Author: Mat Brewster

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Exorcismo: Defying a Dictator & Raising Hell in Post-Franco Spain is the Pick of the Week

During Franco’s reign of Spain from 1939 to 1975, the government controlled all forms of artistic expression. After his death, movies once again began to express themselves as their creators desired. Artistic expression was political freedom. These films, which were suddenly able to explore sexuality, violence, and horror in ways that had been censored for decades, became a kind of cultural exorcism.

Severin Films is now releasing 19 of those films in a boxed set they are calling Exorcismo: Defying a Dictator & Raising Hell in Post-Franco Spain. I’ve not heard of any of these films, and my film knowledge is severely lacking in all Spanish cinema, but this sounds like a marvelous place to start. I’m happy to make this set my pick of the week.

Also out that looks interesting:

Keeper: Osgood Perkins’ latest has gotten very mixed reviews, but I always find his films at least interesting. Tatiana Maslany stars as a woman left alone in an isolated cabin only to discover an unspeakable evil.

3:10 to Yuma: Criterion is giving this classic western starring Glenn Ford and Van Heflin about a mild-mannered rancher who is tasked with shepherding an outlaw back to prison the UHD treatment.

Friday the 13th (2009): Arrow Video is giving this terrible remake their special treatment.

The Verdict (1946)

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Peter Greenstreet and Peter Lorre starred in nine films together including two absolute bangers – The Maltese Falcon and Casablanca. The Verdict was their final collaboration, and sadly it isn’t great. But it isn’t terrible and it was the first film ever directed by Don Siegel so it has that going for it. You can read my full review here.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: Black Phone 2 (2025)

When I first began writing these Friday Night Horror columns, back in 2022, I didn’t really write full reviews of the films. They really were Friday night movies. After supper, me and the family would go upstairs to my bedroom and watch a Doctor Who episode, and then I’d write my Five Cool Things column (which was published on Fridays back then), and then I’d start watching a horror movie. But by then it was usually pretty late. Many times I’d actually fall asleep on the couch before I’d finished the movie. Even if I did make it to the end, it would be way too late for me to be able to write a full review.  So usually, somewhere in the middle of the film, I’d dash off my column with promises to write my full thoughts the next morning (usually this didn’t happen.)

At some point my daughter got older and started having friends over on Friday nights (or she’d go to their house), and the Doctor Who watching kind of stopped. Then I stopped writing Five Cool Things on Fridays, and suddenly I had a lot more free time to start my weekend. Truth be told, I often watch my horror movies on Friday afternoons. 

Short thoughts on movies I hadn’t even finished became full-on reviews, and here we are. I say all this to admit one thing: I can barely remember watching Black Phone (2021). When trailers started dropping for Black Phone 2, I remembered I had seen the first one, but I couldn’t remember anything about it. I was pretty sure I had written about it, so I searched my site hoping to find a review to refresh my memory. I found my Friday Night Horror column on it, but then had to face the fact that it was written at that time when I wasn’t writing full reviews. And in the case of this movie, I was so spoiler-avoidant I hardly said anything about the plot.

I started to watch it again because I wasn’t interested in the sequel, but I’ve got a stack of Blu-rays on my desk that need watching (and reviewing), so I didn’t feel like I had time.  So I watched a couple of trailers and refreshed myself with the basic premise of the films and sat down with the sequel. 

Black Phone 2 takes place four years after the original film. The hero of that film, Finney Black (Mason Thames), the only survivor of the Grabber’s (Ethan Hawke) reign as a serial killer, is haunted by his experience.  His sister Gwen (Madeleine McGraw), who helped find Finn when he was trapped in the Grabber’s basement, is now haunted by  nightmares featuring young boys being murdered at the Alpine Lake Christian Camp. When she receives a phone call from her dead mother and discovers that she once worked at Alpine Lake, she convinces Finn and her friend Ernesto (Miguel Mora) – whose brother was killed by the Grabber – to visit Alpine Lake and investigate.

They tell the camp they are interested in becoming counselors in training. The camp agrees, but by the time they arrive, a great blizzard has rolled in. Most of the staff went home to stay out of the storm, and none of the other counselors (or campers) have arrived.  This leaves our heroes alone with Armondo (Demián Bichir) the camp supervisor; Mustang (Arianna Rivas), Armondo’s niece and assistant; and Barbara (Maev Beaty) and Kenneth (Graham Abbey) two employees of the camp and staunch Christians. 

As someone who grew up in a conservative Christian environment and who attended a Christian summer camp for several years, I have a little complaint to make. Our heroes – two boys and a girl – arrive at this camp in the midst of a terrible storm in the middle of the night. They are greeted rather coldly and then immediately separated – boys in one cabin, Gwen in another. When Gwen asks about this arrangement, not wanting to be left alone in this strange place in the middle of a storm, she’s told by Mustang that there is a law against underage boys and girls sleeping in the same cabin. Furthermore, while Mustang would like to stay with Gwen, she also is not allowed by law because she is not a licensed counselor. 

