PLOT: A 12-year-old girl decides to keep a spider as a pet, not aware that the eight-legged creature is not of this world. The more it eats, the more it grows, and soon a giant space arachnid is running loose in an apartment building, snacking on the residents.
REVIEW: Filmmaker Kiah Roache-Turner is best known for his wild and crazy zombie movies Wyrmwood: Road of the Dead and Wyrmwood: Apocalypse, which blended inspiration from Mad Max and Dawn of the Dead to tell the story of a unique zombie outbreak where the living dead have flammable blood and exhale methane. I enjoyed both of those movies, and though I haven’t seen Roache-Turner’s action comedy Nekrotronic yet, it sounds like it’s pretty much in line with the tone of the Wyrmwood flicks, as it tells the story of “a man who discovers that he is part of a secret sect of magical beings who hunt down and destroy demons in the Internet.” While Roache-Turner collaborated with his brother Tristan for his previous three features, he went solo for his latest movie, the spider-themed horror movie Sting, and he also decided to shake up his style and tone along the way. Sting is much more grounded than the Wyrmwoods, despite the fact that it deals with a man-eating, steadily-growing spider that falls to the earth in a tiny meteorite.
A lot of filmmakers like to cite the Amblin glory days as a source of inspiration when telling stories of regular people dealing with something extraordinary, and while I have yet to see Roache-Turner say he was going for a throwback vibe with this one, during my viewing of Sting I did get a bit of the feeling that comes with watching Spielberg productions like Poltergeist, E.T., The Goonies, Batteries Not Included, Gremlins, Arachnophobia, etc. I also had the occasional flashback to Critters 3 (which Spielberg was definitely not involved with), since that’s another creature feature that takes place in an apartment building. That said, when the horror kicks in, there’s at least one gory death scene that goes further than anything we saw in Gremlins or Arachnophobia, earning the film its R rating.
The story centers on a young girl named Charlotte (Alyla Browne), who has a lot of time to herself now that her mom Heather (Penelope Mitchell) and stepfather Ethan (Ryan Corr) have a baby that gets most of their attention when they’re not busy working. Charlotte spends some of her free time making her way around the apartment building they live in by crawling around in the air ducts. Of course, her familiarity with the air ducts will come in handy when things get horrific, but Roache-Turner takes his time building up to that action. The movie begins with a shot of a meteorite streaking across the sky above a snow-covered New York City (the movie was filmed in Sydney, Australia, but that doesn’t matter much since it takes place entirely in and around the apartment building). This tiny stone busts through a window in Charlotte’s apartment building, landing in the apartment her senile grandmother Helga (Noni Hazlehurst) shares with Charlotte’s unpleasant great-aunt Gunter (Robyn Nevin). Then it splits open and a spider emerges… and when Charlotte finds that spider, she decides to keep it in a jar as a pet, naming it Sting after the Elven dagger in the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. Problem is, the otherworldly critter grows incredibly quickly, its size increasing every time it eats something, and it’s very hungry.
Sting is soon causing trouble for the building’s inhabitants, and Roache-Turner populated the place with some interesting characters. In addition to the family already mentioned, there’s Silvia Colloca as Maria, a heartbroken woman who drinks too much and shares her apartment with an adorable chihuahua, and Danny Kim as Erik, an odd fellow who aims to cure diabetes through experiments he conducts on fish in his apartment. Jermaine Fowler has some fun scenes as exterminator Frank. As the story plays out, Roache-Turner spends a commendable amount of time on character work, making sure we know most of these people, understand their situations, and come to care about some of them… which allows for some shocking moments in the second half.
The writer/director also played around with character expectations in a fun way, starting the movie with a flash forward that indicates one person isn’t going to be around very long. Then when we jump back in time a few days, we get to spend more time with that character – and by the end, I was hoping for this person I had been eager to see more of was going to get taken out, because they were complicating things for characters I cared more about. The movie walks a fine line with the characters it puts in peril. If Roache-Turner didn’t handle things just right, he could completely lose some viewers… and I won’t say how he handled things, but I will say that the movie never lost me.
I figured Sting would be a fun creature feature, and it is, but I appreciated that Roache-Turner didn’t slack in the character department. Some filmmakers would put their entire focus on the spider action, but he actually managed to make me worry about some of these people. When combined with the familiar tone and some cool special effects work, that really enhanced my enjoyment of the movie. I had a good time watching this one, and I think a lot of my fellow creature feature fans will have fun with it as well.
The Wyrmwoods guaranteed that I would always be curious to see what Kiah Roache-Turner would make next, but after watching Sting, I’m even more intrigued to watch his career continue to grow. I look forward to his next film (especially since it’s a World War II shark thriller), and will definitely be circling back to watch Nekrotronic in the meantime.
Well Go USA will be bringing Sting to North American theatres on April 12th.
