CategoryForeign
International horror: J-horror, European extremity, Latin American shocks and the films Hollywood keeps remaking.
901 stories
ForeignMoviesNewsTrailers
A horrifying truth lays beneath the veneer of a painting in the bone-chilling Thai horror film Cracked. In the film, “Ruja (actress/model Chayanit Chansangavej) returns to Thailand from New York with her young daughter Rachel to settle her late father’s estate. Included in her inheritance are two mysterious portraits of a bewitching woman that she is told are worth a fortune if only they weren’t damaged. Desperate to sell the paintings, Ruja hires Tim (K-pop star Nichkhun), an art restorer, to prepare the canvases for sale. But the cracks in the paint have begun to reveal long-hidden secrets, and as strange phenomena begin to emerge around them, Ruja and Rachel quickly realize their lives are in grave danger.” Directed by Surapong Ploensang, Cracked was written by Eakasit Thairaat, Onusa Donsawai, Pun Homchuen, and Surapong Ploensang. It stars Chayanit Chansangavej, Byron Bishop, Nichkhun, and Nutthatcha Padovan. Featuring English subtitles, Cracked premieres on VOD and DVD on May 26, 2023.
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ForeignMoviesThrillerTrue Crime
Director Dominik Moll’s superb French feature The Night of the 12th (La nuit du 12) — César Award winner for Best Film, Best Director, and five other César awards — is a gripping murder mystery/police procedural based on an actual unsolved murder in France. As the film begins, a 21-year-old woman named Clara (Lula Cotton-Frapier) leaves a party in the middle of the night. On her way walking home, a hooded and masked man who calls her by name splashes her with flammable liquid and sets her on fire. She dies from the attack, and detectives Yohan (Bastien Bouillon) and Marceau (Bouli Lanners) are assigned to the case. Yohan is a strictly by-the-book man of few words, while the more veteran Marceau is having marital problems and often on the edge. The Night of the 12th focuses on the investigation and the toll it takes on both the detectives, the others in their department, and those close to Clara. Clara’s
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ForeignMoviesReviewsSci-Fi
A fiery explosion in space results in a meteor that is sent hurdling towards Earth. Meanwhile down on the ground, a young boy named Tommy (Óscar Martín, who appears to be having the time of his life) witnesses the meteor hurtling towards our beloved globe (in a sequence that proves the sound department on this one has zero clue what a kitten sounds like) while some dudes, poachers by disgusting trade, ass-around in the nearby day-for-night forest. Well, said dudes do both the fucking around, and the finding out as they encounter that meteor and the eggs it contains… eggs that are hatching! Because all of that was moving along at a good clip, we cut to rock n’ roll Rick (Ian Sera) who provides a song about fast cars sung with the lowest amount of energy possible before he and his pals trek off to the woods for some rest and relaxation. How does all of that tie together?
Continue reading →
ForeignIndieMoviesReviews
Our fiendish friends over at Severin Films have gathered up four Italian gothic horror films, slapped them in a (beautifully embellished) box, and unleashed them on our arcane asses under the title of the Danza Macabre collection. Let’s feast our putrid peepers on what this set has to offer one by fright-filled one! Disc One brings us 1964’s The Monster of the Opera: This flick opens with a banger of a scene in which a vampire chases a young woman in a nightgown before trapping her behind an invisible wall and trying to dispatch her with a pitchfork! Flash forward and dynamic theater director Sandro (Marco Mariani) has moved his troupe of actors, dancers, and mimes into an abandoned theater despite being warned explicitly not to do so by the caretaker of the joltin’ joint, Achille (Alberto Archetti) by name, who witnessed the ghoulish goings-on mentioned up yonder! As the arsty and fartsy goes on, it becomes ever more obvious
Continue reading →
Film FestivalsForeignMoviesNews
A sexagenarian chauvinist thinks he has met his match with Claudia, who — or in this case, which — happens to be a mannequin. On Saturday, May 27th at 3:45 p.m., the feature film Claudia — directed by Edward Westrop — will have its world premiere at The Romford Film Festival. Following is the official press release. Claudia is a black comedy about a misogynistic, sixty-something year old man named Raymond who forms an emotional relationship with a life-sized, female mannequin. This film aims to put a darkly comedic twist on the topic of domestic abuse when Raymond realises that the mannequin, who he names Claudia, is the perfect vessel for his misogynistic, backwards relationship values. Director of Claudia Edward Westrop is a self-taught filmmaker whose western-themed, stop-frame animation Cloaked Rider was shown at the Cannes Film Festival in 2015. Claudia is Westrop’s first feature film and has already been selected by the Out of the Can International Film Festival
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ForeignMoviesNewsTrailers
A young woman must accept herself in order to overcome a demon in the first trailer for It Lives Inside from director Bishal Dutta and the producers of Get Out. In the film, “Sam is desperate to fit in at school, rejecting her Indian culture and family to be like everyone else. When a mythological demonic spirit latches onto her former best friend, she must come to terms with her heritage in order to defeat it.” It Lives Inside stars Megan Suri, Neeru Bajwa, Mohana Krishnan, and Betty Gabriel. Hopefully, a release date will be announced soon.
