Blood Quantum (2019)

Director: Jeff Barnaby

Cast: Michael Greyeyes, Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers, Forrest Goodluck, Kiowa Gordon

Have I Seen it Before: Never. For some reason I have as yet relented to subscribing to Shudder. As we approached the episode of Beyond the Cabin in the Woods for this movie, I thought about relenting to one more streaming service, and if there were more movies on this year’s Cabin schedule that could be found there, I might have.

Did I Like It: I really, really have lost most of my patience with the very idea of zombies. I can only imagine if you’re reading this that at some point you’ve given up on The Walking Dead. Whenever that moment was for you, I guarantee I jumped ship earlier than that. The commentary of George Romero is long since gone for me, and the craft of making up the creatures was probably passé for me even when Romero was at his height.

And with all of that being said, there’s quite a lot new, and a lot to like here.

I cannot honestly think of a better introduction to a zombie apocalypse than a fisherman suddenly realizing something is terribly, terribly wrong with the already cleaned and gutted catch of the day.

That alone would have inched me closer to making the unlikely conclusion that the genre might still have some life (or, I suppose un-life, if you’re going to force me to relent to the pun orbiting around me) in it yet, but making the supposed realities of a zombie apocalypse a reflection of the indigenous experience made the entire experience refreshing. What’s more, the central plot line involving the fate of the baby to be born to Joseph (Goodluck) and Charlie (Olivia Scriven) keeps the tension up, not just because it is unclear how the character’s fates will be resolved, but it’s never completely made clear what the movie would prefer to happen to them.

I’m even prepared to forgive the film for occasionally becoming a very typical zombie film in the execution, but please, let’s keep that between you and I.

Firestarter (2022)

Director: Keith Thomas

Cast: Zac Efron, Ryan Kiera Armstrong, Michael Greyeyes, Gloria Reuben

Have I Seen it Before: Well, we’ll see, but it has been only a hot minute (see what I did there?) since I saw the original 1984 film, so we’ll see what’s changed up.

Did I Like It: Nope!

You probably want more if you’ve come this far. This remake does manage to improve on a number of deep flaws from the original film. Armstrong and Efron are giving more easily plausible (I’m not going to go as far as to say believable) performance, easily accomplishing the tasks of both behaving as if they were father and daughter, and had ever spoken as humans in the first place.

The special effects are sturdy, if not overwhelming, which is certainly more than can be said for the original, although one has to admit that the only objective difference between the effects here and in the original film is that these effects are only new, and not inarguably better.

The final act is not punctuated with a new mission for Charlie (Armstrong) to expose the evil misdeeds of the people that doomed her parents and damned her out of anything resembling a normal childhood. In the original, the post-truth world we live in can’t help but lead one to wonder how Charlie might expose the truth. Here, it is dutifully ignored.

That will easily be the last nice thing I have to say about the film, and especially the last act. Rainbird and Charlie walk off together in the night, and I can’t even reach into the depths of head canon to make that choice work. Poor Kurtwood Smith very nearly gets the Mark-Hamill-in-The-Force-Awakens deal and may not quantifiably be in the film. Every character—including Charlie—feels like they are barely in the film.

Lora posed the question of whether or not King’s work just doesn’t translate to film well. I think with an IT - Chapter One (2017) and The Shawshank Redemption (1994) that seems an unfair generalization.

But I’m reasonably certain that this King story may eschew any sort of adaptation.