Valley View Motel
Official synopsis
After a 1977 diamond heist goes sideways, two small-time crooks take refuge at a remote Pennsylvania motel, where a pair of bizarre sibling owners, a ruthless hitman and a night full of bad decisions turn their getaway into a desperate fight to survive the night and make it to their rendezvous before it’s too late.
Review
Cowriters/codirectors/stars Kevin Ignatius and Nick Psinakis serve up neo noir thrills and slaughter aplenty with Valley View Motel. Set in the 1970s and boasting an aesthetic that wonderfully fits crime cinema of that era without overdoing things, the film features Ignatius as Cliff, the more reluctant half of a diamond thieves duo with the more hotheaded and desperate Reg (Soulo Smith), and Psinakis as Hal, math teacher by day and hitman by night who is hot on the trail after the thieves abscond with the diamond they were meant to hand over to their employer. Sunny Kang (Laura Im) and her mother Young-Ja (Judy J. Lee) are on their way to restart their lives after their father and husband, respectively, permanently ends his gambling addiction the hard way. As fate would have it, all but one of the above-named characters end up at the titular lodging, where sibling owners Lester (Tom Mesmer) and LouAnne (McKenzie Such) run a shady enterprise of their own. Ignatius and Psinakis helm the film with aplomb, and head up a sizable, highly impressive cast with terrific performances. There’s no getting around the Tarantino and Coen brothers influences, but there’s more than enough originality on display that those influences don’t overpower the proceedings. Valley View Motel is full of surprises and is a genre-film gem that comes highly recommended.
Once Upon a Time in a Horror Movie
Official synopsis
In every horror movie, there’s one killer story…
Hoping for an unforgettable birthday, a group of friends sign up for an immersive horror-movie experience that promises to place them inside their own 1980s slasher film. But as the night unfolds, the lines between fiction and reality disappear, and what begins as a game of make-believe soon becomes a desperate fight for survival, where the only way to stay alive is to make it to the final reel.
Review
If you’re in the mood for gruesome slasher carnage with no shortage of surprises in store, writer/director Ashley Cahill has you covered with Once Upon a Time in a Horror Movie. A group of friends heads to an immersive scare attraction in a summer camp setting but a stop-off at an actual serial killer’s farm leads to real danger. Cahill has some meta fun with fright-fare cinema but also twists on tropes so that the film rises above the pack of many modern slasher homage films. Once Upon a Time in a Horror Movie combines the grit of 1970s exploitation horror, the vibes of 1980s masked killer slasher fare, and the viciousness and butchery of 2000s torture movie terror, with some dashes of dark humor for good measure. The ensemble cast members give all-in performances, Cahill helms with verve, and the gruesome practical effects look great. Fear fare fanatics should have a blast with this feature.
Valley View Motel and Once Upon a Time in a Horror Movie screened as part of Screamfest, which runs October 6–15, 2026 in Los Angeles, California.