What the what? I’ve been to numerous Christian camps and retreats, and while it is true they don’t allow boys and girls to bunk in the same house as each other, it isn’t because of some law but rather because they fear the sexy. Boys and girls can’t be trusted with their lust and therefore must be separated. Even if it is in the middle of the night, in a strange place, and there is a scary snowstorm.  Even if one of the boys is the girl’s brother. And almost every adult I’ve ever known in this situation would absolutely let Gwen either stay with her brother or with them. No way are they making her sleep by herself.

But I digress.

Gwen continues to have dreams. A payphone (for some reason located outside by itself, very near a frozen lake) starts ringing even though it is disconnected. Finn answers it and discovers the Grabber isn’t dead, and he’s ready for his revenge.

Armondo is suspicious these kids aren’t really the Christian camp counselor type (Gwen’s hilariously foul mouth tips him off), and soon enough they confess to him why they are really there. He remembers the mother and agrees to help.

Gwen’s nightmares were shot using Super 8 and Super 16 cameras, which give it a wonderfully gritty and old look. Unfortunately, they are mostly gore-filled jump scares that didn’t do anything for me. The rest of the film didn’t fare much better.

My (admittedly vague) memory of the first film is that it was very tense and thrilling. The sequel has none of that. They don’t attempt to add anything to the lore. They don’t try and explain how the Grabber is still alive. He’s come from hell, I guess. They do some variations on his creepy mask, which is kind of cool, but he isn’t terrifying here. 

I didn’t hate the film. There are moments that are interesting. I do appreciate that they tried to go in a different direction instead of imitating the original, but they missed the goal line.

The Sunday Woman (1975)

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I feel like I grouse a little too much about not having much of a readership. In truth, it isn’t that big of a deal. Sure, I wish more people read my stuff, but I’m not actually trying all that hard to gain a readership. I write because I like to write.

But I also realize that I tend to write about relatively obscure stuff. I don’t go to the movies every week and catch the hot movies. I don’t even tend to watch them at home and write about them. I watch stuff like this – an obscure Italian murder mystery that wasn’t likely known in the US when it came out, much less 50 years later.

Sometimes I tell myself to write about new things, or at least popular ones, but I can’t help myself. I watch what I like, and I write about that.

Oh well. This film may be obscure, it is certainly strange, but it was also pretty good. You can read my full review here.

Listen to Bruce Springsteen’s New Song “Streets of Minneapolis”

I very intentionally stay away from writing about politics in these pages. Partially because I don’t think I would sway anyone one way or another, but also because I just don’t have the energy to argue anymore.

But what ICE is doing all over our country, and especially in Minneapolis, is unconscionable. It is wrong. There has to be a better way.

Bruce Springsteen just dropped a song about it, and it is angry and powerful. He does not hold back. Neither should you. Neither should I. 

New Year, New You: Sleeping Car to Trieste (1948)

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When I was thinking of what theme I should do for January, my wife was the first to come up with the New Year concept. Originally she suggested road trip movies. New Year means trying to make changes in your life, and sometimes that means leaving the place you’ve been stuck in. I liked that idea but wasn’t sure I could do enough road trip movies to make it through the month. 

But I do think you can encompass travel into my larger theme of New Year, New You. Now, we are going to stretch it a little further and suggest any movie where the people are traveling somewhere even if they don’t experience much growth along the way.

I love road trip movies. I love movies set on trains even more. I love train travel in general. I have ridden a lot of trains all over Europe and Asia; it is a wonderful way to travel. As much as I love to drive, it is very nice to ride the rails and not have to worry about anything. Trains are so much more enjoyable than planes. You have more legroom. You can get up and walk about. And the scenery is often much more beautiful. 

There are lots of different types of movies set on and around trains. I love a good mystery or thriller set aboard a train.  Trains are enclosed spaces, so the killer (or thief, or whatever) only has so many places to hide. But there are usually many cars so that you aren’t just stuck in one room. And the train is traveling, which allows for different scenery and different passengers to come and go, and the ever present possibility that someone could jump.

An important diary is stolen from the Paris Embassy by Zurta (Albert Lieven) and Valya (Jean Kent). They hand it to a man called Poole (Alan Wheatley) who is supposed to usher it to a designated rendezvous point. Instead, he runs to the Orient Express with intentions to sell it to the highest bidder. The diary is said to contain information that in the wrong hands would lead to yet another world war.

Zurta and Valya learn of Poole’s deception and board the train. It departs for Trieste. To complicate matters, Zurta is wanted by the authorities in Trieste and must depart before they arrive there.

They don’t exactly know where Poole is on the train; he’s doing a good job of staying low, and they can’t make a show of looking for him because they had every intention of using the diary themselves. 

