Bobby Carroll's Movie Diary

Stacie Passon directs Taissa Farmiga, Alexandra Daddario and Crispin Glover in this adaptation of Shirley Jackson’s 1962 chiller about a secluded family recovering from a scandalous tragedy who have to contend with the arrival of a handsome and controlling interloper.

We tried to see this on the big screen twice but at the time of each limited showing last year life somehow got in the way. Thank you streaming services for gifting us eventual access to it. Overlooked by critics and audiences, this is a very solid drama mystery that maybe had it thunder stolen by the recent similar likes of Marrowbone and various American Horror Stories. The imagery and beats of Jackson’s writing have been recycled and repurposed mucho in the past few years. A likeable cast (best career use of Daddario so far as a broken doll / Stepford Wife in the making) and a gorgeous evocative look get this respectably over the finish line. It has been sold as a supernatural horror but these elements are very reduced, it is far more approachable as a prestige adaptation of a modern classic in literature. Well worth digging up.

7

Check out my wife Natalie’s Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Josef von Sternberg directs Marlene Dietrich, Clive Brook and Anna May Wong in this romantic thriller where a train carriage full of Westerners gets caught by a Chinese warlord.

Pre- Hays Code… so a bit naughtier and franker and salacious and adult than most B&W Hollywood films. This has a cracking plot (based loosely on a true story) that shifts with each act and increases the peril, drama and tragedy as it moves forward. There are some amazing shots of studio replicated China and the lighting is sublime. Dietrich sizzles as the bad girl with a better heart than her “respectable” compatriots. Warner Oland is a hissable villain as the hiding in plain sight dictator… modern eyes will have to get past the yellow face – and casual racism of the era. The only fault is Clive Brook’s stiff upper lip male lead really is not worth Shanghai Lily’s efforts, sacrifice or time. Too wooden and dim. Nice neat underplayed ending too… she buys him a watch but makes sure he’ll ultimately never know what the price she paid was… to keep him alive… ON THE SHANGHAI EXPRESS!

8

Check out my wife Natalie’s Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Brian De Palma directs Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Carice van Houten, and Guy Pearce in this thriller where an incompetent cop finds himself hunting a man who is seeking out Fundamentalist terrorists for revenge.

Flat production values, a dislikable protagonist and compromised storytelling choices really don’t help this. It often feels like a bang average Sunday night cop show from the 90s. There are moments of weakened De Palma that dominate the uneven pace. A blatant Hitchcock pastiche here and your odd split screen terror attack there. Even these feels like sequences executed better on storyboard than on film. In the main though this proves a waste of talent, servicing a tale that flirts with extreme racism a little too often to forgive.

2

Check out my wife Natalie’s Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Claire Denis directs Robert Pattinson, Mia Goth and Juliette Binoche in this sci-fi space drama where murderers and crackheads are sent into the unknown so sex experiments can be performed on them.

Starts out pretty well so I thought I was about to break the curse of Denis. She makes ponderous, harsh films that push the wrong buttons in me. The is full of semen and rape… it lost me. But the design of it all is strong.

4

Check out my wife Natalie’s Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Martin Scorsese directs Griffin Dunne, Rosanna Arquette and Linda Fiorentino in this dark comedy where a yuppie travels across the city for a late night hook-up only to find himself trapped in an existential nightmare.

One of those comedies that is more awkward, disturbing and unsettling than laugh out loud funny… and this is all the better for it. Scorsese’s 1980s output has always been an overlooked bag of initially critically ignored classics and studio work. After Hours and The Color of Money are two of his finest films but because they are often written off as gun-for-hire projects taken while he was trying to get The Last Temptation of Christ off the ground nobody really champions them. These ain’t no holding pattern day jobs, these are fantastic films. Now watching After Hours with modern, mature eyes is a still very strange, unique, immersive experience. Dunne’s lead is a horrible human being, almost deserving of his night in urban hell and sexual frustration. The gender politics are murky, intentionally so. Dunne goes from a meet-cute with the warmly open and hotly desirable Arquette (perfect here) to downgrading every other scene change to a more disturbed, complex, domineering, demanding, dowdier woman. What does this say about masculinity /desire / relationships? I don’t know… but you feel his anguish as he crashes in and out of other human beings emotions, neuroses and lust. There’s violent escalation, manic mob mentality and slapstick paranoia. It is possibly the only big budget comedy where there is an odds on chance our hero will be lynched or castrated or imprisoned for life by the final shot. And who knows, maybe he is incarcerated at close of play? I reckon Paul Hackett will never let his dick take him on a walk on the wild side again. Awesome production design by Jefferey Townsend and Stephen Lineweaver. The score and editing by Howard Shore and Thelma respectively is utterly persuasive. The perfect Triple Bill with Adventures in Babysitting and Quick Change. What other Marty Scorsese flick could you say that about? And it is funny… watching John Heard’s bartender beat the shit out of his cash register is observational aggression at its chucklesome best.

9

Check out my wife Natalie’s Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Gary Ross directs Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson and Woody Harrelson in this dystopian teen sci-fi where kids are forced to take part in an annual tournament to the death.

