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[Nightstream Review] Sci-fi collides with Bizarre Eroticism in ‘After Blue’

Published

5 years ago

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After Blue

Still thinking about Dune, but wish it was more colorful, weird and gay? Look no further than Bertrand Mandico’s (The Wild Boys) sci-fi epic After Blue (Dirty Paradise) which creates an erotic, bizarre dreamworld using practical camera effects. 

To make complete sense of this film would be a foolhardy endeavor. Coming from a director who pioneered the incoherent cinema movement, appreciating arthouse films and excusing a wandering plot are necessary to enjoy this movie. Not to be bogged down with a singular genre, this film can best be described as trippy, practical visuals and transgressive eroticism wrapped in a sci-fi western hero’s quest. 

The film begins with abstract, colorful close-ups filled with the glitter of the protagonist named Roxy (but the village girls call her Toxic) played by Paula Luna. Her voiceover explains that they live on the planet After Blue, where the atmosphere causes hair to grow all over their bodies and the men died because their hair grew internally so they have to be artificially inseminated to procreate. If that sounds like a premise you can even remotely enjoy, you can probably get behind this movie.

Roxy wanders the beach as three girls alternate between bullying her and making out with each other. She stumbles upon a head sticking out of the sand and discovers that it is a woman named Kate Bush (Agata Buzek) buried up to her head because she’s being punished for being evil.

She tells Roxy that if she frees her, she will grant her three wishes. Roxy frees her, and she swiftly murders the three girls and causes havoc across the land. Roxy and her mother, the village hairdresser, are expelled from their community unless they murder Kate Bush, thus starting the journey.

After Blue

Image courtesy of Nightstream

Some other bizarre things that somehow make it into the story: a sexual situation turning into a tentacle attack, guns named after fashion brands, nipples oozing goo and marbles, and spooky stylized ghost sequences.

While it is an epic tale, don’t expect to find much of a coherent plot here. The internal logic of the plot is more abstract, like being on hallucinogens. The director gained notoriety after his previous film, The Wild Boys, which is equally as colorful, artsy and transgressive. 

In the style of Lars Von Trier and Thomas Vinterberg’s Dogme 95 movement, Mandico penned the incoherence manifesto, the mission of which is to celebrate cinema as a chaotic art form that should not be held down by a specific style or plot conventions, and that they must be filmed on expired film stock and use only practical camera effects. If this film is his manifesto in practice, it’s easy to see how it could be either successful or not. Many aspects of the surreal and abstract elements work and reflect a talented filmmaker, but the loose and incomplete plot could be a turn-off for many. 

Outside of that, this film is a visual feast to enjoy. This alien apocalyptic setting shines with its dreamy colors, bizarre set pieces and grandiose costumes and makeup that complete this otherworldly location. 

The actors similarly compliment this bizarre space dystopia. They dominate the scenery, interacting with each other with animalistic intensity and an overabundance of lust. In one moment two people are fighting, the next they are making out. 

Overall the film unapologetically supports the pursuit of female desire. With its unique and artistic style of filmmaking including extended sequences featuring beautiful colored lighting, glitter, feathers and nudity, the film comes off more like poetry than a movie.  

To top it all off, a synth score completes the mood of the film. Stylistically, this film rises above with its colorful excess and sheer filmmaking ingenuity. Unfortunately, the plot cannot support the fantastical sets housing it. While it starts off promising, the second half seems to meander around in the fog like the characters in the film.

With a grand adventure like The Odyssey or Dune but much weirder, this arthouse film has a marvelously skillful art direction but lacks the story to match it.

Check out more Nightstream coverage for “Name Above Title” and “Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes.”

Check out the trailer below.

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Self Driver Runs Out of Road

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9 hours ago

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May 12, 2026

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Every few years someone makes a movie where a desperate person takes the money and watches his conscience become negotiable. I am always there for it. Cheap Thrills. Would You Rather. The whole subgenre of moral erosion for cash that does not have a name but absolutely should. Self Driver walks directly into that territory and for the first half of its runtime, it delivers.

Nathanael Chadwick plays D, a cab driver trying to keep his head above water, who gets recruited onto a mysterious new rideshare app that promises fast money and asks for increasingly terrible things in return.

Writer-director Michael Pierro shot this on cellphones with a skeleton crew. That constraint should work against the film. For the first act, it does not. Chadwick earns your sympathy without doing anything obvious to ask for it, and Pierro keeps things tense enough that the premise does exactly what it is supposed to do.

Then the psychedelic angle shows up.

Self Driver

I want to be fair about this. I understand the intention. But it lands the way a plot fix lands. You feel the seam. By the halfway point the script has accumulated a lot of threads, and the psychedelic detour is where those threads stop being pulled. They do not resolve. They just stop mattering.

That is the consistent frustration with Self Driver. It is not short on ideas. It is short on follow-through. Almost every interesting thing Pierro introduces gets picked up, examined, and set back down before it earns its place in the film. The bones of something genuinely great are visible throughout. The second half just never shows up to finish the job.

Chadwick won Best Actor at Grimmfest for this role, and it is not hard to understand why. He is doing real work here. He makes D worth following even when the film is not fully following through on its own premise. That is harder than it looks.

