Posts by Anton Bitel

What to watch at home in March

By Anton Bitel

A Hideo Nakata classic, a New York city murder mystery and a previously unreleased wuxia adventure are among the highlights on offer this month across physical media and digital.

What to watch at home in February

By Anton Bitel

Killer sloths and a Kubrick classic are among the best new releases hitting physical media and digital this month.

What to watch at home in January

By Anton Bitel

Pagan rituals, a Michael Powell classic and killer alligators are on the agenda in the first of 2024's home ents guides.

What to watch at home in December

By Anton Bitel

Samurai, demon dolls, an actor-murderer and RoboCop are some of the gems to catch up on while you're relaxing this holiday season.

What to watch at home in November

By Anton Bitel

A Jarmusch classic, a meta action thriller and a coming-of-age typhoon drama are among the must-see films coming to streaming and blu-ray this month.

What to watch at home in October

By Anton Bitel

Cannibals, ghosts, demons and housewives are on the schedule for this special spooky season round-up of all the latest in Blu-Ray and DVD releases.

The Exorcist: Believer – a trashy, overstuffed requel

By Anton Bitel

David Gordon Green returns in his role of classic horror reboot guy to exhume and retool William Friedkin’s The Exorcist for new audiences. The results are not pretty at all.

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What to watch at home in September

By Anton Bitel

Ken Russell, Peter Bogdanovich and Nicolas Cage's first starring role are among this month's bevvy of exciting home ents releases.

What to watch at home in August

By Anton Bitel

Buster Keaton, time travel and an unlikely romance are among the gems to take home on Blu-ray and DVD this month.

What to watch at home in July

By Anton Bitel

Two Altman gems, a killer shark and an assassin-for-hire are among the best films hitting streaming and physical media this month.

What to watch at home in June

By Anton Bitel

From Robert Eggers' warring wickies to a duel in Edo era Japan, we bring you six unmissable treats from the world of physical media and streaming.

The Boogeyman

By Anton Bitel

A grieving family find themselves terrorised by a supernatural monster in Rob Savage's jump to big studio horror.

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High school is hell in Isao Yukisada’s Go

By Anton Bitel

A teenage misfit is challenged by a new school and local bullies in this cult classic Japanese coming-of-age film.

The swashbuckling thrills of Brotherhood of the Wolf

By Anton Bitel

Christophe Gans' fantasy-action-horror – loosely based on a true story – boasts a starry cast and some highly memorable set pieces.

Discover the Japanese locomotive thriller that inspired Speed

By Anton Bitel

Junya Sato's classic action-crime film depicts a group of disenfranchised men who attempt to pull of an audacious crime involving a speeding train.

A troubled filmmaker goes through hell in Iván Zulueta’s Arrebato

By Anton Bitel

This 1979 Spanish arthouse film, being rereleased by Radiance, is a fascinating, tricky cult horror.

The Beasts

By Anton Bitel

Neighbourly hostility abounds in Spanish director Rodrigo Sorogoyen's latest psychological thriller, set in the Galician countryside.

review

Gakuryu Ishii’s Punk Samurai is an anarchic take on an ‘unfilmable’ manga

By Anton Bitel

A ronin with lofty ambitions tells a white lie that quickly spirals out of control in this riotous samurai flick.

Midnight in Austin: four world premieres at SXSW 2023

By Anton Bitel

Murderous teens, strange growths and television-haunting ghosts are on the bill in SXSW's midnight movies slate.

Scream VI

By Anton Bitel

Business as usual – albeit with a side of Big Apple – for the long-running meta-slasher franchise with enough sass to get it across the finish line.

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The perverse suburban joys of Welcome to the Dollhouse

By Anton Bitel

Todd Solondz's dark coming-of-ager sees an magnificent Heather Matarazzo play the ultimate awkward preteen in Dawn Wiener.

The Strays

By Anton Bitel

A woman who has worked hard to hide her past finds she can't run from it forever in Nathaniel Martello-White's assured debut.

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The frenetic charm of Miami Blues

By Anton Bitel

George Armitage's 1990 neo-noir starring Alec Baldwin and Jennifer Jason Leigh is a chaotic game of cat and mouse.

January

By Anton Bitel

Two men snowed in at a remote cabin await the return of their boss in Andrey Paounov's unique, existential horror.

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Unwelcome

By Anton Bitel

A young couple reeling from a violent attack play host to strange house guests in Jon Wright's Irish horror.

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How Rob Zombie put his own spin on a television classic

By Anton Bitel

The horror director turns his attention to comedy and romance with his prequel version of The Munsters.

The classic Italian political drama about the tyranny of industrial capitalism

By Anton Bitel

Elio Petri's The Working Class Goes to Heaven remains a sobering portrait of life as a cog in the oppressive machine.

Skinamarink

By Anton Bitel

A young brother and sister face their worst fears in Kyle Edward Ball's inventive microbudget horror.

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The Pale Blue Eye

By Anton Bitel

A hardened detective teams up with a young Edgar Allen Poe to solve a murder in Scott Cooper's chilly thriller.

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A robotic Santa wreaks havoc in a new festive offering

By Anton Bitel

Christmas Bloody Christmas is a Yuletide horror with a dark sense of humour and some killer robots.

The strange cinematic history of King Kong

By Anton Bitel

As a restoration of the 1976 remake lands on home entertainment platforms, it's a fascinating insight into the on-screen story of this iconic feature creature.

The Witch: Part 2 – The Other One is a wild action-thriller

By Anton Bitel

This blood-soaked South Korean sequel picks up where The Witch: Part 1 left off, with a pair of supernatural twins causing havoc.

Discover the slapstick joys of this 80s martial arts comedy

By Anton Bitel

Sammo Hung stars as a hapless amateur detective in Wu Ma's classic comedy caper.

Something in the Dirt

By Anton Bitel

Filmmaking duo Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead discover an ominous paranormal entity in their meta fifth feature.

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30 years on, Ghostwatch is still as haunting as ever

By Anton Bitel

The BBC pulled off an ingenious prank with their 1992 paranormal investigation, which has proven an inspiration for the found footage boom.

Discover the haunting human horrors of this Pre-Code classic

By Anton Bitel

Irving Pichel and Ernest B. Schoedsack's The Most Dangerous Game still has the power to shock, 80 years after its release.

Discover this high-octane, anti-colonial Jackie Chan actioner

By Anton Bitel

Like its predecessors, 1992’s Police Story 3: Supercop offers plenty of thrills and spills – but with more political commentary.

Silent Land

By Anton Bitel

A holidaying couple becomes involved in a tragic event in Aga Woszczyńska’s chilly psychodrama.

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Discover the radical energy of this unsettling psychodrama

By Anton Bitel

Jonathan Weiss offers an unconventional and disturbing adaptation of J.G Ballard's 'unadaptable' work of experimental fiction.

