This year kicked of with a video sent from Harry’s buddy, Quint, over in New Zealand. Quint’s been on the set of The Hobbit for the last few months and has been reporting on the filming of the future masterpieces. He did some behind the scene intros for the video and it was all a lot of fun. Then Peter Jackson called Gandalf (Ian McKellen) over because Quint was feeling pretty awful for not being at his best friend’s birthday party. Gandalf did a little hocus pocus and, after some in theatre explosions, Quint was in the audience! Gandalf leaned in to the camera and told us that he had secretly stashed a copy of the trailer in Quint’s bag just before he sent him.

WE GET TO SEE A TRAILER!?!?!

Well, first, Quint had to find a trailer bearer. You see, you don’t just walk into the Alamo projection room. A few people stood up, but it was Elijah Wood who stood up and yelled, “I will take it!” and ran up to Quint.

Wow. We’re all such freakin’ geeks, because this was awesome.

Well, they couldn’t get the trailer to work, so we had to go into the first film, but we did eventually see the trailer…three times in a row. I can’t tell you anything specific about it, but godDAMN, it looks amazing. I am hardly going to be able to wait until next December to see this movie.

The first movie that we saw was one that Harry introduced by saying that we had all probably just paid to see it very recently. He didn’t care, though, because it’s his birthday and he doesn’t care if it was just released a couple of weeks ago. The movie was pretty much about him and, as soon as he programmed it, all the rest of the programming just fell into place. Luckily, Hugo is probably my favorite movie this year.

Watching it a second time, I really noticed all of the more subtle film images throughout the entire movie. All of the clock faces and gears look like film reels and many of them make the noise of a film projector. Hugo runs around the clockworks, looking out of all of the windows as if he’s watching movies about all of the people who work at the train station. He’s a voyeur just like we all are when we watch movies.

I love this movie and it’s at least as good on a second viewing. It also helped to introduce what ended up being an underlying theme of the festival and, really, all movies: unexpected adventure.

Next up was a movie that plays a big role in Hugo.

A TRIP TO THE MOON (1902)

***** (5/5)

Directed by: Georges Méliès
Written by: Georges Méliès

Georges Melies was THE early visionary of film. Before Melies, film was a sideshow technology. Even the Lumiere Brothers had no idea that film would be a truly big deal. Melies figured out that you could actually tell a story with film.

A Trip To The Moon is Melies’ most famous film and deservedly so. It tells a simple story of a group of scientists (or wizards, depending on how you take the long beards and hats that they wear) who figure out how to go to the moon. They all climb aboard their rocket, hit the man in the moon in the eye, fight some mooninites, bring one back to Earth and are heroes. End story.

While the story was huge for its time, the sets are what amazes now. It’s all stage sets, but they still look better than a lot of CGI sets made today. Because of his background as a magician, he was the first filmmakers to use special effects on screen. His use of jump cuts to make people and objects appear, disappear and change instantly was an accidental invention, but he used it all the time to amaze his audiences.

If you have any interest in film history, A Trip To The Moon is absolutely essential to your film viewing. If you like sci-fi films, this was the first. It’s beautiful to see on the big screen. I wish it had been a tinted version (hand-tinted, of course), but it’s still a great film that should be seen by anyone with the slightest interest in film.

JUST IMAGINE (1930)

** (2/5)

Directed by: David Butler
Written by: Buddy G. DeSylva/Lew Brown/Ray Henderson

In 1930, Hollywood was looking for something new to put on the screen. Movies had just started talking fairly recently, so what could they do with this new version of the media?

Well, a sci-fi musical, of course!

That’s right, kids. This is not only Hollywood’s first sci-fi film, but it’s the first sci-fi musical!

Let’s not take that as a great thing just yet.

Basically a remake of A Trip To The Moon, Just Imagine takes place in 1980, a time far too distant for citizens of 1930 to even dream about. Cars have been replaced by airplanes, marriages have to be approved by the state (weird…we’re pretty much just starting that now), everyone has a number instead of a name and there are no people with pigment in their skin.

In other words, it’s a Republican dream!

LN-18 (a pre-Tarzan Maureen O’Sullivan) and J-21 (John Garrick) are in love. Unfortunately, another man has asked for permission to marry LN-18 and he is above J-21 on the pecking order. This, of course, means that he gets first priority. Unless, of course, J-21 can distinguish himself in the his field: aviation.

What’s a boy to do when everything’s already been done in aviation?

Luckily, esteemed scientist X-10 (Wilfred Lucas) wants to send J-21 to Mars. If he succeeds, he’ll be able to marry LN-18 and everything will be hunky dory. This can only happen, though, if he survives the trip.

Along for the fun are his best friend RT-42 (Frank Albertson) and Single-0 (El Brendel). Single-0 is a man who was somehow frozen in 1930 and is thawed out. He’s all about comic relief and has almost no bearing on the story. He just runs around with a Swedish accent (“What about yustice?!”) and does some vaguely funny Harpo Marx routines. El was a comedian at the time and this was his schtick on vaudeville. He’s kinda funny, but nothing to write home about.

Really, there’s not much to write home about for any of this movie. The sets are pretty amazing and the effects are nice. (A couple of the uncredited effects guys would go on to break down barriers with King Kong a few years later.) But that’s really it. The story is silly, the acting is stiff and the songs are kind of awful.

This isn’t an easy film to see. Amazon is out of stock and the ones that are for sale by other sellers are $999.99. Trust me. It’s not worth all that. If you really want to see the sets, check out a serial from the same time period. A lot of them were reused for…well, I can’t actually remember the serial. Apparently, it’s awesome, though. Too bad.

If you do see it, check out the strangest song of the entire movie where RT-42 and his wife sing about how they no longer kill flies because that fly might be in love with another fly. Then they save a pair of flies just so they can force them upon each other.

Um…what?

Also, there’s a jab at Henry Ford’s antisemitism. THAT is some funny stuff.

Next up was a different kind of adventure.

TINKER TAILOR SOLDIER SPY (2011)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Tomas Alfredson
Written by: Bridget O’Connor/Peter Straughan
Based on book by: John le Carre

John le Carre is one of the preeminent Cold War spy novels. With books like The Spy Who Came In From The Cold (1962) and The Looking Glass War (1965), he basically invented the cerebral, inward-looking spy novel. His books aren’t about globe hopping and lady laying. His are about the inner struggles of being a spy and the inner workings of MI6 and the Circus, the upper echelon of British spies.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (1974) is one of his best loved novels with his most well known creation, George Smiley. Smiley is a man whose entire life revolves around the Circus. Although he’s married, his wife is barely a character in the story…or his life, for that matter.

In the beginning of the film, Smiley (Gary Oldman) is in the middle of a forced retirement. His former boss, Control (John Hurt), calls him back into duty to find out who the mole is among his co-workers. They all seem to have different views from Control, but one of them is feeding information back to the Soviets. Who could it be? When Control dies, Smiley is basically on his own to save his country.

There’s the entire plot. Just a few lines. But, while the movie is VERY good, it’s also incredibly hard to follow at times. In fact, in my already tired state at this point in the day, I was pretty much lost by the time I got my burger. (In fact, that might have been what totally distracted me from what was truly going on. Don’t eat while watching this movie. You’ll get lost and never find your way again.) With all of the names, double-crosses and characters, it was nearly impossible to truly figure out.

This, of course, does not make this a bad film. The plot is kind of a McGuffin. We don’t necessarily care who the mole is. What we care about is seeing Smiley go through the motions of finding the mole. We care about the toll that it takes on Smiley. We care about seeing all of these characters interact together.

It also helps that Gary Oldman is at the top of his game here. Smiley is a very “normal” character and Oldman manages to make him real. There were definitely times that I forgot that this was Sid Viscous/Beethoven/Sirius Black that I was watching. His voice has a British aristocracy lilt to it that I’ve never heard from him before. His face, although not really made up, was older than ever before. And he was perfectly amazing.

The rest of the cast was just as good. Toby Jones, Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, Benedict Cumberbatch (it was nice to see Sherlock play Holmes), Ciaran Hines…all were great. Alfredon’s (Let The Right One In) direction caught all of these performances perfectly, often from a distance away…much like a spy would have.

After sitting through the two hour film, just about everyone had the same look on their face: “That was great! What happened?” Luckily, the studio knew that they had made possibly the most cerebral and complex spy film in decades, so the Alamo staff was provided with dossiers for every audience member, complete with plot points, character sketches and basically a flow chart explaining what the fuck happened.

I kind of love them for it.

This is definitely a film that warrants multiple viewings. I can’t wait to give it another shot and see if I can follow more of it. I’ll have one up on the rest of the audience with the dossier in my hand.

Hell, I actually can’t wait to read the book.

SHERLOCK HOLMES: A GAME OF SHADOWS (2011)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Guy Ritchie
Written by: Michele Mulroney/Kieran Mulroney
Based on characters created by: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Sherlock Holmes has come back in a big way lately. In 2009, Guy Ritchie directed the amped up version of the world’s greatest detective to accolades and dollars. Then there was the BBC update of the original stories perfectly cast with Benedict Cumberbatch as Holmes and Martin Freeman as Watson. There will also be an American version of the Holmes legend on television soon.

Now, Ritchie is back with the sequel to the film that restarted it all. This time out, Holmes (Robert Downey, Jr) and Watson (Jude Law) are on the run from Holmes’ greatest enemy, Professor James Moriarty (creepily played by Jared Harris). The two men are perfectly matched in just about every way with one exception: Moriarty is willing to kill anyone who gets in his way. Even the innocent.

Watson, of course, is about to get married when he and Holmes reconnect, so he is none too excited to get caught up in this latest adventure. The bromance is palpable and the near homosexuality of the two leads is played up even more than it is in the BBC show. “Lay with me, Watson.”

