Brandon Christensen’s Night of the Reaper wears its genre lineage proudly, a film whose scaffolding is unmistakably indebted to the slasher cycle of the late 1970s and early ’80s. Yet what distinguishes it from mere pastiche is Christensen’s attempt to infuse the familiar architecture of suburban dread with a contemporary reflexivity. The result is a work that gestures toward both homage and reinvention, though it occasionally falters under the weight of its own ambition.
At its core, the narrative is bifurcated: Deena, a college student reluctantly drawn into the liminal domestic space of babysitting, embodies the archetypal “final girl,” while the sheriff’s scavenger-hunt pursuit of a killer injects a procedural dimension that broadens the scope beyond the living-room crucible. This duality lends the film a structural intrigue, complicating the linear inevitability characteristic of earlier slashers. Christensen’s gambit is to stretch the genre’s grammar toward a more fragmented, almost puzzle-box form, and while not always seamless, it sustains an atmosphere of unease.
Thematically, Night of the Reaper interrogates surveillance, communication, and the transmission of violence—whether through mailed evidence or the uncanny ritual of watching over another’s child. The “babysitter” trope here functions less as a mere setup than as a cultural cipher: the guardian of innocence, rendered vulnerable not only by external threat but by the epistemic instability of what she sees, hears, and knows.
Performances, particularly from Clement, anchor the film in an emotional realism that offsets its occasional excesses of plotting. If the twists sometimes feel calibrated for shock rather than inevitability, they nonetheless affirm Christensen’s willingness to deny the audience easy comfort. The film’s refusal to collapse into nostalgia, even while nodding to Carpenter and Craven, positions it as both homage and critique.
The Prognosis:
Night of the Reaper is less about transcending the slasher than about testing its elasticity—stretching a well-worn form to see what new resonances might emerge. Christensen may reach a little too high, but in doing so he ensures that the film, like its protagonists, never entirely succumbs to the shadow of its predecessors.
Saul Muerte
Night of the Reaper is streaming on Shudder from Friday 19th Sept
There’s a line I keep coming back to when watching The Conjuring: Last Rites: “The case that ended it all.” Not just for Ed and Lorraine Warren, whose final chapter this is meant to be, but for the sprawling universe their names have conjured into existence. Like every haunting, it’s less about the cold spots and whispers in the dark than it is about the people who believed enough to chase them. And at the heart of all this chasing, for over a decade now, have been Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga.
If the devil lives in the details, then the soul of this franchise lives in their eyes. Wilson’s steady but haunted Ed, Farmiga’s luminous and fierce Lorraine—they’ve carried us through nun sightings, cursed dolls, crooked men, and endless houses rattling at 3 a.m. What’s remarkable is not that they convinced us to be afraid, but that they convinced us to believe in love. Their bond has been the true connective tissue of the Conjuring Universe, more powerful than holy water or a crucifix.
Michael Chaves, who has already carved his name into the annals of this cinematic scripture (The Curse of La Llorona, The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, The Nun II), is tasked with the ultimate rite: closing the circle. He doesn’t swing for jump-scares or gore this time. Instead, he stages something quieter, almost tender. Yes, there are entities in shadowy corners, and the Warrens must confront forces that seem beyond human comprehension. But the real confrontation is with time, mortality, and the question of what we leave behind.
Watching Last Rites feels less like entering a haunted house and more like attending a vigil. Each scene reminds us that the Conjuring films were never really about demons—it was about the Warrens looking into the abyss together, hand in hand. And while the scares are muted, the harmony between Wilson and Farmiga remains intact, their chemistry now weathered but stronger, a testament to why audiences kept returning long after the first clap in the dark.
For longtime followers, this is less exorcism and more benediction. Chaves doesn’t so much slam the door shut as pass the candlelight forward. Whether the torch will ignite future stories in this universe, or flicker out with a final prayer, remains unknown. But there’s a sense of closure—like the last page of a well-worn case file, annotated not just with facts and evidence, but with love letters written in the margins.
The Prognosis:
If you came looking for terror, you may leave unsatisfied. But if you came looking for a farewell—an elegy for the haunted hearts who dared to investigate the impossible—then The Conjuring: Last Rites offers exactly that. A requiem, not for the dead, but for a love that kept the darkness at bay.