One of the biggest sleeper hits this year has definitely been IFC/Shudder’s Late Night With the Devil. Despite having a tiny budget and a very limited release window in theaters, the movie has still managed to gross a pretty amazing $6.2 million (and counting) at the box office. One day, it even managed to make an unholy $666,666, which, to be sure, is the kind of headline you just can’t make up. Star David Dastmalchian is a legend in the horror/ sci-fi community and seems on the verge of true leading-man status. While, throughout his career, he’s shared the screen with many iconic stars, it turns out there was one name in the cast list that impressed him more than any other.
“I’m been in movies with some very cool people, Harrison Ford to name one,” said Dastmalchian. “But, being in a film where Michael Ironside is listed in the credits with me is pretty huge.” In the film, Ironside voices a pseudo-documentary style sequence at the beginning, and sadly, despite his fandom, Dastmalchian was never on set with Ironside at the same time.
“I’ve never met him, and when they told me they got him for the voice, I was just like, ‘Oh my God,’ I flipped out. And he nailed it so hard. It’s so good.”
One interesting thing to note is that Ironside now can claim to be in two of IFC’s biggest movies ever, with him previously having a role in their critically acclaimed sleeper Blackberry. The Canadian legend, who will always be believed for his roles in Total Recall, V (as Ham Tyler) and many others, seems to be a bit of a good luck charm for them.
Fantasy can cross over into several genres where you wouldn’t expect it to be found. Horror is one, of course; I dare you to watch Pan’s Labyrinth and not tell me it’s a horrific fantasy. But another is Science Fiction. Sci-Fi and Fantasy go hand in claw, and no more so than when it comes to Godzilla and his family of monsters.
In this edition of Fantasizing About Fantasy Films, we’re doing something a little different. We’re going with the new modern classic Godzilla Minus One. The return of the King of the Monsters from his home country of Japan and an origin story never previously witnessed. Prepare to be amazed as we see a Godzilla story told in a way that will surprise you, and which became one of the biggest hits of 2023 as we fly toward the monster in Godzilla Minus One.
Godzilla is, to put it mildly, a god in film. Since 1954, the radioactive Kaiju has been destroying movie screens in Japan (and a lot of other places recently) for movie audiences around the world. Nearly 40 movies in total star the nuclear-powered monster with countless comics, a few cartoon series (I always wanted a pager of my own so I could call up Godzilla when I needed him), books, games, you name it. You can even zip line into the monster’s mouth at a theme park in Japan—life goals.
Godzilla has gone through quite a journey in the films that featured him. The original was an allegory for Japan and the fact that nukes had destroyed parts of their country. It was very serious and would have its message tweaked a bit with the American edit that inserted Raymond Burr into scenes. But at its heart, Godzilla was something that showed the world what happens when mankind messes with Mother Nature and the catastrophe that can happen from it.
This message has been seen several times over the years, but Godzilla has morphed from a monster to a hero in the Japanese series of films, even becoming more than a little goofy at times. Then, through the 80s, 90s, and early 2000s, Godzilla became far more serious and took on a harder sci-fi tone.
It was in 2014 that the US dived into the Godzilla pool (let’s try to forget about the 1998 version, which Jesse Shade is diving into this month on Awfully Good). The film that Legendary Pictures released became a massive hit. However, it was more Aaron Taylor Johnson staring off into space than Godzilla (anyone else weirded out by the fact that he and Elizabeth Olsen played brother and sister in Age of Ultron but were husband and wife here?). But the Monsterverse series of films was born.
On the Japanese side of things, a new era for Godzilla was started only two years later with Shin Godzilla, a completely different take on how Godzilla came to be, with the monster evolving throughout the film. Where the 2014 Monsterverse film had some amazing scenes with soldiers jumping to their deaths amid Godzilla’s attack and some strong vibes of 9/11-type destruction and clouds of debris, Shin Godzilla harkened back to Japan’s disaster that happened in 2011.
This was when the tsunami and earthquake caused the nuclear accident at Fukushima. Once again, Godzilla was finding use as a metaphor for nuclear disaster, this one of a different sort and fairly recent to the film’s release. It would also be the first clear evidence that the new reign of Zilla was going to be far more vicious when it came to taking on the Japanese government…something fairly rare when it comes to these films.
The Monsterverse/Legendary films (which we recently ranked here) would see Godzilla become more of a heroic figure, a protector of Earth alongside another titan in the form of King Kong. Japan would bring Godzilla into the realm of Anime in three different entries shared with Netflix. And then…something amazing would happen in 2023.
Rather than going into the future with the king of monsters, filmmaker Takashi Yamazaki went back into the past, all the way back to World War 2. He’d bring a fresh take to the old god, and it would be glorious, heartfelt, and beautiful. And it would blow away the box office in a way a Godzilla film from Japan hadn’t in a long time. It would also do it in a way that would criticize the treatment of the Japanese by their own government after the war as well as how the world treated them. It was a point of view and a serious subject that, again, hadn’t really been seen in this sort of film.
Godzilla Minus One isn’t a direct sequel, of course, to Shin Godzilla. The monster in this is fully formed and not like the evolving creature in Shin. This monster is more of the classic version of the Big G first and foremost.