It’s been a couple of years since I’ve seen the original, so it’s hard for me to compare the two. From what I remember of it, though, I think this one is just as much fun and just as good. Yes, there are plenty of explosions and the direction is kinetic, as always. This is no sedate, Basil Rathbone film, but I think you all knew that. To say that it has a Michael Bay style is to insult the movie. It’s not dumb like a Bay movie. It’s not shit like a Bay movie. This is a Guy Ritchie film and he is getting back in our good graces by using other peoples’ characters. (His next project is The Man From U.N.C.L.E.)

Of course, this movie really has almost nothing to do with the original stories. There are things that fans will recognize, but there’s no story that I know of that follows this kind of path. (Somehow I doubt that Conan Doyle teamed the boys up with a sexy gypsy woman (Noomi Rapace) who kicks just as much ass as the two men. And I don’t think that Mycroft (Stephen Frye) was as…strange…as this version of him.)

This was an incredibly fun movie and, honestly, I can’t wait for these folks to team up again for a third film.

THE BEAST WITH FIVE FINGERS (1946)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Robert Florey
Written by: William Fryer Harvey/Curt Siodmak/Harold Goldman (uncredited)

At one time, a man like Peter Lorre could be a huge star. With his bugged out eyes and crazy voice, you would think that he would be a hard sell. But Lorre was a movie star pretty much from the first time he stepped onto the screen in M in 1931. He has never stopped being an icon.

That’s why it was a bit surprising when Harry said that he had never played a Lorre film at BNAT. The fuck you say?

The Beast With Five Fingers was a pretty good way to start.

Lorre plays an astronomer who lives with an eccentric old pianist (Victor Francen) who has lost the use of his right side. His music has been rewritten by a cynical young man named Bruce Conrad (Robert Alda). When the old man dies leaving all of his money to his nurse (Andrea King), his descendants descend upon his house to try to make it seem like the old man was a blundering fool and that the money should come to him. Of course, Bruce and the nurse are in love.

Oh yeah…Peter Lorre. He actually plays a big role in this, although the description makes it seem like he doesn’t. He is pretty much the catalyst for the whole thing to happen. He’s incredibly protective of his books and his research and wants everyone out of the house…except for the nurse, of course. She can stay.

As time goes on, Lorre goes crazier and crazier and starts to see a disembodied hand crawling around the house and occasionally playing music. Sometimes it even kills people.

This is a great little film that, unfortunately, is hard to find outside of this sort of festival. It’s never been released on DVD and Warner has no plans of releasing it. That’s really too bad because I think the movie could find a niche audience now.

If you ever get a chance to see it, check it out.

G.I. JOE 2: RETALIATION TRAILER

Well, they got rid of Stephen Sommers, so I guess that’s a step in the right direction. But they replaced him with Jon M Chu, director of such classics as Step Up 2, Step Up 3D and Justin Beiber: Never Say Never.

Uh…what?

First off, was anyone really clamoring for this sequel? Second…shit. I don’t even know. I don’t remember anything about this trailer. Whatever. Do what you want, Hollywood. Enough stupid people will be into it.

Let’s move on.

THE ADVENTURES OF TINTIN (2011)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Steven Spielberg
Written by: Steven Moffat/Edgar Wright/Joe Cornish
Based on comics by: Herge

Tintin is one of the most popular characters in the world. Created by Georges Prosper Remi (aka Herge) in Belgium in 1929, he has become like Mickey Mouse to about 85% of the world.

So, you ask, why have you not heard of him? That’s because people in America don’t really care about what happens in any other country. Most Americans had never heard of Jackie Chan until Rumble In The Bronx in 1995. He had only been making movies for about 25 years before that, becoming the most famous man in the world. Why would we have heard of him?

I’m not saying that Americans are stupid. We’re just very insular. Many people see something foreign and they suddenly become uninterested. That really is a shame, though, because other countries make some amazing stuff.

Anyway, enough PSAs. Tintin is like a Belgian Mickey Mouse. He’s a boy reporter who was able to have 23 and a half adventures before Herge died in 1983 while writing the 24th. Sometime in the early 80s, a young director named Steven Spielberg became interested in Tintin because someone compared Raiders Of The Lost Ark to his adventures. Herge then became a fan of Spielberg saying that he was the only man who could possibly bring Tintin to life. Spielberg bought the rights in 1983 and has never let them go.

Skip ahead nearly 30 years when Spielberg goes to fellow Tintin fanatic Peter Jackson to see about using WETA to do special effects for a live action Tintin movie. Jackson says, “No! The only way to do it is motion capture and CGI!”

Agreeance!

I’ve never read a Tintin book, but I feel like I need to now that I’ve seen this movie. It follows Tintin (Jamie Bell) as he and his dog, Snowy, run amok all over the world. They meet Captain Haddock (Andy Serkis), rescue him from smugglers led by Mr. Sakharine (Daniel Craig) and then search for treasure. There’s also the Inspectors Thompson (Nick Frost and Simon Pegg), two identical policemen who bumble their way through helping Tintin catch the bad guys.

And it all starts with a model ship.

This is a really fun movie with amazing animation. For just about the first time, motion capture isn’t totally creepy. I think it’s probably because they don’t try to make these characters look realistic. They look like slightly more realistic versions of the real comic book characters. (Watch for the analog drawings at the beginning of the film.) The 3D works beautifully, too. Not as essential as Hugo, but still a good addition to the film.

I think, though, that even if the animation was as creepy as Polar Express the movie would still be a lot of fun. Story and action go a long way and this one has both to spare. The action is basically non-stop, just like it would be in a comic book.

My only complaint is that maybe the story moves a bit TOO fast. I felt like we got caught up right from the start and there wasn’t enough time to really figure out what was going on who who these people really were. Then again, maybe that’s how it would be in real life. Just go, go, go and don’t stop to think.

I think I’ll have to see it one more time to really get a good feel for it. I had a lot of fun with it, but I think it may be a movie that a second viewing would give it another half star…maybe even a full one.

THE DEVIL INSIDE TRAILER

From the producer of the Paranormal Activity movies and (sigh) Insidious, this looks like Paranormal Exorcist. Lots of people (same person? not sure) getting possessed and then breaking their own backs. Oh, and found footage. Of course. We can’t make a horror movie anymore without found footage.

I dunno. Maybe I’ll check it out on video. I just don’t really want to give this guy THAT much more money.

Oh yeah, when the trailer said, “Based on a true story,” the whole audience laughed.

PORCO ROSSO (1992)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Hayao Miyazaki
Written by: Hayao Miyazaki

Hayao Miyazaki is one of the best directors alive today, live action or animation. The man is amazing. All of his films are at least entertaining on some level. There are some that I don’t like as much as others (don’t shoot me, but I’m just not that into Totoro), but they’re all great.

Porco Rosso is one that has always been on my list, but I’ve just never gotten around to checking it out. I mean, it’s about a pig who flies airplanes. Why does that sound good? Well, it has the name Miyazaki attached to it. That’s why.

Porco is the best pilot in the air just before World War II breaks out. He makes his living as a bounty hunter and rescues people from air pirates. He also happens to have had a spell put on him that turned him into a pig. This, of course, does not stop him from romancin’ the ladies. There’s one lady in particular that he’s had his eye on, but he’s constantly thwarted by Curtis, a fellow flying ace.

This was definitely a movie that I could not stay awake through just from sheer fatigue. It had nothing to do with the quality of the film because, you know, it’s Miyazaki.

Here’s the deal, though. This is Harry’s favorite Miyazaki film. He dressed as Porco for Halloween this year and just loves the shit out of this movie.

I don’t think it’s going to be one of my favorites. I just couldn’t quite connect with it like I did something like Princess Mononoke or Castle In The Sky. It’s a good film (note the four stars), but I don’t think it’s Miyazaki’s best. I will, however, give it another shot sometime.

CABIN IN THE WOODS (2012)

****½ (4.5/5)

Directed by: Drew Goddard
Written by: Joss Whedon/Drew Goddard

Joss Whedon did a LOT for the horror genre when he created Buffy The Vampire Slayer. It’s a real turning point for horror if only for the girl-centric plot of the whole thing.

Unfortunately, he’s also inspired a lot of rather uninspired clones over the years.

Cabin In The Woods is his way of knocking all of them down a peg or two…even if that’s not what he says it is.

I’m not allowed to do a detailed review here, but I can tell you that this movie kicked my ass. It’s so freakin’ smart, funny and full of turns that you don’t quite expect that it’s hard not to fall in love with it. It takes every trope of horror movies and turns them on their inverted ears in a way the Wes Craven and Kevin Williamson couldn’t quite bring themselves to do with Scream.

It’s been a long and winding road for this movie (it was filmed a few years ago, I think), but it’s finally coming out and I hope that it endears itself to lots of fans. It deserves it.

GHOST RIDER: SPIRIT OF VENGEANCE (2012)

** (2/5)

Directed by: Mark Neveldine/Brian Taylor
Written by: Scott M. Gimple/Seth Hoffman/David S. Goyer
Based on comics by: Roy Thomas/Gary Friedrich/Mike Ploog

When Harry announced this one, I think most of the audience groaned a little bit. Seriously? Ghost Rider 2? Why would we want to see a sequel to that shitty movie?

Actually, he had the same reaction when Columbia asked if he wanted to screen it at BNAT. He said, “I need to see it.” He did and he thought it was completely different from the first one and kinda loved it.

Again, I’m not allowed to write a detailed review…but I’m not really sure that I could even if I wanted to. I not only couldn’t stay awake through it, I wasn’t interested enough to stay awake. Sure, Nicolas Cage is in Bad Lieutenant mode here, so he’s a lot of fun to watch while he goes through his weird faces and crazy voices. That, unfortunately, doesn’t make the movie particularly good. It’s good enough to be better than the first, but that’s not saying much. Really, only the kinetic direction (from the guys who brought us the Crank saga…they do know how to get into the middle of the action) and Nic’s craziness keeps it from being the worst movie at BNAT this year.

THE GREY (2012)

****½ (4.5/5)

Directed by: Joe Carnahan
Written by: Joe Carnahan/Ian Mackenzie Jeffers
Based on short story by: Ian Mackenzie Jeffers

Joe Carnahan is one of those directors that everyone just kind of lost faith in. When Narc came out in 2002, everyone thought that the 70s cop drama was coming back. It was a great story of dirty cops in a dirty world.

