Good day, my decomposing decompadres. It's another good week for all things horror, as... absolutely no horror movies were nominated for Academy Awards this week. I mean, The Act of Killing has some horrific things happening, but that doesn't really count. This week you'll find yourself surrounded by mushrooms, swinging fists and a bunch of monster children. It's the life of a parent for you. Plus everyone's favorite guy who looks like Elijah Wood: Elijah Wood.
View The Visual Splendor Of This Trailer And Poster For A Field In England
I didn’t realize Drafthouse Films put this trailer out. Actually, it came out a couple of weeks ago, but it makes the cut because A Field in England is a pretty solid experience, in spite of and perhaps because it’s so different from director Ben Wheatley’s previous films, and so different from 98% of cinema. This preview is a good example of how striking the film is, especially the psychedelic section where the editing goes haywire and everything in the room gets epilepsy.
A Field in England follows a group of 17th century soldiers in the English Civil War who sort of defect and just fade out of the battles and are captured by an alchemist (Michael Smiley) who leads them on a quest for treasure in the middle of a field. What the trailer and poster below don’t give away is the film’s baffling sense of humor that creeps up in the weirdest places and most absurd ways. Even if you hate the movie, as I’m sure some people will, the solid performance from Reece Shearsmith as Whitehead, the guy who loses his shit for a while, can’t be denied.
Get Cooties By Licking This Poster
Though we have yet to see a trailer for Jonathan Millott and Cary Munion’s horror comedy Cooties, it’s screening at Sundance today and will hopefully bring out a ton of positive reviews. But wider audiences won’t get to see anything from this flick for a while, except of course for the poster above, of the skeletal hand holding the lollipop. It’s such a great throwback look for a film with a plot that sounds straight out of the Gremlins knockoff camp. But in a good way.
In Cooties, a strange virus is loose in an elementary school, turning the students into savage murderous beasts. It’s up to a group of teachers to take on the monsters, and I really don’t think they all make it out alive. Written by Saw’s Leigh Whannell and TV writer Ian Brennan, this film boasts an all-star cast including Elijah Wood, Rainn Wilson, Jack McBrayer, Jorge Garcia, Alison Pill, Whannell and Nasim Pedrad. Here are a few of the already released stills. But don’t touch them unless you’re wearing like three gloves.
Painfully Sweet Featurette And Posters For Israeli Comedic Thriller Big Bad Wolves
Israeli directors Aharon Keshales and Navot Papushado have unleashed their dark fairy tale horror thriller comedy Big Bad Wolves upon America on Friday in theaters and on VOD, but I haven’t watched it yet as I’m writing this. I shall remedy that soon or face the wrath of a hammer to the…everything. Above is your usual promotional clip with footage mixed in with the talking head shots, via DreadCentral, but the already great trailer is spliced perfectly with the directors’ and stars’ vague comments about the film’s tone and violence content, and it got me more riled up than I already was. That doesn’t happen to me when Chris Pine talks about being Jack Ryan.
There are also a few new posters for the film, all featuring our three main characters in differing states of smugness. (Well I guess someone’s eyes in and of themselves can’t be smug. But they probably are.) One of those men is Dror (Rotem Keinan), a serial killer who fucked up majorly by killing the daughter of Gidi (Tzahi Grad), a man whose vengeance knows no bounds. Micki (Lior Ashkenazi) is a cop who doesn’t mind working outside the law to stop a killer’s path. And then a clever plot and tools to body parts. Check these posters out and watch the film however you can as soon as you can. In case you can’t tell by how often his name is thrown around, Quentin Tarentino thought it was the best film of 2013 at one point. Take that how you like.
Elijah Wood’s SpectreVision Producing Unique Serial Killer Film Trilogy
Hold your hand up if you thought Elijah Wood’s name was going to come up more than once. His SpectreVision production company, which he runs with Daniel Noah and Josh C. Waller, will next be taking on an interesting project from director Craig Macneill and Clay McLeod Chapman. They will turn their 2012 Sundance short Henley into a full feature called The Boy, which will serve as the first of three films. But this isn’t about a superhero or a teen who can save the world from some evil threat. This is the evil threat.
Written by the pair, The Boy will follow future serial killer Ted Henley at the age of 9, and I’m not quite sure what else the film will have going for it. The other two films in the trilogy will track Henley’s progress at ages 14 and 18, and will end as he truly drifts over the edge into a murderer. He will be played by 8-year-old Jared Breeze, one of the young students in the previously mentioned Cooties. Principal photography will begin on The Boy on February 17, 2014 in Columbia.
Brawler Thriller Brutal Promises "Twilight Zone Meets The Prisoner"
So, there are few things more fun than trailers for movies that make you look at the screen with a face that asks 17 questions at once. So, that’s not quite the case here with Donald Lawrence Flaherty’s rock’em sock’em thriller Brutal, but the film’s description is daffy enough to deserve a full piece here somehow. This is another one whose trailer has been out for a while, but it’s being shopped around at European Film Market, via BloodyDisgusting.
The film follows martial artist actor Morgan Benoit (Keanu Reeves’ stunt double in 47 Ronin!!!), who is abducted by aliens when he was a kid and forced to go through decades of cage fights for some reason until he is turned into this badass fighting monster. It’s part psychological drama and part violent as fuck fight movie, with veteran Hollywood stuntmen Colin Follenweider and Chris Torres. It’s like Raze, but for liberated men. And on that bloody note, we’re off.
Oh, but if you want to win a walk-on role for the upcoming sequel The Purge 2, just head to this link. Otherwise, we’ll see you next time.