The shadows are calling again. The screen is no longer a safe window to peer through but a chasm, hungry and alive, waiting to swallow you whole. Strap in, Sydney — Dark Nights Film Fest Vol. 2 has crawled out of the grave and into the Ritz, and this time it’s not here to play nice.
This isn’t cinema for the faint, the casual, or the polite. This is cinema that stalks you through the back alleys of your subconscious, cinema that rips the floorboards off your cozy illusions and drags you headfirst into a pit of worms. Just when you thought the blood had dried and the screams had faded, festival director Bryn Tilly has cranked open the gates again, ushering in a delirious parade of maniacs, monsters, and midnight visions.
Nine Australian premieres. One unholy cult resurrection. Twenty-two short, sharp shocks from across the globe. It’s a full-course banquet of nightmares, each dish steaming with dread and dripping with the strange juices of cinema’s dark heart.
Opening night doesn’t just raise a curtain — it tears open the roof with Hell House LLC: Lineage, an unhinged carnival of terror where haunted basements and clown-faced demons set the tone for what’s to come: fear without safety nets. From there the fest descends into Germany’s tangled woods with Bark, drags you through the neon purgatory of America in A Desert, and burns you alive with the Serbian one-two punch of A Serbian Documentary and Karmadonna — films that don’t just push buttons, they rip them out and swallow them whole.
But the crown jewel of delirium? Peter Jackson’s Braindead in screaming 4K glory. Thirty years since its last Australian theatrical run, and the pus-filled carnage hasn’t aged a day. This isn’t a screening — it’s an exorcism of sanity, an orgy of undead slapstick that makes every Marvel movie look like a children’s nap-time.
And just when your skull’s about to split, along comes Necromorphosis, burrowing into your flesh like a cockroach in heat, and Sun, a fever-dream hybrid of movement and madness that dances straight into the abyss. By the time the anthology Adorable Humans rolls around, Hans Christian Andersen will be spinning in his grave fast enough to power a small Danish village.
Closing night locks the doors and swallows the keys with The School Duel, a dystopian grenade lobbed at society’s fragile bones — ferocious, timely, and cruelly relevant.
This isn’t just a festival. It’s a séance. A bacchanal of blood, dread, and midnight delirium. Between the Aussie and international shorts, the Movie Boutique of VHS relics and arcane treasures, and filmmakers dropping truth bombs about low-budget survival, Dark Nights is where the monsters come to play.
Forget safe cinema. Forget the plush multiplex glow. The Ritz is where the shadows come alive, and the screen bites back.
Dark Nights Film Fest Vol. 2 — October 9–12, Ritz Cinemas, Randwick. Bring your nerves, bring your nightmares, and leave your soul at the door.
Director Matthew Losasso’s feature debut Row takes the oceanic survival thriller and places it in an unnervingly claustrophobic setting. When a blood-stained rowing boat washes up on the Scottish coast, sole survivor Erin (Bella Dayne) is found with no memory of what happened to her missing crew. As fragments of her ordeal begin to resurface, the line between truth and paranoia blurs, leaving her — and the audience — to question what really happened on the North Atlantic.
What makes Row compelling is its stripped-down intensity. Confined largely to a rowing boat and a handful of central characters, the film thrives on its sense of isolation. Much like Hitchcock’s Lifeboat, the limited setting heightens every glance, every fraying nerve, and every creeping suspicion. Losasso’s direction makes clever use of both the open sea and the more intimate water tank sequences, ensuring the tension never feels stagey or static.
Bella Dayne carries the film with a strong, layered performance, keeping Erin’s vulnerability and resilience in constant conflict. Around her, Sophie Skelton, Akshay Khanna, and Nick Skaugen add fuel to the psychological fire, feeding the audience’s doubts about who can be trusted. The film’s visual texture — captured in Caithness and along the Scottish coast — lends a bleak beauty to the ordeal, a reminder of nature’s indifference to human suffering.
