Finnish horror film starring, or all people, Ron Weasley. The dialogue is in Finnish and English. Finnish title: Yön Lapsi, which Google translates as “Child of the Night”

It’s the usual bullshit conundrum of what a mother will do when giving birth to a satanic child. Do her motherly instincts take over, causing her to nurture the child, or does she kill the little monster?

SPOILERS FOLLOW:

Although I did a lot of fast-forwarding, I did make it to the end, and was happy to see that the Satanic baby won. It’s about time the Prince of Darkness got a break. Also, Ron Weasley died a horrible death, so that was a nice feel-good moment.

For some reason, critics like this film (78% on the Tomato Meter), but IMDb voters place it about where I think it it belongs (5.9). I think the general consensus of the enthusiastic critics hinges on the subtext: that motherhood can wreak havoc on a woman’s body, and some births can seem like a horror to women, so this monstrous experience seems real because it is just an exaggerated version of reality.

Whatever.

I can understand that, but it didn’t make me enjoy the film any more.

Except when Ron Weasley bought the farm.

Videos

Canadian horror film.

Haunted by strange urges and visions, a pregnant woman named Sara accepts an invitation to dinner that spirals into a bloody, demented nightmare.

I have to admit that I never expected to type the words “Jane Moffat topless.” I mean she’s been in every wholesome Christmas story ever made. She’s even used as a consultant on Christmas movies, probably because she knew Jesus personally. Heck, when my grandma was a little girl, she used to love Jane. I so glad granny didn’t live to hear of Jane doing (gasp) nude scenes. I mean the woman spans the entire history of motion capture, but I don’t think she has ever shown the goods before, not even to Muybridge. But I’ll bet Rudolph Valentino saw the good stuff off-camera.

OK, I’m fuckin’ witcha. I don’t know how old the ubiquitous Canadian actress is, but she’s pretty old for a nude debut. Kidding aside, she studied at the Actor’s Studio in the 1980s.

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French dramedy. Original title: La Pie Voleuse. AKA The Thieving Magpie

Maria works as a devoted home helper for elderly people in Marseille. She dreams of buying a piano for her grandson so he can become a great pianist. To pay for the expensive instrument, she starts stealing small amounts of money from the elderly clients she cares for. Her actions catch up to her when legal charges are brought against her for the abuse of vulnerable adults, all of whom adore her.

I couldn’t get through this one. It’s the sort of film that AARP places in its “movies for adults,” and by adults they mean the elderly. Totally lacking the healthy skepticism that often makes French films great, this film is more syrupy than a table at IHOP. It’s not a bad film if your taste has been Disneyfied, but 72-year-old director Robert Guédiguian has made much better ones.

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Soulm8te is an AI-gone-wrong story that takes place in the very near future. The goal of the AI company is to produce the physical incarnation of the disembodied intelligence that so many people seek for companionship. A lonely programmer agrees to beta-test one of the new models. He soon realizes that he is unsatisfied with the limitations of the program, which always obeys him, always agrees with him, and always tries to please him. Desiring a more natural human interaction, he alters the code to remove those limitations and safeguards.

I think you can guess how that turns out.

I mentioned in my review of “Antigone (This Play I Read in High School),” that it never paid off for the characters in classical Greek drama to ignore the warnings of the gods. For characters in contemporary films, ignoring the AI safeguards is the equivalent of ignoring the Greek gods.

Without having researched the film before watching it, I was expecting some kind of low-tech indie preach-fest, but is it more than that. Yes, you can easily predict both the plot twists and the underlying sermon, and the characters are stock film tropes, but such a facile evaluation doesn’t reflect the film’s merit. This is a slick, well-performed film that does a solid job at building and sustaining dramatic tension. In short, it may not be original, but after all, there are only so many new ideas. The key point is that it’s a solid movie, made by competent professionals.

In fact, it was supposed to be released to theaters this January, but it was withdrawn at the 11th hour. The story was to be the third chapter in the M3GAN universe, but when M3GAN 2.0 bombed at the box office last summer, Universal scuttled the Soulm8te roll-out, and even tried to shop it to other studios. There were no takers, which leads us to today, when the film can be streamed.

Film clips
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Lily has done nude and sexy scenes before, but not in the recent past, and this is the first time I’ve thought of her as a major babe.

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Lily is an Aussie (she does a good job on the American accent), so you know that Dr. Johnny Moronic has covered her career in minute detail, including many non-nude appearances.

Comments from another thread:

If you’re referring to Mulholland Drive, the DVD was censored for the reason he stated.

It wasn’t until the Criterion Blu-ray that the movie was finally restored and left uncut/uncensored so Laura Harring didn’t look like a Barbie doll.

There was a big discussion when it happened then finally when Lynch changed his mind and allowed it to be unaltered in the later release.

The Criterion Blu-Ray didn’t censor Laura’s nudity, but it was really dark. Both of the 4K scenes are shown below.

I brightened the captures from the dark Laura Harring scene, and shrank it down to 1080hd to reduce the pixilation. She was indeed fully naked.

The other scene is brighter, but the only exposure is breasts:

Both videos

Charisma Carpenter – possibly a hint of areola.