CineNiche

CineNiche: Stoker Graphic Design It is good to know that Chan-Wook Park's deviant style was not watered down for American audiences.  J.S.A., Old Boy, Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance, Lady Vengeance, and Thirst are films that deal with revenge, incest, and obsession.  They are filled with complex characters whose motives whether extreme or subtle are always understood through the course of the narrative. In Stoker we are given the privilege of seeing excellent performances from Nicole Kidman, Mia Wasikowska, and Matthew Goode.  The story unfolds slowly which provides a great pay off in the end. After the death of Richard Stoker, the patriarch, his brother Charles moves in with the family.  From the very beginning we sense something is off with uncle Charley.  He comforts the non-too-grief-stricken Evelyn while trying to get close to his niece.  When people who know of his past enter the picture, they mysteriously go missing soon after.  India is ver...

In screenwriting you are told to show, not tell; whereas in horror cinema the “rules” dictate you tell about the threat and restrict the audience's access to seeing the threat. The Battery succeeds at both. Even though the film debuted at the Telluride Horror Show last October, its recent VOD release correlates well with the upcoming World War Z debacle. In World War Z we will witness millions of dollars at waste in an attempt to find the balance between character and imminent doom, which The Battery does perfectly with a minuscule budget of $6,000. It is a film that instantly reminds you of Night Of The Living Dead , because at every moment you feel it was a labor of love. Like Night we have a story that focuses more on humanity than it does the zombie threat. The nihilism of Night is modernized in The Battery for the millennial generation as an overall sense of apathy in the face of hopelessness. There is no heavy-handed social commentary, nor are there ...

This is our formal declaration: Steven Soderbergh is not an autuer.  While others may have already came to this decision, we had hope.  With a director like Soderbergh with around 27 titles under his belt we had assumed there may be some subtle nuance of authorial style, some flourish that when seen one can say, "oh, there's that Soderbergh moment."  This is not to say there is no merit to his work, and overall we find his films enjoyable, but his mainstream fare is only entertaining the first time.  Contagion is no different. We at CineNiche believe Contagion to be a more horrific rendering of Wolfgang Peterson's Outbreak .  We were drawn to Contagion not by the overwhelmingly star studded cast, but by the theme of apocalypse.  Of course we had assumed the film would play out like the awesome first half of The Stand and on a lesser scale it does.  It creates a world of palpable paranoia while trying to maintain the logistics of an epi...

Do not be confused by the hype machine and its marketing of Jorge Michel Grau's Mexican film We Are What We Are, this is first and foremost a family drama with a splash of horror.  The horror that is publicized occurs for the majority in the last 10 minutes. We begin with the death of the patriarch and from there we shift perspective to the rest of the family.  Here we have a useless mother, two sons, and a daughter.  It quickly becomes evident that the daughter will function as the mother and the two sons will have to battle each other to secure there place as leader of the clan. The eldest son is next in line, he's level headed but filled with anxiety.  The other son is the wild card and clearly not fit to lead.  The daughter-mother makes it her job to ready the eldest for the next "ritual." The plot moves slowly with a few impressive ingrediants, but overall doesn't deliver until the third act when all hell breaks loose.  In most ca...