In China They Eat Dogs I Kina Spiser De Hunde, Denmark, 1999

A Danish thriller dealing with immigrant trafficking and a plan to steal a car loaded with money. Two resturant employees and their boss, a drug dealer, decide to steal a car to give the money back to a woman who apparently needed it to pay an expensive operation. Little do they know she is lying and has other plans in mind. At times brutal and definitely full of black humor, this is the first in a series of new Danish black comedies that have become quite famous in the international movie scene.

Catsplay (Macskajatek) Ungarn, 1972

Karoly Makk hat wenige Filme gedreht. Er bleibt trotzdem einer der besten ungarischen Regisseure allerzeit. Einige Kritiker meinen, ihm gelang Liebe (und Liebesbeziehungen) auf dem Leinwand zu blenden. In Catsplay geht es um zwei alte Schwester. Sie schreiben sich Briefe, weil sie in verschiedenen Städten wohnen. Eine wohnt in Wien, die andere in Budapest. Alles, was ind en Briefen steht, wird gezeigt, in der Form kurzer und schneller Szenen ohne Dialogen. Diese Technik nennt Makk

Ne t'en fais pas, je vais bien (France, 2006)
After returning from vacations, Lili finds out by her parents that Loic, her brother, escaped home. This is a shock to her, much more so, because her parents do not seem very worried. After several weeks and no news from her brother, Lili starts to get depressed and gets sick. Suddenly she starts receiving letters from her brother telling her that he is ok, but that he could not stand being home. Little does she knows that her parents are hiding a horrible truth that will only be unveiled by Lili's boyfriend. This is a suspsense story that will keep you interested until the end.

The Number 23 (USA, 2006)

Director Joel Schumacher tells the story of Walter Sparrrow (Jim Carrey) who one day finds a book titled "the Number 23" It is an autobiography about a man who at the end becomes obssessed with the number 23. Everywhere he would see this number and make references to his birthday, address, and other calculations, and everytime he would come up with this number. Walter, as he reads the novel, becomes interested, and relates to the main character in the book, and even obssessed with these numbers. Only at the end do we find out that the book was written by Walter himself, and that a horrible crime was committed.

INLAND EMPIRE (UK Trailer)

Young Man (Jeune Homme) Switzerland, 2006

Sebastien, 18, is running away from a family-owned printing firm future for an au pair job in Geneva with a modern and too busy family. Overwhelmed by the events, he gets attached, reveals himself and discovers what he really wants: to become a haute cuisine chef. He also falls in love with a girl he meets in Geneva. Yes, it is a very "family" movie, and it is actually quite entertaining. Sebastien comes from the German part of Switzerland, so half of the movie is spoken in Swiss-German, while the Geneva scenes are in French. It is rare to see a Swiss movie make this language alternations, but it adds to the originality of the film.

The Serpent's Egg (Das Schlangenei), West Germany, 1977

The only movie from Swedish director Ingmar Bergman to be shot in Germany. This is the story, like many German movies, about a woman who tries to save herself from the growing menace of fascism in Berlin. She works as a cabaret girl, and with her connections she is able to live a reasonably comfortable life in the middle of economic crisis. An unemployed American acroba, Abel Rosenberg, decides to look for his brother, who apparently committed suicide in Berlin during a severe personal depression crisis. Doesn't sound like your typical comedy movie, right? Things get worse for Abel, who is interrogated by the State police regarding a couple of murders that took place near the appartement he is renting.

The movie reflects the situation of Germany before the Second World War. Bergman strives for a movie that is more expressionist and direct than his usual storytelling technique. The shocking ending prepares the audience for what is about to happen in that country. It's like a serpent's egg, we see the form of the beast just before it comes out.