Then things started going slightly awry. Smokin’ Aces came out and no one but me liked it at all. No, I didn’t think that it was a great film, but I thought that it was fun. I was all alone. Then came The A-Team.

Done with that.

I really hope that The Grey changes peoples’ minds again. It’s the story of Liam Neeson vs. very large wolves.

Ok, it’s more than that. Liam and his co-workers go down in a plane crash in the snows of Alaska. Only seven of them survive. He is the wolf expert, so he becomes the de-facto leader, even if some of them aren’t so happy with that “decision.” The wolves pick the men off one by one as Liam becomes more and more of a badass and, actually, more full of regret and pathos. His mind is constantly on his wife back home. What happened to make him put his shotgun in his mouth just before he got on the plane?

No action movie is this, though. This is a dark action drama where the men are worse enemies to themselves than the wolves are. The infighting is believable and sometimes hard to watch. Even without the infighting, though, nature is stronger than man. This film never lets us forget that. Never…

This is a great film and I really hope that it brings Joe back in favor. He has pulled a performance out of Neeson that very well could be award caliber. Liam is one of my favorite actors currently working and I love that he’s become a thinking man of action. This is one of his best performances.

After this flick, we all piled onto buses and headed for the IMAX theatre down the road.

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – GHOST PROTOCOL (2011)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Brad Bird
Written by: Josh Appelbaum/André Nemec
Based on television show created by: Bruce Geller

Why the fuck can’t I dislike Tom Cruise movies anymore? Why the fuck does he keep making good movies while he, personally, still sucks?

Sigh. Whatever. The Mission: Impossible franchise has become his goto to make more money and, actually…they’ve become pretty goddamn great. After the mediocrity of the first and outright badness of the second, the third was awesome and the fourth is at least its equal. This has become the director’s franchise that Tarantino has always wanted the Bond series to become.

This time out, the IMF have been disbanded because the American government think that they have gone rogue. They were framed by a mysterious man (Michael Nyqvist, the original Mikael Blomkvist in the Swedish Girl Who… trilogy) who wants to start a nuclear war between Russia and the US. In fact, he has made tension run higher than it has since the Cuban Missile Crisis.

After the Secretary (Tom Wilkinson) is killed, Ethan Hunt (Cruise) is forced to go underground with his crew (Paula Patton and Simon Pegg) and the Secretary’s adviser (Jeremy Renner). The four of them become a well-oiled machine…even if their machines aren’t so well-oiled. In fact, that’s kind of a running joke in the film. None of their equipment seems to work quite right.

Funnier than the last film which, if I remember correctly, was a bit dour, Ghost Protocol is non-stop action and a LOT of fun. I’m not sure what made JJ Abrams and Tom Cruise entrust animation/Pixar director Brad Bird (The Iron Giant, The Incredibles, Ratatouille) with their baby, allowing him to cut his live-action teeth on the fourth installment, but it looks like their gamble paid off in spades. He handles the job like a pro and I hope it leads to more action flicks like this: fun, thoughtful and full of actual story.

A lot has been said about Jeremy Renner being a possible replacement for Tom if he ever decides to leave the series. They’ve been denying it, but I would be up for it. Sure, I don’t think Tom is going to leave his cash cow anytime soon. But if he does, they could do worse than Renner. He’s a really good actor and handles the action very well. Honestly, if this was Cruise’s last M:I film, I wouldn’t be sad. Brandt is a good character and could totally hold the franchise up.

By the way, I would totally buy this Saul Bass inspired poster. Why have I never seen it before? One of the best posters I’ve seen in a while.

So, that was it. One of the better lineups for BNAT, I think. Only two movies that really weren’t up to par, but they even had their place in keeping the flow. (Without Ghost Rider 2, when would I have slept?!)

Another Butt Numb-A-Thon down. I’m already ready for next year.

THE ARTIST (2011)

***** (5/5)

Directed by: Michel Hazanavicius
Written by: Michel Hazanavicius

Silent film is a dead art. Out of all of the styles of film that have come and gone, silent film is the one that no one really goes back to. Outside of one Mel Brooks movie and an episode of Buffy, I can’t think of another silent film made since the early 30s. (I’m sure there are some, but I just can’t think of them right now.)

Michel Hazanavicius has taken up the challenge and made a full-length silent film in the age of CGI effects and Digital Dolby sound. And, strangely enough, it’s fucking amazing.

It’s 1927 in Hollywood and George Valentin (Jean Dujardin in a role that Kavin Kline would have played very well about 20 years ago) is the biggest star in the world. His series of films (including A Russian Affair and A German Affair) are adventure/espionage movies where he and his trusty Jack Russell terrier roam around the world spying on folks and getting tortured.

Just after the premiere of one of his films, George meets Peppy Miller (Berenice Bejo). The two share a moment and then she becomes Hollywood’s IT girl.

Then, tragedy strikes: sound. Can George’s career survive? Will Peppy lose her soul? Will Zimmer (John Goodman) ever direct a masterpiece? What is Malcolm Macdowell doing in this movie for ten seconds?

The Artist will most likely be the best movie that I see at this festival. Not only does it get everything right as far as the silent filmmaking (this looks like it could have been made in the late 20s), but the story is absolutely perfect. It’s hilarious, heartfelt and, most importantly, human. All of the characters are real while still being broad enough to be larger than life.

I didn’t know very much about this movie going in. I kind of wish that I could write a review for it without mentioning that it’s a silent film because I think that some people will avoid it because they don’t want to sit through an hour and a half of no sound. Unfortunately, there’s really no way to review it without that bit of information because it’s so integral to the plot. It’s not just a gimmick. It pretty much is the whole story.

Please don’t let the fact that it’s silent keep you from seeing The Artist. If you do, you might just miss one of the best movies of the year.

DARK MATTERS SHORTS

Typically, a shorts program like this will have three or four real stinkers. This one, though, didn’t have any. It was kinda weird. There was one weak one, but it was still pretty funny.

Let’s check out the horror shorts, shall we?

BLIND SPOT (2011)

Directed by: Matthew Nayman
Written by: Matthew Nayman

When the world is going to Hell, will you notice? Or will you be like the guy in this short who just keeps trying to get his plane ticket changed.

This is a short that knows how to build, tell its story and then get out before it’s too late. Not the best thing around, but it was pretty damn funny and actually had a bit of a point.

HOW (NOT) TO BECOME A VAMPIRE (2011)

Directed by: Keram Malicki-Sanchez
Written by: Lori Fischburg

This was the weak one. A mostly funny instructional video/infomercial for a kit that will turn you into a vampire. Sporadically funny and a bit over done, but still not too bad.

LAST CHRISTMAS (2011)

Directed by: Geoff Redknap
Written by: Geoff Redknap

This was, hands down, the masterpiece of the program. A young boy (Quinn Lord, who plays Sam in Trick ‘r Treat) wakes up to a Christmas tree and a cat. Soon enough, we find out that he’s taking care of his increasingly addled grandmother (Linda Darlow), seemingly all alone. Why won’t he let her go outside? And why is he nervous when she asks about the family?

Great performances and realistic writing make this an incredibly sad and yet still sweet short that will be the one that stays with me after the festival. Redknap has been doing makeup for movies since 1995 (a lot of big ones that you’ve seen), but he keeps that to a bare minimum here. And it’s all for the best.

THE INTERVIEW (2011)

Directed by: Michelle Steffes
Written by: Jacob Givens/Jason Philip Thompson

Another good one about an apocalyptic world where a young man is trying to get a job with the only other person that he knows is alive, the DJ of the radio station that he listens to. (Ok, the ONLY radio station.) They’re advertising for a new VP. When he gets there he finds a normality that isn’t exactly what he expected.

Consistently funny, but not so overboard that it becomes completely ridiculous. Also, strangely sad in a way. Corporate mugs will always be corporate mugs, no matter what happens.

IN THE MIDDLE (2010)

Directed by: Thomas Ward
Written by: Thomas Ward

A waitress at a crappy diner in the middle of nowhere goes through her crappy day serving crappy food to crappy customers. The crappiest are a group of teenaged girls who just don’t get that this lady isn’t “quaint.” They think they’re smarter than her and they show it. The whole thing comes to a boil when they start to talk about “Perjury.” You know, where you wait for your fate just outside of Hell?

Just another day at D’s Mediterranean Diner.

Pretty good stuff. I know how this chick feels, unfortunately.

THE FIRST ZOMBIE (2011)

Directed by: Jeff Norton
Written by: Jeff Norton

Another one that could have been better, but was still pretty funny at times. The first zombie has crawled his way out of his grave and now has to acclimate to his unlife. His wife does her best to help him, but his baby is a bit more on the “AAAAUUUGGGHHH!!!” side of things.

Like I said, pretty funny at times, but I think it could have worked a bit better.

MOVING DAY (2010)

Directed by: Jason Wingrove
Written by: Matthew Graham

I felt like I had seen this one before, but the ending was completely different. A little girl moves into a new home in the countryside with her family. She discovers some not so nice fairies living in the plants. (The first one flips her off, which was actually unexpected.) But she finds a way to get bloody, fiery revenge.

This could have been a disaster, but it was actually pretty damn fun…even if the credits went on and on and on and on. The music is what made it work so well. All innocence and fun at first and the 90s action movie by the end. Not a perfect short, but definitely one worth seeking out.

MUMMY’S LITTLE HELPER (2011)

Directed by: Michael Lavelle
Written by: Michael Lavelle

Heavy handed, but still suspenseful, Mummy’s Little Helper is an anorexia cautionary tale about a mother who is all about losing weight…any way she can. Will she pass that on to her little girl?

Very obvious message that Lavelle beats us over the head with, but it was visually very good and the storytelling was effective. Check it out if you get the chance, but wear a helmet.

