Tate Taylor
Ava is a deadly assassin who works for a black ops organization, and when a job goes dangerously wrong she is forced to fight for her own survival.
In this week’s Video Dispatches, we cover the home video releases of Ma (2019), The Reflecting Skin (1990) and Wagon Master (1950).
With abundant humor and a gruesome ending, Ma is a knowingly silly horror film that allows Octavia Spencer to revel in the grime.
In Tate Taylor’s upcoming horror Ma, a lonely woman befriends a group of teenagers and decides to let them party at her house.
Bleak thrillers that satirize the modern nuclear family seem to be increasing in popularity in recent years. The most prominent example would obviously be Gone Girl, based on Gillian Flynn’s novel of the same name and directed by David Fincher. The latest film that could classify within this subgenre is The Girl on the Train, which contains many similar elements to Gone Girl, including a mysterious disappearance of a woman, which the film’s events revolve around.
The adult thriller continues its comeback with The Girl on the Train, as the ever-changing landscape of the movie industry seems to be shifting back towards these sturdy moneymakers. They’re solid fillers for studios with time in between tentpoles, and while many aspire to the breakout success of Gone Girl, even smaller entities like Eye in the Sky earn steady returns. The Girl on the Train is clearly trying to be the former, providing a juicy, twisty plot that will divide audiences into those who have read the bestselling book of the same name and those who haven’t.