As of March 17, 2020, thousands of movie theaters across the United States will be closing until further notice because of the coronavirus pandemic. They join the thousands of other cinemas around the world that have also shut down for the same reasons.
AMC Theatres, Regal Cinemas, Cinemark and Cineplex are closing until further notice all of their locations in the United States. Cinemark is closing as of March 18, 2020, while the other major cinema companies are closing as of March 17, 2020. In the U.S., several independent movie theaters, such as Alamo Drafthouse and Landmark, also closed of all their locations. In some cities and states, these closures are mandatory. In other areas, the closings are voluntary.
Refunds are being given for tickets purchased in advance for screenings that will no longer take place. AMC, Regal and Alamo Drafthouse all have subscription services. As of this writing, only AMC has officially announced that it will not charge subscription fees during the period of time that its theaters are closed, although Regal and Alamo Drafthouse will no doubt have similar policies. AMC also announced that its subscriptions expirations will not be in effect during the closure of AMC Theaters.
Other movie-theater chains in North America that have closed until further notice include Marcus Theatres, Harkins Theatres, B&B Theatres, National Amusements (also known as Showcase), Caribbean Cinemas, Goodrich Quality Theaters, Southern Theatres, Cinépolis Luxury Cinemas, Neighborhood Cinema Group and Georgia Theatre Company.
Most of the movie theaters in the U.S. that are remaining open have pledged to not book theater rooms at more than 50% capacity. But given the huge dropoff in moviegoing since the coronavirus outbreak was classified as a pandemic, attendance at movie theaters was reaching well below 50% anyway.
In the United Kingdom and Ireland, the three largest cinema companies—Cineworld, Odeon and Picturehouse—are also closing all of their locations, as of March 17, 2020, in Ireland and as of March 18, 2020, in the United Kingdom. These shutdowns will continue until further notice.
What does this mean for movie audiences? Major studios are shortening the period of time that movies in theatrical release will be released on home video for rental or purchase. Universal Pictures has already announced that it will release DreamWorks Animation’s “Trolls World Tour” on video on demand (VOD) and in theaters on April 10, 2020. “Trolls World Tour” had previously been scheduled for theatrical release only on that date. Other movies that are currently in theatrical release will have their home-video releases moved up.
The industry standard used to be that major studios would wait at least 90 days before a movie in theatrical release would be released on home video or streaming services. (This rule wasn’t followed by most independent studios.) The major studios would be threatened with boycotts by corporate-owned movie theaters if they didn’t comply with this 90-day window. And it’s why corporate-owned theaters such as AMC, Regal, Cineplex and Cinemark would not carry independent films and films from streaming services that didn’t follow this release mandate.
But now, with almost all of these corporate-owned movie theaters closed until further notice, they no longer have the power to dictate when studios can release films on home video after a theatrical release. The power has now shifted to those who can deliver movies to people in ways that don’t involve movie theaters. Going to the movie theaters won’t be considered obsolete, but the coronavirus pandemic has permanently altered the cinema business. It’s going to take a very long time for movie theaters to recover. Going to movie theaters just won’t reach the same levels that it had during its peak.
Click here for an updated list of other corona virus-related cancellations and postponements in the entertainment industry.
June 19, 2020 UPDATE: The three biggest cinema companies in the U.S. have announced their re-opening dates:
Regal Cinemas: July 10, 2020
AMC Theatres: July 15, 2020
Cinemark: July 17, 2020
Regal and AMC have announced that they will require all employees and customers to wear masks in the theater building. Customers who show up without masks can purchase masks at the theater location. Cinemark will require all employees to wear masks but will not require customers to wear masks in states or cities that do not have policies requiring that people wear masks in public.
In addition, most movie theaters have pledged to not book screening rooms above 50% capacity. Customers will be encouraged to purchase their tickets online or at kiosks instead of at a theater box office. In addition, placing advance online orders for food is also being encouraged. The major cinema companies have also announced stricter guidelines for more frequent cleaning and social distancing inside each theater location’s building.
October 5, 2020 UPDATE: Cineworld, the company that owns Regal Cinemas and Picturehouse, has announced that, for the second time in 2020, it is temporarily closing all of its U.S. theater locations. The temporary closures begin on October 8, 2020. In addition, all Cineworld and Picturehouse location in the United Kingdom will also temporarily close, as of October 8, 2020. The reason cited is the lack of blockbuster movies scheduled for release in 2020. It has not been announced yet when these Regal Cinemas, Cineworld and Picturehouse locations will re-open.
March 20, 2021 UPDATE: Regal Cinemas will re-open on April 2, 2021.
Culture Representation: Taking place in Ireland in 1998, the sports drama “The Racer” features an all-white cast representing the middle-class.
Culture Clash: A 38-year-old Belgian cyclist, who is a domestique (supporting) team member in the 1998 Tour de France, faces an uncertain future because he’s been a longtime doper who will soon be considered too old for the sport, at a time when pro cycling officials are starting to crack down on dopers.
Culture Audience: “The Racer” will appeal primarily to people interested in dramatic movies about professional cyclists, the Tour de France and the types of athletes who take performance-enhancing drugs.
Louis Talpe and Tara Lee in “The Racer” (Photo courtesy of Gravitas Ventures)
You don’t have to be a sports fan to know that for many athletes, winning at all costs is the only thing that matters. It’s why using performance-enhancing drugs (or “doping”) will always be around, even though some sports leagues have made some headline-grabbing attempts to punish athletes who have been caught using these drugs while competing in their sports. “The Racer” is a fictional look at a professional cyclist who is caught up in a doping lifestyle, not just because he wants to do it, but because he can.
People who are interested in the psychology and culture of doping in cycling have plenty of documentaries for reference, including the Oscar-winning 2017 film “Icarus” and the several documentaries that have been made about disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong, who was stripped of all of his Tour de France champion titles. “The Racer” (directed by Kieron J. Walsh), which takes place in 1998, is an intimate look at a fictional doper cyclist who’s a “domestique”: someone whose only job on the team is not to win but to be a supporting team player who will help the chosen team member win.
Because of the nature of their supporting roles on the team, domestiques don’t get the glory of being racing champions. It takes a certain kind of person who is willing to accept this role of knowing they’ve agreed in advance to lose the race as an individual so that someone else on the team can win. These types of athletes don’t have a big enough ego to crave being the center of attention as a champion. They’re just happy to be a part of the team and make it to the big leagues of the Tour de France.
Belgian cyclist Dominique “Dom” Chabol (played by Louis Talpe) is that type of person. Dom, who is part of the fictional Austrange cycling team of international cyclists, is at a crossroads in his career because his contract with the team might not get renewed and he’s at an age when most professional athletes have to start preparing for retirement. He is 38 years old, he’s been a sports cyclist for about 25 years, and his entire identity is being a cyclist. At one point in the movie he says, “Without a bike, I’m nobody.”
Dom is also a longtime doper. Why? Because being a doper is considered “normal” in pro cycling. Almost all the pro cyclists take performance-enhancing drugs, according to Dom. Based on what former Tour de France champ Armstrong and many of his former teammates have told the media, doping in pro cycling has been an open secret in real life for years.
Dom is a loner whose closest companion is his cycling team’s “Dr. Feelgood,” who supplies them with the drugs and secretive medical treatment that he gives to the dopers on the team. This drug supplier is a Brit named Sonny McElhone (played by Iain Glen), a former pro cyclist who has a “father figure” persona to the cyclists on the team. Sonny travels with the team, so that he’s always on call whenever members of the team need his services.
Sonny’s official title is “trainer/physical therapist” but he’s really a glorified drug dealer who injects the cyclists with the drugs and does things like gives massages to the cyclists, watches them train, and monitors their vital signs. Dom is one of Sonny’s favorite team members because Dom is easy to get along with and respectful to everyone. Sonny also makes sure that the team’s owners and management don’t get all the details about the drug activity, because these head honchos just don’t want to know.
The star cyclist of the Austrange team is Lupo “Tartare” Marino (played by Matteo Simoni), an emotionally volatile Italian who is both cocky and insecure. Tartare is most insecure the night before a big race, when he has severe anxiety. When he has these anxiety attacks, Tartare paces back and forth and starts rambling about how he’s going to lose the race. Tartare also has the huge ego of someone who needs to be the center of attention, but he backs up that ego with the athletic talent of someone who’s very capable of winning races.
Dom is the only one who can really calm Tartare’s nerves when Tartare is having an anxiety attack. Therefore, Tartare is not only physically dependent on Dom to be his domestique during their races together, but Tartare is also emotionally dependent on Dom. Tartare and Dom are not close friends, but they are generally respectful of each other.
The Austrange Team’s coach is nicknamed Viking (played by Karel Roden), who is a no-nonsense leader with a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy about the doping on his team. His chief concern is winning. And if members of the team use illegal drugs that are commonplace in their profession, he’s not going to stop them.
Dom does not have the type of close relationship with Viking that he has with Sonny. Dom’s contract with the Austrange team will soon be up for renewal, but Viking won’t give Dom an answer either way about whether or not the team will renew the contract with Dom. Viking says that a lot of it will depend on how well Dom does in the current Tour de France, which is taking place in Ireland that year, since France is hosting the World Cup.
The movie takes place when the Austrange Team is in Ireland for the first three stages of the Tour de France. During this trip, Dom starts to experience difficulty breathing, dizziness and night sweats. And so, Sonny calls a doctor to give Dom a checkup in Dom’s hotel room.
The doctor who gives Dom this medical exam is one of those “only in the movies” type of doctor. She just happens to be a 26-year-old Irish blonde beauty who looks and dresses more like a young actress than a typical doctor. Her name is Dr. Lynn Brennan (played by Tara Lee), and she’s the only woman in the movie with a significant on-camera speaking role. As soon as Lynn is introduced in the movie, it’s obvious that she’s going to be the love interest for Dom.
It’s a very “male gaze” director cliché that the would-be girlfriend has to be good-looking and often much younger than the leading man. The Lynn Brennan character is the one casting choice in the movie that is not convincing at all. And it didn’t have to be that way. It would not have been hard to cast a female doctor who’s attractive and intelligent but also looks like she actually has several years of job experience in the real world, instead of someone who looks like she recently graduated from college.
“The Racer” director Walsh (who co-wrote the movie’s screenplay with Ciaran Cassidy) fortunately doesn’t let the movie get bogged down in a sappy romance. The movie realistically shows that an athlete like Dom who’s competing in the Tour de France will have this race as his single-minded obsession until his next major race. It’s why when Dom’s sister Emilie (played by Clarissa Vermaark) calls to tell Dom the bad news that their father has died, Dom chooses not to go to the funeral because it would mean that he would miss out on being in the Tour De France.
Emilie (who is not seen in the movie and is only a voice over the phone) is very upset with Dom’s decision, but he is unmoved. Dom isn’t cold-hearted, but he explains to Lynn that he never had a very emotionally close relationship with his parents. By contrast, Lynn is very close to her family. While she and Dom are at a pub together in their free time, she introduces him to her father Peter (played by Reamonn O’Byrne) and her uncle John (Lalor Roddy), who appear briefly in the film.
As for the racing scenes, they’re thrilling and filmed realistically. Because Dom is introverted, he tends to be emotionally closed off from his other teammates, so the other members of the team aren’t given much screen time in the movie. Dom is friendly to a young team newcomer named Enzo (played by Diogo Cid), who looks up to Dom. Although Dom gives this newbie team member some advice, Dom doesn’t exactly mentor Enzo either, since Dom keeps mostly to himself.
Because so much of “The Racer” depends on how Dom is depicted, Talpe does an admirable job in portraying the inner conflicts of someone who doesn’t express his emotions easily. He has a convincing physique as a doper cyclist with no body fat, but Talpe also brings to life a compelling psychological portrait of this very specific athlete. Glen also does a very good performance as Sonny, who come across as someone who’s convinced that he’s helping these athletes, even though the drugs he administers have long-term damaging effects to the athletes’ health.
The doping problem is not treated lightly in the movie (you can bet there’s at least one health scare experienced by a doper on the team), as the storyline of “The Racer” depicts the real-life doping scandal that took place during the 1998 Tour de France. Dom also has trouble dealing with how getting older is affecting his status on the team, when Viking chooses a younger, less experienced teammate named Erik Schultz (played by Paul Robert) instead of Dom for an important part of the Tour de France.
