Directed by: Christopher Nolan
Written by: Christopher Nolan

What is a dream? Well, that’s a pretty heady concept for a normal action movie, but Christopher Nolan isn’t into normal action movies. He goes quite a bit deeper.

First, though, let’s check out a preview or two.

THE SOCIAL NETWORK–I actually wasn’t all that interested in this until I saw who directed it (David Fincher) and wrote it (Aaron Sorkin). Other than that, it’s just the story of how Facebook got it’s start and it stars stunt Michael Cera, Jesse Eisenberg. (Not to take anything away from Jesse. I like him and all, but I really feel like Michael has the market cornered on this character.)

I dunno. I’ve never been very interested in the story of the guys who invented Facebook. It’s not particularly compelling. But with Fincher behind the camera and Sorkin behind the computer, I’m there.

THE TOWN–”From the director of Gone Baby Gone.” That’s one of the first lines of this trailer for a film that stars Ben Affleck…THE DIRECTOR OF GONE BABY GONE! Why do they not use his name?

Anyway, this is the story of a thief who falls in love with a bank teller who was traumatized by hast last heist. As the truth gets closer to her, things get more intense in his life, too. I’m up for this one. Gone Baby Gone was great and I can’t wait to see if Affleck can direct himself.

Ok, let’s get back to those dreams.

The less you know about Christopher Nolan’s latest mindfuck of a movie going in, the better, so I’ll do my best to keep plot points under wraps. All you really need to know is that Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) is the leader of a gang who go into peoples’ dreams to find out their secrets. The team includes Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), Eames (Tom Hardy, the new Mad Max) and, in a way, Saito (Ken Watanabe). He manages to get a new team member out of his father in law (Michael Caine). This new member is college student Ariadne (Ellen Page).

The crew has been hired to do one last job by Saito on a young man named Fisher (Cillian Murphy). If they succeed, then Cobb gets something that he’s been trying for for about a year. If they fail, they could all lose their minds.

And what the hell is Marion Cotillard doing popping up in all of the dreams?

This is a pretty typical “one last job” movie, but with such a twist that it rises FAR above that rather low-concept plot and becomes something much more complex and deep. Something that only a star psych major could truly understand, but laymen such as myself can really enjoy a lot.

As the plot (and the dream world) gets deeper, so we get deeper into Cobb’s life and psyche. It’s an amazing journey and is full of tension and intrigue. We’re so invested in Cobb and his band of merry dream stealers that it’s hard to watch as things get harder and harder for them and they go deeper and deeper.

I loved pretty much everything about this movie. It’s an action movie with more brains than most brainy indie movies lately. It’s proof that, not only should Nolan be given however much money he wants when he wants to make a film, but he should be allowed to collect actors for his repertory along the way. It was nice to see familiar faces from the Batman movies pop up throughout the film.

Most likely, this will end up being the best live-action film of the summer. (Toy Story 3 MAY edge it out as the best film overall.) We can only hope that it gets the box office and accolades that it deserves. So far it seems like it is. The film world may be redeemable yet.

By the way, listen for a lot of Edith Piaf music. Har har har.

This year I actually got to talk to Harry and he was about to tell me WHY I was chosen when he was distracted by a shiny object. DAMMIT!!! I need to know so I’ll know to do it again every year!!

Anyway, whatever the reason, I had my butt in a seat at the Alamo for 26 1/2 hours watching some awesome movies. Here’s how the night went:

We had to start off with the annual torture of one of the Alamo friends. Tim always tells him that he’s going to show Teen Wolf during BNAT and, every year, something “fucks up” and he doesn’t get to show it. This year he had a Dolby “representative” (actually Scott Weinberg in a Dolby shirt) guarantee that the screening would go off without a hitch because of their brand new digital system.

Of course, hitches happen and Scott gave Tim a check for $15,000 “on behalf of Thomas Dolby.”

Many yuks were had by all. Then the movies really started.

FAUST (1926)

***** (5/5)

Directed by: FW Murnau
Written by: Gerhart Hauptmann/Hans Kyser
Based on play by: Johann Wolfgang Goethe

FW Murnau’s Faust has always been pointed to as one of the more amazing achievements in silent cinema. The special effects are still pretty awesome to this day.

If you don’t know the story, you’ve probably been living under a cultural rock, but I’ll explain a little bit here. God and the Devil are hanging out and make a bet. God says that Faust (Gosta Ekman), a genuinely good man, can’t be corrupted. The Devil (Emil Jannings), however, thinks that he can, and he sets out to prove it. He comes to Earth as a man called Mephisto and gives Faust back his youth, helping a beautiful young woman fall in love with him.

Faust shuns him at first, but then decides to allow Mephisto to give him a trial run of a day. When that’s not long enough, Mephisto has him and it’s all over.

In its day, it was one of the biggest spectacles that audiences had ever seen. It’s still pretty spectacular, although it’s easier to see how they did all of it now. And Jannings is perfect as the slimy and underhanded Mephisto. He vamps it up and is generally evil in all the right ways.

The organ accompaniment was pretty perfect, too. I wish I could remember the guy’s name, but it’s been a few days. Anyway, he was great.

If you ever get a chance to see this movie, go. And, in going, be amazed.

THE LOVELY BONES (2009)

****½ (4.5/5)

Directed by: Peter Jackson
Written by: Peter Jackson/Fran Walsh/Philippa Boyens
Based on book by: Alice Sebold

Peter Jackson can probably do no wrong in Hollywood right now. Sure, King Kong didn’t do was well as everyone wanted it to do, but he directed and produced fucking Lord Of The Rings! Give that man anything he wants!

So they did. He wanted to do a small story this time out, so he chose Alice Sebold’s novel about a young girl named Susie (Saoirse Ronan from Atonement) who was killed by a neighbor in the early 70s. She narrates the story from a place called The In Between. Not quite Heaven, but definitely not Hell. More like a fantasy land that is almost like Earth, but much more surreal.

Meanwhile, her family tries to go on. Her dad (Mark Wahlberg) is obesessed with finding her killer. Her mom (Rachel Weisz) can’t seem to move on, but can’t stand what her husband is doing. Her grandmother (Susan Sarandon) is a bit of a drunkard who tells everyone that she’s 35. Her younger sister and brother are doing their best, but it’s hard when their parents can’t seem to cope.

Meanwhile still, the investigation is almost going nowhere under Len Fenerman (Michael Imperioli) doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. The killer (Stanely Tucci) is still at large and still living about 100 feet from Susie’s family.

I gotta tell you, two movies into BNAT this year and I was emotionally drained. The Lovely Bones was something that I usually don’t go in for: a beautiful movie. Not only was the story beautiful (Susie’s journey from needing to have revenge on her killer to just wanting her family to cope), but the In Between was beautiful, too. Surreal, dreamlike and heartwrenching at times.

I loved this movie. It’s long, but I don’t expect much less from Mr. Jackson. He knows exactly what to leave in and wheat to cut out, and he knows how to pull the heartstrings without making us feel like we’ve been duped into crying.

Maybe it’s not the best film out there, but it didn’t matter while I was watching it. And it still doesn’t matter to me. I kinda want to see it again. I don’t necessarily believe in any kind of afterlife, but goddamn, this movie gave me hope for kids who die like Susie.

GIRL CRAZY (1943)

***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: Norman Taurog/Busby Berkeley
Written by: Fred F. Finklehoffe/Dorothy Kingsley/William Ludwig/Sid Silvers
Based on play by: Guy Bolton/Jack McGowan

After Lovely Bones, we were all pretty much beaten down. As Harry said, though, what better to bring a room back up than a Judy Garland/Mickey Rooney musical?

