Hey folks, Harry here - Programming is getting down to that tight point, where we programmers at Fantastic Fest are making the calls and working to get the last touches to make this FANTASTIC FEST - as FANTASTIC as we can. I'm dying to see Friedkin's BUG, ever since I read Ebert's coverage at Cannes, I've been dying to see it. As it happens... the Trailer for BUG just showed up today - and it looks intense. Having the first screening of ROMAN, which was written by Lucky McKee (as well as starring him) and being directed by Angela "MAY" Bettis. I've seen it. It's something very special. A real companion piece to MAY - yet they complement one another in a way that's not as simple as "quirky girl / quirky guy" horror stories. You'll just have to see. Then there's THE WOODS - the next directed feature by Lucky McKee - which features some good Bruce Campbell work and a lot more. Having said that... There's still some impressive titles that will be being announced around September 1st. Passes are nearly gone, so don't be caught in the lurch. To secure your passes - and to see the rest of the programming line up - can be seen at FantasticFest.Com
FANTASTIC FEST TO HOST PREMIERE OF WILLIAM FRIEDKIN'S BUG
We are extremely pleased to announce the U.S. premiere of William Friedkin's BUG at the 2006 Fantastic Fest in Austin, Texas. Print courtesy of Lion's Gate Films.
BUG synopsis:
Horror, 2006, 95 min, USA
The world is going badly. With this troubling and funny adaptation of a play by Tracy Letts (who also wrote the script), the author of The Exorcist and French Connection delivers a black vision of a world suffering from paranoia generated by terrorist threats, wars and all kinds of other secret manipulations: mystical, political, economical. Agnes (Ashley Judd), a waitress living in fear of her husband's release (played by Harry Connick, Jr.) from prison, bathes in the sordid loneliness of her motel room lost in the desert. While she waits on Peter (Michael Shannon), a strange vagrant who speaks in enigmas, she believes she's found company to fill an existential vacuum. Except here we have an invasion of insects (that they alone can see) and the young man's insane conspiracy theories involve her little by little into the most radical madness.
ADDITIONAL FANTASTIC FILMS ANNOUNCED:
In addition to BUG we are pleased to announce the following 18 features which will be screening as part of the 2006 Fantastic Fest. We still have a lot of big titles and events scheduled for the next press announcement, which is currently scheduled for September 3. Check back to www.fantasticfest.com for more details as well as details on the confirmed shorts and previously confirmed features. Press kits and screeners are available for select films below. For press photos or screeners, please contact kier-la@originalalamo.com.
Abominable :: Regional Premiere
Horror, 2006, USA
It has been sighted 42,000 times in 68 countries, a vicious creature of myth and legend called Sasquatch, Yeti, and perhaps most infamously, Bigfoot. We've hunted it for years. But what happens when it decides to hunt us? For newly paraplegic mountain climber Preston Rogers (Matt McCoy), the horror hits home when this ravenous beast attacks a remote forest community. Will its next hot meal be a group of knucklehead hunters (including Lance Henriksen of ALIENS & Jeffrey Combs of RE-ANIMATOR), a skeptical police chief (Paul Gleason of DIE HARD), a cabin full of nubile co-eds (including Ashley Hartman of THE O.C.), or a trapped Preston himself? Rex Linn (CSI: MIAMI) and Dee Wallace-Stone (CUJO) co-star in this wild and gruesome shocker that Fangoria calls "the best serious fright film ever made about Bigfoot!" Featuring music by master composer Lalo Schifrin!!
Blood Tea and Red String :: Regional Premiere
Animation/Fantasy, 2006, 70 min, USA
"We couldn't be more excited to introduce you to this astonishing, 13-years-in-the-making independent masterwork - written, produced, animated, and directed by a single woman, who also built every character and set... this dark, hypnotic fairy tale for adults is a triumph of creative passion as an all-consuming force of nature, brimming with wonder, twisting with madness and hitting its eccentric marks with a uniqueness seldom seen in modern film...The stunning end result of Christiane Cegavske's many years of obsession is an engrossing headtrip that is equally touching, disturbing adorable and gruesome. It is a poetic, dialogue-free aria of unrestrained imagination." - Mitch Davis, FANTASIA FILM FESTIVAL 2006. Winner, BEST ANIMATION, San Francisco Independent Film Festival 2006. Winner, BEST DIRECTOR, Spudfest 2006
Bloodshots :: A 48 Hour Horror Filmmaking Competition
Horror, 2006, 120 min, international
Start brewing your coffee now, because the Alamo is getting set to bring you the greatest 48-hour film challenge the world has ever seen: the second annual BloodShots Film Festival will consist of teams of filmmakers all fighting against the clock to make the best horror film they possibly can. There will be celebrity judges, fabulous prizes, and more fake blood than Sam Raimi can make shoot out of the wall in an abandoned cabin somewhere in Tennessee. Now in it's 3rd year, Bloodshots is expanding past the boundaries of Vancouver and Austin and will be accepting submissions from across the globe. Check www.bloodshots.org for more details.
