Rue Morgue Update: January & February 2023

2023 is off to a killer start for the horror film community. Already we've had a blockbuster (M3GAN dir. Gerard Johnstone), a sleeper hit (Skinamarink dir. Kyle Edward Ball), and a third feature from a certain legacy filmmaker (Infinity Pool dir. Brandon Cronenberg). In addition, I have had the unique pleasure of reviewing three new releases from indie filmmakers: The Outwaters, Attachment, and Consecration. 

Attachment, in particular, was quite a stand-out - a queer love story and supernatural horror film sourced from Jewish folklore. Written and directed by first-time feature film director Gabriel Bier Gislason, and inspired by the life of lead actress Josephine Park, Attachment is a unique tale of possession and exorcism that departs from the Catholic script that has dominated the sub-genre for decades. Check out my recent work for Rue Morgue, here! 

SKINAMARINK, The Visual World of Ethel Cain, and The Horror of the Mundane

Experimental lo-fi horror sensation SKINAMARINK is sweeping the nation this weekend with its limited theatrical run courtesy of Shudder. Despite a few obvious jump scares, the creepy aesthetic, and the heavily suggested violence against young children, critics and viewers alike are left scratching their heads over what exactly makes the film so frightening. Largely plotless and riding on its undeniably unnerving premise, SKINAMARINK relies on the dark side of mid-90s nostalgia to create its eerily familiar mood. 

Lucas Paul as Kevin in SKINAMARINK

Cover of Ethel Cain's EP "Carpet Bed"

The simple synopsis for SKINAMARINK reads as follows: “Two children wake up in the middle of the night to find their father is missing, and all the windows and doors in their home have vanished.” The premise manifests in a spectacularly creepy fashion. Furniture appears on the ceiling, toys cling to the walls, and a demonic voice leads the children to their doom. And in between the film’s more explicitly frightening sequences are countless shots of carpeted floors, wood-paneled walls, and the molding of doorways and baseboards. 

SKINAMARINK

Ethel Cain

Cain

There is an undeniable appeal to the nostalgia of a certain breed of middle-class Americans who grew up in the 90s and early 2000s. But not the warm and fuzzy nostalgia that makes you long for the carefree comfort of childhood. Oh no, this is the kind of repressed memory nightmare fuel that will make you remember sleepless nights and seeing the darkness around you form formidable shapes. SKINAMARINK conjures the fear only a child can have - a complete feeling of helplessness, and a desire for a parent’s protection. 

SKINAMARINK

Cain

Also central to the visual language of SKINAMARINK is the horror that lies in images of everyday scenes or objects, stifled by a horrible sense of dread hanging overhead. In such uneasy circumstances, a lingering shot of a doll, crayon, lego, or Fisher Price Chatter Telephone can form a dark ball of fear in the pit of your stomach. The kinds of images used by the filmmakers of SKINAMARINK point to an ethos of finding horror in the most mundane settings - an instinct shared by multimodal artist and indie musician Ethel Cain. 

Dali Rose Tetreault as Kaylee in SKINAMARINK

"Preacher's Daughter" Album Cover

Inspired by the Southern Gothic, true crime, and her religious upbringing, Cain’s music and storytelling paint a horrifying portrait of life in the American South for a young queer woman. Cain’s music and promotional images bring to life a world full of decay, abuse, desperation, and despair, primarily through the use of unsettling domestic imagery. Not unlike SKINAMARINK’s writer/director Kyle Edward Ball, Cain sees the inside of the home as a site of immense horror. The specter of a traumatic childhood haunts Cain’s fictional world as well as Ball’s. 

It is in these everyday settings that the most disturbing feelings can be evoked in a viewer or listener. In Ball and Cain’s work, a place that is meant to be safe is subverted into a metaphysical prison of sorts. SKINAMARINK and Cain’s debut album Preacher’s Daughter both use the power of suggestion to hint at a family tragedy or crisis that propels the central child characters into their respective nightmares. As the souls of the children inhabiting the home are corrupted in SKINAMARINK, the character of Ethel is driven from her home by her trauma, toward a life on the road that will end in her violent death. 

While SKINAMARINK depicts the monochromatic and nearly-identical nature of new-build suburban homes, Cain’s world is a much more decrepit one, full of aging houses in a dead-end town. The home is an inescapable place for her characters, who are oppressed by religion, domestic abuse, and lack of means to escape. While most works that evoke nostalgic emotions make us wish to be children again, listening to Ethel Cain or watching SKINAMARINK will do the opposite. More likely, instead, is a deep gratitude to have made it out alive. 

Stills sourced from SKINAMARINK (2022) dir. Kyle Edward Ball and @mothercain on tumblr.com. 

The Top Ten Horror Films Of 2022 - Featuring BARBARIAN, X, HATCHING, and More!

FinalGirlGrace’s 2022 Top Ten

#10 - A WOUNDED FAWN

Travis Stevens’ hallucinatory, shot-on-film, serial killer-flick A WOUNDED FAWN is undoubtedly this year’s low-budget hidden gem. The latest in a stellar series of Shudder original content, Stevens’ film threads together greek mythology, psychedelic imagery, and the art dealing world. 

