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Boaz Yakin’s ‘Boarding School’ Will Keep You Guessing Until the Final Frame

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Boaz Yakin has a talent for misdirection. The writer/director, whose previous films have included Now You See Me, is very good at convincing his audiences that they know exactly where a narrative is going while simultaneously preparing to blindside them, and that full skills set is on display in his brand new horror/thriller Boarding School.

Jacob (Luke Prael) is a 12 year old boy who seems to be at odds with his high-strung mother (Samantha Mathis) and well-starched stepfather (David Aaron Baker) no matter what he does. When his grandmother, whom he has never met, dies and her things are brought back to the family’s home, the boy becomes obsessed with her image, her clothes, and her life.

Wrongly suspended from school, Jacob spends hours poring over her things. He turns on one of the records from her collection, pulls on one of her crushed velvet dresses and satiny elbow length gloves and dances around the living room…only to be caught by his stepfather who arrives home early from work.

Within days, Jacob finds himself packed into a car with his things, headed to a very special boarding school for “misfit children” run by Dr. and Mrs. Sherman (Will Patton, Tammy Blanchard), a hyper-religious couple with a firm spare-the-rod-spoil-the-child philosophy.

Samantha Mathis and Luke Prael in Boarding School (Photo Courtesy of Momentum Pictures)

All is not what it seems, of course, and that’s where Yakin proves his writing genius. I don’t want to brag, but I’m pretty good at determining the path a film or novel is going to take. Yet every time I thought I was on the right track, Yakin would once again pull the rug out from under me, and I have to admit, it was a refreshing change.

Boarding School is also one of the rare film’s whose direction and writing are well and truly amplified by its cast.

Yakin’s script requires Prael to maneuver a vast emotional arc throughout the film, and the young actor proves himself more than capable of the task in a performance that could be described as transcendent. The audience watches his mannerisms and physicality evolve to match those emotional requirements as he becomes a friend, protector, and in some ways, the correcting parent to his fellow students throughout the film.

Patton and Blanchard, meanwhile, give their own brilliantly layered performances as the softest notes of their contained malice eventually give way to full-scale operatic level evils.

It isn’t only the film’s stars who brought their A-game to the film, however. Yakin and casting directors Henry Russell Bergstein and Stephanie Holbrook assembled a brilliant supporting ensemble for Boarding School, and this is especially true for its younger cast.

Sterling Jerins (The Conjuring) is almost, if not more, menacing than the Shermans in her role as Christine, the society girl with sociopathic tendencies, and Christopher Dylan White (The Miseducation of Cameron Post) gives an unbelievably skilled head-to-toe performance as Frederic, a young man with Tourette Syndrome.

Also of special note is Nadia Alexander (The Sinner) who plays a young burn victim named Phil who becomes Jacob’s roommate at school and teaches him about astronomy by sticking glow in the dark stars all around their room to form constellations.

Nadia Alexander as Phil in Boarding School (Photo Courtesy of Momentum Pictures)

It isn’t often in a review on a horror site that one has the opportunity to write about set decoration and costume design, but for Boarding School it’s an absolute must.

Production designer Mary Lena Colston and set decorator Cheyenne Ford created a world where everything is perfectly placed. In their hands, the “school” is both decadent and dark with rich colors and sparkling finery throughout. It is the glittering spiderweb full of danger that lures its victims into its depths and is wholly reminiscent of those amazing sets that horror audiences loved in Argento’s Suspiria and a color palette that would make Mario Bava proud.

Meanwhile, Jessica Zavala dresses each character to accentuate both their real and imagined personalities. This is especially true in the stark white and black color pallete of clothing preferred by Blanchard’s Mrs. Sherman, and in the deep blue velvet of the dress that Prael’s Jacob wears multiple times during the film.

And speaking of that dress…

It isn’t often that we see a character in horror that is honestly experimenting with gender fluid expression, and it was fascinating to watch this unfold with Jacob. Yakin’s script never explicitly spells out whether this is a personality trait that will continue or if it was simply experimentation brought on by Jacob’s fascination with his grandmother and her story of survival in German Nazi camps.

However, even if this is experimentation, it is portrayed with an unexpectedly raw emotional honesty by Prael. Jacob seems wholly comfortable, confident, empowered and radiant in the dress at one moment dancing around his living room only to be overcome with shame and fear when he is discovered by his stepfather moments later.

Yakin gives us several moments in the film to watch Jacob’s struggle play out and Prael fully embraces all of the uncertainty that those scenes demand from an actor so young.

Jacob (Luke Prael) and Dr. Sherman (Will Patton) face off in Boarding School (Photo Courtesy of Momentum Pictures)

Some of you out there are no doubt wondering with all this discussion of sets and costumes and gender fluidity, how the film ended up on a horror site’s radar. I can assure you its place is well-earned.

There are genuinely terrifying moments to be found throughout Boarding School. In fact, the ultimate truth and endgame of Yakin’s film, which of course I won’t reveal, tears at the fabric of what we’re taught about family, and its final scene leaves the audience wondering just how changed Jacob has been from the entire experience.

Boarding School is set for release on August 31, 2018 for a limited theater run and on VOD. Check out the trailer below and keep your eyes peeled. This is one you won’t want to miss!

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The Pope’s Exorcist Officially Announces New Sequel

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The Pope’s Exorcist is one of those films that’s just fun to watch. It isn’t the most terrifying film around, but there’s something about Russel Crow (Gladiator) playing a wise cracking Catholic priest that just feels right.

