Never mind the reputation of intense violence, the thing that stood out most to me was that the nudity levels were nearly off the chart on this one - it may not have had the kind of graphic material of Malefique, but in quanitity and screen time of exposed breasts, Hostel was certainly the winner of the festival. Of course, that alone isn't enough to make it a great movie, but it's not a bad start. Anyway, it tells the story of a group of American guys who go to Amsterdam for drugs and women (mainly the latter). Along the way they meet a fellow who directs them to a hostel renowned to have the most beautiful women in Europe that are dying to be with foreigners, who are in short supply there. But, as you have already assumed, there is a dark secret in this supposed paradise.

I am obliged to make mention of the violence in this movie, touted as being extremely brutal and shocking. Well, it isn't not. It's by no means the most violent film I've ever seen. (Those awards go to Japanese films - try movies like Naked Blood or the Guinea Pig series for something truly brutal.) However, it does have a somewhat nihilistic attitude in its violent scenes, treating the human body like a chunk of rotten meat to be butchered and tossed in the garbage. Odds are that most viewers will indeed be shocked and disturbed, once the movie gets going. This is another one of those films (of which I've seen several at this festival) with a really long, slow buildup to violent scenes that don't begin until halfway through. However, it does have a nice payoff, and there is lots of eye candy up to that point. I also appreciated the way the story unfolded, and the idea behind it was pretty interesting. Good stuff, and definitely worth watching if you like a movie depicting numerous cringe-inducing lacerations.

Wolf Creek + Ward 13

Another very good piece of amusingly grueling cinema with a long buildup. Another thing I'll say for this movie, though, is that I actually enjoyed the relatively uneventful first half as much as the second half when things are really rolling. It's the supposedly true story of two gals and a guy who drive down to the Australian bush for a hiking trip but end up being held captive by a psychotic man who lives in the middle of the wilderness. The first 45 or so minutes of the movie are just setting them up in this situation, but the characters were strong enough that I enjoyed watching their interactions and the (fairly plausible, as far as horror movies go) story play out. There are a couple of instances of violence that are really painful to watch (in a good way), but most of it is more about tone and style than simple shock value. I don't think there's anything gore-wise that can match Hostel, but there's certainly nothing wrong with that. I wasn't so crazy about the end of this movie, unfortunately. It came rather quietly and abruptly, leaving me slightly dissatisfied. Everything up to that point made for some good cinema, though.

Ward 13, the claymation short that played before Wolf Creek, was quite a little gem. It did astounding things with pieces of clay, and depicted a nice little tale of a man's daring escape from a hospital that is performing inhuman experiments on patients. I really appreciate that, unlike with Strings (although, granted, obviously they're very, very different films), everything was very tongue-in-cheek. There were no illusions about the fact that these were silly-looking clay characters doing silly things, and it was really very funny even while doing some visually impressive stop-motion work. This was easily my favorite short of the festival.

The Birthday

The most delightful surprise of the festival! I'm positive that some people will fiercely disagree with me over this, and I might very well be the only person who attended both screenings of it. However, the fact is that I found The Birthday to be one of the most unique, possibly brilliant movies I've seen in a while, despite its shortcomings.

Here is a film that I thought I'd see as a lark, but expected nothing special from it. After all, it stars Corey Feldman - when's the last time you saw him in anything worth watching? But this is a Corey Feldman I haven't seen before, playing a strange, lispy character that many have likened to Jerry Lewis, but it seems a little closer to a nervous Peter Falk to me. At times he might make the slapstick stuff a little too broad, and on occasion he seems to slip out of character a tad, but overall it's a suprisingly good comedic performance. The story takes place in the 80s, making Feldman a fitting choice. He has come to the hotel owned by the father of his would-be significant other, hoping to rekindle their relationship and make a good impression on the father.

This is by no means a movie without flaws. Things start out with a hilariously odd tone, full of awkward moments and strange conversations, before the horror/suspense aspect of the movie takes control about halfway through, at which point things gradually spiral down into what I was sure would be an embarassing abyss of overacting and a muddled mess of a story. During this section there are parts so over-the-top that I figured it had to be intentional - it wouldn't at all be outside the tone of this movie. There came times, though, when things got so big and overly dramatic that I couldn't tell if it was purposely silly or just incredibly bad. I'm still not quite sure. During my first viewing, although I was enjoying it, I was wondering if I was enjoying the most embarassingly bad movie of the festival.

Once I arrived in the final act, however, all fears were put to rest. What happens is something that makes independent cinema such a beautiful thing - this movie becomes something I can't imagine a mainstream movie ever being. The final 15 minutes are so bizarre and insane, they'll probably lose as much of the audience as they gain. I don't want to overstate the big, weird mess of a finale, but it was my primary reason for seeing the movie a second time, and it blew me away both times. David Lynch meets... I don't know, one of those old, obscure Japanese video games like Cho Aniki.

I shouldn't fail to mention that this movie is done in real time (with a couple of exceptions, which will be remedied in the DVD version), giving it a unique tempo. It's visually quite pleasing, as well, with a surreal feeling like something from Terry Gilliam. Spanish director Eugenio Mira shows a lot of promise, and I hope to see more from him soon.

This movie will definitely not be suited to everyone's tastes. It's uncompromisingly weird, which is something I love about it, but others might not identify with. It would have been better if the quirky tone had stuck around throughout and not left us shuddering in the seemingly out-of-place, heavily dramatic scenes, but there aren't too terribly many of those. If you can excuse the second half of the second act, there's a lot of great stuff to be found for the remaining hour and a half.