In this edition of Fantasizing About Fantasy films, which you can watch in the video above, we examine how Yamazaki, reinvented the character for a new generation and (maybe) stole a bit of Legendary’s MonsterVerse thunder in the process.
Lionsgate is planning a May 17th theatrical release for the horror film The Strangers: Chapter 1, and with that date just a month and a half away, they have unveiled a new promo, along with a trio of character posters. The promo is embedded above and is meant to look like security camera footage, with the stranger known as Pin-Up Girl (who doesn’t seem to be able to see through her mask very well) approaching someone’s door. The character posters feature the three strangers; Pin-Up Girl, Dollface, and the Man in the Mask (who is now being referred to as Scarecrow). You can check them out at the bottom of this article.
The Strangers: Chapter 1 was directed by Renny Harlin, who shot an entire trilogy of Strangers movies at the same time. We’ve heard that Lionsgate will also be releasing The Strangers: Chapter 2 and The Strangers: Chapter 3 by the end of the year.
Madelaine Petsch (Riverdale) has the lead role in Chapter 1 and is joined in the cast of these films by Froy Gutierrez (Cruel Summer), Rachel Shenton (All Creatures Great and Small), Gabriel Basso (Hillbilly Elegy), and Ema Horvath (The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power). The Strangers: Chapter 1 centers on Petsch’s character as she drives cross-country with her longtime boyfriend (Gutierrez) to begin a new life in the Pacific Northwest. When their car breaks down in Venus, Oregon, they’re forced to spend the night in a secluded Airbnb, where they are terrorized from dusk till dawn by three masked strangers. Lionsgate plans from there to expanding the story in new and unexpected ways with its sequels.
The new Strangers trilogy was filmed in Slovakia. Courtney Solomon produced them with Mark Canton, Christopher Milburn, Gary Raskin, Charlie Dombeck, and Alastair Birlingham. Andrei Boncea, Dorothy Canton, and Roy Lee serve as executive producers. Rafaella Biscayn, Frame Film SK, Johanna Harlin, Juan Garcia Peredo, and Alberto Burgueno are co-producing.
Harlin has said The Strangers:Chapter 1 “is close to the original movie in its set-up of a young couple in an isolated environment in a house and a home invasion happening for random reasons.” Then Chapter 2 and Chapter 3 “explore what happens to the victims of this kind of violence and who the perpetrators are of this kind of violence. Where are they coming from and why?“
Are you looking forward to The Strangers:Chapter 1? What do you think of the security footage promo and the character posters? Let us know by leaving a comment below.
The episode of WTF Happened to This Horror Movie? covering Manhunter was Written and Narrated by Mike Holtz, Edited by Joseph Wilson, Produced by Andrew Hatfield and John Fallon, and Executive Produced by Berge Garabedian.
How cool would it be to wake up in an alternate universe where bizarre versions of your favorite movies existed and you could experience them all over again for the first time? That’s exactly what I can offer to The Silence of the Lambs and Red Dragon fans who have never experienced Manhunter (watch it HERE). The forgotten and abandoned stepchild of the Hannibal Lecter film series. How in the fava bean f*$& does a movie that has the twisted murder weirdness and fascinating serial killer storytelling of a Silence of the Lambs or Mindhunter paired with the coolness of a movie like Heat and flair of a Nicolas Winding Refn film go this unnoticed? Let’s find out together. We’re going serial killer hunting with just WTF happened to Manhunter?
Well, for starters it wasn’t supposed to be called Manhunter. The book (and later remake) were both titled Red Dragon. The reason for this name change that has us more confused than Buffalo Bill’s toy poodle watching him get dressed for the day ahead is actually a pretty sound one. Producer Dino De Laurentiis (who you’ll hear mentioned many, many times in the lore of the Hannibal Lecter franchise) decided that A) He didn’t want the film to be called Red Dragon because he feared people would confuse it with one of Bruce Lee’s Martial Arts movies and B) He saw the box office flopping of 1985’s The Year of the Dragon as a bad omen. Dino had been bullish on the title Manhunter despite pushback from multiple folks including Brian Cox who later called the chosen title “bland” and “cheesy”. I have to agree. No one has ever made something cooler by taking the word “Dragon” off of it. The book itself was named after artist William Blake’s painting The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun. The painting was meant to depict a battle of good and evil and faith overcoming darkness. The book’s killer was fascinated with the work and clearly misinterpreted its message as “wear pantyhose on your head and murder families” but they can’t all be first-round picks.
After going to classes and researching serial killers with agents at the FBI Behavioral Science Unit, Harris wrote the book over a year and a half while in near seclusion in a house resembling the one where the final scene of Manhunter takes place. Finally, Red Dragon was released in 1981 to some pretty great feedback from the world including Stephen King himself who called it “probably the best popular novel to be published in America since The Godfather”. Holy Hell. One of the greatest writers of all time citing your work alongside one of the greatest books of all time? Sounds like something a compulsive liar would brag about. Like, if Steven Seagal ever wrote a book he would tell people, “Stephen King said it was the greatest American Novel since The Godfather. Which, I also wrote and directed but had to put someone else’s name on it because I was working undercover for the CIA at the time. Are you gonna eat that chili dog?”
