Terror of Dracula (2012)
An obscure Canadian film that ambitiously attempts to adapt Bram Stoker’s Dracula on a low-budget. This introduces some elements of the story that other versions ignore and is not uninteresting
Terror Train 2 (2022)
Sequel to the remake of the 1980s horror classic, shot back-to-back with its predecessor, this is a better film than the remake was
The Terror Within (1989)
Roger Corman produces a blatant copy of Alien with a group of people being pursued around a desert laboratory by a rubbery mutant creature
The Terrornauts (1967)
SF effort from the UK’s Amicus Films with an ambitious plot about communication from the stars that manages to prefigure films like Contact and 2001. On the other hand, the film fails is in its pitiful and utterly inadequate special effects
Tetsuo II: Body Hammer (1992)
Shinya Tsukamoto makes a better budgeted sequel to his breakthrough hit. The first film was a masterpiece of guerilla filmmaking but the same frenzied fetishism is missing here
Tetsuo: The Bullet Man (2009)
Shinya Tsukamoto’s third Tetsuo film is a disappointingly commercial concession that waters down all of the surrealism and wild sexual fetishism that made the first film so amazing
The Fantastic 4: First Steps (2025)
After several other film incarnations that went nowhere, The Fantastic Four make their first appearance in The MCU. The film creates a wonderful retro world of 1960s futurism based on their original comic-books for them to inhabit
Theatre of Death (1967)
One of the Hammer Films wannabes of the 1960s that even employs Christopher Lee in a horror film set around the historical Grand Guignol Theatre
There’s Something in the Barn (2023)
This is a Norwegian film based on the Scandinavian folklore figure of the barn elf, a household spirit that can turn malevolent if upset. The film becomes in essence a Nordic version of Gremlins
They (2002)
A routine horror about teens that live in fear of creatures that lurk in the dark. Presented by Wes Craven.
They’re Inside (2019)
Found Footage film where filmmakers find they are being stalked by other people with cameras. Essentially a Found Footage version of The Strangers
The Thief of Baghdad (1961)
Dull remake of the classic Arabian Nights film that casts Steve Reeves and tries to make it into a Hercules peplum adventure
A Thin Line Between Love and Hate (1996)
Martin Lawrence directs and stars in a comedy variant on Fatal Attraction in which he has the role of a player who is stalked by a psycho Lynn Whitfield
The Thing (2011)
Though pitched as a prequel, this is essentially a remake of John Carpenter’s classic. Alas, this only finds the same phantasmagoric outlandishness as Carpenter did in a couple of scenes that may be moderately impressive for those who have never seen the original
Things Heard & Seen (2021)
Ghost story that seems to be intended to play to a more literary level than most of its contemporaries
Thinner (1996)
Adaptation of one of Stephen King’s Richard Bachman novels about an obese lawyer afflicted with a thinning curse. There are some great effects but the film’s moral messages come off as wrong
Thir13en Ghosts (2001)
After the success of their remake of House on Haunted Hill, Dark Castle Entertainment remade another William Castle film here, expanding it with a full arsenal of visual and makeup effects
The Thirteenth Floor (1999)
A Roland Emmerich produced Virtual Reality film that toys with some ideas that almost make it a great SF film before cliches and a bad twist ending take over
This Was America (2020)
A film that offers the depiction of a totalitarian future USA where Donald Trump has refused to leave office. This was made at the end of Trump’s first term and before his second term return to power.
