This week I dabbled in two legacy revivals of 80s sword and sorcery properties which approach the genre from radically different perspectives.
Deathstalker (2025), directed by Steven Kostanski, is an irreverent comedy held together by campy gore and creature effects. It’s basically, “What if Army of Darkness had the tone and gore of Evil Dead 2, and the budget of Evil Dead 1?”. That last point is key. While I knew this was a low-budget offering, I thought that meant 10-20 million. Therefore, I was initially harder on the movie than I think it deserved. I kept thinking that the whole thing felt like an ambitious series of YouTube shorts more than a feature film. Turns out, the director did indeed come from a YouTube background (though, it should be noted, he has several features under his belt at this point), but I was way off about the budget. Rather than $10,000,000, the production budget was closer to $100,000, raised primarily on Kickstarter. Once I discovered that, I recalibrated my expectations and started to have a real good time with what was on offer.
The following evening, I spun up Red Sonja (2025), directed by MJ Bassett. Maybe it’s because I had just finished lowering the bar for Deathstalker, but I found myself really, really digging it. While still “low budget” the productions had about $17 million to play with, so it’s feels more like a “real” movie than Deathstalker. To some, that will make the concessions to budget stand out all the more (such as several characters having their voices seemingly dubbed over non-English performances, or some ropey CGI), but, like Deathstalker, I felt like I saw every dollar of the budget on screen.
Strong recommendation for this double feature. Deathstalker appeals to my inner teenage boy, sitting atop a stack of Fangorias, and Red Sonja…also frankly appeals to that teenaged boy (hang a lampshade on it all you like movie, you’re still dressing the main character in a chainmail bikini), but there’s also a femininity brought to story by the chief creatives which I found refreshing in this genre.
I’ve been stuck at home this past week and so powered through a bunch of movies!
I cannot believe it took me so long to watch classic Jackie Chan. Started with Police Story, then Wheels on Meals and finally Drunken Master. All of them were great in their own ways, but so far Drunken Master has been the chef’s kiss.
Also watched Brigadoon, lovely colourful 1950s musical with Gene Kelly. It’s not the best of his/that era but it was sa good time.
Fun! Police Story and Wheels on Meals are probably the Jackie movies I’ve seen the most, and are excellent entry points to his pre-Hollywood work. Out of curiosity, did you watch the og Drunken Master from the 70s, or the sequel from 94?
I watched Antichrist starring William Dafoe… it certainly was something else.
The Drama (2026) was okay. I came into it hating Zendaya. I came out of it sympathizing with school schooters I guess.
GOAT (2026) was a fun enough kids movie. Does a good job depicting the hostility you will encounter on the playground. It did everything it set out to be.
It Takes Two (1995) is a surprisingly decent family comedy. It’s a borderline remake of earlier films (Thirty Day Princess (1934), and plenty more).
Breakdown (1997) is a well executed but terribly unrealistic story. Had some fun moments.
I watched return to silent hill, the first 30 minutes didn’t feel all that bad but when James got into town the special effects and art direction got increasingly bad. Then i was falling asleep only to wake up and laugh at a wig and a fake beard later on.
Kneecap - 2024. I laughed a lot during this one. It’s cool that they got the actual band members to play themselves.
Weapons - 2025. Thoroughly enjoyed this. Julia Garner is great as always.
Reign over me - 2007. This must have been early in Sandler’s switch from comedy. Very enjoyable. The main cast are all great. It reminded me that I haven’t seen Liv Tyler in much recently though I’m very fond of her as an actress.
Edit: yeah she’s only done one movie since 2020. I wonder what happened.
I didn’t realise until after the fact that Kneecap played themselves, and it was their acting debut too which make it even sweeter.
The Way Way Back
I saw it recommended last week and decided to watch based on Sam Rockwell and it didn’t disappoint. Also about half hour in I had my kids watching with me too which was nice.