Except this was true and De Laurentiis was set to turn it into a feature film that would release just a few years later in 1986. De Laurentiis attempted to scoop up a pre-Twin Peaks and Blue Velvet director David Lynch as the pair had just worked together on the sci-fi classic Dune but Lynch found Manhunter to be “violent and completely degenerate”. Alas, they would turn to director Michael Mann, two films removed from directing James Caan in the super stylish crime drama Thief. And believe me, you can tell. It’s wild to see the cinematic stylings of movies like Thief and Mann’s yet-to-exist classic Heat draped across a twisted Thomas Harris story. For that, we have, in part, to thank the work of cinematographer Dante Spinotti who would go on to work with Mann on multiple other projects, including Heat.
Spinotti and Mann would create a visual masterpiece that was (as we’ll get to in the critical reactions to Manhunter) far ahead of its time. Lingering shots with polarizing blue or green lighting may have thrown viewers off at first but looking at it a bit deeper, they all had a purpose. Spinotti uses blue lighting for the safe spaces of the film such as Detective Will Graham’s home with his wife and son but uses other colors such as green or purple for the darker moments of the film such as those featuring our killer. As Spinotti says “There is nothing in Manhunter which is just a nice shot. It’s all focused into conveying that particular atmosphere; whether it’s happiness, or delusion, or disillusion.” You’ll also notice strange little camera tricks such as vast frame rate changes to make the film feel just a bit “off”. The kinds of things that may not be celebrated upon a first-time watch but add to the mystique that turned Manhunter into a cult classic.
Back to the alternate reality concept, the strangest part about Manhunter for the majority of folks who had seen The Silence of the Lambs first (like me) is the casting of Brian Cox as Lecter ahead of Anthony Hopkins. Cox, whose longevity and filmography in the industry the stuff most actors dream of… was put in the strange position of playing a fascinating character in a movie that bombed, and then later having to watch someone else portray the same character in a wildly successful project in which the other actor even won an Oscar for. When asked about this later, Cox said, “Well, you know, it would be nice to win an Oscar. I wouldn’t necessarily want to win an Oscar for Hannibal Lecter quite honestly. I have very strong views about what happened to Hannibal Lecter. How Tom Harris kind of fell in love with his character. Silence of the Lambs and Red Dragon are both really good stories and wonderful books. I think Hannibal is a bit risible and a bit ridiculous. I think that Hannibal lost his mystery. “ This was in no way a knock on Hopkins however, as he would go on to say as well, “Tony did this extraordinary performance which everybody went for but the interesting thing is subsequently people become aware of the film before that and subsequently it’s become this great thing. That’s sort of plagued both our careers…..I’m very happy with the way things turned out.” And that it was “Not difficult at all. Never ever affected me. I don’t feel proprietorial about things.” Now, just imagine all that was said in the eloquent yet manly voice of Brian Cox instead of my voice. He’s like the grandpa you always wish you had CURRENTLY. Not in Manhunter. Nobody wants a cannibal who looks like Clive Owen as their grandpa.
As is the case with most of these things there are multiple other universes out there where Cox never played the role at all. It is said that at one point Michael Mann originally wanted The Exorcist director William Friedkin of all people to play the role. At another, he was interested in actor Brian Dennehy who actually insisted Cox would be better for the role. Other actor’s names at one point in the running for Lecter included Bruce Dern and John Lithgow.Cox himself based his portrayal of Lecter off of serial killer Peter Manuel. Manuel was a conniving serial killer who had wiggled himself out of trouble several times. He’d been so convincing that he defended himself at his trial and according to the judge had done so “with a skill that was quite remarkable” though he was eventually hanged for multiple murders.
It’s hard not to compare the initial scene between Detective Will Graham and Lecter to the initial meeting of Lecter and Jodie Foster’s Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs. Though there are vast differences, this is ultimately the first time we’re introduced to a character whose reputation precedes him and both involve a game of wits from the opposing sides of a prison cell. There are many differences between the two Lecter performances and a few similarities as well but the best scene of Cox as Lecter comes from another scene entirely. When Lecter negotiates phone privileges and uses his genius to dial the operator MacGyver style, using the foil from a piece of gum before employing his manipulation skills to achieve Detective Graham’s home address in a matter of minutes. This is where Cox truly shines as Lecter in his own right, in my opinion and like Hopkins, managed to do so with limited screen time. Mann had the desire to feature more of Lecter in the film but said, “I wanted the audience to almost not quite get enough of him”.