Thor: God of Thunder (2022)
A low-budget mockbuster from The Asylum designed to jump aboard the bandwagon of Marvel’s Thor: Love and Thunder
Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
The third of the MCU’s Thor films. This time Kiwi director Taikia Waititi gives much more of a comedic emphasis where you get the impression the intention has been to push the film in the direction of Guardians of the Galaxy. On the other hand, the superheroics are routine
Thor: Tales of Asgard (2011)
Though Marvel Comics have had massive success with their big screen adaptations in the 00s, they have been far less successful with their attempts to spin off animated films. An okay but unexceptional animated prequel released at the same time as the first Thor live-action film
Thou Shalt Not Kill … Except (1985)
Film made by several Sam Raimi associates about a crazed cult with Raimi making an acting appearance as the cult’s leader. This wades in much gory enthusiasm
Thoughtcrimes (2003)
This comes with the undeniable influence of the then recent Minority Report in its story about a telepath recruited by law enforcement
The Thousand Faces of Dunjia (2017)
One welcomes a collaboration between Tsui Hark, the godfather of Hong Kong fantasy cinema, and Yuen Wo Ping, fight choreographer for The Matrix and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon but the the results are oddly disappointing, with Yuen’s talents seeming buried under the CGI
Thr3e (2006)
Quite evidently modelled on Se7en even to the lookalike title, this is the novelty of a Christian serial killer thriller. The results are quite strange to say the least
Three Extremes II (2002)
A horror anthology featuring episodes from three Asian directors originally titled Three. The better known Three … Extremes was a sequel whereupon this was retitled and re-released as Three Extremes II
The Three Stooges in Orbit (1962)
The Three Stooges join a number of other comics of this era in taking on the space race. Well they only briefly venture into orbit and mostly this can be described more as a slapstick haunted house comedy with alien invaders
The Three Stooges Meet Hercules (1962)
The Three Stooges travel through time to take on the Italian muscleman film in a never particularly funny comedy
Thrill Seekers (1999)
A throwaway direct-to-dvd release about time travellers come back to view famous disasters that rises above low expectations to develop an occasionally interesting plot
Thumbelina (1994)
Animated film from Don Bluth, an insipid adaptation of the fairytale that eventually bogs down as a comic picaresque (*)
Ticks (1993)
Routine variant on the 1970s killer bug film, although the bugs here are gooey and cartoonish not meant to be taken seriously
Tightrope (1984)
One of the darkest films Clint Eastwood ever made where he is a detective who becomes tempted by the world of BDSM during his pursuit of a serial killer
Till Death (2021)
This had me sold from its one sentence description – Megan Fox is a wife trying to escape hired killers while handcuffed to her husband’s corpse
Timber Falls (2007)
By the numbers Backwoods Brutality where a woman is imprisoned by crazed backwoods fundamentalists in order to bear them a child
Time Freak (2018)
Time travel film in which Asa Butterfield invents a time machine to go back and stop Sophie Turner breaking up with him. On the lightweight side but eventually not unworthwhile
The Time Guardian (1987)
An Australian entry in the 1980s time travel film fad featuring Carrie Fisher engaged in a war across time in a time-travelling city
The Time Machine (2002)
Remake of the classic H.G. Wells novel that comes with the novelty of being directed by Wells’s great-grandson. More disappointingly it prefers to merely remake the 1960 film rather than return to the book
Time of the Wolf (2003)
Michael Haneke has risen to great acclaim in recent years; this is one of his earlier works – a slow Tarkovsky-esque work that seems set in a future that is collapsing at the edges. Haneke is a fascinating talent but this is a bit too vague and well free of anything actually happening for me
The Time of Their Lives (1946)
An Abbott and Costello comedy. Not one of their monster bashes but a variant on the light comedy that had been popular in the last decade with Lou as an 18th Century ghost haunting Bud Abbott in the present. Can’t say I am a big fan of their humour, most of the slapstick that seems dated today
Time Raiders (2016)
Not a time travel film as the title leads you to expect but a Chinese copy of Raiders of the Lost Ark where you expect they were trying to call it ‘tomb raiders’. The director is also the production designer leading to a gorgeously designed film but also one of constant action postures almost entirely lacking in substance
Time Renegades (2016)
South Korean film that borrows the premise of the film Frequency in having two characters separated across twenty years have clairvoyant dreams of the other’s life and combining forces to stop a killer
The Time Travelers (1976)
Unsold tv pilot that was a collaboration between Irwin Allen and Rod Serling where time travelers visit the Great Fire of Chicago
The Time Traveller: The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (2010)
A live-action film based on a popular Japanese young adult novel that has been filmed multiple times before. This is a rather dull film that fails to do anything terribly interesting with its time travel premise
Time Walker (1982)
I had heard about this for years – it had a reputation as ‘the mummy from outer space film’. Seen, it proves disappointingly routine – all the tomb raiding is over after the first scene and the rest is little more than a slasher movie with the mummy akin to a hockey-masked maniac wandering a campus killing co-eds
Timecop: The Berlin Decision (2003)
Sequel to Timecop with more of an action emphasis as Jason Scott Lee replacing Jean-Claude Van Damme trying to stop a criminal who is erasing agents from the timeline.
Timecut (2024)
A time travel film produced by Christopher Landon that has a number of similarities to Totally Killer in which a girl travels back in time to 2003 to prevent her sister being murdered by a serial killer
Timeslip (1955)
A British quota quickie with a fascinating central idea of a scientist who has slipped several seconds out of phase in time and can answer questions before they are asked
Tin Man (1983)
Earnest, sincere film where deaf Timothy Bottoms receives an operation that allows him to hear again, as well as builds an A.I.