The District! :: Austin Premiere
Animation, 2004, 95 minutes, Hungary
Like an Eastern European blend of South Park and Fat Albert's Junkyard Gang, The kids of the district grow up up amidst constant rivalry and fighting as their Gypsy, Hungarian, Arab, and Chinese families engage in everyday hostility. Yet Richie, the youngest of the Lakatos clan attempts to find a way to pacify the Csorba family, and especally their lovely daughter, Jules. As he soon reveals, the way to peace is through money, and that the only way to make money is to have oil. So the kids take a timetrip to the prehistoric age, and create their own oil reserves right under the district. After their return the exploitation of oil begins, radically changing the stance both in the school and in the general criminal environment of the area. And their sudden success draws some unwanted international attention to the district... Winner, BEST ANIMATED FEATURE, Ukraine KROK festival, Ottawa Animated Film Festival, Annecy Animated Film Festival
Edmond :: Austin Premiere
Thriller, 2005, 82 min, USA
"An accommodating middle-aged businessman evolves from meek pushover to dangerous sociopath over the course of one night in this scorching collaboration between the writer of Glengarry Glen Ross and the director of Re-Animator... Shot on a tight budget (its star-studded cast dropped their salaries to scale in order to be involved), Edmond is an anomaly among the current crop of high profile U.S. indies. Undiluted by calculated hipness, it is a violent film, both physically and emotionally, boiling with existential provocations and jet-black wit that redefines the term "uncomfortable." A young, angry David Mamet wrote the script over two decades ago while in the process of a divorce.... Stuart Gordon, who was among the first to direct one of Mamet's plays in his early theatre days, encountered Edmond when it was new and had been wanting to adopt it ever since. It was consistently deemed too controversial and nobody would finance the project. Times have changed." - Mitch Davis, FANTASIA FILM FESTIVAL
Nightmare :: Austin Premiere
Horror, 2004, 111 min, USA
Nightmare fuses psychosexual horror and indie auteur cinema and is the stunning and stylish debut of filmmaker Dylan Bank. A film director wakes one morning in the arms of a mysterious actress. Startled to find a video camera at the foot of the bed, the couple watch the tape, only to see themselves on screen committing a savage murder in the room that they have just slept in. But there are no victims in the room, there is no blood and no sign of struggle. Arriving late at his film-making class that day, the director recounts the horrifying experience he just walked away from, convincing them it's fiction and part of a movie pitch. By the time the class enthusiastically votes to produce his movie, it is too late for him to back out. So now, the director spends his days filming the waking nightmares that he discovers nearly every morning on videotape, and spends his nights searching for who is filming him. Winner, BEST FEATURE - Chicago Horror Film festival
Northville Cemetery Massacre: Director's Cut :: Director William Dear Live
Biker/Action, 1974, 92 min, USA
We are honored to have William Dear in person to present the Director's Cut of his rarely-seen biker classic! When a rowdy biker gang passing through a small town are accused of raping a local girl (it was actually done by a roughneck policeman who blames one of the innocent bikers) a small war breaks out, culminating in a beautifully-orchestrated Peckinpah-esque bloody shootout to the death in the town cemetery! This film began Dear's long-running collaboration with ex-Monkee Mike Nesmith, who provides the film's lingering country-rock score. Dear and Nesmith would go on to make short comedy films for FRIDAYS and SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, and the music video programs they made together were the direct genesis of MTV. As an added bonus to the film, Dear has promised to bring some of these early short films and videos to play before the screening!