Will Lynn find out Dom’s doping secret? Will Dom get caught by racing officials? Will the Austrange team renew Dom’s contract, or will he go to another team? (The movie shows Dom making inquiries to join another team, in case he becomes a free agent.) All of those questions are answered in the movie, where Dom indeed makes some big decisions about his future. “The Racer” is a fictional story but it’s a competent dramatic depiction of the real-life issues faced by a doper cyclist whose entire self-esteem is wrapped up in the sport.
Gravitas Ventures released “The Racer” on digital and VOD on September 18, 2020.
Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed U.S. city in the year 2048, the sci-fi drama “LX 2048” has a predominantly white cast of characters (with one black person) representing the middle-class.
Culture Clash: A terminally ill man, who works as a tech broker, has problems in his marriage and a life-insurance clause where he can be replaced by a clone.
Culture Audience: “LX 2048” will appeal to people who are interested in movies that explore the ethics and concepts of human cloning, but the movie’s main characters are not very easy to like.
James D’Arcy and Delroy Lindo in “LX 2048” (Photo courtesy of Quiver Distribution)
“LX 2048” takes several familiar sci-fi concepts—a dystopian future, next-level virtual reality, chip-implant technology and human cloning—and mashes them all up together in a movie that ultimately becomes scatter-brained and a hokey melodrama in its last few scenes. Written and directed by Guy Moshe, “LX 2048” is the equivalent of a chef’s meal that has too many ingredients and yet not enough distinctive substance to make it enjoyable. Although the film might have started out with good intentions, ultimately it fails to deliver a cohesive story and characters with memorable personalities.
“LX 2048” is centered on Adam Bird (played by James D’Arcy), a tech broker in his 40s, who has recently been diagnosed with a heart illness. The prognosis is grim: He has less than a year to live. The beginning of the movie shows Adam in the office of his physician Dr. Maple (played by Juliet Aubrey), who tells him this bad news: “You’re not dying yet. Your heart is definitely failing though.”
Dr. Maple tries to look on the bright side, because she reminds Adam that he’s on Premium 3 insurance, which is a life-insurance policy where someone agrees that after death, that person can be brought back as a clone by a loved one. The clones are not immortal, but this cloning gives the dead person’s loved ones the illusion that the dead person is still with them. Many of the “people” in this world of “LX 2048” are actually human clones who don’t have souls but can mimic human emotions. Dr. Maple is one of those clones.
Premium 3 insurance has an “upgrade” where a loved one can request that the human clone can have characteristics that the deceased loved one did not have. In other words, physical features and personality traits can be changed or erased, according to the wishes of the beneficiaries listed in the policy. The insurance agents recommend that beneficiaries do not tell the policy holders while they are still alive what they would change about them.
Adam’s health diagnosis isn’t the only depressing thing about his life. He lives in a world where the ozone layer has become so depleted that sunlight has become a danger to people’s health, so people rarely go outside in the daytime. Those that do go outside during the day, such as Adam, have to hear hazmat suits.
Mental depression has become very common in the world’s population, so the government has required that people take 001LithiumX, which is anti-depressant medication that is nicknamed LX. Adam is a nonconformist who refuses to take LX. He also insists on commuting to an office for his job, while almost all of his colleagues work remotely from their homes.
In addition, at the time that Adam has been told that he doesn’t have much longer to live, his marriage has fallen apart. He is separated from his wife Reena (played Anna Brewster), who lives with their three underage sons: Kenny (played by Dylan Pierce), who’s about 13 or 14 years old; Joshua (played by Ronin Zaki Moshe), who’s about 9 or 10 years old; and Nate, who’s about 6 or 7 years old (Majus Motiejus Prokopas). The Birds are a rare family, because in this world where the future is bleak, having three kids is considered a large brood.
For whatever reason, Adam and Reena have held off on signing their divorce papers. However, the movie has a flashback of Adam and Reena in happier times, when they were a couple and when both signed up for Premium 3 insurance. They have separate policies, where each spouse is the beneficiary of the other one’s policy. Whether or not an “upgrade” option is chosen has a lot to do with that happens later in the movie.
When Adam calls Reena to tell her that he’s dying and that he wants to arrange visitation with their children, viewers don’t hear what Reena says on the other line, but it angers Adam to the point where he curses at her and yells that all she cares about is paperwork. It’s later revealed in the story that Reena as a restraining order against Adam. “Fuck you!” he shouts at Reena before he hangs up phone on her.
It isn’t the first time that Adam shows that he has a bad temper. In a virtual-reality meeting with the board of directors at the company he works for, Adam (who is shown wearing virtual-reality goggles as he sits alone in a conference room) yells at the other people in the meeting. It’s because they won’t listen to his advice to divest from virtual reality and invest more in technology chips that can be implanted in people. Adam strongly believes that chip implants and chip installations are the future of technology.
“Bye bye, goggles,” Adam says at one point when he’s by himself. “Sooner or later, I’m going to be out a job.” The company that Adam works for is already struggling financially, and he worries that if the board members don’t follow his advice, the company will go bankrupt or go out of business. And that would put his Premium 3 life insurance policy, which he has through the company, in jeopardy.
Meanwhile, Reena grants Adam’s wish to see their kids, but the children are often unavailable to him because they’re “connected” to their devices. While Adam stays in a guest room, he begins having sex with a sex doll that is connected to a virtual-reality program that he uses. Reena catches him in the act and walks out of the room disgusted. Adam tries to apologize to Reena, but they get into an argument. Reena is very upset because the door was unlocked when she walked in, and she thinks it’s disrespectful that Adam would have sex in a way where any of the kids could possibly see him.
As the movie’s story unfolds, it turns out this other sex life that Adam has in his virtual-reality world is one of the main reasons why his marriage to Reena failed. Reena believes that Adam’s sexual “flings” in this virtual-reality world are infidelity in their marriage. Adam disagrees. And this disagreement reached a point where Reena demanded that Adam “disconnect” from this virtual sex life permanently, or else their marriage would be over.
Adam chose not to disconnect from virtual sex with other women. His current virtual-reality girlfriend Maria (played by Gabrielle Cassi) is about 20 years younger than Adam, and she looks like a typical fantasy blonde. Of course, because Adam has essentially created Maria in this virtual-reality world, she tells him everything he wants to hear to boost his ego and make him feel wanted. But there’s one big problem: Her emotions aren’t real. Adam hates to be reminded of this fact.
Meanwhile, the movie goes on another tangent where Adam tracks down a disgraced scientist named Donald Stein (played by Delroy Lindo), who has been “hiding” in a retirement home under the new name Jeremy Fisher. Dr. Stein has gone into hiding because he was ousted from his government job for making a clone of his virtual-reality lover. Adam idolizes Dr. Stein, whom Adam calls the “godfather of human cloning,”
The reason why Adam wants to meet with Dr. Stein is to tell the scientist that he found out that the skin of clones doesn’t get burned by sunlight because clones’ skin has “augmented pigmentation.” Adam wants to team up with Dr. Stein to figure out a way to transfer this type of skin protection to humans through chip technology, in order to make it safe for humans to go outside in daylight again, without having to wear hazmat suits. Dr. Stein is somewhat intrigued, but he’s reluctant to start doing scientific work again because he’s on some kind of government watch list. Dr. Stein suggests that Adam focus on getting a new heart.
One of the many plot holes of “LX 2048” is it never explains (probably because it’s so hard to believe) that Adam is the only person in this world who has figured out that clones’ skin doesn’t burn. It’s something that would’ve been discovered by many people and many clones already, based on how many clones have been living among humans in this world. And certainly, if Dr. Stein is so “brilliant” and the “godfather of human cloning,” he would have been one of the first people to know that clones’ skin could not get burned by sunlight. Dr. Stein wouldn’t need some random tech worker to tell him that, years after human clones were invented.
A more critical problem with “LX 2048” is that it overstuffs the movie with too many plots going on at the same time. There’s Adam’s terminal illness. There’s his marital discord. There’s his obsession with chip technology. There’s his quest to get Dr. Stein to work with him. And there’s a constant reference to this dystopian world having a serious addiction problem with people who are hooked on LX.
It’s a lot to try to pack in a 103-minute movie, unless the screenplay is well-written. Unfortunately, “LX 2048” isn’t a well-written movie, and it often loses its focus by trying to cover all of these plots. As a result, character development suffers. Adam, the main character, isn’t very likable or even a strongly unlikable anti-hero. He’s just mainly forgettable.
It seems as if writer/director Guy Moshe wants to make Adam sympathetic and heartbroken over Adam’s failed marriage, but Adam’s decision to choose virtual reality (in other words, fake relationships) over his own marriage with his real wife automatically will turn a lot off a lot of viewers from Adam. People aren’t going to be on Adam’s self-pity party train just because he’s been diagnosed with a terminal disease, when his actions show that he can be extremely self-centered and prone to temper tantrums that are bad enough that his estranged wife has a restraining order against him.
It’s also problematic the way that women are written in this movie. Reena is the only human woman in the story with a significant speaking role. The rest of the women with dialogue in the movie are either clones or are virtual-reality creations—in other words, they have no souls. If you were to believe what this movie presents as what a futuristic world looks like, only men are the leaders when it comes to science and new technology, and women have made no important contributions in these areas.
And even though Adam isn’t a great husband, Reena isn’t a great spouse either. She’s a bit of a shrew who seems money-hungry over Adam’s life-insurance policy and what Adam’s death would mean for her household income, since she’s a homemaker who doesn’t want any other job. To her credit, Reena seems to be more caring than Adam when it comes to protecting their children from the mean-spirited arguments that she and Adam have. However, Reena doesn’t seem very concerned that their kids are so addicted to technology that she doesn’t tell them to “disconnect” so they can spend quality time with their father when he comes to visit.
Dr. Stein isn’t in the movie very long, Adam doesn’t seem to work with any people outside of virtual reality, he doesn’t have any friends, and so viewers are stuck with mainly Adam and Reena (two unpleasant people) for most of the movie. After a while, viewers won’t really care much about what happens to Adam, Reena or this ex-couple’s miserable relationship. “LX 2048” has some interesting visual effects and set designs to depict this futuristic world, but nothing in this movie will be nominated for any major awards.
D’Arcy gives it his all in trying to portray Adam as a complex and flawed character. But unfortunately, the last few scenes in the movie are played in such an over-the-top manner, so that what started out as a serious sci-fi drama devolves into a soap opera. Sometimes, a movie’s plot holes can be forgiven if the characters are charismatic enough and the story is engaging enough for viewers to feel some kind of emotional connection. Unfortunately, “LX 2048” is so concerned with trying to dazzle the audience with sci-fi concepts that the people in the movie are as emotionally hollow as the human clones.
Quiver Distribution released “LX 2048” on digital and VOD on September 25, 2020.
Culture Representation: Taking place primarily in unnamed U.S. locations, the darkly droll comedy “I’ve Got Issues” features a predominantly white cast (with two African American men) representing the middle-class.
Culture Clash: In various chapters of the film, different characters have absurd, bizarre and sometimes unexpected experiences that often make them uncomfortable.
Culture Audience: “I’ve Got Issues” will appeal primarily to people who like odd, slow-paced movies.
Macon Blair in “I’ve Got Issues” (Photo courtesy of Gravitas Ventures)
The dreadfully sluggish comedy “I’ve Got Issues” starts out as if it could be a promising dry-humored film, as off-screen narrator Jim Gaffigan says in a deadpan tone: “Humans. They struggle. Every day, they struggle. Why? What is the point?” That last question could be applied to this overly smug movie that tries too hard to be weird for the sake of being weird, but ultimately it just ends up being mindlessly dull without saying much.
“I’ve Got Issues” is told in several chapters, which are really small films with simple set designs, with each chapter lasting from five to 15 minutes long. Each chapter has a different storyline and different characters. Just don’t expect a lot of these chapters to have any meaning as they plod along, with the actors having the same listless and fog-brained demeanor in every single scene.
There are nine actors who play the main characters in the various chapters: Macon Blair, Claire Titelman, John Merriman, Byron Brown, Randy Aguebor, Courtney Davis, Sam Eidson, Paul Gordon and Maria Thayer. In all of these different settings and scenarios, which are supposed to represent America, apparently “I’ve Got Issues” writer/director Steve Collins wants to erase women of color, since women of color do not exist in the world he’s created for this movie.
The opening montage shows different people in various scenarios of annoyance. A man’s car breaks down and he’s left stranded. A man accidentally locks his keys in his car. A woman is walking somewhere in high heels, but one shoe has a broken heel. A man uses a copy machine that mangles the paper. A man tries to use a vending machine that doesn’t work. This montage is then referenced again in the closing scene.