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Film FestivalsForeignMoviesReviews
MINORE In director Konstantinos Koutsoliotas’ Minore (Greece, 2023), sailor William (Davide Tucci) comes to a small Greek coastal town while on shore leave, searching for someone who has been missing from his life. He befriends tavern server Aliki (Daphne Alexander), and soon the pair must join forces with the rest of the townspeople to battle against strange creatures coming from the sea. This is a winning horror comedy with a strong Lovecraftian vibe. It boasts a sizable cast whose members all give fine performances, and the characters — the screenplay is by Koutsoliotas and Elizabeth E. Schuch (The Book of Birdie) — are written so well and in such an endearing manner that viewers will want all of them to survive the invasion. That’s a rarity in horror and horror comedies recently, with so many unlikable characters in many movies of late with no one to really root for. The creatures look pretty cool and get plenty of screen time
Continue reading →
ForeignMoviesNews
They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but in Cracked, a terrifying new Thai horror film, an inherited painting may be worth a thousand screams… “Ruja (actress/model Chayanit Chansangavej) returns to Thailand from New York with her young daughter Rachel to settle her late father’s estate. Included in her inheritance are two mysterious portraits of a bewitching woman that she is told are worth a fortune if only they weren’t damaged. Desperate to sell the paintings, Ruja hires Tim (K-pop star Nichkhun), an art restorer, to prepare the canvases for sale. But the cracks in the paint have begun to reveal long-hidden secrets, and as strange phenomena begin to emerge around them, Ruja and Rachel quickly realize their lives are in grave danger.” Directed by Surapong Ploensang, the film stars Chayanit Chansangavej, Byron Bishop, Nichkhun, and Nutthatcha Padovan. Cracked lands on VOD and Digital May 26, 2023,
Continue reading →
ForeignIndieMoviesReviews
Maya (Hannah John-Kamen, whom you may remember from 2018’s superhero romp Ant-Man and the Wasp, but she’s been in an ass-load of other cool stuff) and Jamie (Douglas Booth) are more than ready to get the fuck out of Dodge after being accosted by thugs, so off they trot to the safety and serenity of the Irish countryside where absolutely nothing can ever go wrong. Once there they move into the home bequeathed to J-Dawg by his recently croaked aunt… but the country home comes with a warning; honor the old ways and pay tribute to the mysterious Redcaps rumored to haunt the land every day, or there will be unspecified static heading their way! Of course our heroes forget that shit Day fuckin’ One, and the town drunk is spirited away by those creepy Caps… but of course the body-count doesn’t stop there and before you can say “Guinness” our protagonists are up to their asses in goblins, psychotic
Continue reading →
Film FestivalsForeignMoviesReviews
If you are looking for a film that is decidedly different from just about anything you have watched recently, look no further than director Isti Madarász’s Hungarian feature Halfway Home (Átjáróház, 2022). This film, which boasts supernatural elements galore, is perhaps the most charming, whimsical consideration of love and death that you are likely to see this year. Kriztián (Péter Bárnai) and Ági (Vivien Rujder) were both rescued from a hospital fire at birth. Kriztián was raised by a witch, which may help him after he is late for a first date — the pair are unaware of each other’s shared hospital story — with Ági. His tardiness resulted in her accidental death. Luckily for Kriztián, he has just landed a new job as a morgue attendant where the dead who have something left undone before their demise wait for a certain period, ascending into Heaven if their desire is fulfilled or meeting with a sadistic demon if it is
Continue reading →
More from Foreign
ForeignMoviesNewsTrailers
A horrifying truth lays beneath the veneer of a painting in the bone-chilling Thai horror film Cracked. In the film, “Ruja (actress/model Chayanit Chansangavej) returns to Thailand from New York with her young daughter Rachel to settle her late father’s estate. Included in her inheritance are two mysterious portraits of a bewitching woman that she is told are worth a fortune if only they weren’t damaged. Desperate to sell the paintings, Ruja hires Tim (K-pop star Nichkhun), an art restorer, to prepare the canvases for sale. But the cracks in the paint have begun to reveal long-hidden secrets, and as strange phenomena begin to emerge around them, Ruja and Rachel quickly realize their lives are in grave danger.” Directed by Surapong Ploensang, Cracked was written by Eakasit Thairaat, Onusa Donsawai, Pun Homchuen, and Surapong Ploensang. It stars Chayanit Chansangavej, Byron Bishop, Nichkhun, and Nutthatcha Padovan. Featuring English subtitles, Cracked premieres on VOD and DVD on May 26, 2023.