Well, I can think of a LOT of things, but this’ll do.

Mickey is a rich playboy who is sent out West by his father to learn a lesson in life. Unfortunately for Mickey, the place he’s sent is an all boys school. No girls at all! What’s a girl crazy boy to do?!?!

Well, he doesn’t have to worry too much. This small town has one girl: Judy. And he instantly falls for her, even if she doesn’t fall for him so easily.

Of course, her grandfather is the dean of the school. And, of course, there’s a guy who she’s pretty much paired with. And, of course, hardly any of the other guys like Mickey. And, of course, the school is threatened with closure unless they can come up with money/applicants.

Car wash!!

Ok, no. No car wash. But there is a rodea, which they pronounce like Rodeo Drive in Hollywood, as opposed to an actual rodeo.

Hollywood. Psh.

It’s a pretty fun little flick, but I’m not rushing out to rent the rest of Mickey and Judy’s collaborations. There was, however, a pretty good Busby Berkeley number at the end. Busby was supposed to direct the whole movie, but he was fired after they filmed this one scene. Too bad, because the movie could have used some of Busby’s flair.

Of course, the script did have some gems like “The things you see when you don’t have a gun!” and “Money is just like women and popcorn: The more you get, the more you want.” I still don’t understand the gun line. The fuck was Judy saying?!

THE RED SHOES (1948)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Michael Powell/Emeric Pressburger
Written by: Emeric Pressburger/Michael Powell/Keith Winter
Based on fairy tale by: Hans Christian Andersen

This is one of those movies that I’ve always heard about, but never seen. It’s a ballet movie and I have very little (if any) interest in ballet. Why would I care?

Well, it turns out that…um…I was right. This was the movie that I had the least fun watching at BNAT this year. But Harry didn’t program it. I’ll get to that later, though.

The Red Shoes is a fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen about a young dancer who wants to be the best dancer in the world. She buys some shoes from a shoemaker that make her dance perfectly…but then she can’t take them off and she can’t stop dancing.

But that’s not what the movie is about. The movie is about a young woman (Moira Shearer, who was really a ballet dancer) who is chosen to be the lead character in a new ballet based on The Red Shoes written by a young writer (Marius Goring). The two start to fall in love, much to the chagrin of the leader of the dance troupe (Anton Walbrook). He is emotionless and feels that his dancers should be, too.

The movie was really good, but I hated the two men. They were both jackasses. And the girl really wasn’t a whole lot better. Add to that a lot of scenes of ballet (which, I guess, were great) and I was just kind of uninterested.

The best thing about the movie (besides Moira being a beautiful redhead) was seeing how amazing the print was! Martin Scorsese’s film restoration crew have really outdone themselves on this one. It looked like it was made last year. The Technicolor was beautiful and made me miss that process a lot.

I’m glad I saw it, but I probably won’t revisit it.

****½ (4.5/5)

Directed by: Martin Scorsese
Written by: Laeta Kalogridis
Based on book by: Dennis Lehane

Now we get to the guy who actually programmed The Red Shoes. Harry originally wanted to lead in to Shutter Island with Sam Fuller’s asylum masterpiece Shock Corridor. He wasn’t even sure if he would get Shutter Island when he got that print. He had to write a letter to Scorsese to see if he could show it and to explain what BNAT is.

Well, Marty wrote him back saying what an amazing idea BNAT is and how he wished that he could join us. But there’s just one thing: don’t lead in with Shock Corridor. Lead in with The Red Shoes. Here’s a print.

How do you say no?

There is actually a very direct link between the two movies, so I can see it. But I would have rather seen Shock Corridor.

Shutter Island, on the other hand, was pretty great. Teddy Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a Boston US Marshall in the 50s sent to a local criminal asylum to investigate a missing patient. His new partner, Chuck (Mark Ruffalo), was brought in from Seattle to help Teddy out. Why is it that it almost seems like the missing patient never existed? What is Dr. John Cawley (Ben Kingsley) hiding? Is Dr. Jeremiah Naerhing (Max von Sydow) a Nazi doing crazy experiments? And why can’t Teddy let go of his dead wife (Michelle Williams)?

It took me a little while to really get into this movie, mostly because the editing seems to be really awful in the beginning. Eventually, though, I realized what was going on and it all worked out. The movie is a mind-fuck of the highest order and it made me want to red the Dennis Lehane novel that it was based on in a way that Mystic River did not.

It may not seem like the most Scorsese-iest of movies, but he’s done well again. Keep up the streak, Marty. We like you being back.

LE MAGNIFIQUE (1973)

****½ (4.5/5)

Directed by: Philippe de Broca
Written by: Philippe de Broca/Vittorio Caprioli/Jean-Paul Rappeneau/Francis Veber

I wonder how much John Candy’s Delerious borrowed from this movie.

Bob Sanit-Clair (Jean-Paul Belmondo) is the world’s most famous secret agent. He shoots randomly into trees, hitting hitmen before they even know that they are hitmen. He sees through every disguise. And he always gets the girl (Jacqueline Bisset).

He’s also being written by Francois Merlin (also Belmondo), a writer who just knows that he can do something besides these crappy pulp spy novels. But they make him money to live off of and they’re very easy for him to write.

On the other side of his aparetment building is Christine (Bissett again), the young lady he’s slightly obsessed with. Can he win her over by letting her read his awful books?

The movie is way funnier than it sounds like it should be. It opens with the spy story and looks like the Zuker brothers and Jim Abrahams had decided to make a spy movie. (Oh wait…they did. It was Top Secret. But this is funnier!) It’s full of great slapstick and some awful puns that make you cringe and laugh at the same time. Add to that the Merlin side of the story that makes you feel for this guy and you’ve got a movie that even French haters can love.

Harry has been trying to show this movie for seven years. I’m glad that he finally got to. It was worth the wait.

MICMACS (2009)

***** (5/5)

Directed by: Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Written by: Jean-Pierre Jeunet/Guillaume Laurant

I had no idea that Jean-Pierre Jeunet was even working on a new film, much less that he had one in the can! I would have been MUCH more excited if I had known.

Bazil’s (Dany Boon) dad was killed by a land mine when Bazil was very young. Thirty years later, Dany is shot in the head and survives. The doctors can’t take the bullet out without possibly making Bazil a vegetable.

Eventually Bazil falls in with a group of homeless folks who collect junk and make it into amazing things. He also finds out that the weapons companies that made the land mine and the bullet are right across the street from each other. The rest of the movie is a Rube Goldbergian plot to bring down both companies…and yet so much more.

If you’ve ever loved Jeunet’s films before, you’ll love this one, too. He brings his usual sense of humor and (shudder…I hate this word) whimsy to the screen and makes us fall in love with this ragtag bunch of geniuses, which includes his old standby, Dominique Pinon.

***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: Adam Green
Written by: Adam Green

Adam Gren has a lot of enemies in the horror world, and I’m not really sure why. Hatchet was a fun flick that didn’t try to be anything more and Spiral, while not brilliant, showed us all that he had some talent for something besides gore.

Now he mixes those two things to bring us something like Open Water on a ski lift. (On the fake lineup that Harry always posts, this slot was filled by Lifeboat. I can see why.)

Three college kids (Emma Bell, Kevin Zegers and Shawn Ashmore) are on a weekend ski trip. It’s Sunday and they want one more time down the mountain. They talk the lift guy into letting them go up one more time, but through a chain of events, they end up stuck on the lift. And the resort doesn’t open again until the next Friday. Now, how do they et down? And are those wolves they’re hearing?

