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  • The Worst Horror Movies Ever, According to Letterboxd

    The Worst Horror Movies Ever, According to Letterboxd

    Letterboxd, the cinematic social media site, is a great place to discover films to watch. You can sort the site’s hundreds of thousands of titles according to their popularity with the app’s users, or according to their highest average rating. And when the leaves start to fall from the trees, and pumpkin spices start to fall into every breakfast cereal and hydrogenated cookie in the land, that means you can also use the site to find horror movies to watch.

    As of this writing, there are over 44,000 movies on Letterboxd categorized under “horror.” And if you sort those 44,000 movies according to their lowest average rating, you can see the movies that users believe to be the worst horror films ever made. Now, if you collect those titles — as I have done below — you will notice that the vast majority of them were released after Letterboxd launched in the fall of 2011. If you feel that makes this list less authoritative about the full scope of crappy scary movies, so be it.

    Personally, I find it refreshing — especially since when you look at the list of what Letterboxd users consider the best horror movies ever you see titles from throughout the 120-year history of cinema and all over the world. In other words, a lot of horror aficionados who use Letterboxd ain’t wasting their time on garbage. And if you heed their warnings and avoid the 25 movies below, neither will you.

    The Worst Horror Movies Ever According to Letterboxd

    Scary? Hardly! These are the worst horror movies in history, according to the users of Letterboxd.

    READ MORE: The Worst Movies Ever Made, According to Letterboxd

    10 Horror Movies That Are Supposedly Cursed

    From mysterious on-set accidents to unexplainable audience reactions, these movies have all gained a reputation for being cursed.

    Matt Singer

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  • The 13 TV Shows With the Biggest Casts

    The 13 TV Shows With the Biggest Casts

    There is something to be said for television shows who keep things minimal and sleek, shows with a core group of cast members occasionally seasoned by additional supporting or guest stars. Then again, there’s nothing like the rush of watching a show with a cast so big every scene seems to have a new character in it, or shows that run so long their core group of characters expands from year to year. To that end, we have compiled a list of the best television shows with absolutely enormous casts, everything from office sitcoms to political dramas to high fantasy thrillers, just to see how big the number of characters in our favorite shows actually is.

    For the purposes of this list, we looked at shows like Deadwood and Game of Thrones that have a large main cast as well as a robust supporting cast, as well as shows like Skins and American Horror Story, whose seasonally rotating cast of characters changes often enough for new members to be brought in, increasing the shows’ overall totals. Here are the best shows on television with the biggest casts, arranged from “pretty manageable” to “will give you a headache if you try to keep all the characters straight at once.” There’s something for everyone here, and we mean absolutely everyone.

    The 13 Best TV Shows With Huge Casts

    Sometimes all you need to make a great TV show is an enormous number of actors.

    Gallery Credit: Emma Stefansky

    READ MORE: The Weirdest TV Shows Based on Beloved Movies

    The Craziest American Horror Story Celebrity Stunt Casting

    From Stevie Nicks to Trixie Mattel, you never know who’s going to pop in on American Horror Story.

    Gallery Credit: Emma Stefansky

    Emma Stefansky

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  • 10 Great Short Films By Famous Directors

    10 Great Short Films By Famous Directors

    Nowadays, names like Martin Scorsese, George Lucas, and Christopher Nolan are synonymous with the kind of big-budget studio filmmaking that turns movies into grand events. These are the names that draw people back to the multiplex and away from the couch, their grand storytelling skills on full display for two full hours or longer. (Often longer.) But a director’s craft, style, and interests are sometimes best showcased in their shorter works, which is why we delved into the depths of ten celebrated filmmakers’ careers to find the short films that are most indicative of their talents.

    Whether they were film school projects, ideas that they would later evolve into features, odes to a beloved performer, or part of a collection of multiple tales, these shorts are an economical and entertaining way for a director to get at the very essence of an idea. Many of today’s most well-known directors launched their careers with shorts that look nothing like the work that would later make them famous, while some waited until later in their careers to try out or return to the format. In this list, we look at the projects that put names like Tim Burton and Lynne Ramsay on the map, as well as lesser-known work that is well worth checking out if you’re a fan. Most of these shorts are available on YouTube and streaming — whenever possible we’ve included direct links to where you can watch them (as of this writing).

    10 Great Short Films Made by Famous Directors

    We’ve all seen our biggest directors’ biggest movies, but these are the lesser known short films from directors like George Lucas, Christopher Nolan, and David Lynch.

    READ MORE: 12 Directors Who Followed A Classic Movie With a Dud

    “90-Minute Movies” On Netflix

    Netflix added a new genre to its lineup, and frankly, we love it.

    Emma Stefansky

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  • Movies That Started Shooting But Were Never Finished

    Movies That Started Shooting But Were Never Finished

    Based on the caliber of movies that are regularly released to theaters and streaming, it’s quite clear that producers will put out anything they think will turn a profit. Obviously, nobody sets out to make a bad movie, but at a certain point, quality no longer factors into the equation. You take what you’ve got, and you hope for the best. (See: Every movie on this list and this list and also this list.)