If there’s a drawback, it’s that the narrative occasionally drifts into familiar survival-horror beats, and some viewers may find its final revelations less impactful than the gripping tension leading up to them. Still, as a debut feature, it’s a confident and unsettling piece of work that thrives on mood, anxiety, and the psychological unravelling of its characters.
The Prognosis:
Row doesn’t reinvent the genre, but it demonstrates that Losasso is a director with a keen eye for atmosphere and psychological stakes. Tightly woven, quietly haunting, and with shades of Hitchcockian influence, this is a thriller that pulls you in and refuses to let go.
Quarxx’s All the Gods in the Sky (Tous les dieux du ciel) is not easily categorised, and that’s entirely the point. Sitting somewhere between psychological horror, arthouse drama, and cosmic nightmare, this French genre-bender takes its time and isn’t afraid to make its audience uncomfortable—both emotionally and philosophically.
At the centre of this bruising tale is Simon, a deeply troubled factory worker played with quiet intensity by Jean-Luc Couchard. Isolated on a decaying farmhouse in the French countryside, Simon devotes his life to caring for his sister Estelle (Melanie Gaydos), who was left severely disabled due to a tragic accident during their childhood. The pair exist in a shared purgatory of guilt, silence, and unresolved trauma.
Quarxx delivers a slow punch of a film—one that creeps under your skin not with conventional jump scares, but with mood, decay, and despair. It builds its atmosphere with surgical precision, weaving in splinters of sci-fi, existential dread, and surrealism. Simon’s fixation with extraterrestrial salvation offers a disturbing mirror into his desperation—a hope that something beyond this earth might rescue them from their irreversible reality.
While not all of its experimental swings land perfectly, the film is bolstered by weighty performances and a haunting visual style. The bleak, moldy interiors and ghostly farm exterior evoke a tactile sense of rot, both physical and spiritual. Quarxx makes no effort to handhold the viewer, instead demanding that we wade through the same confusion and torment as Simon himself.
All the Gods in the Sky is certainly not a film for everyone. Its pacing is deliberate, its emotional resonance often brutal, and its genre elements veer from subtle to grotesque. But for those willing to embrace its unsettling tones, there’s something strangely transcendent at its core—a meditation on guilt, disability, and the yearning for escape, whether divine or alien.
The Prognosis:
Though it never fully ascends into the upper tier of arthouse horror, it remains a distinct and memorable piece—an otherworldly prayer whispered from the darkest corners of human suffering.
Saul Muerte
All The Gods in the Sky premieres on Shudder and AMC+ Monday 4 August
Directed by: Mike Wiluan | Starring Dean Fujioka, Callum Woodhouse | Premieres on Shudder & AMC+ July 25
In Monster Island, Shudder’s latest exclusive creature feature, wartime survival collides with Southeast Asian myth in a film that smartly blends old-school monster thrills with an unexpected emotional core. Inspired by Creature from the Black Lagoon and rooted in Malay folklore, the story drops a Japanese soldier and a British POW onto a seemingly deserted island following a submarine attack. But peace is short-lived, as the island is home to the Orang Ikan — a fearsome aquatic predator who’s as territorial as it is terrifying.
What sets Monster Island apart from many of its creature feature contemporaries is its willingness to slow down and explore the human side of horror. Rather than lean solely on blood and beasts, the film builds tension from cultural divides and post-traumatic wounds, forcing its two leads into a fragile alliance. Dean Fujioka and Callum Woodhouse bring depth and vulnerability to roles that could have been flat archetypes. Their chemistry makes the film’s central theme — that survival often means facing not just monsters, but your own past — all the more resonant.
Admittedly, the film’s ambition sometimes outpaces its resources. Pyrotechnic effects and digital enhancements can look rough around the edges, and the pacing dips during some mid-island soul-searching. But the film’s practical effects — particularly the creature design — are strong, evoking a rubber-suited charm without feeling dated. There’s enough gore to keep horror hounds engaged, but it never overpowers the human drama, and that balance is key to its charm.
The Prognosis:
While it might not revolutionise the genre, Monster Island shows there’s still plenty of room for creature features with a conscience. By grounding its mythological terror in real-world history and emotional stakes, the film claws its way out of B-movie cliché and into something far more sincere. For fans of wartime horror, international folklore, or just old-school monster mayhem with a pulse, this island trip is worth the ferry.
