MOTION PICTURE ASSOCIATION ACCREDITED OUTLET

Written by Klep Napier for WeAreCritiX.com The New York Comic Con panel for IT: Welcome to Derry  made one thing crystal clear. This series is not a Pennywise parade. It is about the fear he leaves behind, the town that absorbs it, and the people who shape it. The creative team and cast kept returning to the same idea: hold the clown back, build tension, and make his arrival unpredictable. The Plan: Play the “Jaws” game with Pennywise Executive producer Barbara Muschietti sai

An award-winning foreign short film, After Dark delivers a haunting 18-minute experience exploring bias, perception, and moral judgment.

Written by Klep Napier for WeAreCritiX.com The 2026 Oscar season is officially in motion, and among the rising contenders is a small but powerful short film making big waves across the festival circuit. After Dark , directed by Iain Forbes , recently won Best International Short Film  at the 2024 Foyle Film Festival , qualifying it for potential nomination at this year’s Academy Awards . I sat down with Forbes and his lead actor Simen Båstad   to discuss the film’s inspiratio

Written by Klep Napier | WeAreCritiX.com Sometimes, sequels aim simply to repeat the original. The Black Phone 2 , directed again by Scott Derrickson  and produced by Blumhouse  and Universal Pictures , goes a step further: it expands the nightmare. Set squarely in the Halloween corridor, the film reunites audiences with one of modern horror’s most unsettling villains: The Grabber  (Ethan Hawke). What follows is a slow-burn, tension-stacked follow-up that leans into trauma, t

Written by Klep Napier | WeAreCritiX.com Sometimes the films that stick with you most are the ones you never saw coming. Affection , directed by B.T. Meza   and starring genre favorite Jessica Rothe  ( Happy Death Day , Boy Kills World ), is one of those films. I didn’t seek this one out, it found me. And I’m glad it did. Premiering on October 18, 2025 , during this year’s Brooklyn Horror Film Festival , Affection  is a slow-burning, skin-crawling thriller that gaslights its

By Klep Napier | Wearecritix.com There are moments in entertainment history when technology doesn’t just change how we play, it changes the stories we tell. The mid-1980s was one of those moments. Movie theaters were booming with blockbuster sequels and action heroes, MTV was turning pop stars into icons, and home technology was creeping into everyday life in ways that felt almost futuristic. Yet amid that cultural explosion, the video game industry was on life support. The i