Complete Fantastic Fest Wrap Up!

Hey fellow Twitchers!

Just got back from the awesome inaugural Fantastic Fest which ran in Austin, Texas this past weekend (Oct 6-9) (http://www.fantasticfest.com) While it was no Fantasia (still my fave fantasy fest) I still had a blast hanging out with the very friendly festival organizing team, including ultra-fanboy Harry Knowles (http://www.aintitcool.com/) . Also caught the much- anticipated world Premiere of Jon Favreau’s (Elf, Swingers) sci-fi fantasy adaptation of Zathura. (http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/zathura/)  Plus sat in on a panel discussion with the animators behind upcoming Philip K Dick adaptation, A Scanner Darkly (http://philipkdick.com/films_scanner.html) and got to see the new extended trailer. Also got to see the World Premiere of the first horror film to be produced by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck’s Project Greenlight, Feast (http://www.fantasticfest.com/feast.php). You can see pictures I snapped of what I got up to over the weekend here: http://ca.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/adamlpz/album?.dir=/2d93&.src=ph

FESTIVAL OVERVIEW

Austin’s Fantastic Fest have modeled themselves on Fantasia (http://www.fantasiafestival.com/), in that they are a broad fantastic film festival, covering Sci-Fi, Horror and Fantasy films. Despite being a upstart fantasy fest, they were able to score quite a few coups, thanks to the organizers connections . Including the World Premieres of Zathura and Sin City the Extended Cut, the North American premiere of Herzog’s Wild Blue Yonder, and the U.S Premiere of Eli Roth’s Hostel. As I was flying down all the way from Toronto (during Canadian Thanksgiving Weekend no less) I tried to see everything I physically possibly could during the festival, but I still had to miss a few due to overlaps in the schedule! Over just 3 and a half days, the organizers of Fantastic Fest had ambitiously programmed 22 feature films (of which I caught 16), 21 shorts (of which I saw 19), and 2 panel discussions.

FILM REVIEWS – IN VERY BRIEF!

Here are some ultra brief reviews and ratings of the feature flicks I caught.

1. MODERN MASTERPIECE FILMS (4 STARS OUT OF 4)

Strings (Sweden, 2004): Stunning puppetry in this mythical, magical epic adventure. Think Lord of the Rings as told by Puppets and you still wouldn’t be close to how beautiful and unique this film is. Four years in the making, this one had audience’s mouths hanging open in disbelief! Why hadn’t we heard of this before, we all wondered? Regardless, two stringed hands, way strung up!

Wolf Creek (Australia, 2005): Shocking gets under your skin slasher road movie, based on actual events, shot in a brutally realistic style. This is Blair Witch meets Texas Chainsaw, and boy, is it hard to watch some scenes. Full of twists and turns as the slasher plays cat and mouse with three trapped young ‘guests’. Guaranteed this film will leave you emotionally drained by the end. Heart-pounding stuff!

Feast (USA, 2005):  Project Greenlight loses all pretension at high art, and goes for splatter comedy in this its third, and possibly final attempt to kickstart American low-budget filmmakers’ careers. Buckets o’ blood and guts, kinky sex, real-life maggots, and Henry Rollins all add their own charms to this gorey tale of a bar besieged by a bunch of voracious critters. This film is what it is, a good old fashioned blood fest with its tongue firmly in its puss-filled cheek. Enjoy!

Sin City – Extended Cut (USA, 2005):  Two words: More Marv. Yesssss! Robert Rodriguez has gone back and added extra footage to each of the three Sin City stories. Now the film clocks in at over three hours, but you get more Marv (you meet his Mom) and Bruce Williis’s character is fleshed out better too. Still as visually stunning as ever. Can’t wait for the DVD!

Zathura (USA, 2005): Jon Favreau’s inventive, witty take on the board game come to life story of the same title. Ultra cool in that he filmed all the thrilling action pieces the old-fashioned way: using Stan Winston made models, and real life props. Just as with Elf, Favreau’s crafted a modern day fairytale that entertains adults as much as kids. Shamelessly good fun with stunning SFX and surprisingly un-annoying kids in the lead roles. A festival crowd-pleaser.