    Given that fact, you can imagine how rare it is that movie is put into production and then just not released. Something has to go very, very wrong in order for that to happen. And not just the everyday, run of the mill bad that produced films like Gigli or Battlefield Earth or North. After all, those movies are horrible — and they were released in theaters, and on home video. You can watch any of them right now if you want to (and deeply hate yourself).

    So it is highly unusual for a movie to just never come out — but it does happen. In this list, we have collected 20 examples of films that were started, developed, and sometimes filmed and even edited, but for a variety of reasons were shipped off to that warehouse from the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark, never to be seen again. While we’ll probably never watch any of these movies, we can dream about what might have been; the supermen who might have lived and the Bambis that might have been killed.

    Movies That Were Abandoned During Production and Never Finished

    These movies were started but never completed or released for a variety of reasons.

    READ MORE: 20 Actors Who Quit Movies In the Middle of Production

    Huge Hits That Initially Flopped in Theaters

    These movies prove that sometimes word-of-mouth hype or a couple decades of reclamation can turn a flop into a runaway hit.

    Matt Singer

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  • The 10 Weirdest TV Shows Based on Beloved Movies

    The 10 Weirdest TV Shows Based on Beloved Movies

    These days, it feels like every time a movie finds any sort of success at the box office or on streaming, we’re likely to see a spinoff or two on television within a couple of years. Peacock’s miniseries The Continental is a John Wick prequel/spinoff, Amazon’s A League of Their Own was a spinoff/remake of the beloved classic movie, and Disney+ has been churning out Marvel and Star Wars TV shows since it launched. We’re tempted to say it hasn’t always been this way, with television drawing inspiration from cinema, but it kind of has. Tons of your favorite shows, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer to Cobra Kai, started off as movies before anyone saw the potential to expand their storylines.

    But it’s not always easy to translate the charms and excitement of a feature film into longform storytelling, and TV spinoffs don’t always work out. In fact, many of them don’t last longer than a season (or an episode) or two, their home networks quickly realizing that maybe their storylines fit better on the big screen. We’ve gathered a list of ten of the oddest TV shows based on beloved cinematic classics, from the forgotten to the unloved to the completely incomprehensible. We can’t necessarily recommend that you immediately go watch all of these, but there are a few hidden gems whose mere existence makes them worth checking out.

    The 10 Weirdest TV Shows Based on Beloved Movies

    A RoboCop animated kids’ show? A TV sequel to The Crow? These oddball TV spinoffs based on famous movies prove anything is franchise-able.

    READ MORE: TV Spinoffs That Are Better Than the Show They Were Based On

    Forgotten Movie Remakes

    These movie remakes replaced the films they were inspired by in the minds of absolutely no one.

    Emma Stefansky

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  • The Craziest ‘American Horror Story’ Stunt Casting

    The Craziest ‘American Horror Story’ Stunt Casting

    Twelve seasons into Ryan Murphy’s camp-laden horror anthology series American Horror Story, in which every season dives into a different type of horror narrative ready to form familiar threads into new shapes, we ask ourselves the question we’ve been asking for years: Why do we still keep tuning in?

    AHS isn’t always what anyone would call a “good” show, leaning heavily on shocks and twists rather than coherent storylines, and even long-time fans admit now and then to being frustrated by it. But the show’s ability to make headlines was always its biggest strength, and what better way to stay at the top of every media outlet’s landing page than by using the age-old technique of stunt casting?

    Murphy himself is no stranger to the art: Every season of his high school choir club musical-satire Glee had its share of celebrity cameos that tended to outshine the main cast, and that was the entire point. If you want to make something more than a little outrageous, you have to do it with some one a little outrageous, and American Horror Story’s casting department is always on the hunt for the weirdest celebs they can rope into their twisted schemes. From world-famous reality stars to platinum-rated musical artists and everyone in between, we’ve narrowed down a list of the wildest members of American Horror Story’s cast through the years.

    The Craziest American Horror Story Celebrity Stunt Casting

    From Stevie Nicks to Trixie Mattel, you never know who’s going to pop in on American Horror Story.

    READ MORE: How American Horror Story’s Seasons Are Connected

    The Scariest Movie Vampires of All Time

    From Dracula to Jerry (yes, Jerry), these are the vampires that’ll have you stringing garlic around your windows.

    Emma Stefansky

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  • Movies That Flopped on Opening Weekend But Became Huge Hits

    Movies That Flopped on Opening Weekend But Became Huge Hits

    When we separate successful movies from failures, we look at a few key factors. Sometimes the movie just isn’t very good. Sometimes it was a critical bomb but a hit with the everyman. Sometimes the box office take is enough to say whether a movie was worth its own budget. Plenty of cinema’s great classics and modern masterpieces were immediate theatrical hits, from Gone With the Wind to Jurassic Park to Titanic to Transformers: Dark of the Moon. For others, it takes a little longer for everyone to catch up with their genius.

