Richard Brake Archives

Review: ‘The Strangers: Chapter 3,’ starring Madelaine Petsch, Gabriel Basso and Ema Horvath

February 5, 2026

by Carla Hay

A scene from “The Strangers: Chapter 3” (Photo by Jordy Clarke/Lionsgate)

Directed by Renny Harlin

Culture Representation: Taking place in 2008, in the fictional small town of Venus, Oregon, horror film “The Strangers: Chapter 3” (the third movie in a trilogy from “The Strangers” movie franchise) features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few Asians, African Americans and Latin people) representing the working-class and middle-lass.

Culture Clash: A young woman named Maya continues to be hunted by the serial killers who murdered her boyfriend in “The Strangers: Chapter 1.”

Culture Audience: “The Strangers: Chapter 3” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of 2008’s “The Strangers” movies and idiotic horror reboots/sequels that never make improvements from the original movie.

Madelaine Petsch and Gabriel Basso in “The Strangers: Chapter 3” (Photo by John Armour/Lionsgate)

“The Strangers: Chapter 3” is proof of what has ruined “The Strangers” franchise. The last film in this terribly conceived horror reboot trilogy ends with a kill that is so underwhelming and predictable, it confirms all three movies are time-wasting garbage. This trilogy can easily be considered one of the worst horror reboots of all time.

Directed by Renny Harlin and written by Alan R. Cohen and Alan Freedland, “The Strangers: Chapter 3” is the third movie in a trilogy of “The Strangers” movies directed by Harlin and written by Cohen and Freedland. These three movies (which were all filmed back-to-back) continue the story that began with 2008’s “The Strangers.” The villains in each “Strangers” movie are three masked and unidentified serial killers (one man and two women), who drive around and stop at houses in remote areas to randomly murder strangers.

In “The Strangers: Chapter 1” (released in 2024), the main protagonists were a dating couple named Ryan (played by Froy Gutierrez) and Maya (played by Madelaine Petsch, one of the executive producers of this movie trilogy), who went on a cross-country road trip from New York to Oregon, because Maya had a job interview in Portland, Oregon. (“The Strangers: Chapter 1,” “The Strangers: Chapter 2” and “The Strangers: Chapter 3” were actually filmed in Bratislava, Slovakia.) Because of car trouble, Maya and Ryan got stranded in the rural town of Venus, Oregon, where they rented a cabin in an isolated wooded area and were targeted by the serial killers. By the end of the movie (spoiler alert), Ryan died, while Maya was in a hospital.

The three killers are described in the movie’s end credits by the types of masks they wear. The male killer wears a scarecrow hooded mask, so he can be called Scarecrow, and he likes to use an axe in his murders. The younger female killer wears a doll mask, so she can be called Dollface. The older female killer, who wears a Betty Boop-styled mask and can be called Pin-Up, is more unhinged than Dollface. The women are more likely to use knives, but all three killers can also use whatever weapon is at their disposal. It was revealed in “The Strangers: Chapter 1” that Scarecrow and Pin-Up are romantically involved with each other.

The serial killers often approach potential victims having one of the women knock on the door where the victims are staying and ask, “Is Tamara here?” It’s revealed in “The Strangers: Chapter 2” (released in 2025) who Tamara is. “The Strangers: Chapter 2” also disclosed Scarecrow and Pin-Up’s close relationship went back to their childhoods.

“The Strangers: Chapter 3” has more childhood flashback scenes of the killers. Scarecrow (played by Jake Cogman) and Pin-Up (played by Nola Wallace) are seen when they were about 10 or 11 years old. There are also scenes from 12 years earlier, in 1996, to show Scarecrow (Kyle Breitkopf) and Pin-Up (played by Finn Cofell) as teenagers and how they met teenage Dollface (played by Stephanie Aubertin), who is a few years older than Scarecrow and Pin-Up.

In “The Strangers: Chapter 2,” the entire flimsy plot was about Maya escaping from the hospital (where she was being treated for her injuries ) and trying to hide from the three serial killers. Two law enforcement officers in Venus—Sheriff Rotter (played by Richard Brake) and Deputy Tommy Walters (played by Pedro Leandro)—become part of the investigation and might or might not be accomplices to the serial killers. Spoiler alert: By the end of the movie, Maya killed Pin-Up (played by Ema Horvath) in self-defense. Pin-Up’s real identity was revealed to be a local diner waitress named Shelly, who referred Maya and Ryan to the rental cabin in the woods where Ryan ended up getting murdered in “The Strangers: Chapter 1.”

“The Strangers: Chapter 3” picks up shortly after the end of the story that was in “The Strangers: Chapter 2.” But “The Strangers: Chapter 3” cuts back and forth between this main story and flashbacks to show more background information about the serial killers. It will be very confusing to anyone who didn’t see the previous two movies in the trilogy. These flashbacks reveal which of the Venus law enforcement officers has been an accomplice to the serial killers and why.

