BY RICARDO LUJAN
Halloween isn’t for another couple of months, but that doesn’t mean horror movies can’t be watched right now. It’s perfectly fine to have a horror movie marathon at any point in the year. The following three movies are all horror movies that portray the feeling of fear in different and unique ways.
First in the marathon for this week is the suspenseful horror movie, Circle. Circle is a horror movie that uses the power of suspense to the fullest. The premise of the movie revolves around a group of people as they are thrust into a tense survival situation that none of them might survive.
The majority of the movie takes place in one setting which sounds bad at first, but it actually works out quite well. We have a huge cast with plenty of characters to choose from to root for. There is the constant threat looming that any character can be killed off as it feels that nobody is truly safe from the threat. Circle does well in keeping the story moving and keeping its viewers entertained with what’s going on.
It is a very unorthodox movie, due to the fact the majority of the film takes place in one room, a factor the movie uses to its advantage. This is worthy of watching at least twice through as the second time around, the attention to detail put into the background allows the viewer to see the elements of the plot coming together before they are revealed. Circle may not be what most people would call a traditional horror movie, but that’s what makes it a good horror movie. You can watch Circle either on Netflix or buy/rent from Amazon Prime.
The second movie in the Tri-Movie Marathon for this week is Brightburn. Brightburn is a horror movie with a very interesting idea for its plot – what if Superman was evil instead of good? It’s an interesting what-if story, especially in the sense of a horror movie instead of an action movie like most typical movie dealing with comic book properties.
Brightburn for the most part does a good job in exploring the aspect of an evil “Superman”. The choice of having this as a horror film is a real gamble and it paid it off fairly well. I would describe the film as more creepy rather than scary. That is a great quality for this film as instead of relying on the overused jump scares, it just allows the idea of an evil “Superman” to settle in as to how terrible that would be for the human race.
All the actors in this film did a fantastic job in playing their roles. The writing for the characters was very realistic for the most part as a typical issue for horror movies is unorthodox or dumb choices made by characters due to the plot. I didn’t really think any of the characters made choices like that.
The movie looks great, is well lit, and the CGI holds up without looking ridiculous. Brightburn was a movie I went into with low expectations with and I’m glad to say it blew through those expectations. You can watch Brightburn on the FHSU movie channel available to students, on STARZ, or buy/rent from Amazon Prime.
Capping this week’s marathon, we have The Ritual. The Ritual is a very good horror movie. It is a nice break from what the genre has become in recent years which is most horror movies just consisting of predictable jump scares. The story revolves around four friends who go on a hiking trip to mourn a recently deceased mutual friend. On their way back from the hike, they decided to take a shortcut through a forest to save some time.
The cinematography is top-notch in this movie in combination with the lighting makes some shots that are amazing. One thing that I found in this movie that it does better than most films, in general, were the scenes in the dark. The lighting was done to where you can actually see in the night scenes without ruining the suspenseful scary mood of the night.
The four main characters do a great job with their performances and they do come off as a very realistic friend group. The only real critique I have with The Ritual is the story starts to fall off in terms of quality at the ending. It can leave a sense of emptiness or dissatisfaction at the end, but despite this fault, The Ritual is still my favorite horror movie. The Ritual can only be found on Netflix.