    Some movies wait decades for their time to shine after being deemed critical and/or commercial flops. Some only have to wait until they’re released on DVD or streaming. When a flop unexpectedly, improbably turns into a hit, it’s a different story every time. Maybe a slew of DVD extras are enough to get a loyal fanbase to cough up a few million dollars. Maybe television syndication is enough to pull public domain movies out of the archive of no return. Maybe a movie that looked like a failure at first turns into a hit through steady ticket sales and word-of-mouth hype. These ten movies originally flopped during their theatrical run, but went on to become certified classics in their own right, proving that sometimes it’s worth it to just be patient.

    Huge Hits That Initially Flopped in Theaters

    These movies prove that sometimes word-of-mouth hype or a couple decades of reclamation can turn a flop into a runaway hit.

    READ MORE: The Box Office Flops That Deserved to Be Big Hits

    DVDs That Sold For Shocking Amounts of Money

    These DVD discs and box sets recently sold for hundreds of dollars eBay.

    Emma Stefansky

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  • 20 Actors Who Quit Movies During Production

    20 Actors Who Quit Movies During Production

    LIke Yogi Berra said, it ain’t over till it’s over. Take a big Hollywood movie. An actor might have signed on the dotted line to play a role, they might have shown up for costume fittings and rehearsals — they might have even started shooting some scenes — but until the film is edited and released, you just never know what might happen.

    Take, for example, the 20 actors listed below. They’re all big names who agreed to appear in one form or another in some very well-known films — most of which you have surely seen before. But somewhere between that initial deal and the movie’s opening date, something went wrong. Whether it was a scheduling issue, personal problems, studio meddling, or good old fashioned “creative differences,” another actor entirely wound up playing the parts they had previously planned to perform. (In at least one case, they had performed it, and fully finished their work, before they walked away from the movie. And the film in question was scheduled to open in theaters in only six weeks!)

    Bear in mind that in a few of the cases below, there is some dispute over the exact nature of the actors’ departures. (Ask the actor and they might say they quit, while if you ask the director, they might say they fired Shia LaBeouf, to name one purely hypothetical example.) Whenever possible, I’ve done my best to present both sides of those debates. Without further ado, let’s take a look at the stars who dropped out of movies and had to be replaced:

    Actors Who Quit Movies During Production

    These actors were all set to play key roles in famous movies — until they dropped out at the last minute. (Or, in some cases, after the last minute.)

    READ MORE: 15 Movie Stars Who Made Commercials Before They Were Famous

    Forgotten Movie Sequels

    Although few of them are remembered well (or at all) these sequels all exist.

    Matt Singer

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  • The Best Final Girls in Horror Movie History

    The Best Final Girls in Horror Movie History

    The horror genre plays on tropes, remixing and reimagining familiar story beats and archetypes for new audiences with each film. There’s always a killer hiding in the basement or the shed, a supernatural force that requires a blood sacrifice, a jump scare coming as soon as the main character rounds a corner. One of the most popular and recognizable horror tropes is the Final Girl, a character archetype that shows up over and over, particularly in slasher films, as the last survivor of the movie’s bloody climax.

    The Final Girl is typically the least likely survivor: She’s nonviolent (until she has to be), virginal (usually), and has a pretty powerful scream, letting the killer think he’s about to win right up until the last second. Horror cinema’s final girls have become some of the most beloved characters of the genre, so well-liked that they often come back for more in their own franchises.

    From the moment Laurie Strode saw Michael Myers following her down the street in the very first Halloween, we knew exactly who to root for. The minute the confused girlfriend turns into the survivalist Terminator of You’re Next, we knew we were in for a few surprises. We’ve compiled a list of our favorites, from the O.G.s to the new kids on the block, ready with an ax or a steak knife to show the bad guys you can’t keep a good Final Girl down.

    The 13 Best Final Girls in Horror Movie History

    Witches and slasher villains and interdimensional beings from Hell have nothing on these expert survivors.

    READ MORE: Then Worst Horror Movie Cliches We Never Want to See Again

    13 Spooky-But-Not Scary Halloween Movies

    These films are perfect for people who love Halloween but don’t love super scary movies.

    Emma Stefansky

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  • The Worst 2010s Movies, According to Letterboxd

    The Worst 2010s Movies, According to Letterboxd

    As of this writing, the film-centric social media app Letterboxd lists 239,369 films released between January of 2010 and December of 2019. That’s a whole lot of movies — more than double the amount of films Letterboxd’s database contains from the 2000s. So to rank among the 25 worst films out of all of them … that puts you in the bottom 0.01 percent of movies on the entire site. In a perverse way, that’s almost an impressive accomplishment. Not even the worst of the worst; at that percentage, it’s more like the worst of the worst of the worst of the absolute dregs.

    If you want to explore the worst (or, if you’re feeling really wild, the best) movies of any decade on Letterboxd, it’s not hard to do. Go to “Films” in the top menu then click “Browse By Year” and choose “2010s.” Then at the next screen go to “Sort By” and pick “Average Rating – Lowest First.” That’s it. (If you want to compare the broader website to your own favorites or least favorites just pick “Your Rating – Lowest First” instead.”) It’s also possible to sort by release date, length, popularity, or even popularity among your friends on the site.