Self Driver is out now on UK digital via GrimmVision. At 2.5 out of 5, it is worth your time if you have patience for low-budget genre work and can make peace with a film that is better than it finishes. Pierro has instincts. Watch for his next one.

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Indie Horror

Panic Fest 2026 Review: ‘Frogman Returns’ Is A Thrilling Sequel That Goes For The Croak!

Published

6 days ago

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May 6, 2026

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Horror as a genre has a greater propensity for sequels than almost anything else in the world of cinema. There have been scores of slasher sequels from the likes of Friday The 13th to A Nightmare on Elm Street to even sequels to seemingly stand-alone affairs like The Exorcist and The Blair Witch Project. While some may be seen as cash grabs or of diminishing returns, it cannot be argued that there have been some phenomenal sequels to horror films such as Aliens and Evil Dead 2 among many others. So imagine my pleasant surprise to see that 2023’s Frogman is back in the aptly named Frogman Returns!

The sequel picks up not too long after the original’s cryptid catastrophe. The Loveland, Ohio Frogman and surrounding cult that was exposed by amateur filmmaker Dallas (Nathan Tymoshuk) has since disappeared and the terror of the magic wand wielding amphibian seemingly ended. Having lost his friend Scotty (Benny Barrett) and a falling out with Amy (Chelsey Grant), Dallas has found a new life heading a cryptid reality web show. But when strange forces call him and his team back to Loveland, will he have to face the Frogman for a final battle?

I was a big fan of the original Frogman upon release, and was interested in seeing where director Anthony Cousins was going to take the story. I’m happy to report that he did the best kind of thing you can do for a sequel like this: made it weirder and wilder! Not only is there Frogman, but a number of classic cryptids have encounters as the genie is out of the bottle and Dallas irrevocably proved that there are truly monsters among us. There is a pretty memorable scene involving a run-in with the living pants-like Fresno Nightcrawler creature that establishes what a brave and bizarre new world things have become since the previous film. Monsters are basically a fact of life now. So, of course, people are finding ways to profit from it.

Dallas’ arc continues from the first film and I do like how he carries the weight and guilt of Scotty’s disappearance and his disconnection with Amy. There are real consequences to the ways things went wrong previously and Dallas is haunted by the consequences of his obsession. Now he attempts to make things right in some form as his adventures bring him back to where it all began. And for those here for Frogman… without spoiling too much, everyone’s favorite amphibious cryptid does make a triumphant return. With a neon explosive finale that left me craving even more.

Frogman Returns does a fine job of documenting the new adventure in the traditional found footage format, with the foundation of Dallas’ new reality web show keeping the cameras rolling. Combining that with ample and memorable practical fx for all manner of beasts and gore to see. Exploding heads, zapped limbs, and so much more get captured on camera in all their visceral glory.

Overall, if you were a fan of the first Frogman, then Frogman Returns is a more than worthwhile follow up to digest.

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Indie Horror

Panic Fest 2026 Review: ‘Creature Of The Pines’ Is An Interesting Found Footage Horror That Walks A Beaten Path

Published

7 days ago

on

May 5, 2026

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There are certain parts of the world that have an inherent evil or cursed nature to them. The Bermuda Triangle, where so many ships have vanished in its waters. Death Valley, where many have met their end in the unforgiving desert. And then there’s The Pine Barrens of New Jersey. A woodland infamous for the cryptid named The Jersey Devil.

While The Jersey Devil may be the mascot or face of sorts for the area, there are other dangers within those woods. Specifically, an area known as Pine Hollow. Infamous for numerous disappearances of local and hikers. While some attribute it to natural hazards, others say the source of these incidents may be tied to folklore. An ancient mimic of indigenous legend that targets those wandering its woods. After a trio of hikers disappear and leaves only one shell shocked survivor and witness wandering the wilderness, a documentary crew attempts to clarify between fact and fiction… only to find themselves subject to their own torments.

Creature Of The Pines is a decent found footage/mockumentary endeavor, and I’m always a sucker for that kind of framing. I will also give points for taking an original approach on the region rather than using a more well known cryptid or monster. Instead, crafting their own beast with the shapeshifting demon of indigenous lore. It did make it more interesting than relying on a more infamous antagonist, allowing the movie to make up its own rules and history behind the titular creature.

Unfortunately, the story does fall into a lot of the cliches of the sub-genre as well. Lots of scenes building up strange sounds coming form the woods leading to some shaky cam segments as a character is dragged off by an unseen force and such. The talking heads portions of the mockumentary featured some decent actors and subjects that kept things fairly fresh. Especially the former forest ranger who discussed the dark and terrible history of Pine Hollow.

Even still, the third act was kind of a mixed bag with the final confrontation and reveal of the horror. Ambiguity tends to work better in found footage for a reason, sometimes its better to leave the evil up to the imagination. There’s also a twist to the ending that felt a bit obvious considering the build up.

But, if you’re a big fan of found footage and mockumentary horror like I am, (especially for New England based horror) then Creature Of The Pines is worth at least a watch.

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