Trans horror’s fiercest voice returns with her most personal and spellbinding film yet
Australian filmmaker Alice Maio Mackay returns to the Fantasia International Film Festivalwith the Canadian premiere of her latest genre-defying feature, The Serpent’s Skin, screening July 23 and 25. Already hailed as her most emotionally resonant and stylistically bold film to date, The Serpent’s Skin fuses supernatural romance with visceral horror, balancing the grotesque and the intimate in true Mackay fashion.
With nods to The Craft, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Charmed, Mackay’s newest film conjures millennial teen nostalgia while grounding its witchy terror in the urgent realities of Gen-Z identity, trans survival, and queer resilience. The Serpent’s Skin follows Anna, a trans girl who escapes her stifling, bigoted hometown only to find both romance and horror in a new city—where she falls for goth tattoo artist Gen and accidentally unleashes a demon that begins feeding on their chosen family. What follows is a chilling exploration of trust, self-doubt, and love under supernatural pressure.
Mackay’s voice is unmistakable—raw, punk, defiantly queer—and in The Serpent’s Skin, she harnesses everything she’s learned across her rising career.
From her debut So Vam (2021), Mackay immediately caught the attention of the indie horror world. Described as “a perfect metaphor for transitions and change” and “crafted with a learned voice,” the film positioned Mackay as a filmmaker to watch. Her follow-up, Bad Girl Boogey (2023), was no less impactful—“gritty and raw,” it revealed a sharpened focus and a stronger command of message-driven horror, showing that Mackay could “resonate” beyond just subculture circles.
With T-Blockers (2024), she made perhaps her most personal statement yet. Reviewers called it “fresh,” “unifying,” and “awakening,” applauding how Mackay used her own lived experience to channel communal anger and hope, all while clearly “having a ball” pushing genre boundaries. Her rapid creative output continued with Satranic Panic, another bold and timely entry praised for placing “real characters dealing with real issues in surreal circumstances.”
Produced by Dark Star Pictures, the company that has stood behind each of Mackay’s last five films, The Serpent’s Skin stars Alexandra McVicker (Vice Principals), Scott Major (Heartbreak High), Charlotte Chimes (Neighbours), and Jordan Dulieu (Before Dawn). It also features Fantasia alumni cameos from Avalon Fast (Honeycomb), Joe Lynch (Suitable Flesh), and Betsey Brown (Assholes), with Emmy-nominated Vera Drew (The People’s Joker) returning as editor and Louise Weard (Castration Movie) joining as producer.
Premiering earlier this year at Frameline and heading next to FrightFest this August, The Serpent’s Skin is more than just a new chapter in Mackay’s filmography—it’s a culmination of her growth as a director, writer, and creative force. She’s built a canon that pulses with identity, rage, humour, and style, always speaking directly to those who need it most.
As she returns to Fantasia—a festival that helped champion her earliest work—it’s clear Alice Maio Mackay is no longer just a promising talent. She’s a defining voice in trans cinema and genre storytelling. And with The Serpent’s Skin, she reminds us that transformation, no matter how painful, can be power.
The sequel we all knew was coming. And yes, we will be referring to our checklist of what makes a good sequel, but that aside, is this outing any good, and was it necessary?
From memory the last movie (reviewed and podcasted by me and Chris Dawes) was definitely ripe for franchising. So straight away we’re not in Matrix territory where the question “Why!? Just why!??” isn’t screaming in your head every few minutes.
In 2.0 we pick up two years after the last movie, where Megan’s creator – Gemma (Allison Williams) and her niece Cady (her name is Cady!?? The whole time you swear they’re calling her “Katie!) played by Violet McGraw – are continuing their lives as the only family each one of them has. Except now Gemma is a staunch and vocal advocate for AI regulation due to her knee-jerk reaction to being almost killed by a robot AI (of her own making, it should be said) and Cady (in turn) is following in her aunts’ footsteps (of sorts) by being a computer science nerd.