    The aggregate of all those individual ratings is what gives us the list below; the 25 worst movies of the 2010s, according to users on Letterboxd. And if you’re thinking about trying any of these movies after you read it … beware. Take care. Stay far away. Maybe watch Lady Bird or Mad Max: Fury Road instead.

    The Worst 2010s Movies, According to Letterboxd Users

    According to the users of the cinematic social network Letterboxd, these are the worst movies released during the 2010s.

    READ MORE: The Worst Movies That Grossed $1 Billion Worldwide

    The Worst 2000s Movies, According to Letterboxd

    According to users of the movie social networking site Letterboxd, these are the 20 worst feature films made in the 2000s.

    Matt Singer

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  • The Worst Live-Action Anime and Manga Adaptations

    The Worst Live-Action Anime and Manga Adaptations

    Next to video games, anime and manga are some of the most difficult storytelling mediums to translate into live-action. Where there have been many successes—Takashi Miike’s samurai flick Blade of the Immortal, Robert Rodriguez’s Alita: Battle Angel, Higuchinsky’s delightfully gross version of Junji Ito’s horror manga Uzumaki, the Wachowskis’ acid trip Speed Racer—there have been even more failures, especially when iconic Eastern stories are retooled to appeal more to Western audiences.

    Because we’re both fans and haters, we compiled a list of the ten worst live-action anime and manga adaptations of all time featuring critical and commercial failures from otherwise storied directors, major studio flops based on beloved classics, and universally derided disasters that simply never should have been made. At least we’ll always have the (much better!) source material to scratch the itch — in these ten cases, you might as well just stick with the originals.

    The 10 Worst Live-Action Anime and Manga Adaptations

    Like video games, the complex storylines and exaggerated characters of even the best anime and manga out there can be difficult to translate to the screen. Here’s the proof…

    READ MORE: The All-Time Worst Sequels Ever Made

    The Best Movies Based On Toys

    Although they’re sometimes associated with craven financial motives, there have been some really good movies based on children’s toys.

    Emma Stefansky

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  • VHS Tapes That Are Still Worth a Lot of Money

    VHS Tapes That Are Still Worth a Lot of Money

    A couple of decades ago “streaming” meant something water did in a small river. Back then, you didn’t watching movies on streaming; no one had even conceived of such a thing. If you wanted to watch a movie, you went to a theater — or if you were too lazy to do that, you watched it on television, mostly likely in pan-and-scan format that cropped out half the picture and looked like low-definition garbage and was interrupted every 15 minutes by ads for Hefty bags and Bufferin.

    If you wanted to watch a movie at home on your own schedule, you needed to take a trip trip to a video store, either to buy or rent a VHS tape — short for “video home system.” Although VHS eventually gave way to DVD and Blu-ray, and now streaming, several generations of cinephiles who were raised on home video remain extremely nostalgic for it. And now that they’re older and have a little money of their own, they’ve started collecting VHS tapes the way our parents became obsessed with old baseball cards or comic books.

    AFP via Getty Images

    READ MORE: 25 Hilarious Bootleg DVD Covers

    Like any other collectible, an old VHS tape is only worth someone is willing to pay for it. So the list of 25 valuable VHS tapes below are based on recent sales on eBay — with best offer prices found, in some cases, on the website 130point.com. Which is to say that someone did pay a lot of money for these cassette tapes, streaming be damned.

    VHS Tapes That Sold For Shocking Amounts of Money

    These VHS tapes recently sold for hundreds of even thousands of dollars.

    10 VHS Tapes You Totally Owned As A ’90s Kid

    These movies were part of every ’90s kid’s VHS collection.

    Matt Singer

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  • Netflix Fall Preview: 28 Blockbusters Coming to Streaming

    Netflix Fall Preview: 28 Blockbusters Coming to Streaming

    Just like in movie theaters, fall on Netflix means big movies and potential awards contenders — or sometimes both combined. For example, in just a few weeks you’ll be able to stream Maestro, directed by and starring Bradley Cooper as famed composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein. Or if you’re in the mood for something a bit more action-oriented, you can watch The Killer starring Michael Fassbender, which is the latest thriller from auteur David Fincher.

    Netflix’s fall 2023 includes 28 titles, and also features stars like Jennifer Garner, Julia Roberts, Mahershala Ali, Benicio Del Toro, Annette Bening, Jodie Foster, and Adam Sandler, plus new movies by Pablo Larrain, Wes Anderson, and Zack Snyder. It’s pretty stacked, all things considered.

    Here’s a look at all the new movies coming to Netflix (and, in a few cases, to theaters) this fall:

    Sept. 6

    Scouts Honor: The Secret Files of the Boy Scouts of America

    Through compelling on-screen interviews and vérité, this investigative documentary will reveal the institutional cover-up and follow the whistleblowers fighting to bring justice against what was once one of America’s most beloved and trusted institutions.

    Netflix

    Sept. 15

    Love at First Sight

    After missing her flight from New York to London, Hadley (Haley Lu Richardson) meets Oliver (Ben Hardy) in a chance encounter at the airport that sparks an instant connection. A long night on the plane together passes in the blink of an eye but upon landing at Heathrow, the pair are separated and finding each other in the chaos seems impossible. Will fate intervene to transform these seatmates into soulmates?

