Bubble (2022)
Anime in which Tokyo is covered by a mysterious energy bubble of alien origin and of a group of defiant youths who live on in its midst until the appearance of a mystery girl
Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (1979)
In the aftermath of Star Wars, the comic-book/serial hero was revived in this heavily Star Wars influenced remake that was released theatrically and then served as the pilot of a tv series
A Bucket of Blood (1995)
Roger Corman’s original A Bucket of Blood is a cult black comedy starring Dick Miller a nerdy wannabe who is acclaimed after passing dead bodies off as works of art. Here it was remade with Anthony Michael Hall inheriting the role of Walter Paisley
Bulk (2025)
Ben Wheatley has gained a cult following in recent years with films like Kill List and High Rise. Here he sets out to make a deliberately low-tech multiverse film that becomes a real head-scratcher
Bullet Head (2017)
A film with a great set-up where three criminals on the run (which include Adrien Brody and John Malkovich) take refuge in a warehouse only to find they are trapped with a maddened killer dog
Bullets, Fangs and Dinner at 8 (2015)
A low-budget independent vampire film set around a group of vampire hunters trying to bring down the master vampire – the local Catholic priest
The Bumblebee Flies Anyway (1999)
This feels like a weepie Disease of the Week drama where Elijah Wood is an amnesiac placed in a hospital ward of terminal patients before the film arrives at an SF conceptual twist
Bundy: An American Icon (2009)
A low-budget film based on the life of serial killer Ted Bundy starring Corin Nemec. This stays to the facts of the case more than some of director Michael Feifer’s other True Crime films
The Bunker Game (2022)
Horror film in which a group of LARPers (live-action role-players) use a wartime bunker as a location and are trapped where the bunker appears to be haunted
Bunker of the Dead (2015)
A revival of the Nazi zombie fad, which essentially becomes a First Person Shooter film as someone wearing a GoPro camera runs through a bunker dispatching zombies
Bunker Palace Hotel (1989)
The first film from Enki Bilal set in a decaying luxury bunker where the elite of the future take shelter from a civil war. A film that creates a fascinating world – in which nothing interesting ends up happening
The ‘Burbs (1989)
Joe Dante black comedy about a neighbourhood where everybody becomes paranoid about the weird new people moved in. The film’s bite gets lots amid everything being pitched at a clumsily shrill level of hysteria
Burial Ground (1981)
An entry from Italian exploitation cinema’s early 1980s fad for zombie films, this has been put together with no other intent than providing a progression of extremely gory set-pieces
Buried Alive (1990)
The directorial debut from Frank Darabont who went on to make The Shawshank Redemption and The Mist. A wife and her lover plot to kill husband off by poisoning him only for him to survive and plot an elaborate revenge scheme
Burke & Hare (1972)
One of several film versions of the story of the 19th Century grave robbers Burke and Hare, made at the height of the Anglo-horror cycle. While reasonably accurate to the facts, the story is sidetracked by softcore happenings at a brothel
Burke & Hare (2010)
Lavishly produced, reasonably historically authentic retelling of the story of the grave robbers from John Landis, which also becomes a wasted opportunity that turns the story into a comedy where the title characters are just two likeable schmucks
Burndown (1989)
Obscure and little seen thriller where a Florida sheriff deals with a series of radioactive murder victims where all clues seem to lead to an abandoned nuclear power plant
Burnt Offerings (1976)
A theatrical film directed by 1970s genre tv producer Dan Curtis. This has the intriguing idea of a house that acts as a psychic vampire. In all other respects, this plays out as a standard haunted house story
Burying the Ex (2014)
Joe Dante makes a zombie comedy. Dante is in his element and the film overspills with classic horror references but Dante feels like he is playing slow catch up with what the zombie genre has become
The Butcher, The Chef and the Swordsman (2010)
Pitched as another Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, this has multiple stories, a cluttered look and a bizarreness that comes out more like a Wu Xia version of Scott Pilgrim vs the World
Butt Boy (2019)
Every so often a film stops you dead in your tracks with its WTF premise. This is one such – a film about a man who develops a fetish for sticking objects up his ass and causes household objects, pets and children to disappear up there
Buzz Lightyear of Star Command: The Adventure Begins (2000)
Video-released spinoff of the Toy Story films featuring Buzz Lightyear in an adventure. Although released under the Pixar name, the animation is all cheaply produced by a Chinese studio
The Bye Bye Man (2017)
Film based on an urban legend film about a boogeyman that kills everybody that speaks its name. Director Stacy Title creates one or two haunting and unusual scenes but in every other aspect this emerges as exceedingly generic