In “The Strangers: Chapter 3,” Maya has multiple awkward encounters with a man named Gregory (played by Gabriel Basso), whom she first met in “The Strangers: Chapter 2.” Gregory was the housemate of three other people who picked up Maya one night in their car when she was trying to escape from the serial killer in a nearby wooded area. Gregory and Maya are the sole survivors of the murder spree that occurred at the house.

Maya’s sister Debbie (played by Rachel Shenton), Debbie’s husband Howard (played by George Young) and their friend Marcus (played by Miles Yekinni) arrive in Venus to look for Maya because she has disappeared from the hospital where they had arranged for an ambulance to pick up Maya. The ambulance driver was killed in “The Strangers: Chapter 2.” Annie, Neil and Marcus do their own investigation because they don’t get much help from Venus law enforcement. The local residents are reluctant to talk, except for a diner waitress named Annie (played by Sara Freedland), who provides some valuable information.

Maya gets captured by the two remaining serial killers and is forced to “replace” Pin-Up. This isn’t really spoiler information because “The Strangers: Chapter 3” doesn’t hide the fact that Scarecrow and Dollface know that Pin-Up is dead. And because these serial killers haven’t killed Maya at all—even though they had many chances to kill Maya and have quickly murdered all of their other victims—it tells you all you need to know about who will be the obvious survivor by the end of the trilogy, which doesn’t even try to have any suspense.

One of the major things disclosed in “The Strangers: Chapter 3” that is not spoiler information is that the three serial killers, who committed their murders in Venus, agreed to only kill strangers who were out-of-town travelers. Which begs the question: Why haven’t all of these disappearances in a small town like Venus been on the FBI’s radar? Don’t expect an explanation in a trilogy that is relentlessly stupid and boring in every possible way.

Lionsgate will release “The Strangers: Chapter 3” in U.S. cinemas on February 6, 2026.

Review: ‘Altered” (2025), starring Tom Felton, Aggy K. Adams, Liza Bugulova, Igor Jijikin and Richard Brake

December 29, 2025

by Carla Hay

Liza Bugulova and Tom Felton in “Altered” (Photo courtesy of Well Go USA)

“Altered” (2025)

Directed by Timo Vuorensola

Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed part of Earth, the sci-fi action film “Wildcat” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few black people and Asians) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: In a futuristic world where people who cannot be genetically enhanced are treated as inferior, a superhero emerges who fights against those who are using genetic enhancement science for exploitation.

Culture Audience: “Altered” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of star Tom Felton and people who don’t mind watching terrible sci-fi action movies.

Tom Felton in “Altered” (Photo courtesy of Well Go USA)

“Altered” is a garbage sci-fi action flick with horrendous acting, a stupid plot, and ridiculous fight scenes. It’s a nonsensical story about human genetic enhancements and a superhero who uses special flowers for his powers. The superhero in question has a costume that makes him look like a low-rent Doctor Doom from Marvel Comics.

Written and directed by Timo Vuorensola, “Altered” takes place in an unnamed part of the world, where people have a mix of American and European accents. “Altered” was actually filmed in Astana, Kazakhstan. The beginning of the movie is narrated by a character named Leonard, nicknamed Leon (played by British actor Tom Felton, talking in a questionable American accent), who explains that this world has survived a nuclear war.

As a result of this war, 90% of the population are classified as Genetics: “genetically improved humans who live like kings.” The remaining 10% of the population are classified as Specials: people who cannot be genetically enhanced and are therefore treated as “scum of the earth.” Leon, who is classified as a Special, has paraplegia and uses a wheelchair.

“Altered” (which has terrible sound mixing and sloppy film editing) then has an exposition dump by showing the Genesis Institute in the Genetic District, where a tour guide is giving a tour to school children who are about 11 or 12 years old. The tour guide explains that a genetic engineer named Liam Smith founded the Genesis Tree, “a marvel of nature that appeared after the war.” The Genesis Tree’s flowers are harvested to fuel the energy of the world.

Among this tour group of students is a 12-year-old named Chloe (played by Liza Bugulova, also known as Elizaveta Bugulova), who is really there on an “undercover mission.” She’s helping her uncle Leon as a lookout because Leon has infiltrated this building to steal a Genesis Tree’s flower, so he can extract the flower’s magical powers to help (for a fee that he charges) other Specials who have been deprived of resources. Leon uses a gas device to make security guards lose consciousness.

The building’s alarm goes off because the security breach is discovered. The building is evacuated. Leon and Chloe are able to escape by being among the people evacuated and being cleared when they pass through a security checkpoint. The stolen plant was hidden in a stuffed teddy bear that Chloe had. The movie makes a point of showing security guards with super-enhanced vision, including X-ray vision, so it’s a plot hole that none of these guards was able to see the plant hidden in a stuffed toy.

It’s not the only plot hole in this extremely idiotic movie. Leon is the guardian of orphaned Chloe, who is slightly bratty and resentful of being in a lower-class status. Chloe and Leon live in a very cluttered warehouse-styled building. Apparently, Leon has been tinkering with building a superhero suit, because out of nowhere he dons this suit during a fight scene. The suit (which sprouts tree leaves when Leon is fighting in the suit) has been enhanced with the Genetic Tree flower that he stole, and it gives Leon the ability to use his legs and fight like a superhero.