In between, there are the chapters where viewers are subjected to a bunch of bizarre people who all talk very slowly, and we’re supposed to think it’s all very hip and funny. It’s just simply dull and not clever at all.
The chapter called “The Healer” basically consists of Gordon playing a New Age hippie type (“the healer”), who’s in a therapy session with two male friends, portrayed by Blair and Eidson. The character played by Blair gets uncomfortable when the healer brings another man into the session and tells the character played by Blair to let this strange man lie on his lap.
In the chapter called “Please Help Griselda,” Davis plays a mute woman named Griselda, who contorts her face and shows up at a stranger’s house and indicates that she needs help. The woman who answers the door is played by Titelman, and she lets Griselda into the home. The rest of the skit consists of asking Griselda repeatedly if she needs help.
A recurring theme in the film is people being interviewed, usually in a job setting. There are also multiple scenarios showing people attempting suicide by hanging. It’s unknown why writer/director Collins has a fixation on showing people with rope nooses that they want to put around their necks, but this imagery ultimately serves no purpose in this movie.
There is some attempt to be provocative when it comes to race and gender issues. In the chapter titled “Slippery Slope,” a man (played by Blair) applies for a job that he finds out is a paid internship to help write a newsletter for a “white male supremacy booster club.” He expresses some initial discomfort with taking the job, until he is told that the place will allow him to do recycling.
On his first day on the job, the only other co-worker in the large office room is an Indian man, who says, “I know it’s f-ed up,” in response to the intern’s surprise that a non-white person works there. The newly hired intern asks, “How are the benefits?” Later, the new intern is shown wearing a Ku Klu Klan outfit while he dumps some trash outside in a recycling bin, while an African American bystander (played by Aguebor) looks on with a shocked expression on his face.
In the chapter titled “Justice,” a woman (played by Thayer) is testifying in a courtroom trial somewhere in a Southern state, where the people talk in exaggerated Southern accents and blather on about sweet tea. She is testifying against the defendant, who is a man accused of stealing her purse and assaulting her. As she gives her testimony (she’s the only woman in a room of white men), the defendant’s lawyer begins to insult her, and she ends up being arrested and hauled off to jail before she can finish her testimony. It’s an obvious commentary on gender discrimination and victim shaming of women.
“I’ve Got Issues” has very low production values and very low concepts that aren’t executed as well as the filmmakers think they were. The actors were obviously instructed to speak their lines as if they’re in an alternate universe where everyone talks in the same irritating monotone. The acting isn’t the problem in this movie.
The biggest problem with “I’ve Got Issues” is the unrelenting boredom that the movie induces because it’s too busy patting itself on the back for being weird. Some people will automatically like this movie because they think it will make them look like they’re in on some kind of cool inside joke. But people who don’t want to be subjected to tedious junk should avoid “I’ve Got Issues” altogether.
Gravitas Ventures released “I’ve Got Issues” on digital and VOD on September 18, 2020.
Culture Representation: Taking place in Los Angeles, the horror flick “Tar” has a predominantly white cast of characters (with one Native American and one Latina) representing the middle-class.
Culture Clash: Some office workers are trapped in a building that’s being terrorized by a tar monster.
Culture Audience: “Tar” will appeal primarily to people looking for a very lowbrow movie that delivers gory thrills with plenty of laughs because it’s not meant to be taken too seriously.
Aaron Wolf in “Tar” (Photo courtesy of 1091 Pictures)
When it comes down to it, there are two kinds of horror movies in this world: The ones that take themselves seriously and want to really scare people to the bone. And the ones that don’t take themselves seriously and have plenty of comedic moments so that people can laugh along with the scares. “Tar” definitely falls into the latter category. Just keep your expectations very low, because this movie is not aspiring to be a horror masterpiece.
“Tar” has a “trapped in a building” concept that can only work if the characters have enough appeal for viewers to be willing to tolerate their personalities for as long as the movie’s running time. Fortunately, the performances from the “Tar” cast members are good enough to keep viewers interested in what happens to the characters in the movie. Directed by Aaron Wolf (who co-wrote the “Tar” screenplay with Timothy Nutall), “Tar” features Wolf in the role of the lead character: Zach Greenwood, who’s in his 30s and who’s been working in his family’s Greenwood Repair business in Los Angeles for the past 10 years.
The business is in an office building that’s right next to the La Brea Tar Pits. On a sidewalk near the office building, a homeless man (played by Graham Greene) displays a sign saying that he will tell a story to anyone for spare change. The story he tells has to do with the history of the La Brea Tar Pits and the legend that 40,000 years ago, mysterious and deadly creatures lived underground and in the tar.
According to this folklore, people have been killed or have disappeared in the tar for thousands of years. And it usually happens when there is construction around the tar pits that disrupt the creatures down below. There’s one tar creature that’s been named as the most fearsome of all: Machi Manitu, also known as Man of the Tar. It’s a creature that stands about 8 or 9 feet tall and has lived for an untold number of years, according to the legend. You know where all this is going in the movie, of course.
One of Zach’s co-workers named Ben (played by Sandy Danto) is so fascinated by this story that he never gets tired of hearing it every time he pays the homeless man to retell the story. On one particular day, Ben wants to heard the story twice in a row, but Zach, who happens to be walking down the street, literally has to lead Ben away so Ben can get back to work.
And by the way, there’s been some construction going on in the area. One night, one of the construction workers gets killed early on in the movie. He’s at the construction area alone when a mysterious force attacks him. At the murder scene, some mysterious tar is left oozing around his body.
Zach’s father Barry Greenwood (played by Timothy Bottoms) is Zach’s boss. And the business was started by Barry’s late father Alfred (played by Max Perlich), who is shown in flashback scenes with a teenage Barry (played by Liam Grace). Zach is only in the family business because it was the wish of his late mother. (Her cause of death is not mentioned in the movie.)
Zach has been getting bored and restless in the job, and he’s starting to wonder if he could’ve done something better with his life. When he starts making these kinds of comments to Barry, his father reminds him that this was the best job that college-educated Zach could get, since he wasn’t getting better offers anywhere else.
Barry also likes to remind Zach how hard Barry’s father worked to start the business and how they are enjoying the privileges of all that hard work. Essentially, Zach and Barry have a tension-filled relationship because Zach thinks Barry doesn’t understand him and is too demanding, while Barry thinks Zach can be whiny and ungrateful. Zach has probably been thinking about quitting the job, but Barry likes to point out that Zach doesn’t have very many options.
Amid this family squabbling, Zach and Barry have a more pressing issue: The family business is being evicted from the office building because the building’s greedy and uncaring owner Sebastian Sterling (played by Stewart Stone) has sold the property to a company that wants to tear down the building in about a month. Sebastian gave the building tenants only two weeks’ notice to move out of the building. Greenwood Repair has to temporarily close until the company can find new office space.
Most of “Tar” takes place on the very last day that the tenants have to move out of the building. Sebastian stops by to talk to Barry and Zach and remind them that if their business hasn’t cleared out by 6 a.m. the next day, he has a right to sue them, according to the lease that they signed. The movie pokes fun at Sebastian, because he’s the type of corporate shark that people love to hate.
Zach, Barry and their remaining two employees aren’t even close to finishing, so they expect to keep packing for the rest of the night. In addition to goofball Ben (who brings most of the comic relief in the movie), the Greenwood company’s other remaining employee is Marigold (played by Tiffany Shepis), who’s into tarot card readings and astrology. Marigold tells Ben that now that she’s out of a job, she’s thinking of starting her own tarot business.
Barry and Zach try to remain positive about their eviction from the building, but the stress of moving frays their nerves, and they start bickering again. Zach gets some relief from the stress when his understanding and supportive girlfriend Rose (played by Emily Peachey) surprises him with a visit. She brings him some food and offers to help pack boxes. Rose and Max also have some lovers’ time alone in a locked office, but they’re interrupted by Barry before they can finish what they started.
A company on the same floor is also one of the last to move out of the office building. The other company is a small financial firm called Diana Dunder Accounting, whose namesake does not look or dress like a typical accountant. Diana Dunder (played Nicole Alexandra Shipley) looks like a model, and her tight blouse is cut so low that her ample cleavage is practically bursting out. Her company’s packing boxes are labeled “DD Accounting,” and it’s the movie’s cheeky way of saying that “DD” could describe her bra size. Diana has a loyal assistant named Carmenia (played by Dani Fernandez), whom Diana promises she will reward with a promotion when they move to a new office space.
Ben has a crush on Diana (who is single), but he’s somewhat reluctant to ask her out on a date because he thinks that she’s way out of his league. When Diana comes over to the Greenwood Repair office to borrow some bubble wrap, all Ben can do is awkwardly ogle at Diana. As day turns into night, there seems to be only seven people left in the building: Zach, Barry, Ben, Marigold, Rose, Diana and Carmenia.
Suddenly, all the electricity in the building goes out. It’s happened before on other days, and the electricity eventually returned, so the people who are left packing up boxes in the building don’t really panic. They just use flashlights. But then, Ben, Marigold and Diana see some creepy shadows in their offices.
Diana is a little freaked out, so Marigold invites her to hang out for a while in the Greenwood Repair reception area. Carmenia is nowhere in sight at that moment. Ben takes the opportunity to flirt with the slightly frightened Diana. Ben tells Diana that if he ends up saving her life, she has to make out with him. Diana laughs and agrees to this deal because she doesn’t think there’s any chance that she’s in danger or any chance that Ben would be capable of saving her anyway.
One of the worst things about low-budget horror flicks is that the acting is often terrible. Fortunately, the cast members of “Tar” get the job done in a way that it looks like they’re having fun and they have genuine chemistry together, even in scenes where some of the characters end up having conflicts. And they handle the comedic scenes well-enough that it isn’t cringeworthy. This movie’s sense of humor makes it enjoyable because a lowbrow movie such as “Tar” should not try to put on fake airs that it’s trying to appeal to film snobs.
As for the Machi Manitu creature, director Wolf made the wise decision not to show the creature in full view until the second half of the movie. It helps build viewer suspense to see what the creature looks like. The monster is grotesque and fairly unique-looking, so the movie gets some points for at least trying to have some originality in how this monster is portrayed. Machi Manitu is played by two people: pro wrestler Othello (whose real name Donald Edwards) and Simon Carmody, who’s also the film editor for “Tar.”
The visual effects are adequate for this low-budget movie, and the scenes where someone gets killed are what viewers might expect. It’s already revealed from the beginning of the film that at least one of the characters has survived, because the movie cuts back and forth to this character (who has a bloody neck injury and whose forehead has tar stains) telling what happened on that deadly night. Fortunately, “Tar” moves along at a good pace, and it’s more entertaining to watch than a pretentious horror movie that tries to be “deep” but is actually very dull.
The biggest flaws in “Tar” are in some of the continuity shots and editing, which could have been smoother. One action scene in particular, when the one of the characters kicks down a door on the monster, looks very unrealistic and could have been filmed a lot better. Machi Manitu can shape shift into tar, which is one of the reasons why it’s hard to kill it.
As for why these trapped people in the building don’t call 911, that’s explained in the movie. Rose tries to call 911, but her phone suddenly dies. It’s implied that there’s a power outage in the area, so cell phone towers aren’t working. And viewers can assume that the offices’ land line phones might already be disconnected because of the evictions and planned demolition of the building.
If people are willing to overlook a plot hole at the end of the film (when it’s not made clear what happened to the dead bodies), “Tar” delivers exactly what it appears to be: It’s a low-budget horror flick that mostly succeeds in blending deliberately tacky horror with an impish sense of humor. It’s the equivalent of a someone telling a silly “knock knock” joke that you’ve heard many times before, but the way that they tell the joke is so unapologetically cheesy, you can’t help but laugh.
1091 Pictures released “Tar” in select U.S. cinemas on October 2, 2020. The movie’s release on digital and VOD is on October 20, 2020.
Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed Canadian city, the sci-fi horror film “Possessor Uncut” features a predominantly white cast (with some black, Asian and Latino people) representing the middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: An elite assassin, who carries out murders by having her mind possess the bodies of other people, finds herself trapped in the body of someone who could threaten to destroy her.
Culture Audience: “Possessor Uncut” will appeal primarily to people who like sci-fi horror with a lot of disturbing visuals and concepts.
