I managed to check out the Fangoria Weekend of Horrors in Austin, Texas this past weekend. All in all, I still maintain that the Frightmare Weekend in Dallas is a superior event, but I had some great fun with Fango nevertheless. The main draw was, of course, the screenings. At the on-site screening 
room, we caught two of the Saturday features: Ils (Them) and The Signal. Both shot on HD video, it was an intentional horror verite smorgasbord. Ils is a film I went into with no pre-knowledge at all, which served only to enhance the experience, and so I recommend avoiding reading up on it prior to viewing it. That said, skip to the next paragraph if you plan on taking my advice. Ils opens with a Romanian mother and daughter, returning home in their SUV from the airport, when they break down in the middle of nowhere. The mother gets out to check the engine, and prompty vanishes. When the daughter gets out to investigate, strange mocking voices from the woods quickly drive her back into the car, but it's too late. Something or someone has already gotten into the car, and her fate is sealed. Cut to a school in Bucharest, where the French teacher is wrapping up fot the day and heading home - passing a tow truck taking the SUV from the first scene along the way. She lives in a very old house in the countryside outside of Bucharest with her husband, a writer. The next 15 minutes or so are devoted to the couple's vast happiness and adoration for one another, an ideal set-up for the horror that follows. I remain hesitant to ruin Ils for you, so I will say only that whoever or whatever attacked the Romanian women in the beginning of the picture has come to this remote house in the middle of nowhere, and thus begins a breathless odyssey of terror that takes them from their home to the dark woods surrounding it and into the ancient subterranean sewers beneath. Ils is well acted, well written, and well shot; even the lighting deeply impressed me (lighting a night scene in the woods for video can't be an easy task!). Yeah, David Moreau and Xavier Palud are indeed the cats responsible for the unnecessary remake of The Eye with the definitely hot but equally talentless Jessica Alba, but do not allow this to influence your decision to see Ils. If I hadn't happened to have caught this screening at Fango, I would never have known that it was one of the best movies of 2007, genre or otherwise. Fo rizzle.
room, we caught two of the Saturday features: Ils (Them) and The Signal. Both shot on HD video, it was an intentional horror verite smorgasbord. Ils is a film I went into with no pre-knowledge at all, which served only to enhance the experience, and so I recommend avoiding reading up on it prior to viewing it. That said, skip to the next paragraph if you plan on taking my advice. Ils opens with a Romanian mother and daughter, returning home in their SUV from the airport, when they break down in the middle of nowhere. The mother gets out to check the engine, and prompty vanishes. When the daughter gets out to investigate, strange mocking voices from the woods quickly drive her back into the car, but it's too late. Something or someone has already gotten into the car, and her fate is sealed. Cut to a school in Bucharest, where the French teacher is wrapping up fot the day and heading home - passing a tow truck taking the SUV from the first scene along the way. She lives in a very old house in the countryside outside of Bucharest with her husband, a writer. The next 15 minutes or so are devoted to the couple's vast happiness and adoration for one another, an ideal set-up for the horror that follows. I remain hesitant to ruin Ils for you, so I will say only that whoever or whatever attacked the Romanian women in the beginning of the picture has come to this remote house in the middle of nowhere, and thus begins a breathless odyssey of terror that takes them from their home to the dark woods surrounding it and into the ancient subterranean sewers beneath. Ils is well acted, well written, and well shot; even the lighting deeply