TinkerBell (2008)
The first in a series of Disney video-released films based around the Peter Pan fairy who is now reconceived as a contemporary Can Do girl
The Titan (2018)
Conceptually highly ambitious SF film about humans being biologically modified in order to be able to live on Saturn’s moon Titan. After a highly promising beginning, the film falls apart in a badly cliched unethical scientist and lab experiment amok ending
Titanic 666 (2022)
An offering from The Asylum where a replica of the Titanic sets sail only to be beset by the ghosts of those who sank aboard the original ship
To Die For (1989)
One of the first of the modern wave of darkly romantic vampire films that became the in-thing in the 1990s. This is occasionally effective but was eclipsed by later entries
To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday (1996)
Ambiguous ghost story in which Peter Gallagher sees and talks to his late wife Michelle Pfeiffer. Written by hit tv producer David E. Kelley (The Practice), this frequently disappears into its own self-congratulatory dialogue
To Your Last Death (2019)
Animated film that is gore-drenched and certainly not for children. Imagine The Belko Experiment conceived as a videogame where the heroine has to survive an office of people trying to kill her while aliens bet on the outcome
Toad Road (2012)
Indie film that seems a mix of A Field in England and The Picnic at Hanging Rock. The first half contains some very realistic scenes of people getting wasted on drugs but the second as characters set out along a path in the woods that leads to Hell proves frustratingly elusive
Der Todesking (1990)
From Jörg Buttgereit, director of the notorious NEKRomantik, an anthology that depicts various scenes of death and suicide. Essentially the original version of The ABCs of Death
Tokyo Ghoul (2017)
Live-action adaptation of a manga about a teenager who becomes part of a secret world of flesh-eating ghouls. The set-up comes with some imagination but the film suffers from an uninvolving story and a reliance on unconvincing CGI
Tokyo Tribe (2014)
Shion Sono is a director who has gained cult acclaim in recent years. This astonishes with the brashness of his approach, set among the street gang warfare of the near future where all of the dialogue is delivered in rap. On the other hand, the film lacks the budget to sustain such energy
Tolkien (2019)
Biopic of J.R.R. Tolkien, author of The Lord of the Rings. This covers many of the key areas of Tolkien’s early life but you also cannot help but notice what it leaves out
Tom and Jerry (2021)
Tom and Jerry are revived in a part-animated, part-live action toon film although come missing the ultra-violence of the original cartoons
tom thumb (1958)
George Pal adapts the Brothers Grimm fairytale with Russ Tamblyn as a miniature youth amid colourful effects and extended slapstick scenes
Tomb Invader (2018)
The Asylum’s mockbuster response to the theatrical reboot of Tomb Raider. This is cut-priced and features globe-spanning adventures that never travel outside of California
The Tomb of Ligeia (1964)
The eighth and last of Roger Corman’s Edgar Allan Poe adaptations. Some claim this tale of possession by a late wife is the best but it feels an uninspired rehash of the plot elements from Corman’s other Poe films.
Tomb Raider (2018)
This reboot of the film series based on the videogame franchise is a mixed affair. Certainly, the perpetually non-acting Angelina Jolie is replaced by Alicia Vikander who gives Lara Croft living, breathing emotions
Tomorrow When the War Began (2010)
An Australian version of Red Dawn – prettily mounted but feels more like Dawson’s Creek Goes to War than it has does a realistic war film
Tomorrowland (2015)
Despite being another film based on a Disney theme park, I had high expectations of this because of Brad Bird. Alas, the initial promise of a retro-sf work that mainlined the wonderment of Jetsons-styled futurism turns into a surprisingly glum and message-heavy work about how the modern world is a depressing place
Toomorrow (1970)
Film that feels construed to blend 60s rock films post The Beatles and an intergalactic trippiness post 2001: A Space Odyssey where alien try to abduct a rock band. From the producer of the James Bond films and the man who created The Monkees
Tormented (1960)
Bert I. Gordon, a director known for his cheapo 1950s giant bug film, here ventures into the ghost story but delivers it in terms crude and absurdly heavy-handed pop-up effects
Tormented (2009)
The first film from Irish director Jon Wright who subsequently made films Grabbers and Robot Overlords concerning a bullied schoolkid who comes back from the grave to kill his tormentors,. Not as polished but what a cast of unknowns
Torture Garden (1967)
Following the success of Dr Terror’s House of Horrors, this was the second of Amicus’s trademark horror anthologies with Burgess Meredith as a carnival barker showing people their fates
Total Recall (1990)
Adaptation of a Philip K. Dick story is killed by being turned into an Arnold Schwarzenegger action vehicle and by director Paul Verhoeven’s burying the reality bending subtleties of the story under bludgeoning ultra-violence
Totem (2017)
I was very impressed with director Marcel Sarmiento on the basis of the perversely twisted Deadgirl. Here Sarminento turns his hand to making a ghost story
Touch (1997)
Paul Schrader adapts an Elmore Leonard novel about a youth who suddenly becomes sought by various parties when it is discovered he has miracle healing powers but the results never quite come off