Instead, the film mostly focuses on Detective Will Graham who is portrayed by William Petersen. An actor that many will remember from his famous character in CSI. Personally, my brain goes directly to him facing off against Marky Mark in 1996’s Fear. In Manhunter, Petersen’s character Will Graham plays a hunter of serial killers who had a mental breakdown after putting Lecter behind bars years previous. Lecter not only put Graham in the hospital with physical injuries but also caused a mental breakdown. This is ultimately what led Graham to where we find him at the start of the film, retired and living on a beautiful beach, spending his days hatching sea turtles with his wife and son. When he’s lured out of retirement to stop a new serial killer, we learn that the reason Graham struggles mentality is that he is somewhat of a method actor when it comes to catching serial killers. He puts himself so deeply in their point of view or “dreams” as he calls it that he loses himself. Something that Lecter uses to try and convince him that they are the same. We watch as Graham slips deeper and deeper into madness, eventually fully giving himself to the cause, even separating from his wife and son until the job is done. This self-destruction of the character gives Petersen a lot of space to go for broke in the role in a bevy of wild ways. Whether working himself into a frenzy in a hotel room, power bombing a reporter into a parked car, or passing out on an airplane with crime scene photos spread across his lap, scaring the children. A scene that, by the way, that they didn’t even have enough money to actually shoot on a set featuring an airplane. So, Mann booked a flight of nearly a hundred crew members and then shot the scene on an actual airplane mid-flight, pissing off the pilot and stewardesses. Personally, I would have just set the scene on a train or maybe even a Hertz Rent-A-Car lobby but I admire the guerilla filmmaking spirit.
All that aside, Peterson totally nails the role of Will Graham and all the wild and awkward moments it encompasses. I think it’s the five o’clock shadow personally. Dudes with a good five o’clock shadow can do anything. There are not a lot of men out there who can pull off talking to themselves while staring out of a rain-soaked window in public like Petersen but that wasn’t without trying. Everyone from James Bond himself, Timothy Dalton, to Jeff Bridges and Don Johnson were considered for the role at one point. Petersen won the role in the end but not before it took its pound of flesh. The actor would later admit that he was so lost in how emotionally exhausting the role had been that he eventually cut and dyed his hair blonde and shaved his beard just so he could shake the character of Will Graham. Probably grew a handsome and cool five o’clock shadow afterward though. Bastard.
Another role that has to this point only been portrayed by fascinating actors is that of ole’ Jack Crawford. A part that has been portrayed by acting greats such as Harvey Keitel, Lawrence Fishburne, and Scott Glenn. But the first to ever do it was Manhunter’s Dennis Farina. Farina had previously worked with Mann on Thief but the fascinating thing about Farina is that Mann actually discovered him while Farina, a real-life cop, had been acting as a police consultant on one of his sets. I’m sure he was a great actual cop in real life but it’s clear here he also had the talent for acting. Just check out this massive “Fuck you” stare he gives a couple of suits after they tried to get cute with him. That’s the kind of look that gets the kids in the backseat to shut the hell up without a single word being spoken. Farina just had one of those presences that stood out in everything he was in. In this case, Crawford’s character was both that of an old-time close friend and bureaucratic badass. He knows what a toll this takes on Will and is haunted by what he has to do to his friend by luring him out of his peaceful retirement to a place that is so dangerous for his well-being. But he also knows that innocent families being brutally slaughtered would be his price to pay for being a good friend. So, he has to ask for his help, knowing what it will do to him. This dynamic is played expertly throughout the film by both characters and is just one of the many interesting layers of Manhunter.
There are many unsung heroes in the production of Manhunter but none more so than actor Tom Noonan. Noonan was cast to play serial killer Francis Dollarhyde and holy shit did he ever. Dollarhyde is a character who doesn’t show up until deep into the film but steals the show with one of the most unforgettable serial killer aesthetics of all time. We’re introduced to him through the eyes of asshole reporter Freddy Lounds (who we saw Will power bomb earlier) played by acting great Stephen Lang in yet another chameleon-esque performance by the actor. I mean you hate this jerk, which is exactly the point. Lounds wakes up to Francis towering above him wearing pantyhose in the creepiest way anyone has ever worn pantyhose. And I’m willing to bet there are a lot of creepy ways to wear pantyhose. Noonan then delivers a haunting monologue about the red dragon and what he does to his victims. Noonan going through slides and asking, “Do you see?” will be burned into my brain for eternity. It’s like your parents reading a bad report card to you, teacher comments included.In a shot that not enough people talk about, in a movie that not enough people talk about, Francis has tied Lounds to a wheelchair, lit him on fire, and sent him careening to his intended receivers.
As if it wasn’t enough for Mann and Harris to show us this horrific side of Francis or the aftermath of the families he slaughtered… they decide to show us his romantic side as well. Something we definitely weren’t asking for. We witness Francis in all of his “oh my god this guy definitely has dead hookers in his basement” glory interacting with a blind woman named Reba played amazingly by Joan Allen. Reba is someone who really needs a friend to have a nice sit down with her and explain to her she can’t go home with strange men just because she likes the sound of their voices. For a second there, the thought that a guy named Francis whose idea of a first date is to take a blind woman to pet a sedated tiger while he cries in the corner can still get laid makes you feel like the universe might be ok. It’s not.
