An author returns to his hometown of Jerusalem’s Lot in search of inspiration for his next book, only to discover that the townspeople are being attacked by a bloodthirsty vampire. (IMDB)
Writer Gary Dauberman intended to make vampires frightening again. He wanted to get away from the sexier, more romanticized undead that have infested pop culture for much of the past quarter century. Even if we enjoy Twilight and The Vampire Diaries, it felt good to see the return of ugly and purely evil vampires.
Salem’s Lot is a two hours long fantastic movie, stuffed with terrific actors who create memorable characters. The dialogues are great, some of it made us genuinely laugh. The effects are top notch and there was a real tension in some scenes.
This is not the first adaptation of Stephen King’s novel. Previously, it was adapted for television: the 1979 mini series Salem’s Lot (1979). A follow up in 1987 called A Return to Salem’s Lot (1987) was created for the big screen, and a TV mini series Salem’s Lot (2004) in 2004.
We haven’t seen the other versions and we didn’t read the book. However, we enjoyed this adaptation very much and I would recommend the movie to any vampire fan.
After raising an unnervingly talented spider in secret, 12-year-old Charlotte must face the facts about her pet-and fight for her family’s survival-when the once-charming creature rapidly transforms into a giant, flesh-eating monster. (IMDB)
Even though the movie is set in an old apartment complex in Brooklyn, Sting is actually an Australian movie. You can sometimes spot some discrepancies, the doorknobs are about 3 ft from the ground in the U.S., here the knobs are halfway up the doors. When showing a street view, the cars are parked on the “wrong side” of the streets compared to the U.S.
The movie lets itself watch. However, even if I’m not exactly a fan of spiders (it’s getting better with the age), Sting didn’t really manage to make me feel uncomfortable, not the way the 90s cult movie Arachnophobia did in its time. It’s probably due to the fact that the movie doesn’t capitalise on the spider being a small and hairy creeper but, instead, a monster.
Even if it isn’t as terrifying as I anticipated, Sting isn’t a bad movie, it’s fast paced enough to keep you entertained and it has a few good moments.
Soforah’s alcohol free tiramisu, the companion of all our celebrations
As if turning 50 wouldn’t be hard enough, this year’s birthday was also the first time that I would celebrate my birthday without a beer or any alcoholic beverage. I have a problem with alcohol, but not what you would think…
On top of our allergies and intolerances, Inge and I are both very sensitive to histamine. Diamine oxydase (DAO) is the enzyme that helps the body get rid of histamine. Alcohol is very armful to DAO. Which means that when we drink alcohol, histamine isn’t properly eliminated and we get all sorts of reactions from rashes and flare ups to anxiety.
Throughout the years, we’ve tried to ignore it, we still drank beers on Fridays and celebrations. Even with a reduced quantity (2 or 3 beers), the consequences on our health worsen. We noticed how better we would feel without alcohol. For many years, we’ve tried to quit it entirely but there was always a good reason to make an exception.
But, that’s not all… While we were reducing our alcohol intake, we noticed that we were actually having a better time when we were keeping 100% alcohol free. We were more enthusiastic, more motivated and, generally, happier. The other day, Soforah asked me: “If your memory was a hard drive and you’d be reaching maximum capacity, which remembrances would you keep?”. Surprisingly, none of them would be a time when alcohol was present in my life.
I don’t say that it should be the case for everyone. I’m a big fan of letting the people choose whatever makes them happy and this isn’t an attempt at converting anyone. But, in my case, on top of my Histamine problem, I think that alcohol always took too much space. I’ve been drinking enough in my life to know exactly what my world looks like when I let that door open, and I don’t like it.
No filters were used in this picture!
So, here I was, a few weeks before my 50th birthday, trying to come up with a plan for the celebration. I can tell you, it has been hell and I’m not sure I would have made it without the help of my sweet wife. Thanks to her amazing support, planning and cooking skills, we both had an amazing time. We visited the Christmas village, we went to a restaurant and we ended up eating the dessert at home while watching the movie Abigail. Everything happened fantastically and entirely without alcohol. The rest of December should be a breeze because Christmas and New Year are not really linked to alcohol for us, so no pressure… I hope to make another post like this in December ’25, celebrating a complete year without a drop.
Meanwhile, we both wish everyone an amazing holiday season!
In 1980s Hollywood, adult film star and aspiring actress Maxine Minx finally gets her big break. But as a mysterious killer stalks the starlets of Hollywood, a trail of blood threatens to reveal her sinister past. (IMDB)
I must start this post with a warning: If you haven’t seen the movie X, go watch it first because MaXXXine is the follow up. While the movie is easy to understand without its prequel, you may get confused with a few scenes. Actually, following the success of X, Ti West almost immediately directed a second movie that serves as origin, Pearl. So, the correct watch order should be: Pearl, X, Maxxxine.
While X manages to produce a great 70s vibe, Maxxxine succeeds perfectly at creating an 80s ambiance. From the dark night clubs of Los Angeles to the Hollywood studios, the visuals are stunning. I particularly enjoyed the chase around the house of Psycho. The casting is also fantastic with returning Mia Goth joined by Giancarlo Esposito and Kevin Bacon.
