.
Ultimately, Doctor Who Am I is quite sad, in the way that fly-on-the-wall documentaries often are. You'd hope that Matthew Jacobs derives some level of resolution and closure from his involvement with the documentary and conventions but perhaps that'll just take time. I struggled a bit with rating this but settled at a good three out of five stars. I'd definitely recommend to all fans of Doctor Who.★★★☆☆
Doctor Who Am I will be in UK Cinemas from 27th October and will be available on Blu-ray, DVD & Digital Download from 28th November.
An infamous Doctor Who screenwriter is reluctantly dragged back into the American Whoniverse, in this funny and moving documentary about finding family in the unlikeliest of places.
Trailer: Doctor Who Am I - directed by Vanessa Yuille and Matthew Jacobs
I have an awkward confession to make: I'd never seen any of Dario Argento's work before viewing Dark Glasses. I'd heard great things about the use of colour, music and gore in his films and was keen to see something from the master of giallo.
Dark Glasses (Italian, original title Occhiali Neri) begins on the day of a solar eclipse in Rome. As the skies darken, we meet young escort, Diana (Ilenia Pastorelli), who stares up into the sun. As the eclipse burns itself onto her retinas and Diana is temporarily stunned, we get a foreboding sense of what is to come.
Elsewhere across Rome, a serial killer is targeting prostitutes, leaving only a handful of clues for the police to follow. Their murders are particularly cruel and gruesome with seemingly little motive.
When Diana finds herself targeted by the predator, she flees in her car only to get into a terrible accident. She wakes up in hospital and learns that she has lost her eyesight. Not only that but she has to come to terms with the tragic consequences of the accident.
As Diana fights to put the pieces of her life back together, she meets a young boy, Chin (Andrea Zhang), who also survived the accident. It doesn't take long for Diana to realise that the serial killer is still at large and he still has her within his sights. The only problem is that she can no longer see him coming and both her and Chin are in danger. With only her caseworker Rita (Asia Argento) to help her, will Diana and Chin survive the ordeal?
I liked Dark Glasses a lot. I loved cinematographer Matteo Cocco's use of colour and loved how the night scenes were drenched in shades of blue, red and yellow. He uses vanishing points and leading lines to draw the viewer in and to suffocate with claustrophobic terror. Watching this film was a visual feast.
Were it not for the gore, I'd class this as more than a thriller than a horror but I enjoyed it nonetheless. Arnaud Rebotini's haunting synthesiser score perfectly added to the tension and kept me right at the edge of my seat. I love it when films blend emotive music into the story, specially when it's done so effectively.
It's always a nice surprise when horror films have good actors. Ilenia Pastorelli did a great job as Diana, capturing the frustration, anger and grief that comes with losing something as important as eyesight. Her sarcasm and self-deprecation provided some welcome levity at times and her symbiotic relationship with Chin helped the plot along.
Likewise, it's always a good sign when horror films have a decent plot and Dark Glasses was okay. There were some Swiss cheese moments - for example when the killer changes his van colour but keeps it the same colour for the rest of the film - but overall, I liked the premise and the sneaky reveal at the end. Human nature is always going to be the best motive.
I give Dark Glasses an excellent four out of five stars. Fans of Dario Argento and giallohorror should like this one a lot. ★★★★☆
A Shudder Exclusive, Dark Glasses, premiers Thursday, October 13, 2022
I give Influencer an excellent five out of five stars and recommend to horror and Shudder fans, especially of the rising influencer genre. After his success with Shudder original Spiral and now this, I'm definitely keen on seeing what Kurtis David Harder does next.★★★★★
I give Sorry About the Demon an excellent five out of five stars. Comedy 
Ultimately, Doctor Who Am I is quite sad, in the way that fly-on-the-wall documentaries often are. You'd hope that 
I give Dark Glasses an excellent four out of five stars. Fans of