Last year, I reviewed A LOT of AI horror films and yes…most were terrible. It is sad that these films exist and someone spend time making them. However, there are some that are not the worst.
“They Have Awakened” by Ethan is a super short film on Antarctic explorers who find a cave that is just chock full of Cthulhu…Cthulhus(?)…Cthulhossiers(?). Cthulhossiers are like other Cthulhus, but they’re mostly into college hoops.
The explorer team finding Cthulhus is essentially a sub-genre; the stories are always the same, BUT some times the rendering is slightly better. I am actually tired of explorers continuing to unleash Cthulhus- can’t they be like the other Antarctic scientists that I’ve met and just turn to alcoholism and amphetamines?
The film is aggressively mediocre, but it’s only 4 minutes and change; so, have an oat-forward pancake and spend four minutes watching.
This is movie should be called- Thank Goodness, my friends are all dead!
I don’t always hope for the death of comrades, but when I do I drink… well, it’s Pellegrino…
“The Devil’s Mouth” is a movie that looks more expensive that it is and that is actually a signature of the producer/director Jeff Wadlow. He budgets his films to have nothing left at the end; so, it looks like a studio film, but it was only 3.5MM.
If you’re trying become a filmmaker on a budget, watch an interview with Jeff Wadlow below.
This was a great way to begin my Horrorthon because I got to start it with Lisa. My regular readers know that Horrorthon films are a mixed bag, AT BEST. There are movies that don’t take themselves seriously and just have fun, there are short films that are masterworks, and there are Alex Magana films that strain my belief in humanity’s ability for redemption.
“The Devil’s Mouth” takes place in Thailand and Sara McKenna (Kathryn Newton) is on an caving trip with her MANY toxic friends. Five minutes into the film and the friends are all snorkeling; unfortunately, Sara decides to snorkel too, but her terrible friends mix themselves up and boat off and leave her behind “47 Meters Down” style. Then, she gets attacked by jellyfish and gets actual wounds. Her most toxic friend Max (Lana Condor) doesn’t even apologize. Max’s main personality trait is that she bosses people around the whole movie (badly) and gets most of the group killed.
Sara needs a tough love friend or dad to say, “Look, you’re comin home or I’ll meet you there. Leave that trash behind!”
Also, why are these 20 somethings going caving in the first place and not wanting to just drink and sleep around…ON LAND?! You’re in Thailand! You all should be trying create some souped up version of HPV.
Sara and her terrible friends go to this cave system that was flooded with salt water and it looks super creepy and Max demands the group ignore the guide and go in the evil cave system. It is really amazing that Max and her friends have lived as long as they have. They can barely swim, they have claustrophobia, relationship issues, and Max, the toxic garbage person, leading them.
Because the cave was flooded with salt water, bull sharks have come into the cave system and start eating them all. Unfortunately, Max stubbornly continues to live until the final 15 minutes. Sara valiantly fights of sharks and risks her life to try to keep the body count down, but the sharks just want it more!
There is cocaine. There are shark movies. There are shark movies that appear to be written whilst on cocaine. Maybe the writer is a straight up teetotaler; in which case, he has no excuse for what he brought forth. Alex Magana is horrible, but you get what you signed up for: smiling woman- there’s a smiling woman. His movies are terrible, but they deliver- terrible terrible stories. Lone Star Shark was like watching a big box store of jumbled ideas with Great Value props.
This movie clocked at 65 minutes and had the following plot threads: relationship on the skids, mental illness, sibling suicide, computer hackers, random parable quoting evil people in suits, a ghost, repeated discussions of couples weekend day trip planning, and a paper mâché shark. There was nothing to indicate that there were even in Texas; so, that was not one of the many many plot threads. It also took near a third of their 65 minute runtime to get on the water. The water was a pond- a small pond. For some reason, they were docked on shore and you could see that from the camera angle, but they kept shouting how they had to swim across the “lake”. Why? Just get out and walk home. It’s not like the paper mâché shark that was basically a poorly made pinata (credit to Lisa for seeing that) could’ve followed them home.