Christopher Abbott in “Possessor Uncut” (Photo courtesy of Neon)
What happens when an assassin’s target turns on the assassin? It’s a concept that writer/director Brandon Cronenberg depicts in the harrowing sci-fi horror film “Possessor Uncut,” but there’s a twist: The assassin’s mind is trapped in a man’s body that she has possessed to carry out her assigned murder spree. When she tries to get her mind back into her real body, the man she has possessed won’t let her go.
“Possessor Uncut” doesn’t get to this crucial part of the story until the last third of the film. Before then, the movie spends a lot of time showing the audience the personal backgrounds and circumstances that lead to this assassination assignment that goes horribly wrong for the assassin. Tasya Vos (played by Andrea Riseborough) is an elite assassin who works for a mysterious Canadian company that’s in the business of murdering powerful people.
The company’s name and city are not mentioned in the movie, but the company’s wealthy clients are enemies of the murder victims. In the movie’s opening scene, a lounge hostess named Holly Bergman (played Gabrielle Graham), who works at an upscale place called the Blue Light Sky Lounge, has viciously stabbed to a death a rich and powerful man named Elio Mazza (played by Matthew Garlick), in full view of several people who are in the crowded lounge.
After she commits the murder, Holly utters, “Pull me out.” She then takes a gun and appears to get ready to place it in her mouth to commit suicide. But for whatever reason, she can’t do it. The police arrive, she shoots the gun at them, and the police fire their guns at Holly and kill her. Instead of shooting herself, Holly has decided to commit “suicide by cop.”
It turns out that Holly’s mind had been “possessed” by the mind of Tasya, whose real body is lying in what looks like a compression chamber. When Holly said, “Pull me out,” it was Tasya telling the company’s employees overseeing her mind transference to pull her mind out of Holly’s body and back into Tasya’s real body. It’s a routine that Tasya has been trained to take every time her mind possesses the body of someone who commits the assassination that Tasya has been assigned to complete.
The company that Tasya works for has a certain procedure that Tasya is supposed to follow: After the murder or murders for the assignment have occurred, the person whose body Tasya has inhabited is supposed to commit suicide. Right before that suicide happens, Tasya has to request to “pull me out,” so the company can pull Tasya’s mind back into her real body.
After the assassination, the next step is that Tasya has to undergo an evaluation by a supervisor named Girder (played by Jennifer Jason Leigh), who’s usually in the room when Tasya’s mind is transported back to her real body. The evaluation includes a test of Tasya’s memories, to see if her own personal memories are intact and not mixed up and with or “charred by” the mind she previously inhabited. Tasya is shown a series of objects from her childhood (such as her father’s pipe and a framed butterfly) and asked to identify them and describe her memories of them.
The assassination of Elio Mazza was completed, and Tasya’s post-assassination evaluation yielded “normal results.” Girder is pleased that Tasya’s evaluation showed no problems. Girder comments, “Our next assignment is almost finalized. I can’t have our star performer falling apart on me.”
But the murder of Elio Mazza didn’t go exactly according to the company’s plan. The murder was supposed to be committed by shooting, but the murder was instead committed by stabbing. And after the murder, Holly did not immediately shoot herself but instead waited to be shot by police. Girder asks Tasya, “Why stab Elio Mazza? We provided you with a pistol.” Tasya can’t really answer the question.
Despite these discrepancies in Tasya not following these instructions, Girder wants to go ahead and give Tasya a very lucrative assignment. One of Girder’s colleagues expresses concern to Girder that Tasya didn’t follow the suicide instructions according to plan, and he wonders if Tasya will also not follow the instructions during the next assignment. However, Girder dismisses her colleague’s concerns and tells Tasya about her next assignment.
The company wants Tasya’s mind to inhabit the body of Colin Tate (played by Christopher Abbott), who started out as the cocaine dealer for a spoiled heiress named Ava Parse (played by Tuppence Middleton) and ended up becoming her lover and is now engaged to be married to her. Colin and Ava are both in their 30s. Ava’s rich and powerful father is John Parse (played by Sean Bean), a tech mogul who owns a company that makes devices similar to Apple Inc.’s Siri or Amazon’s Alexa. Tasya is supposed to possess the body of Colin for three days.
The company has decided that Ava’s fiancé Colin is the best person to commit the murder, since he has a sketchy background as a drug dealer and it will be framed to look like he had insecurity issues over his life being controlled by a wealthy family. Colin works for John’s company, but Colin is in a low-level position that is probably emasculating for Colin.
Girder explains to Tasya that John’s stepson Reid Parse (played by Christopher Jacot) wants an assassin to murder John and Ava, so that Reid can inherit the family fortune. John is divorced from Ava’s mother and Reid’s mother, so these two women presumably aren’t in John’s will. (Neither woman is seen in the movie, although later in the story, John makes a bitter comment to Ava about Ava’s mother leaving him years ago.) Because Reid has John’s last name, it’s inferred that John adopted Reid when John was married to Reid’s mother.
As is the company’s usual procedure, the plan is for Colin (the possessed assassin) to commit suicide immediately after the murders of John and Ava. Rather than have the police look for a stranger assassin, the case will be closed because investigators will conclude that it was a murder-suicide committed by Colin. A sizeable chunk of the fortune that Reid wants to inherit will go to the company that employs Tasya and Girder. Girder also mentions to Tasya that the assassin company will essentially “control” Reid, because it’s implied that the assassin company has so much dirt on Reid (including his murder-for-hire scheme) that the company could easily get more money out of him by blackmailing him.
As a star employee of this assassin company, Tasya’s work life might be going well, but her home life is not going well at all. She’s separated from her husband Michael Vos (played by Rossif Sutherland), who is living with their son Ira (played by Gage Graham-Arbuthnot), who’s about 7 or 8 years old. Michael and Ira don’t know what Tasya does for a living. Throughout the story, it’s implied that because Tasya has such a secretive job that requires her to spend long periods of time away from home, it’s taken a toll on her marriage to Michael.
Although Tasya is officially separated from Michael, she still goes back and forth between her home (where she lives by herself) and the home where Michael and Ira live. It seems that Tasya can’t quite make up her mind if she wants to get back together with Michael or go through with a divorce. During one of those times that she’s back with Michael and sleeping with him, she has nightmares about the stabbing of Elio Mazza.
The marketing materials of “Possessor Uncut” prominently feature star Riseborough as the main character, but she is really only in half of this movie. Abbott gets a lot of screen time as Colin, and he could easily be considered a co-lead actor for this film. In the movie, Tasya is seen spying on Colin and Ava in their home by telescope (apparently Tasya has rented a place near the home), so that she can study Colin’s speech patterns, mannerisms and home routines. It’s her preparation before Tasya’s mind will inhabit Colin’s body.
One of the plot holes in “Possessor” is that it never fully explains how the person who’s supposed to be possessed gets into a situation where the mind transfer can be completed without their full knowledge. There’s some vague imagery of the mind transfer happening to Colin while he’s asleep. Tasya has to be hooked up to machine for the mind transfer, but the body she possesses apparently doesn’t have to be hooked up to a machine when the mind transfer happens. This is a science-fiction film, so viewers will just have to go with this murky explanation for how the mind transfer happens.
As part of her training, Tasya has been warned that although her mind can possess someone else’s body, the original mind of that person can still exist in the body. The trick is for Tasya’s mind to dominate the other person’s mind and then leave no trace of her mind when she leaves the person’s body. The danger comes when the other mind is conscious of being possessed by Tasya and attempts to take back control.
This twisty concept of “Possessor Uncut” might be too confusing to some viewers, because it’s all explained in bits and pieces and not in a completely straightforward manner. This is a movie that can be fully appreciated if it’s watched without other distractions going on. There are many details that need to be paid attention to when watching this movie, in order to get the full picture of what’s happening and the subtle indications of what’s going to happen.
About halfway through the movie, when Andrea’s mind possesses Colin’s body, the movie pivots to showing Colin’s life. At John’s company, Colin works at a job that barely pays minimum wage. He works as some kind of surveillance monitor (he wears virtual-reality goggles as part of his job), for the Siri/Alexa-type devices that are in people’s homes, to make sure that the devices are working properly.
It’s really just a legal way to spy on people in their homes, since people who buy these devices have waived certain rights to privacy as part of the user agreement. Therefore, a lot of this company’s employees can watch many intimate things that go on in people’s homes, including people having sex. It’s what Colin does in one of the movie’s scenes. And it’s writer/director Cronenberg’s way of showing viewers that this part of the movie isn’t really science fiction, because devices like Siri and Alexa have embedded audio and video components that can be monitored by employees of the companies that make these devices.
Colin has a smarmy co-worker named Eddie (played by Raoul Bhaneja), who gets off on watching people have sex without them knowing it. Eddie considers the sexual voyeurism one of the perks of the job, because it happens so often, and he tries to compare “spying” stories with Colin. Colin doesn’t really engage in these conversations because he just sees this spying activity as part of a job, not as a way to feel power over people. However, Colin is curious enough to keep watching when he does see people having sex.
Colin’s relationship with Ava is still fueled by cocaine, which he supplies for them since he has the connections. However, now that he is engaged to Ava and can live off her money, it’s implied that he just buys cocaine and has stopped selling it. Ava seems to be in love with him but it’s not clear how Colin really feels about her because the movie mainly shows Colin when he’s possessed by Tasya’s mind.
During a scene in Ava and Colin’s home where they’re having a small party with their friends, one of the friends named Reeta (played by Kaniehtiio “Tiio” Horn), who works at John’s company, hints that Ava has some “daddy issues.” Ava has a history of dating men who don’t get the approval of Ava’s father John, who then finds ways to humiliate these boyfriends. In Colin’s case, John’s way of humiliating Colin is to give him a very low-paying job at the company. It’s never fully explained why Colin doesn’t just work somewhere else, but it’s implied that Colin wants to do whatever it takes to get in this rich family’s good graces.
Under the orders of Girder, Tasya is told that while Tasya’s mind is in possession of Colin’s body, Colin is supposed to stage a big public fight with John, to give investigators a motive for the murders. The opportunity comes at a lavish party that John has, where many of his business colleagues are in attendance. But all does not go according to plan.
And there were signs that things would go wrong, because Tasya’s memories and thoughts were being in “invaded” by Colin’s memories and thoughts. The movie has some very striking and sometimes unsettling visuals depicting this messy melding and the eventual mind battle that takes place in Colin’s body. All of these visual effects have a very “scary psychedelic trip” look to them that will definitely make people remember this movie.
Riseborough is the top-billed star of “Possessor Uncut,” and she does a good job in her role, but the Tasya character remains a mystery throughout the entire film. The movie shows more of Colin’s personal life than it shows of Tasya’s personal life. Perhaps writer/director Cronenberg wanted to keep Tasya an enigma, so that it would be easier for viewers to see her as a chameleon who could inhabit other people’s bodies.
Abbott has the more difficult performance in conveying a person whose body is being possessed and fought over by two different people. It’s a very convincing performance that takes “Possessor Uncut” to a higher-quality level than the average “body possession” horror movie. The movie’s storyline is sometimes a bit choppy, but if people can handle the film’s dark themes and uniquely horrifying imagery, then “Possessor Uncut” is worth watching for some unnerving depictions of mind power and control.
Neon and Well Go USA released “Possessor Uncut” in select U.S. cinemas on October 2, 2020.
Directed by Alex Huston Fischer and Eleanor Wilson
Culture Representation: Taking place primarily in New York City and Crawford, New York’s Pine Bush area, the sci-fi horror comedy “Save Yourselves!” features a predominantly white cast (with a few people of Indian heritage and one African American) representing the middle-class.
Culture Clash: During a getaway trip in a remote area, a hipster couple in their 30s find out that the world is being invaded by strange, fuzzy alien creatures.
Culture Audience: “Save Yourselves!” will appeal primarily who like quirky comedies that poke fun at “hipster culture” and people’s addictions to technology.
Sunita Mani and John Reynolds in “Save Yourselves!” (Photo courtesy of Bleecker Street)
What’s scarier: Going a week without plugging into any technology or having strange, fuzzy creatures suddenly invade the world? The live-in couple at the center of the sci-f-/horror comedy “Save Yourselves!” find out when they go on a getaway trip to a remote cabin to “unplug” from technology, only to discover that the world is being invaded by creatures from outer space. The offbeat humor works for most of the movie, even though the story might end too abruptly for many people’s tastes.
Written and directed by real-life couple Alex Huston Fischer and Eleanor Wilson, “Save Yourselves!” shines best when it realistically portrays the everyday ebbs and flows of a relatively happy couple’s relationship, even when they’re in the midst of some absurd chaos. Su (played by Sunita Mani) and Jack (played by John Reynolds) live together in New York City’s Brooklyn borough, and they’ve reached a crossroads in their relationship.
