Horror
Rod Lott
With Vile, we may have a new cinematic achievement: the first torture-porn film to open with a quote from Gandhi. Take that with a grain of salt — or perhaps the box of kosher salt poured into the wounds of some sad bastard by some demented madman in the prologue.

Horror
Rod Lott
Until now, I had never seen the 1980 horror film Mother's Day, but its poster art has stayed top-of-mind when I first stumbled upon the VHS box in the early '80s, when the Sound Warehouse at Northwest Expressway and Rockwell Avenue — may it rest in peace — started renting movies in addition to keepin' the metro rockin' with a wide selection of LPs and cassettes.

Horror
Rod Lott
Few critics are unable to see through the violence and admit there's a real artfulness at work in Eli Roth's pair of Hostel films, both now available in their unrated director's cuts on a single, budget-priced Blu-ray from Mill Creek Entertainment.

Horror
Rod Lott
In a post-Saw world, Darren Lynn Bousman quietly has been making a series of horror films more in line with scary movies of the 1970s than the torture-porn genre he helped usher in. Already this year, DVD has brought us his superlative Mother's Day remake and the low-key demonic pic 11-11-11, and now The Barrens. It's just too bad they've all been denied wide theatrical releases.

Horror
Rod Lott
Despite being unleashed from Twisted Pictures, those people who brought us all those Saws, The Tortured has sat in the shelf now for about two years, skipping a wide release on its way to DVD. It's easy to see why: It's strong, sick stuff that delights in punching and kicking its audience as its vengeful characters do their prey.

Horror
Rod Lott
Says a concerned mother in the opening scene, "If I've told you once, I've told you a hundred times: Stay away from vans. Only bad people own vans." Truer words, ne'er spoken, especially in the case of Creep Van, an independently funded flick of horror from the heart.

Thriller
Phil Bacharach
Don’t trust the audience members.

Trusting them appears to be the cardinal sin of Zero Dark Thirty, a masterful, absorbing film dramatizing the CIA's 10-year hunt for Osama bin Laden. It has been at the center of controversy for its depiction of U.S. intelligence agents using “enhanced interrogation techniques,” otherwise known as torture.

Drama
Phil Bacharach
Don’t trust the viewers.

Trusting them appears to be the cardinal sin of Zero Dark Thirty, a masterful, absorbing film dramatizing the CIA's 10-year hunt for Osama bin Laden. It has been at the center of controversy for its depiction of U.S. intelligence agents using “enhanced interrogation techniques,” otherwise known as torture.

Horror
Rod Lott
What began as an intended Saw prequel has spawned a franchise of its own, now that 2009’s The Collector has begat The Collection. I hope in my heart of hearts that The Collection begets a third chapter — The Collective, perhaps?