Meanwhile, a Genetic senator with the last name Kessler (played by Richard Brake) has been campaigning for voters to pass into law something called Proposition 42, which would give equal rights to Genetics and Specials. One of the people who also advocates for Proposition 42 is a Genetic pop star named Mira (played by Aggy K. Adams), who has compassion for Specials. Proposition 42 is controversial because many Genetics want to keep their special privileges in society.

A marauding gang called Anti-Genetics have been wreaking havoc by invading elite Genetic places and killing Genetics. The Genetics have a Special Forces leader named Hughes (played by Igor Jijikin, also known as Igor Zhizhikin), who is tasked with capturing the Anti-Genetics and bringing them to justice. It should come as no surprise in this flimsy-plotted movie that certain people in the story are not who they initially appear to be.

The acting in “Altered” is so cringeworthy, viewers will either laugh or get very annoyed at the abomination of it all. The dialogue is just as horrible. The movie’s visual effects are tacky and not believable. “Altered” is truly a waste of time in every sense of the term, unless you want to see examples of all the things not to do when making a movie.

Well Go USA released “Altered” in select U.S. cinemas, on digital and VOD on November 21, 2025. The movie will be released on DVD, Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD on January 20, 2026.

Review: ‘Sisu: Road to Revenge,’ starring Jorma Tommila and Stephen Lang

November 20, 2025

by Carla Hay

“Sisu: Road to Revenge”

Directed by Jalmari Helander

Culture Representation: Taking place in Finland and in Russia, in 1946, the action film “Sisu: Road to Revenge” (a sequel to the 2023 film “Sisu”) features an all-white cast of characters representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: A former commando in the Finnish Army, whose family was massacred by a Russian Red Army death squad commander, is hunted by the killer and other Red Army soldiers in a series of brutal battles.

Culture Audience: “Sisu: Road to Revenge” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners, the first “Sisu” movie and action movies that have a simple yet effective plot.

Stephen Lang in “Sisu: Road to Revenge” (Photo by Heikki Leis/Screen Gems)

“Sisu: Road to Revenge” serves up the same formula that made 2023’s “Sisu” a hit with action fans: Keep the plot simple and the kills creative. In this sequel, the Finnish protagonist battles against the Red Army death squad leader who murdered his family during World War II. This is the type of movie that delivers exactly what viewers expect and nothing more.

Written and directed by Jalmari Helander (who also wrote and directed “Sisu”), “Sisu: Road to Revenge” had its world premiere at the 2025 edition of Fantastic Fest. The movie takes place in 1946 in Finland and in Russia, then known as the Soviet Union. “Sisu: Road to Revenge” was filmed in Finland.

In the first “Sisu” movie, which took place in Finland, in 1944, protagonist Aatami Korpi (played by Jorma Tommila), a former Finnish Army commando who became a gold prospector, battled against Nazi soldier thieves who stole Aatami’s gold and kidnapped several women. In “Sisu,” Aatami was already a widower. Russia’s Red Army massacred his wife and two sons in the family home during World War II.

“Sisu: Road to Revenge,” just like “Sisu,” is told in seven chapters. In “Sisu: Road to Revenge,” an opening caption reads: “The war is over. Finland seeks territory with the Soviet Union.” As a result, “420,000 Finns had to move to the Finnish side of the new border. Most would never see home again.”

Aatami has returned to the house in Finland where he used to live with his wife and two sons. He dismantles the wooden house, loads the wood onto the back of his truck, and plans to rebuild the house somewhere else. Just like in the first “Sisu” movie, Aatami is accompanied by his adorable Bedlington Terrier named Ukko (played by Simba), who has managed to survive the violent battles that Aatami experiences.

Aatami’s reputation for being hard to kill has earned him the Russian nickname Koshchei, which means “The Immortal” in Russian. That’s because during World War II, Aatami killed numerous fighters in the Red Army. And now, the Red Army wants revenge on Aatami. Just like in the first “Sisu” movie, grime-covered Aatami does not speak in “Sisu: Road to Revenge.”

In a gulag in Siberia, an unnamed KGB officer (played by Richard Brake) meets with imprisoned Igor Draganov (played by Stephen Lang), a Soviet Red Army officer. Igor is the person who killed Aatami’s family. The KGB officer tells Igor that because Aatami is now a folk legend, “Destroy the legend you have created, and you will go home a rich man.”

Igor is released from the gulag and is given several soldiers to help track down Aatami so that Igor can kill Aatami. The rest of “Sisu: Road to Revenge” shows the unusual (and often unrealistic) ways that these vicious and gory battles occur. The trailer for “Sisu: Road to Revenge” already reveals a lot of the best scenes, so there are no real surprises in this movie.

The acting performances in “Sisu: Road to Revenge” are sufficient, but people who are entertained by the “Sisu” movies don’t watch these movies for the acting. They watch for the darkly comedic ways that villains get killed. “Sisu: Road to Revenge” understands the assignment of giving viewers what they want.

Screen Gems will release “Sisu: Road to Revenge” in U.S. cinemas on November 21, 2025.

