Steve Newton Movie Reviews & Previews

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Steve Newton

Agrees with the Tomatometer 77% of the time.

Publications:: Georgia Straight

Total Reviews:: 178

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Showing 1 - 50 of 178

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Rating	T-Meter	Title \| Year	Add Date
0/5	4%	Scary Movie 5 (2013)	" The scariest thing about Scary Movie 5 is that it actually made me chortle less than some of the silly horror flicks it's trying to spoof!" — Georgia Straight Posted Apr 12, 2013
3/5	62%	Evil Dead (2013)	" In memory of beloved horror-booster Roger Ebert I'm gonna give it one hideously mangled tongues-up." — Georgia Straight Posted Apr 5, 2013
3.5/5	39%	The Call (2013)	" The Call does falter near the end when some scary-movie cliches sneak in, but things are just so damn enthralling up until then that its winning sheen remains mostly untarnished." — Georgia Straight Posted Mar 15, 2013
3.5/5	67%	Stoker (2013)	" Stoker is a visually engrossing portrait of upper-class evil and psychosexual suspense that leaves you with a lingering case of the creeps." — Georgia Straight Posted Mar 14, 2013
3/5	73%	The Last Exorcism (2010)	" A fairly absorbing pseudo-documentary demonic-possession flick with all the bodily contortions and jittery camerawork you'd expect." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 26, 2013
2/5	25%	Paranormal Activity 4 (2012)	" The fourth entry in the hugely successful film series just can't match the others in the nightmare-making department." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 26, 2013
1/5	35%	Dark Skies (2013)	" Any quote that uses the adjective 'terrifying' doesn't belong within a billion light years of a lame-ass flick like Dark Skies. " — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 22, 2013
4/5	50%	The Hills Have Eyes (2006)	" On the strength of their 2003 slasher flick, High Tension, Craven hired director-writer Alexandre Aja and writer Grégory Levasseur, and the result is one of the most exhilarating, intense, and engrossing Hollywood shockers ever made." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 16, 2013
1/5	——	The Marsh (2007)	" When will 21st-century horror makers learn that volume, in and of itself, isn't scary? Curses on the sound-effects geek who invented the grating metallic shriek." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 16, 2013
2.5/5	77%	Cloverfield (2008)	" Imagine if somebody came up to you, grabbed your head, and jiggled it around for 80 minutes. Now imagine they did that while you were trying to watch a movie about a monster attacking New York City." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 16, 2013
1/5	22%	The Eye (2008)	" Brothers Danny and Oxide Pang's unnerving spook show from 2002 has been translated into a clunky, aimless interpretation that leaves you with just one overpowering thought: are Jessica Alba's lips for real?" — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 16, 2013
1/5	7%	Shutter (2008)	" Shutter, which attempts to do for cameras what The Ring did for videocassettes, what Pulse did for computers, and what The Grudge did for grudges." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 16, 2013
0/5	8%	Prom Night (2008)	" Thankfully, Prom Night's predictable ending doesn't suggest a remake of the original's 1987 sequel, Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night 2. No kidding, that's what it was called." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 16, 2013
1/5	32%	The X-Files: I Want to Believe (The X Files 2) (2008)	" There was a lot of secrecy surrounding the new X-Files movie... But the film's big secret is out now: it sucks." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
.5/5	14%	Mirrors (2008)	" Even the most forgiving fans of supernatural horror will balk at Mirrors' cookie-cutter characterizations, predictable shocks, and ridiculous, punishing plot." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
2.5/5	58%	Quarantine (2008)	" I don't care how dedicated a TV journalist you are: when a rabid, shrieking hellion lunges for your neck, teeth a-gnashin', it's time to hit the standby button and defend yourself." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
4/5	72%	Stuck (2008)	" Stuck is a character-driven, low-budget surprise that leaps out of nowhere-Saint John, New Brunswick, actually-and grabs your attention like an ice pick to the eye." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1.5/5	12%	Saw V (2008)	" The best thing about this-and any-Saw film is the sick production design. Whoever's responsible for creating these disgustingly grungy chambers of death deserves an Oscar for scuzziness." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1/5	3%	The Haunting of Molly Hartley (2008)	" A contemptible cross between To The Devil a Daughter and a dark version of High School Musical (without the music)." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1/5	49%	Twilight (2008)	" Unless you're a 14-year-old girl who gets all giddy at the thought of cute boys and first love, steer clear of Thirteen director Catherine Hardwicke's anemic adaptation." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
3/5	34%	Repo! The Genetic Opera (2008)	" The lowbrow and highfalutin collide in an orgy of upscale disembowelment as director Darren Lynn Bousman gives uneasy birth to the gore opera. " — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