By placing us at all possible ends of the spectrum, Thomas Harris and Mann paint a broad story around the simple serial killer versus detective drama that feels just as messed up as it does fresh. It also takes a deep dive into the psyche of the victims and men and women tasked with stopping these psychos. Everything in the film feels authentic, deeply thought out, and intentional. There are no tropes or regurgitated scenarios from other films. Manhunter is truly an underrated classic of a film that’s earned its cult status. So authentic that after spending days and weeks working on a detailed red dragon tattoo to go across Noonan’s chest further adding to his intimidating physical presence (for more like it see Dee Snyder in Strangeland… My God, he’s frightening) they decided to nix the tattoo entirely, feeling as though it trivialized the struggle of Noonan’s character. They ended up re-shooting multiple scenes that featured the tattoo, which you can still see in all of its glory on certain home media cuts of the film.
Noonan was a huge part of this culture of authenticity. He decided to stay away from all the other actors during his time on set. During his audition, he noticed the person reading the lines across from him became frightened. He used this to, in turn, frighten them even further. Which is what he believes won him the role. Legend has it Noonan would also sit in his trailer in the total darkness between scenes and would even be joined by Mann at times. I mean, that’s deep and cool and I admire the tenacity but could you imagine how awkward it would be to be in that trailer? Just silent next to Francis Dollarhyde sitting crisscross applesauce in the darkness? No thanks, Jim.
The point is that everything on Manhunter was made with intent and crafted with authenticity. Mann took this a step further by corresponding with a convicted killer named Dennis Wayne Wallace. In full nutbar fashion, Wallace had told him that Iron Butterfly’s In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida had “spiritually connected” him to a woman he killed. You’ll notice this song is used to perfection in the final confrontation at the end of the movie. The entire soundtrack, featuring moments from The Prime Movers, Shriekback, and multiple tracks from The Reds is heavily important to the film’s ambiance and again… very much ahead of its time.
There are so many aspects of Manhunter that we would see come back to life in the future in multiple ways. Whether it be Nicolas Winding Refn with Drive or multiple David Fincher projects like Mindhunter on Netflix or The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. An amazing thought considering the film was written off by many at the time for being “too stylish”. Manhunter would be released in August 1996 and rack up a lowly 8 million dollars. Further troubled overseas by an international issue with De Laurentiis Entertainment Group that kept the film from releasing in the UK until over a year later. This, mixed with meddling critical reviews led to the film being often forgotten about until The Silence of the Lamb’s success years later. It’s a damn shame because I can’t help but think if this film were released today it would be lauded, appreciated…..and may have even been able to win a few Oscars itself.
And that my friends, is WTF happened to Manhunter. I couldn’t recommend Thomas Harris, Fincher, horror, and crime fans check it out more. Thanks for watching and please let us know below how you felt about Manhunter and also who you’d be more afraid to wake up and open your eyes to see hovering above you… Ole’ panty hose headed Francis or Buffalo “puts the lotion on its skin” Bill from The Silence of the Lambs? I’ll just leave you with that thought. Sweet dreams, Clarice!
A couple of the previous episodes of WTF Happened to This Horror Movie? can be seen below. To see more, head over to our JoBlo Horror Originals YouTube channel – and subscribe while you’re there!
It’s a strange thing to show your disinterest in the film industry when you’re promoting your next film. But that’s just what Civil War director Alex Garland is doing, adding that he may very well be done with directing altogether.
Speaking with The Guardian, Alex Garland seemed weary and wary of the business, ultimately saying, “I’m not planning to direct again in the foreseeable future.” He even noted that he had fallen out of love with filmmaking as a whole. One reason may be the lack of communication, instead being put on tour to promote a movie instead of having more intellectual conversations about it. As he told the reporter, “I do actually love film, but film-making doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It exists in a life and also in a broader context. I have to interact, in a way – without being rude – [by engaging in such a manner].”
Alex Garland also said that other aspects of the industry related to trust have kept him up at night. One concern is that he has to try to convince his cast that anything he says will be on the blue screen behind them will in fact be what appears on the big screen, saying, “The pressure doesn’t come from the money. It comes from the fact that you’re asking people to trust something that, on the face of it, doesn’t look very trustworthy.” Another comes from a far more serious place, adding, “Alicia [Vikander] and Sonoya [Mizuno] are trusting that nudity is going to be dealt with thoughtfully and respectfully…[when] cinema leans towards not doing that.”
At just 53 and with just four features (in terms of directing, at least) to his name, it does seem far too soon for Alex Garland to hang it up. But these do appear to be genuine concerns of his in terms of not just his own sets but the industry as a whole, especially when it comes to his aforementioned point regarding nudity. Intimacy coordinators grew in popularity within the industry in the late 2010s as a means to promote safety and limit exploitation on sets when it comes to sexually geared scenes. But one does wonder just how closely such roles are being implemented; and even if they are rigorous, what can you really say to completely put the actor at ease, especially with how much disgraceful behavior has taken place before?
