Eight Eyes (2023)

September 28, 2024 3:16 PM

An American married couple touring Serbia adopt a gregarious but vaguely sinister local as their guide, and find themselves in an increasingly disturbing situation.
posted by kittens for breakfast (3 comments total)

I'll try not to be too spoiler-y, as this seemed fairly well-hidden on the AMC+ app and I imagine most people haven't seen it.

If the blurb sounds like the movie's a cross between Hostel and Speak No Evil, surprise! That's exactly what it is. But there's a little more happening here. The leads -- Emily Sweet as the American tourist, and Bruno Veljanovzki as the guide -- are very good, and Veljanovski in particular delivers a fine performance that demands more range than is usually required of the heavy in a suspense movie. The film itself is gorgeous, and features a nice Goblin-y score; the archaic setting and the old school music at first had me thinking the film was set decades ago, which I'm pretty sure was a deliberate choice by the filmmakers, an illusion that isn't broken until we see a cell phone about ten minutes in.

Nevertheless, this is a VERY derivative film, one that may be second-best appreciated by viewers who've seen Hostel, A Serbian Film, Martyrs, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Mandy, Speak No Evil, and The Beyond (plus...it says here, WandaVision???), and may enjoy playing spot the reference, but even more appreciated by horror fans who've seen none of those movies, but unfortunately I don't think those exist.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 3:32 PM on September 28

Directed by Austin Jennings who also directs The Last Drive In with Joe Bob Briggs.
posted by miss-lapin at 9:13 PM on September 28

I forgot to add this is feature film debut.
posted by miss-lapin at 9:14 PM on September 28