Die Geige(El Violin), Mexiko, 2007

Dieser schwarz-weiss Fillm erzählt die Geschichte einer Gruppe mexikanischer Landwirte, die im Süden des Landes wohnen und arbeiten. Sie leben in Armut, denn für ihre Ernte bekommen sie fast kein Geld. Darunter gibt es eine Gruppe von Rebellen, die gegen die Regierung kämpfen. Sie versuchen, diese schlechte Situation der Landwirte zu ändern.

Genau genommen geht es um eine Familie von Landwirten. Der Mann ist mit der Rebellengruppe beschäftigt, und deswegen ist eines Tages seine Frau und Tochter von der Polizei verschleppt worden. Der Grossvater wohnt mit dieser Famlie zusammen. Er entschloss sich, die Frau und Tochter zu retten. Warum heisst der Film "Die Geige"? Denn der Grossvater besitzt eine Geige, die er immer bei sich hat. Er arbeitet als Strassenmusiker.

Man sieht im Film wie die Landwirte ausgebeutet werden. Das gehört leider zu mexikanischem Alltag Die Landschaft mitten in den Bergen ist wunderschön. Visuell ist der Film auch sehr gut.

MORE FANTASIA FILMS (from around the world):

Offscreen (Denmark, 2007) ☆☆☆☆☆
Director Christopher Boe has put together a film made out of basically home videos. These videos come from actor Nicholas Bro, who during a whole year recorded his everyday life activities and carried around a camera with him almost everywhere. When his friends, and finally his girlfriend, get fet up and break all contact with him, he starts to lose it. Nicholas thinks he is shooting a film, and for this reason asks other friends to help him finish his "production". Nobody takes him seriously and finally, when he loses it, he commits an atrocious crime, all caught on tape and shown to the spectator. It is fake "reality tv" style that shocks. The film suddenly stops being a documentary and strays into fiction, but the line is blurred and makes you believe every scene you are watching is real. Another original Danish production.

Diary (Hong Kong, 2006) ☆☆☆☆
Winnie is a schizophrenic young woman. She sees and hears things all the time. She lives alone in her appartment. Little by little the viewer realizes Winnie has not only killed his boyfriend, but is also about to commit another crime. When she meets another guy who looks like his boyfriend and invites him for dinner, things turn really bad. This movie is a mixture of paranoia, mental illness and murder that will make your mind work to try to find out who is the actual murderer.

Zero City (Russia, 1988) ☆☆☆
Moscow engineer Alexei Varakin arrives to a strange town. In it, there is no one on the streets, and when he arrives to his appointment at a local company, the secretary sits in her desk fully naked! This is only the beginning of many other surreal events taking place in Zero City, where Alexei witnesses a murder and has to stay in town while police makes enquiries as to what really happened. A very strange sci-fi movie from the former Soviet Union.

Nightmare Detective (Japan, 2007) ☆☆
Kyoichi Kagenum is a dream analyzer. He is called upon to help solve a series of crimes taking place in a city. The movie uses a lot of surreal imagery to capture the viewer's attention. But what we are actually seeing is the murderer's mind, and how it sees things. Kyoichi must go inside the murderer's dreams in order to trace him and capture him. A violent headtrip of a horror/crime film.

MORE FANTASIA FILMS (my selection from the United States):

Mulberry Street (USA, 2007) ☆☆☆☆
This low-budget movie really delivers. When a zombie epidemic strikes downtown New York, neighbours in Mulberry Street have no other choice but to defend themselves against these evil beings. Shot in HD video and almost entirely at night, the movie delivers good shock scenes and suspense. You wil never want to take a way at night in your neighbourhood street again.

Right At Your Door (USA, 2006) ☆☆☆☆
A couple living in L.A. wakes up to a nightmare caused by terrorist attacks. Several bombs explode in downtown. The real problem being that the bombs emit biochemical toxins into the air. We follow 24 hours in the lives of this couple, whose lives hang by a thread, and every second there is something going on that keeps you alert throughout the film. Another good low-budget movie that takes place mostly in the couple's house. The unexpected ending is one of the best I have seen in the Fantasia festival.