I guess that I will stick to the shark plotline because the others were just a mess. There’s a paper mâché pinata shark in a pond that has a really hard time eating people. I think that the time on the water was – at most – 40 minutes. The movie had no idea what it was and the shark was really an add-on the many story lines that were like a bowl of mixed up spaghetti. There’s not a lot to say about this strange movie.
It’s not quite shark week, but we’re still all in on sharks eating people here at TTSL. I watched this shark v people movie with Lisa and it was pretty fun. It did have a touch of environmentalist gobbledygook, but it was brief enough to ignore. My advice to anyone doing a shark film is to stick to reality: sharks. You don’t need to bring in vampires, werewolves, or climate change to raise the stakes.
see above
There is a category five hurricane that hits a South Carolina town, it breaks the seawall, the town is taken by the sea, and sharks come in to eat everyone. There were some decent tropes to keep the popcorn popping: abusive foster parents, redneck foster kids, a pregnant woman who gives birth, an annoying anxiety-ridden lady who stares at things through the movie and rises mostly to the occasion, and a wise sailor/marine biologist who actually saves the day.
The mean foster parents and some good Samaritans become shark food, but that was about it. I was happy to see the foster parents die, but one of the foster parents was straight up murdered by the foster kids, which made the foster kids less sympathetic to me. Yes, foster dad was a horrible jerk, but there was no reflection on the fact that they killed him. You would’ve thought the abusive foster parent would’ve been well thought of by the director and writer because he was a state subsidized parent. I thought government intervention was supposed to make everything better?
My three big critiques is that there were not enough deaths, some scenes were too bright, and the protagonist did not get to save the day. “Thrash” was low on the body count; it made me wonder if they ran out of money or had to donate half of their money to an NGO. Did it have to be “Sharknado” levels of shark chomping? No, but I think that there were only five deaths in this film and that’s a little light.
The other critique is the lighting; typically, Netflix films are really dark and I don’t mean mood; it’s actually difficult to see. “Thrash” went the other direction and there was clear sunlight in a number of scenes that were supposed to be at night. The director had an environmentalist streak; so, maybe it was purposeful to lower a carbon footprint and use daylight to film? I do not have a good answer because it took me out of the story.
Finally, the anxiety-ridden star, whom I will call Anxious Girl, was more annoying than inspiring. Also the film ended where the Anxious Girl and the pregnant woman needed to be rescued by Anxious Girl’s uncle. I don’t think the writer understood that this was a failure. The Anxious Girl faced her fears and should’ve saved the day, but it was her Uncle, a minor character, who had to save the protagonist and pregnant woman. Was the Anxious Girl annoying? Sure, but she grew as a character and by taking away her chance at true heroism, it made the victory hollow and deflated.
Is the film worth watching? Sure. Like a tinder date missing a left-arm, “Thrash” was all right.
The song is all about failure. He’s clear-eyed that he’s run out of time. There’s so many things that he could’ve done, but now he’s broken and on his way out. It’s hard to face when things aren’t going to be ok- even these guys feel like failures and they’re rich and surrounded by eager groupies. What does that say for us plebes?
I can only write this from the male perspective. Maybe you keep going to spite your enemies? Maybe you keep going because you still have stupid hope? Maybe you keep going because you’re scared you’ll survive – sort of? Maybe you just keep going because you can’t afford your preferred means to end it? Maybe you keep going because yes it will get worse and yes you are failure, but most people are failures and you figure that you’re not even the worst failure; so, maybe there’s room left to fall? Maybe, like George Carlin suggested, you just don’t have the time to schedule it in?
Whatever your reason, eventually the reason will resolve; so, you need someone to remind you of a backup reason or we will miss you.
Juice WRLD is not really my guy, but my daughter likes him and he did pass way to soon. I think people can see that others value them, but it’s hard to live for other people, when you don’t want to keep going for yourself.
This song always gets to me because I was very in love and in Seattle with everyone I needed in my life. My life has gotten smaller since then, but it’s good to remember the brief times when everything seemed to fit; at least, they seemed to fit.
This movement always made me think of great westerns like Lonesome Dove. The movement never made me think of space or Jupiter. Fun fact, without Jupiter, Earth would be pulverized by meteors constantly. Jupiter is like a big brother.
