Cinematic Chronicles

"I don't need tips because my fake boyfriend, Derek, makes bank." If you weren't satisfied with Grace MacCaullay outlasting her husband and his entire family in that initial, twisted game of "Hide and Seek", Samara Weaving is back to reprise her role seven years later -- as several elite families attempt to murder Grace and her estranged sister, Faith. Warning: there are spoilers ahead. Following Grace's unlikely victory on her wedding night -- and the subsequent demise of the entire Le Domas family -- the remaining members of an elite Council reunite with a simple goal in mind: kill Grace before dawn to acquire the High Seat and a mysterious ring of power. Elijah Wood enters the fray as "The Lawyer", explaining the rules of this new game to the remaining family members (because nobody knows more about mysterious rings than that man). Contenders for the High Seat include siblings Ursula and Titus Danforth, Wan Chen Xing, Viraj Rajan, Ignacio El...

So you want to catch a movie released on Friday the 13th . . . In an era of horror dominated by jump scares, Ian Tuason's Undertone is a minimalistic film that relies almost entirely on sound and unconventional camera shots to create an unsettling atmosphere. The protagonist of this story is Evangeline "Evy" Babig (played by Nina Kiri), who runs a horror podcast alongside her off-screen friend Justin (Adam DiMarco). Warning: there are spoilers ahead . As the plot develops, Justin receives an anonymous email containing ten audio files, recorded by an unknown couple -- Mike and Jessa.  Mike has recorded Jessa at night to capture evidence of her talking and singing in her sleep.  During their podcast, Evy and Justin begin playing these recordings in reverse to uncover secret messages within Jessa's ramblings. Mike, kill all. Lick the blood off. Come in, Abyzou. In her breaks from podcasting, Evy has been tasked with caring for her comatose mother. She feels very guilty a...

Ghostface is back .  "Show me four popcorn right now, or you're dead." (A little humor for those who have played Funko's Scream party game.) Warning: there are spoilers ahead . In the latest installment of the Scream franchise, Sidney Prescott has built a new life for herself in Pine Grove, Indiana. She is married to a police officer and has a teenage daughter named Tatum, who will quickly become the focal point of Ghostface's attacks. As typical of a Scream film, a slew of innocent people are murdered in brutal fashion to build tension that our protagonist or other beloved franchise staples could be next. (McKenna Grace characters really can't catch a break in these films lately.) We are actually treated to three Ghostface killers in this edition, as Gale Weathers makes her dramatic entrance by running over the first masked man with her car -- a former mental institute patient by the name of Karl Gibbs. As the film progresses, it is ultimately revealed that...

Nothing quite says "welcome to the blog" like a review of some run-of-the-mill slasher film. Alexa, play "Psycho Killer" by Talking Heads. Written by Andrew Kevin Walker and directed by Gavin Polone, Psycho Killer tells the story of a police officer (portrayed by Georgina Campbell) who tracks down a serial killer after witnessing her husband's violent murder while on duty. Richard Joshua Reeves (The Slasher) is a Satanist who slaughters a number of people in a variety of graphic ways throughout the film, including a pharmacist to fuel his drug addiction, and a priest whose blood he drinks quite vigorously. Charming. Reeves is able to maneuver in anonymity as the public believes that he died many years prior, having reportedly been shot by a prison guard he attacked while on death row (for -- you guessed it -- mass murder). His ultimate mission this time around? To destroy a nuclear power plant in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania in a suicide mission that is said to ...