The Blackcoats Daughter (2015)

 Osgood Perkins writers and directs this horror/mystery about dark goings on at a private, religious girls boarding school in the Ameican north east. Solid cast includes Kiernan Shipka, Lucy Boynton, Emma Roberts, James Remar and Lauren Holly. Unsettling, Osgood Perkins is a little dark for my taste, but this movie is well put together and takes it story seriously. Shades of "The Exorcist'. ***

Angelica (2015)

 Set in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries in England, a mother tells her daughter (both played by Jena Malone) the true story of her father's disapernce. Psychological, myster-thriller with supernatural overtones is a clever deconstruction of the "hysterical woman" arch type of the era portrayed. Sadly the actual story is not on par with the ideas explored. **1/2

The One I Love (2014)

 Struggling couple Mark Duplass and Elizabeth Moss are sent by their marriage counselor Ted Dansen, to a retreat where they encounter better versions of themselves in the form of physical duplicates who embody idealized versions of each other; can their marriage survive the competition? CIeaver and unique, I loved the ending. ***1/2

The Brood (1979)

 We are in 1970s Toronto and the marriage of Art Hindle and Samantha Eggers is in deep trouble. Samantha has checked herself into doctor Oliver Reed's clinic, to undergo a new form of therapy known as "psychoplasmics". Samantha thinks Reed's a genius, Art suspects he'a a quack. Their five year old daughter dosen't know what to think but misses her mom. Then the murders start. 'The Brood' is best viewed unspoiled, but Cronenberg seems to be back on track after the disappointing 'Rabid'. ***1/2

Rabid (1977)

 This is essentially a less good version of 'Shivers', but with the outbreak originating in a Quebec clinic that specializes in reconstructive surgery. An experimental skin graft on a motor cycle accident victim, leads to a vampirestic plague that is similar to rabies. Was Cronenberg satrizing himself here? I can't tell. **

Shivers (1975)

 Early, Canadian made, David Cronenberg body horror film, produced by Ivan Reitman of all people. An intelligent, vinerally spread parasite, runs amuke among the swingers of a high end condo complex just outside of Montreal. Now if Roger Corman made this movie, I'd probably enjoy it, but it would be like a ** movie. Cronenberg elevates this into a piece of darkley, satirical art I felt genuinely invested in. ***1/2

Caligula (1979): The Ultimate Cut (2023)

 'Caligula' was a notorious, bloated, deboched epic whose production history became legendary. Disowned by its writer, it's principle director and stars, in part because the producers edited (additional) hard core pornography into the film for theatrical release. 'The Ultimate Cut' seeks to return the film to something closer to what the filmmakers thought they were making at the time. This is essentially a completely different film, constructed entirely form alternate takes, there is not a frame of the original film present.

Now this is the only cut of the film (of which their are several) which I have seen. I find it hard to know just what to make of the thing. It's not good, it's very lengthy, very talkie, very sexual and kind of boring. This should have been an epic, but outside of a single coliseum scene, it feels like a pornographic film made by the BBC. Helen Mirren is in this (alot of Helen Mirren), Peter O'Toole and Malcom McDowell. I broke this up into three roughly hour long parts. It was a slog, especially that last hour. I'm not sure exactly what was had in mind, but this film appears to be unsalvagable. *