The Rage (USA, 2007) ☆
Some friends are out on the road going somewhere on vacations. At the same time, a Soviet scientist throws out toxic waste into the air causing pollution, and of course, mutations. When our group of friends encounter the first mutant animals, all hell breaks loose, and of course, from this point on, there is no more plot, just bad acting, I mean, really bad acting, and blood gushing out from almost everywhere. Consider yourselves warned!

Hatchet (USA, 2006) ☆☆☆
The plot is simplicity at its finest: a group of tourists decided to take a boat tour in the swamps of New Orleans. Only one of the tourists knows what really happened in those swamps. There is a madman who kills people by tearing them up to pieces. And this is where the "complex" background story is told, check this out: little Victor Crowley lived alone with his dad. He was born with a deformed head. One day, when the wood house is accidentaly put on fire, Victor's father comes to rescue his son. He tries to open the door with a hatchet, and oops!, he accidentally hits poor Victor in the head, deforming even more his face. Father dies of depression, and little Victor is left alone in the woods (or the swamps) to kill wheover approaches his cabin. There you go. The good news is that the film is actually funny and gory, but the mix here works surprisingly well. Our tourists will be killed one by one, torn to pieces by Victor. All in all, a good laugh like not many horror movies can give you.

The Signal
(USA, 2007) ☆☆☆☆☆

This has to be the best movie I saw at Fantasia, and the best horror movie I have seen this year so far. The movie is divided into three parts, or "transmissions" as they call them, each written and directed by three different directors (David Bruckner, Dan Bush and Jacob Gentry). It's all about the "signal" transmitted by television, which somehow affects people and causes them to go crazy and kill everyone around them. One day TV stations go off and instead a strange humming noise is emitted from every station, causing people to engage in a killing spree. We follow the lives of a group of people in New York and how they try to escape from all the madness going on around them. There is even some comedy (something i hate in horror movies, but here I must say it works perfectly).

The movie kicks some serious ass if you ask me. It is an insanely audacius experiment and apparently it became one of the most popular films at this year's Sundance festival within seconds of its screening. This is for me absolute entertainment, definitely a must-see for every horror movie fan.

Fantasia Festival 2007

For this year's Fantasia festival, here is a list of the 9 movies I went to see:

1. Offscreen (Denmark)
2. The Signal (USA)
3. Right At Your Door (USA)
4. Diary (Hong Kong)
5. Hatchet (USA)
6. Zero City (Russia)
7. Mulberry Street (USA)
8. Nightmare Detective (Japan)
9. The Rage (USA)

reviews coming soon...

The Bridesmaid

(La Demoiselle d'Honneur) France, 2004 ☆☆☆☆

Director Claude Chabrol has the ability to tell original mystery stories. They are mostly tales about murderers caught in strange situations. And this is exactly the case of "the Bridesmaid", in which a young and successful businessman falls in love with one of the bridesmaids at his sister's wedding. In the meantime, his widow mom is dating a lonely and rich man who suddenly disappears. The story then goes back to our businessman, who falls madly in love with the bridesmaid, who by the way starts questioning him regarding his love towards her and what he will be able to do for her, even murder. We soon find out she is a little crazy; she owns a three-story house but decides to live only in the basement; he says she is an actress but does not seem to do anything all day. When one day she comes back and tells our businessman that she has killed the rich guy to prove her love to him, things start to fall apart. As always, the second half of the movie picks up and is far more interesting and bizarre. The ending, not a happy one, as in most of Chabrol's movies, will surely surprise you.

The Last Blues

("Az Utolso Blues", Hungary, 2002) ☆☆☆

Director Peter Gardos tells us the story of Andris, whose life suddenly changes one day when he leaves Budapest and goes to visit his lover in Krakow. For a mysterious reason the brakes on his car would not work, and we see him calling on the phone to almost everyone and half of the film is spent inside his brand-new Seat car. At the end, both his wife and lover meet at a restaurant, and he must decide whether to keep his family life or go live with his Polish girlfriend.