Su, who is 30, is thinking about starting a family with Jack. Jack, who is 34, tells Su that he’s not ready to become a parent yet because he often still feels like a kid himself. They both work in technology-related jobs and look and act like “hipsters”—young people who want to be socially conscious and trendy at the same time. They are also very connected to technology, since they’re constantly on their phones and they use tech devices like Alexa and Siri.
It’s not made clear in the movie how long Su and Jack have been dating each other, but Su wants to take their relationship to the next level by becoming parents. During an argument over this issue, Su yells at Jack, “My mom had three kids by the time she was my age! You’re 34. What are you doing?” It’s the kind of cutting remark that she seems to regret almost immediately as she says it.
Su is the person in the relationship who wants more order, stability and a planned-out way of doing things. Jack is more of a “go with the flow” type of person who is doesn’t get as upset as Su does if things don’t go according to plan. In the movie’s opening scene, Su and Jack have a minor squabble because Jack and used her laptop and erased all the tabs that she had set on the laptop.
After some back-and-forth bickering, he admits that he deleted the tabs, but not intentionally. He tells Su, “In this world, there are so many things that are more important.” He then apologizes: “I’m sorry for all the things you want me apologize for.”
But that isn’t good enough for Su, who demands that Jack verbally list all of the things he need to apologize for until Su is satisfied with what he says. It’s pretty clear from this scene that Su has the more dominant personality in the relationship. She’s not mean-spirited. She would just rather have things done her way.
Later that evening, Su and Jack attend a bachelor party for their gay friend Blake (played by John Early), who is seen briefly in the movie. At the party, Jack talks with the bartender named Raph, pronounced “raff” (played by Ben Sinclair), who tells Jack that he used to be an investment banker, but he gave it all up to travel around the world and work in a less-stressful job.
Raph also gives John a rock crystal that Raph says he got from Patagonia. According to Raph, the rock will help ease anger and stress. Raph also mentions that he has a cabin in upstate New York (in the city of Crawford’s Pine Bush area) that he uses as a getaway. Raph invites Jack to use the cabin whenever he feels like it.
This conversation with Raph idea sparks an idea in Jack to go on a getaway trip with Su and completely unplug from technology for a week. He thinks it would be an ideal way to connect with each other on a deeper emotional level as a couple, since they won’t be distracted by technology and their jobs. Su is willing to try the idea when Jack mentions that Raph’s cabin in the woods would be the perfect place to stay during their trip.
Shortly after Su and Jack call their respective workplaces to let them know that they will be gone for a week, Su’s job sends her a message to let her know that she’s been fired. Apparently, taking that amount of time off from work on short notice was not acceptable to the company. After Su gets over her initial shock, she comments to Jack about getting fired: “This is a good thing.”
Later, after it sinks in how her job loss will affect her financial security, Su starts to worry, but she still decides to go ahead with the getaway trip. Su is in constant contact with her demanding mother, who calls Su frequently and is never seen in the movie. (Zenobia Shroff is the voice of Su’s mother over the phone.) Su dreads telling her mother that she lost her job, so she decides she won’t tell her mother until after Su gets back from the trip.
Before they take their road trip to the cabin, Su and Jack both change their outgoing voice mail greetings to tell callers that Su and Jack will be gone for a week (from June 2 to June 9) and they will be completely disconnected from technology and won’t be checking or returning messages for the entire week. Jack and Su bring their phones with them, in case of an emergency, but they make a promise to each other not to look at their phones during the trip.
When they arrive at the large modern cabin, Su and Jack see a brown shaggy fuzz ball that’s the size of a bowling ball on the kitchen floor. They don’t touch the fuzz ball, but they assume it’s some kind of kitschy decoration, and they call the sphere object a “poof.” (Not the British slang term for a gay man but the term that people use for a poof ball.)
Because the main reason for the trip is to work on their relationship, Su and Jack do some self-help, couples-therapy emotional exercises, where they ask each other questions that are supposed to elicit deep or intimate answers. Jack is initially annoyed when Su admits that she got some of these self-help instructions from the Internet before they left for the trip, because he thinks that defeats the purpose of it being a trip that’s truly free of technology. But Su placates him by saying that she wrote down the self-help instructions by hand instead of printing them out.
Su has a big secret during this trip: She can’t resist checking messages on her phone. She finds out that her mother has called multiple times to talk about creatures that have been sighted all over New York City. Her mother says that some people initially thought the creatures were rats but the creatures are actually something else. Su doesn’t think anything of the messages and doesn’t say anything to Jack about what she heard from her mother.
Soon after their arrival, Su and Jack notice something strange: A bottle of vodka and a jar of alcohol in the kitchen that were full the night before are now empty, with a sticky substance on the outside of the containers. Su and Jack both know that they didn’t empty the containers. Who or what did empty those containers?
Su and Jack soon find out that the “poof” that they thought was harmless is one of several creatures from outer space that have invaded the world. The creatures consume ethanol, which explains the missing liquor. And these creatures attack by secreting a long, red umbilical cord-like appendage that can attach itself to objects and strangle or subdue people.
Jack and Su (who eventually tells Jack that she’s secretly checked messages on her phone) then try to find out what’s going on and attempt to escape from their environment when they find more “poofs” on the property. There are several mishaps (hint: gasoline contains ethanol) and some other desperate fleeing people whom Jack and Su encounter along the way.
“Save Yourselves!” takes some unexpected and wonderfully weird twists. It’s not a typical sci-fi movie because many of the scenarios are so original and because the movie blends so many other genres in the story, such as comedy, horror and even a little bit of drama. Viewers who dislike all things “hipster” should know that Su and Jack are not as annoying as you think they would be. Except for things such as they live in Brooklyn and they think a crystal rock is a cool gift, Su and Jack are very much like a lot of yuppie couples in romantic comedies.
Because the majority of the screen time shows Su and Jack alone together, Mani and Reynolds carry this movie with a lot of authentic charm. Their chemistry as a couple is very believable. Even in Jack and Su’s quiet moments together before the alien invasion (such as reading their phones on a sofa together or spending time in the kitchen together) look very naturalistic and ring very true. In this movie’s very small-numbered cast, Mani stands out with her wonderfully expressive face that conveys all the emotions that Su is feeling, while Reynolds shows a lot of talent in the scenes that involved slapstick comedy.
The madcap parts of the movie, when Su and Jack are trying to escape from the deadly aliens, are obviously meant to be funny. But “Save Yourselves!” also incorporates elements of tragicomedy very effectively. There’s a scene where Jack and Su check their messages and react with a mixture of dread and guilt when they find out that New York City has been evacuated and they were unaware how much their loved ones were in danger while Jack and Su had been relaxing at the cabin. (The voice of Jack’s mother is played by Amy Sedaris.)
“Save Yourselves!” starts out as a couple trying to survive their relationship and end up just trying to survive. A lot of strange and unexpected things happen along the way, but the story never gets so bizarre that most people can’t relate to it. Thanks to memorable performances by Mani and Reynolds, this movie is a ride worth taking as long as viewers don’t expect a conventional ending.
Bleecker Street released “Save Yourselves!” in select U.S. cinemas on October 2, 2020. The movie’s digital and VOD release date is October 6, 2020.
Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed rural town in England, the horror flick “Hosts” has an all-white cast of characters representing the middle-class.
Culture Clash: A family invites two guests over for a Christmas Eve dinner, and the guests go on a bloody rampage.
Culture Audience: “Hosts” will appeal primarily to people who like suspenseful slasher flicks with a touch of science fiction.
Samantha Loxley in “Hosts” (Photo courtesy of Dark Sky Films)
The horror movie “Hosts” might not have much of an original concept (people getting assaulted and possibly murdered in their home), but the movie succeeds in bringing plenty of chilling and terrifying moments that are sure to thrill horror fans who like to see intense and gruesome conflicts between good and evil. “Hosts” is the feature-film debut of writer/director duo Adam Leader and Richard Oakes, who show that they have impressive talent in telling an effective horror story on a limited budget and a small number of people in the cast.
The story of “Hosts” essentially revolves around seven characters. Jack (played by Neal Ward), who is in his late 20s or early 30s, has just arrived by train in an unnamed area that looks like it’s in the English countryside. He’s warmly greeted in an open field by middle-aged Michael (played by Frank Jakeman), who has recently gone hunting, because he has some dead pheasants hanging over his shoulder.
It’s Christmas Eve. Jack and his younger girlfriend Lucy (played by Samantha Loxley), who lives near Michael, have been invited over to Michael’s home to have dinner with Michael and his family. Michael’s wife Cassie (played by Jennifer K. Preston) is preparing the meal in the kitchen. They have a happy and loving marriage, based on the gently teasing banter and public displays of affection that they have before all hell breaks loose.
The other people in Michael and Cassie’s immediate family who are at the dinner are their three children. Eric (played by Lee Hunter) and Lauren (played by Nadia Lamin) are in their 20s and are single. Youngest child Ben (played by Buddy Skelton) is about 11 or 12 years old.
The siblings have a mostly congenial relationship with each other, but they have small annoyances that get on each other’s nerves. Lauren (who is at the family home for a Christmas visit) doesn’t want to make a serious commitment to her boyfriend Matt, so Eric teases her about her not wanting to settle down. Before dinner, Ben and Lauren are playing checkers in his room, and Lauren thinks Ben is being a little bit of a brat.
When Jack and Lucy arrive for dinner, something seems “off” about the way they are acting. They act emotionally disconnected, almost as if they’re in a zombie state of mind. That’s because when Jack and Lucy were at her place, something happened that caused them to not be themselves. It’s all explained in the movie.
Whatever has taken over Jack’s and Lucy’s minds and bodies, it causes them to go on a vicious and bloody rampage in the house. Their attack is a complete shock to the family, who only knew Jack and Lucy as a loving couple. And during this terrifying ordeal, some family secrets are revealed.
All of the actors do a very good job in their roles, but Loxley (as the possessed Lucy) stands out as the more horrific of the two murderers. One of the creepiest parts of the movie is a monologue that Lucy whispers that drops hints about the motivation for this killing spree. The way that Loxley delivers these lines can be considered even scarier than some of the bloody assaults because it’s about the psychological horror of what’s going in her twisted mind.
The cinematography, visual effects and music of “Hosts” are all especially effective in telling this story. And the writing and directing of this film are much better than the average horror flick. “Hosts” isn’t the kind of movie that’s revolutionary, because it sticks to a lot of familiar tropes that have been seen and done many times before in horror movies. But it does those tropes so well that it’s going to make people feel very tense and unsettled during the most disturbing and suspenseful scenes.
Dark Sky Films released “Hosts” on digital and VOD on October 2, 2020.
From movie stars like Charlize Theron and Will Smith to TV favorites Dan Levy and Cole Sprouse and music superstars Cardi B, Megan Thee Stallion, The Weeknd and Lady Gaga, so many iconic performers are nominated for an award.
There are some new categories this year including The New Artist of 2020, The Collaboration Song of 2020 and The Soundtrack Song of 2020, bringing the total up to 44 categories across movies, television, music and pop culture. That’s right, you’ll even recognize some of your favorite social stars among the list of noms.
These are the best stars 2020 has to offer and the winner of each category will be decided by you since the PCAs is the only award show for the people, by the people. And we’ll find out who nabs those coveted trophies during tonight’s star-studded show on November 15 at 9 p.m. ET/PT.
Plus, Jennifer Lopez (People’s Icon of 2020), Tyler Perry (People’s Champion Award) and Tracee Ellis Ross (Fashion Icon Award) will accept the three icon awards and there will be performances by Justin Bieber and Chloe x Halle. Don’t miss pop culture’s biggest night hosted by Demi Lovato starting with our red carpet. Take a look at the full list of 2020 E! People’s Choice Awards nominees below and vote now.
MOVIES
THE MOVIE OF 2020
Bad Boys for Life
Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn
Extraction
Hamilton
Project Power
The Invisible Man
The Old Guard
Trolls World Tour
THE DRAMA MOVIE OF 2020
Hamilton
Dangerous Lies
Greyhound
I Still Believe
Invisible Man
The High Note
The Photograph
The Way Back
THE COMEDY MOVIE OF 2020
Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga
Like A Boss
The Kissing Booth 2
The King of Staten Island
The Lovebirds
The Wrong Missy
To All the Boys: P.S. I Still Love You
Bill & Ted Face the Music
THE ACTION MOVIE OF 2020
Bad Boys for Life
Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn
Bloodshot
Extraction
Mulan
Power Project
Tenet
The Old Guard
THE FAMILY MOVIE OF 2020
Dolittle
My Spy
Onward
Scoob!
