Toronto International Film Festival 2021: Our Half-Dozen “Have to See!” Horror Films
Shocks and shudders abound during Toronto International Film Festival’s (TIFF) hybrid event September 9–18, 2021, with in-person cinema screenings in Toronto and digital screenings available to viewers across Canada. Among the incredible international line-up of horror, science fiction, thriller, and other genre-cinema styles are the following six stand-outs, which Horror Fuel highly recommends. My comments follow in italics after descriptions adapted from TIFF’s official program and website. Kicking Blood “Blaine Thurier’s sultry, perma-stoned, ultra-modern spin on the vampire genre evokes cult-horror figures like George A. Romero and Stuart Gordon.” Fusing the grittiness of George Romero’s Martin with the sly theatricality of Stuart Gordon’s early films (Re-Animator, From Beyond), Blaine Thurier’s Kicking Blood reimagines vampire mythology by transplanting it to the bohemian world Thurier has satirized since he began making films. Instead of the usual desiccated, tormented aristocrats with impossibly innocent victims, Thurier’s undead are hipster scavengers and swingers, their victims luckless hangers-on and drunks. Vampire Anna (Alanna Bale) is disappointed
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