Connect with us

News

Screamfest Review: Soska Sister’s ‘Rabid’ An Entertaining Ode To Cronenberg

Published

on

The Soska Sisters, Jena and Sylvia have made a name for themselves in the modern world of horror with such gory features as American Mary, See No Evil 2, and Dead Hooker In A Trunk. With a proclivity for body horror and deeper subtext (as well as being Canadian) they were the ideal directors to handle a remake of one of David Cronenberg’s earlier works, Rabid.

Image via IMDB

The film follows Rose (Laura Vandervoort) a shy woman attempting to work her way up in the fashion industry and become a successful clothing designer. Her only friend and support being her step-sister Chelsea (Hanneke Talbot) who encourages her to be more assertive. All while working under the obnoxious and arrogant fashion designer Gunter (Mackenzie Gray). After being grotesquely disfigured in a horrific accident Rose’s dreams appear to be shattered… until she receives an offer from the enigmatic Dr. William Burroughs (Ted Atherton) to receive a highly experimental stem cell procedure to regrow her flesh and mend her body. The operation appears at first to be a complete success, making Rose more gorgeous than ever before. But soon Rose finds herself overcome by a hunger for flesh that soon spreads like a pandemic…

The movie is in many ways an improvement on the original story. Giving the lead character of Rose more agency and a larger spotlight and arc throughout the film outside of being Patient Zero. It’s interesting to see Rose’s transition from humble fashion worker to tragically disfigured to a whole new person. The pandemic itself more in the background this time around, and keeping the focus more on the ground and with the immediate characters. As well, the Soska Sisters are clear fans of Cronenberg and don’t just update Rabid, but make the entire movie a widespread homage to the master of body horror. So keep an eye out for those easter eggs.

Image via IMDB

The greatest strength of the movie is its fast pacing. At an hour and fifty minute runtime, it could have easily felt overly long. But The Soskas direct the story into such a breakneck speed and with so many hard hitting scenes that I was hooked on every moment. From the scenes of fashion and iconography to the bites and dismemberment. Which is another positive for Rabid, an amazingly stomach churning level of practical FX. Said FX being so disturbingly real, The Soska Sisters were banned from twitter for promoting the movie with some screenshot gore. The film showcases the outstanding work their team did between bloody massacres and bone crunching body horror.

Unfortunately, Rabid is considerably constrained by a lower budget. As opposed to the original film that showed the pandemic level outbreak of the disease and the ensuing chaos, the scenes and number of characters are noticeably limited. The plus side to those constraints being a greater focus on Rose and grounding the story more. It does diminish the apocalyptic effect and some scenes trying to elevate the danger. And without spoiling, the ending did feel rather abrupt and anti-climactic.

Those flaws aside, Rabid is an impressive update on Cronenberg’s story of infectious madness and sure to attract an audience. With a memorable notch to their credits, I’ll be eagerly looking forward to what Jen and Sylvia Soska do next.

Image via IMDB

'Civil War' Review: Is It Worth Watching?

Click to comment

You must be logged in to post a comment Login

Leave a Reply

Movies

‘Evil Dead’ Film Franchise Getting TWO New Installments

Published

on

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

'Civil War' Review: Is It Worth Watching?

Continue Reading

Movies

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

Published

on

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.

'Civil War' Review: Is It Worth Watching?

Continue Reading

News

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

Published

on

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.

'Civil War' Review: Is It Worth Watching?

Continue Reading