All posts by Rod Lott

Action

Censor Addiction (2026)

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In 2030, the hubbub in America isn’t around the morning-after pill, but the good-morning pill. The drug was developed to cure violent tendencies until its CEO, Addis (Chris Moss), realized the greater windfall stood in having it secretly cause such urges, thus increasing demand. Bwah-hah-hah!

Meanwhile, a former employee named Soul (Daniel O’Reilly) leads a small movement of highly armed revolutionaries against Addis’ greedy, grubby ways. Soul, who looks like John Travolta playing a Ken doll (or vice versa), is so committed to the movement, he initially refuses sex with his hot-to-trot wife (Marnette Patterson) so he can focus.

Like me, Censor Addiction sags in the middle, as each stage of the factions’ ongoing tête-à-tête grows protracted with heavy dialogue. Human action figure Mike O’Hearn (National Lampoon’s TV: The Movie) livens things up for a minute as an Addis fixer who feels no pain, has advanced healing properties and could be the result of entering “bicep but a person” into ChatGPT. Former pin-up model September D’Angelo also livens things up by falling to the ground rather delicately for someone violently plugged with machine-gun fire.

Censor Addiction is basically a reunion of Michael Matteo Rossi’s The Charisma Killers from 2024, right down to the appearances of Vanessa Angel, Vernon Wells, Ana Ciubara, what looks like the same living room, a familiar driveway, and wacko character names — here including Wizard, Pillar and Canvas Jones. The latter is an Addis henchman played by Bart Voitila (David DeCoteau’s The Pit and the Pendulum); he and Moss stand out by acting with the proper sodium level for the ham they’re given. That’s in step with the Addis commercials that open the movie, targeting Big Pharma with satire reaching for RoboCop-style heights. Rossi doesn’t get there, but he should try more of that. —Rod Lott

Get it at Amazon.

Documentary

Corey Feldman vs. the World (2025)

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No doubt as a child of Hollywood, Corey Feldman has seen some shit and experienced no shortage of shit. But for someone who professes a desire to rise above that shit, Feldman sure can’t help himself from stirring it.

Marcie Hume’s fascinating all-access documentary, Corey Feldman vs. the World, shows her (in)famous subject as a bundle of contradictions, the least of which is being in his mid-50s yet still dressed for a Tiger Beat shoot. He believes people are out to scam him, yet guests at his third wedding are asked to pitch in $40 apiece for the food. He accuses others of riding his coattails, yet opens his concerts with a hype video listing every A-list musician he’s seemingly ever shared a room with. The same video prominently features clips of frequent co-star Corey Haim, an awkward nightly spotlight to grant one’s sexual abuser, as Feldman claims the late Haim was.

Perhaps Feldman’s most incongruous element on display is that despite his undeniable skill and likability as an actor (see 2004’s The Birthday for proof from this millennium), the doc finds the erstwhile Goonie pursuing rock-musician stardom. To garner attention, he’s backed by an all-female band in cheap costumes that Spirit Halloween might market as “Sexy Angel.” Like Hugh Hefner minus the mansion, Feldman lets the ladies live with him, his wife and “their” girlfriend, a scenario he presents to interviewers as so noble, you’d think he was appealing to the United Nations. Never mind some of Corey’s Angels have zero experience playing an instrument before embarking on a 10-city tour, because he’s just helping malleable young women achieve their dreams — well, provided they meet his standards of beauty.

As anyone who’s witnessed Feldman trot out his Michael Jackson simulacrum act since his Dream a Little Dream era knows, singing is not among his talents. However, manipulation and narcissism appear to come to him naturally. I’m not saying Hume’s fly-on-wall camera captures Feldman running a cult in between sad concerts, but he certainly exhibits cult-like behaviors, from comparing himself to the Messiah to seeing everything as a conspiracy against him (hence, the movie’s title). The tour bus breaks down; it has to be the bus company trying to make more money. His show gets a bad review; the journalist must belong to “the dark media.” If that weren’t enough, his home is a shrine to himself, right down to the vinyl Barnes & Noble book signing banner.

Corey Feldman vs. the World gives the man every opportunity to set the record straight and rehabilitate his parasitic image. Like everything else he’s been given or earned over the years, he squanders that potential. It’s a shame, because you want to see him succeed. In his explanations (or attempts at such) for transgressions, one recognizes the bullshit-laden patter of someone so high on their own supply, they’re unable to atone, but have deflection down pat. Feldman is his own worst enemy; having cried wolf so many times in the past — several within these engrossing 98 minutes, and its public coda especially — he continues to deplete any built-up reserve of credibility. As a result, he’s the most unreliable narrator of his life — one he sees as an epic poem, if not a revered classic of world literature. Why don’t you recognize his genius? —Rod Lott

Horror

Ghost Train (2024)

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Young, timid YouTuber Da-kyung, aka “Horror Queen” (SNL Korea cast member Joo Hyun-young) investigates strange goings-on at a particular subway station. She hopes her snooping will prove fruitful in terms of traffic, views, likes, clout, etc. — all of which I have difficulty feeling empathy for in modern movie characters.

For intel, Da-kyung bribes the station agent (Jeon Bae-soo, The Wailing) with hooch. He feeds her more stories for her channel, including a schoolgirl pursued by a bandaged-face woman clutching a mug of acid, and a beauty influencer who undergoes a trypophobic transformation after touching a handrail ring.