Review: ‘The Strangers: Chapter 2,’ starring Madelaine Petsch, Gabriel Basso and Ema Horvath

September 26, 2025

by Carla Hay

“The Strangers: Chapter 2”

Directed by Renny Harlin

Culture Representation: Taking place in 2008, in the fictional town of Venus, Oregon, the horror film “The Strangers: Chapter 2” (a direct sequel to 2024’s “The Strangers”) features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans, Latin people and one Asian person) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: A woman leaves the hospital where she was receiving medical treatment because of a murderous rampage caused by three strangers, who continue to hunt down the woman.

Culture Audience: “The Strangers: Chapter 2” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and the 2008 “The Strangers” movie, but this atrocious sequel is proof that “The Strangers” franchise has run out of original ideas.

“The Strangers: Chapter 2” is a pathetic excuse for a movie. It just might have the stupidest crime victim in one of the worst horror sequels of all time. The protagonist constantly and deliberately runs away from safety and runs toward danger, as if she wants to get murdered. It’s all so heinous to watch.

Horror movies often have characters who do mindless things that put them at risk of getting killed. But “The Strangers: Chapter 2” (which has mediocre-to-bad acting) makes it obvious that the filmmakers had no real story and just decided to throw together a bunch of chase scenes that relentlessly insult viewers’ intelligence. The violent murders in this bottom-of-the-barrel trashy movie aren’t nearly as offensive as how “The Strangers: Chapter 2” assaults viewers’ time and brain cells.

Directed by Renny Harlin and written by Alan R. Cohen and Alan Freedland, “The Strangers: Chapter 2” is the second movie in a planned trilogy of “The Strangers” movies directed by Harlin and written by Cohen and Freedland. These three movies (which were all filmed back-to-back) continue the story that began with 2008’s “The Strangers.” The villains in each “Strangers” movie are three masked and unidentified serial killers (one man and two women), who drive around and stop at houses in remote areas to randomly murder strangers.

In “The Strangers: Chapter 2,” the three killers are described in the movie’s end credits by the types of masks they wear. The male killer wears a scarecrow hooded mask, so he can be called Scarecrow (played by Matus Lajcak), and he likes to use an axe in his murders. The younger female killer wears a doll mask, so she can be called Dollface (Olivia Kreutzova). The older female killer, who wears a Betty Boop-styled mask and can be called Pin-Up (played by Ema Horvath), is more unhinged than Dollface. The women are more likely to use knives, but all three killers can also use whatever weapon is at their disposal.

The end of the “The Strangers: Chapter 1” is also mentioned in “The Strangers: Chapter 2,” which shows Maya waking up in the hospital and being told by hospital staffers Nurse Danica (played by Brooke Johnson) and Dr. Tate (played by JR Esposito) that Ryan died from a loss of too much blood. Maya and Ryan had been dating for five years when he was murdered. The couple had been having some relationship problems because Maya wanted Ryan to propose marriage to her, but he was reluctant to make that commitment.

In an unintentionally silly part of “The Strangers: Chapter 1,” the serial killers captured Maya and Ryan in the cabin’s living room and were about to kill them when Ryan had a change of heart about the marriage proposal. He proposed marriage in a scene where Ryan knew he was probably going to die, but he asked Maya to marry him anyway. Maya said yes to the marriage proposal, right before Ryan got the fatal blows from the serial killers.

The reason why it’s important to mention this traumatic marriage proposal is because an unintentionally funny part of “The Strangers: Chapter 2” is Maya always correcting people who describe Ryan has her “boyfriend.” She insists that people describe Ryan as her “fiancé.” It doesn’t matter what people call Ryan. He’s still dead—although Maya has flashback memories and hallucinations of Ryan in “The Strangers: Chapter 2.”

Not long after Maya gets the bad news about Ryan being dead, Maya is interviewed in her hospital bed by Sheriff Rotter (played by Richard Brake) and Deputy Tommy Walters (played by Pedro Leandro), who can only get a vague description from Maya about the killers and the killers’ truck. And quicker than you can say “awful horror movie,” Maya finds herself beng targeted by the masked killers again in the hospital, where all the lighting suddenly turns red.

During this ludicrous chase scene, the hospital staff is nowhere to be found, except for an unlucky orderly (played by Vincent Zaninovich) who walks into the hospital’s morgue at the wrong time. Maya is in the morgue and sees what happens to this orderly. She also ends up hiding in the same storage unit in the morgue where (surprise!) Ryan’s body is being stored. Her reaction isn’t to scream or jump in fright but to caress Ryan’s face and reminisce about the good times they had together.

Maya has multiple chances to be in a safe place and to get help, but she keeps running into the woods, where she knows the serial killers are lurking. Four housemates named Jasmine (played by Ella Bruccoleri), Chris (played by Florian Clare), Gregory (played by Gabriel Basso) and Wayne (played by Milo Callaghan) give a car ride to Maya, who flags them down on a rainy night after she runs away from the hospital. The roommates offer Maya a place to stay at their house, after Maya tells them that she escaped from killers chasing her in the woods. But before they go to the house, Maya jumps out of the car and runs back into the woods.