Three decades on, Joel Schumacher’s Flatliners is a cheesy, existential delight

By Anton Bitel

A group of medical students push the boundary between life and death in this bombastic thriller.

Discover the unique thrills of Johnnie To’s Running Out of Time series

By Anton Bitel

A beleaguered detective faces off against two different thieves in the Hong Kong director’s two-part crime caper.

Revisiting Tremors, the cult monster western with a sense of humour

By Anton Bitel

Ron Underwood's 1990 giant worm flick gets the ultra HD treatment care of Arrow Films.

Luis Buñuel’s culinary send-up of the upper class is more relevant than ever

By Anton Bitel

A group of bourgeoise friends attend the strangest dinner party in this late period Buñuel classic.

The Black Phone

By Anton Bitel

Scott Derrickson returns to his horror roots with this story of a pre-teen who faces off against a sinister serial killer, with help from his previous victims.

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The perverse delights of Jonathan Demme’s cult classic Crazy Mama

By Anton Bitel

An intergenerational matriarchy embarks on a crime spree in the late director’s 1975 action-comedy.

Is this Gaspar Noé’s most religious film?

By Anton Bitel

The director’s short experimental feature, Lux Æterna, plays like a panic attack before reaching a rapturous crescendo.

Discover the cult ’80s slasher that pre-empted Freddy Krueger

By Anton Bitel

The likes of A Nightmare on Elm Street and Scream owe something to Robert Deubel’s co-ed carve up Girls Nite Out.

Something sinister lives among the sheep in this ’70s wild west monster movie

By Anton Bitel

Fredric Hobbs' surreal 1973 film sees a giant mutant sheep terrorise the residents of a sleepy town in rural Nevada.

You Are Not My Mother

By Anton Bitel

A family find themselves troubled by malevolent familial forces in director Kate Dolan’s tense drama-horror.

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The frenetic thrills of Abel Ferrara’s abstract surveillance thriller

By Anton Bitel

Ethan Hawke stars in this poetic and strange thriller about a military operative chasing multiple threads in Rome.

Homebound

By Anton Bitel

A couple pay a visit to an ex-partner and her family in Sebastian Godwin’s effective domestic horror.

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Discover the dreamy delights of this Japanese detective noir

By Anton Bitel

Kaizo Hayashi’s ’80s crime drama To Sleep So as to Dream is a rich homage to Japan’s cinematic heritage.

Monstrous – first-look review

By Anton Bitel

Christina Ricci stars as a mother on the edge in director Chris Sivertson’s lakeside creature feature.

Deadstream – first-look review

By Anton Bitel

Joseph and Vanessa Winter blend horror and comedy in this entertaining haunted house freak-out.

Discover the surreal provocations of this Japanese anthology comedy

By Anton Bitel

Katsuhito Ishii, Hajime Ishimine and Shunichiro Miki’s offbeat Funky Forest: The First Contact is now available on Blu-ray.

Seven glimpses outward from the Glasgow Film Festival 2022

By Anton Bitel

We survey the most exciting titles screening at Glasgow’s premiere annual celebration of film.

Discover the indie horror comedy that made ‘mumblegore’ happen

By Anton Bitel

The Duplass brothers’ Baghead, starring Greta Gerwig in one of her first screen roles, is a charming love letter to DIY filmmaking.

Is this ’80s cult classic Japan’s answer to Mad Max?

By Anton Bitel

Crazy Thunder Road, director Sogo Ishii’s explosive anti-establishment thriller, is dedicated “to all crazy bikers”.

Something in the Dirt – first-look review

By Anton Bitel

Filmmaking duo Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead discover an ominous paranormal entity in their meta fifth feature.

Discover the trippy, transgressive pleasures of Mario Bava’s swansong

By Anton Bitel

The Italian genre maestro’s final film, 1977’s Shock, is a haunted house horror quite unlike any other.

Scream

By Anton Bitel

This stylishly directed “requel” trickily rakes over the grave of the original Scream films, but please, no more!

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Discover this ’80s cult classic that has to be seen to be believed

By Anton Bitel

Renee Harmon is the eponymous Lady Street Fighter in one of the most outrageous exploitation movies ever made.

Discover this goofy intergalactic comedy about star-crossed lovers

By Anton Bitel

Richard Benjamin’s hokey My Stepmother is an Alien is an effects-heavy time capsule of ’80s excess.

Discover the film that helped kickstart the found footage phenomenon

By Anton Bitel

Stefan Avalos and Lance Weiler’s 1998 horror mockumentary The Last Broadcast predates The Blair Witch Project.

Discover this cult Euro crime thriller from Umberto Lenzi

By Anton Bitel

The maverick Italian director’s 1976 film Free Hand for a Tough Cop is now available in the UK for the first time.

Discover Francis Ford Coppola’s Psycho-inspired directorial debut

By Anton Bitel

The Roger Corman-produced Dementia 13 is much more than a quickie Hitchcock ripoff, as this Director’s Cut proves.

Love and misery in Mike Leigh’s All or Nothing

By Anton Bitel

The director’s 2002 drama about life on a London housing estate is a film of bleak moments and occasional hope.

Why Dario Argento’s Deep Red remains a trashy masterpiece

By Anton Bitel

The Italian director’s 1975 giallo classic is being re-released in a newly restored, longer edit with additional scenes.

Antlers

By Anton Bitel

A horned entity stalks Keri Russell’s school teacher in director Scott Cooper’s allegorical American horror story.

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Denis Villeneuve: ‘I’m obsessed by the idea that humans can evolve’

By Anton Bitel

Quebec’s modernist sci-fi maestro talks big screens and small gestures, and how he brought the arid world of Arrakis to life.

Discover the fear and disillusionment of this cabin fever horror

By Anton Bitel

Toshiaki Toyoda’s Monsters Club sees a Unabomber-like character wage a private war from a remote cabin in the woods.

Discover the monstrous spectacle of this meta exploitation movie

By Anton Bitel

Marco Ferreri’s controversial The Ape Woman is a deeply cynical portrayal of masculinity bestialised and femininity reified.

Why Johnny Guitar remains a superior subversive western

By Anton Bitel

With its progressive gender politics and liberal undertow, Nicholas Ray’s 1954 film was way ahead of its time.

How Penelope Spheeris captured the wild side of American youth culture

By Anton Bitel

In 1983’s Suburbia and 1985’s The Boys Next Door, the Reagan era is a place of lay-offs, layabouts and general decay.

Discover this surreal Japanese erotic horror about artistic obsession

By Anton Bitel

Yasuzô Masumura’s macabre masterpiece Blind Beast paints an unnerving portrait of an artist and his muse.