    On Netflix Sept. 15 | In Select Theaters Sept. 7

    El Conde

    The story revolves around Augusto Pinochet who is not dead but an aged vampire who, after 250 years in this world, has decided to die once and for all, due to ailments brought about by his dishonor and family conflicts.

    Sept. 19

    The Saint of Second Chances

    Mike Veeck grew up in the shadow of his hustler father, Hall of Fame baseball owner Bill Veeck. The Veeck name became both legendary and notorious in professional baseball as they introduced the fun at ballparks — giveaways, theme nights, fireworks, and more. But it all came to a screeching halt when Mike blew up his father’s career. Exiled from the game he loved, the younger Veeck spent the next few decades clawing his way up from rock bottom, determined to redeem himself. After receiving distressing news, what started as a journey to reclaim the family legacy, became an opportunity to appreciate that family more fully.

    Netflix

    Sept. 22

    Spy Kids: Armageddon

    When the children of the world’s greatest secret agents unwittingly help a powerful game developer unleash a computer virus that gives him control of all technology, they must become spies themselves to save their parents and the world.

    Netflix

    On Netflix Sept. 27 | In Select Theaters Sept. 20

    The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar

    A beloved Roald Dahl short story about a rich man who learns about a guru who can see without using his eyes and then sets out to master the skill in order to cheat at gambling.

    Sept. 27

    Forgotten Love (Znachor)

    Respected surgeon loses his family and memory. Many years later, forgotten and poor, he meets his grown-up daughter but both are not aware of their connection. Moving to tears! Third movie inspired by the cult novel by Tadeusz Dołęga-Mostowicz.

    On Netflix Oct. 6 | In Select Theaters Sept. 29

    Reptile

    Following the brutal murder of a young real estate agent, a hardened detective attempts to uncover the truth in a case where nothing is as it seems, and by doing so dismantles the illusions in his own life.

    READ MORE: Netflix Just Invented the Perfect Movie Genre

    On Netflix Oct.13 | In Select Theaters Sept. 29

    Fair Play

    When a coveted promotion at a cutthroat financial firm arises, once supportive exchanges between lovers Emily (Phoebe Dynevor) and Luke (Alden Ehrenreich) begin to sour into something more sinister. As the power dynamics irrevocably shift in their relationship, the couple must face the true price of success and the unnerving limits of ambition.

    Oct. 17

    The Devil on Trial

    The Devil on Trial explores the first — and only — time “demonic possession” has officially been used as a defense in a US murder trial. Including firsthand accounts of alleged devil possession and a shocking murder, this extraordinary story forces reflection on our fear of the unknown.

    Oct. 20

    Old Dads

    Three best friends become fathers later in life and find themselves battling preschool principals, millennial CEOs, and anything created after 1987.

    On Netflix Oct. 27 | In Select Theaters Oct. 20

    Pain Hustlers

    Liza Drake (Emily Blunt) is a blue-collar single mom who has just lost her job and is at the end of her rope. A chance meeting with pharmaceutical sales rep Pete Brenner (Chris Evans) puts her on an upwards trajectory economically but dubious path ethically as she becomes entangled in a dangerous racketeering scheme. Dealing with her increasingly unhinged boss (Andy Garcia), the worsening medical condition of her daughter (Chloe Coleman), and a growing awareness of the devastation the company is causing forces Liza to examine her choices.

    Oct. TBD

    Sister Death (Hermana Muerte)

    In post-war Spain, Narcisa (Aria Bedmar), a young novice with supernatural powers, arrives at a former convent, now a school for girls, to become a teacher. As the days go by, the strange events and increasingly disturbing situations that torment her will eventually lead her to unravel the terrible skein of secrets that surround the convent and haunt its inhabitants.

    Nov. 1

    Wingwomen (Voleuses)

    Best friends Carole and Alex are two master thieves — they’re both attractive and ruthless, and remain undefeated. Tired of life on the run, they agree to take on one last heist and ask feisty Sam to assist them in one last job — unlike any they’ve done before. They don’t realize the mission will turn out to be very different from what they expected.

    On Netflix Nov. 3 | In Select Theaters Oct. 20

    NYAD

    A remarkable true story of tenacity, friendship, and the triumph of the human spirit, NYAD recounts a riveting chapter in the life of world-class athlete Diana Nyad. Three decades after giving up marathon swimming in exchange for a prominent career as a sports journalist, at the age of 60, Diana (four-time Academy Award nominee Annette Bening) becomes obsessed with completing an epic swim that always eluded her: the 110-mile trek from Cuba to Florida, often referred to as the “Mount Everest” of swims. Determined to become the first person to finish the swim without a shark cage, Diana goes on a thrilling four-year journey with her best friend and coach Bonnie Stoll (two-time Academy Award winner Jodie Foster) and a dedicated sailing team.

