Comrade Courant Culture Critic

The First Omen (2024): A Feminist Horror That Demands Bodily Autonomy “Not every miracle is divine—and not every institution deserves your trust.” — 4/5 Stars In the post-Roe era, horror has become a vital space for reckoning with the erosion of bodily autonomy. The First Omen (2024) doesn’t just participate in that conversation—it weaponizes it. This is not a haunted house story. It’s a procedural thriller about institutional gaslighting, reproductive control, and the quiet violence of faith used as a tool of patriarchal power. Set in 1971 Rome, the film follows Margaret Daino (Nell Tiger Free), a young American novitiate sent to the prestigious Mater Lachrymarum Convent to prove her devotion. But from the moment she arrives, something is wrong. The nuns are cold, the priests evasive, and the orphanage next door houses girls who vanish without explanation. When a series of “miracles” begin to unfold—...

Kids vs. Aliens (2022): A Gory, R-Rated Love Letter to ’90s Kids’ Horror “Goosebumps meets Evil Dead—but leave the kids at home.” — 3/5 Stars On the eve of Halloween, there’s a special kind of joy in a movie that doesn’t pretend to be anything other than what it is: loud, bloody, and wildly entertaining. Kids vs. Aliens (2022) is exactly that—a gory, R-rated romp that wears its influences like badges of honor. Think of it as what happens when the kids who grew up on Goosebumps and Are You Afraid of the Dark? hit their 30s, watched Evil Dead , and decided to make something that honors both. Unlike R.L. Stine’s Pumpkinhead —a perfect gateway horror for younger viewers—this one is decidedly not for kids . It’s chaotic, profane, and drenched in practical-effects gore. The film follows Sam, a sharp-witted teen played with fierce commitment by Phoebe Rex, as she tries to survive a Halloween house party th...

Late Night with the Devil (2023): A Fun, if Flawed Séance in the Studio “Do not adjust your set.” — And don’t expect perfection, but do expect a wildly entertaining Halloween night. — 3.5/5 Stars I’ve been hearing about Late Night with the Devil since it dropped—a buzzed-about “instant cult classic” that fused analog horror, found footage, and 1970s late-night TV into something supposedly groundbreaking. As someone who followed ARGs like The Mikaeli ARG (yes, the “hitting metal 17 times” guy— In my opinion a defining voice of modern analog horror, whose project concluded just last year), I went in hoping for a feature-length version of that same immersive, broadcast-based dread. What I got was something far more modest—but still very fun. This isn’t a masterpiece. It’s not even terrifying. But it is a wildly entertaining, impeccably styled Halloween movie that absolutely earns a spot in your annual rotation....

Immaculate (2024): A Missed Opportunity in Religious Horror “Not every intervention is divine.” — And not every horror film with a great premise deserves your time. — 2/5 Stars Immaculate (2024) arrives with a premise ripe for horror: a devout American nun, Cecilia (Sydney Sweeney), joins a remote Italian convent only to discover she’s been chosen for a terrifying divine purpose. The film flirts with powerful themes—bodily autonomy, reproductive control, institutional gaslighting, and the weaponization of faith against women. In the hands of a bold filmmaker, this could have been a Rosemary’s Baby for the post-Roe era. Instead, director Michael Mohan and writer Andrew Lobel deliver a film that feels like it was focus-grouped into mediocrity, or never intended to be great in the first place. There are so many interesting ideas here—Cecilia as a modern-day vessel, the convent as a gilded prison, the Chu...

The Substance (2024): Body Horror as Capitalist Self-Cannibalism “Audaciously gross, wickedly clever, and possibly Demi Moore’s finest hour.” — 4/5 Stars In a world that demands women consume themselves to stay relevant, The Substance literalizes the metaphor with grotesque, operatic precision. Coralie Fargeat’s audacious body-horror epic isn’t about aging—it’s about the capitalist machinery that turns self-optimization into self-annihilation. Demi Moore stars as Elisabeth Sparkle, a fading aerobics icon fired on her 50th birthday for being “too old.” Desperate, she injects a black-market serum that splits her body in two: out of her back emerges Sue (Margaret Qualley), a younger, hotter, more marketable version of herself. For seven days, they alternate consciousness. But the system demands sacrifice—and the original body pays the price. The Horror of Self-Commodifi...