Discover the eco-horror of this eerily prescient creature feature

By Anton Bitel

John Frankenheimer’s Prophecy sees Mother Nature exact revenge against a researcher couple in rural Maine.

Luz: The Flower of Evil

By Anton Bitel

A backwater preacher pushes his small congregation to its limits in this quasi-mystical Colombian parable.

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Discover this cutting-edge, Gothic-inspired ’80s slasher

By Anton Bitel

Starring Linda Blair as a textbook final girl, Tom DeSimone’s 1981 Hell Night offers an effective blend of horrors old and new.

Is True Romance the ultimate male movie fantasy?

By Anton Bitel

With its movie nerd hero, doting blonde heroine and shocking violence, this early ’90s cult classic is peak Tarantino.

Discover this postmodern, manga-inspired meditation on authorship

By Anton Bitel

Tezuka’s Barbara is a meta ode to the director’s late father, the ‘godfather’ of the Japanese graphic novel.

The Filmmaker’s House

By Anton Bitel

Marc Isaacs’ docu-fiction hybrid has fun subverting the sit-com format, but feels glib and exploitative.

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How Basic Instinct turned the erotic thriller on its head

By Anton Bitel

Paul Verhoeven’s subversive 1992 film is a Hitchcockian thriller with the kink brought to the surface.

The Amusement Park

By Anton Bitel

George A Romero’s long-lost public service announcement captures the inherent horrors of old age.

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The cult teen crime-drama that became a Gen X touchstone

By Anton Bitel

The angst-ridden Over the Edge from 1979 was a major influence on Richard Linklater and Kurt Cobain.

Discover this sweet-toothed Japanese corporate satire

By Anton Bitel

Yasuzô Masumura’s Giants and Toys from 1958, about rival confectionary companies, shows a nation in flux.

Discover this medieval monster movie inspired by Army of Darkness

By Anton Bitel

Jordan Downey’s fantasy revenge horror The Head Hunter pays homage to Sami Raimi’s Evil Dead series.

Discover the fast-paced thrills of this hard-boiled Euro crime drama

By Anton Bitel

Based on real events, Sergio Martino’s Silent Action from 1975 is as cynical as it is uncompromising.

Discover the film that brought together two of horror’s greatest stars

By Anton Bitel

The Black Cat was the first of six Universal pictures to star Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi.

Discover the sole horror film produced during the Soviet era

By Anton Bitel

Viy, Konstantin Ershov and Georgiy Kropachyov’s 1967 Gothic chiller, boasts spectacular visuals and effects.

The Columnist

By Anton Bitel

This blood-lashed black comedy takes aim at rightist trolls as it explores the limits of free speech.

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Discover this gross-out ’90s high school movie by way of Jurassic Park

By Anton Bitel

Starring Denise Richards and an animatronic dino, Tammy and the T-Rex is one of the decade’s campiest curios.

Discover this newly restored Hitchcock aping cult horror

By Anton Bitel

With its surreal premise and zoological themes, Richard Franklin’s Link remains a most curious creature.

Discover the devilish pleasures of this Roger Corman chiller

By Anton Bitel

The cult director’s 1964 Edgar Allan Poe adaptation The Masque of the Red Death sees Vincent Price sell his soul.

Discover the military thriller that put Park Chan-wook on the mapf

By Anton Bitel

2000’s JSA – Joint Security Area was one of the first significant films of the so-called Korean Wave.

Discover this early Samuel Fuller noir set in Tokyo’s criminal underworld

By Anton Bitel

House of Bamboo, one of the first American features to be shot in Japan, is as hard-boiled as they come.

Archenemy

By Anton Bitel

Joe Manganiello stars in this sort-of superhero origin story from director Adam Egypt Mortimer.

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Polytechnique remains a harrowing portrayal of violent misogyny

By Anton Bitel

Denis Villeneuve’s third feature, which respectfully dramatises a real-life school shooting, remains tragically relevant.

Patrick

By Anton Bitel

One man’s quest to find his missing hammer becomes a profound existential journey in this stripped-down comedy.

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Alexandre O Philippe on telling the inside story of The Exorcist

By Anton Bitel

The documentary maker discusses Leap of Faith, his spiritual excavation of William Friedkin’s 1973 masterpiece.

How Mothra introduced a new breed of kaiju creature feature

By Anton Bitel

Godzilla creator Ishiro Honda’s globe-trotting adventure is a strangely sweet family adventure.

Unwrap the yuletide thrills of this controversial Santa slasher

By Anton Bitel

The original theatrical cut of Charles E Sellier Jr’s Silent Night, Deadly Night is now available on Blu-ray.

Discover this retro-styled psychological horror from Shinya Tsukamoto

By Anton Bitel

The Tetsuo director is at his hyper-stylised, idiosyncratic best in this unnerving period tale.

His House

By Anton Bitel

Generational trauma and a fear of the unknown power Remi Weekes’ bone-chilling haunted house horror.

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Saint Maud

By Anton Bitel

A pious young nurse experiences an extreme crisis of faith in writer/director Rose Glass’ arresting psychodrama.

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Discover this gentle Japanese drama about an eccentric family

By Anton Bitel

The Taste of Tea marks an intriguing departure from director Katsuhito Ishii’s earlier Tarantino-esque capers.

Discover this anarchic ’90s portrait of youthful despair

By Anton Bitel

Director Fruit Chan’s 1997 indie Made in Hong Kong captures a group of characters – and a city – in transition.

Barking Dogs Never Bite

By Anton Bitel

Bong Joon-ho’s wryly funny social commentary is released for the first time in the UK courtesy of Curzon.

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Discover this era-spanning yakuza epic and its contemporary remake

By Anton Bitel

Kinji Fukasaku’s Graveyard of Honor and Takashi Miike’s 2002 update redefined the postwar Japanese gangster flick.

Koko-di Koko-da

By Anton Bitel

A grieving couple embark on a camping trip in writer/director Johannes Nyholm’s folkloric psychological horror.

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How The Man Who Laughs redefined early horror cinema

By Anton Bitel

Paul Leni’s 1928 chiller, starring Conrad Veidt as a grinning carnival performer, is one of the most important films of the late silent era.

Why Flash Gordon remains a singularly joyous comic book adaptation

By Anton Bitel

With its camp aesthetic and winking humour, Mike Hodges’ swash-buckling space romp is undeniably a product of its time.

Make Up

By Anton Bitel

A Cornish caravan park provides the backdrop to a young woman’s sexual (re)awakening in Claire Oakley’s impressive debut.

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Why The Game remains David Fincher’s trickiest thriller

By Anton Bitel

The director’s 1997 film contains a sly parody of the capitalist ideals underpinning the American Dream.