Until this point, I didn’t know Ghost Train was an anthology. More surprising is not a single story fails. Not even the one that sounds stupid on paper: a homeless man harassed by a bullying cop gets revenge with cans of killer soda. Executed with O. Henry twistiness, this morality tale is one of the more creative and original ideas K-horror has offered.

Like a dog with a full bladder, Ghost Train jumps right out there and does its business. That’s especially admirable for Asian horror, which has a tendency to balloon toward two hours or more, including Tak Se-woong’s previous film, Devil in the Lake. I also appreciate how the wraparound story isn’t an afterthought or a device for device’s sake; it’s actual plot and feels like it takes up a third or more of the running time. Se-woong treats Da-kyung’s efforts as every bit as important as any of the five standalone stories.

In efficiency and effectiveness, Ghost Train reminded me of 2021’s Ghost Mansion — only to find out the omnibuses share the screenwriting mind of Jo Ba-reun. Both deliver more chills to the spine than jumps to the heart, and that’s the way to go. But don’t confuse Ghost Train with 2022’s similar-sounding The Ghost Station, which isn’t an anthology, but is also about a female content creator so desperate for a spooky scoop, she turns to the turnstiles. Only one is worth getting your bags together for and bringing your good friends, too.* —Rod Lott

*With apologies to Cat Stevens. #nofatwas

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Kitchen Sink

Triple Fisher: The Lethal Lolitas of Long Island (2012)

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WTF

Name a current narcissistic, headline-hangry piece of shit posing as a human being — I’m going with Ruby Franke — and odds are, you’ll find multiple documentaries about them scattered across various streaming platforms. In the pre-digital world, however, their lives and crimes were quickly churned, burned and turned into made-for-TV movies.

Take Amy Fisher — please! Barely six months after the New York teenager put a bullet in the noggin of her married lover’s spouse in 1992, her story became fodder for such three prime-time premieres: NBC’s Lethal Lolita, ABC’s Amy Fisher: My Story and CBS’ Casualties of Love, respectively starring Noelle Parker, Drew Barrymore and Alyssa Milano. Not only did all three air within a week’s time, but two aired opposite each other. I’ve never seen any.

But I have seen all — in a way, via Dan Kapelovitz’s mashup, Triple Fisher: The Lethal Lolitas of Long Island. Riotously entertaining, it tells the same story using select bits from the competing pics. Other than Barrymore’s Amy longing for eggplant parm, it’s difficult to keep track of who’s in which, and it doesn’t matter. In fact, that’s exactly Kapelovitz’s point. 

Down to the beepers and goombah ’fros, the triplets’ shared resemblance is so uncanny, a 23andMe test would be superfluous. It’s almost as if they worked from the same outline; essentially, by pulling info from the shared Porta-Potti of ’90s tabloid journalism, they were. One can imagine the individual producers collaborating:

“Do we really want to spend time on the promotional shirts for Joey Buttafuoco auto repair shop?”
“Well, we will if you will.”
“Okay, settled.”

Triple Fisher is hilarious, although none of the material was intended as anything but Serious Drama. One has Joey, looking not unlike Saturday Night Live’s Horatio Sanz, snorting coke while driving. One’s Mary Jo Buttafuoco is a spitting image of Amy Sedaris’ Strangers with Candy character. Best of all, one has Mr. Fisher asking his daughter who gave her “the herpes.”

Way to go, Joey! —Rod Lott

Sex

Bight (2025)

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As box-office returns for The Housemaid demonstrate, America is horny again! Whatever the reason for the erotic thriller’s comeback, if more turn out neither erotic nor thrilling like Bight, that resurgence could quickly go flaccid.  

Following a miscarriage (of fetus, not justice), Atticus and Charlie are in a rut. Played by Cameron Cowperthwaite and Maiara Walsh, both likable, the spouses hope for a distraction at a party thrown by their couple friends, Sebastian (Mark Hapka) and Naomi (Maya Stojan). Tension follows Charlie and Atticus through the door, because last time they were all together, things got weird. Meaning, they shared a foursome. 

There’s no party — ’tis all a ruse by Sebastian, a pompous art photographer, to coerce his emotionally fragile pals into posing nude for his latest work. This involves — after a round of drugged tea, of course — Atticus and Charlie facing one another and tightly bound in red ropes while Naomi flings paint on their bodies and Sebastian shouts orders (in a manner not unlike the photoshoot scene in Austin Powers: “Burrow! Burrow! Make an interconnected series of tunnels like the Viet Cong!”). 

Until its tail end, Bight is a movie of conversation over action, and such talks are often interminable. Each character says a lot without saying anything of consequence, e.g., “Apologies aren’t weak. What’s weak are the people who don’t say them.” Arguably worse, they speak as if their lines require delivery with a degree of reverence, as if orating Shakespearean monologues onstage at the Globe. You be the judge:

Atticus: “I didn’t know there were rules to exploring, but that first one sounds made up.”
Sebastian: “Well, all rules are made up.” 
Naomi: “We’re the ones that give them power, but fear not. Rules, whether they’re made up or not … are there for a reason.” 

In addition to writing the screenplay with onscreen hub Cowperthwaite (Bury the Bride), Ms. Walsh (Mean Girls 2) calls the shots helming her first feature. She makes Bight look good — even great at times. The problem remains their script. In addition to aforementioned deficiencies, it’s not even clear why the characters get so worked up (not sexually speaking) over certain situations or how they choose to react.

Bight’s most appealing parts are the opening and closing credits, credited to one “Yori X,” who executes both in the style of 007’s celebrated title sequences. But with sex ropes. —Rod Lott

Get it at Amazon.