JoeMama's Movie Reviews

V/H/S/99 Starring Veronica Blue, Alexia Ioannides, Steven Ogg, Melanie Stone Directed by Johannes Roberts, Vanessa & Joseph Winter, Maggie Levin, Tyler MacIntyre, Flying Lotus The V/H/S/ franchise is a fantastic way for up-and-coming horror directors (as well as more seasoned ones) to deliver deliciously delectable bite-sized horror stories that the general moviegoing masses would never see since they're too short on their own to get a wide release. They're smaller in nature and yet their stories are frightening, unique, and compelling - at least some of them. As with any other anthology series, you're bound to have some duds, but more often than not they're not that bad because you're not sitting through a two-hour feature, but rather a twenty-minute tale. "V/H/S/99" is the newest installment of the franchise, and focuses on the fears, bad energies, and generally despicable behaviors of people in 1999 before they ushered in a new decade, offering five...

Worst2First: My Top Ten Films to Watch on Amazon Prime This Halloween Halloween is the time for ghosts, ghouls, and everything dark and twisted to be celebrated, and the streaming services offer a plethora of ghastly goodies to watch. For Amazon Prime Days of Horror, I picked ten films from the streaming service I would suggest watching this Halloween season. **THERE WILL BE NO SPOILERS** #10 Jack Frost If you're looking for something more humorous and outrageous this Halloween season, "Jack Frost" is right up your alley. When a serial killer comes into contact with rare genetic materials, he turns into Jack Frost, a seemingly unstoppable killer snowman who returns to his hometown to get revenge against the cop who put him away, and create some Yuletide carnage along the way. Some horror films are so bad because of a poor story or performances, but "Jack Frost" is bad for all the right reasons - it doesn't take itself seriously and relishes on its B-rated...

Ticket to Paradise Starring Julia Roberts, George Clooney, Kaitlyn Dever, Maxime Bouttier Directed by Ol Parker The 90s was the decade for the romantic comedy subgenre, with films like "She's All That," "10 Things I Hate About You," and "While You Were Sleeping" dotting the cinematic landscape, allowing people who still believed in true love to enjoy their passion being portrayed on the big screen. During that time you hardly went a year without a rom-com featuring the likes of Julia Roberts ("Notting Hill," "Runaway Bride," "My Best Friend's Wedding," etc.)  but George Clooney didn't have the same flair for the romantic. Still, the two veteran actors became best friends and have appeared in several movies together ("Ocean's Eleven" and "Ocean's Twelve," where they play a divorced couple, along with "Confessions of a Dangerous Mind" and "Money Monster"), and their rap...

Black Adam Starring Dwayne Johnson, Aldis Hodge, Pierce Brosnan, Noah Centineo Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra Everyone loves a good hero, but everyone also loves a good anti-hero. Ryan Reynolds proved this with his antihero Deadpool in two amazing films (and a third on the way), proving that sometimes doing bad is as good as doing good, crossing that moral line that most heroes - like Batman, Captain America, and the like- would never cross: killing bad guys. While it's morally right to keep the bad guys alive and have them face justice, it seems better for the world if they weren't in the picture at all, because in comics it's always a given that they'll escape their chains and return to doing what they do best, and all-too-often at the cost of innocent lives that would've still been alive if they had shuffled off this mortal coil. To that end, "Black Adam" re-defines the DCEU and introduces us to their first anti-hero, a god who is neither good nor evil,...

Halloween Ends Starring Jamie Lee Curtis, Andi Matichak, Rohan Campbell, James Jude Courtney Directed by David Gordon Green On October 25, 1978, a small film entered the cinemas called "Halloween," directed by John Carpenter and starring newcomer Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode, a babysitter who's stalked by a killer named Michael Myers (also known as "The Shape"). The film revolutionized the slasher genre and gave it a new look, a new feel, and allowed for the "slashics" like "Friday the 13th," "A Nightmare on Elm Street," and "Child's Play" to follow in its iconic footsteps. While there were slashers before (most notably "Black Christmas"), "Halloween" become an icon in and of itself, and the film became synonymous with the holiday it was named after. After a slew of lackluster sequels and reboots, David Gordon Green and Danny McBride came together in 2018 and penned out three new sequels that w...