Discover the anarchic fun of this genre-defying Hong Kong blockbuster

By Anton Bitel

Ricky Lau’s 1985 hit Mr Vampire deftly combines knockabout comedy, martial arts, monster horror and wacky dancing.

Discover the sly social critique of this Reagan-era teen thriller

By Anton Bitel

Sean S Cunningham’s The New Kids sees James Spader terrorise a group of upwardly-mobile youths.

Discover the tender romance of this backwoods monster movie

By Anton Bitel

After Midnight confirms co-directors Jeremy Gardner and Christian Stella as among most exciting talents working in American independent horror today.

Discover the out-of-time futurism of this ’90s Philip K Dick adaptation

By Anton Bitel

Christian Duguay’s Screamers, starring RoboCop’s Peter Weller, was originally conceived back in 1981.

Discover the dark side of virtual reality is this modern tech thriller

By Anton Bitel

Yedidya Gorsetman’s 2018 film Empathy, Inc explores themes of identity, alterity and technophobia.

Discover this awe-inspiring collection of Japanese ghost stories

By Anton Bitel

Masaki Kobayashi’s Oscar-winning 1964 anthology film Kwaidan is now available on Blu-ray for the first time.

Dreamland

By Anton Bitel

The director and star of cult horror hit Pontypool reunite for a hard-boiled hitman noir.

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Discover this bizarre B-movie riff on The Exorcist

By Anton Bitel

Warner Bros took legal action over 1974’s Beyond the Door, but its differences from Friedkin’s film are more striking than its similarities.

Is this the pinnacle of Japanese pink cinema?

By Anton Bitel

Atsushi Yamatoya’s 1967 Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wasteland subverts expectations of this softcore genre.

Discover the religious allegory of this epic King Hu wuxia

By Anton Bitel

The Chinese master’s 1979 Raining in the Mountain is now available on home video for the first time in the UK.

Discover the final horror from one of the genre’s unsung greats

By Anton Bitel

José Ramón Larraz’s slasher swansong, Deadly Manor, features some playfully misdirection and an insane ending.

Sonic the Hedgehog

By Anton Bitel

A scene-stealing Jim Carrey just about sustains this fast, fun and forgettable video game crossover.

review

First Love

By Anton Bitel

A young romance blooms one wild night in Tokyo in director Takashi Miike’s high-energy caper.

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Daniel Isn’t Real

By Anton Bitel

A traumatised man summons his former imaginary friend in Adam Egypt Mortimer’s knotty psychological thriller.

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Discover this classic ’80s slasher with a contemporary twist

By Anton Bitel

José Ramón Larraz’s Edge of the Axe buries several over-used tropes of the genre.

The Turning

By Anton Bitel

Floria Sigismondi’s long-delayed update of ‘The Turn of the Screw’ finally surfaces – was the wait worth it?

review

Discover the ocular nightmare of this cult Lucio Fulci horror

By Anton Bitel

The visionary Italian director’s 1981 film The Beyond remains one of his most unnerving, transgressive works.

Why The Exorcist III remains a fascinating, flawed horror sequel

By Anton Bitel

A sense of creative conflict infuses William Peter Blatty’s spiritual follow-up to William Friedkin’s 1973 classic.

Revisiting Paul Verhoeven’s sexually explicit answer to Grease

By Anton Bitel

The 1980 coming-of-ager Spetters is one of the Dutch master’s most uncompromising and controversial works.

Discover the sleazy cautionary tale of this hitchhiking thriller

By Anton Bitel

Irvin Berwick’s cult 1983 film Hitch Hike to Hell is an American nightmare writ large.

Discover the allegorical terror of this landmark silent era horror

By Anton Bitel

Paul Wegener’s nightmarish take on the Golem of Jewish folklore introduced German Expressionism to the world.

Little Monsters

By Anton Bitel

Lupita Nyong’o defends a group of school kids from a zombie horde in Abe Forsythe’s tame comedy-horror.

review

Doctor Sleep

By Anton Bitel

Ewan McGregor retreads familiar ground in this sequel to Stephen King’s (and Stanley Kubrick’s) The Shining.

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Is An American Werewolf in London a love story?

By Anton Bitel

Romance, tragedy and horror combine to potent effect in director John Landis’ iconic 1981 feature.

Discover the troubling eroticism of this twisted ’70s thriller

By Anton Bitel

Stanley H Brassloff’s Toys Are Not for Children centres on a doll-like heroine with severe daddy issues.

Discover the sordid pleasures of this late-career Mario Bava slasher

By Anton Bitel

The Italian horror maestro’s 1971 film A Bay of Blood remains one of his most shocking works.

Programmers Picks from the 2019 BFI London Film Festival

By Anton Bitel

Away from the showpiece gala screenings, these are the films worth seeking out at this year’s LFF.

Rambo: Last Blood

By Anton Bitel

Rambo starts off breaking horses before breaking skulls in this strangely laconic revenge fantasy involving the Mexican cartels.

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Does The Hills Have Eyes II contain that Wes Craven slasher magic?

By Anton Bitel

A new Blu-ray of this 1984 cheapjack sequel shows there's more value to it than meets the eye.

IT Chapter Two

By Anton Bitel

Time stands still in more ways than one as this dull rehash of Andy Muschietti’s 2017 horror overstays its welcome.

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Crawl

By Anton Bitel

The director of Piranha 3D goes back into the water for this alligator-based creature feature starring Kaya Scodelario.

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Memory: The Origins of Alien

By Anton Bitel

This documentary reveals how HP Lovecraft, Francis Bacon and Alejandro Jodorowsky inspired Ridley Scott’s sci-fi opus.

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How Cruising exposes the dangers of internalised homophobia

By Anton Bitel

William Friedkin’s 1980 thriller casts an unwavering eye over New York’s gay S&M subculture.

Revisiting Paul Verhoeven’s Hollow Man and its straight-to-video sequel

By Anton Bitel

Both film are now available as part of a special collector’s edition box set.

The subversive fantasy of Catherine Breillat’s Romance

By Anton Bitel

The French auteur’s 1999 erotic drama challenges the viewer to separate sex from love.

Kursk: The Last Mission

By Anton Bitel

Thomas Vinterberg reconstructs the K-141 Kursk submarine disaster but throws in a few too many gimmicks.

review

Annabelle Comes Home

By Anton Bitel

The demonic doll is back playing paranormal havoc as this horror franchise points to its future.

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Knife + Heart

By Anton Bitel

A masked killer targets Vanessa Paradis’ adult film producer in Yann Gonzalez’s neon camp thriller.

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In Fabric

By Anton Bitel

Peter Strickland spins a yarn about a haunted dress in this fashionable freakout.

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Discover the nightmarish imagery of this psycho-supernatural oddity

By Anton Bitel

A man wrestles with his telepathic powers in Roger Christian’s disturbing directorial debut.

