Frightfest Diary Day One: Romero, Romero, Romero, A Bittersweet Life and Evil Aliens.

Before Land showed at 7pm, we were treated to a Q&A with special effects meister Greg Nicotero, who brought along some zombie props from Land to hand around the audience. He also showed us a demo reel prepared especially for the Fright Fest, of various effects he had made and recorded in order to show George Romero a number of ideas he had. This was extremely entertaining, and made me look forward even more to the forthcoming Unrated DVD.

I know Land this has been out for a while overseas, so I won’t go into detail, but I will say that nothing compares to Romero Zombies, and this has all the hallmarks of a classic Romero Movie. Dennis Hopper was on fine form too. Though lacking the punch of his Romero’s previous flicks, this was still an extremely strong entry into the genre.

Once Land had finished, we were treated to another Q&A, this time for which George Romero came on stage and chatted with the audience. What can I say except the man’s a legend and it was a fitting end. Bizarre trivia moment: The scene in which Dennis Hopper picks his nose while delivering a line, he just asked Romero on spec if he could do that. Romero decided why not?

9.30pm A Bittersweet Life. (Dir. Ji-woon Kim)

Moving on after a quick snack at the local café, it was straight back for the 9.30pm showing of A Bittersweet Life, a very beautiful looking movie and ultra cool to boot. A worthwhile watch, although I don’t hold anywhere near the same regards as the director’s previous and frankly sublime, A Tale Of Two Sisters. This was still a slick, loud and ultra cool gangster flick.

00.00am Evil Aliens (Dir. Jake West)

After a quick coffee we were onto our final movie of the day, the midnight feature of Jake West’s Evil Aliens. I was somewhat concerned about this, considering his terrible first feature Razor Blade Smile and wondered whether to take the gamble with the movie and suffer the even more horrific night bus home, or skip it and hit the last tube. I took the gamble.

The best I can describe Evil Aliens is an amalgamation of Braindead, Bad Taste, Deliverance and Predator, this film is fun, tasteless and slapstick to the extreme. Following an intrepid group of reporter’s from a small Sci Fi Programme, investigating a supposed Alien Abduction in a remote Welsh Valley, in which one of the abducted claims to have become impregnated. our team of not so professional reporter’s have a few overtly close encounters of their own, and these ET’s don’t wanna play nice.

Starting off with an anal probing scene (or should I say, anal drilling) that probably had the whole audience clenching their butt cheeks in unison, you soon know Evil Aliens means business. Teaming with a group of redneck welsh farmers armed with chainsaws and shotguns, a fight to the death ensues in an interterrestrial grind-a-thon. As our bunch of cocky, smart ass brits and welsh rednecks go head to head against predator like fiends. it’s a hilariously blood soaked monster mash from the get go.

Interestingly, for a low budget flick, Evil Aliens has some not bad (if extremely cheesy) spaceship effects. Fitting in with the gore soaked lunacy, it’s a bizarre amalgamation, but it works. And hey, any movie that features death by combine harvester (with ‘I’ve got a brand new combine harvester’ blaring over the soundtrack no less) has got to be a treat. Thumbs Up!