Mystery

The Samurai and the Prisoner (2026)

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At first glance, The Samurai and the Prisoner, a literary adaptation set in late 16th-century Japan, hardly seems like horror/thriller auteur Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s usual cup of sake. Within a few minutes, when it suddenly reveals itself as a murder mystery, all makes sense.

The film takes place almost entirely at a castle ruled by Lord Murashige (Masahiro Motoki, 1999’s Gemini), who’s already anxious about an imminent enemy siege when a young visitor is found dead. The boy appears to have been shot with an arrow, yet no weapon is located. It’s almost a locked-room puzzle, if not for a mere 3-inch gap.

To crack this case, Murashige leans on his adversary’s envoy, Kanbei (Masaki Suda, Kurosawa’s Cloud), held captive in the castle’s dungeon, to pore over the clues and form a hypothesis. Kanbei’s deductive skills prove excellent — I mean, he’s got the time — because three more devious crimes will confound the castle before the end. If managing all that chaos isn’t enough for m’lord, he does so while grieving the loss of his true love: a precious tea urn. 

Understated humor like that is layered throughout, most notably in an extended bit concerning a slain general’s head; Murashige is uncertain which clan can claim the honor of killing because, as a soldier reasons, “We were fighting in the dark, no names were given.” 

Obsessed with matters of ritual and religion and oneupmanship, the picture is as meticulously crafted as it is purposely episodic. As the weather turns, a new whodunit presents itself for Murashige to pass to Kanbei to solve, making The Samurai and the Prisoner far from an ordinary costume epic, even if those majestic visuals and dynamite lead performances suggest otherwise. Its two-point-five hours move quickly, although no pace can completely hide the occasional meandering. —Rod Lott

In theaters, expanding Aug. 7 and 14.

Thriller

The Man in the Back Seat (1961)

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As Batman famously noted, “Some days you just can’t get rid of a bomb.” And some nights, as the crooks of this Brit crime corker learn, you just can’t get rid of the unconscious bookie handcuffed to the briefcase full of cash you just stole from the doggie races. 

A year before playing robbers in Vernon Sewell’s acclaimed thriller Strongroom, Derrin Nesbitt and Keith Faulkner play the robbers of/in Sewell’s The Man in the Back Seat. Harry Locke (The Creeping Flesh) essays the title character, spending almost the entire 57 minutes knocked-out — and likely handing a template to Terry Kiser to utilize nearly four decades later in Weekend at Bernie’s. In contrast, Nesbit and Faulkner, meanwhile, spend much of the movie attempting to find the proper tool to separate the gentlemen from their riches. 

Emerging from the mind of Edgar Wallace, that job is easier said than done, not to mention a fool’s errand. At every turn, their simple quest is hampered by one inconvenience or another, from a flat tire and lack of adequate parking to nosy coppers and a nosier wife (Carol White, Something Big). That qualifies it as a “one crazy night” picture à la After Hours — only not funny. 

Nor is meant to be. It’s a sober example of crime-doesn’t-pay cinema from the bottom half of the bills, with a short detour into British kitchen-sink drama when White is involved. Back Seat bends the rules of reality in its abrupt conclusion, heralded by SUDDEN! BLARING! TRUMPETS! — an unexpected kick to your movie-watching pants. —Rod Lott

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Kitchen Sink

The Trip (1967)

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WTF

Growing up, I never drank alcohol or took drugs, mostly because of an unwavering superiority complex that tended to rub people the wrong way, alienating them and leading me to a lifetime of hardship, strife and loneliness.

But if I had to do an addictive substance, I probably would do acid.

I mean, from what I’ve heard from classroom film strips, after-school specials and related docudramas, it’s a total carnival freakshow where the sights, smells and other sensory factors create a real horror vibe, drudging up the demons of your mind so you can, typically, cast yourself out a fifth-story window. That sounds kind of fun …

Even though I’m far too old now for drug-fueled shenanigans, 1967’s The Trip is supposedly a based-on-real-life excursion to the hallucinogenic world, but with the MPAA on hand to regulate everything we’re about to see … or not see. Written by pre-Chinatown Jack Nicholson, directed by pre-New World Pictures Roger Corman and starring a pre-Easy Rider Peter Fonda, it’s automatically a cinematic exploitation beatdown of low-budget proportions.

The Trip finds the somewhat tanned Fonda as successful commercial director Paul. He’s in the doldrums of ’60s depression from a somewhat-bitter Hollywood divorce, so friend-with-weed-is-a-friend-indeed John (Bruce Dern) takes him to a swingin’ bachelor pad — or, if you’re so inclined, a psychedelic drug den to take some primo stuff, man.

As some trippy sitars begin to play, Paul takes some blotter-paper LSD and slowly starts to float downstream. Here, the movie takes on the approximation of what a trip “actually” feels like, starting from the blending of colors, shapes and strobing dots, man, to on-location shots of rock-climbing, cliff-diving and love-making to buxom women on said rocks.

On his journey, Paul encounters hooded figures, spooky witches, go-go dancers and, of course, the occasional midget. There’s a haunted house, peeling faces, burial shroud, a big-haired woman and campy Mexican music on the soundtrack. And don’t forget the old-time carousel, paranoid delusions about chairs and Dennis Hopper doing his comedic (?) Church of Satan routine with bloodstained pictures on LBJ on the wall.

