Unfriended (2015)
R | 83min | 2015 | USA | Levan Gabriadze
Synopsis: On the one-year anniversary of the death of a fellow classmate, six friends are forced to remain online and answer to her spirit.
Review: Horror fans will find better acting and more thrills in an episode of ABC’s Pretty Little Liars.
Unfriended takes a staple of the horror tradition—teens getting killed one at a time—and gives it an innovative twist: the entire film is “set” (if that’s the right word) on the desktop of the main character, Blaire Lily (Shelley Hennig). Through the course of the film, Blaire skypes with her boyfriend and friends, messages on Facebook, watches YouTube videos, and Googles a few things. The film immerses us in a wholly cyber world in which people connect entirely through social media.
David Robert Mitchell’s It Follows (2014) is destined to be a classic horror film. It’s mesmerizing, chilling, and deeply unsettling. It’s indebted to the horror tradition, yet utterly distinct. On the surface, it’s about the classic equation of horror: sex = death. But underneath, it’s just about death—not violent, bloody, shocking death but death’s slow inexorability.
In its central plot device, It Follows draws from the slasher tradition: you have sex, you die, not at the hands of a knife-wielding monster but in the form of something that acts like a virus. Some “thing” as Hugh (Jake Weary) tells the protagonist, Jay (brilliantly played by Maika Monroe), after he’s passed it on to her, will now follow you: it won’t run; it’ll only walk, but it won’t stop and if it touches you, you’re dead. We see the influence of Gore Verbinski’s The Ring (2002) here. For now Jay has something of an ethical dilemma: does she pass on the fatal “thing”? To whom?
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Sometimes life forces you into hard decisions. For example, whether you should watch the new episodes of Intervention on A&E or test out Lifetime’s new series The Lizzie Borden Chronicles. While neither will disappoint if you enjoy drama and suspense, The Lizzie Borden Chronicles premiere episode (airing on 4/5/15) was surprisingly AMAZING! This new series follows on the success of the Lifetime Movie Lizzie Borden Took an Ax (original air date 1/25/14) which chronicled the Borden murders and subsequent trial. The new series picks up in the aftermath of Lizzie Borden’s acquittal. While I did enter into the series with low expectations, I certainly will not make the same mistake after watching the first episode.
APRIL FOOL’S DAY
R | 89min | 1986 | USA | Fred Walton
Synopsis: A group of wealthy college co-eds escape to a private island to celebrate spring break. They have little idea that their April Fool’s weekend is no laughing matter.
Review: ‘April Fool’s Day’ is no laughing matter.
taking horror seriously so you don't have to
