April 2026 [13-19]
She Loved Blossoms More, Satan Wants You These Final Hours, Sorry’ Baby, Dirty Pretty Things
- She Loved Blossoms More [2024]- 30 DNF
A near-inaugural work by duo, Dimitris Emmanouilidis and Yannis Veslemes, She Loved Blossoms More dares ask the modern question: “What if we remade 1986 cult classic, The Fly, but stripped anything that made it interesting?” Bold and daring of them to ask, but I have an equally audacious answer for the young filmmakers: I wish you didn’t, because this is basically unwatchable. The movie looks great — effects are spectacular and the body-horror is genuinely gross — but goodness there’s just NOTHING going on with the plot at any given moment, and there’s so many tiny, meaningless lines of dialogue that its pretty impossible to care about any one thing over another. She Loved Blossoms More also falls prey to the trope a lot of cheap horror movies do, where the main female character basically exists just to be either lewd or nude in as many scenes as possible, but doesn’t actually do anything to drive the plot forward, something I find very distracting and annoying. I understand the vehemence that reviewers get for a movie they didn’t even finish… But also consider that this movie is only 88-minutes long… I can doomscroll social-media I don’t even like longer than that.
- Satan Wants You [2023] - NR
I waffle a lot on how to rate documentaries… So I just didn’t this time. Satan Wants You is a 2023 exposé that works to decode the truth behind the 1980 “memoir” Michelle Remembers; A chronicling of Michelle Smith’s trauma at the hands of a satanic cult. This is a really interesting one in a post-Epstein world because, Michelle Remembers has long been regarded as a hoax, something this documentary is pretty specifically about and something it tells compellingly… But a lot of what she talks about experiencing are things very similar to descriptions of many Epstein victims. Correlation? Causation? Entirely unrelated? Who can never be sure, but it’ll be interesting to see if the stance on this novel changes over time because of recent revelations — especially interesting since this documentary itself is pretty new. Regardless, none of that is what this is actually about, and what it is about is very interesting and well presented, though, at the same 88-minute runtime as She Loved Blossoms More, I would have liked a little more patience with certain aspects of this story, particularly wanting them to have spent more time with the fallout of the “Satanic Panic” and its continuing influences on culture today.
- These Final Hours [2013] - 78
Another small, indie scifi, These Final Hours is a little rough around the edges, and its obviously small production causes a couple of unintentional questions to be asked, but it’s still an ultimately rewarding and interesting watch, especially given its low-budget context. In a vaguely similar vein to last week’s Exposure 36, These Final Hours deals with a known-and-looming end of the world [this time in the form of a meteor that has already struck the other side of the planet] and the people awaiting the tides of destruction it will bring. It’s not a terribly inventive story, but it’s a good little A-Z journey pocked with moments of interesting humanity, people doing their best [and worst], and overall feels like a very plausible “what would I do in this situation” type of thing. Turns out I’ve given this a 1-point lower score than 2009’s Triangle, and that tracks, as I was just about to compare them, but now I don’t have to. Check this one out if the whole “end of the world” thing isn’t entirely too real for you yet here in the real one.
- Sorry, Baby [2025] - 94
WELL, one of those movies that takes the “in my movie I’d end it right here” words out of my mouth, Sorry, Baby is difficult, heavy, and insanely intelligent. While it features one moment of hand-holding that I truly think we don’t need, the rest of the script is absolutely excellent, reminding me of the strongest moments of 2020’s Violation, my recent fawning over If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, and even moments of Sean Durkin’s brilliant Martha, Marcy, May, Marlene. I can see how someone might not jive with this story in pieces, but it’s one of those movies that I feel like everyone should sit with if, for no other reason [and there’s plenty of other reasons], the power of the film’s closing lines. There’s a lot of clear intention behind the way certain things are shown and depicted that I don’t think necessarily translates into the direct narrative, instead choosing to build the world around said narrative and the motivations of our characters in both impressive and meaningful ways; Something both difficult and delicate to do. Even without taking into account that this is a debut film for lead actress/writer/director, Eva Victor, Sorry, Baby is an impressive entry into the “movies ignored by the Academy in 2025” list but, when that fact is considered… Sheesh, this easily becomes a “must watch”.
- Dirty Pretty Things [2002] - 71
From the same writer as Locke, and the director of Philomena, Dirty Pretty Things is a political thriller/drama that follows a pair of immigrants in London as they struggle to make ends meet, avoid harassment from immigration officials, and get exploited and abused at every turn by those around them with any semblance of power. This movie is… Good… but that’s kind of it. It’s well made, the story is twisty and intriguing, and it wants to have a lot to say, but it also never quite makes room to say it. Yes, upon even light examination, one could turn this into a truly damning example of how London [and many other places] treat immigrants, but the plot almost parodies itself by explaining this through a single line of dialogue near the every end. It’s both well delivered and set up, but it still kind of cheapens the entire ride by summarizing its point for the audience. Again, still clever in that the person the line is delivered to basically scoffs and turns around [emulating the way the world treats these kinds of issues], but this is one of those movies that just misses the engagement mark somehow, even though its plot is intelligently complex, important, and well executed.