Screen Gems seems to agree with this assessment, as they have just officially announced that The Pope’s Exorcist sequel is in the works. It makes sense that Screen Gems would want to keep this franchise going, considering the first film scared up almost $80 million with a budget of only $18 million.

The Pope's Exorcist
The Pope’s Exorcist

According to Crow, there may even be a The Pope’s Exorcist trilogy in the works. However, recent changes with the studio may have put the third film on hold. In a sit-down with The Six O’Clock Show, Crow gave the following statement about the project.

“Well that’s in discussion at the moment. The producers originally got the kick off from the studio not just for one sequel but for two. But there’s been a change of studio heads at the moment, so that’s going around in a few circles. But very definitely, man. We set that character up that you could take him out and put him into a lot of different circumstances.”

Crow has also stated that film’s source material involves twelve separate books. This would allow the studio to take the story in all kinds of directions. With that much source material, The Pope’s Exorcist could even rival The Conjuring Universe.

Only the future will tell what becomes of The Pope’s Exorcist. But as always, more horror is always a good thing.

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New ‘Faces of Death’ Remake Will Be Rated R For “Strong Bloody Violence and Gore”

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In a move that should surprise absolutely no one, the Faces of Death reboot has been given an R rating from the MPA. Why has the film been given this rating? For strong bloody violence, gore, sexual content, nudity, language, and drug use, of course.

What else would you expect from a Faces of Death reboot? It would honestly be alarming if the film received anything less than an R rating.

Faces of death
Faces of Death

For those unaware, the original Faces of Death film released in 1978 and promised viewers video evidence of real deaths. Of course, this was just a marketing gimmick. Promoting a real snuff film would be a terrible idea.

But the gimmick worked, and franchise lived on in infamy. The Faces of Death reboot is hoping to gain the same amount of viral sensation as its predecessor. Isa Mazzei (Cam) and Daniel Goldhaber (How to Blow Up a Pipeline) will spearhead this new addition.

The hope is that this reboot will do well enough to recreate the infamous franchise for a new audience. While we don’t know much about the film at this point, but a joint statement from Mazzei and Goldhaber gives us the following info on the plot.

“Faces of Death was one of the first viral video tapes, and we are so lucky to be able to use it as a jumping off point for this exploration of cycles of violence and the way they perpetuate themselves online.”

“The new plot revolves around a female moderator of a YouTube-like website, whose job is to weed out offensive and violent content and who herself is recovering from a serious trauma, that stumbles across a group that is recreating the murders from the original film. But in the story primed for the digital age and age of online misinformation, the question faced is are the murders real or fake?”

The reboot will have some bloody shoes to fill. But from the looks of it, this iconic franchise is in good hands. Unfortunately, the film does not have a release date at this time.

That’s all the information we have at this time. Make sure to check back here for more news and updates.

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Panic Fest 2024 Review: ‘The Ceremony Is About To Begin’

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People will look for answers and belonging in the darkest places and the darkest people. The Osiris Collective is a commune predicated upon ancient Egyptian theology and was run by the mysterious Father Osiris. The group boasted dozens of members, each forgoing their old lives for one held in the Egyptian themed land owned by Osiris in Northern California. But the good times take a turn for the worst when in 2018, an upstart member of the collective named Anubis (Chad Westbrook Hinds) reports Osiris disappearing while mountain climbing and declaring himself the new leader. A schism ensued with many members leaving the cult under Anubis’ unhinged leadership. A documentary is being made by a young man named Keith (John Laird) whose fixation with The Osiris Collective stems from his girlfriend Maddy leaving him for the group several years ago. When Keith gets invited to document the commune by Anubis himself, he decides to investigate, only to get wrapped up in horrors he couldn’t even imagine…

The Ceremony Is About To Begin is the latest genre twisting horror film from Red Snow‘s Sean Nichols Lynch. This time tackling cultist horror along with a mockumentary style and the Egyptian mythology theme for the cherry on top. I was a big fan of Red Snow‘s subversiveness of the vampire romance sub-genre and was excited to see what this take would bring. While the movie has some interesting ideas and a decent tension between the meek Keith and the erratic Anubis, it just doesn’t exactly thread everything together in a succinct fashion.

The story begins with a true crime documentary style interviewing former members of The Osiris Collective and sets-up what led the cult to where it is now. This aspect of the storyline, especially Keith’s own personal interest in the cult, made it an interesting plotline. But aside from some clips later on, it doesn’t play as much a factor. The focus is largely on the dynamic between Anubis and Keith, which is toxic to put it lightly. Interestingly, Chad Westbrook Hinds and John Lairds are both credited as writers on The Ceremony Is About To Begin and definitely feel like they’re putting their all into these characters. Anubis is the very definition of a cult leader. Charismatic, philosophical, whimsical, and threateningly dangerous at the drop of a hat.

Yet strangely, the commune is deserted of all cult members. Creating a ghost town that only amps up the danger as Keith documents Anubis’ alleged utopia. A lot of the back and forth between them drags at times as they struggle for control and Anubis keeps continuing to convince Keith to stick around despite the threatening situation. This does lead to a pretty fun and bloody finale that fully leans into mummy horror.

Overall, despite meandering and having a bit of a slow pace, The ceremony Is About To Begin is a fairly entertaining cult, found footage, and mummy horror hybrid. If you want mummies, it delivers on mummies!

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