The Toxic Avenger (2023)
A remake of the work that launched Troma films. The original The Toxic Avenger was a gungily nasty film that readily trod way over all lines of good taste. In being cast with name stars, this has been cleaned up considerably
Toxic Shark (2017)
Another in plethora of gonzo killer shark films viz Sharknado concerning a mutated shark that spews a plume of toxic waste. Not the bottom of the barrel, an adequately made B movie that takes itself relatively seriously
The Toymaker (2017)
The third of the Robert the Doll films. Here Andrew Jones takes a few leaves from the Puppet Master films in creating an origin story set during the Nazi era
Train (2008)
A blatant copy of Hostel featuring tourists caught aboard a train in Ukraine that runs an organ-harvesting operation
Trans-Atlantic Tunnel (1935)
Early sound era depiction of the attempts to build a tunnel between the UK and USA. The film conjures something of the epic architectural imagination of Metropolis but is crippled by dull, static scenes with characters sitting around talking (a novelty for early sound audiences)
Transcendence (2014)
A film that bites off some Big Ideas from the transhumanist movement – A.I., nanotechnology, and especially Mind Upload – and fails to do anything with them except for reach for hoary cliches of Frankenstein science. A film that, despite its self-importance, ends up as only a better budgeted version of The Lawnmower Man
Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014)
Are there any new creative directions that Michael Bay feels he he has to explore for a fourth Transformers film? All the Transformers beating the crap out of each other and copious mass destruction has become hard to tell one of the films from each other
Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)
The third of Michael Bay’s Transformers films. While the human scenes opt for a ghastly miscalculated sense of humour, the effects houses are at the peak of their game, even if Bay allows them to drag the mass destruction out to a numbing excess
Transformers One (2024)
Since Michael Bay retired from the series, The Transformers films have been looking for new directions. This ventures into animation to tell a Transformers origin story
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009)
The first of Michael Bay’s Transformers sequels has even better effects and more copious mass destruction to the point it washes over you without any effect
Transmorphers: Fall of Man (2009)
Transmorphers was The Asylum’s mockbuster copy of Michael Bay’s Transformers and one of their better films. When Bay released his sequel Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, The Asylum also made this prequel
Transylvania Twist (1989)
A Roger Corman produced horror parody that conducts send ups of most of the horror icons of the 1980s – Freddy Krueger, Pinhead, Michael Meyers etc – without being particularly funny
Trap (2024)
M. Night Shyamalan film with Josh Hartnett as a serial killer caught up in a police sting being held at a rock concert
The Traveler (2010)
This has the intriguing hook of casting 1990s teen heartthrob Val Kilmer as a supernaturally empowered mysterious stranger. It soon becomes apparent that the film is a variant on Clint Eastwood’s High Plains Drifter. After blowing its twist soon in, the film only proceeds to a desultory ending
Treasure Hunt (1994)
Rather silly and plotless Hong Kong comedy with Chow Yun Fat as a CIA agent encountering a magical girl at a monastery in China
Treasure of the Four Crowns (1983)
Cheap and tatty copycat of Raiders of the Lost Ark shot in the short-lived 1980s 3D revival fad
Treasure Planet (2002)
Disney animated film that proved a flop, this lazily remakes Treasure Island set in space. The result is bad science-fiction with sailing ships in space, Ben Gumm as a malfunctioning robot and so on
Trees (2000)
One of the strangest film homages one has come across – an almost complete scene-for-scene remake of Jaws but with the shark substituted by a killer tree being hunted through a park by rangers
Tremors: Shrieker Island (2020)
After thirty years, the Tremors series has held up in terms of quality much better than most other monster series. This is the seventh and what would appear to be the last of the films
Trial Run (1984)
Woman directed New Zealand horror film where Annie Whittle is attacked by a mysterious assailant
Triassic Hunt (2021)
Film from The Asylum about dinosaurs hunting mercenaries. Essentially Jurassic Park that takes place in a warehouse
Triassic World (2018)
A mockbuster from The Asylum that was designed to capitalise on the release of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, this is a low-budget CGI dinosaur film that is slightly better than most
Trick or Treat (1986)
Film about a heavy metal star resurrected from the dead. This sets out spoofing fundamentalist paranoias about backwards masking but soon ends up all over the place and fails to take itself serously
Trick or Treats (1982)
From the heyday of the slasher film, an effort about a babysitter stalked by an escaped maniac on Halloween Night, which draws great influence from classics of the era such as Halloween and When a Stranger Calls. Nothing standout but what a great supporting cast
Trick ‘R Treat (2008)
Disappointing Bryan Singer produced horror anthology set around Halloween where its potential is frequently dragged down by over-emphatic direction
Trilogy of Terror II (1996)
Sequel to the classic Karen Black-starring horror anthology tv movie with Lysette Anthony starring in a trio of horror tales