Andy

A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is a “Cool” movie. Directed and written by Ana Lily Amirpour, the film’s tagline states: “The first Iranian Vampire Western.” The pretense of being the first of its kind before you’re even in the seats proves at once irritatingly brazen and enticing. It’s the kind of attitude that makes the “I-liked-this-before-anyone” feel maddeningly solipsistic but also somewhat vindicating when, you know, you can be the one to say it.

To pitch something as post-apocalyptic is beginning to carry the weight of moody adolescent poetry. When AMC and the CW, along with the occasional network TV programming, start running grim, “gritty” dystopian survivalist shows its safe to posit mainstream culture is transfixed on the demise of Western society, bordering on some mass auto-erotic asphyxiation that pushes us to the edge of destruction before final catharsis.

As Tom Cruise once said: “Live. Die. Repeat.”

Set in 1974 Oxford, “The Quiet Ones” follows documentarian Brian (Sam Clafin) who finds himself, along with two hot-to-trot students, under the employ of charismatic and philandering Prof. Joseph Coupland (Jared Harris). Coupland is determined to prove that the supernatural is in fact a scientifically explainable phenomena. Coupland’s latest patient, a veritable Jane Doe cleverly named Jane (Olivia Cooke), signs on to undergo some intense, experimental treatments designed to draw out and expel her telekinetic abilities.

Manny Marquez’s “Psychopath” documents the tumultuous period in which his uncle Victor set out to build an ambitious horror attraction in the small Oklahoma town of Sperry. The gloriously named “Psycho Path” springs from Victor’s interest in make-up effects and his stalled ambition to become a Hollywood effects person. After purchasing a parcel of land and beginning construction Victor is met with opposition from his neighbors and some mild family indifference. As the opening date draws near Victor finds himself struggling against political forces, racism, and egos.