    Nov. 3

    Sly

    For nearly 50 years, Sylvester Stallone has entertained millions with iconic characters and blockbuster franchises, from Rocky to Rambo to The Expendables. This retrospective documentary offers an intimate look at the Oscar-nominated actor-writer-director-producer, paralleling his inspirational underdog story with the indelible characters he has brought to life.

    On Netflix Nov. 10 | In Theaters Oct. 27

    The Killer

    After a fateful near-miss, an assassin battles his employers, and himself, on an international manhunt he insists isn’t personal.

    Nov. 15

    Stamped From the Beginning

    Oscar-winning director Roger Ross Williams brings Dr. Ibram X. Kendi’s New York Times bestseller to the screen with Stamped from the Beginning. Published in 2016, Dr. Kendi’s National Book Award winner chronicles the entire story of anti-Black racist ideas and their staggering power over the course of American history.

    Nov. 16

    Best. Christmas. Ever!

    Every Christmas, Jackie sends a boastful holiday newsletter that makes her old college friend Charlotte feel like a lump of coal. When a twist of fate lands Charlotte and her family on Jackie’s snowy doorstep just days before Christmas, she seizes the opportunity to prove her old friend’s life can’t possibly be that perfect.

    On Netflix Nov. 17 | In Select Theaters Nov. 3

    Rustin

    The architect of 1963’s momentous March on Washington, Bayard Rustin was one of the greatest activists and organizers the world has ever known. He challenged authority, never apologized for who he was, what he believed, or who he desired. And he did not back down. He made history, and in turn, he was forgotten.

    Nov. 21

    Leo

    Actor and comedian Adam Sandler (Hotel Transylvania, The Wedding Singer) delivers signature laughs in this coming-of-age animated musical comedy about the last year of elementary school –– as seen through the eyes of a class pet. Jaded 74-year-old lizard Leo (Sandler) has been stuck in the same Florida classroom for decades with his terrarium-mate turtle (Bill Burr). When he learns he only has one year left to live, he plans to escape to experience life on the outside but instead gets caught up in the problems of his anxious students — including an impossibly mean substitute teacher. It ends up being the strangest but most rewarding bucket list ever…

    Nov. 30

    Family Switch

    Jess and Bill Walker are doing their best to keep their family connected as their children grow older, more independent, and more distant. When a chance encounter with an astrological reader causes the family to wake up to a full body switch –– on the morning of the most important day of each of their lives –– can the Walkers unite to land a promotion, college interview, record deal, and soccer tryout?

    US and Canada Dec. 1 | In Select Theaters Nov. 17

    May December

    Twenty years after their notorious tabloid romance gripped the nation, a married couple buckles under the pressure when an actor arrives to do research for a film about their past.

    Dec. 7

    The Archies

    Set in ’60s India in the fictional hill station town called Riverdale, The Archies is a coming-of-age musical following the lives of the town’s favorite set of teenagers –– Archie, Betty, Veronica, Jughead, Reggie, Ethel, and Dilton. Seen through the lens of the unique Anglo-Indian community, The Archies explores friendship, freedom, love, heartbreak, and rebellion.

    On Netflix Dec. 8 | In Select Theaters

    Leave the World Behind

    A family’s vacation is upended when two strangers arrive at night, seeking refuge from a cyberattack that grows more terrifying by the minute, forcing everyone to come to terms with their places in a collapsing world.

    Aardman / Netflix

    Dec. 15

    Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget

    Having pulled off a death-defying escape from Tweedy’s farm, Ginger has finally found her dream — a peaceful island sanctuary for the whole flock, far from the dangers of the human world. When she and Rocky hatch a little girl called Molly, Ginger’s happy ending seems complete. But back on the mainland the whole of chicken-kind faces a new and terrible threat. For Ginger and her team, even if it means putting their own hard-won freedom at risk — this time, they’re breaking in!

    On Netflix Dec. 20 | In Select Theaters Nov.22

    Maestro

    Maestro is a towering and fearless love story chronicling the lifelong relationship between Leonard Bernstein and Felicia Montealegre Cohn Bernstein. A love letter to life and art, Maestro at its core is an emotionally epic portrayal of family and love.

    Dec. 22

    Rebel Moon — Part One: A Child of Fire

    From Zack Snyder, the filmmaker behind 300, Man of Steel, and Army of the Dead, comes Rebel Moon, an epic science-fantasy event decades in the making. When a peaceful colony on the edge of a galaxy finds itself threatened by the armies of a tyrannical ruling force, Kora (Sofia Boutella), a mysterious stranger living among the villagers, becomes their best hope for survival. Tasked with finding trained fighters who will unite with her in making an impossible stand against the Mother World, Kora assembles a small band of warriors — outsiders, insurgents, peasants, and orphans of war from different worlds who share a common need for redemption and revenge.

    The Best Movies of 2023 So Far

    Through the first half of the year, here are the movies you have to see.

    Matt Singer

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  • Actors Who Performed While They Were Really Under the Influence

    Actors Who Performed While They Were Really Under the Influence

    Actors are hard workers, throwing themselves into their characters day after day and night after night to make sure they get the best, most authentic performance. Sometimes, this quest for authenticity goes a little too far, though, causing even the most accomplished performers to take a few sips of liquid courage now and again — or a few hits of the good stuff during a slow shoot.

