There is a nice photo of Paul Mescal to tide y'all over -- I'm about to head off to another great big batch of NYFF screenings, including Mescal's other film showing at the fest Foe with Saoirse Ronan. I am seeing that tonight (I will include the trailer down below) and tomorrow I have the great big double whammy of Todd Haynes' May December(NYFF's Opening Night film) alongside Yorgos Lanthimos' Poor Things! And both of those movies are having press conferences since tomorrow is the official start of the fest, so I say you should follow me on Instagram if you don't already because I will most definitely be posting photos from those. I don't know who will be in attendance given the ongoing actor's strike, but Todd Haynes & Yorgos Lanthimos ain't chopped liver! Anyway that's where I will be all day tomorrow, meaning I won't be here blogging. But my first NYFF review will be landing at Pajiba tomorrow, so stay tuned for that. It's for a movie that also stars Paul Mescal, one that we were just talking about this morning! Imagine that. Anyway looking ahead -- next week is an even busier NYFF week of screenings, so expect posting to be even more sporadic. But reviews will be coming. That's something? Like, the thing I do that I legitimately care about? So stay tuned, and stuff. And have a good weekend!
The gore gets piled yea high in Demián Rugna’s When Evil Lurks, a possession thriller and a truly nasty piece of work that will nevertheless have you feeling high off all the yays you’ll be whooping as it slaughters its way across half of Argentina and back. Having just played TIFF and Fantastic Fest, the latest from the Terrified filmmaker drops on Shudder on October 6th, and it does so with a great big juicy splat of pus-filled viscera. For those of you who are into such things. (Cue the “Haha Yes Sickos” meme.)
Handsome farming brothers Pedro (Ezequiel Rodríguez) and Jimmy (Demián Salomón, giving off big Scoot McNairy energy) are minding their business one night when the sound of gunshots suddenly erupt out in the woods – and there will be a lot of “going to investigate”’ing happening in When Evil Lurks so it’s best if you get over being annoyed by that horror movie cliche right up front. Everybody is always “going to investigate” things they most assuredly should never go investigate, and it never works out well, and yet nobody learns. If Pedro and Jimmy had just sat their asses at home sipping their cerveza we all could’ve rested in peace!
Unfortunately the brothers go and the brothers investigate, and what they find starts off disgusting and only works its way up the barf dial from there. A body sliced clean down the middle leads them to a nearby farmstead, where a family has been hiding their dirty (and I do mean dirty) secret behind some blanket curtains in a back-room – their son has gone “rotten,” which is how people in this film’s world describe those possessed by demons. It seems to be a common enough occurrence in the world of this movie – the script refrains from spelling it out too hard but there are several vague references to religion being dead, and everybody knows somebody who knows somebody who’s had to deal with a devil in their midst.
“Rotten” is certainly the word for it though, since the possessed man resembles nothing less than a pouch of spider eggs splattered liberally with tar and bloodied yolks. He’s truly a marvel of grotesque design – the practical-effects in Where Evil Lurks are top-notch; you’ll wanna take a medley of Silkwood showers by the time this goopy baby’s come in for landing.
Slowly we learn a few more rules about this world we’re inhabiting – most importantly that you can’t shoot the “rotten” dead, because that will cause the evil inside of them to explode out like a virus, infecting everyone within reach. So Pedro and Jimmy and another neighbor get the super not bright idea to just load the “rotten” up in the back of their pick-up and drive it a few hundred miles away, where they will toss it into a ditch and drive off. Let this be a lesson, kids – you can’t ignore your problems or unload them on other people, especially when they’re hell-spawned pustule people out to swallow ya souls.
So that goes wrong, and before you know it the stench of possession is stinking up the land – Rugna wisely decides to keep us focused on the brothers and their immediate loved ones, but it’s pretty clear that this is a small apocalypse in the making. And so we follow Pedro as he goes to grab his kids from his estranged wife, which goes about as well as you can expect whenever an estranged husband pops up out of nowhere trying to snatch his kids. The film escalates from there into a series of madnesses spilling into one another, ratcheting up the tension and the body count, and letting it be known fast and ruthlessly that nobody is safe – pets and children and lovers of both of those things, beware!