impressed me (lighting a night scene in the woods for video can't be an easy task!). Yeah, David Moreau and Xavier Palud are indeed the cats responsible for the unnecessary remake of The Eye with the definitely hot but equally talentless Jessica Alba, but do not allow this to influence your decision to see Ils. If I hadn't happened to have caught this screening at Fango, I would never have known that it was one of the best movies of 2007, genre or otherwise. Fo rizzle.The Signal didn't come so easy to me. I knew precious little about the flick before it started; only that there is some signal transmitted through televisions, phones, radios and the like that transforms those exposed to it into raging murderers. Indeed, this is very nearly identical to the plot from the recent novel Cell, but I can assure you that the execution is not. Comprised of 
three segments by three separate directors - Transmissions 1, 2, and 3 - The Signal surprised me if nothing else by consistently taking the narrative to places I would never have expected. The picture opens traditionally enough with a love story between an unhappily married woman and her lover, who may or may not choose to run away together on New Year's Eve. She returns home to her obnoxious blue collar husband just in time for the titular signal to begin taking effect when her hubby beats his buddy to death with a baseball bat and all the neighbors start going apeshit. The remainder of Transmission 1 concerns her attempted flight from the city with the surviving friend who didn't meet the business end of the bat, only to determine that he, too, has been changed by the signal. When he starts punching her in the face while she is driving (!), she crashes the car and runs away. The poor confused sap who comes out to see what all the commotion is about becomes the focus of Transmission 2 - a comic take on the situation. Here, we watch confused shenanigans among a milquetoast woman who has killed her enraged husband just prior to their New Year's party, their nerdy landlord who discovered - and killed - the enraged friend from part 1, the bat-wielding husband who is now searching for his wife, and the only guest to brave the apocalypse in order to attend the party - good ol' Jim Parsons. The comedy is, for the most part, effectively funny - nothing super extraordinary, but definitely entertaining. Chad McKnight, however, who plays Jim Parsons, is AMAZING. I don't know when was the last time I was this surprised by a fresh comic talent (probably the first time I saw Sam Rockwell, of whom McKnight is strangely reminiscent), but this guy is golden. Almost entirely oblivious to the society-destroying chaos that surrounds him, the only thing on Jim Parsons' mind is whether or not he is going to get laid at a party that can't possibly happen. With astonishingly tasteless exclamations like "I'm gonna find me a slut and pee in her butt!", he proves to be as rude as he is stupid, and by far the best part of the movie. Transmission 2 ends with an abrupt death of the comedy, heralded by the arrival of the extramarital lover from part 1, who escapes with the landlord to find his woman in Transmission 3. This final segment is the darkest and most experimental in terms of tone and narrative, both of which disintegrate into chaos as it becomes less and less clear just who "has got the crazy." It all boils down to a showdown between husband and lover over who gets the girl, but it's so nutty by that point that the filmmakers go so far as to conflate the two men, leaving the audience unsure who is who and whether or not anyone ended up happy. If it wasn't the most satisfying ending, it is by design - the group with whom I saw The Signal talked about it for an hour afterward, offering up possible interpretations between breathless quotations of Jim Parsons. Although I remain firm in my conviction that Ils was overall the better movie, I was very pleasantly surprised to view a thoroughly entertaining genre picture that actually failed to conform to my expectations, as most of them do.
