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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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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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Here is what drew me to The Vord: the premise is the kind of thing that only works if someone actually takes it seriously. An ancient Nordic entity bound to a corrupt priest, sent to claim a woman’s soul as an offering to something older and worse, while that same entity is also her spiritual guardian. I wanted this film to work.

It does not fully work. But it is trying to do something interesting, and that makes it worth watching.

Writer-director M.T. Maliha’s feature debut arrives on UK digital May 4 via Miracle Media.

What Maliha Is Going For

The setup puts Jillian between two competing forces pulling at her from opposite directions: the Catholic Church, which has colonized her spiritual life and now turns out to harbor a priest who has sold himself to something ancient, and her pagan roots, which the film treats as something alive rather than something historical.

The entity called The Vord sits above both of these, watching, bound to the priest by a deal that requires it to deliver Jillian’s soul to the Old One in exchange for its own redemption. The theological architecture here is actually interesting. Can something that exists outside human moral categories be held accountable to them? Can an entity that has survived centuries of watching humanity be moved by one woman’s particular situation?

Maliha has said the horror she was after was psychological, the confusion of faith and will rather than gore or jump scares. Midsommar works because it treats pagan tradition as something that believes in itself. The Witch works because its supernatural architecture is airtight. The Vord is reaching for that register but never sticks the landing.

Where the Film Breathes

There are moments here that find what they are looking for. The film understands that dread does not need noise to work, and in its quieter stretches, something is present in the frame that earns the atmosphere.

The mythological framework, pagan tradition framed not as superstition but as a parallel system of real spiritual authority that the Church has spent centuries trying to bury, gives the film a tension that does not depend on the effects budget to land. That part works without costing anything extra. Maliha clearly did her research and cares about this material.

The Part That Is Hard to Get Past

The cast is committed. That is what I want to say first, because it is true. The cast is fully committed to this material, and commitment matters. The problem is that the script does not always give them the footing they need to stand on, and when it does not, the gaps are visible.

The scenes that depend most heavily on dialogue to build tension are the ones that struggle the most. The Vord is a film where the horror is supposed to live in what people say to each other, in revelation and betrayal and spiritual crisis, and those scenes require a level of precision in both writing and performance that is not consistent here. Some of the more ambitious emotional confrontations in the second half land somewhere between affecting and slightly stiff. There is nothing cruel to say about that. It is a hard thing to execute, and first films do not always execute the hardest things.

The storytelling also has structural issues that make the mythology harder to follow than it needs to be. The film would benefit from a more disciplined approach to when it reveals information. The narrative shifts do not always land with the weight they are reaching for, and the audience ends up doing more work than they should to stay oriented inside the mythology.

The Budget Is a Real Factor

Psychological horror is one of the most budget-sensitive genres there is. It needs control of every element, the sound, the light, the silence, the space between what is shown and what is not. These things are expensive, and the gap between what The Vord wants to do atmospherically and what the production can fully deliver is visible throughout. This is not a criticism so much as a description. Maliha is attempting a film whose entire emotional register depends on precise atmospheric control, and she does not always have the resources that precision requires.

Working within budget constraints while making folk horror is genuinely one of the harder problems in low-budget filmmaking. Caveat pulled it off on a shoestring because it found the specific visual grammar its story needed and stayed inside it. The Vord has not fully found that grammar yet.

Worth Seeing Anyway

The Vord is not the film it wants to be. But the film it wants to be is more interesting than most of what is on offer in this corner of horror right now, and Maliha is worth watching as she figures out how to make it. The mythology she is drawing from, the premise she has built around it, the question of whether the thing guarding you and the thing hunting you can be the same entity, these are good materials. Good materials in imperfect hands are still good materials.

This is a debut. Give it the weight that deserves.

The Vord is streaming on UK digital from May 4 via Miracle Media.