Puzzlehead :: Austin Premiere
SciFi, 2005, 81 min, USA
"mining the frankenstein myth and finding psychosexual gold" - New York Times
Set sometime "after the Decline", in a world of no-place, this Hitchcockian story of an android, painstakingly created in the likeness of his maker, is a Frankenstein fable for the millennium. The dark and eerie world of PUZZLEHEAD is one where betrayal, deception, and murder lurk just beyond each twist and turn of this meditative plot. Special effects wizardry and sure handed direction drive this tour de force thriller by first time director/writer James Bai in this unusual and very strange tale of love, passion, and the conflict between man and machine. Winner, BEST FEATURE, Scienceplusfiction Festival
Renaissance
SciFi/Animation, 2006, 105 min, France
Take METROPOLIS, BLADE RUNNER and SIN CITY, set them in Paris in 2054, run their widescreen visuals through an ultra-high-contrast B&W photocopying machine and you'll have a semblance of "Renaissance," a melancholy actioner that shines a new light on film noir. A sort of THE THIRD MAN for the 21st century, chiaroscuro curio's level of graphic invention is exceeded only by its pleasingly mournful approach. Fans of live action melded with a graphic-novel sensibility should consider this a must. Suspenseful, though not entirely unfamiliar, narrative follows an intrepid cop assigned to find a kidnapped, 22-year-old female scientist. She works -- as does just about everybody -- for mega-corp Avalon. But something that happened back in 2006 casts a long, mysterious shadow over his investigation. Pic's monochrome, visually startling universe portrays a future that's exceedingly cool but not too futuristic, including a nod to Op Art of the '60s. The Metro is still running, and the Eiffel Tower and Sacre-Coeur are both where they belong. - VARIETY
Roman :: Regional Premiere, director Angela Bettis and star Lucky McKee live
Horror, 2006, USA
Angela Bettis helms in her directorial debut, and Lucky McKee, who directed Bettis in the cult horror hit MAY, takes a turn in front of the camera as Roman, a lonely guy who has nothing in his life except for looking out a window after work. He watches the same girl go by every day, but he never talks to her, until he meets her by chance. Unfortunately, he's obsessed so much with her that things go horribly wrong. "The Girl" is played by the ever-enchanting Kristen Bell (VERONICA MARS, PULSE).
Simon Says :: Regional Premiere, director William Dear live in person
Horror, 2006, USA
William Dear (THE NORTHVILLE CEMETERY MASSACRE, HARRY AND THE HENDERSONS) directs proverbial screen weirdo Crispin Glover in not one, but TWO roles, as insane backwoods twins who stalk transient vacationers for recreation. Five teenagers set-off on a spring break camping trip only to have their vacation plans interrupted by the mysterious disappearance of one of their friends. Before long, the kids realize they'd made a grave mistake trusting the odd set of twins who recommended the isolated lakeside campsite, and they are launched into a deadly game of cat and mouse - complete with elaborate wilderness booby-traps and one of the most unhinged performances of Glover's career!
Street Trash :: Repertory Screening
When a liquor store owner finds a case of "Viper" in his cellar, he decides to sell it to the local hobos at one dollar a bottle, unaware of its true properties. The drinks causes its consumers to melt very messily. Two homeless men find themselves up against the effects of the toxic brew, as well as going head to head with "Bronson" a Vietnam vet with sociopathic tendencies, as well as the owner of the junkyard they live in. Winner, SILVER RAVEN AWARD, Brussels Int'l Festival of Fantasy Film 1987
The Meltdown Memoirs: Austin Premiere
Documentary, 2006, 120 min, USA
Over four years in production, Roy Frumkes' The MELTDOWN MEMOIRS is more than a 'making of' documentary about the cult film STREET TRASH; rather, it is an intensely personal, expansive impression of the STREET TRASH years, and what preceded and followed them. Bolstered by a haunting score, dozens of interviews with cast, crew and other genre figures and rare footage detailing the cult classic's evolution, this is a uniquely eccentric, sometimes shocking experience from the creator of DOCUMENT OF THE DEAD. Features an interview with director Bryan Singer [SUPERMAN RETURNS and X-MEN, and a PA on STREET TRASH], an appearance by the New York 'subway vigilante' Bernard Goetz and-almost-the entire cast of STREET TRASH!