That little premise holds a lot more fear than it seems like it should. Not only is there plenty of suspense, but there’s more emotion than you would think of coming from Adam. The two guys have been best friends since grade school and the girl is dating one of them. You can see where that’s going.

Not an amazing film by any means, but absolutely worth checking out. One of my friends who hates Adam said that this is absolutely his best film. He liked it quite a bit. If that’s not a recommendation, I don’t know what is.

THE CENTIPEDE HORROR (1984)

**½ (2.5/5)

Directed by: Keith Li
Written by: Amy Chan Suet-Ming

Hong Kong isn’t really known for thier horror movies…and there’s kind of a reason for that. Most of them are pretty silly. I mean, Mr. Vampire is a great movie, but it’s silly as hell.

The Centipede Horror really won’t win any converts for HK horror. In fact, it will probably make people run from the genre.

The movie was introduced to us as being horribly vile and banned in many countries. I don’t really understand what the hell Tim and Zack were talking about. Yeah, there were a couple of gross-out moments, but it really wasn’t any worse than most Hollywood movies now. Vomiting centipedes (real ones!) is gross, but it’s not as squirm enducing as they made it out to be.

A couple of young girls go from HK to SE Asia (they talk about it like it’s a country) for a quick vacation. They’ve been warned to never go there, but they go anyway and, of course, one of them DIES!!!! She’s killed by centipedes, which apparently have a bite so strange that no doctor knows what one looks like.

Her brother comes to SE Asia to find out what happened and gets trapped in a plot by an evil wizard who hates the guy’s grandfather. He’s cursing everyone in the man’s family to be killed by centipedes.

What’s really interesting about this movie is how quickly everyone is ready to jump on the “maybe it’s something supernatural” bandwagon. Someone trips and their friend says, “Maybe an evil wizard cursed you!”

It’s a pretty awful movie, but it’s funny in its awfulness. Possibly the worst movie of the day, but it was enough fun that I was able to enjoy it. If you’re a fan of bad, weird Asian cinema, see if you can find it. And watch for the broiled zombie chickens.

THE CANDY SNATCHERS (1973)

** (2/5)

Directed by: Guerdon Trueblood
Written by: Bryan Gindoff

The fake lineup movie for this one was The Lovely Bones. Heh.

Candy (Susan Sennett) is a 16 year old daughter of a jewel store manager. She gets kidnapped by three inept criminals who want a bag full of diamonds from her dad. What they don’t realize is that daddy isn’t too hip to getting Candy back.

I really don’t have a lot to say about this one. It’s an exploitation film that I don’t think made a really big impression on anyone except for the weird relationship that Candy developes with one of the kidnappers. It’s not supposed to be sexual, but it’s still a little bit creepy.

And then there’s the ending with the mute kid and his annoying mom. She’s SUPER-annoying. But her kid isn’t much better, really, and he’s suppoed to be sort of a hero of the movie…kind of.

IRON MAN 2 TRAILER

This was the only clip we had all night! I was a little surprised. It started out as an E! True Hollywood Story style bit about Harry with Jon Favreau, JJ Abrams and Michael Fucking Bay talking about how Harry nearly ruined their careers. Then Jon comes back and introduces the trailer. It looks pretty awesome, although I agree with one reviewer: Mickey Rourke’s Whiplash looks like he’s more of a danger to himself than to Iron Man. We’ll see, though. I’ll be there. You know it.

***** (5/5)

Directed by: Matthew Vaughan
Written by: Matthew Vaughan/Jane Goldman
Based on comic by: Mark Millar

I kind of can’t believe that they allowed a movie to be called Kick-Ass, but that’s really the only way that I could describe the movie, to be perfectly honest.

Dave (Aaron Johnson) is a geek. He’s a little bit obsessed with comic books and spends most of his time with his two buddies at a local coffee shop/comic book store. (Why hasn’t someone opened one of these up in Austin?!)

That’s where he gets the idea. The idea that will change his life forever. How come no one has ever become a superhero? So that’s just what he does. He goes out and buys a wet suit and walks around town until he finds some crime to fight…and gets his ass beat.

Kick-Ass didn’t have a very auspicious beginning, but he soon finds out that there are other people doing it…and they’re much better at it than he is.

Damon Macready (Nicolas Cage and his moustache) is a devoted father to Mindy (Chloe Moretz from (500) Days Of Summer and Hammer’s upcoming remake of Let The Right One In). So devoted, in fact, that he has taught her to kick some major ass…and he helps her steal the movie from everyone else.

Frank D’Amico (Mark Strong from Rocknrolla) is a gangster. He’s also a family man. His son, Chris (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), goes to school with Dave, but he’s never able to make friends with anyone. Too many bodyguards. All he wants to do is fit in at school. And, of course, be just like his dad.

The movie wasn’t quite finished, but DAMN was it good! It never let up! The action only stops long enough to let some more comedy in. And there’s more than enough story and character to go around. It’s surprising to me that this was based on a comic book by the same guy who created Wanted.

I’m not really sure how this movie is going to find an audience, though. It’s a pretty hard R what with all of the violence and cursing being perpetrated by small children. (Mindy says things that would make a grown-ass man blush.) But I really hope that it’s a hit.

Kick-Ass comes out in April with a few CGI tweaks and a slightly different soundtrack. The soundtrack was a major source of consternation amongst the audience. It was fucking perfect the way it was! But Warner Brothers won’t let them use the Batman and Superman themes. That’s really too bad, because they’re used in scenes that are perfect with those themes.

Speaking of the soundtrack, there’s one scene where the audience burst out into applause and then started clapping along to the score. I’ve been to a LOT of movies in my life and that is something that I’ve never witnessed.

Yeah. We all loved this movie. It was my favorite of the day. Go see it in April.

Director Matthew Vaughan was at the screening and talked a bit about the casting process. Apparently, there’s a mother out there who was very upset with the fact that there was a masturbation reference on page three. She thought that it would give her 16 year old son bad ideas. Lady! Your 16 year old son had those ideas at LEAST three years ago! And he’s had those same ideas a LOT! Stop worrying about it!

Before I go, one more plea:

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE LET MATTHEW VAUGHAN USE THE BATMAN AND SUPERMAN THEMES!!!!

GodDAMN, I can’t wait to see this movie again!

Ok. I’m done. On to the next movie

Visuals: ***** (5/5) Story: ***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: James Cameron
Written by: James Cameron

I really wish that Harry had ended the day with Kick-Ass, but whatever. The day ended the way it needed to, not the way we wanted it to.

We all know what Avatar is by now: James Cameron’s new half-billion dollar movie about aliens, environmentalism and 3-D.

But we don’t all know what it’s like. I do. I’ll tell you.

Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) is a Marine who is now paralyzed. His twin brother was part of the Avatar project, which allows humans to go out onto a hostile planet without dying from the atmosphere. They are basically able to project their minds into artificial bodies of the local inhabitants. This also means that they can (sort of) blend in with the aliens.

The Marines are there to take a certain element from the planet, no matter what the inhabitants say. The unfortunate thing for all involved is the fact that the biggest deposit is right under the giant tree that the inhabitants live in.

The other unfortunate thing is that Jake is actually a little bit sensitive. While he’s in his brother’s avatar, he falls in love with one of the natives (Zoe Saldana) and decides that they deserve to live their lives the way they want to.

SHOCK!!

The other side of things involves Sigourney Weaver as a scientist who feels the same way as Jake and Giovanni Ribisi as an engineer (maybe?) who thinks that these “savages” need to get the hell out of the way of Earthling’s progress.

