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Now on Netflix: BASKIN (2015) is Torturous, Horrifying

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There have been very few movies throughout the course of my movie watching career that were able to truly chill me to the bone. The Turkish-language horror flick Baskin, which is now available to stream on Netflix, was one of them.

Depicting Hell is a tricky affair – but when it’s done right, it can be downright torturous to watch. Baskin follows a group of police officers responding to a call for backup. Once they arrive at the mysterious building in which they were hailed to, they find that the inside is more or less a gateway to Hell itself.

Making excellent use of color and mood, the film does its best to try and disgust the audience as much as possible through obscenity and horrific imagery. Spoiler alert: it works. This unique depiction of a literal Hell on earth is not the lazily-concocted brimstone and fire that many would expect; it’s something much more surreal. Watching Baskin is likened to experiencing an intense fever dream that does not let up.

There’s a plot somewhere in this film, too, but it’s somewhat hard to find. While some may criticize the movie for lacking in story and relying mainly on style over substance, I found that the confusion with the overall storyline made for an even more otherworldly experience. I’m not sure if it was intentional, but the vague plot and lack of explanations for everything made me feel even more unsettled after the movie ended. There is a meaning behind this movie – I think – but it may take more than one watch to figure it out.

And while it is incredibly scary, it could have been taken even further. The last ten minutes of the movie seem to be hastily put together and a bit uninspired; still, this does not take away from the Hellish experience that the rest of the movie puts you through. I have no doubt that the reaction to this film, now that it’s available on such an attainable format and viewed by many curious horror fans, will be heavily divided. It’s been highly anticipated, and there will be many who think that the violence, heavy and disturbing as it is, could have been taken further. But as a fan of films such as Suspiria and Hellraiser, I was pleasantly surprised to see a mixture of the two of them in one grisly, rotten film. No, Baskin is not nice. It does not play fair and it will use cheap tricks to get a rise out of people. Still, I greatly enjoyed this film – I even considered sleeping with some lights on after the fact.

Is Baskin my new favorite movie? Not quite. Regardless of how terrifying I found it to be, the loose story and confusing plot points must be addressed and taken into consideration. Still, for anyone looking to scare themselves silly, this movie is a perfectly good choice.

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‘Evil Dead’ Film Franchise Getting TWO New Installments

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It was a risk for Fede Alvarez to reboot Sam Raimi’s horror classic The Evil Dead in 2013, but that risk paid off and so did its spiritual sequel Evil Dead Rise in 2023. Now Deadline is reporting that the series is getting, not one, but two fresh entries.

We already knew about the Sébastien Vaniček upcoming film that delves into the Deadite universe and should be a proper sequel to the latest film, but we are broadsided that Francis Galluppi and Ghost House Pictures are doing a one-off project set in Raimi’s universe based off of an idea that Galluppi pitched to Raimi himself. That concept is being kept under wraps.

Evil Dead Rise

“Francis Galluppi is a storyteller who knows when to keep us waiting in simmering tension and when to hit us with explosive violence,” Raimi told Deadline. “He is a director that shows uncommon control in his feature debut.”

That feature is titled The Last Stop In Yuma County which will release theatrically in the United States on May 4. It follows a traveling salesman, “stranded at a rural Arizona rest stop,” and “is thrust into a dire hostage situation by the arrival of two bank robbers with no qualms about using cruelty-or cold, hard steel-to protect their bloodstained fortune.”

Galluppi is an award-winning sci-fi/horror shorts director whose acclaimed works include High Desert Hell and The Gemini Project. You can view the full edit of High Desert Hell and the teaser for Gemini below:

High Desert Hell
The Gemini Project

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‘Invisible Man 2’ Is “Closer Than Its Ever Been” to Happening

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Elisabeth Moss in a very well-thought-out statement said in an interview for Happy Sad Confused that even though there have been some logistical issues for doing Invisible Man 2 there is hope on the horizon.

Podcast host Josh Horowitz asked about the follow-up and if Moss and director Leigh Whannell were any closer to cracking a solution to getting it made. “We are closer than we have ever been to cracking it,” said Moss with a huge grin. You can see her reaction at the 35:52 mark in the below video.

Happy Sad Confused

Whannell is currently in New Zealand filming another monster movie for Universal, Wolf Man, which might be the spark that ignites Universal’s troubled Dark Universe concept which hasn’t gained any momentum since Tom Cruise’s failed attempt at resurrecting The Mummy.

Also, in the podcast video, Moss says she is not in the Wolf Man film so any speculation that it’s a crossover project is left in the air.

Meanwhile, Universal Studios is in the middle of constructing a year-round haunt house in Las Vegas which will showcase some of their classic cinematic monsters. Depending on attendance, this could be the boost the studio needs to get audiences interested in their creature IPs once more and to get more films made based on them.

The Las Vegas project is set to open in 2025, coinciding with their new proper theme park in Orlando called Epic Universe.

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Jake Gyllenhaal’s Thriller ‘Presumed Innocent’ Series Gets Early Release Date

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Jake gyllenhaal presumed innocent

Jake Gyllenhaal’s limited series Presumed Innocent is dropping on AppleTV+ on June 12 instead of June 14 as originally planned. The star, whose Road House reboot has brought mixed reviews on Amazon Prime, is embracing the small screen for the first time since his appearance on Homicide: Life on the Street in 1994.

Jake Gyllenhaal’s in ‘Presumed Innocent’

Presumed Innocent is being produced by David E. Kelley, J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot, and Warner Bros. It is an adaptation of Scott Turow’s 1990 film in which Harrison Ford plays a lawyer doing double duty as an investigator looking for the murderer of his colleague.

These types of sexy thrillers were popular in the ’90s and usually contained twist endings. Here’s the trailer for the original:

According to Deadline, Presumed Innocent doesn’t stray far from the source material: “…the Presumed Innocent series will explore obsession, sex, politics and the power and limits of love as the accused fights to hold his family and marriage together.”

Up next for Gyllenhaal is the Guy Ritchie action movie titled In the Grey scheduled for release in January 2025.

Presumed Innocent is an eight-episode limited series set to stream on AppleTV+ starting June 12.

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