Cinema Head Cheese - Movie Reviews, News, a Podcast and more!: January 2022

January 31, 2022

A Binge too Far #21: Fright Nights: Horrorant 6 Film Festival report

6th Horrorant International Film Festival, 2019, poster

I am a 35-year-old film journalist madly in love with a 6-year-old festival (wait a minute, what did your perverted mind thought?). Said film festival is none other than Horrorant from Greece, which this year took place simultaneously in both Athens and Thessaloniki, from the 9^th to the 15^th of May 2019, kick-starting its festivities with a cosplay event.

In terms of screenings, the opening ceremony featured Mon Mon Mon Monsters (2017), i.e. last year’s winner of the best film prize.

The competition panorama was compiled of several great features, including Freaks (2018), Anya (2018), Long Lost (2018), Two Times You (2018), Albatroz (2019), Scopophilia (2018), Every Time I Die (2019), The Tenants (2018), Kill Ben Lyk (2018), The Spell (2018), Finale (2018), Carga (2018), Go Home (2018), Werewolf (2018), Pledge (2018), Last Sunrise (2019), Romina (2018), Alive (2018), The Soul Conductor (2018), I’ll Take Your Dead (2018), After The Lethargy (2018), The Last Serb In Croatia (2019), Abrakadabra (2018), Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich (2018), Dead End (2018), Dukun (2018), Long Lost (2018), and Blood Fest (2018).

Famous for its retrospectives, Horrorant this year also provided the aegis for the ‘3X3 Latin’ special, in which the talents of South American filmmakers were explored, and included screenings of Sonno Profondo (2013), Trauma (2017), Sendero (2015), Perfidia (2014), Luna De Miel (2015), Perdidos (2014), and Francesca (2015).

But Horrorant is also known for featuring in its program some of the very best short films currently on the festival circuit, and this year audiences had the opportunity to catch up with Clickbait (2018), Stray (2018), Escalada (2018), Muffin (2017), Met@slash (2018), It Follows (2018), Amme (2018), Mum I’m Scared (2018), Piggy (2018), Apollyon (2019), A Doll Distorted (2018), Blackout (2019), Lura (2018), Mask of Sanity (2018), The Last Well (2018), Anacronte (2018), Glitch (2018), My Brother Juan (2019), Claudia (2018), My First Time (2018), Beyond Money (2018), Forgive Me (2019), Η Ερήμωση (2019), Antxoni (2018), Sin Ti (2018), Do you Want me to Kiss you this Time? (2018), and Brainrain (2018).

Once again Horrorant was packed with guest filmmakers from all over the world that either provided master-classes or informative and entertaining Q&A sessions.

The Reviews

Yours truly was once again the Head of the Awards Jury, and watched all films in the competition block, and here’s selected reviews.

After the Lethargy (2018)

After The Lethargy

Upon receiving a dodgy alien conspiracy DVD and during the writing of a book on that particular subject, the female lead Sara Hamilton (Andrea Guasch) travels to a U.F.O. hot spot, where she is introduced to the local weirdoes (including a ranger and a repairman), until she will come face to face with a well-made CGI creature. In the meanwhile, a police investigation is taking place in the broader area, after the surfacing of some dead bodies, but things may not be what they seem to be.

Writer/director Marc Carrete (ASMODEXIA [2014]) takes his time to build up the tension, and that makes its third act even more exciting, when all hell breaks loose, and a combination of CGI and practical effects, as well as a few twists in the plot result in a very worthy viewing. Although it is apparent that the film was made with limited means, the filmmakers made the most of them.

The film premiered at South America’s prestigious Fantaspoa International Fantastic Film Festival, and has played many more festivals since, nominated for several awards and actually winning some of them.

2018, Spain

DIRECTOR: Marc Carrete

The Spell (2019) poster

The Spell

Director Amit Dubey’s second feature comes from Cambodia (it must be the first film from that country that I get to see), and it is reminiscent of other Asian ghost films. The plot revolves around a young couple which is moving to a new secluded villa, where they will come face to face with supernatural terror, in the form of a ghost. Instead of leaving, they decide to stay and fight evil. Will they make it? You should watch the film yourself and find out, as loads of scares ensue, both of the jump variety and otherwise.

Sure, the story is not the film’s strongest asset as we have seen all of the above plenty of times already, but the visuals are impressive. The film benefits from Jeremiah Overman’s stunning cinematography and the glorious widescreen version is a work of art, really. I’m glad I caught up with it at Horrorant Film Festival, where the world-wide premiere took place.