0/5	11%	The Unborn (2009)	" I kept hoping Oldman would revert to his Sid & Nancy punk persona and kick the little freak in the yarbles like some pain-deserving Springsteen fan, but no such luck." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1/5	31%	The Uninvited (2009)	" The only genuinely startling moments come via the deafening sound effects that accompany a large roast hitting the floor and Anna scraping metal hangers along a clothing rack. " — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1.5/5	25%	Friday the 13th (2009)	" Five nauseating 20-somethings head out to Camp Crystal Lake to guzzle Pabst Blue Ribbon and have loud tent sex, but Jason roasts one of them like a weenie and says howdy to everyone else with his trusty machete. And that's just the intro!" — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
2.5/5	19%	Obsessed (2009)	" Fans of the Final Destination flicks should enjoy seeing how Larter's horror roots are revisited in the over-the-top climax of this trashy exercise in glossy B-movie-making." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
0/5	55%	Orphan (2009)	" Dump a murderous psycho brat with a corny Russian accent into that troubled mix and you've got a real horror show on your hands. But not a good one." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
2.5/5	21%	H2: Halloween II (2009)	" Relentlessly disturbing though it is, the movie is not particularly frightening." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
.5/5	29%	The Final Destination (2009)	" The Final Destination is a catastrophe in and of itself." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
.5/5	21%	Sorority Row (2009)	" By the time the killer's identity is finally revealed you'll be amazed at how screenwriters make big bucks penning lines like, "Who the hell lit the house on fire? S---!"" — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
.5/5	12%	The Stepfather (2009)	" What a shame that the remake fell into the unwieldy hands of the same jokers responsible for last year's execrable Prom Night redo." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1/5	45%	The Box (2009)	" What they end up deciding sets in slothlike motion a convoluted string of ludicrous events that will take writer-director Richard Kelly years to live down." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
2.5/5	67%	Daybreakers (2010)	" Around here Daybreakers' clever streak runs out and the previously witty, refreshing film becomes a predictable action romp that's big on over-the-top gore but lacking in everything else." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1/5	20%	Legion (2010)	" An utterly ludicrous entry in the biblical-horror subgenre." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
4/5	71%	The Crazies (2010)	" Activism-minded moviegoers will welcome the second coming of Romero's cautionary tale, but they'll have to sit through one hell of a nasty pitchfork scene to get the message." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
4/5	60%	Frozen (2010)	" Green avoids Hatchet's corny clichés and totally redeems himself with a harrowing portrait of humans at the mercy of the great outdoors." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1/5	15%	A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)	" This Elm Street reeks of a rushed cash-grab, as even the most reliable of clichéd shocks fail to register on the fright-o-meter. " — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
0/5	74%	Splice (2010)	" Who would have thought talent of that calibre would combine to create such a catastrophic stinker." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
3/5	12%	Jonah Hex (2010)	" It's popcorn-chomping fun rooting for the soul-stripped Hex as he battles his way toward redemption and sweet, sweet payback. " — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
2.5/5	63%	Predators (2010)	" Predators never overcomes the fatal miscasting of Brody as the group's take-charge, tough-guy leader. " — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
2/5	13%	The Last Exorcism Part II (2013)	" The avian-suicide thing wasn't that scary when we saw it last week in Dark Skies." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
4.5/5	72%	Machete (2010)	" Machete is the coolest revenge-driven, gore-splattered, star-studded Mexploitation flick ever!" — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1.5/5	23%	Resident Evil: Afterlife (2010)	" Resident Evil: Afterlife sees Anderson returning to cinematic dreck with a stunningly tedious exercise in 3-D CGI wankery." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
0/5	9%	My Soul to Take (2010)	" What [Wes Craven] wound up with was a witless stab-the-teen time-waster that could be his worst film ever. And considering 2005's wretched Cursed, that's pretty bad." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
4.5/5	59%	Paranormal Activity 2 (2010)	" It's the scariest movie in years." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1/5	10%	Saw 3D (2010)	" Saw 3D is the seventh Saw I've seen, and maybe the sickest-which is exactly what I said about Saw VI." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
1.5/5	15%	Skyline (2010)	" Directors Colin and Greg Strause eschew things like a credible script and decent acting to focus on CGI enactments of hapless apartment dwellers being rammed into slimy alien orifices." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
2/5	20%	The Rite (2011)	" Although Hopkins shines when his evil-infused priest exhibits low-level nastiness, his climactic exorcism scenes don't ring true and aren't very frightening." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
.5/5	4%	The Roommate (2011)	" it's hardly worth sticking around for the routine climax of this toothless thriller just to see the ocular sweets get all chewed up and mangled." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013
3/5	45%	Drive Angry (2011)	" There isn't much to Vancouver-raised director Patrick Lussier's film besides mayhem and muscle cars, but he sure gets those things right." — Georgia Straight Posted Feb 15, 2013

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