three segments by three separate directors - Transmissions 1, 2, and 3 - The Signal surprised me if nothing else by consistently taking the narrative to places I would never have expected. The picture opens traditionally enough with a love story between an unhappily married woman and her lover, who may or may not choose to run away together on New Year's Eve. She returns home to her obnoxious blue collar husband just in time for the titular signal to begin taking effect when her hubby beats his buddy to death with a baseball bat and all the neighbors start going apeshit. The remainder of Transmission 1 concerns her attempted flight from the city with the surviving friend who didn't meet the business end of the bat, only to determine that he, too, has been changed by the signal. When he starts punching her in the face while she is driving (!), she crashes the car and runs away. The poor confused sap who comes out to see what all the commotion is about becomes the focus of Transmission 2 - a comic take on the situation. Here, we watch confused shenanigans among a milquetoast woman who has killed her enraged husband just prior to their New Year's party, their nerdy landlord who discovered - and killed - the enraged friend from part 1, the bat-wielding husband who is now searching for his wife, and the only guest to brave the apocalypse in order to attend the party - good ol' Jim Parsons. The comedy is, for the most part, effectively funny - nothing super extraordinary, but definitely entertaining. Chad McKnight, however, who plays Jim Parsons, is AMAZING. I don't know when was the last time I was this surprised by a fresh comic talent (probably the first time I saw Sam Rockwell, of whom McKnight is strangely reminiscent), but this guy is golden. Almost entirely oblivious to the society-destroying chaos that surrounds him, the only thing on Jim Parsons' mind is whether or not he is going to get laid at a party that can't possibly happen. With astonishingly tasteless exclamations like "I'm gonna find me a slut and pee in her butt!", he proves to be as rude as he is stupid, and by far the best part of the movie. Transmission 2 ends with an abrupt death of the comedy, heralded by the arrival of the extramarital lover from part 1, who escapes with the landlord to find his woman in Transmission 3. This final segment is the darkest and most experimental in terms of tone and narrative, both of which disintegrate into chaos as it becomes less and less clear just who "has got the crazy." It all boils down to a showdown between husband and lover over who gets the girl, but it's so nutty by that point that the filmmakers go so far as to conflate the two men, leaving the audience unsure who is who and whether or not anyone ended up happy. If it wasn't the most satisfying ending, it is by design - the group with whom I saw The Signal talked about it for an hour afterward, offering up possible interpretations between breathless quotations of Jim Parsons. Although I remain firm in my conviction that Ils was overall the better movie, I was very pleasantly surprised to view a thoroughly entertaining genre picture that actually failed to conform to my expectations, as most of them do. Later in the evening, we all headed over to the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema at the Village for a screening of Maniac Cop 2 with director (and Blue Underground impresario) Bill Lustig live in person. I had never seen the movie 
before, and was just beside myself with glee for its whole duration - it really is a spectacular movie. Bill was just as much a treat - he's just a delightful, pleasant guy and full of amazing stories from last great age of B horror. He talked about making the film, cringing when he sees things he wished he'd done differently, and how the unions can really fuck a filmmaker over. And I was estatic to spend time in the company of a real life grindhouse legend - here was the guy who made Maniac standing 10 feet in front of me! Just spectactular.
before, and was just beside myself with glee for its whole duration - it really is a spectacular movie. Bill was just as much a treat - he's just a delightful, pleasant guy and full of amazing stories from last great age of B horror. He talked about making the film, cringing when he sees things he wished he'd done differently, and how the unions can really fuck a filmmaker over. And I was estatic to spend time in the company of a real life grindhouse legend - here was the guy who made Maniac standing 10 feet in front of me! Just spectactular.
The following night we closed the weekend with more misathropic terror from the French, and surely the most nausea-inducing killspree I have seen in a long time - Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury's À l'intérieur (Inside). In a nutshell, this film deals with a young pregnant woman named Sarah, recently widowed in a terrible auto accident, who is terrorized by a fiercely psychotic woman in her home over the course of one fantastically brutal night. The woman (never named) wants Sarah's baby, and she wants it now. Clearly, even the title is sick, serving as a double entendre for the woman having gotten inside the house, and now working at getting inside Sarah's body to get that baby. And before you dismiss this as more of that so-called "torture porn" along the lines of Saw or Captivity, I say thee nay - À l'intérieur is torture art, an extremely