Worst2First: My Top Ten Films to Watch on HBOMax This Halloween Halloween is the time for ghosts, ghouls, and everything dark and twisted to be celebrated, and the streaming services offer a plethora of ghastly goodies to watch. For HBOMax Horror, I picked ten films from the streaming service I would suggest watching this Halloween season. **THERE WILL BE NO SPOILERS** #10 Malignant James Wan is one of the best horror directors of this generation, and "Malignant" is one of his most unique, to say the least. The film follows a woman who sees murders being committed by a strange being known as Gabriel who has ties to her past. What follows is Wan's love letter to Italian Gaillo horror filled with bonkers twists, turns, and gory kills complete with a one-of-a-kind story that'll stick with you long after it ends. #9 It Stephen King is the undisputed master of horror, and "It" is one of his most beloved masterpieces that's already been adapted into an ac...

  Goodnight Mommy Starring Naomi Watts, Cameron Crovetti, Nicholas Crovetti, Peter Hermann Directed by Matt Sobel When it comes to international horror, there's no comparison: they're downright revolutionary, going beyond any borders American filmmakers dare to go in providing not just cheap scares, but truly visceral moments that seep into your very bones and leaves you a changed person. Not relying on jump scares or teeny-bopper tales, the international community knows how to really terrify audiences and leave them spellbound. From Japan comes the likes of "Ringu," "One Cut of the Dead," and "Ju-On." France has had a resurgence known as the New French Extremity with films like "Martyrs," "Inside," and "Irreversible." The remainder of the European nation has also had their fair share of unrelenting and thought-provoking horror including "Let the Right One In" and "Goodnight Mommy." While America do...

Mr. Harrigan's Phone Starring Jaeden Martell, Donald Sutherland, Joe Tippett, Kirby Howell-Baptiste Directed by John Lee Hancock Stephen King is best known for his spine-tingling tales of terror, but he's also written some of the most thought-out, deeply character driven coming-of-age stories out there, like the classic "Stand By Me." Sometimes he manages to blend both the macabre and the memorable into something profoundly scary and insightful, and one of those is the novella "Mr. Harrigan's Phone" from his work If It Bleeds . Also as it goes with King's adaptations, however, when they're put to the big screen something gets lost in the translation, such as the case with "Mr. Harrigan's Phone," which would've worked a lot better as a part of an anthology series than a feature-length film. Craig (Jaeden Martell) has spent three days a week for the last five years reading for the elderly but wealthy Mr. Harrigan (Donald Sutherlan...

Don't Look at the Demon Starring Fiona Dourif, Jordan Belfi, Harris Dickinson, Randy Wayne Directed by Brando Lee While I am a horror aficionado and absolutely enjoy all things supernatural, I could never get into shows like "Ghost Adventures" because I feel like they're too fake, and lack any real investigative talents. The show has been around for years, and the closest they've ever come to capturing a real life ghost is fleeting shadows, muffled words, and self-described cold spots with unexplained scratches. Never once has they - or anyone, to my knowledge - ever captured an unliving, unbreathing ghost on camera that'd be the be-all-end-all for proof of the afterlife. Films like "Grave Encounters" manage to fictionalize these ghost hunting shows in a very powerful, terrifying way, and "Don't Look at the Demon" is a great blend between the two: it's not a "found footage" film, but rather a more straight-on film about a ...

Worst2First: My Top Ten Films to Watch on Hulu This Halloween Halloween is the time for ghosts, ghouls, and everything dark and twisted to be celebrated, and the streaming services offer a plethora of ghastly goodies to watch. For this "Huluween," I picked ten films from the streaming service I would suggest watching this Halloween season. **THERE WILL BE NO SPOILERS** #10 Lights Out Based off a short film on YouTube (and featuring the actress in it), "Lights Out" will give you another reason to fear the dark. The film follows Rebecca (played by Teresa Palmer), who discovers an evil entity that thrives in the darkness that seeks to kill her and her younger brother, and finds it has a tether to their family in particular. Filled with effective jump scares and a decent family storyline, "Lights Out" will have you keeping the lights on when you go to sleep at night. #9 The Collection Lost amid the sea of other torture porn films "Saw" and "Hos...