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Soul of the World (The Ascension Cycle, #1)
Soul of the World (The Ascension Cycle, #1)
David Mealing | 2017 | Contemporary, Science Fiction/Fantasy
8
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
The biggest weakness of this book in some ways is also it's biggest strength, and that is the lack of explanation. This book does not lead you by the hand, but instead expects you to pick things up as you go along. No info-dumping found bound within these pages! At the start I found this very off putting, as the magic systems are so intriguing you want to know everything about them straight away, making it a bit of a slog to start with. Plus the fact the chapters alternate between three different view points, investment came hard. But boy it is worth persevering! As the magic systems are slowly revealed to you, you get more and more invested, and it definitely didn't follow the path I was expecting, especially in one aspect, which I won't spoil here. It is very hard to believe this is a debut novel. I'm excited to proceed with the series in due time!
  
The Hills Have Eyes (1977)
The Hills Have Eyes (1977)
1977 | Horror
9
7.4 (10 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Cannibal Savages
The Hills Have Eyes- is a disturbing psychological survival horror film. Wes did it again.

The plot: Wes Craven's cult classic about cannibalistic mountain folk, including the Carter family, who are on the trail of stranded vacationers in the arid Southwest Californian desert.

Craven based the film's script on the legend of cannibal Sawney Bean, which Craven viewed as illustrating how supposedly civilized people could become savage.

Wes Craven desired to make a non-horror film, following his directorial debut, The Last House on the Left (1972), because he saw the horror genre as constraining. However, he could not find producers interested in financing a project that did not feature bloody violence.

The film was initially given an X rating by the MPAA due to its graphic violence. Due to this, significant material was removed from Fred's death scene, the sequence where Mars and Pluto attack the trailer, and the last confrontation with Papa Jupiter.

Its a excellent movie.
  
The Vast of Night (2019)
The Vast of Night (2019)
2019 | Mystery, Sci-Fi
High-concept, low-budget SF movie. It's the night of the year's first basketball game somewhere in Texas, and most people are watching. But small-town DJ Everett and switchboard operator Fay aren't, and they start to get strange reports of mysterious radio signals and peculiar lights. The same phrase recurs again and again: there's something in the sky...

Framed as a Twilight Zone or Outer Limits pastiche, and while the subject matter is certainly similar, much of the style is not: long takes, either static or mobile, rattling dialogue, a sort of self-consciousness about form which is only to be expected in a directorial debut. Interesting subtext about the aliens' agenda and the people prepared to speak up about their experiences (generally speaking, it's people from the lowest strata of society). Genuinely tense and even a bit eerie in places: Rod Serling would never have written something so oblique, but I think he would have appreciated its quality regardless.