The last half of When Evil Lurks gets a bit bogged down in over-explaining itself – it’d done a decent enough job up until then just telling us what we needed to know in the moment we needed it, so it’s a little disappointing when it starts spinning its wheels. Especially as a lot of the “rules” and “explanations” don’t entirely jive with what we’ve seen, or how our characters have behaved. But none of that is enough to entirely dilute the nasty power that When Evil Lurks drums up at its strongest – it stays on the right side of WTF just enough to WTF you up.
I was just wondering the other day when we would see Superman-to-be David Corenswet next and what he might looks like, and these pics snapped of him by a pap (via, thx Mac) in California yesterday have answered that with a resounding "Henry Cavill." The beard, the beefy ass -- it's uncanny! In all seriousness this will probably just end up being his "actors are on a strike right now" look, but he's definitely been hitting the squats hard.
The poster for Andrew Haigh's All of Us Strangers, starring Paul Mescal and Andrew Scott as sexy ass lovers, has arrived -- here is the trailer in case you missed that last week, which I posted just a few hours before seeing the movie. And because I've had a few people ask me -- my review will be out soon, or soon enough anyway. The film doesn't screen at NYFF until Sunday so I'm trying to time it closer to that. But here's an insider tidbit -- I've already written it! I wrote it almost immediately after seeing the movie, so I could really ride the wave of emotion it'd stirred up in me. So stay tuned! Won't wanna miss that one, or this movie.
Until these photos the most interesting thing about actor Finn Jones to me was that he was really good, comfortable friends with Julian Morris and Julian's husband Landon Ross (see these photos) -- I also have a vague memory of him saying some annoying things politically (like far left annoying -- not far right, which would be truly unforgivable) which had turned me off at some point?
Anyway abs like this will grab a lot of attention and right a lot of wrongs, is my point. I have no idea what he's doing these days career-wise, since Iron Fist was kind of a flop and it doesn't seem like Marvel will be rebooting it like they are Charlie Cox's perfect Daredevil, but whatever it is he's doing these gray sweatpants need to be his costume for it:
Before any of you ask -- nope, I still have not watched Red White and Royal Blue yet. I will at some point -- I imagine I will need something I don't need to think about very hard around the holidays, after all of these very serious NYFF screenings, and this looks as if it will very much fit that bill. So just wait a little longer for me, Nicholas Galitzine! (Or I'll just watch Bottoms for the fourth time and get my fix of you that way.) These photos are via Style magazine, or their Insta anyway -- I don't have any interview with him to share. But I definitely do have more photos! And for those we hit the jump...
Teasing us with sexy images of Barry Keoghan and Jacob Elordi in Saltburn is only appropriate because the movie is a great big dick-tease itself -- and I don't mean that at an insult in the slightest. I'm not going to get too far into it, I will save that for my review when it's out in November, but this is one horny fucked-up movie and you should rearrange your schedules, your lives, accordingly. Anyway yes here a couple of weeks after I shared some other hot new pictures we have a few more -- hit the jumpfor them all...
I think we can all extend gratitude (I said extended gratitude) to Edward Holcroft for sharing this selfie and making my return to the blogging seat all that much sweeter. As foretold I have been in NYFF screenings for the past two straight days, but today I am here! Lucky everyone. None of us as lucky as Edward, since he sees Edward in the mirror, but lucky enough anyway. Happy Hump Day! Let's try to get to it, then...
It's the 25th anniversary of Pecker this upcoming Monday and with all the John Waters feting happening (his show at the Academy Museum, his star on the Walk of Fame) it seemed a great opportunity to talk about one of his least talked-about movies, and so I did just that! Click over to Mashable to read my little tribute to the film. I had to come around on Pecker myself (yup, that's gonna be funny every time I use it in a sentence) -- I didn't love Pecker at first, if you can believe it! I was slow to accept Pecker inside of me. But with time and patience, I realized that Pecker was everything I wanted Pecker to be and more. Now I can't get enough Pecker! Pecker for breakfast! Pecker for lunch! Pecker for afternoon tea! Pecker for din-din and my midnight snack. I peeked a peck o' Pecker and I liked it -- I liked it!