Byte (2024)
This takes the award for bizarre concepts – a phone app that turns users into werewolves
Cabal (2020)
Film from low-budget director Rene Perez where a hitman who wears a beaten steel mask is pitted up against a hulking backwoods killer
Cabin 28 (2017)
A true crime film based on an unsolved home invasion in California in 1981 that left four for dead. From prolific British director Andrew Jones
Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever (2009)
The first sequel to Eli Roth’s film, directed by a then unknown Ti West who subsequently tried to have his name removed. The gore effects look cheap and cheesy and the film misses the comedic angle of the original
Cabin Fever (2016)
A remake of Eli Roth’s first film? Why, given that the original only came out 14 years ago, is anybody’s guess. This literally recycles the original’s script but is deaf to its sarcastic humour of the original
Cabin Fever: Patient Zero (2014)
Eli Roth’s Cabin Fever had a surefire premise – a series of gory meltdowns with tongue planted in cheek. It is a puzzle then why two sequels, despite reasonable directors at the wheel, have managed to completely miss these basics
Cabin in the Sky (1942)
This was Hollywood’s first film featuring an all-Black cast, a musical in which enjoys from both Heaven and Hell come down to engage in a war over a man’s soul
The Cable Guy (1996)
Ben Stiller directed comedy with Jim Carrey playing a stalkerish cable installer who makes Matthew Broderick’s life a misery. Carrey’s fans didn’t seem to want to see him play psycho and this was his only flop of this period
Cadence (2016)
For a long time, this effort about a girl experiencing nightmare visions on her family farm doesn’t seem to be doing anything – then gets interesting as it switches to a parallel reality where what happens is mirrored slightly different
Cafe Flesh (1982)
An adult film that gained a critical respectability when it came out, an avant garde work set in a future where the populace has become impotent and the handful unaffected perform sex in clubs for paying audiences
The Call (2013)
A formulaic psycho-thriller from the usually worthwhile Brad Anderson with Halle Berry as a 911 call operator who answers a call from an abducted Abigail Breslin that feels like a cable thriller ended on the big screen
The Call Up (2016)
This has the interesting idea of a group of people selected to take place in a live-action videogame only to find themselves trapped in a The Belko Experiment scenario.
Cam (2018)
This comes with the intriguingly original premise where Madeline Brewer is a camgirl performer on an adult site who finds that her life has been hijacked by a doppelganger
Camelot (1967)
The Arthurian legends become the basis of this filmed version of a musical by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe. On screen with a name cast, the film is slow and stodgy
Cameron’s Closet (1988)
VHS era horror about a demon that appears out of a young boy’s closet and kills all who threaten him. Mostly this is an excuse to serve up novelty deaths
Camille Rewinds (2012)
This French film is an uncredited copy of Peggy Sue Got Married wherein director/star Noemie Lvovsky a dissatisfied divorcee who is propelled back to her high school graduating year and gets to relive her life choices
Camp Blood 2 (2000)
The second entry in a surprisingly prolific series of low-budget films – currently running to fifteen films – that homage the 1980s slasher film
Camp Blood (2000)
The first in a surprisingly prolific series of slasher films, which has produced some fourteen sequels at current count. Made on a micro-budget, this vigorously homages the 1980s basics
Camp Dread (2014)
This pays much homage to the 1980s summer camp slasher film and does a competent re-run of the basics if nothing that turns the genre on its head. On the other hand, it is less interesting when it tries to tap into the reality tv horror fad
Candy Cane Lane (2023)
Eddie Murphy – one of the funniest talents of the 1980s – has been largely absent for much of the 2010s. He returns here with a Christmas comedy in which he is the recipient of a curse given to him by an evil Santa elf
Candyman (2021)
A Jordan Peele-written/produced revival of the Candyman series. Director Nia DaCosta lights it up with a new contemporary social relevance but fails to recapture the eerie horror the original held
Candyman: Day of the Dead (1999)
The second and so far final of the Candyman sequels, a routine entry with Baywatch starlet Donna D’Errico as a descendant of Candyman who is pursued by Tony Todd
Cannibal Apocalypse (1980)
Entry in the notorious Italian cannibal genre of the late 70s/early 80s. Here the recent hits of Dawn of the Dead and Apocalypse Now are merged in a plot involving zombified Vietnam veterans
Cannibal Comedian (2023)
A film that fairly much sells you in its deliberately ridiculous title concept – a cannibal who sets out to find success as a stand-up comedian.