In an overcompensating effort by Gemma, she ensures Cady takes Akido lessons so she can defend herself. Unfortunately Cady takes those lessons to an unwanted extreme by regarding Steven Segal as a martial arts poster boy, and one beaten up school bully later, Cady gets in trouble; Gemma is at her wits end, and we soon realise life between them is full of tension. For Gemma still punishes herself for putting Cady in harm’s (Megan’s) way, and Cady hates on Gemma for… reasons. She’s a teenager now, so it’s Hollywood lore she be a little bitch to any authority figure in her life. To be honest, you kinda zone out when you go through their motivations ‘cause you’re keen for the Megan goodness to begin.
And that gets kick started by the presence of another killer robot named Ameila (played by NOT Olsen sister, Ivanna Sakhno). However, unlike Megan, Ameila is very lifelike in face and body, as she is constructed NOT to be a faux babysitter for kids, but as a turbo charged infiltration assassin for the CIA.
How she came into existence is the McGuffin that drives the Main Plot of this film, as we simultaneously find out that (shock surprise) Megan is still “alive”, in an online only sort of way. So when Amelia goes rogue (because of course she does) and comes after Gemma and Cady (for reasons you’ll have to watch to understand) Megan’s primary directive to protect Cady at all costs comes to the surface as she demands Gemma build her a new body to literally kung fu fight Amelia (robato robato).
So with our pieces on the board, let’s get into the nuts ‘n’ bolts of M3gan 2.0.
And for a more detailed description of that, as with our last analysis of the first movie, here’s Chris
Dawes with his half of this review.
Dude – I didn’t see it! You went to the premiere without me!
Chris Dawes
Thanks Chris!
Anyway – some highlights worth mentioning is the existence of another Chekov’s Gun in the form of a cybernetic exo-skeleton that makes people super strong (although its application is at least a little funnier/cooler than you’d think).
We also have a new Megan dance number. For those of you who don’t remember, the main (and some would argue, only) reason the first movie did so well, was because of Megan’s hip-hop/ballet moves she pulls before killing Ronnie Cheng. It was a perfectly bite sized Tik Tok moment which gave the film it’s viral boost as countless people imitated it along the lines of Deadpools *Nsync number.
However, Megan’s effort this round – whilst certainly cool – is less memorable due to the fact it doesn’t have any unique & easy-to-copy dance move(s). In the first instalment it was a simple twist of the hips and a rubbery swing of the arms mixed with a sideways head-duck. But for 2.0 she does the Robot (very generic and a bit on the nose) with a 360-degree head spin (which is impossible to replicate). Although in its defence, it’s still entertaining to watch…
Kiwi legend Jermaine Clement guest stars as Alton Appleton, a tech billionaire who serves as both plot device and comedy device.
Another nice (re)addition is the return of Gemma’s two co-workers from the last film Cole (Brian Jordan Alvarez) and Tess (Jen Vann Epps) giving us some nice continuity for 2 characters (and actors) who really don’t need to be there.
And speaking of returning cast – the 2 most important also come back, despite the fact that, had they not, a lot of people wouldn’t have noticed. And they are Amie Donald and Jenna Davis. For they are Megan. More specifically her body and voice respectively.
As Megan was meant to be a pre-teen to match Cady in the first film, the immediate problem they were always facing was, IF they were going to recreate her as before, they would have to recast. But the film-makers clearly appreciate one of the reasons Megan works, is because Donald and Davis clearly work.
And so – with Donald going through the typical growth spurt that comes with puberty – Megan finds herself a foot taller when given her new body, and leaning into this means that the franchise is trying to give the impression each instalment will be a continuation of Megan’s evolution; both in body and in sentience.
And that alone implies this film series will be less Chucky and more Terminator. In more ways than one, as tonally there is a clear shift in Megan’s role from being the Big Bad, to the thing that fights the Big Bad (just like Arnie did in T2)
The Prognosis:
The film-makers have put careful thought into this sequel by analysing the first film’s success, identifying what worked, and leaning into those markers.
