Dune (2021)

When it comes to cult classics, the horror genre has always had an overwhelming number of B-movies. Horror B-movies refer to the low-budget feature films as compared to major feature films. One might call them “low-grade” cinema as opposed to the more artistic endeavours, but I’d refrain from saying that. The horror B-movie is a source of unbridled entertainment and for the fans of spooky business, it’s the perfect way to round out Halloween night or any night in which they’re in the mood for horror. Usually characterized by a somewhat loose storyline, sometimes some quite silly characters, a little over-the-top acting and a bunch of practical effects, horror B-movies used to rule the world of horror during the ’70s and ’80s with franchises like Friday the 13, Slumber Party Massacre and Halloween.

But since the late '90s, with big-budget horror films like End of Days and Hollow Man, the focus has shifted from the horror B-movie. We now have major horror features like It and Midsommar and every year, there are almost ceremonial releases from the studio A24 which gave us The Witch and Hereditary. This year itself, Ti West's X and Jordan Peele’s Nope came out, which are far from being horror B-movies. But that being said, it’s only the focus that has shifted because we still have horror B-movies being made. If you enjoy the bizarre, less refined and entertaining world of the horror B-movies and want a break from the nuanced and poignant big-budget horror releases, I have a list of gore-fests from the last ten years to enjoy this October. Here are fifteen films for the fifteen days that remain till the auspicious date of Halloween!

The biggest subcategory of horror B-movies by percentage is the slasher film. Almost overdone violence and heavy reliance on practical effects as opposed to CGI characterize the slasher. And of course, the heavily criticized but also equally loved trope of the final girl is a slasher staple. Some of the most gruesome on-screen deaths have been courtesy of the slasher horror B-movie and I’m here to offer you some more horrible killings. If gore makes you queasy, you may consider skipping this segment.

Moon Knight is the newest Marvel series to premiere on Disney Plus.  The pilot aired about a month ago.  He is a lesser known character in the Marvel universe.  As someone who’s been reading comic books and obsessing over Marvel lore for decades, I admit I was unaware of the character for many years.

Moon Knight begins with Steven Grant (Oscar Isaac), a straitlaced, fairly insecure British man who works in a museum gift shop.  Mr. Grant has trouble when he sleeps at night.  He surrounds his bed with sand to monitor footprints and braces his ankles to the floor to trace his somnambulism.  But it gets worse.  Mr. Grant starts experiencing black-outs in the daytime, waking up in strange places, not knowing how he got there.  He then meets Arthur Harrow (Ethan Hawke), a mysterious, cult-like figure in search of a golden scarab.  You get the impression that Harrow is not up to anything good, and he sends a few goons after Steven.  Steven loses consciousness once again, then wakes up to find himself surrounded by the same men now bloody and beaten.  

We begin to piece things together and discover that Mr. Grant has dual personalities.  One being Steven Grant, the other being mercenary Marc Spector.  Spector is Moon Knight, an avatar and servant of the Egyptian Moon God Khonsu.  Khonsu is a tall ghostly creature with robes and the skull of some type of bird in place of its head that follows Steven and Marc wherever they go.

Toward the end of the first episode we meet the eponymous Moon Knight, a superhero cloaked in Egyptian burial threads, a hood and a cape beating some hell hound dog creature to a pulp.  He's a cool-looking Marvel character right off the page!  He’s got these glowing eyes and he just kicks ass everywhere he goes, seemingly impervious to pain.  

From there the series follows Marc/Steven and his partner Layla (May Calamawy) on their quest to track down the scarab which leads to a lost tomb filled with otherworldly power. It’s up to Moon Knight to save the world from annihilation, all the while struggling with multiple personalities that tend to get him into serious trouble.  

The 94th Academy Awards are right around the corner and with some truly wonderful films like The Power of the Dog, Dune, CODA, Belfast, and Licorice Pizza, the race for Best Picture is incredibly tight. But there's a film that has been gaining momentum at the perfect time - Ryusuke Hamaguchi's Drive My Car. Since the inception of the ceremony, The Academy had long avoided awarding foreign films the honor of Best Picture, even going as far as to award Alfonso Cuaron Best Director for Roma, then proceeding to give the Best Picture award to Peter Farrelly's Green Book in 2019. But in 2020, they finally broke this near century-long habit and awarded Bong Joon Ho's masterpiece Parasite with not only Best International Feature but Best Director and of course, Best Picture, becoming the first foreign film to ever do so. Now Drive My Car has the chance to do the same.

Drive My Car exudes a palpable sense of dreariness and lifelessness that is further embodied by Yusuke, portrayed tragically by Hidetoshi Nishijima, which is historically, exactly what The Academy loves. This film is a slow-burn that demands your attention in every scene, and by slow-burn, I mean glacial. You feel every second of its three-hour runtime and it asks for long periods of empathy and introspection that you have no choice but to give. It can be exhausting being enveloped in such monotony and gloominess, but this isn't the only experience Hamaguchi gives the audience - we also get to witness a journey to acceptance, albeit a lackadaisical one, that eventually leads to a moment of incredible emotional surrender and catharsis. This no doubt puts Drive My Car in a great position for Best International Feature (which it's surely a lock for) but also Best Picture being as there's one thing that The Academy has proven to cherish above all else, no matter what...the Drama.

But it's not exactly a shoo-in. There is stiff competition this year - whether it's Jane Campion's The Power of The Dog, which is very similar in style with a very slow and permeating feeling of dreariness, or Sian Heder's CODA which takes enormous steps forward in the way of deaf representation, we also have to acknowledge films like Paul Tomas Anderson's Licorice Pizza or Denis Villeneuve's Dune where the craftsmanship and quality are among the best Hollywood has to offer but lacking major representation. But Drive My Car is in an interesting position being the first foreign film nominated for Best International Feature and Best Picture since Parasite, while The Academy has been getting better at nominating the films that belong in both categories, they've been rather choosey about awarding foreign films the honor of Best Picture. It's possible for this narrative to change of course, but in a year with so many excellent films deserving of the award, I can't help but feel it might be overlooked. But of course, I'm no insider, I'm basing this entirely on the history of The Academy and their shoddy history of selecting Best Picture winners.

Now that we’re officially over halfway through Hispanic Heritage Month, let’s take a look ahead at movies coming out through the end of 2021 featuring Hispanic and Latine representation. 

Coming to Netflix October 13, this mystery-horror is based on a novel of the same name. The premise is about two young mothers whose charged relationship reveals environmental and spiritual catastrophes. It features Spanish actress Maria Valverde Rodriguez and Argentine actress Dolores María Fonzi. 

The latest in the Bond franchise, this movie arrives in theaters October 8. Rising star and Cuban-Spanish actress Ana de Armas plays Paloma, a CIA agent. She is set to appear briefly in the movie, however she has already been named a stand-out within the cast and plays a very different kind of Bond girl.