As his trip comes down — and as the audience loses patience — Paul goes on a rampage though the Sunset Strip, meeting various dancers at a “happening,” laundromat patrons just trying to do their laundry and a real menacing tiger on black velvet that somehow terrorizes him into sobriety.

Hmmm … maybe I don’t want to try acid?

Sure, Fonda, Dern and Hopper are/were great actors after — and in spite of — The Trip, but it’s on par with a Reefer Madness scare film: great to take a toke, a hit or a dose to, but after 30 minutes, you’ll be reaching for the remote and down a box of Ding-Dongs. Or, if you’re really tripping balls, a tentacle will come out your slimy sternum to change the mellow groove-box, man, and take you to the other side.

In the end, the movie is a bum Trip. —Louis Fowler

Get it at Amazon.

Sex

Behind Locked Doors (1968)

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Creeper-peeper boobie movies abound in regional ’60s sinema. Charles Romine’s Behind Locked Doors, however, is unique, if only because the roughie’s villain resembles what would happen if Henry Kissinger crawled into Seth Brundle’s telepod without noticing Isaac Asimov curled up in the window.

The hypothetical result is Mr. Bradley (Daniel Garth), a former mortician turned sex researcher. We’re not talking legit and credentialed like Kinsey or Masters and Johnson, but suspicious and self-studying like that one cousin or uncle your family pretends no longer exists.

We meet the binoculars-equipped Mr. Bradley spying on a barn of hipsters frugging to what sounds like Neal Hefti’s Batman TV theme song. In the hayloft, Mr. Bradley saves the pretty, pert Ann (Eve Reeves) from beatnik rape by whacking the guy with a pitchfork. Ever the gentleman, Bradley even re-hooks her brassiere!

When the party ends, Ann and lesbian co-worker Terry (Joyce Danner) find their convertible mysteriously drained of gasoline. Good thing Mr. Bradley lives nearby so they can stay the night! It’s good only for him, so Ann and Terry can unwillingly participate in his science experiment. It entails being tied to a bed, whipped and subjected to eugenic inquiries such as, “What nationality were your parents?”

Bradley’s unstated hypothesis is if he removes his Hef robe, oils his carpeted chest and Pooh belly, then forces intercourse upon the women … I dunno, they won’t die? And if they do, well, that’s what the basement dungeon is for. There, previous subjects eternally pose topless in unconvincing rigor mortis. Upkeep on their corpses, like daily dusting, falls to the property’s requisite handyman of questionable IQ (Ivan Agar, Shriek of the Mutilated).

With Romine (the Bill Shatner-hosted weirdumentary Mysteries of the Gods) customarily packing in extended sequences of rug-cutting and breast exploration, this horror-tinged Harry Novak production (Hitch Hike to Hell, Rattlers, Kiss Me Quick!, et al.) goes the route of the rote, save for two surprises. One being that, in contrast to the sinister doings, Behind Locked Doors is shot with bright colors; the dungeon is especially vibrant, as if Orgy of the Dead were being shot 10 feet away. The second is Reeves isn’t more voluptuous without clothing. That’s exploitation for you. —Rod Lott

Get it at Amazon.

Horror

Dead Media (2025)

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Instead of hitting the hay to rest for her grad-school audition, the irresponsible Maggie (Sammi-Jack Martincak, 2024’s Incoming) slums on the couch to watch a movie with her fellow Gen Z friends. I can relate to that desire. I also can relate to them having trouble deciding what to watch. In no way can I relate to Maggie spontaneously inviting her exasperating Uncle Heppy (Sam Landman, 2025’s Good Sport) to join, even over her girlfriend’s protests.

Heppy brings his rare DVD for Night of the Lurchers, an obscure 1999 B movie about zombie-like beings that suck the souls from people until they’re mere husks. The film is known for being cursed, with several crew members having died and the director disappeared, all under the usual mysterious circumstances. (The Venture Brothers’ James Urbaniak and Mystery Science Theater 3000 alum Bill Corbett provide film-in-film cameos.) And when Maggie clicks the proper buttons to unlock the disc menu’s rumored Easter egg, the world of the movie no longer restricts itself to staying on the backside of the screen.

As someone who lived — and purchased his way — through the peak DVD era and watched every disk’s special feature until the pile grew overwhelming, I should get a kick out of Dead Media. There’s no doubt writer/director Joseph Scrimshaw’s heart is in the film; it’s even in the right place. It just never catches a beat, as if biding time for someone to swoop in with the defibrillator paddles.

Like many first features, its rhythms are off. That shows up most in the cast’s overly exaggerated, performative approach, which was anathema to my enjoyment. Something of a calmer Rip Taylor, Uncle Heppy isn’t someone I’d want to be stuck next to in social settings (although he does have a killer Blue’s Clues insult), while Maggie is defined by her trauma — a current crutch of the horror genre. And her pals aren’t given much of a personality, other than that the woman (Jessica Fenton) likes to knit, while the guy (Antonio Teodoro) has a hair swoop that threatens to topple him and, for a split second, can be mistaken for Tig Notaro.

The premise to Dead Media has an analog ancestor in the VHS-oriented The Video Dead. As rinky-dinky as that 1987 rental is, its execution doesn’t annoy because the pic is campy by accident, whereas Dead Media tries too hard to be — until the conclusion, when it suddenly wants to get serious in a shift conducted without a clutch. —Rod Lott

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