Category: Uncategorized
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Event Horizon
A haunted spaceship movie that really isn’t very good despite a rabid cult following. It has some good ideas that get sidetracked by cgi spectacle that has not aged well. The film is about the ship Event Horizon which has can travel faster than light through the use of a dangerous new drive. The ship…
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Little Monsters
A pretty bad zombie movie recently released on Hulu that has some really nice moments, but is ultimately not very good. The story follows a slacker who loses his girlfriend. He moves in with his sister and her son. He takes the son on a field trip in order to hit on and hookup with…
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Candyman
A really unsettling and tense horror film with a lot more o. It’s mind than just blood and guts. This one is streaming on Netflix and definitely worth checking out. Released in 1992, this horror film follows a pair of graduate students researching urban legends. The one that intrigues them most is the story of…
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The Curse of Frankenstein (1957)
A violent and intense adaptation of the classic story. This film is melodramatic and deliciously sinister. It’s a fun ride of a movie. This is the movie that launched Hammer horror. Hammer produced a particular brand of bloody and violent horror film shot in glorious technicolor. It all started here. The story deviates from the…
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Frankenstein (1931)
A stunning and genre defining film that has left an indelible impact on the pop culture. It deserves to be viewed this Halloween. While not the first film adaptation of Mary Shelley’s story (there was a silent film in 1915 from Edison studios that is available online. It’s creepy and worth checking out for the…
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The Uninvited (1944)
A perennial favorite. This chilling ghost story is full of haunting scenes, and a surprisingly great sense of humor. Just be sure to watch the classic from 1944 not the awful movie of the same name from 2009. The story follows a brother and sister as they walk along the English countryside and find an…
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Hush
An example of a great, inventive, and horrifying trapped in the secluded house with a menacing force trying to get in. The story follows a deaf woman who is spending time away in a house deep in the woods. One night a man in a mask shows up and starts to toy with her and…
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He’s Out There
A pretty middle of the road horror film that has a few chilling moments but never dives deeper than the surface of its premise. A woman brings her two young daughters to the family’s secluded lake house for the weekend. Dad stays behind for work. Once there, the women are tormented by a menacing force…
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Bram Stoker’s Dracula
This is a movie that dials it up to eleven on everything. It is a big beautiful mess. It is over the top and just about as wild as a movie can be. It is also completely fun and entertaining throughout. This film changes the traditional Dracula story by adding a centuries old love story…
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Ghost Stories
A gripping and unsettling collection of frightening stories that is dripping with atmosphere and unease. It doesn’t quite stick the landing, but the entire movie preceding the finale is worth seeing. The film follows a journalist who is investigating a series of supernatural stories. He is a skeptic and seeks to disprove each one in…
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Pet Sematary (2019)
A very dark and very creepy horror film that leans too heavily on subverting the source material and making things more bleak than necessary. It is preferable in reviews to address the film itself and not how it compares to previous iterations and source material. This film embraces the comparisons and whole segments of the…
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The Perfection
A brutal and somewhat manipulative thriller on Netflix is a solid and pretty shocking movie that is worth a watch for those with strong constitutions and an affinity for twists and turns. The film follows a former cello protege, Charlotte, who visits her old teacher as he selects the latest child prodigy to join his…
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Winchester
A ghost story more known for its bad reviews than for the movie itself. It isn’t as bad as it was purported to be, but it’s not a movie either. The Winchester mansion is fascinating. It is a real mansion built by Sarah Winchester over the course of almost 40 years. It encompasses 24,000 square…
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The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
The animated short film from Disney holds up and inspires more Halloween feelings than almost any other film. This is the first Halloween film that I saw and loved as a kid. It is an animated short film that perfectly captures fall and Halloween for me. It made me laugh. It brought me joy, and…
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In the Tall Grass
Latest Netflix film is a huge disappointment. It is well shot and has all the potential in the world, but it fails in pretty much every regard. The film has a simple and premise constructed by Stephen King and his son Joe Hill. A brother and sister on a cross country road trip stop by…
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Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark
A nice blend of cheese and true fear inducing filmmaking combine to create an endearing and enjoyable halloween romp. Based on the series of books by the same name, this adaptation follows a group of teenagers in the late 60’s as the discover a book of stories that seem to be coming true around them.…
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Ready or Not
A bloody, tense, and darkly hilarious horror thriller that will delight anyone looking for an off kilter and tense horror comedy. The premise is a little tough to swallow. A wealthy family made their fortunes a hundred years ago by making a blood pact with the devil. Whenever a new person joins the family they…
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Horror of Dracula
Starting the month with a classic. This is a solid, surprising, and startling film that started a new wave of horror movies. In the 1931 Universal Studios inspired a wave of scary movies starting with Dracula and Frankenstein. These brilliant horror films created iconography that lasts to this day. However these films were hampered by…
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Happy Halloween
I hated horror films. I considered them garbage. They weren’t worth the time it took to press play. This opinion was backed up by two decades worth of schlocky slasher movies and cheap remakes. In film school a friend of mine forever changed this opinion. He watched a different horror film every day during the…
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This is Us: Season One
This Is Us is a stunning show that employs clever story structure and sincerity to elicit some of the most powerful emotions a show has ever rung from its audience. Director Alfred Hitchcock once said, “film is just life with the boring bits cut out.” This Is Us seems to take that axiom to heart.…
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Yesterday
A great premise, wonderful performances, and a surprising script combine for a wonderful night at the movies. The story follows Jack Malik. He’s a struggling musician whose songs are only appreciated by his trio of best friends including his manager and biggest supporter Ellie. After a freak accident jack wakes up and realizes he’s the…
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Men in Black International
The latest in the alien police series lacks the genuine inspiration of its predecessors, but through solid direction and the overwhelming charm of the cast the film is entertaining and definitely worth a viewing. The film has two main threads. It follows Molly played by a wonderful Tessa Thompson who witnesses the secret Men in…
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Rocketman
A music biopic that transcends the cliches and tropes of the genre to create a unique and fulfilling film viewing experience for the audience. Rocketman follows the life of Elton John, but it does so in a surreal and expressionistic manner that elevates the material and provides insights impossible in standard biopics. Most music biographies…
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Avengers Endgame
Oh boy, this is a movie and a half. This is the culmination of more than a decade of superhero movies, and it satisfies in almost every way. For the uninitiated, this film will be difficult. It does a nice job reestablishing characters and relationships, but it isn’t for the newbies. It deals with a…
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Abducted in Plain Sight
A Netflix documentary with an unbelievable, horrifying, and fascinating story told very poorly. The film follows the true story of the kidnapping and brainwashing of Jan Broberg by Robert Berchtold in the 1970’s. The story of how this pedophile got initial access and continued access to this vulnerable young girl over the course of many…
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Mary Poppins Returns
Lead by a stellar performance from Emily Blunt, this warm hearted, optimistic, energetic sequel to Mary Poppins is very pleasant company even if it falls short of being truly great. A sequel to the classic 1964 film Mary Poppins, this film follows the children from the original all grown up with kids of their own.…
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Green Book
With two powerhouse performances, this film is a joyful emotional success that is a pleasure to watch again and again. It doesn’t preach nor dictate. It tells the story of these two men and their relationship and lets the emotions flow. The direction offers little beyond getting out of the lead actors’ way as they…
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Join Me For a Cup
What could be better than talking about movies over a cup of tea? On this site, I will endeavor to share my take on moves. I invite you to pour yourself a cup and consider my opinions as you decide what movie to spend your time on. I’m launching this enterprise in connection with the…
Cup of Tea Reviews 