The movie’s flimsy excuse for Maya’s irrational actions is that she’s paranoid and feels that she can’t trust anyone. That only makes sense up until a certain point. It doesn’t make sense when Maya gets in the roommates’ car and doesn’t ask to be driven to the nearest place where she can emergency transportation out of Venus. Maya left her phone behind at the hospital, but she could’ve borrowed a phone to ask someone in her life to buy her a train ticket or plane ticket.

Maya also doesn’t think about going to the sheriff’s office when she gets a car ride because that would be too logical for an idiotic movie like “The Strangers: Chapter 2.” Maya has been told that the sheriff’s office hasn’t been able to solve the murder spree in the area, including other murders that happened before Maya and Ryan arrived. However, that shouldn’t have prevented her from seeking shelter and protection at a law enforcement station that should be open 24 hours a day.

Doesn’t Maya have any family or friends who can help her? The movie shows that while Maya was in the hospital before the seral killers arrived, she got a video message from her sister Debbie (played by Rachel Shenton) saying that Debbie and someone named Howard (presumably Debbie’s husband or boyfriend) were stuck at Heathrow Airport in London, but they arranged to have a private EMT (emergency medical techician) service pick up Maya in an ambulance. Once Maya saw that the killers found her at the hospital, and Maya escaped, the last thing on her mind should be waiting around for a private ambulance. The only new things that are revealed about Maya in “The Strangers: Chapter 2” is that she has a sister, and Maya acts even more dimwitted than Maya did in “The Strangers: Chapter 1.”

“The Strangers: Chapter 2” attempts to give a backstory for two of the killers, by showing flashbacks of Pin-Up (played by Nola Wallace) and Scarecrow (played by Jake Cogman) as children. However, this backstory is poorly written and unsatisfying. It’s enough to say that Pin-Up and Scarecrow have known each other since childhood, when Pin-Up began showing homicidal tendencies. As a serial-killing adult, Pin-Up is known for knocking on people doors and asking, “Is Jasmine here?” The movie shows Jasmine as a child (played by Pippa Blaylock) and how Jasmine knew Pin-up and Scarecrow when they were all about 7 to 9 years old.

“The Strangers: Chapter 2” can’t even get small details right. During all the frantic and brutal fights that Maya has in the movie, her gold-painted fingernails continue to look perfectly manicured. And there’s a scene in the woods where dirty and disheveled Maya suddenly pulls out a needle and thread to sew up a wound. Where did that needle and thread come from while she was running for her life? Don’t expect any logical answers in a movie that has no logic and can only shovel up cinematic garbage because that’s all this terrible movie has to offer.

Lionsgate released “The Strangers: Chapter 2” in U.S. cinemas on September 26, 2025.

Review: ‘Bingo Hell,’ starring Adriana Barraza, L. Scott Caldwell, Richard Brake, Clayton Landey, Jonathan Medina, Bertila Damas and Grover Coulson

December 30, 2021

by Carla Hay

“Bingo Hell”

Directed by Gigi Saul Guerrero

Culture Representation: Taking place in the fictional U.S. city of Oak Springs, the horror film “Bingo Hell” features a racially diverse cast of characters (Latino, white, African American and Asian) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A working-class city affected by gentrification gets targeted by a sinister gambling mogul, who promises to make people rich by playing bingo.

Culture Audience: “Bingo Hell” will appeal primarily to people who don’t mind watching horror movies that put more emphasis on campiness than being scary.

Clayton Landey, Bertila Damas, Adriana Barraza, L. Scott Caldwell and Grover Coulson in “Bingo Hell” (Photo by Brian Roedel/Amazon Content Services)

“Bingo Hell” takes a good concept for a horror movie and squanders it on a cheap-looking flick that’s short on scares and too heavy on campiness. It’s like a very inferior episode of “Tales From the Crypt” but made into a movie. Not even the charismatic talent of “Babel” Oscar nominee Adriana Barraza can save this misguided and monotonous film, because the “Bingo Hell” filmmakers make her protagonist character into a simplistic and annoying parody of a busybody senior citizen.

“Bingo Hell” is part of Blumhouse Television’s “Welcome to the Blumhouse” series partnership with Prime Video to showcase horror/thriller movies directed by women and people of color. The movie touches on issues that many underprivileged people of color face when they are priced out of neighborhoods that become gentrified. However, this social issue is flung by the wayside when the movie devolves into a predictable and dull story about a demon taking over a community, culminating in a badly staged showdown with no surprises.

Gigi Saul Guerrero directed “Bingo Hell” and co-wrote the movie’s screenplay with Shane McKenzie and Perry Blackshear. For Hulu’s “Into the Dark” horror anthology series (another Blumhouse production), Guerrero directed and co-wrote 2019’s “Culture Shock,” which did a much better job of combining horror with socioeconomic issues of race and privilege in America. One of the worst aspects of “Bingo Hell” is the movie’s musical score, which sounds like irritating sitcom music. The score music (by Chase Horseman) is very ill-suited for a horror movie that’s supposed to be terrifying.