Cannibal Girls (1973)
Legendary Canucksploitation film from Ivan Reitman about a cannibal hotel. This has gained a cult reputation. Seen it seems to lack the essential trashiness that justifies its reputation
Captain America (1944)
Captain America’s first screen appearance was this 15 chapter serial, although about the only common element with the comic is the costume. On the plus side, the action and cliffhangers are good, while Lionel Atwill chews scenery in grand style as the villain
Captain America: Brave New World (2025)
The fourth Captain America film, where Anthony Mackie now takes over the shield and costume. And you really need to have been following MCU continuity to make sense of much of what is going on
Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)
One of the more disappointing of the Marvel Comics adaptations. Despite all the elements assembled, this never comes to life in director Joe Johnston’s hands and takes forever to get into action
Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)
Captain America’s second solo outing feels more like a Mission: Impossible film or an episode of 24 than a superhero film. Lots of Marvel continuity and fanservice and you are taken aback at how political it is prepared to be
Captain Marvel (2019)
The MCU offers up their first superheroine with very unexceptional results. A competent enough effort but DC’s Wonder Woman easily blows everything this tries to do out of the water
Captain Nemo and the Underwater City (1969)
Amid the fad for Jules Verne adaptations in the 1960s, Captain Nemo was spun off in this original adventure. By now Verne’s brooding inventor has become an absurdly larger-than-life comic-book character
Captain Sindbad (1963)
A cheaply made Arabian Nights fantasy adventure that came out seeking to copy ride the coattails of the success of Ray Harryhausen’s The 7th Voyage of Sinbad
Captive State (2019)
A highly politicised films that takes place several years after an alien invasion and concerns the resistance against them. However, the aliens feature very little and the film resembles more of a ‘hood drama
Capture Kill Release (2016)
A Canadian-made micro-budgeted Found Footage film about a couple filming themselves as they plan out a murder for the thrill of it – only to fall out in the midst of doing so
The Card Player (2004)
A disappointingly tame giallo thriller from Dario Argento about a poker-playing serial killer. Disappointingly, Argento has cut back on all his customary extravagantly arty and sadistic murder set-pieces
The Care Bears Adventure in Wonderland (1987)
The third of the Care Bears film conducts a crossover with Alice in Wonderland, although it is an adaptation that is liberal in its treatment of Lewis Carroll to say the least
The Caretaker (2008)
Average slasher film that is nothing standout about teens being stalked in the midst of a Halloween prank. Jennifer Tilly turns up in a campy performance.
Carnage Park (2016)
Mickey Keating makes a Backwoods Brutality film that has borrowed a good deal from The Most Dangerous Game about a woman abducted and forced to make a survival run through the desert with her bare hands
Carnifex (2022)
A monster movie that takes place as a documentary crew are trying to study the wildlife displaced by the Australian bushfires
The Carpenter’s Son (2025)
A horror film about the life of Jesus as a child. That’s not quite what we end up getting but it is enough to give this a bizarre freakshow appeal and get this site watching. Behind that though, this is surprisingly traditional
Carrie (2002)
TV mini-series remake of the Stephen King novel, which restores many aspects of the book not in the 1976 film. Unfortunately, Brian De Palma has been replaced by a tv director who regards it as just another assignment
Cars 3 (2017)
Another of the weaker sequels that Pixar seem determined to churn out. This lacks the fun among the anthropomorphic vehicles that its predecessors had with a hardly inspiring story about its hero feeling old and over-the-hill
Carved: The Slit Mouthed Woman (2007)
J-horror film based on the Japanese urban legend of a boogeywoman with a face slit from ear to ear who appears to kill people
Casper (1995)
Film adaptation of the popular Casper the Friendly Ghost comic book ends up being like its title character – cute but insubstantial. Mostly this feels driven by slapstick scenes.
Cassadaga (2011)
Director Anthony DiBlasi has become a rising name in the horror genre in recent years. Here he makes a film about a deaf woman who gains mediumistic abilities and her tracking a serial killer who turns his victims into living marionettes
Cassandra (1987)
An Australian clairvoyance thriller that seems to have substantially drawn its influence from Eyes of Laura Mars. The film was little seen when it came out and the uninvolved direction does little to draw us into what is taking place
The Cassandra Crossing (1976)
From the heyday of the disaster movie, an all-star cast head up a big scale drama about a train where a passenger is carrying a deadly plague, only for the train to be shunted all across Europe
Castle Freak (1995)
Stuart Gordon had a cult hit with Re-Animator and much of the rest of his career felt like his attempting to repeat that. Here he re-teams with many of the Re-Animator personnel for what is essentially a rehash of a 1960s Italian Gothic film
Castle of Evil (1966)
At initial face value, this appears to be a 1960s revival of the Old Dark House film with a hooded figure killing a cast assembled at gloomy old mansion, but then takes a turn for the bizarre with an unexpected science-fiction twist mid-film
The Cat (1992)
This is a completely demented Hong Kong film about alien body snatchers who are hiding in an apartment building on Earth
The Cat and the Canary (1978)
The fourth film version of the classic Old Dark House thriller, remade in the vein of the recent success of Murder on the Orient Express with an all-star cast of the day
The Cat Creeps (1946)
An Old Dark House thriller that has the distinction of being the last horror film made during Universal’s Golden Age of Horror. The results are creaky and impoverished looking
The Cat from Outer Space (1978)
From the era of Disney live-action comedies, this involves assorted slapstick tomfoolery as various parties try to aid or capture a telepathic alien cat that is stranded on Earth
A Cat in the Brain (1990)
Cult Italian horror director Lucio Fulci plays himself, a horror director being driven to hallucinations and acts of murder by the violence he directs in his films
The Cat in the Hat (2003)
Adaptation of the Dr Seuss book made following the success of Ron Howard’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas. The book is dragged down into noisy slapstick chaos, capped by a badly unrestrained Mike Myers as The Cat
Catacombs (1988)
An almost quite good film from Charles and Albert Band’s Empire Productions about imprisoned evil stirring beneath a monastery. The build-up is well done and the film only falters at a weak ending
Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
A disaster tv mini-series about the most powerful storm in recorded history descending on Chicago just as a hacker disables the power grid. Most of this plays by the cliches of the genre.
