Marshmallow (2025): 4.7/10
Whether it means to or not, Marshmallow raids nearly every cliché in the slasher playbook. The soundtrack and sound design are easily its strongest assets, creating tension the performances rarely sustain. The acting gets exceptionally rough in places, though this is hardly a movie built around nuanced performances. The bigger problem is the pacing: it waits until nearly the midpoint to reveal what is actually going on, then expects that turn to supply momentum the first half never builds.
The Light at the Edge of the World (1971): 4.1/10
A Jules Verne survival adventure with Kirk Douglas, Yul Brynner, Samantha Eggar, and a windswept lighthouse should be much more exciting than this. Instead, the movie is overlong and relentlessly grim without generating much suspense. Douglas gives it some energy and Brynner supplies the menace, but the film remains stranded between an old-fashioned adventure and harsher 1970s exploitation, never quite working as either one. A few striking locations aside, it is mostly a slog.
Father Mother Sister Brother (2025): 6.9/10
Jarmusch is very good at the awkward little distances that can form between adult children and their parents, and this triptych gives him three variations on that discomfort. The pauses, forced small talk, and things left unsaid often reveal more than the conversations themselves. It all comes back to the old saying that you can choose your friends and lovers, but you cannot choose your family. That is a simple idea, but Jarmusch finds humor, sadness, and recognition in it, helped by strong performances across the entire ensemble.
Perfect Days (2023): 7.8/10
I may be predisposed to this one because I love Paris, Texas and Japanese culture, but Perfect Days earns admiration entirely on its own terms. Wenders photographs Tokyo beautifully without turning the city into a travelogue. Kōji Yakusho gives a remarkable performance built from routine, gesture, and silence, making Hirayama's repetitive days feel full rather than empty. His cassette collection and love of American music are perfect personal details, suggesting an entire emotional life through what he chooses to hear. Like Hirayama himself, the film is simple, reserved, and quietly beautiful. An outstanding meditative film.
Feed the Devil (2015): 4.2/10
There is some decent gore in Feed the Devil, but almost everything surrounding it is rough. The performances are terrible across the board, the dialogue is stiff, and the characters are too thin for any of the danger to matter. A movie this deep in the wilderness should be able to generate atmosphere almost by accident. Somehow, this one mostly generates boredom.
Elysium (2013): 5.4/10
The premise has teeth: the wealthy abandon a ruined Earth, then hoard medical care on a luxury station above it. Blomkamp keeps reducing those ideas to blunt symbols, thin characters, and increasingly generic action. The production design and effects still have some weight, but Matt Damon is stuck playing a standard reluctant hero while everyone around him seems to be performing in a different movie. It wants to be angry, urgent science fiction. Too often, it is just silly.
Sleepaway Camp (1983): 5.1/10
Calling Sleepaway Camp one of the best slashers ever made is not the same as calling it great cinema. I grew up on these movies, and part of loving them is admitting how bad they can be. This one is cheap, awkward, sexist, full of racist caricature, and disturbingly casual about sexualizing young characters. It is a product of its time in the best and worst possible ways, and I cannot imagine anyone making quite this movie now. Still, its strange energy, memorable kills, and sheer lack of restraint make it essential slasher viewing. The 5.1 includes points for a lifetime of loving horror movies that I know better than to defend.
Quick Change (1990): 5.5/10
I know Quick Change has plenty of defenders, but I do not see it. The opening bank robbery is clever, then the movie loses momentum and turns the escape from New York into a string of sluggish encounters and stretched-out gags. Bill Murray, Geena Davis, Randy Quaid, Jason Robards, and a ridiculous number of familiar faces should make this feel alive. Somehow, it still falls flat. This has to be among Murray's weakest movies, and the 5.5 is mostly there because I will watch him in almost anything.