Discover the pressure-cooker tension of this alien invasion thriller

By Anton Bitel

Robert Wise’s 1971 sci-fi The Andromeda Strain tapped into space race and Cold War anxieties.

#Like

By Anton Bitel

A teenager exacts revenge on her sister’s cyber stalker in Sarah Pirozek’s socially-conscious thriller.

review

Ma

By Anton Bitel

Octavia Spencer reckons with teenage trauma in this suspenseful and darkly funny smalltown horror.

review

Discover the director’s cut of Olivier Assays’ Demonlover

By Anton Bitel

The French filmmaker explores the dark side of the internet age in this erotic thriller from 2002.

Godzilla: King of the Monsters

By Anton Bitel

The third instalment in Legendary’s MonsterVerse franchise is a clash of the titans on an epic scale.

review

Discover the punkish energy of manga-inspired coming of ager

By Anton Bitel

Toshiaki Toyoda’s Blue Spring perfectly captures the fleeting excitement of youth.

Styx

By Anton Bitel

Susanne Wolff plays a woman lost at sea in this smart nautical allegory from Wolfgang Fischer.

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Thriller

By Anton Bitel

This retro-styled slasher from first-time director Dallas Jackson has a distinctly modern flavour.

review

Hellboy

By Anton Bitel

Neil Marshall’s reboot finds our red-skinned hero caught on the horn’s of his own destined dilemma.

review

Discover the feminist subtext of this Finnish folk horror

By Anton Bitel

A newlywed woman is transformed into a vampiric beast in Erik Blomberg’s supernatural tale.

Virtual Arthouse: Tsai Ming-liang’s The Deserted at the Taiwan Film Festival

By Anton Bitel

An 8K presentation of the director’s VR project provides a uniquely immersive experience.

Discover Australia’s dread-filled answer to The Shining

By Anton Bitel

Tony Williams’ 1982 horror Next of Kin bears all the hallmarks of classic Victorian gothic.

Discover the post-Scream pleasures of this ’90s meta-slasher

By Anton Bitel

Daniel Liatowitsch and David Todd Ocvirk’s Kolobos preempted the rise of reality TV.

Border

By Anton Bitel

A customs officer falls in love with a strange traveller in Ali Abbasi’s twisted modern romance.

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Discover the demonic pleasures of this ’80s possession horror

By Anton Bitel

Occult thrills abound in director Camilo Vila’s New Orleans-set exorcism fable The Unholy.

A new Berberian Sound Studio adaptation brings aural chills to the stage

By Anton Bitel

Joel Horwood and Tom Scutt’s production brilliantly amplifies Peter Strickland’s 2012 film.

Discover the wild ride of this Hammer-esque ’70s Euro-horror

By Anton Bitel

Eugenio Martín’s Horror Express is like a locomotive mash-up of The Thing and Murder on the Orient Express.

Discover the first-person POV terror of Dario Argento’s Opera

By Anton Bitel

The horror maestro’s 1987 giallo is released in a special new 2K restoration this month.

Two decades on Waterworld remains a mad, fascinating folly

By Anton Bitel

A new restoration reveals the insane ambition of this bloated Kevin Costner vehicle.

Discover this shocking ’70s deep cut to middle-class America

By Anton Bitel

A babysitter is terrorised by an anonymous called in Fred Walton’s proto-slasher When a Stranger Calls.

Discover the retro camp charm of this Razzie winning comedy horror

By Anton Bitel

In 1988’s Elvira: Mistress of the Dark, Cassandra Peterson’s heroine proudly display her two best assets.

Discover the erotic grotesquery of this Japanese triptych

By Anton Bitel

The prolific filmmaker Teruo Ishii invented a whole new subgenrre with 1969’s bizarre Orgies of Edo.

The bleak futurism of John Carpenter’s Escape from New York

By Anton Bitel

The genre maestro’s dystopian thriller feels eerily prescient in its depiction of a broken police state.

Suspiria

By Anton Bitel

Luca Guadagnino puts a bold allegorical spin on Dario Argento’s baroque horror classic.

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Lulz and Luz at the Soho Horror Film Festival 2018

By Anton Bitel

Tilman Singer’s intense psychodrama was among the highlights of the inaugural genre showcase.

Overlord

By Anton Bitel

Two US soldiers make a surprising discovery behind enemy lines in this World War Two horror from Julius Avery.

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How Candyman reflected the fears of urban society

By Anton Bitel

Bernard Rose’s cult 1992 horror, based on a Clive Barker short story, tackles sex, class and race in inner-city Chicago.

Discover the animalistic terror of George A Romero’s first studio movie

By Anton Bitel

The genre maestro’s 1998 Monkey Shines was dubbed ‘An Experiment In Fear’ – and with good reason.

Programmers Picks from the 2018 BFI London Film Festival

By Anton Bitel

Personal recommendations to seek out during the upcoming edition of the UK’s biggest film event.

Cheap Thrills: In Praise of The Evil Dead

By Anton Bitel

On the envelope-pushing effects work of Sam Raimi’s hand-tooled gorefest, set for re-release this Halloween.

Discover the deranged melodrama of this maternal horror

By Anton Bitel

Ted Post’s 1973 film The Baby takes the notion of the dysfunctional family to a whole other level.

The House with a Clock in Its Walls

By Anton Bitel

Eli Roth’s latest offering is a Harry Potter-fied version of a 1950s haunted house horror.

review

Discover the ferocious insanity of this cult Japanese horror

By Anton Bitel

Teruo Ishii’s Horrors of Malformed Men contains one of cinema’s most straightforwardly stark raving villains.

Upgrade

By Anton Bitel

A man finds himself aided in his quest for revenge by an unusual piece of tech in this slick thriller from Leigh Whannell.

review

Discover the ethical outrage of this erotic Japanese drama

By Anton Bitel

Akio Jissôji’s celebrated – and controversial – This Transient Life boldly challenges social convention.

Discover the grainy depravity of this notorious cannibal horror

By Anton Bitel

Umberto Lenzi’s Cannibal Ferox fully deserves its reputation as one of the genre’s toughest watches.

Discover the co-ed carving thrills of this classic ’80s slasher

By Anton Bitel

Shot in a real abandoned asylum, Richard Friedman’s gore-fest shows a subgenre in microcosm.

The First Purge

By Anton Bitel

This Purge origin story presents a timely dystopian vision of America’s class, race and culture wars.

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Discover the Lynchian mysteries of this backwoods meta-horror

By Anton Bitel

Resolution, from filmmaking duo Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, is a true original.

Adrift

By Anton Bitel

Shailene Woodley and Sam Claflin play a young couple lost at sea in Baltasar Kormákur’s survival romance.

review

Discover the human drama of this post-apocalyptic sci-fi

By Anton Bitel

The end of the world is just the beginning in Geoff Murphy’s The Quiet Earth from 1985.