Continue reading →
ForeignMoviesThrillerTrue Crime
Director Dominik Moll’s superb French feature The Night of the 12th (La nuit du 12) — César Award winner for Best Film, Best Director, and five other César awards — is a gripping murder mystery/police procedural based on an actual unsolved murder in France. As the film begins, a 21-year-old woman named Clara (Lula Cotton-Frapier) leaves a party in the middle of the night. On her way walking home, a hooded and masked man who calls her by name splashes her with flammable liquid and sets her on fire. She dies from the attack, and detectives Yohan (Bastien Bouillon) and Marceau (Bouli Lanners) are assigned to the case. Yohan is a strictly by-the-book man of few words, while the more veteran Marceau is having marital problems and often on the edge. The Night of the 12th focuses on the investigation and the toll it takes on both the detectives, the others in their department, and those close to Clara. Clara’s
Continue reading →
ForeignMoviesReviewsSci-Fi
A fiery explosion in space results in a meteor that is sent hurdling towards Earth. Meanwhile down on the ground, a young boy named Tommy (Óscar Martín, who appears to be having the time of his life) witnesses the meteor hurtling towards our beloved globe (in a sequence that proves the sound department on this one has zero clue what a kitten sounds like) while some dudes, poachers by disgusting trade, ass-around in the nearby day-for-night forest. Well, said dudes do both the fucking around, and the finding out as they encounter that meteor and the eggs it contains… eggs that are hatching! Because all of that was moving along at a good clip, we cut to rock n’ roll Rick (Ian Sera) who provides a song about fast cars sung with the lowest amount of energy possible before he and his pals trek off to the woods for some rest and relaxation. How does all of that tie together?
Continue reading →
ForeignIndieMoviesReviews
Our fiendish friends over at Severin Films have gathered up four Italian gothic horror films, slapped them in a (beautifully embellished) box, and unleashed them on our arcane asses under the title of the Danza Macabre collection. Let’s feast our putrid peepers on what this set has to offer one by fright-filled one! Disc One brings us 1964’s The Monster of the Opera: This flick opens with a banger of a scene in which a vampire chases a young woman in a nightgown before trapping her behind an invisible wall and trying to dispatch her with a pitchfork! Flash forward and dynamic theater director Sandro (Marco Mariani) has moved his troupe of actors, dancers, and mimes into an abandoned theater despite being warned explicitly not to do so by the caretaker of the joltin’ joint, Achille (Alberto Archetti) by name, who witnessed the ghoulish goings-on mentioned up yonder! As the arsty and fartsy goes on, it becomes ever more obvious
Continue reading →
Film FestivalsForeignMoviesNews
A sexagenarian chauvinist thinks he has met his match with Claudia, who — or in this case, which — happens to be a mannequin. On Saturday, May 27th at 3:45 p.m., the feature film Claudia — directed by Edward Westrop — will have its world premiere at The Romford Film Festival. Following is the official press release. Claudia is a black comedy about a misogynistic, sixty-something year old man named Raymond who forms an emotional relationship with a life-sized, female mannequin. This film aims to put a darkly comedic twist on the topic of domestic abuse when Raymond realises that the mannequin, who he names Claudia, is the perfect vessel for his misogynistic, backwards relationship values. Director of Claudia Edward Westrop is a self-taught filmmaker whose western-themed, stop-frame animation Cloaked Rider was shown at the Cannes Film Festival in 2015. Claudia is Westrop’s first feature film and has already been selected by the Out of the Can International Film Festival
Continue reading →
ForeignMoviesNewsTrailers
A young woman must accept herself in order to overcome a demon in the first trailer for It Lives Inside from director Bishal Dutta and the producers of Get Out. In the film, “Sam is desperate to fit in at school, rejecting her Indian culture and family to be like everyone else. When a mythological demonic spirit latches onto her former best friend, she must come to terms with her heritage in order to defeat it.” It Lives Inside stars Megan Suri, Neeru Bajwa, Mohana Krishnan, and Betty Gabriel. Hopefully, a release date will be announced soon.
