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Originally published on Elements of Madness.   L-R: Lola Berthet as Irina and Jimena Anganuzzi as Carla in THE ATTACHMENT DIARIES. Content/trigger warning: The Attachment Diaries deals with sexual assault, self-harm, mental illness, and abortion. These subjects are also briefly discussed in the review below. The Attachment Diaries is a difficult movie for two reasons. First, it focuses on a handful of difficult topics (including abortion, which has just become more relevant than ever in the United States), and it presents those topics in a blunt and, at times, irreverent way. Second, it’s difficult because it asks us to think about imperfect people in imperfect situations. The film appeals to very raw and carnal emotions, asking viewers to indulge in the thoughts and feelings that we aren’t supposed to think and feel. It’s a good thing that The Attachment Diaries is so masterfully shot, because it may take several viewings to make sense of it.
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  NOPE. Written, produced and directed by Jordan Peele. If the first trailer for Jordan Peele’s Nope piqued your curiosity with its foreboding tone and vague details, then you were probably bummed out by the final trailer, which seemed to give everything away. You’ll be pleased to know that despite its revealing final trailer, Nope still has a handful of surprises to offer. While it's not quite as intense or chilling as Peele’s first two feature films, Get Out (2017) and Us (2019), Nope is a well-developed, well-rounded, and well-crafted flick that is sure to delight crowds at the theater. It’s filled with all the thrills and chills of a summer box-office hit, bringing together the best of comedy, sci-fi, and horror. And, of course, every shot is accented by Peele’s penchant for the disturbing. As the talented writer and director proved with his first two films, Peele has more than a few tricks up his sleeves when it comes to plot twists, uncanny visuals, and bizarre narratives. Peele has not only joined the ranks of 21st century auteurs - he’s also leading the charge.
 A scene from 20th Century Studios' NO EXIT, exclusively on Hulu. Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios. © 2022 20th Century Studios. All Rights Reserved. If you want to avoid a horror-movie situation, it’s probably best to stay away from isolated cabins in the dead of winter. Stephen King was certainly onto something when he set The Shining and Misery in snowed-in Colorado abodes. The strange, frigid silence of a snowstorm is the perfect backdrop for stories about isolation and hopelessness. That’s why director Damien Power was so drawn to No Exit, a novel by Taylor Adams, which also takes place during a blizzard in Colorado. In Power’s film adaptation of the book, which premieres February 25, 2022, on Hulu, Power makes the most of the snowy, isolated setting. He creates the ideal setup for the heroine, Darby (Havana Rose Liu), to undergo intense physical and psychological distress.
Originally published on Elements of Madness.  Çecilia Milocco as Molly in KNOCKING. If you’ve spent any time living in an apartment building or a dorm, you’ve probably had a few run-ins with noisy neighbors. It takes guts to knock on a stranger’s door and ask them to keep it down. Depending on what kind of noise you hear, you might even opt to skip the awkward conversation and call the police. But what happens when nobody else can hear what you’re hearing? What do you do when someone is calling out to you for help and the police don’t believe you? Who can you turn to when your neighbors think you’re having a psychotic break? In Frida Kempff’s psychological thriller, Knocking, a woman named Molly (Cecilia Milocco) becomes suspicious of the men in her apartment building when she hears persistent knocking and crying coming from the floor above her at night. No one else can hear it, and no one is interested in helping her solve the mystery. But Molly knows what she heard, and she’ll stop at nothing to help the unknown woman on the other side of her ceiling.
  (L-R) Autumn Reeser as Carly and Nicolas Madrazo as Danny in THE LEGEND OF LA LLORONA. In the trailer for The Legend of La Llorona, a distraught mother (Autumn Reeser) asks, “What is ‘a llorona’ and what does it want with my son?” Clearly, this mother isn’t a fan of low-budget horror. If she was, she’d probably recognize the Mexican folktale of La Llorona, or “the weeping woman,” which has served as the inspiration for a number of forgettable spooky flicks over the years. In 2019, the legend was brought to life in two film adaptations that proved to be somewhat more popular than their predecessors — Michael Chaves’ The Curse of La Llorona (the sixth feature installment in The Conjuring Universe) and Jayro Bustamante’s La Llorona.