The Last Days (USA, 2005) ☆☆

Director Gus van Sant tells the story of the last couple of days in the life of singer Kurt Cobain. As in many of van Sant's films, there are extremely long shots, very little dialogue, major emphasis on cinematography and little explanation as to what is happening in the scenes. I just wonder if Kurt's last days were as sad as what we see on screen.

The Abandoned (Spain, 2007) ☆☆

Spanish director Nacho Cerda is known for his shocking movies. Barely known in his native country, Cerda shot his last movie in English and it has got some distribution in North America. With The Abandoned, he tells the story of a woman in search of her past. She travels to a farmhouse in Russia, where she was born. Of course the place is haunted, what else. Her mother and stepdad appear as vicious zombies trying to kill her. With the help Nicolai (who according to his version of the story is the woman's brother) they try to uncover the hidden truth. The plot is somewhat predictable, and instead of running away from the haunted house, they just change from one room to another or run in the forest while being chased by the spirit of whoever lived in the farmhouse. Predictable with some good scares, nothing more.

Shutter
(Thailand, 2004 ) ☆☆☆☆

Imagine everytime you take pictures there is a ghost that appears in the background. It does not sound very original, but the plot of this movie sounds better: a couple is driving on the road at night and suddenly hit a girl who crosses the road. Instead of stepping off the car and helping, they live her lying on the road. Unfortunately for them, the spirit of the girl will take revenge and start appearing in their pictures. By the way, the guy is a professional photographer, isn't he lucky?

The plot gets a little more complicated; apparently the photographer had a relationship with this girl. In the meantime, she stalks his girlfriend, plays polstergeist in his appartment and gives the audience some pretty good scary moments.

In one scene, we see a collection of photographs of supposedly "real" ghost apparitions. Let me tell you they look damn scary! All in all, the movie delivers good scary scenes and a decent plot makes it interesting to watch.

The Three Faces of Fear
a.k.a. Black Sabbath (Le Tre Volti Della Paura), Italy 1963 ☆☆☆

This mystery film from Italy is divided into three different stories. In the first story, a woman receives strange phone calls, apparently by a serial murderer who just escaped from prison. The second involves the legends of the living dead, set in Eastern Europe, where a young man finds a secluded family living in fear of the waking dead. The third one is for me the scariest one; a woman for some reason is called upon to dress up the body of a woman who has just passed away. Maybe arrangements for her funeral? We never find out. Without anyone noticing, she steals a gold ring from the dead corpse. As you can figure out, she will soon regret this act. She will be hearing voices in her house, and the dead body will come back for her ring. It all sounds quite cheesy, but remember the movie dates back to 1963, where Dracula and the Werewolf were still fighting in castles. This is a fresh twist on the mystery/horror genre. Wonder why the US title is Black Sabbath. I personally prefer the Three Faces of Fear.

Into Great Silence
(die Grosse Stille) Deutschland, 2006 ☆☆

Die Idee ist sehr gut, es klingt sogar spannend: eine Beschreibung des Lebens in einem Kloster. Weiss man wirklch, wie das Leben da drinnen ist? Die meisten von uns haben natürlich keine Ahnung. Und dieser Film berichtet über den Alltag der Möncher. Leider dauert den Film fast drei Stunden! Meiner Meinung nach ist das zu viel. Immer wieder tauchen die gleichen Szenen auf: das Abendessen, die Arbeit beim Textschreiben, das Gebet, die Massen, und so weiter. Aber, wie erwartet, gibt es nichts Ausserordentliches. Es ist auf jeden Fall interessant zu wissen, dass es noch Leute gibt, die in so ein einfaches Leben führen. Die Möncher besitzen fast nichts, sie tragen immer die gleiche Kleidung und Schuhe. Im Kloster findet man spärliche, einfache Möbel. Wenn der Film nur kürzer dauern würde...