5 Movies From 2022 That Remind Us of RI

This year was packed with tons of highly anticipated movie releases. I was fortunate (or sometimes unfortunate) enough to see these movies for myself, and sometimes I was reminded of our good ol’ Rhody in these viewings. Here are 5 movies that I watched this year that reminded me of RI in some way, shape, or form.

Prey for the Devil

Directed by Daniel Stamm, Prey for the Devil follows the story of Sister Ann [Jacqueline Byers], a nun with a plagued past who tries to tame her demons at an exorcism school in Boston (yes, pun intended). Any time I watch a horror movie, I compare it to famous predecessors, most notably The Conjuring, which was based on events that happened in RI. This movie makes me think of RI in that all the horror buffs who flock here to visit the Conjuring house quite literally make themselves prey for the Devil. Have fun being haunted! Plus Boston’s not all that fah, and the accents there are haunting.

The Menu

Mark Mylod’s The Menu offers a charming, witty commentary on modern ‘foodie’ culture. 12 guests journey through Hawthorne, an exclusive restaurant that has a meticulously planned menu specifically for their visit, with a heightened focus on a woman named Margot [Anya Taylor-Joy from “The Queen’s Gambit”]. From its elusive, multi-course meals to microscopically arranged dishes, this movie joyfully reminded me of the quirky, niche restaurants that RI has begun to sprout. Though we all enjoy these restaurants, The Menu gives us a refreshing way to play around with them a bit.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

Sam Raimi returned to the Marvel scene this year with Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, which I would argue is a triumphant return to his superhero films. Doctor Strange [Benedict Cumberbatch] works with teen America Chavez [Xochitl Gomez] to save the lives of innocent people across the multiverse by eliminating threats, outrunning the Scarlet Witch [Elizabeth Olsen], and bumping into some fun cameos along the way. One of the biggest draws of this movie was the concept of multiversal versions of popular characters: Captain Carter, Captain Marvel, and Reed Richards, for example. This film in all of its campiness reminded me of RIComicCon, in that you get to see so many unique interpretations of the same character, whether they have their own spin or a gender-bent quality. Sure, this is true for any large Comic Con, but there’s always such a Rhody charm to RICC.

Terrifier 2

Damien Leone left viewers fainting with his highly anticipated sequel film, Terrifier 2. Leone’s film documents the return of Art the Clown [David Howard Thornton], a horrifying (shall I say, terrifying?) clown who stalks locations like Miles County. In this sequel, Art specifically targets teen girl Sienna [Lauren LaVera] and her younger brother Jonathan [Elliott Fullam]. This movie is definitely unique in comparison to other horror movies of its day: it’s unapologetically gory, campy, but genuinely frightening at the same time. Like most tales of clown murderers, I’m often reminded of 2016 when killer clowns were all the rage after there were rumored to be murderous clowns wandering around RI. I remember being in high school at the time, and all of my classmates and I would be freaked out about possibly bumping into a clown on our way home from school. [ed. note – now Maddie works with clowns, and doesn’t seem to mind]

Smile

This delightfully frightening film centers around Dr. Rose Cotter [Sosie Bacon], a psychiatrist who becomes traumatized and consumed by a horrific experience with one of her patients. However, it turns out that she is not simply consumed by her trauma – she’s consumed by an evil force that’s been at work long before she came along. I couldn’t help but think of New Englanders when watching this movie – who else would be seriously unnerved by the sight of so many people smiling around them on the streets?