The Big Picture Magazine
Nobuhiko Obayashi’s House (Hausu, Japan, 1977) is a coming-of-age film that mixes horror and fantasy elements with humour and an undisguised penchant for the experimental. The title itself is programmatic – seven schoolgirls find themselves trapped in a haunted house. Shocked by the unexpected news that her widowed father has remarried while on a business […]
Several decades into its inception, the internet is the most prominent form of mass media. While today social media brain rot is the social concern du jour, twenty years ago the sheer expanse of accessible information online was an idea met with skepticism and fear. This paranoia was examined most patently in two films from […]
In the closing moments of Ari Aster’s latest ‘elevated horror film’, our beleaguered hero Beau Wasserman (Joaquin Phoenix) is sat in a small motorboat – forcefully moored in a giant pool within a darkened stadium full of all the people he has ever known – having to defend his life against none other than his […]
Director Mark Mylod is best known for drama series such as Succession and Game of Thrones, but he breaks out of TV dramas with the horror comedy The Menu (2022). This Golden Globe nominee follows a group of esteemed guests and their haunting experience at one of the world’s most exclusive restaurants. Last minute edition […]
BONES: Any of the pieces of hard whitish tissue making up the skeleton in humans and other vertebrates. AND: Conjunction, used to connect words of the same part of speech, clauses, or sentences, that are to be taken jointly. ALL: Everything – everything under the sun, and, indeed, above and/or beyond the sun, including your […]
Nobuo Nakagawa’s Jigoku (Japan, 1960) starts with shots of a coffin in a crematorium and of flames filling the whole screen while horrifying screams are heard from the off. The title in blood-red kanji is followed by the credits next to images of half-naked women in lascivious poses accompanied by a melodious jazz tune. This […]
In Eyes of Laura Mars (1978), Faye Dunaway is a fashion photographer with a penchant for sensationalism and stylised violence in her imagery. But between the luridness of the fashion and the precision of her photography, there is something indistinct, unknown and unexpected that takes her to the edge. Director Irvin Kershner plunges viewers into […]
In a new feature, Aliza Richardson fixes her gaze on memorable houses in film, exploring their uniqueness as architectural marvels and evocative cinematic locations.
“You can understand why someone would rob a house if they’re broke, but to rob…children of their lives [is] far more insidious…” Wes Craven states in his director’s commentary for the R-rated 1991 film, The People Under the Stairs. Loosely based on a true occurrence, Craven’s “horror noire” examines the irony of its Mother (Wendy […]