2019, Cambodia

DIRECTOR: Amit Dubey

Freaks (2018) poster

Freaks

Chloe (child TV actress Lexy Kolker) is a young peculiar girl, that upon escaping her weird father’s (Emile Hirsch, who also started as a TV actor, but has now graduated to features) custody, she finds solace at the hands of Mr. Snowcone (Bruce Dern, no introduction needed), an ice-cream man that may or may be not her grandfather and who helps her bring out her super powers.

Written and directed by the dynamic duo of Zach Lipovsky and Adam B. Stein (a television specialist), this is thematically weird and visually creepy, and you can’t really go wrong with aspects like those. Premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival, Freaks then went on to perform very well at several festivals all around the world, nominated for several awards and even winning quite a few of them.

2018, Canada/USA

DIRECTORS: Zach Lipovsky, Adam B. Stein

Puppet Master: The Littlest...

Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich

Imposing a twist on the Puppet Master franchise’s (1989 – present) story, this kind of mainstream and quite high profile reboot from directors Sonny Laguna and Tommy Wiklund has a decayed Andre Toulon (Udo Kier, no introduction needed) as a homophobic Nazi, who created the famous puppets as the ultimate evil spy killing machines back in the day of the Reich. Fast forward to the present day, and Carol Doreski (Barbara Crampton, again no introduction needed), a guide at a tourist resort at the infamous murders of Toulon’s puppets murders, loses control of the situation, when said puppets are unleashed and start murdering gypsies, Jews, etc. Panic ensues and many cast members face inevitable gory deaths.

Wildly entertaining, this is actually the franchise’s bloodiest entry yet (and I imagine that it will be difficult for anyone to top this in the near future, although a ‘To be continued…’ title card in the end is promising). It is also featuring slick cinematography (the kind that the franchise never had the luck to feature previously) and the best score the puppets ever had in their background (it was composed by Lucio Fulci darling Fabio Frizzi). The puppets are amazing as well (and it is quite the innovation seeing them here as the bad guys, an idea so great it surprising it wasn’t developed earlier by Charles Band, who is an executive producer here), but the real winner is the stellar cast, and I am not talking only about the two mega-stars mentioned above; it just seemed that every cast decision works in spades here.

I believe that this is the best Puppet Master film we have seen so far, but even you don’t agree, fear not, as it has been said that this reboot will run independently from Full Moon’s series canon, so in the near future you will have two celluloid universes to choose from. Why not indulge in both?

2018, UK/USA

DIRECTORS: Sonny Laguna, Tommy Wiklund

The Awards

Best ‘Competition’ Film: Pledge

Best ‘Panorama’ Film: Last Sunrise

2^nd Best ‘Panorama’ Film: Kill Ben Lyk

Best Director: Adrian Panek (Werewolf)

Best Screenplay: Luna Gualano & Emiliano Rubbi (Go Home)

Best Male Lead: Bruce Dern (Freaks)

Best Female Lead: Anne Bergfeld (Finale)

Best Cinematography: Yuri Bekhterev (The Soul Conductor)

Best Special Effects: Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich

Special Mention: Nicolás Onetti for his contribution in the giallo revival.

Best Foreign Short: BrainRain

Best Greek Short: BlackOut

Afterword

This event report was written almost three years ago, but somehow managed to remain on shelf for far too long, now that Horrorant is about to come back from the dead (or rather, the pandemic), I think that the timing is perfect for its publication.

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January 10, 2022

Monsters in the Closet (2021)

Even though this film’s trailer intrigued and excited me, I still had that uneasy feeling that comes with most indie films. It’s not often that these flicks succeed and I was worried my hopes would be dashed against the rocks of mediocrity. Fortunately, my psyche experienced only slight battery over the 88-minute running time.

Monsters in the Closet is about a recluse writer who suddenly dies. His estranged daughter goes to his house to do what all surviving family members do – rifle through his shit. Interrupted for only a moment by her father’s publishing house representative about getting their hands on his last work, Jasmin gets to her dad’s house to find a laptop with a recorded video, just for her.

Aside from not taking any responsibility for his aloofness and terrible parenting skills, he wants to tell her about his latest project. It’s going to be a HUGE success! You see, he found a seventeenth-century book on black magic that teaches the reader how to cast spells by writing stories about them. And once you read them aloud, the characters in each story come to life. Imagine, having a real vampire in your house!