    Some of the examples of actors who performed under the influence may come as a surprise — Margot Robbie? Nicolas Cage?!? — while others are maybe not so surprising — Billy Bob Thornton’s sloshed performance in Bad Santa is no secret. Any one of us would have considered knocking back a few during Robert Eggers’ horror film The Lighthouse. We would die to have late-night margs with Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman, or share a couple of martinis with Cate Blanchett and Sarah Paulson. From shocking to not-so-shocking to dang-I-wish-I-had-been-there, we’ve compiled a list of the most iconic times when accomplished actors were a little or more than a little under the influence while making their best movies.

    Actors Who Performed Scenes While Under the Influence

    Plenty of actors filmed famous scenes while under the influence of some substance or another. Could you tell from their performances?

    READ MORE: 10 Stars Who Had Surprising Careers Before Hollywood

    Movies That Were Changed Due to Controversy

    These movies were very famously changed after public controversies.

    Emma Stefansky

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  • The Biggest DC Box Office Bombs

    The Biggest DC Box Office Bombs

    It hasn’t been a great run of movies based on DC Comics lately, at least from a box office perspective. The lame duck era of the DC Extended Universe has produced one financial disappointment after another; I was sure, for example, that The Flash would be one of the two or three biggest movies of the summer. How could it not be, thanks to an appearance by Michael Keaton’s Batman? Boy, was I wrong; the film is barely hanging onto a spot near the bottom of the 20 biggest films of 2023 in the U.S.

    It wasn’t always like this. Richard Donner’s Superman completely changed the way people looked at superhero movies in the late 1970s; a decade later, Tim Burton’s Batman did the same. That said, DC has also had its share of flops through the years. You can probably rattle some of them off the top of your head; when DC movies fail at the box office, they tend to fail in spectacular fashion.

    The precise degree to which a movie bombs is sometimes hard to pinpoint; Hollywood studio accounting is notoriously secretive, and even the reported figures for things like budgets rarely included the money spent on marketing, which can sometimes double the cost of a production. So these are listed not in the order of the size of the bomb, but simply based on their raw ticket sales. But you can also see that number compared to budgets (based on the best available information on sites like The Numbers.)

    Here are ten notable DC box-office bombs.

    The Biggest DC Movie Bombs

    These movies may have featured some of the biggest superheroes in history, but they were also big flops.

    READ MORE: Every DC Extended Universe Movie Ranked From Worst to Best

    The Biggest Marvel Box Office Bombs

    These movies, based on comics released by Marvel, were not hits — and that’s putting it mildly.

    Matt Singer

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  • 25 Movie Remakes You Forgot Existed

    25 Movie Remakes You Forgot Existed

    When you get right down to it, remakes are about one thing: Brand recognition. A studio or a producer believes there is money to be made in releasing something with the same title and/or concept as an old hit. And that’s exactly what they do.

    That line of reasoning is not without some justification. Many of the biggest box-office hits in history are remakes. The 2019 remake of The Lion King grossed $1.64 billion worldwide. Two years earlier, the live-action Beauty and the Beast grossed $1.26 billion. War of the Worlds. King Kong. Clash of the Titans. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Ocean’s Eleven. The Mummy. The Karate Kid. All hugely successful remakes. And on and on and on.

    Of course, it doesn’t always work out that way.

    READ MORE: The Worst Movies That Grossed $1 Billion at the Box Office

    Just because a film was popular once is no guarantee it will be again. Occasionally, a film’s popularity works against a remake’s viability. If people love a movie, does that mean they want to see it again, with other (possibly less charismatic) actors, directed by a different (possibly less talented) filmmaker? Not necessarily. And when that happens, the results can be underwhelming, disappointing, or downright forgettable.

    Collected below are 25 examples of exactly those sorts of remakes. Some were box-office bombs, but others did reasonably well in theaters, propelled by the very sort of brand recognition that got them made in the first place. But even then, they could never live up to the movies that inspired them — nor could they replace them in the minds of viewers. Instead, they live on right here.

    Forgotten Movie Remakes

    These movie remakes replaced the films they were inspired by in the minds of absolutely no one.

    Forgotten Movie Sequels

    Although few of them are remembered well (or at all) these sequels all exist.

    Matt Singer

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  • The Best Movies That Made More Than $1 Billion

    The Best Movies That Made More Than $1 Billion

    These days, it seems like every couple of weeks a new Hollywood blockbuster tops $1 billion at the box office. It’s not exactly that frequent (though we’re sure the studios would love if it was), but it’s happening more and more often. As budgets for the biggest tentpoles of the summer and the fall seasons continue to inflate into the hundreds of millions, distributors are pulling out all the stops to make sure they make good on their investment. Sometimes, when the stars align, it all pays off, and audiences flock to the multiplex in droves to snag a ticket for the latest must-see movie. But are all of these movies really worth the money they cost or earn?

