Tag: Lin Shaye

REVIEW: Abattoir [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“Better living through sin and sacrifice” You have to admire Darren Lynn Bousman‘s ambition because he could have just kept going with the Saw franchise after taking over the reins from James Wan. Instead he jumped ship to work on a passion project developed with Terrance Zdunich and Darren Smith entitled Repo! The Genetic Opera. Here was a science fiction horror musical based upon a short produced two years previously with enough character and originality to become a cult favorite. Since then he wrote a couple films that didn’t go…

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REVIEW: Jack Goes Home [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“Artists write poetry. Assholes just complain.” There’s no question that Thomas Dekker‘s sophomore effort as writer/director is a head-scratcher. What you as a viewer must decide is whether or not to keep scratching. I don’t think anyone outside of Dekker himself can truly unpack the type of psychological chaos occurring within Jack Goes Home and I like that notion. This is an artist using his medium as an outlet to exorcise demons without necessarily factoring in audience expectations. It doesn’t supply easy answers, leaves a ton of loose ends as…

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REVIEW: 3 Days of Normal [2013]

Jared Mobarak

“Have a super day!!” The romantic comedy is derivative as a point of fact—there are only so many ways an unsuspecting boy and girl can meet and thaw before falling desperately in love. Settings change, periphery characters provide the big laughs, and you hope the spark is realistic and sweet enough to get you through the inevitability of their union. Add in a fish-out-of-water trope done to death across all genres, though, and you’d assume the end result would be nothing short of an obnoxious waste of your time. Well,…

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REVIEW: Take Me Home [2012]

Jared Mobarak

“I actually really like the paint in the bedroom” A road movie that surprisingly doesn’t fall prey to the easy tropes of its brethren, Take Me Home uses the American landscape as a backdrop to its journey through the tumultuous expanse of two lost souls. States fly by in seconds without a mention, just glimpses outside the windows of the illegally operated taxicab taking our leads from New York City to Encinitas, California. Where most would bask in the ability to montage famous sites, writer/director/star Sam Jaeger only sprinkles in…

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REVIEW: Insidious [2011]

Jared Mobarak

“Last night I watched myself sleep … then I flew away” Ever since James Wan and Leigh Whannell collaborated on what became a franchised sensation in Saw, expectations for the two were high. I haven’t seen their second film, Dead Silence, but I do remember press being positive and the creepiness of dolls—a motif the two seem to champion, (look at the chalkboards for an Easter Egg here)—quite unnerving. So, with the buzz on their newest horror film, Insidious, almost universally great, I became excited for what could be an…

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