1564 – Mimic (1997)

spacetime coordinates: 1990’s New York City

Mimic is a 1997 American science fiction horror film co-written and directed by Guillermo del Toro based on Donald A. Wollheim‘s short story of the same name, and starring Mira Sorvino, Jeremy Northam, Josh Brolin, Charles S. Dutton, Giancarlo Giannini and F. Murray Abraham. The film features Norman Reedus in his Hollywood debut. (wiki)

Originally planned as a single 30-min. short as part of a feature of sci-fi/horror/comedy shorts by Miramax. The other segments also grew into the features Impostor (2001) and Alien Love Triangle (2008).

imdb

1560 – Relic (2020)

!DISTURBING CONTENT!

Relic is a 2020 Australian horror drama film directed by Natalie Erika James in her directorial debut, from a screenplay by James and Christian White. It stars Emily Mortimer, Robyn Nevin and Bella Heathcote. (wiki)

A woman links her mother’s increasingly volatile behavior to an evil presence at their family’s decaying country home.

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imdb   /   rottentomatoes

1559 – Now Apocalypse (TV Series 2019)

spacetime coordinates: 2010’s Los Angeles

Now Apocalypse is an American comedy television series that aired for one season of ten episodes from March 10 to May 12, 2019, on Starz. The series was written by Gregg Araki and Karley Sciortino. Araki also was director and executive producer alongside Steven Soderbergh and Gregory Jacobs. Starz canceled the series on July 26, 2019. Araki later stated that he was shopping the series to other networks.

Ulysses, his friends Carly and Ford, and Ford’s girlfriend Severine navigate love, sex, and fame in Los Angeles. Troubled by sinister, premonitory dreams, Ulysses wonders if the end of the world as we know it is coming, or if he is simply suffering some kind of marijuana-fueled delusions. (wiki)

This is all perfectly well-made, candy-coloured fun as well as being a bang up-to-date exploration of 21st-century sexual identities (co-written by Araki with sex columnist Karley Sciortino), albeit one in which everyone looks amazing all the time. Boyd Hilton / Empire Magazine / rottentomatoes

imdb

1541 – Pinocchio (2019)

spacetime coordinates: 19th century Tuscany, Italy (the city of Catchfools,  Toyland etc)

Pinocchio is a 2019 Italian fantasy film co-written and directed by Matteo Garrone (tale-of-tales-2015), based on the 1883 book The Adventures of Pinocchio by Italian author Carlo Collodi. (wiki)

imdb

1538 – Like Me (2017)

Like Me is a 2017 American crime drama/horror film written and directed by Robert Mockler. The film stars Addison Timlin as a loner on a crime spree that she broadcasts on social media. (wiki)

“Robert Mockler’s visually arresting debut feature, produced by indie horror veteran Larry Fessenden, takes the viewer into a world of fabricated personalities and offers a thought-provoking portrait of isolation in our increasingly digital world.” (rt)

imdb

1535 – Bastion (2011 video game)

spacetime coordinates: the aftermath of the Calamity, a catastrophic event that suddenly fractured the city of Caelondia (/seɪˈlɒndiə/) as well as the surrounding areas of the game’s world into many floating pieces, disrupting its ecology and reducing most of its people to ash.

Bastion is an action role-playing video game developed by independent developer Supergiant Games and originally published in 2011 by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. In the game, the player controls “the Kid” as he moves through floating, fantasy-themed environments and fights enemies of various types. It features a dynamic voiceover from a narrator, and is presented as a two-dimensional game with an isometric camera and a hand-painted, colorful art style. (wiki)

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS (Windows):  OS: Windows XP, Vista, 7 / Processor: 1.7 GHz Dual Core or Greater / Memory: 2 GB / Hard Disk Space: 1.0 GB / Video Card: 512 MB DirectX 9.0c compatible graphics card (shader model 2) / DirectX®: 9.0c / Sound: DirectX 9.0c compatible

steam

1530 – The Vast of Night (2019)

spacetime coordinates: November 1958. small-town Cayuga, New Mexico

The Vast of Night is a 2019 American science fiction film directed by Andrew Patterson, and starring Sierra McCormick and Jake Horowitz. The film is written by Andrew Patterson under the pseudonym of James Montague, and Craig W. Sanger. It premiered at the 2019 Slamdance Film Festival in January 2019. Amazon Studios acquired distribution rights to the film and released it on May 29, 2020, including drive-in theaters in the United States and via video-on-demand on Prime Video. The film’s plot is said to be loosely based on the Kecksburg UFO incident and Foss Lake Disappearances.

The film takes place over a night, with the story framed as an episode of Paradox Theatre, a Twilight Zone-style anthology television series.

Patterson financed the film himself with earnings from his work producing commercials and shorts for the Oklahoma City Thunder and others. It was filmed in three to four weeks at a cost of $700,000. (wiki)

imdb   /   rt