Continue reading →
Film FestivalsForeignMoviesReviews
MINORE In director Konstantinos Koutsoliotas’ Minore (Greece, 2023), sailor William (Davide Tucci) comes to a small Greek coastal town while on shore leave, searching for someone who has been missing from his life. He befriends tavern server Aliki (Daphne Alexander), and soon the pair must join forces with the rest of the townspeople to battle against strange creatures coming from the sea. This is a winning horror comedy with a strong Lovecraftian vibe. It boasts a sizable cast whose members all give fine performances, and the characters — the screenplay is by Koutsoliotas and Elizabeth E. Schuch (The Book of Birdie) — are written so well and in such an endearing manner that viewers will want all of them to survive the invasion. That’s a rarity in horror and horror comedies recently, with so many unlikable characters in many movies of late with no one to really root for. The creatures look pretty cool and get plenty of screen time
Continue reading →
ForeignMoviesNews
They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but in Cracked, a terrifying new Thai horror film, an inherited painting may be worth a thousand screams… “Ruja (actress/model Chayanit Chansangavej) returns to Thailand from New York with her young daughter Rachel to settle her late father’s estate. Included in her inheritance are two mysterious portraits of a bewitching woman that she is told are worth a fortune if only they weren’t damaged. Desperate to sell the paintings, Ruja hires Tim (K-pop star Nichkhun), an art restorer, to prepare the canvases for sale. But the cracks in the paint have begun to reveal long-hidden secrets, and as strange phenomena begin to emerge around them, Ruja and Rachel quickly realize their lives are in grave danger.” Directed by Surapong Ploensang, the film stars Chayanit Chansangavej, Byron Bishop, Nichkhun, and Nutthatcha Padovan. Cracked lands on VOD and Digital May 26, 2023,
Continue reading →
ForeignIndieMoviesReviews
Maya (Hannah John-Kamen, whom you may remember from 2018’s superhero romp Ant-Man and the Wasp, but she’s been in an ass-load of other cool stuff) and Jamie (Douglas Booth) are more than ready to get the fuck out of Dodge after being accosted by thugs, so off they trot to the safety and serenity of the Irish countryside where absolutely nothing can ever go wrong. Once there they move into the home bequeathed to J-Dawg by his recently croaked aunt… but the country home comes with a warning; honor the old ways and pay tribute to the mysterious Redcaps rumored to haunt the land every day, or there will be unspecified static heading their way! Of course our heroes forget that shit Day fuckin’ One, and the town drunk is spirited away by those creepy Caps… but of course the body-count doesn’t stop there and before you can say “Guinness” our protagonists are up to their asses in goblins, psychotic
Continue reading →
Film FestivalsForeignMoviesReviews
If you are looking for a film that is decidedly different from just about anything you have watched recently, look no further than director Isti Madarász’s Hungarian feature Halfway Home (Átjáróház, 2022). This film, which boasts supernatural elements galore, is perhaps the most charming, whimsical consideration of love and death that you are likely to see this year. Kriztián (Péter Bárnai) and Ági (Vivien Rujder) were both rescued from a hospital fire at birth. Kriztián was raised by a witch, which may help him after he is late for a first date — the pair are unaware of each other’s shared hospital story — with Ági. His tardiness resulted in her accidental death. Luckily for Kriztián, he has just landed a new job as a morgue attendant where the dead who have something left undone before their demise wait for a certain period, ascending into Heaven if their desire is fulfilled or meeting with a sadistic demon if it is
Continue reading →