Sonic the Hedgehog
The Call of the Wild
The Willoughbys
Trolls World Tour
THE MALE MOVIE STAR OF 2020
Chris Hemsworth, Extraction
Jamie Foxx, Project Power
Lin-Manuel Miranda, Hamilton
Mark Wahlberg, Spenser Confidential
Robert Downey Jr., Dolittle
Tom Hanks, Greyhound
Vin Diesel, Bloodshot
Will Smith, Bad Boys for Life
THE FEMALE MOVIE STAR OF 2020
Camila Mendes, Dangerous Lies
Charlize Theron, The Old Guard
Elisabeth Moss, The Invisible Man
Issa Rae, The Lovebirds
Margot Robbie, Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn
Salma Hayek, Like a Boss
Tiffany Haddish, Like a Boss
Vanessa Hudgens, Bad Boys for Life
THE COMEDY MOVIE STAR OF 2020
David Spade, The Wrong Missy
Issa Rae, The Lovebirds
Joey King, The Kissing Booth 2
Keanu Reeves, Bill & Ted Face the Music
Noah Centineo, To All the Boys: P.S. I Still Love You
Pete Davidson, The King of Staten Island
Salma Hayek, Like a Boss
Will Ferrell, Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga
THE ACTION MOVIE STAR OF 2020
Charlize Theron, The Old Guard
Chris Hemsworth, Extraction
Jamie Foxx, Project Power
John David Washington, Tenet
Margot Robbie, Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn
Vanessa Hudgens, Bad Boys for Life
Vin Diesel, Bloodshot
Will Smith, Bad Boys for Life
THE DRAMA MOVIE STAR OF 2020
Ben Affleck, The Way Back
Elisabeth Moss, The Invisible Man
Issa Rae, The Photograph
KJ Apa, I Still Believe
Lin-Manuel Miranda, Hamilton
Russell Crowe, Unhinged
Tom Hanks, Greyhound
Tracee Ellis Ross, The High Note
TV
THE SHOW OF 2020
Grey’s Anatomy
Never Have I Ever
Outer Banks
The Bachelor
The Last Dance
The Masked Singer
This Is Us
Tiger King
THE DRAMA SHOW OF 2020
Grey’s Anatomy
Law & Order: SVU
Outer Banks
Ozark
Power
Riverdale
The Walking Dead
This Is Us
THE COMEDY SHOW OF 2020
Dead To Me
Grown-ish
Insecure
Modern Family
Never Have I Ever
Saturday Night Live
Schitt’s Creek
The Good Place
THE REALITY SHOW OF 2020
90 Day Fiancé: Happily Ever After?
Below Deck Mediterranean
Keeping Up with the Kardashians
Love & Hip Hop: New York
Love Is Blind
The Real Housewives of Atlanta
The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills
Queer Eye
THE COMPETITION SHOW OF 2020
American Idol
America’s Got Talent
Top Chef
RuPaul’s Drag Race
The Bachelor
The Challenge: Total Madness
The Masked Singer
The Voice
THE MALE TV STAR OF 2020
Chase Stokes, Outer Banks
Cole Sprouse, Riverdale
Dan Levy, Schitt’s Creek
Jason Bateman, Ozark
Jesse Williams, Grey’s Anatomy
Norman Reedus, The Walking Dead
Sterling K. Brown, This Is Us
Steve Carell, Space Force
THE FEMALE TV STAR OF 2020
Christina Applegate, Dead To Me
Danai Gurira, The Walking Dead
Ellen Pompeo, Grey’s Anatomy
Lili Reinhart, Riverdale
Mandy Moore, This Is Us
Mariska Hargitay, Law & Order: SVU
Sandra Oh, Killing Eve
Sofía Vergara, Modern Family
THE DRAMA TV STAR OF 2020
Cole Sprouse, Riverdale
Chase Stokes, Outer Banks
Danai Gurira, The Walking Dead
Ellen Pompeo, Grey’s Anatomy
Mandy Moore, This Is Us
Mariska Hargitay, Law & Order: SVU
Sandra Oh, Killing Eve
Sterling K. Brown, This Is Us
THE COMEDY TV STAR OF 2020
Christina Applegate, Dead To Me
Dan Levy, Schitt’s Creek
Issa Rae, Insecure
Jameela Jamil, The Good Place
Kate McKinnon, SNL
Kristen Bell, The Good Place
Sofía Vergara, Modern Family
Yara Shahidi, Grown-ish
THE DAYTIME TALK SHOW OF 2020
Good Morning America
Live With Kelly & Ryan
Red Table Talk
The Ellen DeGeneres Show
The Kelly Clarkson Show
The View
The Wendy Williams Show
Today
THE NIGHTTIME TALK SHOW OF 2020
Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen
Full Frontal with Samantha Bee
Jimmy Kimmel Live
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver
The Daily Show with Trevor Noah
The Late Late Show with James Corden
The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon
THE COMPETITION CONTESTANT OF 2020
Gigi Goode, RuPaul’s Drag Race
Hannah Ann Sluss, The Bachelor
Jaida Essence Hall, RuPaul’s Drag Race
Just Sam, American Idol
Madison Prewett, The Bachelor
Kandi Burruss, The Masked Singer
Rob Gronkowski , The Masked Singer
Sammie Cimarelli, The Circle
THE REALITY STAR OF 2020
Antoni Porowski, Queer Eye
Darcey and Stacey Silva, Darcey & Stacey
Jonathan Van Ness, Queer Eye
Kandi Burruss, The Real Housewives of Atlanta
Kim Kardashian West, Keeping Up with the Kardashians
There are numerous horror movies available to watch on TV, computers or mobile devices, but for Halloween 2020, there are some horror flicks and supernatural thrillers that will be released in theaters in October. Horror and supernatural movies released before October 2020 that should still be in theaters during the Halloween season include “Rent-A-Pal” (not rated); “Ten Minutes to Midnight” (not rated); and “Shortcut” (not rated).
Here are the movies that have an October 2020 release in theaters:
Information in this article is about U.S. releases.
Hospital nurse Mandy (played by Angela Bettis) is having a very bad day at work, where’s she’s doing a 12-hour shift. She’s been illegally selling organs of dead people, and now one of those sales has gone horribly wrong because she’s been paid for a stolen kidney that is now missing. Mandy has to find another kidney before some thugs come after her and her ditzy cousin Regina (played by Chloe Farnworth), Mandy’s partner in crime who lost the kidney. “12 Hour Shift,” written and directed by Brea Grant, has a dark comedic tone and cast that includes David Arquette, Mick Foley, Nikea Gamby-Turner and Kit Williamson. The movie, which is rated R, opens in select theaters and on VOD on October 2, 2020.
Taking place in 1987, some teenage friends play a prank that goes too far at the home of sinister married couple Edith Cranston (played by Lin Shaye) and Edward Cranston (played by Tobin Bell). The teens then find themselves back at the home, where Edward tells them that they can inherit $100,000 if they make a phone call and can stay on the line for 60 seconds. Directed by Timothy Woodward Jr., “The Call” has a cast that includes Chester Rushing, Erin Sanders and Judd Lormand. The movie, which is rated R, will be released in select theaters on October 2, 2020.
Oliver (played by Azhy Robertson) is a lonely young boy who is overly attached to his cell phone and computer tablet. These devices become portals for a mysterious creature to enter the world, and Oliver’s parents (played Gillian Jacobs and John Gallagher Jr.) must fight to save their son from this monster. Written and directed by Jacob Chase, “Come Play” (which is rated PG-13) is due out in theaters on October 30, 2020.
Set in 1973 on the outskirts of a remote Protestant village, a young woman named Audrey Earnshaw (played by Jessica Reynolds) and her mother Agatha (played by Catherine Walker) are accused of witchcraft. Mysterious deaths and plagues have been happening in the area, but Audrey and Agatha’s farm remains mysteriously unaffected. Written and directed by Thomas Robert Lee, “The Curse of Audrey Earnshaw” has a cast that also includes Jared Abrahamson, Hannah Emily Anderson, Geraldine O’Rawe, Don McKellar and Sean McGinley. The movie, which is unrated, arrives in select theaters on October 2, 2020, and on digital and VOD on October 6, 2020.
A young woman named Chelsea (played by Amanda Arcuri) connects with a man named Brad (played by Jackson Rathbone) over social media. When they meet in person at a Halloween party, he kidnaps her and brings her to his home, where he’s been keeping other abducted women. Written and directed by Walt Woltosz and his son Daniel Woltosz, “Do Not Reply” has a cast that includes Kerri Medders, Elise Luthman, Ashlee Füss, Ivon Millan and Thom Gossom Jr. The movie, which is rated R, is set for release in select theaters and on VOD on October 2, 2020.
After a young woman named Caitlin Kramer (played by Courtney Bell) and several other people witness a man being murdered and don’t step in soon enough to help him, the bystander witnesses are mysteriously killed, one by one. Is it a coincidence or something else? And will Caitlin survive what might be revenge serial killings? “Don’t Look Back,” directed by “Final Destination” writer Jeffrey Reddick, has a cast that also includes Bryan Batt, Will Stout, Skyler Hart, Jeremy Holm, Jaqueline Fleming, Amanda Grace Benitez, Damon Lipari, Han Soto, Dean J. West and Stephen Twardokus. The movie, which is unrated, is set for release in select theaters and on VOD on October 16, 2020.
When a girl goes missing, a former cop encounters a secretive group that’s trying to conjure up an evil spirit called the Empty Man. This movie is based on “The Empty Man” graphic novel series. “The Empty Man” written and directed by David Prior, has a cast that also includes James Badge Dale, Stephen Root, Joel Courtney and Marin Ireland. The movie, which is rated R, is set for release in theaters on October 23, 2020.
A college student named Grace (played by Amy Groening) investigates the mysterious murder of her best friend after they set off a sinister Halloween-themed computer meme. Grace gets assistance from a fellow student/computer whiz named Spencer (played by Jason Daley), and they find out that their college has a terrible secret. Written and directed by Jay Dahl, “Halloween Party” also stars Bradley Bailey, Scott Bailey, Zach Faye and Lisa Hackett. The movie, which is unrated, arrives in select theaters and on VOD on October 2, 2020.
In this movie, a Monsterpocalypse has devastated the world and forced humans to live underground to hide from the giant monsters that have taken over the world. Seven years after this invasion, Joel Dawson (played by Dylan O’Brien) reconnects over the radio with Aimee (Jessica Henwick), his girlfriend from high school, who is 80 miles away. When Joel falls in love with Aimee again, he decides to risk it all to go above-ground to reunite with her. Directed by Michael Matthews, “Love and Monsters” has a cast that includes Michael Rooker and Ariana Greenblatt. The movie, which is rated PG-13, arrives in theaters, on digital and on VOD on October 16, 2020.
In “Possessor Uncut,” an elite, corporate assassin named Tasya Vos (played by Andrea Riseborough) uses brain-implant technology to take over other people’s bodies and murder her intended targets. But then she becomes trapped inside a mind that can destroy her. Written and directed by Brandon Cronenberg, “Possessor Uncut” has a cast that includes Jennifer Jason Leigh, Christopher Abbott, Sean Bean, Rossif Sutherland and Tuppence Middleton. The movie, which is unrated, is due in theaters on October 2, 2020.
The horror/sci-fi comedy “Save Yourselves!” centers on a New York City hipster couple in their 30s named Su (played by Sunita Mani) and Jack (played by John Reynolds), who decide to go on a weeklong getaway at a remote cabin and “unplug” from all technology. During their retreat, they find out that the world is being invaded by deadly fuzzy creatures that Su and Jack call “poofs,” which have reached their remote area of the woods. Written and directed by Alex Huston Fischer and Eleanor Wilson, “Save Yourselves!” has a cast that includes Ben Sinclair, John Early and the voice of Amy Sedaris. The movie, which is rated R, is due out in theaters on October 2, 2020, and on digital and VOD on October 6, 2020.
