The Cherry Hill Chainsaw Massacre

To all my loyal readers and supporters, have you ever wondered what my process for reviewing a film is? The days that I watch a movie and the days I spend reviewing it? The types of notes I take, and whether I take them during or after the movie? Or whether I take them at all? Oh, you haven't? Fair enough. But I'll let you in anyway.  Every film critic, I would imagine, has their own process when it comes to writing about movies. It's one of the things I often wonder about with the most fascination and curiosity. Do they see the film one time in theaters, then type up their review as soon as they get home? Or do they sit with the movie for a day or two, allowing it to marinate in their subconscious to produce a more emotionally accurate, balanced piece? I'm sure it's different for the independent freelance critics such as myself, versus those who work for a publication. For those in my camp, we have all the time in the world to watch a movie then write about it. We ...

In late 2019, a mysterious virus by the name of COVID-19 emerged in Wuhan, China before quickly making its way across the globe into the United States. On March 12th, 2020, the U.S. government issued a worldwide lockdown, and the world as we knew it radically changed. For the first two weeks, schools were closed, which was no problem for me since, by that point, I had been relieved of the burden of academia for three years. All buildings that didn't serve an essential function (hospitals, grocery stores) were forced to lock up shop. The worst part for me was the closing of restaurants. All my favorite places to eat out on Friday and Saturday nights were now reduced to inferior but better-than-nothing takeout service. And once those two experimental, cautionary weeks had expired, the lockdown would remain in place for approximately the next five months. It wasn't until sometime in August when I noticed the first restaurant to resume indoor dining. In addition to the mandatory cl...

It's no secret the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences harbors a poorly concealed aversion to the genre of horror. I'm not even sure why I care about or put any sort of thought into the inner workings of the Academy. After all, it's not like I go to the movies anymore. Growing up, from the time I was a child until I was 21, my parents and I used to go to a theater every Saturday afternoon. It didn't matter what we saw. I just loved getting out of the house, immersing myself in the interior spacious beauty of the theater, sitting in a darkened room with a large bucket of popcorn seated on my lap, and allowing the story unfolding on a giant screen to wash over me for a couple hours. As should be no surprise at this point, my favorite films to see on the big screen were horror. It was my favorite Saturday activity since I was five, when I saw what I believe was my first theatrical horror experience: The Grudge . Nowadays, I find it far more rewarding to watch these...

Going into Nosferatu , F.W. Murnau's unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker's 1897 Gothic horror novel, Dracula , I tried to keep as open a mind as possible as someone in 2025 watching a silent horror movie from 1922. Originally, the next horror film I was going to review was  Poltergeist , but after receiving this suggestion from my very smart cousin, born from the fact that Robert Eggers' critically acclaimed remake was recently unleashed during Christmas, I decided to try something different. My TV doesn't provide many ancient horror films. Occasionally it'll offer some movies from the 1930s-60s, but never have I seen any option from the 20s. Fortunately, YouTube has an abundance of links to Nosferatu , and thanks to a recent upgrade, I now get YouTube on my TV. (Which is a blessing because I can not sit on a chair for two hours watching a movie on my computer. I've tried in the past and realized it just doesn't work for me.) So now my only challenge was ...