#9 - FRESH

2022 was a good year for cannibal flicks as well, one of the best being Mimi Cave’s FRESH. A pitch-black horror/comedy starring Daisy Edgar-Jones and Sebastian Stan, FRESH stylishly critiques the modern dating scene, setting its sights on power dynamics related to both gender and class.  

#8 - THE BLACK PHONE

Based on a novella by Joe Hill (son of Stephen King), Scott Derrickson directs this slick yet gritty film, equal parts coming-of-age thriller and supernatural slasher. Ethan Hawke as the Grabber comes in at a close second behind Mia Goth’s Pearl as this year’s horror villain of the year.

#7 - X

Ti West finds his muse in newly-made horror icon Mia Goth in this year’s most and least traditional slasher. Superior to its technicolor prequel PEARL, X is a love letter to both the horror genre and, oddly enough, the porn industry. Aiding in the ascension of scream queen Jenna Ortega, X is a demented film with a red beating heart at its core. 

#6 - BARBARIAN

Horror newcomer Zach Cregger directed 2022’s Movie Of The Year, in terms of sheer cultural impact. The true must-see of the year, BARBARIAN subverts expectations in the most delicious of ways, tackling generational trauma, class, and gender-based violence all while staying true to its own innate nastiness.

#5 - BONES AND ALL

Another adaptation of horror literature, Luca Guadagnino’s BONES AND ALL - based on the novel by Camille DeAngelis - takes cannibalism and young love on the road. Following young “eaters” Maren and Lee as they meet, fall in love, and try to find themselves in a harsh and violent world, BONES AND ALL is a harrowing watch that is both deeply tender and deeply uncomfortable. 

#4 - HATCHING

Feral-girl summer comes to Finland in Hanna Bergholm’s nerve-tearing tale of childhood emotional abuse, HATCHING. 12-year-old gymnast Tinja brings home and hatches a mysterious egg, and what emerges proves to be a nightmare disguised as a dream come true as Tinja begins to strike back at her overbearing mother. 

#3 - NOPE

Bonafide horror-auteur Jordan Peele returned this year with his third and most ambitious feature, NOPE, a dazzling western that explores alien invasion, human-animal relations, Black film history, and the nature of spectacle. NOPE is an epic achievement for Peele: both an original blockbuster and a sci-fi/horror masterpiece. 

#2 - BODIES BODIES BODIES

Directed by Halina Reijn, BODIES BODIES BODIES, will go down in horror history as a distinctly “2020s” film, one that encapsulates Gen-Z influencer culture in all its horrifying glory. With a soundtrack boasting Charli XCX, Slayyyter, and Shygirl, BODIES is on the pulse, ahead of its time, and a fitting update to the teen slasher formula. 

#1 - MEN

Perhaps 2022’s most divisive film, genre master Alex Garland’s third feature film is a gruesome meditation on each man’s responsibility for our misogynistic world, the cyclical nature of learned woman-hating, and the trauma of domestic abuse. Starring Jessie Buckley and Rory Kinnear as the archetypal man and woman respectively, MEN features the year’s greatest moments of body horror, and some of the most beautifully haunting sequences in horror film history. 

Honorable Mentions: Horror-Adjacent Films

Sci-Fi:

CRIMES OF THE FUTURE (dir. David Cronenberg) 

PREY (dir. Dan Trachtenberg)

DUAL (dir. Riley Stearns)

Thriller: 

THE MENU (dir. Mark Mylod)

LUX AETERNA (dir. Gaspar Noé - 2019 premiere, 2022 release)

WATCHER (dir. Chloe Okuno)

FinalGirlGrace's 2022 Writing Highlights - Rue Morgue

 Movie Review: Riley Stearns' DUAL is a Dual Between Dark Comedy and Dystopian Nightmare

Panic Fest '22: Stellar Short Film Selection Includes "They See You," "The Pey," and Others

Panic Fest '22: The British Horror-Comedy Will Keep You Laughing Even WHEN THE SCREAMING STARTS

Movie Review: Follow the PINK RABBIT into Zetkin Yikilmis' Indie Horror Nightmare

Movie Review: Best Friends Must Choose to Ride or Die in THE FRIENDSHIP GAME

Movie Review: Love Will Swallow You BONES AND ALL in Luca Guadagnino's Latest

Movie Review: A Serial Killer Meets His Match in Shudder's Psychedelic A WOUNDED FAWN 

FinalGirlGrace's Top 8 Horror Movies Of 2021

#8 - CENSOR dir. Prano Bailey-Bond

#7 - GAIA dir. Jaco Bouwer

#6 - MALIGNANT dir. James Wan

#5 - LAST NIGHT IN SOHO dir. Edgar Wright

#4 - THE ADVENT CALENDAR dir. Patrick Ridremont

#3 - TITANE dir. Julia Ducournau

#2 - OXYGEN dir. Alexandre Aja

#1 - THE NIGHT HOUSE dir. David Bruckner

Read my Rue Morgue review of THE NIGHT HOUSE here!