Discover the time-skipping eroticism of these classic Japanese animes

By Anton Bitel

Third Window Films are releasing two Animerama series films from Astro Boy creator Osamu Tezuka.

Discover the haunting tragedy of this Polish possession horror

By Anton Bitel

Marcin Wrona’s 2015 film Demon puts a modern twist on the Jewish legend of the dybbuk.

How eXistenZ predicted the gaming industry’s dark future

By Anton Bitel

David Cronenberg’s 1999 tech-thriller sees Jude Law and Jennifer Jason Leigh enter a strange VR world.

Allure

By Anton Bitel

Evan Rachel Wood stars in this twisty erotic thriller about a cleaner who strikes up a friendship with a client’s daughter.

review

Discover the hypnotic mystery of this nihilistic thriller

By Anton Bitel

An entrancing existential streak runs through Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s 1997 film, Cure.

Discover the post-apocalyptic nightmare of this landmark social drama

By Anton Bitel

Mick Jackson’s BBC telemovie Threads imagines the devastating fallout of nuclear war.

Wonderstruck

By Anton Bitel

Todd Haynes’ wistful adaptation of Brian Selznick’s novel is a tad too saccharine for its own good.

review

A Quiet Place

By Anton Bitel

There’s much to admire about this muted horror from actor-director John Krasinksi.

review

Discover the fragmented horrors of this Robert Altman psychodrama

By Anton Bitel

The writer/director’s idiosyncratic 1972 film Images is ripe for rediscovery.

Horror highlights from Glasgow FrightFest 2018

By Anton Bitel

Some of the year’s best and most challenging genre titles were served up over a truly chilling weekend.

Discover Henri-George Clouzot’s psychedelic swansong

By Anton Bitel

The French director’s 1968 La Prisonnière aka Woman in Chains is both compelling and perverse.

The generation-spanning human drama of Hal Hartley’s Henry Fool trilogy

By Anton Bitel

Made over 17 years, this unlikely series is among the indie writer/director’s finest achievements.

Discover the grisly drama of this surgery-based Southern gothic

By Anton Bitel

John Grissmer’s Scalpel, about a psychopathic plastic surgeon, has been rescued from VHS obscurity.

Discover the proto-giallo pleasures of Dario Argento’s debut feature

By Anton Bitel

A 4K restoration of The Bird with the Crystal Plumage is being released.

Discover the Psycho-esque thrills of this ’70s serial killer romance

By Anton Bitel

Peter Collinson’s Straight on Till Morning offers a grisly vision of Britain in the 1970s.

The low, lurid pleasures of Dario Argento’s The Cat O’ Nine Tails

By Anton Bitel

The Italian director’s 1971 giallo shows a visionary film artist still finding his feet.

The Unseen

By Anton Bitel

There’s shades of Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now in this twisty mystery thriller from writer/director Gary Sinyor.

review

The horror of coming-of-age in Brian De Palma’s Carrie

By Anton Bitel

Adolescence is key to everything in this seminal Stephen King adaptation from 1974.

The surreal, singular genius of Dario Argento’s Suspiria

By Anton Bitel

Forty years on, the director’s nightmarish gialli has lost none of its potency.

Most Beautiful Island

By Anton Bitel

Ana Asensio gives an assured debut as writer and director with this haunting story about a migrant woman in the Big Apple.

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The Prince of Nothingwood

By Anton Bitel

Salim Shaheen, Afghanistan’s singular, strutting auteur, is the subject of this wonderfully entertaining doc.

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Discover the patriarchy skewering thrills of this Japanese splatterfest

By Anton Bitel

Sion Sono’s fantasy horror TAG features one of the most arresting opening sequences in movie history.

Discover this yuletide slasher that inspired John Carpenter’s Halloween

By Anton Bitel

Black Christmas contains one of the earliest examples of the ‘final girl’ trope in horror cinema.

How John Carpenter’s The Thing became a horror/sci-fi classic

By Anton Bitel

The director’s newly-restored 1982 film continues to stand the test of time.

Is this the greatest werewolf movie ever made?

By Anton Bitel

Joe Dante’s The Howling is a perfect blend of modern horror and practical effects.

Programmers Picks from the 2017 BFI London Film Festival

By Anton Bitel

The players behind this year’s festival offer their personal viewing recommendations.

Discover the classic Gothic chills of this Mario Bava masterpiece

By Anton Bitel

Kill, Baby... Kill! contains one of cinema’s earliest evil children.

Discover this Japanese epic about the horrors of war

By Anton Bitel

Shinya Tsukamoto’s Fires on the Plain is a harrowing reminder of the futility and madness of human conflict.

The Limehouse Golem

By Anton Bitel

Director Juan Carlos Medina takes us on a grisly tour through Victorian London in this terrific gothic chiller.

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Discover the voyeuristic thrills of this gory ’70s giallo

By Anton Bitel

Sergio Martino’s schlocky 1973 film Torso offers a masterclass in the male gaze.

Discover this shocking precursor to A Nightmare on Elm Street

By Anton Bitel

JS Cardone’s The Slayer also centres around a vindictive bogeyman.

Is Psycho II the most misunderstood sequel ever made?

By Anton Bitel

Richard Franklin’s follow-up to the Hitchcock classic is a chilling horror in its own right.

David Lynch: The Art Life

By Anton Bitel

The cult filmmaker reflects on his remarkable career in this compelling docu-portrait.

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Discover the perverse allegory of this film about love after death

By Anton Bitel

Jörg Buttgereit’s necrophilia-themed 1991 horror Nekromantik 2 is now out on Blu-ray/DVD.

Discover the paranormal chills of this classic haunted house horror

By Anton Bitel

The Amityville Horror is one of the great ’70s genre films.

Discover this ’80s slasher that’s an early prelude to The Babadook

By Anton Bitel

Ovidio G Assonitis’ Madhouse similarly concerns a damaged woman’s psychotic meltdown.

The Red Turtle

By Anton Bitel

There’s an ecological thread running though this delightful animated fable from Studio Ghibli.

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Discover the beastly pleasures of this Japanese werewolf romp

By Anton Bitel

“Sonny” Chiba-starring Japanese genre hybrid Wolf Guy is now available on home video.

Discover the psychological subtext of this shocking ’80s horror

By Anton Bitel

Sidney J Furie’s The Entity is deeply disturbing but essential viewing.

How to run a successful independent film company

By Anton Bitel

Jason Blum, producer of The Purge, Insidious and Get Out, offers valuable insight into low-budget movie making.

Harmonium

By Anton Bitel

A young family comes apart at the seams in this gripping drama from Japanese writer/director Kôji Fukada.

