F gets us to almost 25% done with the alphabet. And unlike E, I have loads of F’s. Luckily since there weren’t many for E, I can overload F. Right? That fits within the rules, right? Wait, are there rules?

I stumbled on this gem many moons ago. I wasn’t aware that Bill Paxton dabbled behind the cameras. And what a dabbling this is. Paxton also stars in this. As a single dad mechanic struggling to keep things going with his two sons, but his faith keeps him going. And then one day he has a message from God. He has been tasked with finding demons on earth and dispatching them. And he has a list.

At this point we don’t know what is going on. Is this a religious crusade he is engaging in, or is he becoming a serial killer?

And that’s the juicy goodness of this movie. Going along with the characters on this journey. I don’t want to get into too much here, other than to say that I really wish he had directed more. Only one other feature film to his credit and it was about golf.

If you only know him from his role in Aliens (well that is a really good one), you would do no wrong seeking out this movie. If this were a review, it would be a 10. But F day may be a bit repetitive in that aspect.

A medical drama that dips into horror. Five close friends and medical students have an idea to question the boundaries of life and death. By killing themselves. In a controlled way of course. And they manage to do just that. Stopping their hearts while closely monitoring things and then restarting it. Allowing them to engage in factual discussions about what happens when death occurs.

But coming back to life brings more than just discussions about life and death. Something else came back too. Something specific for each of them. Something within their subconscious mind.

And it isn’t happy with them.

The strength of this movie is in dealing with the personal connections and reasons for their subconscious bringing back the specific horrors that are haunting them.

I mention Kiefer, but this movie has a cast that was amazing for the time. Kevin Bacon. Julia Roberts. Oliver Platt. William Baldwin (ok, not him so much, but the rest of the cast has an astonishing pedigree.)

Would it surprise you to know this movie is an easy 10 for me?

The premise for this is so simple, and yet so terrifying. 3 friends are on a ski vacation. The day is coming to an end as the workers are closing down the lift. But the girl manages to sweet talk the guy into letting them go for one more ride.

Now I’m not a skier. Went once with my kids and that excursion ended early when I discovered a tear in my pants and blood spattered. That was pushing 20 years ago, but I still have the scar. Anyway. I had never thought about how they manage the lift. In this movie they show the “loading worker” putting a sign on a lift chair and then not letting anyone else on. When the “unload worker” gets the sign, he knows it is safe to shut it down.

Our trio accidently manages to get on the lift after the sign has been put up because the worker who put the sign stepped away and another was watching the lift without realizing the sign was up. To make matters worse, the slope is going to be closed for a week. Not a good time to get stuck on a lift.

This 10 star movie is really well done and worth seeking out. Much scarier than the Disney Frozen version.

She was raped by three guys back in her hometown, and essentially fled to Tokyo to start a new life. Which she did. But one day as she is about to leave for work, one of the men arrives at her apartment.

There are cultural differences here as well as biological ones for me talking about this. Because I don’t have the frame of reference to fully understand what she went through and how it impacted her. And in the culture, there is a constant view of saving face. Allowing something bad to happen simply to avoid anyone knowing about it. So when the bad guy shows up, she winds up letting things get out of hand so that nobody finds out she had been raped.

This isn’t a revenge type of movie like I Spit On Your Grave. Even though it does shift in that direction. I think the main difference is that in revenge movies, the main character actively seeks retribution. In this, Chihiro is dragged kicking and screaming back into the horrors that made her flee to Tokyo in the first place.

A really good movie that deserves 10 stars. A movie that will make you think long and hard about the trauma a woman endures because of a sexual assault. And just how far a person can be pushed before they break.