    We’d say some of them definitely are, and for this list we’re counting down the ten best movies that earned $1 billion at the global box office. Our picks include a sequel to a beloved animated kids’ movie, one of the best popcorn adventure films ever made, and eight more titles in between. Sure, there are plenty of worthy contenders for this list that didn’t quite make enough at the box office to make the cut, but you’ve gotta admit, all of the films below are pretty great.

    The Best Movies That Made More Than $1 Billion

    From Batman to Bond, hobbits to blue aliens, these are the movies worthy of the $1 billion crown.

    READ MORE: The Worst Movies That Made $1 Billion Worldwide

    The Worst Billion-Dollar Blockbusters

    All of these movies grossed more than $1 billion at the box office. And they all stink.

    Emma Stefansky

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  • Directors Who Followed a Classic Film With a Total Dud

    Directors Who Followed a Classic Film With a Total Dud

    Show me a great director and I’ll show you a great director who’s made a few missteps along the way. It’s inevitable, really; even the all-time legends of cinema had made their fair share of bad movies. Every single artist you love has a skeleton or two in their closet they’d rather forget and hope you never find out about. And sometimes those duds have come immediately following some of their biggest and most beloved hits.

    This is an interesting phenomenon to consider. Does success cloud an artist’s judgment? Once you’ve had a major hit, do you stop taking constructive criticism, or listening to your trusted collaborators? Do you try too hard to please the audience instead of yourself? Do you get distracted by the trappings of wealth and fame?

    READ MORE: Successful Movies That Switched Directors in the Middle of Production

    Who knows. All I do know is the 12 incredibly talented and hugely popular directors below all followed one of their biggest hits with one of their biggest commercial or critical flops. (Or, in a lot of cases, both.) To find your name on this list is not something to be embarrassed or ashamed about. In a weird way it’s actually more like a badge of honor. Because you had to be enormously successful to then have bombs this notable and famous. And if no one ever screw things up, how would we ever recognize and appreciate when they got things right?

    Directors Who Followed a Classic Film With a Dud

    Some of the greatest filmmakers of all time followed up beloved favorites with stinkers. It happens.

    The Best Sequels Not Made By the Original Movie’s Director

    Matt Singer

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  • The 13 Scariest Movie Vampires Ever

    The 13 Scariest Movie Vampires Ever

    Vampires, immortal as they are, will always be a part of horror cinema, either sparkling in the sunlight to woo teen girlfriends or trapping real estate agents in their ancient castles so their army of undead wives can suck their blood. They’ve made their way from whispered warnings in fairy tales and folklore to the biggest movie screens, and we haven’t gotten bored with their undead antics yet. (Although we could do with more vampires in capes; no one has cool capes in movies these days.)

    With The Last Voyage of the Demeter offering yet another twist on the vampire genre, we figured we would honor the O.G. scary vampire (that’s Dracula, if you’re wondering) by counting down the scariest movie vampires of all time, starting with a classic from 1920s German Expressionism and traveling through Sweden, South Korea, snowy Alaska, and post-Apocalypse New York City to bring you the spookiest of the spooky, those fanged freaks that keep us up at night long after the credits have rolled. As one Abraham Van Helsing once said, “The strength of the vampire is that people will not believe in him.” Hopefully, this list will convince you otherwise.

    READ MORE: 10 Horror Classics That Probably Couldn’t Get Made Today

    The Scariest Movie Vampires of All Time

    From Dracula to Jerry (yes, Jerry), these are the vampires that’ll have you stringing garlic around your windows.

    Popular Movies That Were Supposed To Be Way Darker

    Things might have turned out differently for these hit films if they’d stuck with their original (darker) scripts.

    Emma Stefansky

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  • The Worst 2000s Movies, According to Letterboxd

    The Worst 2000s Movies, According to Letterboxd

    As of this writing, the invaluable movie social networking site Letterboxd lists 112,245 released from January 1, 2000 to December 31, 2009. Ten years, over 112,000 movies. That means if you dedicated your life to watching every single movie released in the decade over the course of the entire decade, you would have to watch 30 movies every single day to watch them all. I don’t think that is physically possible, although it might be fun to try it.

    Regardless, the users of Letterboxd are free to rank any and all of these movies on a zero to five star scale. And it is possible for any user to arrange all 112,245 2000s titles in their database according to those rankings — either from highest to lowest or lowest to highest. Doing the latter gives you … well, frankly it gives you quite possibly the most cursed idea for a film festival ever.

    READ MORE: The Best Movies of 2023 So Far, According to Letterboxd

    So while I cannot in good conscience recommend you watch any of these movies, I am here to sate your curiosity about the titles Letterboxd users collectively consider the worst of the worst from this century’s first decade. If you are wondering how many films on the list you might have already seen, just scroll on down. (By the way, the correct answer to the question “How many of these movies have you seen?” is “None!” — although “Too many” is also an acceptable response.)

    The Worst 2000s Movies, According to Letterboxd

    According to users of the movie social networking site Letterboxd, these are the 20 worst feature films made in the 2000s.

    The Worst ’80s Movies, According to Letterboxd

    According to thousands of users on the movie website Letterboxd, these are the 15 worst movies released during the 1980s.

    Matt Singer

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