Cathy’s Curse (1977)
From the great era of Canuxploitation, an entertainingly ridiculous film about a possessed child wreaking psychic havoc and an often absurd series of deaths against those who are mean to her
The Catman of Paris (1946)
A blatant but far more pedestrian copy of Cat People in which a man has blackouts during which he suspects he turns into a catman who is wanted by police for a string of murders
Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore (2010)
Cats & Dogs was amiable but this sequel struggles against the irritatingly cutsie elements that have come to dominate this mini-genre of live-action talking animals films
Cat’s Eye (1985)
An anthology of three Stephen King stories, this comes out with extremely variable results where what were originally a series of tight and mordant tales end up strangely overblown
Cats Kill (2017)
Low-budget psycho film where Cat who lives in the Catskills decides she wants to hunt tourists from the big city
The Cave (2005)
This big-budget film came out the same year as The Descent and is a very similar work about a cast of name explorers in a vast network of underground caves being hunted by monsters
Caveman (1981)
A comedy spoof of One Million Years B.C. and the whole sub-genre of caveman vs dinosaurs films This proves amiably goofy where Ringo Starr seems perfectly cast as the lead caveman
Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974)
Vastly over-praised French New Wave film that is a ghost story of sorts. Three hours plus of tediously protracted happenings that don’t seem to be about anything at all
Cell 213 (2011)
A muddled allegorical redemption drama with Eric Balfour sentenced to a maximum security prison where he is haunted by hallucinations
Cell Count (2012)
People are locked in a facility and undergoing biological meltdowns. A film that is driven by a series of wild effects at regular intervals but falls down when it comes to its poorly constructed mystery
Cello (2005)
The huge success of J-horror films like Ringu and Ju-on: The Grudge in the 2000s was copied right around the Asian region. This was one of several K-horror (South Korean) ghost stories produced during this period
Cemetery of Splendor (2015)
Critical favourite that he is, I find Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s have some incredibly eerie, haunted moments. But these sit alongside banal, uneventful happenings that never seem to intersect in a plot
Cerebrum (2022)
A young man recuperates from a brain injury while tended by his father. As he tries to piece together what happened, we discover we are in the midst of a Frankenstein-type film
The Chain Reaction (1980)
An Australian film from many of the people behind Mad Max about the cover-up of a nuclear accident. Essentially The China Syndrome with the addition of car chases
Chain Reaction (1996)
Thriller with Keanu Reeves wrongfully accused and on the run from authorities in the quest for a process that creates cheap energy from water. A rehash of director Andrew Davis’s The Fugitive mostly construed around its set-pieces
The Chair (1989)
One of a spate of killers returned from the electric chair films that came out around the time of Wes Craven’s Shocker. The film is all build-up and almost no delivery, although is enlivened by an undeniable sense of humour
The Chairman (1969)
Big-budgeted spy thriller with Gregory Peck as a scientist who poses as a defector to Communist China. This never enervates much as a thriller but its recreations of Communist China are amazing
Chamber of Horrors (1966)
TV pilot about two waxworks curators tracking a mad killer, this was deemed too gruesome for audiences and released to theatres with the addition of a William Castle-like promotional gimmick
The Changed (2021)
Tony Todd heads a B-budget body snatchers film about a neighbourhood being taken over by beings that promise a great transformation
The Changeover (2017)
Adaptation of a book by NZ author Margaret Mahy. Mahy has a sublimely poetic turn of phrase in the writing but the film strips the book down to the point we get no more than a by-the-numbers Young Adult work