Marquis T. Woods (played by Omari Hardwick) is a successful corporate attorney who travels by private plane with his wife and two teenage children to his West Virginia hometown in the Appalachian area to attend the funeral of his late father. But when the plane crashes, Marquis wakes up to find that he is being held captive by a crazy voodoo priestess named Eloise (played by Loretta Devine), who uses body parts for her rituals. Directed by Mark Tonderai, “Spell” has a cast that also includes Lorraine Burroughs, Hannah Gonera, Kalifa Burton, John Beasley, Steve Mululu and Tumisho Masha. The movie, which is rated R, is set for release in select theaters and on digital and VOD on October 30, 2020.
In this horror/sci-fi comedy, Mara (played by Katherine Langford) and Dylan (played by Charlie Plummer) are two students in high school who fall in love with each other, even though their world is experiencing a mysterious plague where people are spontaneously exploding. Written and directed by Brian Duffield, “Spontaneous” has a cast that includes Piper Perabo, Ron Huebel, Hayley Law and Yvonne Orji. The movie, which is rated R, is set for release in theaters on October 2, 2020, and on VOD on October 6, 2020.
New Orleans paramedics and best friends Steve (played by Anthony Mackie) and Dennis (played by Jamie Dornan) are on the scene of some gruesome accidents that are being blamed on a mysterious new party drug. But after Dennis’s oldest daughter disappears, Steve finds out the horrifying truth. Directed by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead and written by Benson, “Synchronic” has a cast that includes Katie Asleton and Ally Ioannides. The movie, which is rated R, is set for release in theaters on October 23, 2020.
For 40,000 years, creatures have been living under the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles. Barry Greenwood (played by Timothy Bottoms) and his son Zach (played by Aaron Wolff) have had to shut down their office business because of city construction on the land. But the construction triggers a nightmarish reaction from a creature down below, and the humans above have to fight for survival. Directed by Wolff, who co-wrote the movie with Timothy Nutall, “Tar” has a cast that includes Graham Greene, Tiffany Shepis and Max Perlich. The movie, which is rated PG-13, is set for release in select theaters on October 2, 2020, and on digital and VOD on October 20, 2020.
A small-town sheriff has to solve a series of murders that happen only when there’s a fool moon. He doesn’t believe in werewolves, and he’s also having problems at home with his wife and rebellious teen daughter. Jim Cummings is the writer and star of “The Wolf of Snow Hollow,” whose cast also includes Riki Lindhome, Robert Forster, Jimmy Tatro and Chloe East. The movie, which is rated R, is set for release in select theaters and on digital and VOD on October 9, 2020.
SPECIAL RE-RELEASES
“The Addams Family” (2019)
Directed by Conrad Vernon and Greg Tiernan, “The Addams Family” is the animated version of Charles Addams’ comic-strip that ran in the New Yorker from 1938 to 1988. The comic strip , which is about a spooky clan that has a hard time fitting into a “normal” world, would go on to spawn a live-action TV series in the 1960s, an animated TV series in the 1970s and live-action films in the 1990s. The all-star voice cast of “The Addams Family” animated film includes Oscar Isaac as patriarch Gomez Addams; Charlize Theron as matriarch Morticia Addams; Chloë Grace Moretz as daughter Wednesday Addams; Finn Wolfhard as son Pugsley Addams; Nick Kroll as Uncle Fester, Gomez’s brother; Snoop Dogg as Cousin Itt, Gomez’s cousin; Bette Midler as Grandmama, Gomez and Fester’s mother; and Allison Janney as reality TV host Margaux Needler, the story’s villain. “The Addams Family” is rated PG-13. Cinépolis will show the movie on October 23, 2020. The screenings for Alamo Drafthouse locations will vary by location, and audience members are encouraged to wear costumes.
“Annabelle”
The 2014 film “Annabelle” is an origin story of the evil doll Annabelle from “The Conjuring” movies. In the movie, a loving husband has given Annabelle as a gift to his pregnant wife. And all hell breaks loose. Directed by John Leonetti, “Annabelle” has a cast that includes Annabelle Wallis, Alfre Woodard, Ward Horton, Tony Amendola, Eric Ladin and Brian Howe. “Annabelle,” which is rated R, will have screenings at AMC Theaters on October 9, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Annabelle: Creation”
In this 2017 prequel to “Annabelle,” a dollmaker and his wife, who are grieving over the death of their young daughter, welcome a nun and several girls from a shuttered orphanage into their home. Little does this couple know that a doll named Annabelle will unleash some deadly terror on the people in the home. Directed by David F. Sandberg, “Annabelle: Creation” has a cast that includes Anthony LaPaglia, Miranda Otto, Stephanie Sigman and Talitha Bateman. “Annabelle: Creation,” which is rated R, will have screenings at AMC Theaters on October 2, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Beetlejuice”
Tim Burton’s classic 1988 horror comedy tells the story of deceased young couple Adam and Barbara Maitland (played by Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis), who haunt their former home and try unsuccessfully to scare away the house’s new residents: Charles and Delia Deetz (played by Jeffrey Jones and Catherine O’Hara) and their moody teenage daughter Lydia (Winona Ryder). In desperation, the Maitlands conjur up the obnoxious ghost Betelgeuse (played by Michael Keaton) to enlist his help in terrifying the Deetz family into moving out of the house. “Beetlejuice” (which is rated PG) will have screenings at several movie-theater chains. Cinemark will show “Beetlejuice” on October 2, 2020, while Cinépolis will show the movie on October 9, 2020. The screenings for Alamo Drafthouse locations will vary by location.
“Casper”
Based on the beloved ghost character from Harvey Comics, this 1995 live-action/animated movie tells the story how a greedy heiress, an after-life therapist and the therapist’s daughter find some ghosts in an old mansion. Casper is a friendly ghost, but the same can’t be said for Casper’s ghost uncles Stretch, Fatso and Stinkie. Directed by Brad Silberling, the movie’s cast includes Christina Ricci, Bill Pullman, Cathy Moriarty, Eric Idle and Amy Brenneman, as well as the voices of Malachi Pearson, Joe Nipote, Joe Alaskey and Brad Garrett. Alamo Drafthouse locations will show “Casper,” which is rated PG, with screening information varying by location. Audience members are encouraged to wear costumes.
“Coco”
In the Oscar-winning animated 2017 film “Coco,” a Mexican boy named Miguel, who is an aspiring musician, travels to the Land of the Dead to learn more about being like his idol Ernesto de la Cruz. “Coco” (directed by Lee Unkrich) has a voice cast that includes Anthony Gonzalez, Gael García Bernal, Benjamin Bratt, Alanna Ubach, Renée Victor, Ana Ofelia Murguía and Edward James Olmos. “Coco,” which is rated PG, will have screenings at multiple movie-theater chains. AMC Theatersand Cinépolis will show “Coco” on October 9, 2020.
“The Conjuring”
Based on a true story, the 2013 film “The Conjuring” shows how paranormal investigators/married couple Ed and Lorraine Warren (played by Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga) were called in 1971 to help a family who have moved to Harrisville, Rhode Island, in a farmhouse that is possessed by an evil spirit. Directed by James Wan, “The Conjuring” has a cast that includes Lili Taylor and Ron Livingston. “The Conjuring,” which is rated R, will have screenings at AMC Theaters on October 23, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“The Conjuring 2”
In the 2016 film “The Conjuring 2” (the sequel to “The Conjuring”), it’s 1977, and paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren (played by Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga) go to London to help a single mother who is raising four children in a haunted house. Directed by James Wan, the movie’s cast includes Frances O’Connor, Madison Wolfe, Simon McBurney and Franka Potente. “The Conjuring 2,” which is rated R, will have screenings at AMC Theaters on October 30, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“The Craft”
In this 1996 film, four teenage girls in high school find out that they have the power to practice witchcraft. Directed by Andrew Fleming (who co-wrote the screenplay with Peter Filardi), “The Craft” has a cast that includes Robin Tunney, Fairuza Balk, Neve Campbell, Rachel True, Skeet Ulrich, Christine Taylor and Breckin Meyer. The Alamo Drafthouse theater chain is showing “The Craft” (which is rated R), with the dates varying by location. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“The Curse of La Llorona”
The 2019 film “The Curse of LaLorona” is based on the Mexican folklore of La Llorona, the ghostly weeping woman who drowned her children and then committed suicide. In 1970s Los Angeles, La Llorona is stalking a troubled widowed mother who is being investigated by social workers. Directed by Michael Chaves, the movie’s cast includes stars Linda Cardellini, Raymond Cruz, Patricia Velasquez and Marisol Ramirez, Sean Patrick Thomas, Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen and Roman Christou. “The Curse of La Llorona,” which is rated R, will have screenings at AMC Theaters on October 23, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“The Exorcist”
The 1973 classic “The Exorcist,” directed by William Friedkin, is often ranked as the scariest horror movie of all time. In the story, Chris MacNeil (played by Ellen Burstyn) is distraught when she sees her 12-year-old daughter Regan (played by Linda Blair) begin to act strangely, such as speaking in tongues. When Regan starts levitating, Chris is convinced that Regan might be possessed by the devil. Chris asks a local priest named Father Damien (played by Jason Miller) for help. He then requests to perform an exorcism, and the Catholic Church sends an exorcism expert Father Lankester Merrin (played by Max von Sydow) to assist in the exorcism. “The Exorcist,” which is rated R, received 10 Oscar nominations (including Best Picture), and ended up winning two Oscars: Best Original Screenplay and Best Sound Mixing. The Cinépolis theater chain is showing “The Exorcist” (which is rated R) on October 23, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Frankenstein” (2011 National Theatre stage production)
In 2011, Fathom Events released a screening of the U.K.’s “Frankenstein” National Theatre stage production, starring Jonny Lee Miller as Dr. Frankenstein and Benedict Cumberbatch as Frankenstein’s Creature. Directed by Danny Boyle, this special screening (which is not rated) is getting a re-release in select U.S. cinemas on October 28, 2020. More information and ticket purchases are available here.
“Friday the 13th” (1980)
The horror legend of Jason Vorhees began with 1980’s original “Friday the 13th” film (directed by Sean S. Cunningham), a classic slasher flick where a serial killer is on the loose and murdering teenagers at Camp Crystal Lake. According to local folklore, Jason Vorhees was a boy who drowned in the lake due to bullying. Did he really die? And is he out for revenge? The movie’s cast includes Kevin Baker, Betsy Palmer, Jeannine Taylor, Robbi Morgan, Harry Crosby and Adrienne King. The 40th anniversary of the release of “Friday the 13th,” which is rated R, will be celebrated with a restored and remastered release in select theaters on October 4, October 6 and October 7, 2020. The screenings will include a featurettes called “Secrets Galore Behind the Gore,” with commentary by special-effects and makeup artist Tom Savini, who worked on the movie. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Ghost”
The pottery-making scene in the blockbuster film “Ghost” has been widely parodied, but this 1990 film remains a fan favorite for romantic supernatural movies. “Ghost” tells the story of banker Sam Wheat (played by Patrick Swayze) and potter Molly Jensen (played by Demi Moore), a live-in couple who are deeply in love. Sam is tragically murdered, and Molly believes his spirit is contacting her, with the help of a sassy psychic named Oda Mae Brown (played by Whoopi Goldberg, in an Oscar-winning performance). The 30th anniversary of “Ghost” will be celebrated with Turner Classic Movies commentary in select theaters on October 24 and October 25, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Ghostbusters” (1984)
The original 1984 “Ghostbusters” movie is considered a horror-comedy classic. Directed by Ivan Reitman, the movie tells the story of three paranormal investigators (played by Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis), their first recruit (Ernie Hudson), their socialite client (played by Sigourney Weaver), her neighbor (played by Rick Moranis), and how they stumble upon ghosts and demons in New York City. The Alamo Drafthouse theater chain is showing “Ghostbusters” (which is rated PG), with the dates varying by location. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Halloween” (1978)
John Carpenter’s “Halloween” is considered one of the most influential horror movies of all time, and certainly one of the top films representing the “slasher” subgenre of horror flicks. The mask-wearing, knife-wielding, mute serial killer Michael Myers has become a much-parodied and imitated horror icon, but at the time that “Halloween” was released, many of the terror-inducing elements of this movie were considered groundbreaking. The slow-burn suspense of “Halloween,” which spawned numerous inferior sequels, can be fully appreciated on the big screen, considering that most modern “slasher” movies follow a formula of someone getting killed every 15 to 20 minutes. Jamie Lee Curtis, as teenage babysitter Laurie Strode, made her movie debut in “Halloween,” one of many horror films in which she’s had a starring role, including the 2018 movie sequel of the same name. Donald Pleasence also stars in the original “Halloween” as Myers’ psychiatric doctor, who doggedly tries to find his patient after Myers escapes from a psychiatric institution. The Cinépolis theater chain will have a screening of the original 1978 “Halloween” (which is rated R) on October 30, 2020. More information and ticket purchases are available here.
