Screen Anarchy

As found footage has firmly established itself as a genre, its foothold on the public imagination (and on that of filmmakers) bears scrutiny. The excellent documentary The Found Footage Phenomena (2021) and books such as Found Footage Horror Films by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas and POV Horror by Duncan Hubber have helped contextualize its appeal and power. But efforts like What Happened to Dorothy Bell? do more to carve out a place for found footage in film history than critics and academics ever could. I like to think that critics are the most haunted of observers. Like the protagonists in Grave Encounters (2011). we wander endlessly through the halls of cosmic dread and outright terror these narratives create space for. So powerful are they that even an absolutely bare bones…

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There you are, preparing your spooky season viewing schedule as October approaches. If you’re a subscriber to Hollywood Suite here in Canada then you have to pay mind to their Shocktober lineup.    The highlights of the month, over a killer lineup of repertoire programming, includes the premiere of R.L. Stine’s 2023 film Zombie Town and the rarely seen Canadian/UK horror flick, Richard Loncraine’s The Haunting of Julia, starring Mia Farrow.    About the rep programming. Shocktober has a monstorous list of classic screamers, slashers, thrillers and Halloween favorites. Vampires, Deadites, Killer Klowns, Daywalkers, Tiny Creatures, Psycho Killers, the whole lot of them and more.   Over three dozen classics and contemporary standouts await you next month. Check out the full ilst below.    HOLLYWOOD SUITE…

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Frédéric Farrucci sophomore feature blends neo-Western elements with social issues exploring land exploitation, identity, and resistance.

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Iranian filmmaker Nader Saeivar crafts a quietly intense narrative that intertwines personal and political conflicts, offering an exploration of power, repression, and resistance within the framework of contemporary Iranian society.

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As spooky season approaches consider what streamer MUBI has to offer this October, starting with their collection The New Coven: A Female Horror Renaissance. The collection includes breakout hits Revenge from Coralie Fargeat and Jennifer Reeder’s Knives And Skin, perennial favorites of Anarchists.    Three more films should fall under the spooky season banner, romantic thriller The Blue Room (caution on the scroll down to the provided bare bum image), thriller The Lonliest Planet and mystery thriller Coma.    A new wave of female directors is reshaping the horror genre, continuing a tradition that began with Alice Guy-Blaché in the early 1900s. Directors like Jennifer Kent, Coralie Fargeat, and Susanne Deeken are leading a renaissance, reclaiming female agency and addressing themes such as gender roles, sexuality,…

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In the article series Sound and Vision we take a look at music videos from notable directors. This week: Elton John’s Who Wears These Shoes, directed by Just Jaeckin. In 1988 Sir Elton John came out of the closet as a gay man, and more widely in an interview for Rolling Stone Magazine in 1992. He stated at the time he didn’t do that earlier, because he thought that his sexuality was common knowledge. The problem with that statement is that just a few years earlier Elton made a few career choices that, in hindsight, might have seemed like trying to pass as straight. I’m not trying to diminish the fluidity of sexuality, because as a queer person myself I know how gender and sexuality…

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Today the teaser trailer for Marvel Studios released the trailer for Thunderbolts*, their go at the rag-tag band of misfits action adventure film to which they once held the crown for with the GotG films before that trilogy’s director left and took all their mojo with them to another studio to repeat that success with a banger of a sequel to that studio’s ill-fated attempt at stealing the crown from Marvel.   You follow? Sure you do. You know exactly what we’re talking about. Marvel’s been in a bit of lull lately and need wins to get bums back in cinema seats. The Marvel devout can only buy so many tickets before their coffers run dry too. With other projects in flux and going off…

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Trapped on a farm in rural Georgia, a group of neighbors must put aside their differences and unite in the face of a mysterious and deadly threat.

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lexandros Avranas presents a visually stark and ambiguous exploration of bureaucratic indifference and familial trauma, blending elements of thriller, satire, and political drama while challenging conventional narrative forms and styles.

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The 1990s already felt mid-apocalyptic to the queer community — AIDS had torn through America largely unimpeded in the ’80s thanks to the utter disregard of the Reagan and Bush governments, and though life-sustaining treatments began to roll out in the ’90s, the gap in the community felt cavernous, and unfillable. Couple this with the fact that Los Angeles always feels slightly mid-apocalyptic — a sprawling nowhereland frying under persistent heat and even more persistent cultural cannibalism — and you arrive at the blistering vibe of Gregg Araki’s “Teen Apocalypse Trilogy,” which rolls out in 1993 (Totally F***ed Up), 1995 (The Doom Generation), and 1997 (Nowhere), newly restored by Strand Releasing and made available through the Criterion Collection as a boxed set. Araki — whose…

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