Studio 666 (2022) - When this project was first announced, I remember thinking, "A horror film starring the members of The Foo Fighters being terrorized by spirits as they record their next album in a haunted house? WTF? This can't be real. It's a marketing stunt." Well, yeah, it was marketing. But it also really was a film that was released in theaters. And it's just as absolutely bonzo crazy as you'd expect. However, it was also fun. I gotta watch it again as Katie is pissed I watched it without her. She loves Taylor Hawkins and was even willing to watch a horror film to see him on screen. Who knew?

They Live (1988) - I have always seen images from this film in popular media. The weird skin-stripped, almost-robotic, humanoid faces with propaganda posters surrounding them. And I knew they were from this film, but I had never actually watched the film. For as much as I claim to love John Carpenter, I have seen shockingly few of his films. So I've been working to remedy that as well. So here's another. But it was such a weird film starring late WWF Hall of Famer "Rowdy" Roddy Piper that I had trouble really getting into it. I may just not have been in the right headspace for it. Could be worth another shot.

The Mothman Prophecies (2002) - I've really gotten into cryptid lore lately. From photographing the occasional toy, to reading a book, to checking out a lot of websites about them, to sharing in art made by friends and coworkers who share the passion. So it was only a matter of time before I checked out the big screen, star-driven film featuring one of the lesser known to the masses cryptids, the Mothman. This movie is all about a guy whose wife, while driving late at night, sees the Mothman flash in front of her windshield. She crashes the car and dies from her injuries. Her husband becomes obsessed with stories of the giant winged creature focused on a small West Virginia town and it takes over his life. It was a well done film with a strong late 90s/early 00s sensibility to it. I just wish they had set the film at the time when these cryptid appearances were actually reported, which was the late 1960s. Oh well. Can't have it all, can we?

Motherly (2021) - I had never heard of this film or any of the actors in it until I saw it show up in a streaming service and turned it on for the heck of it. Basically, a mother takes her teenaged daughter and go on the run to get away from the specter of her husband's murder of the daughter's best friend. Although he's convicted and behind bars, not everyone thinks the outcome was the way it should have been, including the victim's parents. It's not a particularly complex film, but it was well done and I enjoyed the twist, as obvious as it was.

Us (2019) - This second film from writer/director Jordan Peele was not at all what I expected. Well, it was for the first half, in which a family on vacation near Santa Cruz, CA, is stalked by another family that looks exactly like them. Why there is an entire family of doppelgangers is one of the reasons you'll just have to watch this for yourself. What happens in the second half that made this film completely unexpected? Again, just watch it. I can't even begin to describe it without ruining the whole thing.

Nope (2022) - Jordan Peele's third film features a brother and sister who run a ranch in central California raising and training horses that are used in Hollywood films. A ways down the road is another ranch that has turned into a bit of a carnival run by a former child actor who was the lone survivor of an attack by a crazed chimpanzee on set. He also claims to have seen aliens over his ranch and believes that he can summon them to visit and people pay to come see this happen. However, when his claims turn out to be true (not that he can summon, but that there actually are aliens), things get really weird. Yanno, not that they weren't already weird enough. This is probably my least favorite of Peele's films so far. But, like They Live, I wonder if I wasn't really in the right headspace when I watched it. Could be worth a second watch.

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