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Is this the greatest film ever made about food?

By Anton Bitel

Juzo Itami’s ‘ramen western’ Tampopo – finally out on Blu-ray – is a culinary romp like no other.

The Endless – first look review

By Anton Bitel

Directors Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead serve up a meta meditation on cults in this smart genre-blurring thriller.

Discover the amateur insanity of this Japanese Evil Dead rip-off

By Anton Bitel

Shinichi Fukazawa’s Super-8 gem Bloody Muscle Body Builder in Hell is a throwback to ’80s horror.

The Belko Experiment

By Anton Bitel

Greg McLean and James Gunn turn just another day at the office into full-blown battle royale.

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Raw

By Anton Bitel

Cannibalism goes to school in director Julia Ducournau’s extreme French fable.

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Discover the stomach-turning thrills of this infamous ’80s slasher

By Anton Bitel

Juan Piquer Simón’s Pieces is among the goriest films ever made.

Discover the schlock and gore of this sleazy ’80s horror

By Anton Bitel

Undead Nazi soldiers and gratuitous nudity overflows in Zombie Lake, now out on DVD.

Discover the anti-military allegory of this classic Jack Nicholson buddy movie

By Anton Bitel

The actor delivers arguably his finest hour in Hal Ashby’s The Last Detail.

Shin Godzilla – first look review

By Anton Bitel

This latest reboot of Japan’s longest-running movie franchise is big, fun and very dumb.

A Cure for Wellness

By Anton Bitel

Gore Verbinski’s macabre asylum thriller offers an intoxicating blend of mystery and surrealism.

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Get Out

By Anton Bitel

Jordan Peele’s thoroughly modern horror examines racism in America with a sharp, darkly funny eye.

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Discover the sly social critique of this Blaxploitation classic

By Anton Bitel

Is Gilbert Moses’ Willie Dynamite a paean to pimp life or a flamboyant allegory of the American Dream?

Is this the most extreme 108 minutes in the history of Japanese cinema?

By Anton Bitel

Destruction Babies is raucous rebel filmmaking at its brutal best.

Discover the strange legacy of this cross-border ’70s classic

By Anton Bitel

Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia has inspired everything from Barton Fink to Swiss Army Man.

Split

By Anton Bitel

James McAvoy is on spine-tingling form in this effective thriller from M Night Shyamalan.

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Discover the retrofuturist thrills of this modern anime classic

By Anton Bitel

Metropolis, Rintaro’s 2001 manga spin-off, is coming to DVD.

Endless poetry

By Anton Bitel

Alejandro Jodorowsky embarks on a(nother) mad, metaphysical quest for identity.

review

Discover the primal thrills of this prehistoric B-movie

By Anton Bitel

Dinosaurs are well and good, but One Million Years BC proves it is sex that really sells.

Discover the stomach-turning horrors of this Anne Hathaway baiting thriller

By Anton Bitel

Adrian Tofei goes full psycho-stalker in Be My Cat: A Film for Anne.

The unbearable intensity of Abel Ferrara’s The Driller Killer

By Anton Bitel

A troubled man cracks under immense pressure in the director’s cult 1976 thriller.

Discover the meta genius of this rough-cut cinematic gem

By Anton Bitel

Japanese director Eiji Uchida’s Lowlife Love is now available to own on DVD and Blu-ray.

The Wailing

By Anton Bitel

An outbreak of madness and murder takes hold of a small South Korean town in this superlative thriller.

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Discover the next door terror of this socially-conscious horror

By Anton Bitel

Law abiding becomes a matter of life and death in Marcus Dunstan’s The Neighbour.

Ouija: Origin of Evil

By Anton Bitel

Director Mike Flanagan dramatically improves the fortunes of this would-be franchise with a smart, scary-as-hell horror.

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How genre cinema fuelled our collective fear of killer clowns

By Anton Bitel

These funny-faced pranksters continue to inspire a special blend of amusement and unease – and movies are partly to blame.

Discover the hallucinatory horrors of one man’s mental collapse

By Anton Bitel

Joseph Sims-Dennett’s taut psychological thriller Observance is out now on DVD.

Programmers Picks from the 2016 BFI London Film Festival

By Anton Bitel

Need help navigating the massive LFF line-up? Here are 10 more left-field gems for you to seek out.

Discover the freewheelin’ madness of this exploitation-era biker movie

By Anton Bitel

Don Sharp’s Psychomania is now available on DVD and Blu-ray.

Aloys

By Anton Bitel

Swiss director Tobias Nölle stuns with this haunting feature debut about alienation and hope.

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The Girl with All the Gifts

By Anton Bitel

A new star rises in Sennia Nanua who plays a preteen zombie who’s still showing signs of life.

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Hunt for the Wilderpeople

By Anton Bitel

Taika Waititi lays on the charm in this storybook adventure yarn about a young Maori orphan.

review

Blair Witch

By Anton Bitel

The long-awaited horror sequel no one saw coming is here – and it’s scary as hell.

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Discover the multi-levelled madness of this Saw-esque house horror

By Anton Bitel

Darren Lynn Bousman’s gory latest, Abattoir, is now available to buy and stream.

The 20 best FrightFest films ever – part 2

By Anton Bitel

Find out what’s top of the pile in our gore-drenched salute to the horror cinema bonanza.

The 20 best FrightFest films ever – part 1

By Anton Bitel

Are these the creepiest cuts from the dark heart of modern horror cinema?

Discover the T&A titillation of this homecooked horror

By Anton Bitel

Cannibalism and nudity abound in Microwave Massacre, now available on Blu-ray and DVD.

Discover the criss-crossing chills of this horror anthology

By Anton Bitel

The blood-soaked, multi-authored Southbound is now available on DVD and Blu-ray.

The Purge: Election Year

By Anton Bitel

The second sequel to 2013’s dystopian satire feels eerily prescient in its depiction of a polarised America.

review

Discover the grotesque silliness of this Super 8 splatterfest

By Anton Bitel

JR Bookwalter’s Evil Dead-inspired feature debut The Dead Next Door is now available on DVD.

Star Trek Beyond

By Anton Bitel

Simon Pegg brings the funny on script detail in this rollicking second sequel in the latest Trek adventure.

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Why The Dark Knight is the greatest blockbuster of the 21st century

By Anton Bitel

In Christopher Nolan’s urban epic, Batman takes on The Joker… or should that be, George W Bush takes on Osama Bin Laden?

Discover the progressive identity politics of this early ’90s thriller

By Anton Bitel

Suture, Scott McGehee and David Siegel’s black-and-white shocker, is out on DVD.

Finding Dory

By Anton Bitel

Pixar’s latest transoceanic odyssey is a pixel-perfect comedy about learning to overcome adversity and disability.

