DISCLAIMER: Spoilers will be included at the end of the article where I will also offer my opinions and critiques of the films.
It is time to get in the Halloween spirit ladies and gentlemen, and what better way to do so than by watching some horror movies? I have definitely been starting my Halloween festivities by taking a trip to see the recently released horror movies.
The first horror movie I watched to start off the Halloween season was “Barbarian“. Barbarian follows Tess Marshall, played by Georgina Campbell, a young woman traveling to Detroit for a job interview.
Tess rents a rental home for her stay only to find the stranger Kieth, played by Bill Skarsgard, occupying her home. Tess decides to stay in the rental home with this stranger only to find an even more frightening thing living in that house.
I would love to go into more detail about the movie but I do not want to give out any spoilers because it is a film I think that everyone should watch this spooky season.
What I really enjoyed about this movie was the comedy that was incorporated. Although I am not 100% sure if that was the intention of the film, I am glad that I was able to have a good laugh with all the jumpscares that were popping up.
Rating the scariness of this movie was definitely a 1.5/5. The only real moment where I was scared was the first jumpscare when the mystery guest is introduced.
This movie is more of a jumpscare movie and not a real psychological scare one. But overall, I would rate the movie a 4/5.
The only reason I would not rate it a 5 was because of the ending and some further details I wish the film had discussed which I will go more into in the spoiler section I will include in the end.
The other recently released horror movie I have watched is “Smile“. “Smile” was a movie that genuinely shocked me because this whole time you are waiting to see what the Smile “monster” looks like and it’s at the end of the movie where it is shown.
The film follows Dr. Rose Cotter, played by Sosie Bacon, after witnessing some horrifying events and her journey in trying to explain the unexplainable.
I definitely enjoyed Smile more than Barbarian because Smile was more of a psychological scare and it also incorporated the jumpscares. There were also many plot twists in the movie that made you think that everything was going to turn out the way you expected it to but in reality, it is not.
The rating on the scariness would be a ⅖. The only truly scary moment is when the Smile “monster” is revealed because I definitely did not expect it to look like that. But overall, the movie was a ⅘ and I would highly recommend watching it!
Now diving into the spoiler section and some of my thoughts on how the movie ended. If you do not want to read any spoilers please skip to the very end of the article and please let us know your thoughts and opinions if you watched these films!
Let’s begin with Barbarian. I do not like the way the movie ended so abruptly with Tess just killing “The Mother” and then just walking away. I also wish the movie would have gone into more detail about how “The Mother” was created.
I know that “The Mother” was just a giant incest baby but I do wish they would have gone into more detail about how they survived down there and how those human babies turned into that giant monster.
Now moving on to Smile. The only critique I have about this movie is the ending. I do not like the fact that the Smile curse was passed on to Joel because I believe that it would have made more sense if Rose had passed it onto the sister since the sister did not believe what Rose was seeing.
Joel was helping Rose because he still cared for her and wanted to help her survive. The sister just continued to believe that Rose was crazy like their mother and that Rose was experiencing past trauma.
If the curse was passed on to the sister it would have continued that generational family trauma.
If you watched either of these two movies please let us know your thoughts on them @HerCampusSJSU!