list/discuss/rate - your recently watched movies

^ Good movie, and a powerful score from Terrence Blanchard.

Not bad, not great, and an unclear future for the Bond franchise.

the Last Shift (2014) Directed by Anthony DiBlasi

Rookie cop's first day on the force has her assigned to looking after an abandoned Police Station prior to it's permanent closure the next morning. Bored but eager to please her superiors, the likeable and beautiful Officer Loren (Juliana Harkavy) avoids encroaching tedium until things take a distinctly sinister turn and her routine chore turns into a harrowing ordeal. Reference points are fairly easy to spot in the last Shift, from Assault on Precinct 13, the criminally neglected Let Us Prey from the same year, to echoes of the Manson family cult but it's never derivative and manages to exploit its single location/solitary actress budget limitations to telling effect. Some of the imagery is genuinely unsettling so it's not a horror for the feint of heart (and if any are, they ain't worthy of the name) There is also a plot twist at the conclusion I genuinely didn't anticipate which is well worth sticking around for. More psychological thriller with horror elements than standard issue horror, it's a tale of an idealistic young woman's mental disintegration when confronted with ghosts of the past (real or imagined) and a very interesting tangent on how so many otherwise rational and intelligent females somehow get sucked into the black hole event horizons of the likes of Charles Manson, Ian Brady, Richard Ramirez, Jimmy Boyle, David Koresh, Warren Jeffs, Keith Raniere et al. Credibly creepy throughout, choc full of jump scares and with a knack for tourniquet tight suspense, the Last Shift might have a few glaring plot holes here and there but is great value for it's modest outlay in cinematic resources.

the Old Ways (2020) Directed by Christopher Alender

I was thinking recently that of all the world's accents, the least conducive to conveying terror and dread might just be Mexican. Can you imagine the Exorcist with Father Merrin and Father Karras portrayed by Cheech and Chong respectively invoking the same intended gravitas?. Picture my delight therefore at discovering a contemporary exorcism film that takes place in Veracruz, Mehiko. Rest easy Gringos, as any unwitting humour is absent entirely and the economy of the dialogue throughout is probably deliberate. Although the Old Ways doesn't bring anything new to the table genre wise, it does have a back story depth that very few even attempt. Kudos are due therefore to Director Christopher Alender's subtle and understated handling of his theme which posits the spiritual and moral anomie prevalent in the first world is fertile ground for all manner of psychological maladies to thrive. (real or imagined, with demonic possession being just one manifestation of this) Our heroine Cristina is a high achiever US emigrant journalist who lives in a state of heroin injected spiritual perdition c/f her cousin Miranda, who remained in Veracruz, is infinitely more naive but considerably wiser in the ancient brujeria wisdom from which the movie is clearly inspired. Perhaps the denouement might be considered a tad predictable but it shouldn't spoil your enjoyment of what is a very accomplished horror which manages to weave in a moral fable in a place where we would have least expected one.