We’d hate to see Alex Garland retire so early, especially since his films, like Ex Machina and his latest, have generated worthy conversation about our society. Hollywood would absolutely be suffering a loss if Garland steps away.
4K is about to get a lot darker, as director Guillermo del Toro teased over the weekend that four more of his films will be hitting the format within “the next year or so”. They are: his 1993 debut Cronos, 1997 follow-up Mimic, 2002’s Hellboy, and 2015’s Crimson Peak, which is one of del Toro’s most visually striking features.
In an X post from yesterday, Guillermo del Toro wrote, “4 new 4K transfers coming up: CRIMSON PEAK, then CRONOS, BLADE II and finally MIMIC all in the next year or so. I am done with the color timing of 3 out of the 4.” Note that these releases will not be coming out simultaneously or in chronological order.
4 new 4K transfers coming up: CRIMSON PEAK, then CRONOS, BLADE II and finally MIMIC all in the next year or so. I am done with the color timing of 3 out of the 4.
No doubt that these works from Guillermo del Toro will benefit from the 4K format, as the man has one of the most unique eyes in film right now. That this collection will be going back to his feature-length origins will also be a perk for fans and collectors. This quartet of films will also ensure that every one of del Toro’s features so far has been released on 4K, joining The Devil’s Backbone, Hellboy, Pan’s Labyrinth, Hellboy II, Pacific Rim, The Shape of Water, Nightmare Alley, and Pinocchio, which The Criterion Collection released last year as spine #1,201.
But before we go celebrating too much, we should all be aware that just because a movie comes to 4K doesn’t mean it will be the perfect copy, no matter who the director is. After all, there has been a lot of controversy surrounding the waves of James Cameron 4Ks, with criticism targeting the use of artificial intelligence to clean up the image and the removal of film grain, thus deleting a key quality of the work.
Even still, we do have high hopes for these del Toro 4K releases and have faith that his hands-on approach will maintain the integrity of his style.
Which of these Guillermo del Toro films are you most looking forward to seeing on 4K? Will you be picking up the entire lot? Let us know below!
“Ma’am, I’m 10 years old, you think I could write this alone? I don’t think so.” The age demographics in Hollywood are about to skew a lot younger because a pre-teen has pitched an idea that is soon enough going to be written for the screen – and it’s a wonder it hasn’t been made yet. Here we have Home Alone meets The Godfather, in which we imagine one scene where Kevin McCallister jumps on his parents’ bed, only to find a decapitated horse head at the foot of it. The title? Little Wiseguy.
But the pitch doesn’t come from a desperate studio suit but rather a 10-year-old named Connor Esterson, who you may actually be familiar with, as he co-starred in last year’s Spy Kids: Armageddon. (Interestingly, that movie’s director, Robert Rodriguez, gave his son, Racer, story credit on 2005’s The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl when he was just eight years old.) And while Esterson has very likely seen Home Alone numerous times around the holiday season, he admits he has yet to see Francis Ford Coppola’s gangster epic.
As wild as a Home Alone / The Godfather mash-up sounds, the real story is the development. Esterson took it upon himself to work on a six-page treatment, which he then got in the hands of producer Joe Isgro, who passed it onto screenwriter Nick Vallelonga, who won the Best Original Screenplay Oscar for Green Book. Vallelonga is teaming with George Gallo – whose credits include Midnight Run, The Whole Ten Yards and, yes, 1986’s Wise Guys – to get the screenplay moved into production. While Esterson will likely at least receive a story credit, he has aspirations to continue on in the future as a director. Who knows, maybe he’ll helm the sequel: Little Wiseguy: Lost in New York, which would see the hero taking out intruders with a garrote instead of a paint can to the face.
Even though Esterson had his tiny foot in the door through Spy Kids and the Quantum Leap reboot, it’s still pretty amazing that he’s seeing his idea of Home Alone clashing with The Godfather go through the entire filmmaking process. Just think about what you were doing in fifth grade – but please, for the love of all that is holy, don’t share that with us!
In a recent sit-down with GQ, while promoting his new film Knox Goes Away, the great Michael Keaton took some time to look back at his favorite roles. One of them, of course, was Batman, which we wrote about here, but another was the 1996 comedy Multiplicity, which was directed by Harold Ramis. In that film, he plays a busy family man who has himself cloned.
“Multiplicity – to make it today it would take about seventeen minutes. It’s 96, right? You don’t have all the toys.”
He said the initial idea was that to play the multiple characters, he would wear make-up and fat suits, but to him, that was the wrong approach. “If you cloned yourself, you’d still have you, but what is the thing that’s not you in that? That was the premise. What’s the little thing?”
“I loved doing Multiplicity,” he says, remembering how fun it was working with Harold Ramis and the challenge of playing so many different versions of the same character. “I think two was the testosterone-driven version; the third was really sensitive. The nicest man.”