Just a reminder that Raul Castillo, as I told you at the start of this week, is in Cassandro with Gael Garcia Bernal, and that it's not the sort of thing that you want to miss. And it's on Prime right now! Okay that's all -- please do carry on with your morning.
Heads up on another good horror movie of the year 2023 hitting theaters -- director Bishal Dutta's It Lives Inside is out as of tonight and I quite liked this creep-fest! Here is my review from the Fantasia Fest where I saw it a couple of months ago. There are some really strong and terrifying scares in this one! (The swingset scene still haunts me.) Click here to see if the movie is playing near you, and here's the trailer (which I say don't watch if you're planning on seeing this, as I do with all horror movie trailers):
I momentarily considered amending yesterday's post of five photos of Lucas Bravo in Vogue Netherlands to make it eleven photos of Lucas Bravo in Vogue Netherlands, but my brain decided against it almost immediately for reasons unknown. Seriously, I have no idea what I'm doing here or why. And that's why you love me! Anyway yes here we are with seven more photos of Lucas Bravo in Vogue Netherlands -- these ones came right from Lucas himself (or whoever is running his Insta anyway) and for that we say, "Thanks!" Hit the jump for them...
John Morris: I left my family out of hatred and that my father was the person I despised most in this world. I despised everything about him. I sincerely thought I had been freed of all that until tonight. Listening to you, what do I realize? That most of the things that I thought I'd been doing these past years, freely the opinions that I thought I had of my own volition were in fact dictated by my hatred towards that man. I'm 35 years old and my life is like an empty cylinder.
Happy 5 to this, one of my favorite movies of recent years! Jacques Audiard has made several very very very fine films (A Prophet and Dheepan and Rust and Bone, oh my!) but this one's probably always going to be my favorite -- but then it's not playing fair, having a cast I love as much as I love as this one, and seeing Jake Gyllenhaal and Riz Ahmed (as Kermit Hermann Warm!) fall in love (yes this movie is a romance).
So do yourselves a favor and watch this movie as double-feature with Kelly Richard's First Cow this weekend -- that will make for a perfect, exquisite night. I promise. (Not to mention that it will definitely prepare you for Pedro Almodovar's Strange Way of Life, which I saw last night and which belongs riding right astride this two.)
As shamelessly boasted last evening I am seeing Andrew Haigh's All of Us Strangers (starring Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal) tonight at the NYFF press screening. What does that matter to you? Besides the fact that your heart is swelling with joy and pride for my good fortune, of course? What it means is I am not watching, and therefore not giffing, the trailer for All of Us Strangers that has just dropped this morning. I'm not watching a single second of this dammit. And if today's Twitter is filled with other people posting images from it, I will burn that place down quicker than Elon Musk has managed. Anyway I will share the trailer here for you, because I am wildly generous of spirit -- just don't say anything about it until tomorrow! Pinky swear!
Slide on over, Russell Tovey -- you've got company this morning. (click to embiggen) This is from some BBC3 show called Juice created by some guy named Mawaan Rizwan -- no offense at calling you "some guy" Mawaan, but I don't know you. Still you seem like my kind of people since you made this and this happen for yourself:
Checking two great big gay 2023 checkmarks off tonight as I head off to a double-feature of Pedro Almodóvar's Strange Way of Life with Pedro Pascal & Ethan Hawke followed by Emerald Fennell's Saltburn starring Barry Keoghan & Jacob Elordi (seen above). Watch the trailer for the former here and the trailer for the latter here. In related news NYFF press screenings are off to the races and my schedule's about to become hella hectic -- the next couple of days aren't too bad, but next week it's going to be nigh a ghost town up in here. Just so's you don't call the police declaring me deceased or anything! I will only be dead insofar as cinema will have swallowed me whole. The best way to go! Anyway that's next week. Tonight -- gay shit. (Also tomorrow night -- gay shit -- as I'm seeing Andrew Haigh's All of Us Strangers with Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal tomorrow! One hell of a sudden legendary week upon me here.)
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