THE DINNER MEETING (2011)

Directed by: Antony Webb
Written by: Ethan Marrell

This was probably my second favorite. It’s about a guy who wants to propose to his girlfriend. She picks the restaurant and he meets her there. But what is this restaurant called Eternity? And why is the maitre’d so freakin’ nervous?

I actually didn’t see where this one was going until it hit me in the face with it. This is a fun and dark little flick. Definitely check it out.

***½ (3.5/5)
Nastiness Rating:
***** (5/5)

Directed by: William Lustig
Written by: CA Rosenberg/Joe Spinell

There are some films that I just can’t understand why they’re not on the official Video Nasties list. Maniac is near the top of the list.

Joe Spinell (more on him later) plays Frank Zito, one of the most perverse and disgusting serial killers in the history of film. He kills women in order to possess them forever. He doesn’t take their whole body home, though. He scalps them and sticks the scalp on a mannequin. His apartment is full of mannequins with bloody scalps covering their bald heads.

Really, that’s the entire plot of the movie. Frank goes from woman to woman, killing them all. He gets to know a couple of them, but he always ends up killing them in horrible, bloody ways. Whether he strangles them, shoots them in the face or stabs them with a short sword in a subway station bathroom, he slaughters them all.

In fact, there’s only one man killed in the entire movie. It happens to be effects guru Tom Savini whose head gets exploded by a shotgun. (This is the scene that made Gene Siskel walk out of the theatre, feeling that the film could not redeem itself after that. It’s hard to disagree.)

Why, you might ask, would a movie like this ever get made?

Oh, come on. We all know why it got made. William Lustig and Joe Spinell were fans of The Deuce. They hung out in 42nd Street theatres, watching some of the most violent films ever made. It inspired them to do some research into serial killers and come up with their own. It had to be better than these silly movies, right?

It’s certainly more depraved than just about any other movie I’ve ever seen. Lustig knows how to shoot a gore scene and keep the mood creepy and dirty. It helps that the movie was shot on location in NYC. This would make a great double feature with Basketcase because they really show how it was in NYC in the early 80s. Both films are so dirty and twisted that it’s hard to NOT feel like you’re right there in the middle of Times Square and The Deuce. Although, the movies are pretty much night and day. Where Basketcase is, if not a light romp, it’s certainly a fun horror movie. Maniac, though, is so freakin’ dark that it’s pretty goddam hard to watch.

When the movie came out, womens’ groups went INSANE. Yes, they had ever right to do so, but they also managed to make the movie a huge hit on The Deuce. Everyone suddenly wanted to see this movie with the poster with the killer who’s getting a raging boner from holding a woman’s scalp.

Would the movie have been a hit if it weren’t for everyone deriding it? I think it would have been big in NYC, but nowhere else. Because of them, though, it made quite a bit of money.

Also because of them, that money went to Joe Spinell’s head. He remained a super nice dude according to everyone in the documentary about him on the Blue Underground disc, but he started doing drugs and drinking more than usual.

Joe Spinell, you see, was one of Hollywood’s great partiers. He was also, strangely, instrumental in a lot of great peoples’ lives. He was with Spielberg when he was denied a nomination for directing Jaws. He was in The Godfather and Taxi Driver. He was the man who got Rocky a green light.

But he was also Frank Zito, a deranged killer of women. And, because of this, he has always been a side-note in film history. Which is really too bad. I’m not going to say that I remember him in all of these films, but I’m absolutely going to be on the lookout for him from now on.

So, in effect, those groups who protested Maniac did two things: they made Joe go a little crazy himself and they made him want to redeem his character (in a way, since it’s really a different character) in a sequel where he plays a kiddie show host who kills abusive parents. The movie was never finished, but it apparently had some promise.

Anyway, I’m kind of getting away from the point of this review, which is Maniac. The movie has a reputation and it’s pretty damn well deserved. I keep saying that it’s depraved, dirty and disgusting…but really there aren’t too many other words that describe it as well. From the first frame of Joe waking up and screaming for his mother to the final, bloody climax that really makes no goddamn sense. (Joe kept the severed head until the day he died.)

It’s hard to say that this is a good film, because it really isn’t. The acting is rough, the writing is rougher and it’s seriously a little bit inept at times. But it’s also hard to just dismiss it as terrible. It’s certainly a touchstone for horror and is probably one of the more disturbing films that I’ve seen in a long time…and I’ve watched a lot of Fulci lately.

In other words, not only is this film not for everyone…it’s almost not for anyone. It’s definitely not for women.

As a side note, the main thing that reminded me that this film existed and made me want to finally see it was actually Jay Chattaway’s score. It’s a really menacing synth score that kind of works on its own. Chattaway went on to work with Lustig a few more times before becoming the go to guy for Star Trek TV scores!

Maniac is the first in a new series of vinyl re-releases coming from the Mondo, the Alamo Drafthouse’s famed t-shirt/poster company. I can’t WAIT to see what they decide to put out next. (Shameless plug, dudes. I’m here for YOU!)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Nini Bull Robsahm/Patrik Syversen
Written by: Nini Bull Robsahm/Patrik Syversen

Sometimes, you just don’t know what you’re getting yourself into. I just knew that I wanted to see two films today, so that I got as much out of the day as possible. I had to work, so I wouldn’t make the first block of movies. The second block, though, had two movies that I wasn’t too interested in and one that I had already seen.

Lesser of two evils?

You Said What? won out.

Glenn has a bit of a problem. His girlfriend just cheated on him on their first anniversary…with whipped cream. Now he’s alone. Sad Glenn is sad.

His three buddies decide that they need to cheer Glenn up, so they reenact Takeshi Miike’s Audition…without all the blood. They hold auditions for a movie that they have no plans to make.

Enter Linda, the woman of Glenn’s dreams. They hit it off and a funny thing happens…they now HAVE to make the movie. Unfortunately, they have no experience in filmmaking besides working at a video store.

FAR funnier than it ever should be, this romantic comedy rises above its silly premise and becomes something that I didn’t think that I would be into. Sure, there are no new plot points here. You know exactly where things are going the entire time. Luckily, though, the writers and actors manage to make it seem new.

They get a few good digs in at the film business, too. Their trip to the talk show is pretty priceless. And, of course, Peter Stormare is amazing.

Check this one out. It’s also called Help, I’m In Filmmaking! or something like that.

THE INNKEEPERS

***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: Ti West
Written by: Ti West

Ti West is one of those directors that I just can’t fully understand the appeal of. The Roost was such a terrible fucking movie. And then House Of The Devil was kinda awesome.

Where does his newest film fall on this spectrum? Well, somewhere in the middle, actually.

Claire and Luke (Sara Paxton and Pat Healy) are a couple of part-time kids at a smalltown haunted hotel that is on its last weekend. There are only three guests left. A mom and her small son and a has-been actress who Claire is a huge fan of (Kelly McGillis).

Claire and Luke are amateur ghost hunters, so they have been taking EVP recordings of the hotel since they started working there. So far, nothing. But could this last weekend be the time that they finally find something of Madeleine O’Malley, the ghost that supposedly haunts the hotel?

As I said, this movie falls somewhere between The Roost and House Of The Devil. The Innkeepers starts off as a pretty straight comedy. Claire and Luke are a totally modern pair (who are NOT together, by the way) of cynical kids who would LOVE to prove that ghosts exist, but they just barely believe in them. They make fun of the guests (sometimes to their faces) and take great joy in doing things to scare each other. Their dialogue is pretty real and this part of the movie is great. It had the potential to be something of a modern-day prequel to Ghostbusters.

Then the scary starts in. There are some genuine creepy moments, but a LOT of the real scares are “cat in the closet” scares. (How DID that bird get in the basement?) Yes, they sometimes call attention to them, but it still doesn’t always work. I started to get annoyed with it pretty quickly.

Then, at some point near the end, Claire became the stupidest person alive…and I HATE it when filmmakers do this. When you’re scared shitless and you’re waiting for someone to come downstairs, if you hear a noise from the basement, guess what you’re NOT going to do.

That’s right. Investigate the fucking creepy noise! I’m either staying put and yelling for the person I’m waiting for or I’m getting the fuck out of that place as fast as I can. I certainly don’t go to the basement!

I did, however, like the ending. I just wish that getting there hasn’t been an exercise in dumb.

By the way, this was definitely the Festival Of The Inhaler. Claire is asthmatic, as were the Martins in Human Centipede 2 and Retreat. Now THAT’S creepy!

So that’s how the Festival ended. Not quite a bang or a whimper. Somewhere in the middle. The party was fun, but I did a bad, bad thing: I tried two pieces of deep fried butter and a piece of deep fried bacon.

My arteries hate me right now.

And I can’t wait for next year.

RETREAT (2011)

***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: Carl Tibbetts
Written by: Carl Tibbetts/Janice Hallett

Another day, another home invasion flick. Better than some, still no Straw Dogs. (And I mean the original. Eff the remake.)

Martin and Kate (Cillian Murphy and Thandie Newton) go out to an isolated island for a little R&R and relationship rehab. Unfortunately, Jack (Jamie Bell) shows up in full military garb and blood. He tells them to start plugging up holes in the house and not let anyone in because there’s been a pandemic that has decimated the population.

Would you believe a slightly crazed supposed military dude? Neither did they.

So, there’s the plot. Was it good? As I said, it was ok. Great acting in a pretty mundane plotline, but it was pretty well executed. My only real problem was how stupid Martin was. Kinda wanted him to be a normal dude, not a guy with about three brain cells to rub together.

Other than that, though, not a bad flick with an ending that was better than most in this genre. Check it out.

NIGHT OF THE DEVIL (2011)

Directed by: Florian Puchert, Wolfgang Boehm

One of the better shorts that I’ve seen. A woman is haunted by something. Her husband doesn’t believe. They get someone to come out to exorcise the demon. Unfortunately, he might only be in it for the money.

Some creepy stuff going on here with some great makeup effects. Nothing too terribly special, but definitely cool for a short.