It’s Dances With Ferngully! Add in some comments about how “we ARE the terrorists” and you’ve got a modern fable about America and how selfish we are.

I dunno. The movie is decent as far as the story is concerned. Nothing special, though.

No one cares about the story, though. Not really. They’re going for the spectacle. And that spectacle is fucking amazing! The CGI is nearly perfect. (Still a bit cartoony for my taste, but that’s to be expected…kinda.) The 3-D is amazing. The world that Cameron and his crew created is beautiful. It’s absolutely worth seeing on the big screen in 3-D. Probably even on the IMAX.

I just really wish that he had attached a better story to those visuals.

Well, maybe next time…ten years from now.

That’s it from BNAT! It was actually a pretty amazing day. Harry fully admits that the last couple of years have been a little bit on the lame side. Not terrible at all, but not really want BNAT is all about. He’s remembered now and, hopefully, his mojo is back. We’ll see next year.

See you in the theatre. I’ll be right behind you.

Luckily, both of my choices were wise.

MOON

****½ (4.5/5)

Directed by: Duncan Jones
Written by: Duncan Jones/Nathan Parker

Two men are stuck on the moon in a three year contract with a company that harvests H3 for the Earth’s energy consumption. They are just about ready to go home…but they are the same person. Or are they? And are either of them the original?

Duncan Jones and his star, Sam Rockwell (who is becoming one of my favorite actors these days), came up with this basically over dinner and it ended up being, so far, the best film I’ve seen at the Festival. Like the great sci-fi films of the 70s (Silent Running, Logan’s Run, Outland, etc), they have managed to create a movie with a great story, pretty realistic science and great practical effects that looked SO much better than any digital effects. (The split screening was done REALLY well, too. It looked like to different actors playing these two guys. I never thought, “Ok, that’s a double.”)

I loved this movie. Duncan could have more great films ahead of him. Sam was able to develop two characters who are seeded from the same character and make us care for both of them. And the story is told at times in a very emotionless way, but other times it is full of emotions. It’s kind of amazing how it manages to walk that line.

My favorite of the three characters in the film was actually the computer, Gertie, voiced by Kevin Spacey. They give him a smiley face to show his “emotions” and it’s pretty hilarious. It also makes him more human than you would think. (Shades of HAL, of course.)

Go see this movie. It’s a pretty amazing film that needs an audience.

MIDNIGHT SHORTS

This is one of the shorts programs that I always do my best to go see. They’re always fun, but I think this may have been a better batch than usual.

TREEVENGE (2008)

Directed by: Jason Eisener
Written by: Jason Eisener

–I saw this one before, which means that I’ve already reviewed it. This time, though, I really noticed how cool of a 70s style horror movie it is. Still freakin’ awesome.

WARM AND FUZZY FEELING (2009)

Directed by: Tom Kuntz/Matt Dilmore
Written by: Tom Kuntz/Matt Dilmore

Um…I really have no idea what to say about this one. Gramma gets a new puppy and it has quite the gift for her. There’s no dialogue and, in fact, it all seems to be in slow motion. There’s some nice, muzaky music. And then the creepy starts. A minute long short that is long on…uh….yeah.

BUTTHOLE LICKIN’ (2008)

Directed by: Kanako Wynkoop
Written by: Kanako Wynkoop/Bridget Irish/Missus Sarah Adams

A couple of lesbians do a bit of experimenting. Unfortunately, the receiver doesn’t want to to kiss after the experiment is over. This starts a rift. Shot over a weekend, director Kanako Kyle Wynkoop wanted to show that lesbian sex was just as funny and at times uncomfortable as straight sex. It’s a funny look at the intricacies of trying something new and trying to get comfortable with it.

BIG PUSSY (2008)

Directed by: Todd Strauss-Schulson
Written by: Todd Strauss-Schulson

A guy loves his girlfriend. But what does he do when she smells…down there? In the case of Todd Strauss-Schulson’s film, hilarity ensues. I loved his trainer. “Man, you got to tell her about that shit!” Awesome.

RECEIVE BACON (2009)

Directed by: James M. Johnston
Written by: James M. Johnston

–A couple are going at it in the bathroom of a bar. He bends her over and she sees something that makes her laugh….a lot. A little setup goes a long way in this one joke film. Pretty funny stuff for a short film. I don’t know that I would give the filmmaker a grant for a feature, but that’s not what this was all about. It was about telling a joke in a minute or two. And that he can do.

FISH OUT OF WATER – THE NIGHTMARE (2008)

Directed by: Ben Barnes
Written by: Ben Barnes/Joel Huggins/Gabriel Tigerman

Two roommates decide to take on the monster in their third roommate’s dreams. Will the monster get the better of them? The fact that the third roommate is a fish doesn’t even enter into the picture. The second in a series of films about these guys is pretty damn funny. It sets up the characters, makes us care and then gives us a great ending that actually makes sense. A lot of fun and I can’t wait to check out what Ben Barnes and his crew do in the future.

SCATTERBRAINED! (2007)

Directed by: Joe Avella
Written by: Joe Avella

A couple of guys sit at an overhead talking about a hot new disease: Scatterbrain! They’re developing an educational video to warn people against Scatterbrain! The short uses little blurbs, cheesy slides and Mountain Dew make this a pretty funny little skit that would fit nicely into any improv theatre’s repertoire.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT (2008)

Directed by: Will Hartman
Written by: Will Hartman

Two teenagers indulge in their deepest urges. When their teacher catches them in the act, she shows them exactly why they shouldn’t do it. You wouldn’t want to create even MORE brain eating zombies, would you? This was a really cool short with a pretty predictable ending, but that didn’t matter. It was a lot of fun.

I LIVE IN THE WOODS (2008)

Directed by: Max Winston
Written by: Max Winston

–A blue haired man who lives in the woods does whatever he wants, including finding God…and doing some very surprising things to the deity. Everyone seemed to like this one a lot. I thought it was pretty good, but not amazing. It had its moments and the puppets were pretty cool looking. Not much more than that, really. But the character was pretty damn funny.

THE FAMISHING (2009)

Directed by: Tony Durke/Toby Gorman/HS Rathore
Written by: Tony Durke/Toby Gorman/HS Rathore

–A good story and good, gross effects in a short? Weird! A couple of guys are walking around a seemingly barren land with only a couple of saltines between them. When they come up on a guy cooking meat, they get excited…but so does the local cannibal. It’s a bit overlong, but it’s really cool and gets a lot across with no dialogue.

MANBABIES (2009)

Directed by: Will Elliott/Kirk C Johnson
Written by: Will Elliott/Kirk C Johnson

–I usually don’t really dig on the whole “putting words in babies’ mouths” joke, but this was pretty funny. “Osh Kosh By Gosh, where did you get those kicks?” The effects were funny and the dialogue was, at times, pretty hilarious.

SAFETY FIRST (2008)

Directed by: Ross Wilsey
Written by: Ross Wilsey
Based on book by:

–A bunch of ugly puppets and a Mexican standoff. Not the best of the shorts, but it did have it’s “shock” moments. That’s about all it had, though.

BOOB (2009)

Directed by: Jonathan Milott/Cary Murnion
Written by: Jonathan Milott/Cary Murnion

A slight transformation from a bit from Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Sex and yet, it was still pretty funny. A woman is getting a government issued super-weapon implanted in her breast. Unfortunately, the weapon has a mind of its own, tearing the boob off and going on a killing spree. Funny stuff and bloody as hell. Not amazing, but I liked it.