Not sure that’s so great, but go on, Father…

What follows is her dad telling four different tales. And as you might guess, an element from each story comes to life in the house where Jasmin sits, ALONE, watching her father’s final video.

I do love a good anthology film. And while the execution is lacking, overall I have to say I enjoyed it. It’s definitely a comedy/horror mash-up and each story is quite unique from all the others. Not saying the individual stories themselves were particularly original, but I’m glad they didn’t all blend together with shared tropes.

We’ve got zombies, a serial killer, a mad scientist, and just good, old-fashioned, isolated mania. While some of the acting is horrible, I gotta give props to John Paul Fedele and his ability to sell the idea of having sexual relations with an…assembled woman. His story was my favorite as it had me laughing the most often. And I wish I could remember the character names to shout out the actors, but the pair playing the couple who bought their first fixer-upper house in the second segment balanced hyperbole and believability so well! This was a close second place behind the mad scientist story as the humor hit home more often than not.

Something's missing. I can't quite put my finger on it...

The mixed bag of CGI did little to help. Some looked completely realistic, and others were obvious cheap computer programming. But it didn’t detract too much from the movie, making it easily forgettable.

Thankfully, the acting was better than I expected. The worst of it came in the weakest story, the third segment called “The One Percenters”. Cliché, obvious and terrible, and I’ve forgotten most of it. The performances in the main/wrap-around story were lackluster at best, awkward at worst, but not so bad as to make me want to shut it off. The good acting in the rest of the film absolutely made up for anything lacking elsewhere.

If you like to give indie films a try, despite that nagging feeling you might be setting yourself up for a long night of binge drinking, check out this one. I don’t think you’ll be sorry!

3.5 Hatchets (out of 5)

January 1, 2022

A Binge too Far #20: Nobody Sleeps in the Woods Tonight duo (2020 – 2021)

Frame from Nobody Sleeps in the Woods Tonight (2020)

Happy new year! For me New Year’s Eve is always about changes and setting new goals. Well, for starters, I thought I’d change the way my posts work in Cinema Head Cheese. You’ll still be getting one post per month by yours truly, but whereas both my columns were bi-monthly, for 2022 you’ll get A Binge too Far posts on the 1^st of January, February, April, May, July, August, October, November, and you’ll get Static Age posts on the 1^st of March, June, September, and December. In other words, for every two A Binge too Far posts, you’ll get one Static Age post. I decided upon this new arrangement in order for Static Age to grow a bit bigger and include more content each time (I’m thinking more than 1,500 words per post), while of course A Binge too Far will remain pretty much the same, with a couple of reviews crammed in each post. Got it?

Nobody Sleeps in the... (2020)

Nobody Sleeps in the Woods Tonight (2020)

Directed by Bartosz M. Kowalski (his second feature) this Netflix original from Poland, is about a group of internet-addicted teenagers (aren’t they all?) that join a reform camp in the woods of the aforementioned country in order to take some time offline; but it looks that someone or something is taking them off – period – in the most gruesome of ways.

Featuring an original concept (as it becomes apparent from the film’s premise) that is also quite convenient (mobile phones in horror films have been a problem since the device’s inception), this does not manage to stay away from the slasher tropes and quickly ends up being formulaic. The villain owes a lot to the Hatchet film series (2006 – present) and the tone is mostly reminiscent of the Wrong Turn franchise (2003 – present).

However, by aiming for an old school approach – the special effects are awesome in all their practical glory – and employing inventive kills, this is a winner. Special mention should be given to Radzimir Debski’s score, which would not be out of place in any 1960s Italian exploitation, and it could in fact have been composed by Riz Ortolani.

Nobody Sleeps in the Woods Tonight 2 (2021)

Nobody Sleeps in the Woods Tonight 2 (2021)

Following the events of the first film, this sequel helmed by returning director Bartosz M. Kowalski (who also penned the screenplay with Mirella Zaradkiewicz) leaves aside the original’s teenage-centric sensibilities and opts for a love story involving monsters.

Featuring wilder practical special effects and set-pieces, this loses steam with its enhanced comedy elements (apparently Poland is a country in which it is still relevant to make jokes about the connection between prostitution and HIV, or small dicks and swastikas). Elsewhere the Abbott and Costello approach fails miserably, making the end result seem tired, lifeless, and too self-conscious for its own good. However, it is still visceral enough to guarantee for an at least interesting visual experience, while some of its references are interesting [signaling Maniac Cop (1988) is always welcome].