Mixed in with all of this espionage is a big bag of characters having their own side stories. Usually this kind of film has lots of these types of characters, but their screen time is minimized. They exist to give the film color, to give the setting some realism. But here they are given ample opportunity to be on screen. Numerous, what would normally be side characters, are given time to have fully drawn stories. Our leads often feel like supporting parts. 

There is a young GI looking for some birds to chat up and winds up in a car with a British ornithologist. A boorish Brit spends all his time with the train’s renowned chef trying to teach him how to cook dull dishes. A businessman takes a woman with him who is decidedly not his wife in hopes of an affair, but fate keeps intervening and keeping them apart. Etc. and so forth. 

Poole bribes a porter to get a private room where he hides the diary. But then he’s kicked out because that room was reserved by a very prominent and rich writer. He’s then sat with a French detective, Inspector Jolif (Paul Dupuis). Eventually, the diary will be found, and someone (or someones) will find themselves dead. It is Inspector Jolif who will have to put everything together. But even then the film doesn’t bother itself too much with that angle.

I sound like I’m complaining, but I’m absolutely not. I enjoyed this crazy cast of characters and each of their stories. I would have enjoyed it more if they’d spent just a little more time on the thriller aspects, but mostly this film is a lot of fun.

Watch J Mascis Jam with Wilco on a Cover of Neil Young’s “Cortez the Killer”

I love, love, loved Dinosaur Jr. when I was a teenager. A bad breakup with a girl in college kept me away from them for a long time, but I’ve since come back to enjoy their brand of music.

Wilco is one of my very favorite bands. Wilco invited Dinosaur Jr to play on their Sky Blue Sky festival in Mexico this week. During Wilco’s set J joined them for a fiery version of Neil Young’s “Cortez the Killer.”

Three lead guitar players is always a challenge but I love the way they pulled it off here. Jeff, J, and Nels all get a chance to solo, but when they aren’t doing that they still add plenty of texture. I love how Jeff seems to almost forget about the final verse and just kind of throw it out there at the end.

New Year, New You: Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore (1974)

alice doesn't live here anymore poster

Well, once again I seem to have completely biffed on a monthly movie theme. I really should only choose genres and time periods. Everything else seems to be too much work. I can easily choose movies from a genre on any streaming service or my own collection. Ditto for movies by decade. But when I choose something like this – movies that feature characters in transition or moving in some manner – then I have to do a little research, and then I have to figure out how to watch those films. Most days I’m too tired to do even that little bit of effort.

So here we are on January 24, and I’m talking about my second film from this month’s theme.

Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore was Martin Scorsese’s fourth feature-length film. He was still trying to find his footing as a director. His first film, Who’s That Knocking On My Door, is actually quite interesting and dives right into many of the themes Scorsese would continue to tackle for the rest of his career, but it was really just one step above a student film. 

After that he moved to Hollywood, and Roger Corman gave him the money (with stipulations) to make Boxcar Bertha. It isn’t a bad film, but it was definitely a director-for-hire kind of gig. Scorsese’s friends, especially John Cassavetes, hated it and were afraid Scorsese was selling out.

He then made Mean Streets, a semi-autobiographical film about street hoods in New York City. It did quite well both commercially and critically and hailed Scorsese as a director one should keep their eye on.

The question then was, what would he do next?  The answer came from Ellen Burstyn. She was looking to make what they used to call a “Woman’s Picture” but with more modern sensibilities. Her friend Francis Ford Coppola told her to watch Mean Streets, and she immediately thought Scorsese was the man to make her film.

The movie immediately announces she was right. The opening credits roll over soft satin; an old romantic song croons on the soundtrack. Then we open on a farm straight out of The Wizard of Oz. Scorsese drenches it in bright reds as if the sun is setting. It looks very much like an old film from the classic days of Hollywood. Everything is beautiful, but artificial.

A young girl, Alice (Mia Bendixsen), sings the song we just heard over the credits. She says something about how she’ll grow up to be a singer, and then something like, “I hope to Christ I will.”  It is that “Christ” that catches your attention. Little girls in old movies don’t blaspheme. A moment later she’ll curse again. Then she’ll be called into her house for supper. The film moves in on her through the window.

Then crash cut. “All the Way From Memphis” by Mott the Hoople blasts on the radio. The color returns to normal. We see Ellen, now an adult (and played by Ellen Burstyn), in the kitchen of her new home.  Her preteen son Tommy (Alfred Lutter) lies on the floor listening to that song loudly, the speakers set inches away from his ears.  Ellen is enjoying it. She sways to the music, but her husband, Billy (Donald Hyatt) isn’t so chill. He shouts at Tommy to turn that racket down. 

This is Scorsese announcing that this isn’t your mothers type of movie.

