Dear friend,
as I experience another revolution of the Earth around the Sun, I feel like I’m forgetting things I once knew very well. As if years of studies were being obliterated by work and irrelevant knowledge, as if what’s temporary and superficial was getting too much relevance compared to what should be important and permanent. I’m not sure if it’s a normal process, and whether there is a way back.
The music is reversible, but time’s not.
Exhuma/파묘, written and directed by Jang Jae-hyun, South Korea, 2024 - ⭐⭐⭐
One of the best-reviewed Asian horror films of last year, this film never really gripped me, except for a startling scene with a strange snake. In my defence, I had to watch it with an Italian dubbing, which makes every character always speak with a perfect voice intonation, like they are playing in a radio drama, and the voice acting is not always in line with the on-screen actor’s interpretation. It’s definitely interesting for its depiction of rituals, but most of the time I had the impression to be watching a very serious take on Ghostbusters.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers, directed by Philip Kaufman, written by W.D. Richter from the novel by Jack Finney, US, 1978 - ⭐⭐⭐⭐
The best-known frame of this film (featuring Donald Sutherland) is, unfortunately, also the last shot, so I couldn’t avoid having it spoiled (it’s quite effective anyway). What I didn’t expect were the trippy initial alien scenes, and, most of all, a priest with the face of Robert Duvall having expressionless ‘fun’ on a swing.
I also didn’t know young and dashing Jeff Goldblum would be in this film, or that a person could do that thing with their eyes.
I wonder what someone who doesn’t know beforehand the plot of this film (or the title, which is a spoiler per se) would think is going on. Me, I felt very anxious during the whole running time. Probably the most paranoid film ever made?

Door, directed by Banmei Takahashi, co-written with Ataru Oikawa, Japan, 1988 - ⭐⭐
I was curious about this film because of The Evolution of Horror podcast, which uses its theme tune as the background music for one of the segments for the Fresh Blood episodes (very enjoyable monthly recaps of films released in cinemas and on streaming services I can’t have access to). But I digress.
Door is essentially a nonsensical film where a door-to-door salesman becomes obsessed with a very anxious housewife who broke his hand while he was essentially home-invading her house. Illogical events happen, and most actors’ voices have, for no apparent reason, a speaker-phone quality, so I was hoping for some sort of reveal. There’s a cool overhead shot where a lot of action happens, but it comes quite late, so it can’t save a movie that should have been a short film. While I was writing this, I found out that one of the screenwriters is Ataru Oikawa, the author of the best and the worst Tomie films. I’m a bit less surprised now.

Door III, directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa, written by Chiaki J. Konaka, Japan, 1996 - ⭐⭐⭐
With no interest at all in watching Door II, I discovered with no small amazement that chapter III was directed by none other than my favourite Kiyoshi, before he became the director the world knows and loves.
I knew the Door films have absolutely nothing in common with each other, nevertheless I was surprised at the severe lack of relevant doors in this one. This could also have been titled ‘Bar MMCM’ or ‘Cell Phone XXIV’.
It’s a totally different genre, moving away from home invasion into a much darker sci-fi workplace thriller, with a lot more to say about office dynamics and sex. Both Ghost-woman-in-a-red-dress and Women-walking-in-unsettling-ways from Kurosawa’s later films make a welcome appearance.

Babygirl, written and directed by Halina Reijn, US, 2024 - ⭐⭐½
Like Halina Rejin’s previous film Bodies, Bodies, Bodies, this one also feels very overrated to me. It might simply be that I don’t like this kind of dynamics between characters, so I couldn’t stand it when it was repeated for the third, fourth, fifth time. As reductive as it may be, I had the same thought as everybody else while watching the film: this is a variation on Eyes Wide Shut, down to the Christmas setting.

The Woman in Black, directed by James Watkins, written by Jane Goldman based on Susan Hill’s novel, United Kingdom, 2012 - ⭐⭐
I am sure I saw The Woman in Black as a stage play in London, but I have no recollection of it, aside from the theatre where I saw it. The film was a vastly underwhelming experience, with its creepy figures being too small in scenes that were too dark to have any effect, and annoyingly loud jump scares. It’s super heavy-handed too, with the lead character’s trauma being shown and discussed again and again in the first ten minutes (and further on). Nevertheless, I think Daniel Radcliffe is perfect for this role: his most natural performance, whereas I find his presence in most other films a bit too conspicuous.

Eyes of the Spider/蜘蛛の瞳, directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa, co-written with Yōichi Nishiyama, Japan, 1998 - ⭐⭐⭐½
When in doubt, go Kurosawa, I tell myself, at least as long as I can find a way to watch his films. This is his second 1998 film, in a diptych with Serpent’s Path, that deals with a character looking for revenge after the death of his daughter. Rather than the process of exacting revenge, this one focuses on what happens after the mission is complete, and in some ways works like a proto-Breaking Bad, alternating a story of crime with its effects on the lead character’s family life. It wouldn’t be extremely memorable, except for two elements: a two-step jump scare that’s soooooo effective because it’s absolutely unexpected (and out of place, some might say: I don’t think it is), and a quote that sounds worth reflecting on, which is translated as “Emptiness isn’t misery. It’s the beginning of something new.”