When we got there around 7:45, we were told that we had to go through the hospital and the “lobotomy room.” Now, I don’t know if that’s actually what the second room was for originally, but just having someone call it that was creepy as hell. All of the lights were off (of course, no electricity) and we were walking through these dark, empty rooms by the light of a few flashing yellow lights set up by the theatre staff and my weak little keychain light. Most of the rooms were open so we could explore on our own, but I really didn’t want to do too much exploring. I just wanted to take a cursory look and get the fuck out. Lots of weird things going on in those halls many years ago. Who knows what’s left behind?

So we made it through that and went on to the outdoor screen and settled in for a long winter’s viewing. Luckily it wasn’t too cold. That came later, and even then it never got unbearable. Gotta love Central Texas falls.

SESSION 9 (2001)

**** (4/5)

Directed by: Brad Anderson
Written by: Brad Anderson/Stephen Gevedon

The first movie of the night I had already seen and didn’t care too much for it on first viewing. Not bad, but I thought the location, the tapes one of the characters was listening to and the documentary on the DVD were creepier than anything else going on in the story. But I knew it would play well to this crowd at this location.

And I was right. I loved this movie this time around.

Session 9 is the story of asbestos and what it can do to you. Or, moreover, what taking asbestos out of a creepy old abandoned mental institution can do to you.

Gordon (Peter Mullan–a bit player in Braveheart and a small timer from Trainspotting) is desperate for a job. He runs an asbestos removal company and has fallen on hard times. He’s got a new baby and is obviously having some problems at home. So it’s time to pull out a miracle. He and his crew, Phil (David Caruso in one of his best roles), Hank (Josh Lucas from American Psycho, A Beautiful Mind and Sweet Home Alabama), Mike (Stephen Gevedon) and Jeff (Brendan Sexton III from Welcome To The Dollhouse, Desert Blue and Boys Don’t Cry), have a job that should take them at least 2-3 weeks. In order to get the job Gordon promises a week. Personally, I think it looks more like 6 months, but I don’t know dick about asbestos removal.

So the boys get down to the job. Unfortunately there’s all kinds of tension between all of them. Jeff is Gordon’s mullet-headed American nephew who doesn’t really know his ass from his foot and he’s got nichtophobia. He can’t function at all in the dark. Hank stole Phil’s girlfriend from him and neither of them can let it go. And then there’s Mike. He’s just kind of biding his time working with these guys. He’s actually a pretty brilliant guy, but he had no interest in the bar exams when he took them, so he failed them. Now he’s reconsidering, but he needs money…so here he is.

But when Mike finds a box of tapes recorded during doctors’ sessions with Mary Hobbes, things start changing for everybody. Mary was an inmate of the hospital when it closed (and was a big reason for a lot of these institutions’ closures). She was involved in a law suit against her parents for ritualistic abuse and rape that was all found in sessions like the ones on tape. Was it true? Or was she just making it up? Did she even know?

And when one of the guys goes missing, things really heat up.

My feelings on this movie still hold true, but on viewing it again I’ve decided that I actually really do like the story. The place itself (it actually was filmed in the Danvers Sate Hospital) is the creepiest aspect of the whole movie. Even on film you can feel the horrors of what went on there before it was closed. It’s just an old building, but there’s something there. On the DVD there’s a documentary about the making of the film and it has some of the history of the building. The actors all felt the tension of working there. Caruso actually said that, while filming on the roof, for a fraction of a split second he thought, “Jump.” Not because he felt like committing suicide. It wasn’t a depression that washed over him. It was more curiosity. What would it feel like to fly? He also said that he saw things go by the window during filming.

And then there’s the tapes. Oh, the tapes. Mary Hobbes’ psychiatric tapes are just frightening. She has four different personalities (the fourth doesn’t come out until session 9, but you know it’s there from the get go) and they all sound like different voices. And whoever made the tapes put little imperfections in the recordings as if moisture had gotten to one part of each tape. And that really makes all the difference. Without those imperfections it would have just been weird. With them it’s downright scary.

Pretty much everything is in place in this movie. Yeah, Caruso is a little over the top at times, but it works for his character. Everyone does a fine job and the tension is built up gradually and deliberately by director/writer Brad Anderson (Happy Accidents and Next Stop, Wonderland). Maybe it was the atmosphere of the mini-festival, but I liked this movie a LOT better the second time around.

After Session 9, my buddy and I decided to do a little exploring of the grounds. We walked around the track where they walked the inmates around in circles to turn them into butter. Then we found the cemetery. I can’t describe to you what it feels like to go into a cemetery on the grounds of an old asylum. Just knowing that the people underneath me probably never found peace in life made me feel a little freaked out to be walking over them. I mean, what really makes me more sane than these folks were? Is the real asylum outside of this building? (A question that Douglas Adams posed to us in the Hitchhiker’s Trilogy pretty overtly.)

But no time for that. Time to get back to the movies.

DR. TARR’S TORTURE DUNGEON (aka, The Mansion Of Madness, aka Dr. Goudron’s System, 1973)

** (2/5)

Directed by: Juan López Moctezuma
Written by: Juan López Moctezuma/Carlos Illescas/Gabriel Weiss
Based on book by: Edgar Allan Poe

Tim League, owner of the Alamo, promised us that this was a great Eurotrash asylum flick. That it would really blow our minds. That we would never forget the experience of Dr. Tarr’s Torture Dungeon.

Well, he was right, but not really in a good way.

This is, of course, based on the famous Edgar Allen Poe story The System Of Dr. Tarr And Professor Fether. Now, anyone who has read Poe knows that he never really wrote a bad story. He was one of the masters of horror literature and probably the first to actually be considered literature in the horror genre. That he died in a gutter just adds to his macabre reputation. You just have to love the guy!

This story is basically an “inmates run the asylum” story. Dr. Maillard (Claudio Brook, later from License To Kill and Cronos) has invited Gaston LeBlanc (Arthur Hansel from Mary, Mary, Bloody Mary) to write a story in his paper about his asylum. But things start to go awry for the “good doctor” when he introduces Gaston to Eugenie (Ellen Sherman). Doubts start to creep in. Is this the real Dr. Maillard? Is Eugenie really an inmate? What about those weird Napoleonic guards outside? Are they really guards? And should they be allowed to have guns?

So, you see, there really are no questions in this movie? We know from the beginning exactly what happened even if we have never read a word of Poe. (I haven’t read this particular story, but I’m pretty sure that Poe didn’t envision weird priest dudes with spirals on their tunics…although it makes an interesting Halloween costume. No one would guess it.)

I know we can’t grade these kinds of movies on the same curve as a real movie. (The acting is always stiff, the direction is always bizarre and the story is always nearly non-existent.) But we should at least be able to grade it. This one almost seemed like it was trying too hard to be weird. Not to mention just kinda boring. There’s only so much crazy that you can take before you finally tune it all out.

One thing I couldn’t tune out, though, was the fucking music. It was grating and terrible. One character is supposed to be comic relief (he wasn’t) and was tied up and hopping around screaming for help through a gag. The xylophone and the flute are two instruments that should NEVER be allowed to play together. It made the whole thing sound like a really bad cartoon. I wanted to stick the flute down its player’s throat and beat the xylophone player with his own mallets.

But there were some good points. Claudio Brook puts in a GREAT and over the top performance as the crazy doctor who has devised his own system (credited to the mysterious Dr. Tarr and Prof. Fether…probably figments of his own imagination) to get the “crazy” out of people. Some of his lines are so badly psychotic that you just have to love the character. And his sudden bursts of laughter at inopportune moments make for some very strange viewing. (“Let’s hope it’s not Mr. Chicken. Bwaa!!! Ha-ha-ha!!!” End laughing….now!)