The way people act and talk contributes to the movie feeling special and, when the end credits were rolling on the song “Betty Davies Eyes by Kim Carnes”, our first reaction was to say “well, that was different”. And when I say different, I mean good different, excellent even.
In 1979, a group of young filmmakers set out to make an adult film in a rural Texas farm, but when their reclusive, elderly hosts catch them in the act, the crew find themselves fighting for their lives. (IMDB)
It’s definitely an horror movie set around the shooting of a porn, not the other way around. While there are a few nude scenes, X is a slasher with a few well made gore scenes.
However, the gore isn’t what makes X special, the old folks getting horny was far more disturbing and, sometimes, grotesque.
If you’re into slashers but you’re in need of a twist, give this movie a try… The casting is great and the pace of the movie is not too often slowed down. It was nice to see something different without turning into a psychological drama. X remains a slasher, and a good one.
High school student accidentally travels back to 2003 and decides to stop the serial killer who murdered her sister.(IMDB)
This movie is the safest slasher I’ve ever seen. I’m not kidding, even if there are murders (duh), there’s no gore in any of the kill scenes. Also, the protagonists are over-the-top pink and could have been casted by Disney.
While I couldn’t care less that this movie doesn’t bring anything new to the genre, it surely feels like a complete Totally Killer rip off, even the killer masks looks suspiciously identical.
However, we had a good time watching it. It’s fresh, it isn’t filled with excessive drama scenes and, despite most people saying that the plot is predictable, I didn’t figure out who was the killer before it was revealed.
While not being an outstanding movie, it was good enough to keep us entertained for 91 minutes.
After a Black Friday riot ends in tragedy, a mysterious Thanksgiving-inspired killer terrorises Plymouth, Massachusetts – the birthplace of the infamous holiday. (IMDB)
We had no clue that Eli Roth’s Thanksgiving would be this good. Frankly, at this point, seing “Directed by Eli Roth” became a seal of quality.
The movie is so good, we’ve been enjoying it from the opening scene to the closing credits. It has this 90s slasher vibe that we love so much with a lot of characters who could be the killer, a high school bunch of kids in danger, and a relatable motive for the antagonist. The kill scenes are all excellent, with a perfect blend of creativity, gore and blood splatter. The Black Friday sequence was beyond amazing and set the tone of the rest of the movie.
Thanksgiving is the pinnacle of what we love in horror movies, I highly recommend.
I had to check our Horror List twice, I can’t believe that we didn’t write a post about Final Destination yet, since we love the franchise and we recently did a complete rerun.
The story, which was originally going to be the concept for an episode of X-Files, follows a group of people who managed to avoid a catastrophe thanks to a premonitory vision. sooner or later, those who escaped their doom start to die as death itself attempts to correct the path they’ve escaped.
From a plane crash to a roller coaster accident, the initial catastrophe is followed by dozens of very brutal freak accidents. There isn’t much suspense beside finding out who wil die next and how he/she will die. However, those brutal deaths are fun to watch and each of the 5 movies is absolutely free of unnecessary drama.
Apparently, a sixth movie titled “Final Destination: Bloodlines” will be released in 2025. Series producer Craig Perry said the film would be set “in the world of first responders” and feature EMTs, firefighters, and police officers. (Wikipedia)
So, Longlegs was our pick for the second movie of this year’s Halloween eve, AND WE HATED IT!!!
It was praised by so many people, just as Hereditary or Smile were. But these movie are exactly what WE HATE (yes, caps!) in the new wave of horror. It’s heavy, slow, psychological, dramatic and artsy. If you read my past horror movies reviews, you will know that this is exactly what makes me downgrade a movie.
When I hear people say that this is the best serial killer movie since Silence of the Lambs, it makes me want to punch them in the face! They aren’t even in the same registry. One is a real FBI investigation, the other is a psychological circus of boring scenes.
I could have written something about the actors or the synopsis but even Nicolas Cage can’t make me wanna write another word about this movie.
In a few hours, we’ll be celebrating our favourite time of the year. As I’m writing this post, Soforah is cooking our traditional Pumpkin Pastas and a delicious Tiramisu to keep us going through our horror movie night. The apartment is decorated, the tree leaves have the right colour and The Headless Horseman is once more riding the skies of Azeroth, all is good… So here’s our program for this year’s celebration:
We’ll first be collecting as many Tricky Treats from the Candy Buckets of The Dragon Isles and Khaz Algar. Then we’ll be watching the Family Guy’s Halloween Special and the latest Simpson’s Tree house of Horror (from season 35, do you believe that?!) while the Gratin will be in the oven. During the dinner, we’ll watch the original Halloween movie then we’ll be stuffing ourselves with the dessert while watching Longlegs.
While coming back from groceries shopping this morning, I found this flyer in our mailbox and it made us incredibly happy to see that Halloween is still kicking, even in our neighbourhood.
If you wonder why I’m using this illustration of Brand New’s album cover for the Halloween post… Well, it’s because The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me is probably the most iconic album for this season. Since the day we first heard it at Caroline music (Liège) many years ago, this album has been the embodiment of all we love in this season, from the album cover to the excellent “You won’t know”.
Finally, I’ll leave you with this timeless gem from internet:
