THE RADLEYS (2024)

 The Radleys

Directed by Euros Lyn
Written by Talitha Stevenson, Jo Brand, based on a novel by Matt Haig
Starring Harry Baxendale, Damian Lewis, Kelly Macdonald, Bo Bragason
Running time 1 hour and 55 minutes
Rated R by the MPA

by "Doc" Hunter Bush, contributor, host and podcast czar

Based on the 2011 novel by Matt Haig, The Radleys is about a normal-seeming family - doctor dad Peter (Damian Lewis), active housewife mom Helen (Kelly Macdonald), gay photographer son Rowan (Harry Baxendale), and vegan, sorta bitchy (*) sister Clara (Bo Bragason) - with a big secret. When Clara accidentally kills an attempted rapist in the woods, the parents find themselves forced into at least three tough spots. Not only do they have to come clean to their kids about the "family disease", but they have to dispose of the body to keep Clara out of jail and keep their vampirism a secret. To accomplish this, they have to call Peter's twin brother Will (also Damian Lewis) who rolls up in an RV full of absolute chaos.

(*) I am willing to attribute Clara's turn to being just The Worst hormonal and attitudinal teenage stereotype to her beginning to drink blood.

I've been watching a LOT of vampire films this year, gearing up for Vamp-tober on the Hate Watch/Great Watch Podcast, and one thing that's dawned on me is that playing with "the rules" of vampires is as much of a staple of vampire fiction as anything else. The TV Tropes page for Our Vampires Are Different is chock-a-block with examples great and small. In The Radleys, vampires find sunlight irritating but not deadly, and are able to choose to abstain from drinking blood at the cost of most of the usual vampire abilities.

Blood is treated somewhat like alcohol and/or drugs within the world of The Radleys. Clara's attitude after starting to imbibe - which is so shitty and petulant that she can't even keep her cool long enough to avoid tipping the cops off that she was involved in the murder - supports this read, as does Rowan's sneaking little airplane-size bottles of blood from Uncle Will's fridge to work up the courage to talk to the boy he likes. Obviously, Helen & Peter's abstaining and keeping the vampirism from the kids parallels hard partiers giving up the life to raise a family.

All of this is called into very high contrast by the presence of Uncle Will. His hair is longer than Peter's, he wears lots of open shirts, and generally "doesn't see what the big deal is" about everything. But there's a sinister edge to him. He encourages the kids' more negative instincts and almost immediately brings up some past relationship between he and Helen, which doesn't totally make Helen uneasy. Pretty shortly, Peter starts on his journey, straight out of American Beauty: sneaking blood in the garage, seeking (or at least being open to) extramarital relationships, all while being kind of oblivious to all the tumult in his family unit.

The Radleys is an odd duck, but not a bad time. Four of the five family members are pretty well-developed. The exception, weirdly, is Clara who is mostly a walking inciting incident and has less development than some supporting characters, like the boy Rowan likes (Jay Lycurgo) and his ex-cop dad (Shaun Parkes) who fully believes The Radleys are vampires and blames then for his wife's disappearance years ago! They're not exactly well-rounded, but they are given enough screen time to develop their characters via performance, and as a result you're pulling for Rowan's relationship to work out, and the ex-cop dad feels like a real threat.

Tonally, The Radleys touches on a lot of vampire films. The teen romance of Twilight (2008) mixed with The Lost Boys' (1987) male bonding; the grounded suburban setting of Fright Night (1985) and the metaphorical lens of The Addition (1995). It's darkly funny at times, and steamy in parts, but since each family member has their own Vampire Movie going on, it can't quite commit to being any one thing. Nevertheless, the cheap and nasty thrills have an almost Lifetime Movie vibe at times, which is nothing if not crowd-pleasing.

The variety of tones and plot lines gives The Radleys a good chance to appeal to a wide segment of audiences, but also means most of those characters don't get a ton of time in the spotlight. When the closing credits rolled, I'd had a good time, but felt ever so slightly unsatisfied.

The Radleys will be in Theaters, On Digital and On Demand October 4, 2024.

WATCHLIST - October 2024

October Watchlist 2024
A no-pressure walk through of an artisanal viewing experience

by "Doc" Hunter Bush, contributor, podcast czar, HWGW cohost

I love Halloween. Always have. I know, I'm not special. Most chain stores and companies start rolling out their Halloween offerings months in advance. But it feels false. It feels more like Hollow-een, if you catch my drift. It lacks the personal, home-spun touch of decorating that I remember from when I was a kid. Despite everyone living in the same neighborhood, every house had different decorations; a different aesthetic. It felt special.

In an effort to bring a little of the specialness back to the season, a few years ago I started composing watchlists. I'd pull out my trusty cauldron (smartphone), add a few eyes of newt (fair use photos and fonts), say "Double, double, toil and trouble" (spend a week brainstorming) and the result is a collection of film prompts - one for each day of October.

And I'm sharing this year's with YOU! Alakazam! (*)

(*) If you're a MovieJawn subscriber, a physical copy of the prompts list will be included in your Fall Zine, which you should be receiving shortly if you haven't already.

These watchlists began as a way to unite my house at the time (myself, my partner, and two roommates) with a sort of Family Movie Night, by giving everyone the chance to pick some titles for the month. As it turns out, some people I've shared these with over the years felt overwhelmed by being presented with so many open-ended choices, so in an effort to take some of the pressure off, allow me to walk you through exactly how low-pressure it is to choose titles for your very own, month-long film series!

First of all, if anything seems TOO open-ended for the moment, just come back to it later; start with the ones that are easiest for you to fill in. Remember, this is YOUR watchlist we're making, I've just given you the framework.

Secondly, there are NO wrong answers. There are no rules here. You can choose all films you've seen, or all first-time watches. If you choose a movie to fit a prompt - let's just use Oct. 1st: ROMANCE - and you've never seen it, or you remembered it differently, and it turns out you were wrong and there's no romance in it at all: Who cares? No harm, no foul.

Third: the search bar is your friend. Need some suggestions for FOOD? Typing "spooky food movies" brought up at least a dozen good suggestions from all across the horror spectrum. Need to know movies from a specific country or era? May I suggest signing up for a free Letterboxd account? You can sort films really easily there (also you can follow me @DrHBus and like every single one of my reviews).

Let's walk through the prompts, shall we? First off we have the wide-open ones: the decades ('50S - 2010S), B+W (black and white), REMAKE, and the international selections. These should be the easiest to cross off your list because you have so many options. Just pick a couple. And remember: no wrong answers! For '70S, you could choose a movie made in the 1970s like Halloween (1978) or you could pick Fear Street: 1978 (2021) which is set in that decade. Same goes for the international titles, they could be films that come from those countries, or they could take place there. Also, if you happen to live in Europe, Asia, or any Spanish-speaking country, feel free to sub in a different country. May I suggest Canada? Lot of good flicks originate up there.

Some people get in their head about what "should" or "can" go on their watchlist. Anything you want! Like SPACE for example. If, like me, you find 2013's Gravity to be an absolutely terrifying viewing experience (no joke; I had a full-on panic attack in that theater, hahaha), then that can be your SPACE movie. Or you can go with Aliens (1986), The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), or Leprechaun 4 (1996). Your opinion of a movie is kind of all that matters. To that end GREAT TITLE, and SEXY should be no problem. Whether you think The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) is the be-all end-all of movie titles, or you think Bloodsucking Pharaohs in Pittsburgh (1991) is: You Are Right! If you pick Species (1995) for SEXY because it's all about sex and breeding, or you pick the Fright Night remake from 2011 because Colin Farrell really revs your motor, both are equally valid choices.

The genre-centric ones are a piece of cake: ROMANCE, HISTORICAL, MUSICAL - those are easy enough. Just keep in mind, these things are defined however you decide they are. You can watch Shaun of the Dead (2004) as a musical because there are so many music-related moments in it. DAYLIGHT HORROR is any movie that has scary scenes during the day, FOLK HORROR is anything with that pastoral, cut-off from the modern world vibe, and NOT HORROR is anything that's still spooky season appropriate, but not a horror movie: It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966) comes to mind.

It's all free association. FOOD could be The Silence of the Lambs (1991) because we're all food to Hannibal the Cannibal; SONS + DAUGHTERS can be any movie where the family unit is threatened or upended, maybe The Faculty (1998) or Children of the Corn (1984). Don't stress about it. No one is going to come to your house and revoke your Movie Enjoyer card.

If the FRANCHISE ones seem intimidating, keep in mind that they don't have to be from the same series. You could only watch IT: Chapter One (2017) because it's technically a 2-part franchise but the 2nd one is garbage (don't @ me). Most franchises have at least three entries, so SEQUEL and THIRD shouldn't be too hard to assign titles for, I honestly don't even see 4TH being a huge roadblock, and FINAL can just be the final film in a franchise, or one of many films with "Final" in the title.