In “Bingo Hell,” Barraza plays a widow named Lupita, a feisty, longtime resident of the fictional U.S. city called Oak Springs. Most of Oak Springs’ residents are low-income, working-class people. Senior citizens and people of color are a large percentage of the city’s population. Lupita, who lives by herself, has been getting letters in the mail from real-estate developers asking her to sell her home, but she refuses.

As an example of how she feels about being unwilling to sell her home, an early scene in the movie shows Lupita getting one of these letters, from a company called Torregano Real Estate. She takes a lit cigar and stubs it on the letter. Lupita rants to anyone who listens that no amount of money can make her sell her home. She also doesn’t like that some of her friends have taken offers to sell their homes, and she fears that more of her neighborhood friends will also sell their homes and move away.

And if it isn’t made clear enough that Lupita hates that her neighborhood is being gentrified, when she walks down a street and sees a young hipster woman drinking coffee, Lupita deliberately bumps into the woman so that she spills the coffee. Lupita pretends to be sorry for this “accident,” but she really isn’t sorry. She has a smug grin on her face, as if she’s glad that that she caused this mishap. Lupita is a senior citizen in her 60s, but she has the emotional maturity of a 16-year-old.

Lupita is a stereotypical nosy old lady who has to be in everybody else’s business because she has too much time on her hands. One by one, she visits her four closest confidants. Yolanda (played by Bertila Demas) is a friendly owner of a hair salon, where gossipy grandmother Dolores (played by L. Scott Caldwell) is a regular customer. Just like Lupita, Dolores says she doesn’t want to sell her house.

Clarence (played by Grover Coulson) is a laid-back mechanic who’s been working on one of his vintage cars for years. He’s been working on it for so long, it’s become an inside joke among these friends. Morris (played by Clayton Landey) is a “regular guy” plumber who comes into the hair salon one day to do some pipe repairs. Morris has a crush on Yolanda. Since they are both single, there’s some flirtation between them that’s not very interesting.

The community has been talking about the mysterious death of a widower named Mario (played by David Jensen), who is shown dying in the movie’s opening scene. He is sitting at a table in his home with a crazed look on his face, as he says: “I sold the house to him. I love him.”

A sinister-sounding male voice in the distance can be heard saying, “She would be so proud,” in reference to Mario’s late wife Patricia. Mario suddenly begins gorging on bingo balls until he chokes and dies. Meanwhile, a suitcase of cash is seen nearby in the room where Mario has died. All of these are obvious clues about what’s to come later in the story.

Meanwhile, Dolores has been having some family drama at home. Her rebellious teenage grandson Caleb (played by Joshua Caleb Johnson) and Caleb’s single mother Raquel (played by Kelly Murtagh) have come to stay with Dolores because Raquel has been having financial problems. Dolores’ son is Caleb’s father, who is described in the movie as a deadbeat dad who is not involved in raising Caleb.

Raquel and Dolores frequently clash because Dolores thinks that Raquel is a terrible mother who’s too lenient with Caleb (who’s about 15 or 16), while Raquel thinks Dolores is too strict and a failure as a mother because Dolores’ son turned out to be an irresponsible person. The movie wastes a lot of time with this family squabbling. The only purpose is to show that Raquel is money-hungry but she’s too lazy to want to find a job, which is an attitude that affects her decisions later in the movie.

It’s also problematic that the one character in the movie who’s a young African American male is portrayed as someone who commits crimes. Caleb’s misdeeds include breaking into cars. It’s such a lazy and unnecessary negative stereotype that is over-used in movies and TV. This gross stereotype doesn’t accurately represent the reality that most African American teens are not troublemaking criminals.

Dolores spends a lot of time at Oak Springs Community Center East, where she and some of her friends like to play bingo. The community center is also a place for support-group meetings. Eric (played by Jonathan Medina) is a local man in his 30s who leads a support group meeting.

Lupita invites Eric to the next bingo game, but he declines, by saying: “Bingo is not my thing. Maybe in 50 years, when I’m your age.” Eric isn’t disrespectful to Lupita, because he calls Lupita and Dolores “legends” of Oak Springs. Lupita feels good enough about the community center that when she finds a $100 bill on the street (the bill is covered with a mysterious white gummy substance), she donates the $100 to the community center by dropping the bill in a donation box.

Not long after this act of generosity, a big black Cadillac shows up in town. The driver calls himself Mr. Big (played by Richard Brake), a gambling mogul who speaks in an exaggerated Southern drawl and has an evil smirk. Mr. Big has come to town because he’s opening Mr. Big’s Bingo, a gambling hall specifically for bingo games.

Mr. Big talks in the type of grandiose clichés that you might expect from a carnival huckster or an infomercial hawker. He shouts to a crowd in Oak Springs: “They say that money can’t buy happiness! I disagree! You know what kinds of people believe this nonsense? Losers! Now tell me, Oak Springs, are you losers?”

Mr. Big makes a big splash in the community by showing off his wealth and with a flashy ad campaign where he promises that people can win thousands of dollars per game at Mr. Big’s Bingo. After this bingo hall opens, people in the community who play at Mr. Big’s Bingo inevitably get greedy and competitive. Because it’s a horror movie, you know where this is going, of course.