I’ll admit I was harshly dismissive of this on first watch. Who wants to go to the cinema to see a PG rated Battle Royale where everyone mopes about? Turns out… everyone. My wife and my Dad both love these films. Jennifer Lawrence is a big part of their connection to the watered down material I’d wager, though for very different reasons. I’d still contend that it is way too dour a fantasy to truly enjoy, the plankish boys Katniss is offered hardly get the juices flowing and Lawrence has to quietly add a lot physically to a blankly written avatar role. But I’m not a teenage girl, so what do I know? In my eyes, they even fumbled the easy to execute makeover scene… so are Cinderella dress-up moments and child-on-child violence awkward bedfellows? The world building is impressive, the adult support cast also match their new star and do lots with very little. Once that tame violence begins I did care about seeing at least how our heroine will survive to the finish line this cautious rewatch. In genre terms, this is pretty toned down business but as an introduction to a franchise or a form, there are far worse first steps out there.

6

Check out my wife Natalie’s Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Jerry Zucker directs Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore and Whoopi Goldberg in this supernatural romance fantasy where a deceased man tries to protect and make contact with his grieving love.

Slick, polished and orchestrated to an inch of its (after)life. This actually plays wonderfully. There’s a comedy strand, a thriller strand, a kid friendly terror strand, a romance strand and they all bind together to make a strong entertainment. Something for everyone! Swayze works best with the quirkier character actors but his heat generated with Moore is undeniable. The SFX are obvious but actually fit visually with a man who is now no longer in sync with the temporal world. You wouldn’t want to be dragged by the hell shadows or stuck in a door, that’s for sure. It is ultimately an undemanding entertainment but in difficult times there’s nothing wrong with falling back into a well constructed sentiment. Stick a dime in the jukebox, pop the Righteous Brothers on, join your lover at the potter’s wheel, get steamy and dirty and lovely.

8

Check out my wife Natalie’s Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Henri-Georges Clouzot directs Pablo Picasso, himself and Claude Renoir in this documentary where the great artist doodles out a dozen canvases like Rolf’s Cartoon Club.

Mainly filling the screen with works in active progress rather than the topless man himself, this often feels like a very sophisticated screensaver. What might have been fascinating over a couple of artworks becomes background noise at feature length. We see every line and daub added without context or explanation but none of the finished works are Picasso gold standard. A nice film to pop on (sound off) in a hipster pub or cafe.

4

Check out my wife Natalie’s Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Ben Stiller directs Jim Carrey, Matthew Broderick and Leslie Mann in this dark comedy where a broken hearted yuppie finds himself stalked by the man who installed his television cable.

Uneven but better than it’s bad reputation. When Jim Carrey unexpectedly came from nowhere and overtook Tom Hanks, Arnie and Bruce Willis to become the mid-90s biggest box office star, he could suddenly command the biggest payday. An unprecedented $20 million for any project he wanted to make. The project he chose to break star salary records was a small indie script, set mainly in one apartment that spoofed the babysitter / affair / cop “from hell” sub-genre. His check doubled the production budget, quadrupled the expectations of a small quirky production. And the critics sensing the world was off kilter, bundled on and tore apart the end result. The released film has issues… it is a little too dark and strange for a big summer tentpole. The final act is badly edited, skipping scenes and plot points, not really making any narrative sense but moving so fast you can’t stop to catch up. The scope shifts between intimate stagey scenes in a single setting, to big lunatic set pieces where Carrey can let loose and gurn and improvise and overkill to perfection. These bolted on set-pieces are the best parts of the film. Funny, full of relentless energy and unhinged. They just never slot comfortably in with a housebound unsympathetic Matthew Broderick seeing his life destroyed by his malevolent new “friend.” But who bought a seven dollar ticket for that? This is Jim’s show and, taken out of context, his jousting tournament, basketball hijack, toilet assault and karaoke jam sequences are high points of his pure comedy acting career. He’d go on to find drama projects that housed his less crowd pleasing sensibilities far snugger… but this curio demands a cult reputation.

7

Check out my wife Natalie’s Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/

Park Chan-wook directs Choi Min-sik, Yoo Ji-Tae and Kang Hye-jeong in this Korean thriller where a middle aged drunk is kidnapped, imprisoned for 15 years and mysteriously let back out in the world with a bestial vengeance programmed into him.

There has never been a film as elaborately plotted and unpredictably executed as Oldboy. It is a lunatic thriller completely uninterested in norms, form or comfort. Even now as Oh Dae-Su’s lurid quest matures into cinematic adulthood it still makes for a pretty wild ride, even when you know the hairpins and bumps. Not perfect, the noticeable age difference between antagonists never gels for example, but pretty fucking unmatched.

9

Check out my wife Natalie’s Horror blog https://cornsyrup.co.uk

We also do a podcast together called The Worst Movies We Own. It is available on Spotify or here https://letterboxd.com/bobbycarroll/list/the-worst-movies-we-own-podcast-ranking-and/