Now, there are a few prompts that I can imagine might throw a couple of people. What constitutes a LOW BUDGET? Well, if nothing jumps readily to mind, use the MST3k rule: if Mystery Science Theater 3000 has ever done an episode on it, that's probably right in the sweet spot. PICK A NUMBER can be any film with a numerical title. Heck, you could get a little meta, actually make a list of titles, and roll some dice to pick on that night. I just came up with that right now! See how easy this is?

ALL HALLOW'S EVE is my "free space". This is any damn thing you just LOVE watching on Halloween!

This October on my podcast Hate Watch/Great Watch, we're doing ALL vampire movies, so to show you an example of a completed watchlist, here's a hypothetical Vamp-tober watchlist:

The only ones I got tricksy with here were maybe The Apple for MUSICAL (it's definitely a musical, but really only briefly features a vampire. Though we are assured it's an "actual, actual, actual, vampiiiiiire!") and Twilight: Breaking Dawn Parts 1+2 for FINAL. In my mind, since they're one movie split into two parts, they count as one. Lost Boys might confuse some folks as my pick for FRANCHISE, but it may surprise you to know there were a few direct-to-dvd style sequels called The Tribe (2008) and The Thirst (2010). Fun Fact.

HWGW drop new episodes every other Wednesday, which means three episodes in October this year! Jugular Wine: A Vampire Odyssey (1994) for the prompt LOW BUDGET, Werner Herzog's Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) for REMAKE, and a little film called Love Bites (1988) for SEXY. I imagine Herzog's Nosferatu might be streaming, but the other two I doubt will be. Fear not! You can just listen to our discussions of those films and decide if they're worth the time/money/effort to track down and watch for yourself.

And speaking of time and effort: I'm including a blank watchlist below for you to download, so you can fill in the titles on your own! If you end up making your own watchlist using this year's prompts, let us know! Share my prompts list and your selection of titles on social media with #spookyjawn and remember to tag @DrHBus, @MovieJawn & @HWGWpodcast anywhere applicable.

I hope this October finds you well, and that this watchlist makes your spooky season even more enjoyable. Long Live the Movies!

Fantasia Fest 2021 - ALL THE MOONS (2021)

Fantasia Fest 2021

All the Moons

Directed by Igor Legarreta

Written by Legarreta and Jon Sagalá

Starring Haizea Carneros, Josean Bengoetxea, Itziar Ituño

Running time 1 hour, 42 minutes

Currently unrated but contains depictions of violence, war, death and undeath

By Hunter Bush

If you’ve been wondering when someone would make a vampire movie that feels like something you haven’t seen many times before, Igor Legarreta’s All the Moons might be what you’ve been searching for. Melancholy and beautiful, it treads familiar ground analyzing the emotional toll that eternal life would take on a person’s emotional growth, but with a patience and gentleness mostly unheard of in vampire cinema. More a tragedy than a horror movie, All the Moons is not to be missed.

I don’t mean to make All the Moons out to sound miserable - it absolutely isn’t. It’s a lovely film about wanting to live and to be a part of the world seen through the eyes of a young girl (Haizea Carneros) given a second chance at life when she’s rescued from a fatal injury by a mysterious woman (Itziar Ituño).

An aspect of the movie’s appeal to me is that its setting, when combined with director Legaretta’s lyrical imagery gives the movie the feeling of a fairy tale or a fable. The film takes place in the 1870s in northern Spain, giving the movie the bucolic setting that’s traditionally part and parcel with the phrase “Once upon a time…”. Another fascinating aspect of the location is that the cast are speaking Basque, a language only spoken along the Pyrenees mountain range between northern Spain and southern France and that unusual sounding dialect actually adds to the magical, otherworldly feeling of the picture.

The young girl, who eventually comes by the name Amaia, ends up in a small religious town, in the care of a man named Candido (Joseann Bengoetxea) whose family had passed away some time before and, inverting everything you associate with vampire lore, instead of taking a life, she restores it. Metaphorically of course, and it’s beautiful.

The story unfolds more in a world of emotions than logic, so occasionally things just happen and you have no choice but to roll with them and see where they lead but even that adds to the magical, dreamlike spell the movie casts. Ultimately All the Moons tells a story whose moral is that suffering is an unfortunate part of life, but a necessary one. Would you appreciate the good times without the bad ones for contrast? Of course, like all fables this is probably open to your own interpretation.

All the Moons screens at the Cinéma Impérial on August 19th and digitally on the 20th. Check the Fantasia Fest 2021 site for ticket information.

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