Midsommar

The movie Hereditary was one of my favourite films last year. I actually let out an audible gasp while watching it. I didn't and still don't understand the Exorcist cult-like ending - it was bananas. But I loved every minute of it. So when I heard Ari Aster had a new film coming out, well I was giddy.

Midsommar is off the hook bananas. OMG did I love this movie. It's like if The Wicker Man had a Rosemary's Baby with The Holy Mountain. What's it all about? Good grief, where do I start?!

The simplest explanation, it's about a bunch of university kids who go spend their summer at a Swedish hippie farm for their summer festival. But not all is as it seems (of course) and the weird factor just keeps ramping up and up. I think in this day and age, it takes courage to go this weird. It's also about Dani (played by Florence Pugh) who has lost her parents and has a clingy relationship with her boyfriend Christian. There is a lot going on in Dani's post traumatized head and it's compounded with everything that's going on the Swedish Kool-Aid Acid Farm. Take a trip to Sweden and catch this one on streaming services or in a rep cinema near you.  

Us

It's October, so let's get into some horror movies. Let's begin with something that came out earlier in the year, Us. Us is the second horror film from comedic star, Jordan Peele. Critics gushed over his first film, Get Out. I liked it, didn't love it. Peele seems to have embraced the horror genre with loving arms, so much so that he has rebooted The Twilight Zone. So I went into Us with somewhat midgrade expectations; horror is hard to do well. I was delighted to find a very creepy monster knocking on my cinema's door.

What's it all about? It's about the childhood fears of getting lost and it's about adult fears and guilt of losing a child. It's also about the innate existential fear of being replaced - somebody could take my job; my partner could leave me and get a better me; my kids could have a better stepfather than their real dad; our very existence will one day be gone and we will be replaced.

It's about the Wilson family, Gabe and Adelaide (played with great intensity by Lupita Nyong'o) and their two kids. One night a strange family comes knocking on the Wilsons's door. It's their doppelgangers dressed in red outfits and wearing ornate racing gloves - it's scary shit.

Peele is a comedian and he has sprinkled humour throughout his new monster movie of the self. Elisabeth Moss calling for the police is particularly amusing. This is all I want to tell you - go watch it with the lights out.

You couldn't do much better than Us, to begin your Halloween horror movie season. Catch it on streaming services.