well-honed exercise in terror over simple over-the-top disgustingness. There certainly are a few scenes that lean toward gross, and there is more claret spilled here than in just about any other serious horror film ever made, but the audience wasn't laughing the way they do at Eli Roth's crapfests. When À l'intérieur screened at the 2007 Fantastic Fest, there was reportedly a woman who rushed out of the theatre halfway through the screening and vomited all over the lobby. (She was apparently enraged at the theatre for embarrassing herself so badly!) I don't know this woman, and I don't know which scene pushed her over the edge, but I can assure you she wasn't grossed out - no, she was terrified. This movie is dark, it's profoundly sad, and it is filled to the top with a sense of horror that crosses over into utter hopelessness. It is also by far the best genre movie I have seen in a year or more. All of these filmgoing shenanigans notwithstanding, I still say that the highlight of the weekend occured in the dealer's room. I know, the dealer's room at these things tends to be a little on the lame side, from overpriced shit quality bootlegs to z-list movie stars from bad 1980s franchise sequels begging you to let them give you an autograph. This was no different, to be honest, 
except for one variable - Richard Kiel. Yeah, that's right, JAWS from The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker. But to me, he is the amazing star of such Mr. Trash favorites like Eeegah! and The Humanoid (the latter of which can be found in the Mr. Trash Archives). Perhaps most important to me, however, is Mr. Kiel's participation in one the greatest studio disasters of all time - as well as one of my favorite movies - the legendary Skidoo. This was one of the great Otto Preminger's last films, and by all rights should have been THE last. It's just awful, makes very little sense, and is a serious embarrassment to otherwise phenomenal talents like Jackie Gleason and Groucho Marx. It is also an unparalleled exercise in out-of-touch studio exectives trying their damnedest to make a "hip" picture and failing miserably at each and every turn. So naturally, I bumrushed Richard Kiel and fell all over myself with gushing expressions of adoration for Skidoo. "Oh, that's a TERRIBLE movie!" Kiel moaned, but I wouldn't have any of it. I persisted that it's pure magic, although I conceded that I understood why not everyone agrees with me. Kiel was more than happy to share his awful experiences on the set of that film with us, despite his puzzlement with my love for it. "Preminger was a dictator," he told us, "a terrible man!" Evidently he terrorized Austin Pendelton so much on the set that the great character actor re-developed a stutter he spent years in therapy to rid himself of. What a prick! But, he was the prick who made Anatomy of a Murder, Advise & Consent, The Cardinal, and In Harm's Way, so I can't really complain too much. He apologized for not having any Skidoo pictures to sign - apparently no one had ever asked about it before! - but was gracious to take photos with us, all the while pretending to crush our little skulls between his massive hands, a fierce Jaws sneer on his face. What a terrific guy.
except for one variable - Richard Kiel. Yeah, that's right, JAWS from The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker. But to me, he is the amazing star of such Mr. Trash favorites like Eeegah! and The Humanoid (the latter of which can be found in the Mr. Trash Archives). Perhaps most important to me, however, is Mr. Kiel's participation in one the greatest studio disasters of all time - as well as one of my favorite movies - the legendary Skidoo. This was one of the great Otto Preminger's last films, and by all rights should have been THE last. It's just awful, makes very little sense, and is a serious embarrassment to otherwise phenomenal talents like Jackie Gleason and Groucho Marx. It is also an unparalleled exercise in out-of-touch studio exectives trying their damnedest to make a "hip" picture and failing miserably at each and every turn. So naturally, I bumrushed Richard Kiel and fell all over myself with gushing expressions of adoration for Skidoo. "Oh, that's a TERRIBLE movie!" Kiel moaned, but I wouldn't have any of it. I persisted that it's pure magic, although I conceded that I understood why not everyone agrees with me. Kiel was more than happy to share his awful experiences on the set of that film with us, despite his puzzlement with my love for it. "Preminger was a dictator," he told us, "a terrible man!" Evidently he terrorized Austin Pendelton so much on the set that the great character actor re-developed a stutter he spent years in therapy to rid himself of. What a prick! But, he was the prick who made Anatomy of a Murder, Advise & Consent, The Cardinal, and In Harm's Way, so I can't really complain too much. He apologized for not having any Skidoo pictures to sign - apparently no one had ever asked about it before! - but was gracious to take photos with us, all the while pretending to crush our little skulls between his massive hands, a fierce Jaws sneer on his face. What a terrific guy.Richard Kiel snuggles with Mrs. Trash.
That's all for now - check out the latest batch of terrific reviews over at Mr. Trash Presents if you haven't already, and stay tuned for more trashy nonsense.
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