THE DEVIL’S BUSINESS (2011)

*** (3/5)

Directed by: Sean Hogan
Written by: Sean Hogan

Yay, for devil worshiper movies! Boo, for bad endings!

Two men (one to learn, one to teach) go to kill another man for their boss. They find some pretty awful things going on in this guy’s house. When they actually kill him, things REALLY get going.

The Devil’s Business is a fairly run of the mill devil worshiper movie, but it rises above it with the acting and the sense of dread that comes from these two guys walking around a dark house. I could have done without 20 minutes of the movie being given over to one of them telling a ghost story that just barely paid off at the end, but I liked it overall.

Until the end, that is. They tried a little bit too hard for a “big payoff” that ended up just being silly. There was a point where I thought it would have been great if they had just cut the scene and ended the movie. Unfortunately, they went on, showed a silly creature and ended with a whimper.

What makes the movie worth it, really, was the performance of Billy Clark in a role that Dean Stockwell would have taken about 20 years ago. He’s the hardened hitman who does his job and gets out and is never shaken by anything…until…

But, damn that ending.

ANGELS & AIRWAVES PRESENTS LOVE (2011)

**½ (2.5/5)

Directed by: William Eubank
Written by: William Eubank

When a band’s name is above the title and it’s not a concert video, you know there’s something wrong. Especially when that band is the side-project of a guy from Blink-182.

Lee Miller (Gunner Wright) is alone. Completely alone. I don’t mean that kind of alone that a teenager feels when he’s “so in love” with the girl next door. Or even the kind of alone that a girl in a romantic comedy feels when she’s the only one of her friends who isn’t getting married. I mean he’s actually on a space station and he’s told that he’s going to be left there for an indeterminate amount of time with no contact with the Earth.

The rest of the film is Lee slowly going insane. He talks to pictures that other astronauts left behind. He uses his treadmill as a sled. He keeps his beard amazingly trimmed for the first six years. (As a man with a beard, I can tell you that this is impossible.)

I was almost with this movie up until the 2001 ending, complete with white room and nonsensical mumbo-jumbo about the human race. (Speaking of which, why would a ship with lots and lots of mainframes and advanced technology apparently be controlled by an Apple IIe?) It was an interesting study of isolation. Then it just went all dumb and derivative.

Here’s what IS impressive: The guys from the band managed to make this film basically in their back yard for under $500,000. It’s a sci-fi film that is pretty impressively realistic made in someone’s back yard. While the movie itself didn’t impress me, I’m kind of happy that it got made. Maybe someone with more writing talent will see it and decide that they can do better. I guess we’ll see.

The soundtrack was ok. Probably better than anything else that Angels & Airwaves has ever done. It’s pretty atmospheric and has some really cool passages. Overall, it gets a better rating than the movie. I don’t know that I’m going to rush out and buy it, but it was at least interesting.

URBAN EXPLORER (2011)

***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: Andy Fetscher
Written by: Martin Thau

Urban exploring is one of the more fascinating subjects of exploration out there. Yeah, exploring jungles and woods and stuff holds its appeal, too. Space certainly would beat all of this out. But exploring the things that we humans have left behind and forgotten can lead to some pretty amazing discoveries, especially in big, old cities. Hell, even in Austin there are plenty of tunnels to go through.

Unfortunately, a lot of this stuff has been boarded up or just plain destroyed.

Berlin, though, is a bit of a different story. According to this movie, anyway. Yes, the tunnels have been blocked off, but there are apparently tours of the Berlin underground going on right under the authorities’ noses. (Actually, I’m sure this happens everywhere. Whatever.)

Urban Explorer is about four kids who take one of these tours. They get a guide and go looking for the “Fahrenzimmer.” It’s the room where the Nazis’ drivers would hang out and it has tons of murals and Nazi graffiti everywhere. It’s been walled up to keep Neo-Nazis from going in to worship at the alter of their Fuhrer.

The kids make it to the room (and it is VERY interesting), but on the way out, their guide falls, breaking his leg. Time to get help!

The rest of the movie is a cat and mouse game between the kids and a super-creepy Nick Nolte look-alike. And a true thrill-ride it is. Not only is the scenery amazing (it was all filmed in the actual Berlin underground…all of these places are fucking real!), but the action is pretty non-stop.

No, the kids aren’t super interesting. They do smart things and stupid things. (NEVER investigate a noise when you’re on your way to safety!) There are leaps of logic. (I definitely heard a squishing noise. How is he still alive?) But it was a really fun ride and, with this kind of movie, that’s all I really need sometimes.

One thing I don’t like is the fact that the filmmakers seem to kind of equate the Nazis with the Communists. The bad guy is a former border patrol soldier. They make so many references to Nazis (and hardly any to Communists) that it’s easy to start to think that he was a Nazi, but Nazis didn’t build the Berlin Wall. Communists did. This guy was not a Nazi.

Could the movie be an anti-Communist statement?

Whatever. Somehow, I doubt it. I think it was just an excuse to film down there and they happened to run into some old plumbing from the Wall.

Definitely check this one out if you get a chance. It’s well worth your time.

“But wait, Prof Wagstaff! That can’t be all! This was the last full day of the festival. Did you only see FOUR movies?!”

No, no, child. I actually saw five. Unfortunately, the fifth one (the Hong Kong movie), I’m not allowed to write about. It’s really too bad, too, because it probably would have been a 4.5 star review. Pretty damned awesome stuff. But I can’t tell you what movie it was.

Sad face.

Directed by: Andrew Bond
Written by: Andrew Bond

In a land where everyone is dirty, soap is a strange, strange thing. Especially when it has a face. And talks. And has magical powers.

This is meant to be a children’s adventure short about a dirty world that wants to be clean. The Mighty Soap comes along to teach them how. It’s alright, but I think it’s a bit on the slow side for kids…and long for a short. Kinda fun, though. Just super silly.

BODY TEMPERATURE (2011)

***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: Takaomi Ogata
Written by: Takaomi Ogata

Speaking of super silly, that’s something that this movie actually isn’t. Rintaro (Chavetaro Ishizaki) is a lonely guy. The only love he gets is from his trusty sex doll. To him, she’s a real person. (So much so that, at this point, she IS a real person.)

His perfect relationship is threatened when he meets Rinko (Rin Sakuragi, who also plays the sex doll), a girl who looks just like his sex doll. Could she be better than the fake thing?

Super slow and methodical, Ogata’s very short feature draws things out just like they’re drawn out in real life. This guy’s life is boring and Ogata wants us to know it. (No, really. That was his intention. I’m not just being sarcastic.) Not only are there some long and boring scenes, but there are a lot of really uncomfortable scenes. Rintaro is terrible with real women and…well, sex with a sex doll is kind of uncomfortable anyway. Of course, when you treat a real girl like a sex doll…nevermind.

Not a bad movie at all. It does what it needs to do and then gets out. And I really felt for Rintaro. This guy is a real sad-sack and doesn’t know how to be a real human being. Rinko is his first true link to life. She brings a spark out that even he didn’t know was there.

Heartbreaking and painful, Body Temperature certainly isn’t for everyone. In fact, I think most audiences would probably run away from it. It certainly isn’t Lars And The Real Girl.

By the way, the Japanese don’t truly understand how we Americans laugh at uncomfortable situations. Ogata said that he was trying to make a film that was not funny at all, so he was a little bit disturbed when we laughed a few scenes.

THE ETERNAL EVIL OF ASIA (1995)

*½ (1.5/5)

Directed by: Man Kei Chin
Written by: no one?

Hong Kong must have been a weird place in the mid-90s. I just watched a man rape a woman from another room.

There was a string of films made from the 70s until about this movie that showed how afraid of the outside world Hong Kong truly was. Anyone from other places in Asia were total hicks who believed every bit of the voodoo religions from ancient times and they will kill you with it. Devil Fetus is one of these.

In The Eternal Evil Of Asia, Bon and his buddies go to Thailand for a good time. Bon is totally in love with his girlfriend, May, so he doesn’t do any fuckin’. His friends, though, are fuck machines.

They all meet a Thai wizard, save his life and become his friends. (This is where the flesh-eating placenta comes in. Stick with me, here.) His sister falls in love with Bon, but he won’t love her because of May. Brother tries to put a hex on Bon to make him have sex with her, but it backfires and hits the other three guys. Of course, the four of them have sex, wake up and they suddenly have fuck remorse. Then there’s the “whoops” killing of the sister.

Brother Wizard goes on a ravenous rampage of revenge.

There’s lots of sex, lots of blood, lots of gore and, of course, lots of rape. Can’t have a decent Category III film without lots of rape. Of course, it’s all tied together with a story that is so simple that, even though it’s chopped to hell, it doesn’t matter. Revenge and sex. That’s all you need to know.

Why is the movie choppy? Well, here’s a little something I learned about Hong Kong films:

The production companies would hold midnight screenings the day before the movie was set to release. The filmmaker and producer would sit in the projection booth and take notes on what the audience liked. (Read: what didn’t make them throw things at the screen. The crowds were violent as shit, sometimes beating the shit out of the filmmakers in the lobby.)

If they wanted to at the end, they would get the editor, throw him in a van and have him run from theatre to theatre editing bits out of the film. As the guy who introduced the film said, “They liked the sex at the beginning and the flesh-eating placenta in the middle, but they didn’t like the dialogue between? Oh well. Cut the dialogue!”

Hong Kong must have been a weird place in the mid-90s.

But, let’s get started, eh?

THE HOLDING (2011)

***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: Susan Jacobson
Written by: James Dormer

“Farmville was never this brutal”? Seriously? That’s all Horrortalk could come up with? And I don’t get paid for this shit.

Cassie Naylor (Kierston Wareing) just killed her husband. We don’t really know why, but she did it with the help of the old man who helps on the farm, Cooper (David Bradley, aka ARGUS FILCH!!). Now she has to keep her head above water on the farm while raising two young girls.

Along comes Aden (Vincent Regan), a lonely drifter who says that he knew her husband back in the day. All of her problems seem to be solved, but is Aden all that he says he is?