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Discover the progressive attitude of this taboo-busting psychodrama

By Anton Bitel

Robert Altman’s second feature, That Cold Day in the Park, is now available on Blu-ray and DVD.

Discover the relentless torment of this home invasion thriller

By Anton Bitel

Adam Schindler’s directorial debut Intruders offers a suspenseful blend of tragedy and trauma.

Warcraft: The Beginning

By Anton Bitel

Despite the silly names and cheesy nerdism there’s plenty of fun to be had in Duncan Jones’ video game adaptation.

review

Discover the hidden history of this subversive ’70s coming-of-ager

By Anton Bitel

Alan Clarke’s made-for-TV Penda’s Fen is getting a long-overdue home ents release.

Discover the amnesiac chills of this Alice in Wonderland-esque thriller

By Anton Bitel

Indonesian writer/director Joko Anwar’s 2012 film Ritual is now available on DVD.

Alice Through the Looking Glass

By Anton Bitel

There’s charm, humour and no shortage of strangeness in this radical rewriting of Lewis Carroll’s classic tale.

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Jeremy Saulnier: ‘The motivations for the violence are all very practical’

By Anton Bitel

The Green Room director offers some sage advice on how to ride the wave of your first indie hit.

Discover the post-traumatic insanity of this atheist horror

By Anton Bitel

William Peter Blatty’s madballs directorial debut, The Ninth Configuration, is finally available on DVD and Blu-ray.

Discover the eerie mystery of this lost erotic horror

By Anton Bitel

José Ramón Larraz’s chilling 1974 film Symptoms is coming to Blu-ray and DVD this month.

Discover the radical world view of this apocalyptic exorcist movie

By Anton Bitel

Marc Carreté’s Barcelona-set horror debut Asmodexia is out on DVD this month.

High-Rise

By Anton Bitel

Ben Wheatley serves up a sensational 21st century satire that’s funny and frightening in equal measure.

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Discover the postmodern wit of this mesmerising metahorror

By Anton Bitel

David Winters’ self-reflexive slasher from 1982, The Last Horror Film, is now available on DVD.

The Ones Below

By Anton Bitel

Director David Farr delivers a top-notch domestic drama starring a maternally-conflicted Clémence Poésy.

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Family fragments and domestic disruptions at Glasgow FrightFest

By Anton Bitel

Norwegian disaster movie The Wave was among the highlights of Scotland’s annual carnival of genre.

Discover the strange romance of this alien invasion drama

By Anton Bitel

There lots to admire in Michael Shumway’s directorial debut about an all-out extra-terrestrial invasion.

Discover the psychological horrors of this microbudget slasher

By Anton Bitel

Derek Mungor’s perspective-flipping horror, You Are Not Alone, is available on Blu-ray and DVD this month.

Discover this Taiwanese epic that brought kung fu to the art-house

By Anton Bitel

King Hu’s seminal ’70s wuxia is finally arriving on Blu-ray and DVD later this month.

Discover the crazed cult charm of Cannon’s Ninja Trilogy

By Anton Bitel

Classic ’80s actioners Enter the Ninja, Revenge of the Ninja and Ninja III: The Domination are coming to Blu-ray and DVD.

The Forbidden Room

By Anton Bitel

Lose yourself in the mind-bending majesty of Guy Maddin and Evan Johnson’s cine odyssey.

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Macbeth

By Anton Bitel

A vital reimagining of ʻThe Scottish Play’ with stellar turns from Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard.

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The Treatment

By Anton Bitel

This harrowing Belgian noir thriller explores the subject of paedophila with great verve and tact.

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P’tit Quinquin

By Anton Bitel

The high priest of gloom, Bruno Dumont, returns with a comedy which is part Jacques Tati, part Twin Peaks.

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The Tribe

By Anton Bitel

Miroslav Slaboshpitsky’s punishingly bleak tribute to silent cinema and modern disability is a great debut.

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Girlhood

By Anton Bitel

This quietly radical and poetic teen drama depicts the black experience in the suburbs of Paris.

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The Tale of the Princess Kaguya

By Anton Bitel

Studio Ghibli does it again with this vibrant, bittersweet adaptation of a classic Japanese folk tale.

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It Follows

By Anton Bitel

A petrifying and refreshingly original horror movie from American name-to-watch, David Robert Mitchell.

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The Double

By Anton Bitel

Richard Ayoade branches out into steampunk paranoia with this feisty and funny adaptation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s 1846 novella.

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Frances Ha

By Anton Bitel

Ahoy sexy! In which the great Greta Grewig stakes a convincing claim to the thrown of most loveable living screen actress.

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Byzantium

By Anton Bitel

Bloodsuckers hit the beach in Neil Jordan’s woozy and extremely violent British noir.

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The Lords of Salem

By Anton Bitel

An indulgent and original horror bonanza from auteur-in-the making, Rob Zombie.

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Beyond the Hills

By Anton Bitel

Palme d’Or winner Cristian Mungiu returns with a searing love story that riffs on both The Exorcist and Black Narcissus.

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Super

By Anton Bitel

You won’t see a masked vigilante movie more morally responsible or edgy this side of The Dark Knight.

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Last Year at Marienbad (1961)

By Anton Bitel

Alain Resnais’ 1961 classic is as elegant in its symmetries as it is perplexing in its paradoxes.

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13 Assassins

By Anton Bitel

Takashi Miike’s magnificent 13 marks both the end of an era and the boundary of a genre.

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Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole

By Anton Bitel

Despite all the flying, its jarring mismatch of hyperrealism and unabashed fantasy stops it soaring.

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Down Terrace

By Anton Bitel

In his low-budget feature debut, Ben Wheatley brings a very English working-class brand of domestic banality to his evil.

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Alice in Wonderland

By Anton Bitel

Tim Burton has always been a visual storyteller and his Alice is a source of visual wonder.

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Ponyo

By Anton Bitel

At its heart, Ponyo is a film about a global catastrophe, but the apocalypse has seldom seemed so joyous or tender.

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Fast & Furious

By Anton Bitel

The biggest auto-based franchise around gets the high-spec reboot it probably didn’t deserve.

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Tony Manero

By Anton Bitel

Pablo Larraín’s Saturday Night Fever-inspired drama is a damning indictment of the Pinochet dictatorship.

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Bronson

By Anton Bitel

Tom Hardy delivers a knockout performance as Britain’s most notorious convict in this bruising psychodrama.

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About Little White Lies

Little White Lies was established in 2005 as a bi-monthly print magazine committed to championing great movies and the talented people who make them. Combining cutting-edge design, illustration and journalism, we’ve been described as being “at the vanguard of the independent publishing movement.” Our reviews feature a unique tripartite ranking system that captures the different aspects of the movie-going experience. We believe in Truth & Movies.

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