Unrest :: Austin Premiere
Horror, 2006, 110 min, USA
Medical School. First year. First day. Students are thrown into their Gross Anatomy class where they see their own mortalities reflected in the dead bodies that lay before them - waiting to be cut up. Some students are reverent. Others turn to humor to lessen the horror in front of their faces. Sensing her cadaver is not at rest, Alison sets out to discover the truth behind this mysterious body. But each clue comes at a price: someone's life. Unrest is the brainchild of Jason Todd Ipson, a teacher and former surgeon, who has taken the familiar elements of the horror genre and combined them with his knowledge of the world of medical students to create an intelligent medical thriller that explores the issues around mortality and the separation of body and soul.
Wilderness :: Austin Premiere, Director Michael Bassett live in person
Survival Horror, 2006, 110 Min, UK
Equal parts Deliverance, Friday the 13th, S.C.U.M. and Lord of the Flies, this intense, smartly-scripted survivalist slasher adventure film will bungee-drop you off the edge of your seat and bash your skull into crimson mountain sludge. UK filmmaker Michael J. Bassett, along with his eclectic ensemble cast (which includes The Descent's Alex Reid and Dog Soldiers' Sean Pertwee), has made something truly sensational: an engrossing genre hybrid that plays against conventions to deliver a consistently surprising avalanche of ferocity. Although shot with a proper budget and seasoned cast, this is nonetheless guerilla filmmaking in a most literal sense. Actors and crew were forced to work under grueling environmental conditions throughout the film's Northern Ireland shoot, lending much to the primal energy on-screen. This is Bassett's second full-on genre film following his atmospheric World War 1 shocker Deathwatch. With Wilderness , he has proven himself to be a major talent in the new wave of British horror cinema. No wonder New Line tapped him to helm the sequel to this year's The Hills Have Eyes." -Mitch Davis, FANTASIA FILM FESTIVAL
The Woods :: Austin Premiere, director Lucky McKee live in person
Horror, 2006, USA
The Woods is a psychological horror story that begins when a neglected teenager named Heather (Agnes Bruckner) is dropped off by her parents at a remote all-girls boarding school deep in the forest. Watched over by sinister headmistress Ms. Traverse (Patricia Clarkson) and her staff, Heather is tormented by her classmates and is desperate to go home. But when students start disappearing and she begins to have horrifying visions, Heather realizes things at the school are not what they seem. She only knows there's something out there in the woods - and it won't be letting her leave any time soon.
Zhest :: Austin Premiere
producer Joseph Bahshiev and director Denis Neimand live
Crime/Thriller, 2006, 110 min, Russia
"A big, burly popcorn flick with a nasty edge. Beautifully shot with some fantastic set pieces, flaming cars and crazy people wielding axes. How much more can you ask for, really?" -TWITCHFILM.COM
"One of the most memorable domestic film debuts this spring was Zhest, a psychedelic action movie, which succeeds as a fantasy reconstruction of present-day Russia. Written by Konstantin Murzenko and directed by Denis Neimand, the movie features Marina (Alyona Babenko) as an intrepid and glamorous Komsomolskaya Pravda investigative reporter who reluctantly embarks on one last assignment. The planned profile of a deranged pedophile and rapist (Mikhail Efremov) goes awry when the killer escapes from an asylum into the woods, while Marina, dressed in a racy miniskirt, tags along with the police. Marina ferociously navigates this trancelike setting to learn some supposed truths about the person she was investigating. Just beyond the fringe of the big cities, it seems, lurks an eerie and infernal land, dominated by a brutal indigenous population that hunts urbanites for fun. The most threatening part of the parody in Zhest, however, is that a freeway connects this toxic hinterland directly to Moscow's Garden Ring." -RUSSIA PROFILE
ABOUT THE FESTIVAL:
Fantastic Fest is an eight day festival of the best new sci-fi, horror, fantasy and genre films, as well as choice classic and obscure cult titles from all over the world. The festival director is Tim League (Alamo Drafthouse Cinema). Programmers include Harry Knowles (Ain't It Cool News), Kier-la Janisse (Big Smash, Cinemuerte), Matt Dentler (SXSW) and Paul Alvarado-Dykstra. Festival co-chairs are Paul Alvarado-Dykstra and Tim McCanlies (director, Iron Giant). This year's festival will feature over 60 premiere features and 30 shorts. Festival Badges are currently on sale at www.fantasticfest.com. The festival is co-sponsored by Ain't It Cool News and the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema South Lamar.
