REMNANTS OF WORSHIP
1
Crashing the late-night secret screening had for the first time in years reminded Malcolm of the bold film critic he had been as a young man, a time before this middle-aged functioning-drunk version had torn down his esteem and walled off every viable pathway to prestige. Back then, waves from Hollywood rolled across the nation, and he rode them with limber body and high-toned bravado. It was amazing, how studios cared what he thought of their films, how peers copped his blend of irreverent showboating and scholarly deconstruction. Social media was just a teenager, and he penetrated her alluring expanse, having his way with that fickle, ever-relevant creature.
Nowadays, studios rarely plucked his reviews for use in promotional materials, he struggled to maintain primary status at film festivals, and his podcasts got lost in a haystack of relentless up-and-comers who knew not the differences between “movies” and “films,” and couldn’t seem to fail no matter how stupefying their analyses. Vlog critics lacking attention spans and no discernable talents for taking a film apart were kicking his tired ass.
Tonight, though, Malcolm felt the hard-on of victory. In an abandoned church used as a pop-up theater, that in-demand, trend-bucking wave-rider had returned to hand his successor the keys to a comeback. He had secured a spot to watch the scariest motion picture ever created. Most critics didn’t think the film he was here to see even existed, and if it had, certainly couldn’t live up to the hype.
The ceiling arched high overhead, while a scattering of leaves that had survived here for seasons crunched under his feet as he sat on the butt-worn wood of a church pew. A rack on the pew in front of him contained an ancient hymnal. The place rocked an old-school-horror charm. Hazed-over stained glass forbade the moon full access, but what got through froze the sanctuary in a cold mist of colors. On the right, a large piece of wall had crumbled away, the opening was blocked by a chipped-up sculpture: a woman with her head tilted downward to meet her hands that were pressed together. He thought of his mother, a memory that never failed to lift him with joy and burden him with grief. She was sanctified, like this church had been; were she to speak to him tonight, her words would fall like scripture.
Audience members whispered as if there was need to. Malcolm couldn’t make out most faces in the darkened sanctuary, but their host could not be missed. Tall and pale as wax with lank hair too black to be natural, the man silently stood at the front of the church. Behind of him, in the pulpit, Malcolm saw a huge, dingy silk screen.
“Welcome,” the Announcer said.
A kid with a bowl cut pushed a roll cart to the front of the sanctuary. The cart’s squeaky wheel couldn’t be more distracting. The tray on top contained an array of knives. A cool spring wind pushed through decrepit brick and whistled in the place, and hung in the air like heavenward cries of fallen angels. Malcolm had a tinge of regret for having come here tonight. The desperation that drove him to seek out this moment was a two-sided coin. He did what no other critic had done, but would it really amount to something he could use, something to turn the tide of his life? He had a slate of films to review later today and no one would blame him if walked out. The clash between two Malcolms was interrupted by a sound behind him, a heated whirling, the noise of film flapping through the guts of the projector. Small talk throughout the sanctuary fell away. The big screen up front flickered into motion, its collection of jumping images settled into seamless illusions. Its glow at the center of the pulpit became the world.
Malcolm’s eyes fell into the light.
Copyright © 2026 by Marvin Brown
