Director Kevin Greutert returns to the franchise that birthed his feature-length career with Saw X, a precise and brutal high watermark that knows exactly what its audience wants. Top-tier Tobin Bell, top-tier Shawnee Smith, top-tier traps: it’s the best Saw in years and perhaps since the original. Minor spoilers ahead…

Every single Evil Dead movie is a bloody, gruesome delight, and now the tradition continues with Lee Cronin’s Evil Dead Rise. A decade after a deadly-serious reboot turned the franchise on its head, this new installment finds a bond between sisters shredded by a disgusting waltz of Deadites, guts, and gore. Alyssa Sutherland brings her A-game as a twisted, cackling fiend: a physical performance for the ages. Minor spoilers ahead…

Happy Halloween! There’s nothing quite like the words “Guillermo del Toro curates an anthology” to stoke a horror fan’s anticipation. Cabinet of Curiosities, del Toro’s attempt to assemble an all-star roster of genre voices, is as consistently wonderful and gruesome as anthologies get. With creeping eldritch terror, nasty alien infestations, and gothic creature features, Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities has remarkably few duds and more than its fair share of bangers. It’s the perfect way to spend your All Hallow’s Eve. Minor spoilers ahead…

The secrets to Zach Cregger’s Barbarian have been closely guarded since its premiere at San Diego Comic-Con in July, and for good reason: There are some nasty tricks hiding in this basement. Gore-hounds and squirm-fiends with appetites for sick thrills will have a great time with the film’s surprisingly funny descent into madness, but Barbarian’s fizzling atmosphere and payoffs make it this year’s not-quite-Malignant. Minor spoilers ahead…

A sprawling, sci-fi procedural anchored by weighty performances, white-knuckle set pieces, and thunderous soundscapes, Nope is director Jordan Peele’s most mature and layered work, exploring our primordial obsession with spectacle and our desperate need to capture it. A slowly unfolding puzzle box that is as alluring as it is exhilarating, Peele assembles his formidable image-making around what he knows best: terror and wit. Minor spoilers ahead…

Scott Derrickson’s highly anticipated The Black Phone is a fractured, slack exercise in lukewarm horror. Undermining Joe Hill’s short story of the same name with multiple threads that never come together and a villain as thin as he is forgettable, The Black Phone makes weak-willed grasps at the intelligent thriller it could have been. At least Ethan Hawke got paid. Minor spoilers ahead…

Combining familiar, 70s grindhouse terror with modern sensibilities, X is director Ti West’s best film since 2009’s House of the Devil. With bloody slasher mayhem unspooling on a porn set, West’s latest slice of brutality brings the nudity and gore, but underneath its vintage horror pastiche lies a sex-positive, beating heart that examines the cutting power of jealousy and the unforgiving cruelty of time. Mia Goth, Brittany Snow, and Jenna Ortega form a new Scream Queen triumvirate. Minor spoilers ahead…

Rebecca Hall continues her streak of blistering performances in Andrew Semans’ harrowing Sundance psychodrama. A tale about motherhood, hidden pasts, and the limits of control, Resurrection unspools a single mother’s crushing secret in a steely structure that belies its brazen, outrageous horror. Every Sundance has that one Midnight film that lays worms in your brain, and Resurrection is this year’s culprit: a bloody, twisted ride with shocking revelations. Minor spoilers ahead…

Edgar Wright’s decades-long tour of genres makes a no-frills horror pitstop in Last Night in Soho. A collision between past and present painted with the brush of giallo and other era-appropriate terrors, the film is a lush and arresting thriller…until it isn’t. Last Night in Soho soars in its first half with Wright’s signature craftsmanship and a pair of great performances from Thomasin Mackenzie and Anya Taylor-Joy, but its final act is undone by its over-polish, toothlessness, and muddled pastiche. Minor spoilers ahead…

It’s that time of year again. With Spooky Season in full swing, I’m once again counting down a collection of under-the-radar horror gems you can stream right now. Scrolling through all your streaming services for the perfect Halloween movie night can be a daunting task, especially if they’re spitting out the same recommendations time and time again. For this list, we’re skipping right past the old favorites, the classics, and the genre mainstays for some deeper cuts - truly scary and unnerving horror movies that just might have escaped your attention, all a click away.

The fourth installment of the found footage anthology series, V/H/S, hits Shudder today. A collection of four short horror vignettes sandwiched within a sinister frame narrative, V/H/S/94 continues the tradition of its predecessors delivering nasty - and uneven - chills. Running the gamut of sewer-dwelling cryptids, haunted wakes, and outrageous mad scientists, there’s a little something for everyone within the creepy walls of V/H/S/94. Minor spoilers ahead…

Midnight Mass is the best thing Mike Flanagan has ever done. A searing, complete work at the intersections of faith and doubt, life and death, it’s genre storytelling at its most emotionally rich. Contemplative, dialogue-driven horror that paints its themes with a dark and heavy brush, Midnight Mass is utterly transfixing with its layered performances and shocking swerves. The entire cast is fantastic, but people will be talking about Hamish Linklater’s turn as Father Paul for a very long time. Minor spoilers ahead…

My TIFF 2021 coverage starts here! Kicking off this year’s Midnight Madness slate is Rob Savage’s followup to his 2020 “screenlife” hit, Host. Extrapolating COVID found footage beyond just a Zoom lobby, DASHCAM doubles down on pandemic horror to very mixed results. Ramping up the scope and intricacy - but not the ingenuity - of Host, the film gets wildly uneven mileage out of its grating protagonist and its everything-but-the-kitchen-sink terrors. Minor spoilers ahead…

More Saw and Dead Silence than The Conjuring and Insidious, James Wan’s Malignant takes a gruesome detour from mass appeal horror back into the land of subversive terror. A Frankenstein’s amalgam of giallo, camp, and body horror, Wan’s latest takes pages from Argento, Cronenberg, and even De Palma to deliver the wildest of gory rides. Nothing will really prepare you for the nasty surprises Malignant has in store for you. Minor spoilers ahead…

A cynical, rage-fueled film carried by its no-holds-barred violence, gore, and depravity, Rob Jabbaz’s The Sadness is the most difficult watch of 2021’s Fantasia Festival. Crossing lines and spilling copious amounts of blood, Jabbaz’s feature-length debut strikes at the heart of our depraved, animal nature. For better or worse, The Sadness is like no zombie movie you’ve seen before. Minor spoilers ahead…

The Night House flips the script on haunted abodes with chilling efficiency. Powered by a singular, wrenching performance from Rebecca Hall, director David Bruckner’s latest explores the spaces between terrifying, grief-fueled dreamscapes. Minor spoilers ahead…

Once again, I have the privilege of being invited as accredited press to Fantasia Festival, North America’s largest genre film festival. With a larger focus on Asian genre cinema and some eye-popping premieres, this year’s festival will undoubtedly be a cinematic feast. This page will be your portal to my coverage, a full list of all of my Fantasia Festival 2021 film reviews. All reviews in viewing order…

M. Night Shyamalan revisits the stylings of The Happening with his rapid-aging horror thriller, Old. A labored reach for existential poignancy undone by an absurd, awkward, and alien script, Shyamalan’s latest is a far cry from the halcyon days of The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, and The Village. Even with some great horror beats, your mileage will depend entirely on just how much you can stomach Shyamalan’s particular brand of unironically stilted messes. Minor spoilers ahead…