Night of the Living Dorks (Germany, 2004):  Finally got to see this Audience favourite of festivals worldwide. And now I can see why everybody loves it: it’s American Pie meets Dawn of the Dead. This wonderfully endearing Cinderella zombie story has something for everyone: sex, drugs, flesh eating teens, comedy, all accompanied by a kick-ass German punk rock soundtrack. A guilty pleasure.

2. PRETTY DARN GOOD FILMS (3 STARS OUT OF 4)

The Dark Hours (Canada, 2005):  Extremely suspenseful horror thriller, about a psychiatrist and her family trapped in a snowy Canadian log cabin by a couple of former patient sickos. The constant dread is tempered with the darkly comic wit of the lead perp. Full of surprises, you won’t see the ending coming! Highly recommended. And, the biggest shock, horror for me? it’s Canadian!

Malefique (France, 2002): Imagine a French Version of 12 Angry Men crossed with Cube. Four cellmates in a prison discover a book of black magic spells in their cell. Which they start experimenting with to try and escape. But there’s always horrific side effects to each spell they try, including dismemberment. This gruesome, minimalist supernatural chiller, is enlivened by clever use of CGI, sound, and stand-out performances from the four main leads. Wickedly nasty!

Hostel (USA, 2005):  Sneak peak at the eagerly anticipated sophomore effort from Eli Roth (Cabin Fever). I was a bit uneasy about catching this full bodied slasher horror flick, given the reviews from Toronto’s midnight madness last month… but pleasantly surprised. Sure it’s got incredibly hard-hitting torture scenes, and it’ll make you think twice about back-packing across Europe. But the ending is so kick-ass good (the T&A at the beginning isn’t bad either) that you’ll happily go to sleep disturbed by it!

3. DISSAPOINTMENT FILMS (2 STARS OR LESS OUT OF 4)

Wild Blue Yonder (UK/FRANCE 2005), Much-hyped, but sadly universally disappointing to Fantastic Fest crowds “sci-fi fantasy” from acclaimed documentary filmmaker Werner Herzog. Brad Dourif expertly narrates this bizarre 81 minute-long mock documentary about space travel. Repetitive use of the same Nasa stock footage, alongside grating tribal chant music sink this adventure. For experimental film lovers only.

P (Thailand, 2005) Underwhelming “Carrie-Lite” from Thailand. A Bangkok teenager,  unwittingly duped into becoming a stripper,  uses black magic to wreak revenge on her new customers, employers and peers at her strip beer, with murderous results. A promising beginning, let down by a weak, meandering, and downright confusing last third of the film. Pass.

Pulse AKA Kairo (Japan, 2001). Rare screening of much-hyped cyber-supernatural flick by J-horror maestro Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Cure). Maybe it was the midnight timeslot, combined with the slow pace of the film. Or maybe it was that the film genuinely was confusing and overly slow, but one way or another I didn’t dig this film. Even though I loved Cure. Go figure!

4. POST-APOCALYPTIC RETROSPECTIVE

Fantastic Fest also ran an incredible retrospective of rarely seen 1970’s and 1980’s post-apocalyptic cinema. The films were uniformly riveting to watch:

No Blade of Grass (1970 British stunningly brilliant survivalist horror), Miracle Mile (1988 US nuclear war fear mongering chiller),  1990: Bronx Warriors (1982 so bad its good Italian take on Escape from New York), and The Last Wave (thought-provoking 1977 Aussie flick about a man haunted by dreams of the world’s destruction)

WANT TO SEE MORE?

Each film at Fantastic Fest has its own festival page with a full synopsis and details including pictures, which can be reached by clicking on the film’s title here: http://www.fantasticfest.com/programming.php

QUICK CLOSING PLUG

As some of you may know, the main reason for my trip South to Austin, during Canadian Thanksgiving was research! I am planning to launch an equivalent to Austin’s Fantastic Fest and Montreal’s Fantasia in Toronto next year. Having chatted to Todd about this, Twitchfilm.net will be one of our partners this amazing undertaking! If you live in Toronto or nearby, and would also like to get involved in launching our festival – where we’ll be playing a number of of the films covered in the pages of Twitchfilm - please drop me an e-mail at
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Thanks and take care!

Adam Lopez
Festival Director
After Dark Film Festival
Coming to Toronto
Fall 2006