There’s absolutely nothing new here. This is the same movie that you’ve seen a dozen times. But sometimes, that just doesn’t matter. Sometimes the same old story works just fine as long as it’s written, directed and acted competently. And all three things are in place here, so it’s a perfectly enjoyable flick.

Special props should probably go to Regan for edging that line between savior and angel of death without tipping the scales until absolutely necessary.

Check it out if you’ve got nothing better to do. If you’re sick of this story, though, you can skip it and not worry too much about it.

LET THE BULLETS FLY (2010)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Wen Jiang
Written by: Wen Jiang
Based on story by: Ma Shitu

I really didn’t know anything about this one, either. When I found out, though, that it was going to be Chow Yun-fat with guns, I was there.

Chow plays a super-corrupt master of a prefecture of China in the 1920s. When a well-known bandit named Pocky Zhang (writer/director Jiang) shows up posing as the governor of one of Chow’s cities, the bullets do fly.

Pocky and his boys robbed a train with the real governor aboard. Everyone was killed except for Counselor Tang (Xiogang Feng) and the governor’s wife (Carina Lou). The two of them join the fight against Master Wu.

Almost like a Western in structure, Let The Bullets Fly does just what the title says it will, all with tongue placed firmly in cheek. This is, first and foremost, a comedy, which is not something that I’ve seen Chow Yun-fat do very often. He’s pretty good at it, though. One guy at the screening said that it felt like a Stephen Chow movie that wasn’t as good. Honestly, though, this is better than just about any Stephen Chow movie I’ve ever seen. Besides Kung-Fu Hustle, that guy is just not funny. Sorry.

I really enjoyed this one. There were enough double-crosses to go around and the plot moved through the entire 132 minute run-time. It helped that Chow and Wen were so good as foils.

Definitely one to check out if you’re into Hong Kong films at all. Maybe not as good as the heyday films, but still pretty fun.

THE DAY WITHOUT POLICEMAN (1993)

* (1/5)

Directed by: Gwing-Kai Lee
Written by:Ping-Kit Koo/Kwong-fai Lai/Johnny Lee/Desmond Wu

Speaking of Hong Kong’s heyday, this film is from that era…which doesn’t mean that it’s quality.

Let me start this review with this: I love Hong Kong film, especially from the late 80s and early 90s. Classics like John Woo’s Better Tomorrow series (actually, just about any John Woo movie of that time), Full Contact, The Bride With White Hair and lots and lots of other great films were made in about a ten year period. Many of them were better than anything Hollywood was putting out at the time.

Then there were movies like The Day Without Policeman.

You see, somewhere in the late 80s, HK finally decided to join the rest of the world and put a ratings system into place. They created a rating called Category III that allowed filmmakers to put as many boobs and as much blood into a movie as they wanted to. Mr. Woo took advantage of this to make some truly amazing action movies.

Others, however, decided to go a slightly different route. They took a queue from the American grindhouse movies of the 70s and just exploited the shit out of everything they could…mostly women. They had much more greed than talent.

This doesn’t make these movies unwatchable. You see, when HK movies are good, they’re great. When they’re bad…they could be even better. Movies like Sex & Zen (or, as my friends and I like to call it, Two Girls And One Flute), The Fruit Is Swelling (where a six year old girl’s spirit enters an 18 year old girl’s body…and learns about sex) and Erotic Ghost Story (where a guy has lots and lots of sex with ghosts) were the norm.

The Day Without Policeman is on the more violent side of any of those “wonderful” films. It’s an action film. This means that every woman in the film has to get raped, beaten, kicked, stabbed, shot and, otherwise completely demoralized. Most of the men have all of these things but the rape happen to them, too.

And there is lots of blood. Buckets of it, in fact.

This film stars Simon Yam (who was actually in a lot of good films) as the worst policeman ever. I don’t mean he takes bribes or beats people senseless for no reason. I mean he’s completely incompetent and ineffectual…and not in a funny Rowan Atkinson sort of way. More in a “people die because he sits there and watches it happen” sort of way.

He has a reason for it: a horrible phobia of AK-47s. He watched his partner get gunned down by one and hasn’t been the same sense. His wife left him soon after because he folded into himself. He, of course, is still in love with her, but he just can’t get it up anymore. (Yes, this is strangely important to the “plot.”)

Months go by and he’s been demoted to being a cop on a small island off the coast of HK. Mainland Chinese guys come in (with AK-47s, of course) and wreak havoc on the island, basically killing everyone in their path…and he can’t do anything about it because he’s crying in the corner.

I hated this guy. A lot. He was worthless. Luckily, enough outrageous stuff was going on around him that the movie was still…um…enjoyable? It was enjoyable in that “HOLY SHIT! THAT JUST HAPPENED!” way. He watches his soon to be ex-wife get raped. The baddies kill a child. A large man rapes a woman while constantly saying, “Uhbuh! Uhbuh! Uhbuh!” (Apparently, this means “Comfortable?”) Our “hero” tells his wife, “Your sister is with the gays! She might get raped!” (Um…what?)

That’s another thing about these movies: the subtitles are amazing. They make absolutely no sense most of the time, even if you don’t pay attention to the bad grammar. They seem to have been written by someone who didn’t speak English AND was in the middle of a mescaline trip. It’s surreal and, strangely, perfect.

With all of its illogic, strange dialogue and just overall ineptness, The Day Without Policeman is NOT a good film by any means. It’s pretty awful, in fact. Bottom of the HK barrel stuff. BUT, it’s one of those movies that you can watch and laugh at from moment one. It would be pretty difficult to find a copy of this movie at this point (totally out of print and maybe never even released on DVD…only laserdisc), but you could watch it with a bunch of drunk friends and have a pretty damn good time with it.

If, of course, you can handle about 50 pounds of rape.

SENNENTUNTSCHI: CURSE OF THE ALPS (2010)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Michael Steiner
Written by: Stefanie Japp/Michael Sauter/Michael Steiner

I don’t actually know how I feel about this one. I may never really know.

A little girl finds a skeleton and her mother tells the police the story of what happened in the village in 1975 when a mysterious girl (Roxane Mesquida from The Fat Girl) wanders into town after the apparent suicide of a priest. What ensues is mass chaos. The chief of police (Nicholas Ofczarek) tries to uncover her story, but only find a picture of her from 1950. Could that be possible? And why does the head priest hate her so much? Why does he keep saying that she’s the devil?

There is so much going on in this movie that it’s pretty difficult to keep up all the time. I’m sure that, after a few viewings, everything will start to click into place. And, honestly, I’m willing to try that. The story is so interesting and the movie is so good that I wouldn’t mind watching it two or three times just to puzzle it all out.

I’m not really sure, though, that it’s meant to be puzzled out. The ending is very ambiguous and could be interpreted many different ways. Sometimes, that’s what separates the great from the merely good.

I’ve heard that this is the first true horror movie to come out of Switzerland. If it is, I can’t wait to see what else that country comes up with. Steiner needs to make more movies immediately and get them released in America.

Even if I hadn’t liked the movie so much, I think that it still would have made me want to visit the Swiss Alps. MAN, was the movie beautiful.

ELITE SQUAD II: THE ENEMY WITHIN

***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: José Padilha
Written by: José Padilha/Rodrigo Pimentel/Bráulio Mantovani

We all know that South America’s government is dirty. There’s no surprise there. The surprise is typically how deep it goes.

Jose Padilha’s new installment in his Elite Squad series is out to uncover the deep. It still centers on Lt. Colonel Nascimento (Wagner Moura), head of BOPE, the Special Police Force of Rio. It’s always been there job to get rid of the drug dealers, but now Nascimento has started to realize that getting rid of drug dealers doesn’t get rid of the real problem: dirty cops. Eventually, the cops are making even more money from other things than they ever were from drugs.

I’ve never seen the first film, so I really had no frame of reference going into this movie. It was only a time-filler. Luckily, it wasn’t a bad time-filler. Not a great one, but not a bad one.

My main problem wasn’t the acting or the action. All of that was great. The problem was how fucking confusing it was. One of the legislators looked a lot like Nascimento, so I kept getting them confused. There was so much double-crossing going on that I had no idea who was on what side. Finally, once I kind of had it all figured out, I kind of wanted the nearly two hour movie to be over.

If you’re looking for something to do and want a little bit of realistic action (this ain’t know Ahnold flick), check it out. I might check out the first one, if possible.)

YAKUZA WEAPON (2011)

**½ (2.5/5)

Directed by: Tak Sakaguchi/Yûdai Yamaguchi
Written by: Tak Sakaguchi/Yûdai Yamaguchi
Based on manga by: Ken Ishikawa

At some point, Sushi Typhoon will learn how to make movies again. They almost threatened it with this one.

The best Yakuza fighter in Japan is coming back home because his father has just been killed. He finds out that the murderer was one of his father’s lieutenants, so he goes after him…hard. Soon enough, he’s minus an arm and a leg. The government gives him new ones. His arm now has a machine gun and his leg is a rocket launcher.

But he’s not nearly as sexy as Rose McGowan.

Imagine Robocop directed by Lloyd Kaufman, but take all of the satire and pathos out of it. Then you might come close to the silliness of Yakuza Weapon. The co-writer and star of Versus (which got an anniversary screening just before this movie) teamed up to write and direct this one and, honestly, I don’t even think that they learned anything from that experience. (Remember, I’m one of the few people at this festival who thought that Versus was not particularly good. It was amazing for about 15 minutes and then it was boring for the other six hours. I thought Azumi, which no one else liked, was WAY better.)

The funny thing is, this movie has more depth than most of Sushi Typhoon’s movies lately. Their only good movie is still The Machine Girl, but this one is probably a VERY distant second…maybe third. But there are a couple of scenes in this movie that would probably serve another movie really well. The scene with the lead character and his life-long arch-nemesis/friend fighting to the death ends really well. It should have been in some kind of John Woo gangster movie.