The horror part of “Bingo Hell” is frustratingly undercut by hammy acting from Brake and the aforementioned sitcom-like musical score. Meanwhile, the characters in the movie act increasingly like caricatures, as the cast members give average or subpar performances. What started out as a promising portrait of how gentrification and greed can cause horror in a community turns into a silly gorefest with ultimately nothing meaningful to say and nothing truly frightening to show.

Prime Video premiered “Bingo Hell” on October 1, 2021.

Review: ‘The Virtuoso’ (2021), starring Anson Mount, Abbie Cornish and Anthony Hopkins

May 25, 2021

by Carla Hay

Anson Mount in “The Virtuoso” (Photo by Jessica Kourkounis/Lionsgate)

“The Virtuoso” (2021)

Directed by Nick Stagliano

Culture Representation: Taking place in Ohio and unnamed parts of the United States, the crime drama “The Virtuoso” features an all-white cast of characters representing the middle-class and criminal underground.

Culture Clash: An assassin finds out one of his hit jobs might be his most dangerous assignment when he has problems finding his murder target.

Culture Audience: “The Virtuoso” will appeal primarily to people who don’t mind watching badly written and tedious movies about assassinations.

Anthony Hopkins in “The Virtuoso” (Photo by Lance Skundrich/Lionsgate)

The first clue that “The Virtuoso” will be an annoying, witless bore is within the first five minutes, when the main character starts droning on in voiceover narration about what’s happening on screen. It’s never a good sign when movies over-explain things that don’t need to be explained, but it’s even worse when the explaining is for things that don’t even make sense and no amount of explaining will help. The lead character is supposed to be an expert assassin, who thinks so highly of himself that he calls himself a “virtuoso,” but he makes so many dumb mistakes, viewers will be left with the impression that this drama is really an unintentionally bad comedy.

However, there’s nothing really funny about “The Virtuoso,” unless you consider it a cruel joke that Oscar-winning actor Sir Anthony Hopkins ended up in this bottom-of-the barrel dud. Viewers will be more intrigued by speculating how Hopkins found himself in this embarrassing mess of a movie than intrigued by the dull, so-called mystery that’s supposed to be the film’s main plot. “The Virtuoso” director Nick Stagliano (who co-wrote the movie’s atrocious screenplay with James Wolf) was extremely lucky to get a talented actor on the caliber of Hopkins to be in this forgettable garbage.

“The Virtuoso” is one of those pretentiously conceived films where all of the main characters are supposed to be so mysterious that they don’t have any names. The movie’s locations are mostly unnamed, but “The Virtuoso” was actually filmed in New York and Pennsylvania. Anson Mount is the lead character, a loner assassin who is seen doing a hit job in the movie’s opening scene. This character is credited as The Virtuoso in the movie’s end credits, but he’s such an idiotic bungler, that calling him a “virtuoso” is too generous.

In the movie’s opening scene, the assassin is staked out in a hotel room, where he shoots a middle-aged man in another hotel room across the street. And just to make this movie look “edgy” (when it’s actually very unimaginative), the shooting takes place while the targeted man (played by Blaise Corrigan) is having sex with a much younger woman (played by Estelle Girard Parks), who is not his wife. In this hit job, the assassin is so precise in his shooting that he is able to shoot off several bullets at his target, starting with the groin area, without any bullets hitting the woman.

She screams in terror and then quickly leaves the room, but not before robbing the dead guy of whatever cash was in his wallet. She doesn’t call for help because she knows that the murdered man is the type of person who wouldn’t want the cops around. And she doesn’t want to stick around to answer any questions.

In a voiceover, the assassin predicts all of these actions because he knows exactly who was in that room when he did the hit job. He also predicts how long it will take before the police arrive, so he can make his getaway. What he doesn’t explain is how he had the good luck of the murder victim having his hotel window curtains wide open so the assassin could clearly see where to shoot in the room.

Get used to this assassin over-explaining every single thing he does, as if he’s dictating an instruction manual called “Assassinations for Dummies,” because this constant narration plagues almost the entire movie. Here’s a sample of what he says in voiceover narration about this particular hit job: “With this employer, you rarely get more than a name—sometimes not even that. It adds to the risk, and it adds to the fear.”

When he calmly walks out of his hotel room after murdering his target, the assassin continues to drone on about how to be a top assassin: “It’s vital that you show no urgency. You trust your planning, your accuracy. You’re a professional, an expert devoted to timing and precision—a virtuoso.”

The assassin lives with his dog in a remote, unnamed wooded area, because as he over-explains in the narration, a “virtuoso” assassin is supposed “live off the grid as much as possible.” He get his mail by renting a box at an independent, privately owned mail service, not the U.S. Postal Service. And he never uses his real name.

The assassin has a mentor (played by Hopkins), who oversees the hit jobs that the assassin does. The next assignment that the assassin has is to murder a corrupt CEO, who was indicted on an unnamed charge, but the indictment was recently dropped by a judge. The assassin travels to Ohio to complete this mission.