Playing the third version raised an interesting conundrum, as Keaton wondered if, perhaps, he should play the character as gay. When he asked Ramis if he thought the character was gay, the director’s response stuck with him. “Harold (Ramis) wisely said, ‘I dunno’. And I said, ‘No, it’ll help me as an actor because I’m good with it.’ And he’d say, ‘I dunno.’ And I went (pause), ‘That’s right – that’s exactly right. It doesn’t matter. He’s just REALLY sensitive! One of my favorite characters of all time, by the way.”
Keaton also said that they used a lot of stand-in actors to help film the movie, and despite the complicated FX work, Ramis encouraged a lot of improvisation. “There was a lot of improvising because Harold comes from a real improv background,” Keaton said. He noted that was a challenge because if he improvised as one character, he’d have to set up the next character to be able to feed off it.
He also related a weird Ben Stiller story. As Keaton remembers it, he was working on the set and Stiller, whom he had never met before, came by to visit. He asked Keaton what he was working on. Keaton brought him to his trailer to show him a chart he had come up with tracking the various characters he was playing, and as he remembers it, Stiller simply looked at the chart and, without a word, walked out of his trailer, not saying goodbye or anything. “And I’ve never talked to him since! I have no f*cking idea if he went, ‘oh f*ck, I don’t even want to know about that…”
While he loved working with Ramis, Keaton has especially fond memories of working with co-star Andie McDowell, taking special delight in making her laugh. In fact, she told him one day, that he actually made her pee her pants in laughter at one point. “To influence a person’s bladder is such a sense of power!”
For more from Michael Keaton, check out our exclusive interview with him here!
Easter Weekend proved to be absolutely gigantic for WB and Legendary’s MonsterVerse, with the fifth film in the franchise (which we ranked here), Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, grossing a massive $80 million domestically. While it was no doubt propelled by the holiday weekend (tomorrow’s grosses should be huge), it can’t be denied that the movie opened way beyond even the most optimistic expectations. Industry estimates (ours included) expected the film to open in the $50 million-ish range, but despite mixed reviews, the movie grossed about $30 million more than anyone expected.
While this is only the second largest MonsterVerse opening weekend (Godzilla made $93 million in 2014), this is considered a massive win for Warner Bros. To compare things, the last MonsterVerse movie, Godzilla Vs Kong, only opened to $30 million. Granted, that was at the height of the pandemic, and the movie was on the day and date on HBO Max, but no one expected this to do these kinds of numbers. Its opening is in the Dune: Part Two range. Wow.
So far, the CinemaScore rating is a solid A-minus, so it should have decent legs at the box office. It will likely be easy for it to hold on to first place next weekend unless The First Omen and Monkey Man massively overperform. Meanwhile, Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire saw its business completely collapse, with it falling a massive 65% following its underwhelming opening. With a $15.7 million weekend, it seems like this entry into the franchise may be its last on the big screen for a while.
However, one movie that rallied unexpectedly this weekend was Dune: Part Two, which pulled in ahead of Kung Fu Panda 4 to make $11.1 million compared to Panda’s $10.2 million. This was a surprise; many thought family audiences would boost the animated four-quel. Dune 2 has now made over $252 million domestically, with a $300 million finish not out of the question.
The horror title Immaculate also showed signs of life this weekend. While its opening last weekend was Neon’s biggest, many assumed it would collapse at the box office this weekend. Yet, Neon’s marketing team has been working overtime to play up some of the more controversial aspects of the flick, and it seemed to have worked. The movie only fell 39% this weekend to post a $3.265 weekend, which is good for horror titles (they nearly always fall over 50%).
Mark Wahlberg’s family title, Arthur the King, has struggled to find an audience, with ComScore revealing it lost 478 screens this weekend, only grossing $2.4 million in 6th place. Perhaps this should have joined other Wahlberg movies like The Family Plan on streaming. LateNight With the Devil, which is IFC/Shudder’s biggest movie ever, continued to perform well, grossing over $2.2 million, with a very small 22% week-to-week decline. The movie hits Shudder in three weeks and might break $10 million domestically, which is quite a coup for a microbudget horror indie.
Eighth and ninth place belonged to two Indian movies, with the Telugu language rom-com Tillu Square opening to $1.8 million, posting the second-highest per-screen average of the weekend (after Kong). Next up was the female-led Bollywood flick Crew, with a $1.49 million opening. These Indian films are really starting to clean up at the North American box office, with Indian audiences flocking to them. Watching these movies with an audience is a lot of fun, as the screenings tend to be quite raucous.
Finally, in tenth place is the Blumhose horror flick Imaginary, which is starting to wrap up its theatrical run with $1.4 million for a $26 million gross.
Next weekend sees the release of the well-received prequel, The First Omen, and Dev Patel’s awesome-looking action flick, Monkey Man. Do you think either has a chance to take out Godzilla x Kong in first place? Let us know in the comments!