Unfortunately, it was attached to this, which was just more of the same over-the-top CGI blood effects and silly “comedy.” But, no matter how bad their movies are, Fantastic Fest will continue to support them and show their movies.

Well, it was at least better than Robo-Geisha.

DREADNAUGHT (1981)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Yuen Woo-ping
Written by: Wong Jing

This year, the Festival programmers decided to show four surprise Hong Kong films from the early 80s. You see, they recently received about 650 prints from a production house that went under. The programmer for the New York Asian Film Festival came in to help them categorize them and decided to stick around and show these four films.

The first one was called Dreadnaught and was directed by martial arts choreography legend Yuen Woo-ping and was the first movie to be made by his family. If this had been 10 years ago, I probably could have told you just by watching it that it was written by Wong Jing because it was SUPER silly.

It also made me realize how I had forgotten how goddamn entertaining these old martial arts movies could be.

Mousy (Yuen Biao) is just what his name implies: a mousy little guy. He just can’t bring himself to be a hard-ass, even when people owe his family money. He desperately wants to be taught martial arts by the legendary teacher, Wong Fei-hung (Kwan Tak-hing, who played this role approximately 5498 times…this was his last time). His best friend, Ah Foon (Leung Ka-yan), is Wong’s student and wants to help Mousy in his quest.

Meanwhile, a masked murderer named White Tiger (Yuen Shun-yee) is roaming the streets and is after Mousy because he carries bells with him. There’s sort of an explanation, but it’s not particularly good.

Mousy, of course, gets in all kinds of trouble with Ah Foon leading the way. Eventually, though, he learns to get by and finds out that he knows more kung-fu than he thought. He also has to get revenge.

I had never seen or even heard of this one before, but I’m really glad that I saw it. It may not be the greatest movie ever made (really, what martial arts movie from the early 80s is?), but it really is a lot of freakin’ fun. If you’re into martial arts flicks, especially of this era, find a copy and watch it immediately.

RABIES (2010)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Aharon Keshales/Navot Papushado
Written by: Aharon Keshales/Navot Papushado

When four kids get lost in the woods in Israel, chaos reigns. They run into a guy whose sister is trapped in a box underground. Then, while the guys are off trying to help him, the girls run afoul of a couple of cops, one of them being a bit too handsy. Then there’s the park ranger and his dog who are just trying to help.

Blood is everywhere.

Keshales and Papushado set out to make the first horror film ever to come out of Israel and, against all odds, they did a pretty amazing job. Not only is it a good horror film, but it’s a horror film that plays with conventions so well that you almost forget what those conventions were in the first place. (Notice that I didn’t even mention the killer. He exists, but….watch the damn movie.) They lace the entire thing with a pitch black sense of humor and a surprising sense of tragedy. As the filmmakers said, “That’s life in Israel.”

Rabies may not be the best movie at the festival, but it may end up being one of my favorites. Definitely worth a couple of looks. This is a really cool film.

And, no, the dog does not have rabies. In fact, no one does. But violence is a disease that spreads to everyone.

The filmmakers said that there are a couple more horror flicks coming out of Israel soon. I hope we get a chance to see them. Pent up countries always make the best horror films.

The animated shorts program is always fun at Fantastic Fest. This year was a particularly mixed bag, though. And one film didn’t make it to the Festival in time, so we didn’t see Two Friends. It’ll play Monday, though. And I won’t see it.

PATH OF BLOOD: DEMON AT THE CROSSROADS OF DESTINY (2011)

Directed by: Eric Power

South Park animation with ultra-Samurai-violence? Yes, please! This was a particularly gory little short that hit all of the tropes of a Samurai film, just with animation that made the gore more “palatable.” Loved it even with the anti-climax. (Also a trope of Samurai films, honestly.)

BEDTIME FOR TIMMY (2010)

Directed by: Thomas Nicol

One of my favorites, this is about just what it seems like it would be about: a little boy going to bed and being scared of his closet. He keeps waking up after hearing noises. When he finds out that those noises WERE made by something, he’s not so scared of it. Unfortunately, that thing is scared of something else.

This kind of short makes me happy that stop-motion and claymation are still being used by filmmakers. There was actually a LOT of stop-motion this year.

SK8RZ (2011)

Directed by: Robin Todd

I’m not really sure how I felt about this one. It takes place in a world where people have wheels attached to them. Some are bottoms and some are tops. When one guy who is usually a bottom meets a girl with a broken wheel, it’s love at first skate.

The animation is pretty awful (it kind of looks like bad cyberpunk Photoshop), but the idea is interesting enough for a short. And they may have done that kind of animation on purpose. Whatever. It was ok.

THE LAST NORWEGIAN TROLL (2010)

Directed by: Pjotr Sapegin

Another of my favorites that ended up being a rumination on bygone days and mythologies. The last Troll roams the Norwegian countryside just surviving. He thinks about what little he remembers of his childhood and gets bested by some goats. That’s when he figures out what really happened to the rest of the Trolls.

Max von Sydow narrates and voices the Troll. Pretty awesome stop-motion stuff. This is one that I would show to my friends if it ended up online.

THE HOLY CHICKEN OF LIFE AND MUSIC (2010)

Directed by: NOMINT

Not too sure that I understood this one, but it’s one of two shorts involving chickens. Something about a giant two-headed chicken that controls life and music. Interesting enough, but I don’t really know where the hell it was going.

LADY CRUSH (2011)

Directed by: Hanna Sköld

This was one of my least favorite. A man, a woman and an old woman clash in a story of acceptance and finding yourself. The man wants to be a lady, the woman wants to be old and the old lady wants to be…a crow?

I understood the point and appreciated it, but we were beat over the head by 12 minutes of shots of a guy’s skinny ass transposed with claymation of him pulling his dick off and sticking it to his chest, forming it into breasts.

BLACK DOLL (2011)

Directed by: Sofia Carrillo

Another one that I wasn’t so into, except that the animation was great. (More stop-motion.) A woman is obsessed with her dead little sister…and keeps a doll of her in a jar. Narration didn’t really help move the story along, but the visuals were really interesting.

CREATE (2011)

Directed by: Dan MacKenzie

A mad scientist is creating life. Or is he just a kid with Clay-Doh? Fun stuff that didn’t try for anything loftier than “kids and their imaginations are amazing together.”

YUICHI : THE BEGINNING OF THE END (2011)

Directed by: Aaron D. Guadamuz

Lots of black and white drawings bringing about the end of the world. Nuclear holocaust and giant fish chasing dogs. Cool, but it didn’t really go anywhere. I liked the animation, though.

THE LADY PARANORMA (2011)

Directed by: Vincent Marcone

Big head CGI isn’t usually my thing, but this one really worked. It was a story narrated by Peter Murphy of a girl in a small town who just didn’t fit in. She heard the voices of the dead, but never saw them, so never had a true friend. Finally, one day she sees a chance to have one. Really cool animation and a great story. Very Tim Burton-esque.

INNERCITY (2011)

Directed by: Alain Fournier

Another one that I just didn’t quite get. Again, the world and the marionettes were amazing, but I don’t know what the deal with the pigeons was. A little boy creates wings to fly to a little girl that he’s been watching. But what was the world that they lived in. Post-apocalyptic? Dystopian? I just couldn’t quite follow it or what it was trying to say…and I really feel that it was trying to say something.

LAZAROV (2010)

Directed by: NIETOV

Apparently, this is all about trying to “resurrect Soviet power.” I dunno. It really looked like it was about a bunch of scientists trying to resurrect a plucked chicken. This was one of the biggest laughs of the program. When the chicken comes back to life, things kinda get outta hand. Chaos reigns. Funny, funny stuff with some Three Stooges style action.

DICKFACE (2011)

Directed by: Thomas Seeberg Torjussen/Eric Vogel

A very short short about a guy with a dick nose. He figures out how to pleasure himself…but only for a little while. Really simple. Really funny. Really short. Everyone loved it.

SHORT FUSE: HORROR SHORTS

The horror shorts are always a source of gore and grue. This year, though, only a couple of them were super gory. Most of them were just bordering on horror, really. Not as amazing as in past years.

THE INCUBATOR (2011)

Directed by: Jimmy Weber

So a guy wakes up in a bathtub full of ice and the word “Thanks!” written on the mirror in lipstick. He finds that he’s been ripped open for something. When that something starts to come alive, the old urban legend takes an even more horrific turn.

Not bad and had some good grue towards the end, but I had to look it up after it was all over to remind myself what it was about. Never a really good sign.

THE UNLIVING (2010)

Directed by: Hugo Lilj

The longest of the shorts at 28 minutes, this one probably could have been cut down a little bit. It was really cool, though. We’re in a future where zombies are used for menial labor by basically giving them a lobotomy. When one of the technicians finds his zombified mother, all bets are off.

This one definitely took its time to create its world and I think it really paid off. It was a complete story, which is more than I can say for a lot of these shorts.

THE HUMAN NATURE (2010)

Directed by: Tore Frandsen

Two rednecks are out hunting rabbits. They catch one and drive away, but the rabbit somehow escapes the cage. Unfortunately, there’s something hunting humans.

Short and to the point and the creature makeup was amazing. Slimy, creepy and perfect.

NO WAY OUT (2011)

Directed by: Kristoffer Aaron Morgan

I’m not really sure what was going on here. A guy is trapped in what looks like a warehouse outside of a school gym. He’s been attacked by some Lovecraftian nightmare outside. Eventually, he gets trapped and then bashes his own head in to set his brain free.

I guess I get the metaphor, but it didn’t seem to have a lot to do with the grue that accompanied it. It looked great, though!

THANK YOU, JESUS! (2010)

Directed by: Free

Probably the least of the shorts in this program. A couple are out having a picnic when the girl is possessed by an Italian speaking squirrel? She kills the guy, but he’s brought back to life by an oily looking primitive.

I didn’t get it at all. It started over and when it was cut off, someone yelled out, “Thank you, Jesus!” I think we all had the same feelings on this one.