I’d seen this film once before many years ago. In my memory, Billy was a horrible husband, mean and abusive. Alice sets out on her adventure by leaving him. I was pretty sure she left her son with him.  

In reality, the husband isn’t so bad. He’s not particularly attentive, but other than some yelling, he isn’t abusive. He seems like a man who has become tired of his life – of his low paying job, of his son, who is rather high-strung and is always making noise, and of his wife, who isn’t quite as exciting as she once was.  There is an early scene where he lies on the bed watching TV. Alice comes in and asks what he’s watching and what it’s about. He mostly grunts, giving her half answers. He’s not really paying attention to the show, but wants to be left alone.  She begins to quietly sob.  But he notices her, sees her pain, and comforts her. There is love in that relationship.

Then he dies. A terrible car accident changes Alice’s and Tommy’s lives forever. Alice moved to New Mexico when they got married, but now she’s thinking of that old farm in Monterey, California. She was happy there. She thinks she could be happy there again.

She sells all her stuff and takes to the road. But there isn’t enough money to get them to Monterey. They stop in Phoenix. She gets a job as a lounge singer. She meets a guy (Harvey Keitel). At first she pushes him away, but she’s lonesome, and she lets him have her. He seems nice, and she thinks about staying. Then his wife shows up, and he loses his temper, and they hit the road once again.

They make it to Tucson, and she’s forced to take a job as a waitress at a crummy diner. She befriends Flo (Diane Ladd), a fiery waitress with a way with words (and yes, this part of the movie is the basis for the long-running television series, Alice). She meets another man, David (Kris Kristofferson), and once again her plans for Monterey get sidetracked. 

It does feel like a film that was taking something old and outdated and giving it a modern spin. Alice wasn’t exactly unhappy in her life as a homemaker, but she wasn’t thriving either. Her husband’s death forces her to make changes, but this isn’t a film where everything comes up roses. She struggles. She gets sidetracked. 

Tommy is a good kid, but he’s loud, obnoxious, and he talks back constantly. Alice mostly lets him get away with it. She gives him sass right back. Sometimes she yells at him, but she’s also very protective of him.  This gets her into trouble with her men. David tells her she spoils the kid, that what he needs is a good swift kick in the rear. But she won’t have any of that. It is a very real picture of single-motherhood with all its struggles. Alice isn’t perfect, but she’s trying.

Other than that opening scene, Scorsese refrains from making it too flashy. He lets the story (and Burstyn’s performance, for which she won an Oscar) take the lead. It isn’t my favorite Scorsese picture by a long shot, and it feels very much apart from pretty much every other film he’s directed, but it is still quite good and I recommend it.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: Good Boy (2025)

good boy poster

The idea of a horror movie told from the perspective of a dog is a good one.  It’s a great one, actually. It seems so simple you wonder why it hasn’t ever been done before. The execution of Good Boy is mostly good too. Except for a few shots, it isn’t from the dog’s POV or anything, but the camera is often set down low, from the height a dog would normally see. The dog’s owner, Todd (Shane Jensen), barely has his face on screen. If you’ve ever had a dog suddenly look out a window into darkness or bark at a door when no one was outside, then you know the feeling this movie gives you.

There isn’t a whole lot of plot to describe. Todd has some kind of disease. The kind that makes him cough up blood regularly. The film opens on him unconscious, lying on his couch with the dog Indy (a very good dog, indeed) sitting by his feet. Todd’s sister Vera (Arielle Friedman) discovers him there and calls for an ambulance. 

Upon release, he moves to his dead grandfather’s old home in the woods. Vera constantly calls Todd with concerns over his health, to his increased annoyance. The house is old and creepy and possibly haunted. Indy regularly feels a dark presence there. Sometimes he sees something lurking in the shadows. Sometimes it does more than lurk. This is the type of film that will linger in a wide shot inside the house. After a long beat, something will move, or a shadow will become a creature. I found myself always looking in the backgrounds to find some new horror.

It is a mood film with jump scares.

I dug all of that. But the script has problems. Nothing is very well defined. My expectations were that Todd would be attacked in some way by the monster and Indy would triumphantly save him. I would have even accepted Todd dying early in the film and the rest of it being Indy trying to survive the monster like a Final Girl.

But Todd hardly even notices the evil presence. It might be attacking him. It might be making him sicker.  Or it might be possessing him somehow. But none of that is clear. At one point I thought the monster might just be a metaphor for his illness.

Indy is more of a passive observer than a hero. It would have been incredibly obnoxious to have him barking at everything the entire movie, but he just sits there watching weird shadows appear and nightmare monsters attack without hardly even growling. 

All of this makes the film fairly inert. There isn’t much forward motion to it. The plot never seems to go anywhere, but the themes—what the film is trying to say—are more muddled than clear.

I’m glad I watched it. I really do think the concept is a good one, and the execution is well done. I just wish there was more to it.