“Hocus Pocus”
The supernatural comedy film “Hocus Pocus,” directed by Kenny Ortega, tells the story of three ancient sister witches (played by Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker and Kathy Najimy) who are accidentally conjured up by a teenage boy (played by Omri Katz) after he and his family move from Los Angeles to Salem, Massachusetts. “Hocus Pocus,” which is rated PG, will have screenings at several movie-theater chains. AMC Theaters, Cinemark and Cinépolis will show “Hocus Pocus” on October 2, 2020. The screenings for Alamo Drafthouse locations will vary by location.
“The House With a Clock in Its Walls”
Based on the children’s novel written by John Bellairs, the 2018 movie “The House with a Clock in Its Walls” tells the story of an orphaned 10-year-old boy who goes to live with his uncle in a creepy hold house and finds out that the town in inhabited by witches and warlocks. Directed by Eli Roth, the movie’s cast includes Cate Blanchett, Jack Black, Owen Vaccaro, Kyle MacLachlan, Colleen Camp, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Vanessa Anne Williams and Sunny Suljic. The Cinépolis theater chain will have a screening of “The House With a Clock in Its Walls” (which is rated PG-13) on October 30, 2020. More information and ticket purchases are available here.
“It”
Based on the Stephen King novel of the same name, the 2017 blockbuster “It” (also known as “It Chapter One”) is a story that features one of horror entertainment’s most terrifying clowns. When children begin to disappear in the town of Derry, Maine, a group of 13-year-old misfit kids who call themselves the Losers Club are faced with their biggest fears when they square off against an evil clown named Pennywise (played by Bill Skarsgård), whose history of murder and violence dates back for centuries. The movie’s cast include Jaeden Martell as Bill Denbrough; Jeremy Ray Taylor as Ben Hanscom; Sophia Lillis as Beverly Marsh; Finn Wolfhard as Richie Tozier; Wyatt Oleff as Stanley Uris; Chosen Jacobs as Mike Hanlon; Jack Dylan Grazer as Eddie Kaspbrak and Nicholas Hamilton as Henry Bowers. “It” author King has a cameo in the movie. The Cinépolis theater chain will have a screening of “It” (which is rated R) on October 2, 2020. More information and ticket purchases are available here.
“It Chapter Two”
In this sequel to the 2017 horror blockbuster “It,” the members of the Losers Club once again join forces in their quest to get the evil clown Pennywise (played by Bill Skarsgård) out of their lives. It’s now 27 years since the Losers Club last saw Pennywise as 13-year-olds in their hometown of Derry, Maine. Pennywise is back, and the adult members of the Losers Club reunite to do battle against him. The cast of “It Chapter Two” includes Jessica Chastain as the adult Beverly, James McAvoy as the adult Bill, Bill Hader as the adult Richie, Isaiah Mustafa as the adult Mike, Jay Ryan as the adult Ben, James Ransone as the adult Eddie, and Andy Bean as the adult Stanley. Reprising their roles as the original members of the Losers Club are Jaeden Martell as Bill, Wyatt Oleff as Stanley, Jack Dylan Grazer as Eddie, Finn Wolfhard as Richie, Sophia Lillis as Beverly, Chosen Jacobs as Mike, and Jeremy Ray Taylor as Ben. Bill Skarsgård returns in the role of Pennywise. The Cinépolis theater chain will have a screening of “It Chapter Two” (which is rated R) on October 2, 2020, with tickets available here.
“Jack-O” (RiffTrax version)
RiffTrax comedy stars Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett give their running commentary during the 1995 campy horror flick “Jack-O.” In this R-rated movie (directed by Steve Latshaw), Jack the Pumpkin man is an evil warlock who rises from the grave to seek revenge on the Kelly family, who are descendants of the man who buried Jack years ago. The movie’s cast includes Linnea Quigley, Maddisen K. Krown, Gary Doles and Ryan Latshaw. The RiffTrax version of “Jack-O” is set for select theaters on October 21, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Lights Out”
In the 2016 film “Lights Out,” a young woman named Rebecca and her kid brother Martin experience a terrifying evil spirit when the lights go out. They begin to suspect that it has something to do with their mother. Directed by David F. Sandberg (in his feature-film debut), the movie’s cast includes Teresa Palmer, Gabriel Bateman, Billy Burke, Alexander DiPersia and Maria Bello. “Lights Out,” which is rated PG-13, will have screenings at AMC Theaters on October 9, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“The Lost Boys”
This 1987 comedic horror film is about a group of teenagers who discover that a gang of teenage vampires has invaded the California beach city where they live. Directed by Joel Schumacher, “The Lost Boys” has a cast that includes Corey Haim, Corey Feldman, Jason Patric, Kiefer Sutherland, Jamie Gertz, Dianne Wiest and Edward Hermann. Alamo Drafthouse locations will have various screenings of “The Lost Boys,” which is rated R. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Memories of Murder”
Originally released in 2003, Oscar-winning director Bong Joon Ho’s “Memories of Murder,” which is based on true events, follows the hunt for a serial rapist and murderer who has been targeting a small province in 1980s South Korea. Three detectives are at the center of trying to solve the case: Park Doo-man (played by Song Kang-ho), the leader of the trio; Cho Yong-koo (played by Park Kim Roi-ha), his aggressive cop partner; and Seo Tae-yoon (Kim Sang-kyung), the youngest of the trio. (In real life, the killer was caught in 2019.) The rerelease of “Memories of Murder,” which is rated R, arrives in select theaters on October 19 and October 20, 2020. These screenings will include an exclusive prerecorded conversation with filmmakers Bong Joo Ho and Edgar Wright, the director of “Shaun of the Dead” and “Baby Driver.” More information and ticket purchases can be found here. The VOD release of “Memories of Murder” is on October 27, 2020.
“The Nightmare Before Christmas”
The 1993 animated musical “The Nightmare Before Christmas”—produced and conceived by Tim Burton and directed by Henry Selick—tells the story of Jack Skellington, the King of Halloween Town, who accidentally goes through a portal to Christmas Town. When he returns to Halloween Town to celebrate Christmas and share his knowledge about Christmas, chaos ensues. Danny Elfman, who wrote the film’s songs and score, provided the singing voice of Jack. The voice cast also includes Chris Sarandon, Catherine O’Hara, William Hickey, Ken Page, Paul Reubens, Glenn Shadix, and Ed Ivory. “The Nightmare Before Christmas,” which is rated PG, will have screenings at several movie-theater chains. AMC Theaters and Cinépolis will show “The Nightmare Before Christmas” on October 16, 2020. Alamo Drafthouse locations will have a costume element for their screenings of the movie, which vary by location.
“The Nun”
In this 2018 prequel in “The Conjuring”/'”Annabelle” universe, “The Nun” tells the story of a Catholic priest sent by the Vatican to investigate a nun’s suicide in Romania. Directed by Corin Hardy, the movie’s cast includes Demian Bichir, Taissa Farmiga, Jonas Bloquet, Charlotte Hope, Ingrid Bisu and Bonnie Aarons. “The Nun,” which is rated R, will have screenings at AMC Theaters on October 2, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Poltergeist” (1982)
In the original 1982 “Poltergeist” movie, the Freeling family, which has three underage kids, has moved into a new house, where strange things starts happening and the youngest child mysteriously disappears. Directed by Tobe Hooper, “Poltergeist” has a cast that includes Craig T. Nelson, JoBeth Williams, Dominique Dunne, Heather O’Rourke, Oliver Robins and Zelda Rubinstein. The 2015 “Poltergeist” remake flopped with critics and audiences, unlike the original “Poltergeist.” The 1982 “Poltergeist” film, which is rated PG, will have screenings at AMC Theaters on October 16, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Psycho” (1960)
The most influential film ever directed by Alfred Hitchcock is 1960’s “Psycho,” a horror masterpiece that is considered the “grandfather” of slasher movies. In the beginning of the movie, embezzler Marion Crane (played by Janet Leigh) is on the run from the law with stolen cash, when she checks into the creepy and isolated Bates Motel, whose caretaker is Norman Bates (played by Anthony Perkins). What happened to Marion in her motel room’s shower became one of the most iconic horror scenes in movie history. It isn’t long before Marion’s sister Lila Crane (played by Vera Miles) goes looking for Marion, and she also ends up at the Bates Motel, where Lila discovers how dangerous the Bates Motel really is. “Psycho” spawned the 1983 sequel “Psycho II” (starring Perkins and Miles) and director Gus Van Sant’s 1998 “Psycho” remake, both of which got mixed-to-negative reviews. The “Bates Motel” TV series, which was on the air from 2013 to 2017, was the origin story of a teenage Norman Bates. The 60th anniversary of “Psycho” will be celebrated with an uncut version of the movie (and Turner Classic Movies commentary) in select theaters on October 11 and October 12, 2020. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Scream”
This 1996 classic film features a masked serial killer on the loose with an ultimate target: high schooler Sidney Prescott (played by Neve Campbell). The psycho also likes to call his victims before he murders them. Directed by Wes Craven, “Scream” has a cast that includes, Courteney Cox, David Arquette, Matthew Lillard, Rose McGowan, Skeet Ulrich and Drew Barrymore. Alamo Drafthouse locations will have various screenings of “Scream,” which is rated R. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“Shaun of the Dead”
The 2004 horror comedy “Shaun of the Dead” shows what happens when two best friends (played by Simon Pegg and Nick Frost) try to survive during a zombie apocalypse in England. Directed by Edgar Wright (who co-wrote the screenplay with Pegg), the movie’s cast includes Kate Ashfield, Lucy Davis, Dylan Moran, Bill Nighy and Penelope Wilton. Alamo Drafthouse locations will have various screenings of “Shaun of the Dead,” which is rated R. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“The Shining”
“The Shining” is director Stanley Kubrick’s version of the Stephen King novel, which tells the story of an aspiring writer named Jack Torrance (played by Jack Nicholson), who takes a job as a live-in caretaker of the historic Overlook Hotel in Colorado’s Rocky Mountain area during the hotel’s off-season. He moves there with his wife Wendy Torrance (played by Shelley Duvall) and kindergarten-aged son Danny Torrance (played by Danny Lloyd), who shows signs of having psychic abilities. The hotel cook Dick Hallorann (played by Scatman Crothers) notices Danny’s unusual abilities, which Dick calls “the shining.” When Danny’s visions become more menacing and Jack starts descending into madness, it’s only a matter of time before all hell breaks loose. The 40th anniversary of the release of “The Shining,” which is rated R, will be celebrated with Turner Classic Movies commentary in select theaters on October 17, October 20 and October 22, 2020. More information and ticket purchases from can be found here. In addition, the Cinépolis theater chain will have a screening of “The Shining” on October 16, 2020, with tickets available here.
“Tales From the Crypt: Demon Knight”
The 1995 film “Tales From the Crypt: Demon Knight” features a serial killed named The Collector who’s on a murderous rampage. Directed by Ernest Dickerson, the movie’s cast includes Billy Zane, William Sadler, Jada Pinkett, Brenda Bakke, C.C.H. Pounder, Dick Miller and Thomas Haden Church. Alamo Drafthouse locations will have screenings of “Tales From the Crypt: Demon Knight,” which is rated R. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”(1974)
The original 1974 film “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” introduced horror audiences to the chainsaw-wielding serial killer Leatherface. In the movie, a group of unlucky young people end up being targeted by cannibals. Directed by Tobe Hooper (who co-wrote the screenplay with Kim Henkel), “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” cast includes Marilyn Burns, Paul A. Partain, Edwin Neal, Jim Siedow and Gunnar Hansen. Alamo Drafthouse locations will have screenings of the 1974 version of “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” which is rated R. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
“The Thing” (1982)
In the original 1982 version of “The Thing,” which is rated R, 12 researchers at a remote Antarctic research station discover a deadly alien that had been buried in the snow for over 100,000 years. Directed by John Carpenter, the movie’s cast includes Kurt Russell R.J. MacReady, Wilford Brimley, T.K. Carter, David Clennon, Keith David, Richard Dysart, Charles Hallahan, Peter Maloney, Richard Masur, Donald Moffat, Joel Polis and Thomas G. Waites. Alamo Drafthouse locations will have screenings of the 1982 version of “The Thing,” which is rated R. More information and ticket purchases can be found here.