So checklist time:
1. Is it a clone of the original? NO
2. Is it a clone of the original but simply more and just bigger? NO
3. Does it expand the universe/lore of the original? YES
4. Is it a good standalone film without relying too heavily on the original? YES
5. (Optional) Does it have a cool new gimmick or element that’s not in the original film, but sits well within the universe of the first film? (Eg: Think Yoda and his ground breaking puppetry in The Empire Strikes Back. Or the CGI T-1000 in T2). NO
6. Does it identify the SPIRIT of the original, and duplicate it? YES definitely.
Because the biggest thing the film-makers have wisely clocked is that Megan ISN’T a horror film, but a fun film. Camp fun. And that’s what makes this movie an upgrade from the original.
Directed by The Motorcycle Diaries‘ Walter Salles and boasting a stellar cast led by Jennifer Connelly, Dark Water (2005) had all the ingredients for a compelling psychological horror. But despite its prestigious pedigree and the eerie bones of its Japanese source material, the film never quite rises above a slow, soggy trudge through grief, isolation, and leaky ceilings.
Connelly plays Dahlia, a mother in the throes of a bitter divorce who relocates with her daughter to a dilapidated apartment on Roosevelt Island. From the outset, the mood is steeped in melancholy—a constant downpour, peeling wallpaper, and a black stain that won’t stop bleeding through the ceiling. It’s all metaphor, of course, for abandonment, trauma, and emotional erosion. And while Connelly commits fully, offering a deeply felt, restrained performance, even her best efforts struggle to keep the film from sinking under its own dreariness.
There’s strong support from the likes of John C. Reilly, Tim Roth, Dougray Scott, and Pete Postlethwaite, each adding gravitas in small doses. But the ensemble feels wasted on a script that paces like a dirge and spends too long building atmosphere at the expense of real suspense. Where Hideo Nakata’s 2002 original (Honogurai mizu no soko kara) balanced its ghost story with quiet dread and a haunting emotional core, this remake feels bloated by comparison—drawn out and uncertain of where to land its final blow.
Salles, though an accomplished filmmaker, seems misaligned with the genre here. The horror elements never hit hard enough, the tension evaporates rather than builds, and even the film’s climactic revelations arrive without the sting they need. There is a tragic weight at the story’s centre—a meditation on motherhood, abandonment, and sacrifice—but it’s bogged down by the film’s sluggish rhythm and predictability.
The Prognosis:
Dark Water isn’t without merit. It’s beautifully shot and well-acted, and at its heart lies a poignant idea about the things we carry and the past we cannot rinse away. But ultimately, this is a film that, despite all the polish and pedigree, feels like a remake with little new to say—trailing in the shadow of its superior original.
Soaked in mood but lacking menace, Dark Water leaves only a damp impression.
Directed by Jeff Wolfe, Outbreak promises psychological dread and emotional turmoil against the backdrop of a creeping viral catastrophe—but ends up delivering little more than a tepid, trauma-soaked shuffle through familiar terrain.
The film follows a State Park Ranger (Billy Burke) and his wife (Alyshia Ochse) as they navigate the emotional wreckage of their teenage son’s disappearance, only to be confronted by a mysterious outbreak that further destabilises their world. As the infection spreads, so too does the sense of despair—but unfortunately, not much tension.
Billy Burke anchors the film with an earnest and committed performance, his weathered presence lending weight to otherwise limp material. Wolfe allows plenty of room for grief to dominate the narrative, but the pacing is sluggish, and the dramatic beats soon feel repetitive. Rather than building momentum, Outbreak spirals into melodrama, with a script that too often leans on genre clichés and a plot that telegraphs its twists from miles away.
There are a few flashes of atmosphere—some moody cinematography and eerie silences—but the film’s tonal heaviness overshadows its horror ambitions. The virus metaphor is serviceable, and by the time the film reaches its climax, the emotional payoff feels muted and overly familiar.
Despite its promising premise and a solid cast including Raoul Max Trujillo, Taylor Handley, and Jessica Frances Dukes, Outbreak plays it safe when it desperately needed to take risks. Watchable, sure—but only for the curious or the committed fans of the cast. For most, this is a slow trudge through thematic terrain that’s already been better navigated by others.
Outbreak will be available to rent or buy on DVD & Digital across Apple TV, Prime Video, Google TV, YouTube, and Fetch (AU) from July 2nd.
Surgeons of Horror 