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Tag: Jenna Ortega

  • ‘Scream VI’ is the series’ best sequel | Non-spoiler review

    ‘Scream VI’ is the series’ best sequel | Non-spoiler review

    The survivors of the latest Ghostface killings try to escape their pasts in New York City in Scream VI. Unfortunately for them, Ghostface follows them to the Big Apple.

    Making perfect use of its New York City setting, Scream VI is bigger, bolder, and scarier than any of its predecessors. While it sticks to the tried and true tropes and references that film fans will love, it pushes the boundaries of its story and, most importantly, kills to exciting new territory. Ghostface takes Manhattan and I couldn’t be happier.

    Scream VI, a sequel to the 2022 requel of Wes Craven’s original 1993 slasher classic, is bigger, bolder, and scarier than any of its predecessors. That’s in large part because of its New York City setting. While the city has always been ripe for horror, I mean it’s a claustrophobic concrete maze filled with 8 million highly stressed individuals (I’m a New Yorker, I’m allowed to say this), making one that captures its full potential has largely alluded us (I’m looking at your Jason Takes Manhattan). Scream VI  uses the city’s potential to magnify almost every element of the franchise — the lore, the kills, and, of course, the potential identities of Ghostface.

    After a requel that knowingly remakes the original film while also moving the story forward, Scream VI catapults in an entirely new direction as we focus in on the “core four” as Mason Gooding’s Chad puts it. ​​The movie picks up months after the latest Ghostface killings centered around sisters Sam (Melissa Barerra) and Tara (Jenna Ortega). They along with Chad and his twin sister Mindy (Jasmin Savoy Brown) have gone off to start a new life in New York City. However, it wouldn’t be Scream if the world wasn’t obsessed with the recent string of murders perpetrated by horror-obsessed serial killers—and why wouldn’t they? This is the world of the internet, though, and as with any news story the dark corners create a conspiracy.

    The most horrifying thing in the world, a subreddit, is convinced that Sam perpetrated the latest Woodsboro killings complicating the sisters’ lives in the Big Apple. Thankfully, something comfy and familiar pops up to remind them of home — a Ghostface killer! But this is the sixth movie in a franchise of movies that know they’re movies in a franchise. Horror movie geek Mindy breaks it down for us. Now that they’re deep in the franchise the rulebook is out the window. That means that no one is safe, even legacy characters.

    From the classic cold open that plays with our expectations to the final reveal, Scream VI constantly surprises with its ability to be more brutal and menacing (Ghostface with a shotgun? Horrifying.) while maintaining its winky film nerd charm (complete with a shoutout to Letterboxd). This time, the movie takes aim at how franchises slowly lose reverence for the source material in an effort to keep the themselves relevant. Its criticism of the genre isn’t nearly as incisive as previous installments, even last year’s less successful Scream “requel” had more to say about current state of horror. Instead directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett lean into the iconic horror elements that make up the series — i.e. the kills.

    Often horror movies portray New York City as long concrete blocks of shadowy corners and urban emptiness. Scream VI does the opposite and uses its crowdedness to its advantage — the two most impressive set pieces take place in public on a bodega and the subway. In a city of millions, no one can hear you scream. It’s that expansion outside of suburban interiors that make this installment so exciting. Classic elements like the chase scene and horrors lurking behind closed doors remain, but new elements bring new life screeching back into the series.

    The mystery is perhaps the most twisted — for better and worse — while legacy characters like Courtney Cox‘s Gale Weathers and Hayden Panettiere‘s Kirby Reed add to the movie’s plethora of easter eggs.

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  • ‘X’ is a Texas Boogie Nights Massacre | movie review

    ‘X’ is a Texas Boogie Nights Massacre | movie review

    X follows a young group of aspiring filmmakers who travel to an isolated farm to film a porn. It doesn’t go well.

    X is a detailed and well-studied recreation of 70s exploitation B-movies and the Golden Age of the slasher genre, right down to the film grain. However, director Ti West does more than homage. He adds his own darkly comedic tone to mine some real laughs in between the carnage as well as a surprisingly complex pair of villains — which is why a prequel film has already been shot. Nostalgic cinematography, a tense Carpenter-esque score, and deliciously camp performances — particularly from Brittany Snow, Mia Goth, and Martin Henderson — make X a gloriously bloody and entertaining throwback. Like Boogie Nights by way of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

    X is now playing in theaters.

    The most fascinating thing about X is how straightforward it is. There are no tricks, no twists, no sudden genre shifts or gotcha moments, but that’s exactly what director Ti West intends. He’s not looking to reinvent the slasher genre, he wants to celebrate every single gritty bloody detail right down to the film grain — although The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is clearly his biggest inspiration. But that’s not to say he doesn’t have some tricks up his sleeves.

    The glorious The Cabin in the Woods, perhaps the most meta meta-horror movie that lovingly skewers the genre for its repetitive tropes, posits that the victims of slashers are being punished for their youth. Not just being young, but taking advantage of that youth. However, movies from the genre’s heyday in the 70s and 80s personify that punishment as an inhumane mysterious force — Michael Myers, Leatherface, Jason Voorhees. West subverts that trope and instead finds humanity in the antagonists. If anything, X’s villains are devastatingly human.

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    But first, let’s go back to 1979. You know the setup. A group of six young people travels to an isolated part of Texas for a weekend of fun. Though, in a Boogie Nights-like twist the group isn’t just doing it for their own pleasure. They’re shooting an adult film to take advantage of the newly formed home video market. Maxine Minx (Mia Goth), in particular, is obsessed with being a star. Something her boyfriend and film’s producer Wayne (Martin Henderson) is convinced she’s destined for.

    Maxine’s co-stars Bobby-Lynne (Brittany Snow) and Jackson Hole (Scott Mescudi aka musician Kid Cudi), on the other hand, are more seasoned porno actors. Rounding out the group are the film’s director RJ (Owen Campbell) and his girlfriend Lorraine (Jenna Ortega), who are more conservative compared to their companions, especially Lorraine who didn’t even know what the project was.

    In an effort to keep costs low the group is shooting the film in the farmhouse on the isolated property of elderly couple Howard (Stephen Ure) and his wife Pearl (Goth, playing double duty in impressive old age makeup). West makes it clear that something is amiss with his chilling bloody cold open, the foreboding music by composers Tyler Bates and Chelsea Wolfe, and classic horror shots framing the villains with menace. We don’t get a clear view of Wayne or Pearl’s faces for some time.

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    After some brilliant slow-burn tension building where we begin to learn a bit more about our characters, hell breaks loose. Or should I say, Pearl breaks loose and X pivots to being a full-blown slasher with all the blood and gore you could hope for. Still, West finds depths in its narrative while maintaining its horror elements. Maxine and Pearl feel like parallel stories running in two different timelines. Pearl could’ve been Maxine in an earlier life and Maxine could become Pearl. X presupposes that the real horror here is time. It highlights the brilliance of casting Mia Goth in both roles and the decision to film a prequel in tandem.

    As straightforward of an homage to 70s and 80s horror X is, it mines the thematic depths of youth, time, regret, sex, and the horror genre itself. Horror and porn are often lumped together as gratuitous and deviant as they deal with the taboo topics of sex and gore. West questions asks why that is the case with his narrative. Why do we find two people having sex on camera so alluring yet unacceptable (the same for violence)? The answer is the movie itself.

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    More movies, less problems

    Hey! I’m Karl. You can find me on Twitter and Letterboxd. I’m also a Tomatometer-approved critic.

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