Movies

Adult Swim Terrifies Audiences With Surprise Film Disguised as a ‘Yule Log’

Published

1 year ago

December 12, 2022

If you recall a few years back Casper Kelly made a collection of late-night, faux infomercials. These ranged from a popular one titled Too Many Cooks, and a terrifying one titled Unedited Footage of a Bear that acted as a late-night pharmaceutical commercial. As they progress, they end up becoming more and more disturbing. Kelly’s latest work, Fireplace aka Yule Log, is a surprise horror film that plays out around a Yule Log burning in a fireplace.

Fireplace/Yule Log surprised audiences last night by going from a faux Yule Log fire to a full-on, feature-length horror movie. Best of all, this horror film is effective on all fronts. It jumps from supernatural to slasher to home invasion to killer log exploration and then back again. What makes Yule Log that much more interesting and worthwhile is the ingenuity around its production. For most of the film the camera is entirely in one spot before going full Evil Dead and flying around the room.

Yule Log is also very much about its practical effects gore. The first bit of this shocks you by bashing someone’s face off, in full unflinching gory glory. Much like the Infomercial series, Yule Log is also very funny, and never takes itself too seriously. I’m also a huge fan of how Yule Log jumps from dread-filled to gut-busting.

Ever since Kelly created those creepy Infomercials, I have been a huge proponent of him getting his own horror film. I’m happy to see that he is excellent even in a feature format. It is also an added hilarious bonus that Kelly wrote the title track for “The Fireplace” as a nice end credit treat.

“Last year during the holidays I was watching a yule log video and suddenly I had an image of legs walking past the fire, just slightly out of focus, and hearing dialogue off screen.” Kelly said. “I loved the mysteriousness of that, and a story started to form. I’m so grateful to Adult Swim for taking the plunge with me, and I’m so proud to have made their first live-action film!”

Fireplace/Yule Log is as hilarious as it is chilling and its ability to jump between those two sentiments is a real accomplishment and keeps you on your toes. It takes some talent to be rife with dread and also to be a knee-slapper. Fireplace/Yule Log is unnerving and darkly funny all with a special kind of fantastic subversion. Kelly has a bright future ahead of him in horror. Fingers crossed he works with the likes of Blumhouse or Atomic Monster next.

You can stream Fireplace/Yule Log now on HBO Max.

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Movies

‘Evil Dead’ Film Franchise Getting TWO New Installments

Published

2 days ago

April 26, 2024

Timothy Rawles

It was a risk for Fede Alvarez to reboot Sam Raimi’s horror classic The Evil Dead in 2013, but that risk paid off and so did its spiritual sequel Evil Dead Rise in 2023. Now Deadline is reporting that the series is getting, not one, but two fresh entries.

We already knew about the Sébastien Vaniček upcoming film that delves into the Deadite universe and should be a proper sequel to the latest film, but we are broadsided that Francis Galluppi and Ghost House Pictures are doing a one-off project set in Raimi’s universe based off of an idea that Galluppi pitched to Raimi himself. That concept is being kept under wraps.

“Francis Galluppi is a storyteller who knows when to keep us waiting in simmering tension and when to hit us with explosive violence,” Raimi told Deadline. “He is a director that shows uncommon control in his feature debut.”

That feature is titled The Last Stop In Yuma County which will release theatrically in the United States on May 4. It follows a traveling salesman, “stranded at a rural Arizona rest stop,” and “is thrust into a dire hostage situation by the arrival of two bank robbers with no qualms about using cruelty-or cold, hard steel-to protect their bloodstained fortune.”

Galluppi is an award-winning sci-fi/horror shorts director whose acclaimed works include High Desert Hell and The Gemini Project. You can view the full edit of High Desert Hell and the teaser for Gemini below:

^{High Desert Hell}

^{The Gemini Project}

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Movies

Fede Alvarez Teases ‘Alien: Romulus’ With RC Facehugger

Published

2 days ago

April 26, 2024

Timothy Rawles

Happy Alien Day! To celebrate director Fede Alvarez who is helming the latest sequel in the Alien franchise Alien: Romulus, got out his toy Facehugger in the SFX workshop. He posted his antics on Instagram with the following message:

“Playing with my favorite toy on set of #AlienRomulus last summer. RC Facehugger created by the amazing team from @wetaworkshop Happy #AlienDay everybody!”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Fede Alvarez (@iamfedealvarez)

To commemorate the 45th anniversary of Ridley Scott’s original Alien movie, April 26 2024 has been designated as Alien Day, with a re-release of the film hitting theaters for a limited time.

Alien: Romulus is the seventh film in the franchise and is currently in post-production with a scheduled theatrical release date of August 16, 2024.

In other news from the Alien universe, James Cameron has been pitching fans the boxed set of Aliens: Expanded a new documentary film, and a collection of merch associated with the movie with pre-sales ending on May 5.

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Movies

‘Invisible Man 2’ Is “Closer Than Its Ever Been” to Happening

Published

2 days ago

April 26, 2024

Timothy Rawles

Elisabeth Moss in a very well-thought-out statement said in an interview for Happy Sad Confused that even though there have been some logistical issues for doing Invisible Man 2 there is hope on the horizon.

Podcast host Josh Horowitz asked about the follow-up and if Moss and director Leigh Whannell were any closer to cracking a solution to getting it made. “We are closer than we have ever been to cracking it,” said Moss with a huge grin. You can see her reaction at the 35:52 mark in the below video.

^{Happy Sad Confused}

Whannell is currently in New Zealand filming another monster movie for Universal, Wolf Man, which might be the spark that ignites Universal’s troubled Dark Universe concept which hasn’t gained any momentum since Tom Cruise’s failed attempt at resurrecting The Mummy.

Also, in the podcast video, Moss says she is not in the Wolf Man film so any speculation that it’s a crossover project is left in the air.

Meanwhile, Universal Studios is in the middle of constructing a year-round haunt house in Las Vegas which will showcase some of their classic cinematic monsters. Depending on attendance, this could be the boost the studio needs to get audiences interested in their creature IPs once more and to get more films made based on them.

The Las Vegas project is set to open in 2025, coinciding with their new proper theme park in Orlando called Epic Universe.