Lots of nudity, too. Director Juan López Moctezuma (also Mary, Mary, Bloody Mary…and not many others) must have liked his female nudity (Who doesn’t?) because he put it in at every turn. Even when it had no purpose at all. Although he does have a scene with grapes that predates American Beauty’s rose petal scene by about 30 years.

And then there’s the chicken dance. Oh my. This nearly made the whole 88 minute movie worth sitting through. As a friend of mine at the show said, Andrew Lloyd Webber ripped THEM off, he just did it with cats instead of chickens.

But women dressed as chickens doing surreal West Side Story impressions aside, this movie is nearly worthless unless you’re a Eurotrash completist. No one really liked it except for Tim League. I guess I’m glad I saw it because it’s pretty rare, but I won’t search for it again.

Time for some more exploring. My buddy and I decided to run to the car to get some blankets because it was starting to get a little chilly and we were sick of sitting in lawn chairs. The problem was that, because of the detour through the hospital, we didn’t really know how far away our car was. Luckily it wasn’t too far, but it was a little weird walking through the grounds pretty much alone. There were a few people here and there, but we were basically all alone.

At one point we found a building with an open door. (Actually, most of the buildings were open…hmmm.) He went in with me shining the light around the mostly empty room from the doorway. (Yeah, I’m a pussy. What can I say.) When we heard a noise just on the other side of the wall, he walked quickly out trying to save his cool exterior. Not so sure he succeeded, though. Time to get back to the movies.

TWITCH OF THE DEATH NERVE (1971)

**½ (2.5/5)

Directed by: Mario Bava
Written by: Mario Bava/Filippo Ottoni/Dardano Sacchetti/Giuseppe Zaccariello/Franco Barberi

Mario Bava was one of the giants of Italian horror. Every horror film geek knows his name and his reputation. With movies like Black Sunday and Black Sabbath he defined what it meant to be a horror director. By 1971 he was ready for something new, so he invented the slasher movie.

But he didn’t do what everyone after him did. There is no one killer. The killer is everybody. There’s no one who is innocent. No one. I think every character in this movie kills someone.

The story is, well, um…it’s got something to do with a couple trying to get insurance money out of the woman’s mother…or aunt…or something who was just brutally murdered, but the cops think it was suicide. In order to get the money, certain people have to die. Why? I guess because they know too much, but it doesn’t seem like they know much at all, actually.

So lots of people die in really cool ways. But does that make a good movie? Unfortunately, no. This flick was slow, slow, slow. There were some good bursts of murder (a lot of which were copied for Friday The 13th about a decade later), but everything moved so slowly that I kind of lost interest after a while.

Some of that may have had to do with the fact that, not only was it my third movie of the night and I had been up since 5am (had to work on Sat., dammit), but I was also laying down on one of the blankets we went to get. Probably a mistake.

So, no, I didn’t really like this Bava film, which ended up being a sequel to Wes Craven’s first film Last House On The Left, even though it came out a year earlier…and it has not one thing to do with the Craven film. Not a sausage.

And I had such high hopes for this one. It’s got one of the greatest titles in the history of horror film. And it was our first “mystery film” of the night. It didn’t bode well for our mystery premiere later that night.

Not much exploring done for the rest of the night. Just a lot of announcements to “Get the fuck off the water tower!” and to stop vandalizing the school. Tim probably won’t ever have this event out there again. Too bad. It’s a perfect place for it.

ALONE IN THE DARK (1982)

***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: Jack Sholder
Written by: Jack Sholder/Robert Shaye/Michael Harrpster

In the early 80s there were many, many slasher movies running around. For a young producer it was a quick and easy way to make money. And, after making a couple of flicks that really didn’t make any money (Stunts with Robert Forster and John Waters’ Polyester), Robert Shaye decided to try his luck. With these three movies Shaye would lay down the foundation of his little production company, New Line Cinema. Later he would, of course, be the producer of the Nightmare On Elm Street series and, unbelievably, The Lord Of The Rings!

But enough about him. Let’s talk about the movie.

When Dr. Dan Potter (Dwight Schultz, Lt. Barclay in Star Trek: The Next Generation) is moved to a new asylum where his mentor, Dr. Leo Bain (Donald Pleasence who couldn’t get away from playing obsessed psychiatrists at this point in his career), he has no idea what a horrific experience he is about to give his family. He is put in charge of the third floor where they keep the four most dangerous men in the hospital, Col. Frank Hawkes (Jack Palance), Byron “Preacher” Sutcliff (Martin Landau), Ronald “Fatty” Elster (Erland van Lidth from The Running Man and Stir Crazy) and Skaggs aka “The Bleeder” (he never shows his face).

The problem with Dr. Potter’s therapy sessions with these guys is that they loved their old doctor. In fact, Hawkes gets them all to believe that this new guy killed their old doctor in order to take his place. So revenge must be theirs. And, since Dr. Bain doesn’t believe in bars, all it takes is a power outage to set these dangerous men free. (The windows and doors have sensors on them that make steel walls come down if anyone gets too close to windows and doors.) The whole city goes out for a couple of days and the inmates go on a rampage in order to get vengeance for their favorite doctor’s death.

The rest of the movie is like a sick cross between Straw Dogs and The Dream Team. Dr. Potter, a normally mild mannered man, must become a killer in order to protect his family. But, ya know? I liked it. It was fast paced, interesting and always pretty thrilling. Yeah, it’s a pretty typical horror flick where the insane guys are the bad guys, and it’s pretty sad to see Martin Landau in a movie like this (and when, exactly, did the new family friend get arrested?), but it’s a lot of fun and not a movie that you ever hear about anymore.

And Jack Palance is always great to watch, especially when he’s fighting some inner turmoil. (Heh heh.)

And now for the big premiere. We knew we were going to see a movie that wouldn’t be released until next year, but no one had any clue what it was. Luckily, it was a great way to end the mini-festival.

CABIN FEVER (2002)

***½ (3.5/5)

Directed by: Eli Roth
Written by: Eli Roth/Randy Pearlstein

When five friends decide to take a vacation in a cabin in the woods, horror strikes. Yes. You read that right. Five kids are in danger when they stay in the woods. Who’da thunk it?!

But this time it’s not a mysterious killer on the loose. It’s a disease and human nature that do these kids in. Paul (Rider Strong from Boy Meets World) is the moral center of the group. He’s a nice guy who all the girls see as a brother, including childhood friend, Kelly (Jordan Ladd from Never Been Kissed and The Specials) who he, of course, has the hots for. Jeff (Joey Kern from Super Troopers) is almost the exact opposite of Paul. He’s not a complete dick, but he seems to be in it all for himself. He and his girlfriend, Marcy (Cerina Vincent from Not Another Teen Movie…and the Yellow Galaxy Ranger–bet there are a lot of kids looking forward to seeing her naked, and they will here) don’t seem to want to do anything but have sex. Go figure. And then there’s Bert (James DeBello from Detroit Rock City and 100 Girls). Bert’s just a jock moron who doesn’t want to do anything but shoot squirrels because they’re gay.

It’s all fun and sex for these kids until a weird hermit with some kind of skin disease shows up on their doorstep and starts trying to get them to help him. The kids decide that they can’t bring the guy in the cabin, but they’ll try to get help. Unfortunately, the hermit gets in their truck and tries to drive away, exploding blood from his mouth before he is able to get very far. The kids get him out of the truck and accidentally set him on fire sending him into the woods. Now they have to deal with the fact that maybe they caught the disease.

