Odds are, when you consider the horror genre in general, you’re thinking bloodbaths, vicious villains and relentless scare tactics. While there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, wouldn’t you like to give a different type of scare a go for a change? Ti West’s The Innkeepers focuses on The Yankee Pedlar Inn, a quaint hotel with a spooky past on the verge of being shut down for good. For the establishment’s final weekend in business, its sole remaining employees, Claire and Luke (Sara Paxton and Pat Healy), opt to spend the night so that when they’re not tending to the Inn’s mere three guests, they can explore and perhaps catch the  [ Read More ]

Attention all aspiring filmmakers; looking for some inspiration? Check out what writer-director Dee Rees accomplished. After spending some time working in the marketing industry, Rees decided she had a story to tell and aptly used NYU’s graduate film program to do it. To fulfill her thesis film requirement, Rees created a short with a portion of that very story and, thanks to the success of that short, Rees finally got the opportunity to tell the full tale through a feature, Pariah. The piece focuses on a young girl named Alike (Adepero Oduye) who’s not only hesitant to come out to her family, but is also just having a tough time  [ Read More ]

German-born director Uwe Boll is a throwback of sorts to the pioneers of traveling, self-distributed filmmaking — part storyteller, (perhaps much larger) part huckster. Whatever one thinks of him, he is certainly prolific, cranking out around three movies a year over the last half-decade. Brent Simon recently had a chance to speak with the inimitable Boll about his new film ”In the Name of the King 2,” U.S. presidential politics, his passion project “Bailout,” which 2011 box office hit he can’t believe made so much money, and how his wife doesn’t like his movies. The conversation is excerpted below: ShockYa: ”In the Name of the King 2″ speaks a lot of prophesy and destiny,  [ Read More ]

The holidays are officially upon us and that means a slew of new movies are on the way, however, it’s not very often that we get two movies from the same director. Not only does Steven Spielberg have War Horse due out in theaters for Christmas, but The Adventures of Tintin, too. Based on three of Hergé’s iconic comic books, The Adventures of Tintin follows the young journalist and his loyal dog Snowy. When Tintin buys a model of an old ship called the Unicorn, he attracts some unwanted attention. After Tintin refuses to sell his ship to a pair of overeager buyers, he discovers the Unicorn happens to be  [ Read More ]

Elizabeth Mitchell is the sort of actress whose statuesque beauty (she’s 5’9″) has allowed her to be cast both by and against type. She made out with Angelina Jolie in the HBO movie “Gia,” made a much more unsettling impression in Wayne Kramer’s creepy “Running Scared,” and then enjoyed a healthy run as Juliet Burke on the small screen smash hit “Lost.” She’s now moved on to “V,” and is also part of the ensemble cast of writer-director Matthew Leutwyler’s “Answers To Nothing,” in which she plays a woman trying to get pregnant with a husband (Dane Cook) that she doesn’t know is cheating on her. ShockYa recently had a chance  [ Read More ]

Thank You for Smoking, Juno and Up in the Air; can director Jason Reitman do no wrong? Thanks to his latest feature, Young Adult, I’m inclined to believe so. The film stars Charlize Theron as Mavis Gary who quite literally is a young adult. She’s a professional living in the big city, but Mavis hasn’t shaken her high school years. Still believing she’s the popular girl, Mavis heads home to Mercury, Minnesota to claim what she thinks is rightfully hers, her high school sweetheart Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson). Former nerd Matt Freehauf (Patton Oswalt) attempts to talk some sense into her, explaining Buddy’s married with a kid, but thanks to  [ Read More ]

All caught up on Breaking Bad? No? First off, how dare you? But, more importantly, watch out because this piece is packed with spoilers! Earlier this evening Breaking Bad baddie, Giancarlo Esposito, showed off how unlike Gus Fring he really is, enjoying a nice night out with his daughter at the premiere of The Adventures of Tintin. Naturally, after Gus’ shocking demise, the obligatory question had to be asked – is that really the end of Gus? While Esposito artfully dodged the question, he does note that “no one dies on Breaking Bad” and that Gus will “definitely be back” perhaps “to put a final stamp on the series’ ending.”  [ Read More ]

My inner fan girl takes over! Earlier this evening, Steven Spielberg took to the red carpet for his upcoming release, The Adventures of Tintin. Keep an eye out for the Tintin coverage closer to the film’s December 21st release, but for now, we’ve got something for all you Jurassic Park diehards out there. As Jurassic Park is my favorite film of all time – yes, you can certainly quote me on that – it should come as no surprise that I legitimately wake up to the roar of Spielberg’s T-rex every morning. After schvitzing quite a bit as Spielberg made his way closer and closer to my spot on the  [ Read More ]

