The Boys Next Door (1985)

“Everything looks like MTV.” Cruising down a main strip in Los Angeles, the two teenage boys – Roy (Maxwell Caulfield, off the box office disappointment of Grease 2) and Bo (Charlie Sheen, pre-Platoon) – take the street scene all in with glee, yelling at the punks and catcalling the ladies. Director Penelope Spheeris, and her […]

Don’t Torture A Duckling (1972)

The copy of director Lucio Fulci’s Don’t Torture A Duckling (1972) on Tubi that I watched felt like it was an older DVD transfer uploaded as the image quality was desaturated and a little fuzzy, which added to how the Italian village of Accendura comes across in the movie. The rocky hills seem almost yellow […]

Silent Trigger (1996)

Dreaming about a YouTube ambient video titled, “Meditating with Dolph Lundgren in his high rise building sniper’s nest while raining.” While Silent Trigger (1996) is an action movie that gives fans what they want – Dolph using a massive sniper rifle to take down masked mercenaries who are toting sub-machine guns – it also aims […]

Variety (1983)

A young white woman sitting in a ticket booth for a porno theatre. The key image to Variety (1983) that I had in my head before watching it. New York city in its grimy, sleazy prime. “The old New York” is an idea that has been mythologised into nostalgia, often calcified (HBO’s The Deuce, for […]

Murina (2021)

Deep down in the blue. A morning errand dive for teenager Juljia (Gracija Filipović) and her father Ante (Leon Lučev). The type of father whose moods cloud and control the household. Underneath the water, he can’t say anything, demean and insult. They both carry spearguns to catch eels. Underwater is also where Julijia finds escape […]