CURTAIN (2011)

Directed by: Dennis Widmyer

Another great one. A guy and his bitchy girlfriend move into a new apartment with some strange rules. Don’t take down the creepy shower curtain with all of the crosses on it. If you do, you might just meet a succubus demon that was exorcised from the apartment.

This, of course, happens.

A lot of fun and some great demon effects. And definitely watch out for Mr. Pokeyman.

A RIVER IN THE WOODS (2011)

Directed by: Christian Sparkes

A group of children living in the woods meet a benevolent monster. When night falls, who knows what might happen?

I do! I do! This short did exactly what I thought it would do, but it was pretty well done. The creature was great and the kids were all very good actors. I wish that it had been less predictable, but that’s ok. Still worth watching.

Of course, the whole time the kids were running around, I could only think, “Fucking hipsters.”

VILE BEAST (2011)

Directed by: William Justin Crooks

This is another one that I just couldn’t really understand. A man and his wife are having a rather emotionless conversation when a strange creature bursts into the house, knocks the man out and starts to try to rape the woman.

The man opens an eye, only to close it again because it’s not his cue yet. Then, he finally gets up and beats the beast away. Then, everything stops so they can pay him.

They start up again and he runs out.

What? No idea. Whatever.

HOW TO RID YOUR LOVER OF A NEGATIVE EMOTION CAUSED BY YOU! (2011)

Directed by: Nadia Litz

A young lady is annoyed with her boyfriend, so she keeps putting him out and performing a mysterious surgery on him. What she’s taking out…well, I’m not really sure. It’s small and it’s black. She does this a couple of times and then decides that it’s just not quite enough.

Blood and gore and relationship therapy. Why not? Not the best of the shorts, but definitely alright.

BEYOND THE BLACK RAINBOW (2011)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Panos Cosmatos
Written by: Panos Cosmatos

Just a few weeks ago, I saw a movie that I loved more than I ever thought I would. Drive was such a throwback to the crime dramas of the 80s that I just fell in love with the first note of the electronica soundtrack.

Beyond The Black Rainbow is going for the same vibe, just with late 70s and early 80s Canadian sci-fi. It’s slow. It’s cerebral. And it’s all kinds of psychedelic. I don’t know if I really understood it but, MAN, did I like it.

Elena (Eva Allen) has been raised in a white room basically since birth. She is in the middle of some sort of self-help guru’s compound. What he’s helping people with, I’m not really sure, but Dr. Barry Nyle (Michael Rogers) is thoughtful and creepy. He sees Elena only through a glass wall and tells her that she is not allowed to see her father.

Why is he keeping her from her father? Because she is the chosen one. Chosen for what? I don’t really know, but she seems to have some strange powers that aren’t fully explained.

None of this really matters, though. This movie is visually amazing. From the grainy, period film to the crazy sets that consist of white rooms, giant glowing pyramids and the occasional nebulous blob, there wasn’t a moment of the film that I could take my eyes off of. And, like Drive, there are short bursts of ultra-violence. (Not nearly as much or as many as Drive, but close enough for Canadian work.)

I kind of can’t wait to see what peoples’ reactions to this movie are. I also can’t wait to read some interpretations. The dreamlike state of the movie and its audience will make that more interesting than half the films at this Festival.

Also just like Drive, I can’t wait to own the soundtrack. It was all done on period synths and keyboards.

THE LAST SCREENING (2011)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Laurent Achard
Written by: Laurent Achard, Frédérique Moreau

All Sylvian (Pascal Cervo, who looks like a young Dudley Moore) wants is some good movies to screen, the love of his mother and some more ears for his star wall. Can he help it if the theatre he works at is closing and the girl that he’s falling in love with (Charlotte Van Kemmel in her first role) is getting a bit too close?

Cinema is a passionate thing and Achard’s new film shows just how passionate some people can get about it. Sylvian is crazy, but he loves movies. He’s even charmingly shy, which is why the actress who comes to see the movies starts to fall for him.

The Last Screening is a really good homage to the cinema…especially French cinema, but also Hitchcock of the 60s. The film even sort of looks like a 60s film. See this movie if at all possible.

A LONELY PLACE TO DIE (2011)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Julian Gilbey
Written by: Julian Gilbey/Will Gilbey

When mountain climbing, never forget your bullet proof bodysuit.

Alison (Melissa George) and her four friends learn this lesson the hard way when they find a little girl in a hole in the ground. When two creepy dude with guns start chasing them, things get bloody real quick.

The action is pretty non-stop and the acting is great throughout this survival flick. Nothing too new, but Melissa George gets her “Get away from her, you bitch” moment and all is good in the world. I completely understand how this has won a few audience awards at other festivals. It’s a LOT of fun and, despite a few leaps of logic (how DOES that fire start?), it keeps its wits about it.

See it. See it often.

By the way, I kind of want to go to the festival with the fire and naked chicks. It’s called the Beltane Fire Festival. Hmmmmm….

The really weird thing about this year is that there don’t seem to be any big premieres. There are only two Secret Screenings (that I won’t get in) and those could be Robo Geisha 2 or something. Eff that.

It could be because Tim League has other things on his mind…like his brand new twins. (Congrats, Tim!) He said that he was taking the festival in a new direction because of the twins…a more family friendly direction. He even had Elijah Wood get on stage with him to do the “dancey-dance” that Elijah taught the Yo Gabba-Gabba creatures how to do!

When the exploding heads and porn started to get intercut into the footage of the dancey-dance…well, we all knew that Tim was lying all along.

Ok. Enough of this bullshit. Let’s get to those movies!

Michael (2011)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Markus Schleinzer
Written by: Markus Schleinzer

Sometimes, a normal guy is not a normal guy. Michael (Anthony Edwards/Tony Hale mix, Michael Fuith) gets home from work after a quick trip to the grocery store and goes about his boring, normal life. It all looks like something we don’t care about until he opens his sound-proofed basement door.

What the fuck?

Turns out, Michael is a small boy named Wolfgang (David Rauchenberger) imprisoned in his basement. Sure, they go out to petting zoos and have Christmas, but there’s something MUCH darker going on here.

This movie is creepy, disgusting and, against all odds, funny. It’s not graphic by any means. All we ever see is a door closing…but we know what’s going on. Unfortunately. And, somehow, Schleinzer is able to make us laugh occasionally. I saw the movie and I’m not exactly sure how he managed it. The situation is never made fun of, but that situation is treated in such a mundane way by its participants that it’s hard not to laugh. “Sonny” may never sound the same to me again.

As time goes on, we keep wondering how the kid is going to get the best of Michael…or will he. David is actually completely amazing. He’s accepted his fate as this guy’s “son”/sex toy, but he still has a lot of fight left in him.

The movie shouldn’t have been as good as it was, but from the rather work-a-day beginning to the “What the fuck?” ending and through all of the jump cuts and long, drawn out shots, it kept me completely enthralled.

Michael certainly isn’t for everyone, but it is a great movie that, hopefully, will get some sort of release here in the States.

Haunters (2010)

*** (3/5)

Directed by: Min-suk Kim
Written by: Min-suk Kim

In 1991, a little boy makes a decision that changes his life. Both of his parents want to kill him…so he kills one of them and nearly kills the other. But he doesn’t do it with his own hands…he does it with theirs.

Fast forward to 2010 and that little boy has grown into a young man named Cho-in (Dong-won Kang) who uses his superpower to steal money. Another young man, Kyu-nam (Soo Go), has no powers…so he’s a loser. Funny thing is, he can’t be controlled by the other guy. The two face off in increasingly more bloody battles that end in death and destruction.

And it’s a comedy!

Not a bad little movie that pretty much turns into a superhero movie. It’s pretty fuckin’ silly at times, though. (The hero’s two buddies are pure comic relief. Of course, he pretty much is, too.)

By the end of the movie, as much as I liked it, I was ready for it to end. Kyu-nam had taken more abuse than is humanly possible and I was just tired of the villain. He was pretty cool, but relentless in his illogical obsession. He didn’t seem to be fighting for anything…just fighting. And he never escalated his attacks. He had all this power to control multiple people. Instead of having them attack Kyu-nam in new and interesting ways, he just has them stand between him and Kyu-nam.

Seriously.

Check it out if you like Korean films and have a little time. Otherwise, you’re probably ok to skip it and not kill yourself.

Human Centipede 2: Full Sequence

*½ (1.5/5)

Directed by: Tom Six
Written by: Tom Six

A couple of years ago, Danish director Tom Six brought a truly depraved movie to Austin for Fantastic Fest. The Human Centipede became a bit of a sensation…even though it wasn’t quite as bad as everyone thought it was. It certainly helped that it was a pretty decent movie. I kinda loved it.

When I heard that he was making another one, I was all over it. I knew it was going to be great.

Um…goddamn it.

Martin (Laurence R Harvey, not to be confused with the REAL Laurence Harvey) is a young man with MANY problems. First off, he’s mentally retarded. Second, he has a bitch of a mother. Third, he was molested by his father. (His mother blames him.) Fourth, he’s become obsessed with a film called The Human Centipede.

Yes, in this movie, the first movie was, in fact, a movie. Martin, though, seems to think it was a documentary. He wants to make his own centipede. He’s gonna do Dr. Heiter one better, though. Actually nine better.

Martin starts to bean random people over the head and takes them to an old warehouse with bad wiring. Amongst all of the screaming and crying, there’s also a lot of bleeding and pooping. Luckily, the movie is in really stark black and white, else it would have been even worse.

And it was bloody awful. Tom Six just took a whole bunch of gross and depraved ideas and strung them all together into a heavily Eraserhead influenced and LOUD film. The sound mix was so fucking loud and screechy that I wanted to tear my ears off.

Man, I wanted to like this movie. Unfortunately, I just couldn’t. I’m all for depraved, but this was just depraved for depraved’s sake. The only redeeming quality was Harvey’s performance. He was pretty amazing in what was basically a wordless role.

Skip, skip, skip this movie, though. There is absolutely no reason to watch it. Stick to the first one.

Tom said that he has a third movie already in the works. I’m actually afraid now.