I truly liked the 1989 adaptation of Stephen King’s Pet Sematary, not to mention the rocking theme song by the Ramones. And I kinda liked the 1992 sequel, even if it shouldn’t have been made, but I dug its early ’90s atmosphere, even it if was a broken fog machine with too much dry ice. I was not enthused by the 2019 remake, with good reason: It was a broad, cynical movie that played like I was trapped in a Spirit Halloween shop on the grounds of an abandoned CVS drugstore. Spooky!

And, in the undead spirit of nonliterary gravedigging, the new prequel, Pet Sematary: Bloodlines, is more of the rotting same, with 50% more David Duchovny. Thank you? (It’s presented by the Paramount Players, a production company which sounds like an ensemble cast of stage and screen actors brought to you by the DuMont Television Network, but not as sociable or talented. Discuss…)

Set in 1969, the film follows Jud Crandall (originally played by Fred Gwynne, then John Lithgow, but here essayed by Jackson White with no Maine accent) and his girlfriend as they leave town to join the Peace Corps. That seems like a good deal until a bird flies into their car window — and, into the front, a growling, disheveled dog on the road.

Taking the dog to his former friend’s house who just came back from the war, where, apparently, a Miꞌkmaq demon possesses you and turns you into a clinically depressed jerk with a chronically bad attitude. Following a pro-war speech, the dog mauls the girlfriend furiously, or as much as the budget will allow.

Meanwhile, Jud’s friend Manny (Forrest Goodluck) — here they insert some Indigenous teachings that are half-baked, for the most part — finds his sister murdered, then resurrected, albeit zombified. In a series of flashbacks, we learn it’s due to an ancient curse. You should know the one. 

Either way, the last 15 minutes are so badly, lit I couldn’t tell what was happening. Sometimes, dead is better than an unlit film, even if it premieres on a streaming service?

Sure, it seems like these movies are part of some Injun sideshow, featuring stereotypical use of the Indigenous tribe; once again, the Miꞌkmaq tribe and their stories are used in a degrading way. But what about how Samantha Mathis, who I thought had been dead for years, is wasted in a nearly wordless role.

Sometimes, with Bloodlines … ah, never mind. —Louis Fowler

Get it at Amazon.

Of the myriad horror franchises alive and kicking today, I consider the 13 Cameras trilogy as the Little Franchise That Could. It’s so under the radar, you may not have realized the 2015 original birthed a sequel, let alone a pair now. Heck, it’s so under the radar, it brushes shoulders with the fighter pilots in Top Gun: Maverick whose planes hug the desert floor to sneak up on bombing the bad guys’ uranium plant, if the speed and gravitational pull don’t kill them first.

And if those things don’t, well, you know the peeping, pernicious Slumlord sure will try. Yep, like all serial killers worth their salt, the sweaty, antisocial Gerald now carries a media-friendly moniker. He’s also now played by James Babson (Ghost Team One) as a reasonable facsimile of Neville Archambault, who died way too young last year (and to whose memory this unexpected second sequel is dedicated).

If 14 Cameras took the linear route in continuing 13’s story, but from a differing vantage point, 15 Cameras takes an off-ramp to explore our nation’s current obsessions with true crime and social media. Closely intertwined, both essentially operate as extensions of the voyeurism in which the Slumlord specializes.

Cool girl Sky (Angela Wong Carbone, 2022’s Resurrection) is utterly, completely fascinated with the Slumlord’s still-raging reign of terror, as depicted on a Netflix-style documentary series. A large part of her inability to look away is because her new residence was one of his hidey-hole homes of homicide. Sky’s slacker husband, Cam (Will Madden, The Beta Test), seems immune to her morbid thrill of association … until he finds a secret room the cops somehow missed, with Gerald’s surveillance system across every corner of the duplex still fully operational.

Suddenly able to peep on his sister-in-law (Hilty Bowen, Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates), Cam — oh, the irony of that name! — is equally transfixed. And when two hot college girls move in next door? You bet he’s binge-watching that livestream.

With this setup, director Danny Madden (Beast Beast) and writer PJ McCabe (who starred in 13 Cameras) make us complicit in Cam’s crimes. As viewers, we know Cam’s eye-in-the-sky (and -shower) actions are wrong — in bold, italics and all caps — yet there we are, wanting to witness every flickering, low-res frame as his eyeballs. Guilty, your honor!

Rather than merely rehash, the film builds on the previous chapters with clever turns, committed performances, tangible suspense and cameos from 13’s surviving victims (Brianne Moncrief and Jim Cummings). 15 Cameras culminates in an über-gruesome driller-killer of a scene that’ll leave horror enthusiasts happy and hopeful for a 16 Cameras. Logicless nomenclature aside, I’ll be ready to move in, provided the creative powers that be find yet another, um, angle from which to gaze. –Rod Lott

Get it at Amazon.