As things (including their bodies) degenerate, they start to show their true colors and none of them really like the others much.

And, of course, there’s the locals who are all a bunch of Deliverance rejects who don’t understand human compassion or the fact that the kids didn’t bring this contagious menace with them.

This was a really clever little horror flick with some great humor A LOT of gore effects. The disease is based on the same flesh-eating virus that one of the sound mixer (John Neff) contracted once. He says that the make-up was pretty much dead on.

Writer/director Eli Roth shopped this flick around for about seven years trying to make sure that it was an Evil Dead type horror movie where it was the kids themselves who were the “evil.” (There are even “Shemps” credited at the end in homage to Sam Raimi.) He kept getting turned down because there was no killer! That’s what’s so cool about the movie!! The kids turn into monsters and do whatever they need to just to survive themselves. After he made it all of the same folks who turned him down to begin with were clamoring to see it at festivals. Bob and Harvey Weinstein actually posed as him and his producers in order to get a copy of it so they could see it. Assholes.

Roth, who helped out with some Broadway plays, was able to get Angelo Badalamenti (Broadway and Hollywood score writer) to do his score for free! That’s how much faith people had in him after a while.

Lucky for us he was able to get this movie made. It’s a great flick. Anyone who likes those late 70s/early 80s gore flicks will LOVE this one. There’s murder, twisted reasoning, leg-shaving scenes, a fingering, sex, nudity and, of course, lots and lots of gore.

Cabin Fever was the best way to end this festival. Can’t wait to see what’s on the slate for next year. And, as we walked away in the day time, the sun brought a new perspective to the asylum, as it always does. Gone were all of the dark corners and recesses of the site. Now it looked exactly like what it was: an old school that was abandoned a few years ago. Probably a reform school or something (with a cemetery?), without all of the creepy parts. It was still weird, but not as chill inducing. Funny how the light can bring clarity.

(Anybody know anything about this place? It’s a right turn away from the Texas Dept. of Corrections just outside of town on Rt. 969. I looked up Texas State School on the net and got nothin’. I’d love to know what’s up with this place and how the hell Tim got permission to do this.)

But I didn’t get a ticket to the 4th Annual Butt-Numb-A-Thon. (24 hours of pure movie pleasure!!) Oh well. I may have one with some friends all on my own on the same day. So n’yah!

A few years ago, a guy named Lucky McKee wrote and directed a little horror movie called May. It wasn’t a huge hit, but it gave him a pretty big cult following. His star, Angela Bettis (who I went to high school with but, unfortunately, have no recollection of at all…sorry, Angela), got her own little cult following of goth dudes who thought it was awesome that she liked to cut people up.

Now it’s Angela’s turn to put Lucky through actor’s hell. He still wrote the script, but Angela is directing him in the title role.

Roman is a lonely guy, but he doesn’t do a whole lot to remedy that situation. He keeps to himself at work, so much so that no one likes him. He never leaves his apartment except to check the mail. This he does at the same time every day. Why is that? Because that’s when SHE checks her mail.

The object of his desire (Kristen Bell before she got all “Veronica Mars”ed up) crosses his window every day at 5:31. He rushes out and watches as she checks her mail. Then he goes back home and sulks. Or he goes up on the roof and drinks a beer…which is what she does one day.

And that’s when they meet. Things go well for a little while. Then they go bad. Very, very bad.

Then he meets Eva (Nectar Rose from Serenity). And things go well again. But not for long.

Some people were thinking that this was going to be May with a guy instead of a girl. It’s not. There are similarities, but it’s completely different. And it’s just as good. Desperation and loneliness are terrible things and can drive some people to do crazy things.

There’s a bit of Vertigo in the film, but I don’t know if it’s intentional. Kristen and Nectar look a lot alike. Who knows? Was Eva supposed to be a substitute for the first, unnamed girl?

The acting is, well, a little shaky. Kristen and Nectar are fine, but Lucky is pretty self-conscious in front of the camera. You can say it was the character, but I think I caught him actually looking at the camera a couple of times. But he’s good enough to be a little bit creepy, but still sort of sympathetic.

Roman took about four years to make. Lucky wrote it soon after May and he and Angela started shooting soon after that. They shot Kristen’s scenes first and then had to put the movie on hold for a while while Lucky did Sick Girl (his “Masters Of Horror” entry) and The Woods, which also played the festival, but I missed it. I’m really glad that they went back to this one. Angela’s a good director and I hope she does something else. Right now she doesn’t have any plans, but if something good comes along she said that she might try it again.

The movie was shot on a GL1 and an XL2, so it looks like video. But that shouldn’t keep you from seeing it. It’s a great psychological horror movie with a heartbreaking ending. I have no idea what the release plans are, but hopefully it’ll be released in some way. Probably straight to video.

JACK STEVENSON PRESENTS: MOVIES WITH ROOTS IN HELL

Jack Stevenson has been writing about film for a long time. He specializes in cult and hard to find films and doesn’t like to show anything in his road show on video. He has a huge collection of 16mm films that he cuts together to show different aspects of film through the ages.

This first program was all about the evils of drugs. Or, at least, what Hollywood used to say about them. It’s a collection of films from 1916-1972 and ran all the way from “drugs are great!” to “drugs are bad, mmmkay.” Most of it was pretty clueless, but it was all interesting.

The first film he showed was a silent short from 1916 starring Douglas Fairbanks called The Leaping Fish. The hero of the film (played by Fairbanks) was named Coke Ennyday (“Drugs are great!”). He’s always down until he shoots up a little coke and then he can take on anybody! He, in fact, with the help of coke, saves the day.

It’s probably the first real drug comedy on film, but what’s really funny about this short (besides the fact that it actually holds up pretty well for being 90 years old) is that I saw it in a Discovery Channel documentary about coke about three days after this program.

There were a bunch of excerpts and trailers for movies in the 30s (including one that featured a bunch of 40 year old high school girls getting naked and going swimming after smoking some marijuana) and it was amazing how naive they were about drugs. Marijuana is the “devil weed” and it makes kids kill and fuck. ‘Cause that’s what it takes to make kids want to fuck. They don’t want to do that unless they’re stoned. And when was the last time someone who just smoked a joint killed someone?

As time went on films started to show drugs in a more favorable light again. Some of the, anyway. There was, of course, a clip from The Trip, a weird little Roger Corman/Peter Fonda movie from 1967. Oh, sure, Peter has a bad trip on acid, but it opens his mind and makes him more clear.

The really eye-opening clips, though, were from 1970′s The People Next Door. This is apparently one of Jack’s favorite movies. He showed us at least four clips and explained the whole movie to us. It stars Deborah Winters as a 16 year old girl who starts to experiment with drugs and sex. Her straight-laced parents (Eli Wallach and Julie Harris) don’t know what to do with her. They blame her brother (Stephen McHattie), but she takes all the blame herself.

For a movie from 1970, this movie has a lot of nudity in it. Male and female. And it deals with just about every issue of the day: drugs, sex, birth control pills, infidelity, donkey fucking…everything. I actually really want to see this movie. Jack said that he would try to bring it to Austin sometime. Sounds awesome.

Jack’s a pretty interesting guy. I would definitely sit through more of his programs. He’s a little back-dated, though. He’s been living in Denmark for years now and I don’t know if that’s the influence or if he’s actually a little bit out of touch. he uses phrases like “record album” and “DVD cassette” or “DVD cartridge.” It was kinda terrifyin’.

By the way, in the poster, that’s not Jesus. But it would be a lot funnier if it was.