Originally published on Elements of Madness.   Haizea Carneros as Amaia in ALL THE MOONS. No country’s literature or filmography is short of romance stories. If a writer tells you they’re working on a piece about love, you’ll probably assume they’re talking about romantic love. We live in a culture that prioritizes romance and marriage, and it’s easy to forget that other types of love can be just as fulfilling. When Igor Legarreta and Jon Sagalá wrote a screenplay about a girl searching for love in her doomed existence as an immortal vampire, they decided not to turn their bloodsucker story into a romance. In All the Moons, which screened at the Fantasia International Film Festival in August, the young heroine discovers meaning in her wretched existence not from a romantic relationship, but from the love of a lonely man who becomes the parent she never had. Legarreta and Sagalá undertook a great challenge in choosing to write a vampire movie (at this point, what hasn’t already been done with vampires?), however, they made the most of this fantasy/horror sub-genre by exploring parent/child relationships and the question of consent in matters of life and death. The final product, directed by Legarreta, is an enchanting fantasy that wraps the joy, wonder, and melancholy of an entire lifetime into a single feature-length film.
 (L-R) Nicolas Cage as Hero and Tak Sakaguchi as Yasujiro in the action/adventure film, PRISONERS OF THE GHOSTLAND. Photo courtesy of AMC+ and Shudder. There’s just no other way to put it: Sion Sono’s Prisoners of the Ghostland is just downright bizarre. But is it a bizarre work of genius, a bizarre flop, or something in between? This absurd dystopian action flick scores so highly in some categories and so poorly in others that it’s difficult to rate the film overall. The production design is outrageously fun, the cinematography is breathtaking, and Joseph Trapanese’s score is bursting at the seams with memorable motifs that work perfectly in a genre-driven movie. But the script? Let’s just say it’s a good thing Nicolas Cage has so much experience pushing bad dialogue to its limits. Thanks to Cage’s performance, Prisoners of the Ghostland falls into the “it’s so bad, it’s good” category. If you can accept the movie for what it is — a wacky celebration of genre created by an experienced director who has earned the right to do whatever he wants with his movies — you might not hate Prisoners of the Ghostland too much.
 A still from WHEN I CONSUME YOU. Do your worst childhood fears ever come back to haunt you? Does it feel like the monsters in your closet never left? Most of us outgrow our fear of shadows, monsters, and the dark, and we can now keep the closest door open at night and venture down the dark basement staircase with ease. But for Daphne and Wilson Shaw (Libby Ewing and Evan Dumouchel), the lead characters in Perry Blackshear’s When I Consume You, the haunting presence that plagued their childhood never left them alone. As the brother and sister grapple with the struggles of adulthood, a slew of mental health issues, and the lasting effects of a bad home life, they’re also haunted by a relentless stalker who has been watching them with malevolent yellow eyes since they were kids. After years of living in fear, Daphne and Wilson decide it’s high time to seek revenge.
Content Warning: They're Outside includes a brief scene about self-harm that may be triggering to some viewers. This scene is briefly discussed in the following review.  Tom Clayton-Wheatley as Max in THEY’RE OUTSIDE. If you developed a short-term fear of going outside in March 2020, you’re probably not the only one. During the onset of the COVID-19 crisis in the U.S., once-simple errands turned into elaborate and complex rituals involving masks, Clorox wipes, and hand sanitizer. But after only a few months of quarantine, most of us were so ready to get back to our normal routines that we overcame our fears and started to venture outside with ease once again. But for those who suffer from agoraphobia, the fear of public spaces and social interactions can be a life-long struggle. These fears might sound irrational to those who don’t experience a lot of anxiety. But truth be told, you never know what horrors are waiting just outside your door — especially if you’re a character in a horror movie. In They’re Outside, a found-footage-style horror flick from directors Airell Anthony Hayles and Sam Casserly, a YouTube psychologist investigates the case of a woman who developed agoraphobia after the disappearance of her young daughter. However, the arrogant influencer has no idea that this grieving mother’s seemingly irrational fears have nothing to do with psychology and everything to do with the paranormal.
Content Warning: The Blazing World involves heavy subject matters that may be triggering to some viewers, including self-harm. These issues are briefly discussed in the following review.  Carlson Young as Margaret Winter in THE BLAZING WORLD. The fantasy genre is endlessly attractive. It can enchant us with whimsical imagery and inspire us with dynamic characters who set off on adventurous quests. Fantasy lets us escape into mystical worlds with different rules than our own — but usually, those worlds reveal some kind of universal truth. In The Blazing World, a college student named Margaret Winter (played by Carlson Young, who also wrote and directed the movie) enters a fantasy world that reflects the inner workings of her subconscious mind. Her mystical journey through this world allows her to process grief that she’s been bottling up since childhood. The Blazing World is an attractive fantasy film, but a flawed one. It’s attractive in a sensory way, charming us with lush imagery and a rich sound design. The story, however, is more distancing than attractive, and it gets stuck under the weight of heavy-handed and self-indulgent psychoanalytic themes.
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