Tatiana von Furstenberg and Francesca Gregorini, the writers and directors of “Tanner Hall,” had organic qualities in mind when they set out to make the film. “We wanted to make an artful movie,” von Furstenberg said. “We didn’t want to condescend to the audience, we didn’t want to talk down to them. This is not a disposable environment; it’s very organic. Von Furstenberg and Gregorini strove to make their film–the story of a group of friends as they grow up and learn the trials of life in their privileged girls’ school–as timeless as possible. “There are no iPads, trendy hairstyles, no makeup,” von Furstenberg said. The girls’ uniforms, which were  [ Read More ]

Of course there’s no forgetting George Washington, All the Real Girls and Snow Angels, but, for the sake of this piece, think Your Highness and Pineapple Express plus children. Or, basically, raunchy adult humor with some kids on the side. Actually, raunchy humor, childish shenanigans and a surprisingly hefty dose of heart most accurately describes David Gordon Green’s most recent film, The Sitter. Jonah Hill stars as Noah, a college dropout crashing with his single mother. When his mom gets the opportunity to meet a new guy, Noah’s thrilled. The problem? The only way his mom can go on this blind date is if the mutual friends find a babysitter  [ Read More ]

A story of remarkable devotion and incredible spousal support and understanding, director Luc Besson’s “The Lady” stars Michelle Yeoh as Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, the democratically elected leader of Burma who spent years imprisoned by her native country’s military junta. While Yeoh is better known for the sort of physicality she’s put on display in more straightforward genre films, “The Lady” showcases her quiet side, to often heartrending effect. ShockYa recently had a chance to speak to Yeoh one-on-one in person, about her exacting research for the movie, the challenges of embodying a well known public figure, and more. The conversation is excerpted below: ShockYa: Thank you for your time. Is  [ Read More ]

He can’t spill the beans on the in-the-works “Entourage” movie, but fans will still be seeing plenty of Jeremy Piven in the time it takes for his character, Ari Gold, to wind his way to the big screen. The actor’s latest film, available on VOD and hitting big screens this week, is Mark Pellington’s “I Melt With You,” the story of four wildly disillusioned old college friends (including Rob Lowe, Thomas Jane and Christian McKay) who reunite for an annual summer bacchanal, and start to entertain a suicide pact from their teenage years. Piven plays Ron, a financial services hotshot facing impending ruin stemming from corruption and fraud charges. ShockYa had a chance to  [ Read More ]

Diablo Cody set the bar pretty high with her first feature, Juno, but Mavis Gary (Charlize Theron) follows right in our favorite blue slushy chugging teen pregnancy case’s footsteps. Well, somewhat. Mavis is quite literally a young adult. She’s all grown up and working in Minneapolis as the ghostwriter of the once popular young adult series, Waverly Prep, but she’s very much stuck in the past. When her marriage fails and she’s asked to pen the final installment of the series, Mavis attempts to use her high school flame, Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson), to lift her spirits. Regardless of his loving wife and child, Mavis packs up her things, hops  [ Read More ]

Julie Benz has been dead for a couple years now – well, to a lot of people who follow “Dexter” religiously. Thankfully, in real life, the 39-year-old actress has kept busy even after her shocking fourth-season offing from the hit Showtime series, popping up in roles on “Desperate Housewives” and “No Ordinary Family,” amongst other projects. In writer-director Matthew Leutwyler’s new film, “Answers To Nothing,” she plays Frankie, a hard-charging Los Angeles police investigator working to solve a case involving a missing little girl. ShockYa recently had a chance to sit down and talk to Benz one-on-one, about “Answers To Nothing” and the extremely short preparation time she had for the project  [ Read More ]

David Weissman feels that as a person who was living in San Francisco during the early 1980s AIDS epidemic, he has a mission. “It’s the obligation of people like me who lived through that time to tell their story,” he said. Weissman has completed his part of the obligation by directing (along with Bill Weber) and producing “We Were Here,” a documentary focusing on four individuals–Paul Boneberg, the executive director of the GLBT Historical Society; Guy Clark, a florist in the Castro district; Daniel Goldstein, an artist; Ed Wolf, a healthcare worker and Eileen Glutzer, a nurse who was on the front lines during the beginning of the outbreak in  [ Read More ]