Another cheapie about a woman, Dawn (Jodie Jameson), who has just lost her unborn baby and her boyfriend within about a week of each other. She goes on vacation by the ocean to get a little time to heal, but she finds a new object of obsession on the beach: a weird creature that, at first, appears to be dead. But she nurses it back to health.

Then things start to get a little…strange. The creature starts secreting a jelly type substance that Dawn just can’t resist. It’s apparently liquid orgasm. She starts to lick the weird little creature.

In other Dawn news, she finds a new man. John (Burt Ruspoli) is a really nice guy who starts to fall in love with Dawn pretty quickly. But, when the creature gets a little jealous, things don’t go well.

For such a low budget, this movie had the grossest monster of the festival. It was a creepy, pink little thing that barely moved. It’s only function seemed to be to secrete this weird substance and take over Dawn’s life.

It’s a pretty good movie that, while a little bit predictable, kept my interest for the entire run of the film. I wanted to know just how far she would go to keep protecting her surrogate baby. And it showed that love is hard. Especially when a monster is involved.

BUG

And speaking of hard love, William Friedkin comes to the rescue of his own career and does his best film, possibly since the 70s. Definitely his best since Rules Of Engagement.

Agnes (Ashley Judd) is trying to make it in a small town when her asshole ex-husband (Harry Connick, Jr.) gets out of jail. Luckily, she meets Peter (Michael Shannon) just in time. Unluckily, Peter is completely insane. He believes that bugs are attacking him and that the government has manufactured those bugs.

That’s about all you need to know. It gets pretty crazy and Shannon and Judd put in some pretty amazing performances.

One thing that I was wondering about this one is where it’s coming from politically. If it had been written in the last six years it would have been seen as a Republican propaganda story saying that all conspiracy theorists are batshit crazy. But it’s based on a play that was written at least about 10 years ago. (Shannon is the only person who has played Peter, so he’s gotten plenty of practice. Something like 250 performances worth of practice.)

This is a great movie where the monster is inside your head. And the performances and direction suck you in so hard that you can’t get out until the very end. And even then you start wonder if you’re really out of it. Go see it.

THE GLAMOROUS LIFE OF SACHIKO HANAI

Speaking of political statements, this has to be the only soft-core political comedy in existence. Of course, it’s Japanese.

Sachiko has been shot in the head. Before that she was a stupid hooker who could barely put two and two together to get three. But after the incident, she’s a woman who gets off on philosophy and carries a cloned of George W. Bush’s finger that is going to be used to launch the bombs.

Guess where the finger goes occasionally.

This is probably the funniest movie I saw at the festival. It starts off pretty weird and just gets weirder and weirder until it finally gets to be a nightmare in the head of growth on Noam Chomsky’s shoulder that looks like Susan Sontag. And it stars a hot Asian chick who takes her clothes off every 15 minutes. Nothing at all wrong with that.

I can’t see how this movie could get any better. Yeah, it’s a little bit slow in parts, but not enough to really make it seem longer than it should be.

The only way to describe this movie is that you have to see it to believe it. Nothing else will do it justice. So find it. See it. Love it.

SHORTS

GOD’S LITTLE GIRL (played with Venus Drowning)

A woman loses her year old baby and wonders how God could take such an innocent little being. Obviously, the old adage about only the good dying young is true. So she now has to find a way to be just a little bit bad.

Not a bad short, but maybe a bit too long. I actually don’t remember it too well, so that’s probably not such a great sign. I think I remember thinking that it was alright, though.

HEAD SHOT (played with Sachiko Hanai)

When an actor can’t even get a job on a snuff film, he has to figure that he just doesn’t have the talent to pull it off, right? Maybe not.

This is a pretty funny short that proves the theory that you have to be a pretty good actor to act so badly.

Now the previews have come out. And it at least looks like it could be a good, fun flick. Maybe no true winner or anything, but it looks like Johnny Depp and Geoffrey Rush were having a blast making it. And it’s directed by Gore Vorbinski, director of The Ring, so it could even be a little bit scary.

And, even better, there don’t seem to be any “Bad Dog!” moments.

I’ll check it out.

THE ITALIAN JOB-Having never seen the original (but I’m working on it) I have no point of reference for the remake, but it looks pretty good. I could watch paint dry on Charlize Theron, so that’s one plus that it has (and there’s no Keanu!) and Edward Norton is always high on my list of actors to see in movies. Mark Wahlberg is another story, though. He hasn’t impressed me lately. He hasn’t made a truly good movie since Three Kings. (Perfect Storm doesn’t really count although I kinda liked it.) I know he has it in him to be a good actor, so why doesn’t he try it in some good movies? I hate that!

Along for the ride in the Mini are Seth Green, Donald Sutherland, Mos Def and Jason Statham. It’s one to make some time for.

ALEX AND EMMA-Which brings us to this one. What the hell is it? It’s a romantic comedy by Rob Reiner based on the true story of Dostoyevsky and his transcriber.

A writer (Luke Wilson-HA!) hires someone (Kate Hudson) to type out his latest novel as he dictates it. She starts to have input that he doesn’t want, but it makes it into the story anyway. They fall in love. End of story. Whatever.

Kate plays four or five different roles in the different stories that are going on in Luke’s head.

I’m not so sure about this one. Looks pretty typical. But the goofiness of Kate and Luke might work well together. I guess we’ll see. But not until video.

CHARLIE’S ANGELS-FULL THROTTLE-Despite the shitty title, I really want to see this one. I liked the first one quite a bit and this one looks like it might be even bigger and better. Plus it has Demi Moore coming out of retirement as a fallen Angel! What more could we want? How about the Creepy Thin Man back again? Well, Crispin is back, too.

I’m all over them, er, it.

Now to the ten little Indians.

What happens when you get ten flawed people together on a dark and stormy night at a creepy old motel on a deserted road that no one can get to?

People DIE!!!

That’s what happens when a limo driver with a past (John Cusack), the ex-movie star he’s driving around (Rebecca De Morney), a questionable cop (Ray Liotta) and the scary inmate he’s transporting (Jake Busey), a weak husband (John C. McGinley), a comatose wife (Leile Kenzle), their quiet son (Bret Loehr), a skittish motel manager (John Hawkes), a call girl on the run (Amanda Peet), a young, just married couple (Clea DuVall and William Lee Scott), the Professor and Mary Anne meet up here at Gilligan’s Sadistic Motel.

Sure, they’re all pretty much archetype characters, but the actors are so good in their roles that they never become caricatures. The best is, of course, Cusack as a guy who is so much more than just a limo driver. He has a dark spot on his past, but he never lets it define him.

In fact, everyone has a dark spot on their past. There are no clear consciences here. Each character has their little quirks that makes them basically not a good person. Not always bad, just not good.

Oh, and there’s a little story going along with it about a prisoner who is facing the chair tonight if Alfred Molina can’t convince the judge that he’s insane. What does that have to do with anything? Watch and find out.

This is one of the best slasher flicks I’ve seen in a long time. Certainly the smartest since the original Scream and the most serious one since the first Nightmare On Elm Street. But it’s never fully a horror movie. It’s a psychological thriller with slasher/horror aspects…kinda like Psycho. But it ain’t THAT good.

There are lots of good scares, but some of them are pretty cheap (There’s something clumping around the big dryer. I wonder what it is!) and the ending is a little too much of a “shocker” to really work. But it would have been too neat otherwise. Hopefully they don’t decide to take the movie to Sequel Land.

Check it out if you’re up for a good scare and a bit of a mind fuck.