It’s another murder where he shoots at his target from a nearby building. This time, the scene of the murder is on a street that looks like it’s in a business district of the city. And the target gets shot while driving in his car, which crashes into a reacreational vehicle camper that’s parked on the street. The CEO’s car and the camper explode. And something happens that the assassin could not predict: A woman, who was an innocent bystander, happened to be standing on a sidewalk next to the camper when it exploded, so she caught on fire and died.

The assassin makes a hasty exit back to his remote home. And because he prides himself on not killing innocent victims, this mistake has left him shaken to the core. He screams out in emotional pain and guilt. Although this screaming scene is supposed to be serious, it’s done in such an over-the-top way that viewers might laugh when they see it. Throughout the movie, the assassin has guilt-ridden flashbacks and nightmares of seeing the woman screaming in agony while engulfed in flames.

Viewers will find out a little bit more about the assassin and his mentor in a scene that takes place in a graveyard during the day. The assassin is there to visit the grave of his father. And then, the mentor suddenly shows up unannounced, almost as if he had been following the assassin (or hired someone to follow him), so he knew exactly where his protégé would be at that exact moment. The mentor has followed the assassin there because the assassin hasn’t been answering the mentor’s phone calls.

During their conversation, it’s mentioned that the assassin, his late father and the mentor all served in the military. The assassin’s father and the mentor were soldiers together during the Vietnam War. And in the movie’s best and most harrowing scene, the mentor delivers a monologue that only a few actors such as Hopkins would be able to deliver with credibility and gravitas. The monologue describes in vivid and horrific details a Vietnam War experience that the mentor had with the assassin’s father, when they were ordered to massacre all the people and animals in a Vietnam village, and what happened to a toddler boy who tried to escape.

The assassin’s mentor gives this monologue as a way to tell the assassin to “get over it” when the assassin seems to be mentally cracking under the guilt of accidentally killing an innocent bystander during a hit job. The mentor says that the dead bystander was just “collateral damage,” and that when these things happen, assassins just need to be professional and move on. “We humans are homicidal killing machines,” the mentor coldly tells the assassin. Privately, the assassin vows to himself to never allow this mistake to happen to him again.

And that’s why the assassin’s next assignment exposes the idiocy of this story. He takes an assignment where he doesn’t really know who his target is except that it’s someone whose identity is somehow connected to the words “white rivers.” Knowing full well that he could kill the wrong person due to mistaken identity, the assassin takes the assignment anyway.

The rest of the movie is a silly slog of the assassin going to a small town, where he encounters people who might or might now know who his target is, and one of them might be the actual target. All of the possible targets are people who spend time at a local diner called Rosie’s Cafe. They include:

A cop named Deputy Myers (played by David Morse), who’s immediately suspicious of the assassin when he sees him in the diner.
A waitress who calls herself Dixy (played by Abbie Cornish), who works at Rosie’s Cafe.
A sleazeball named Handsome Johnnie (played by Richard Brake), who has a criminal record and a gun.
A timid woman (played by Diora Baird), who is Handsome Johnnie’s new girlfriend.
A quiet loner (played by Eddie Marsan), who carries a gun with him.

And so, in this empty-headed story, the assassin who’s supposed to be as discreet and undercover as possible, shows up and starts asking people if they know anything about “white rivers.” He might as well have just worn a sign that said, “I’m a Stupid Assassin and I’m Here to Let People Know I’m Looking for My Target With My Biggest Clue About My Target’s Identity.” He acts more like a bumbling detective than a “virtuoso” assassin. What was that lecture he was saying in the beginning of the movie about “planning” and “accuracy”? Pure crap.

And since this is a small town, and the assassin hangs out at the diner acting like he’s looking for someone, it doesn’t take long before the word gets out that this stranger is probably up to no good. Needless to say, “The Virtuoso” is so sloppily written that the assassin’s process of elimination in figuring out the identity of his target makes absolutely no sense and contradicts the vow that he made to himself about not killing the wrong people.

“The Virtuoso” tries very hard to be like a neo-noir thriller, but the washed-out and dreary cinematography and monotonous editing just drag down this already sluggishly paced and nonsensical film. Fortunately for Hopkins, his screen time in “The Virtuoso” is no more than 20 minutes. His graveyard monologue really is the best thing about this terrible film. The rest of the cast members are serviceable in their roles. However, even the best acting in the world couldn’t save this very clumsy and vapid movie.

And because “The Virtuoso” recycles as many tired stereotypes as possible, the waitress and the assassin find themselves attracted to each other. Too bad Mount and Cornish have very little believable chemistry together. And since “The Virtuoso” is a very “male gaze” movie, only the women have nudity in the sex scenes. The only thing to say about the big “reveal” at the end is that it’s another very predictable cliché that’s a big yawn, assuming that any viewers who make it that far in this mind-numbing and plodding movie haven’t fallen asleep by then.

Lionsgate released “The Virtuoso” in select U.S. cinemas, on digital and VOD on April 30, 2021, and on Blu-ray and DVD on May 4, 2021.