Cube a Smart, Suspenseful Canadian Sci-Fi Thriller

Sometimes good movies just find their audience. Such is the case with the 1997 independent Canadian sci-fi/horror hybrid, Cube. After Cube screened at the Toronto International Film Festival, it only saw a marginal theatrical release. But late-night showings on cable television and VHS gave this Kafkaesque thriller a much-deserved second chance. Followed by two so-so […]

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Ghost in the Machine A Dial-Up 90s Techno-Thriller

No amount of nostalgia can change the fact that horror hit a low point in the first half of the decade. Technically, Silence of the Lambs mixed crime drama, suspense, and horror elements. Major horror franchises – including Friday the 13th and A Nightmare on Elm Street – were running on fumes. Aside from the […]

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Screamers Quietly Falls Short of Its Story’s Potential

Somewhere in the mid-1990s, before Scream revived the genre, horror wasn’t in the best place. Arguably, the year 1995 was the nadir for horror in the decade of flannel and grunge. Yes, Se7en shocked audiences across cineplexes that year. Maybe you personally loved Demon Knight, though it’s hardly a classic. But Vampire in Brooklyn, Village […]

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Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III Substitutes Grimy Gore For Tension

As an individual movie, Tobe Hooper’s The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remains among the greatest horror movies produced. Unfortunately, the legacy of its sequels, prequels, and remakes is checkered. In between Hooper’s misunderstood sequel and the crater-sized disaster that was Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation, New Line Pictures took a more straightforward approach to the […]

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Popcorn Screens Some Early 90s Meta Horror

Before Scream, Wes Craven’s New Nightmare, and In The Mouth of Madness, a small slasher movie called Popcorn experimented with meta-horror. Today meta-horror is common enough to sometimes wonder if straightforward horror wouldn’t be more revolutionary. But in 1991, Popcorn was just taking a risk daring to recycle tired slasher tropes. Adopting films-within-a-film was a […]

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End of Days Fires Blanks in this Mashup of Horror and Action

Every 80s action star got one – their own hybrid of shoot ’em up and horror. Both Charles Bronson and Steve McQueen started in B-horror movies – House of Wax and The Blob, respectively. Stallone hunted a cult of serial killers in Cobra. Years later Jason Statham tangled with Ghosts of Mars before re-visiting the […]

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Event Horizon: A Criminally Under-Appreciated Gem

Sometimes when horror mixes with science fiction the results are amazing. Alien. The Thing. Invasion of the Body Snatchers. All of these movies are classics. You’ll also find some cult classics, like the 80s remake of The Blob, alongside some middling efforts, such as Species or Deep Rising. And then sometimes studios launch their franchises […]

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