Worst:

Strings

This was the first movie I saw, and it simply was not my cup of marionette. I know some folks are absolutely raving about the brilliance and majesty of this epic tale told with wires and whittled driftwood, but it just didn't work for me at all. I can, and do, respect the creators for the achievement that this film is - I actually think it's a really nice idea. They managed to create a whole lush world complete with a rich mythology that works with some really intriguing ideas.

However, I predicted my feelings on this movie before I entered the theater. I read the description and I thought, "This looks pretty interesting, but I don't think I'll be able to tolerate a dramatic story told by puppets for the duration of an entire feature length film; I'm betting I'll be sick of it after 20 minutes." Well, after viewing Strings, I found that I was a little off - I was ready to be out of the theater before 20 minutes was up.

I will reiterate that this is a very admirable film in many ways, and in fact, even though I didn't like it I might see clear to recommend it to certain people. But the thing to be noted about it is that, as you may have gathered by now, the characters are puppets! This, to me, is fundamentally incompatible with a grand, incessantly dramatic, epic story. This is a movie that takes itself incredibly seriously - in fact, I don't believe there was even a moment of comic relief (a convention that I typically hate in movies, but I only mention it to make a point). Strings takes its characters, lore, and dramatic elements deadly seriously, and I can't even pretend to care about them when I'm looking at pieces of wood dangling from wires. I, personally, am just not capable of taking something so silly looking so seriously.

Just for the sake of thoroughness, I might also mention that I didn't consider the story itself to be anything new or great, anyway. The lore and the world of the puppets? Very clever. But the story was a typical, formulaic epic, sprinkled with cliches. That's not to say it's necessarily a bad story, but it's nothing groundbreaking. This movie will certainly be highly enjoyed by some, but for me, it was a very unfortunate start to the festival, and despite its short running time, it seemed to last for ages.

Wild Blue Yonder

This movie... I'd like to articulate some constructive thoughts about it, so I'm going to try very hard to express my feelings about it with more than just profanity. I also don't want it to come across as if I'm too quick to judge or too closed to different types of cinema. But, I will start by summing it up in one sentence:

This is the worst movie I have ever seen in my life.

I absolutely despise this movie. It's my first exposure to a work from Werner Herzog, and I can only say that if this is what he considers interesting or worthwhile, I'm probably not even willing to give him a second chance. I'm generally pretty lenient with movies, being a film lover first and critic second, and if I don't like something the first time, often I will watch it again or try to reconsider it in a different way to give it the benefit of the doubt. Eight times out of ten, when I read a person's negative review of a movie, I find myself wishing they wouldn't go so hard on it.

Enter, The Wild Blue Yonder. I mentioned that Strings seemed to last for ages, but I was only bored, unmoved, and a little irritated during my 75 minutes of dead time. Wild Blue Yonder is also very short, at a mere 81 minutes, but each second ticked by like an hour. This time I was not only bored, but angry. I was really furious that I was watching it and that it was being shown and that it even existed, and although I didn't walk out, I did treat myself to a couple of leisurely bathroom breaks.

I don't know if I can possibly describe the film in a way that can explain this reaction - I don't fully understand it myself, but it must be the reverse effect of the same mystical force that causes some people to be entranced and enchanted by it despite seeing it for what it is. This film is nothing more than an hour of some of the most dull stock footage a person could chance to discover. The footage is mostly from NASA recordings of astronauts in the shuttle and explorers scuba diving in Antarctica. Most of the documentary segements are preceded by monologues from Brad Dourif (I confess, these scenes on their own are not awful, thanks to Dourif's acting talent, but they easily overstay their welcome.) as an alien who explains the plot: His planet's people had once come to settle on Earth, but things didn't go according to plan and they were unsuccessful. Then the people of Earth discovered ways to quickly travel around the galaxy, and so a group of explorers went to his planet and supposedly destroyed it. When they returned home, they found that hundreds of years had passed on Earth, and the planet had returned to prehistoric beauty.

Doesn't sound like a bad story, does it? But remember, it's not a story that unfolds organically, it's a story that is told through 10+ minute segments of stock footage of extended ocean exploration and astronauts tossing a toothbrush back and forth the shuttle. Strictly speaking, all that documentary footage is completely irrelevant to the story (obviously), and it could have been told in the (perhaps) 15 minutes of Brad Dourif's monologue. But this movie really isn't about the story, which felt as if it were really just scrounged up as a weak excuse to tie all this footage together.

Now, I dare not neglect to mention one of the other key elements of the film. Could there possibly be anything that could make the pretentious tie-ins of incredibly uninteresting stretches of videos of astronauts killing time more grueling? Don't underestimate this director - of course there is. During these scenes you'll also be treated to some of the most irritating, grating, and distasteful music I've ever been exposed to - and I'm someone who generally likes dissonant, atonal music. It comes courtesy of Sardinian chanters and some intensely piercing cello work. You can hear samples of it here:

RIGHER HERE!

But listening to it in the comfort of your home cannot compare to the experience of its deafening groan in concert with the most dull footage ever captured on celluloid.

I am quite sure I do understand what this movie means to accomplish. It doesn't aim to be a "movie" movie inasmuch as it is supposed to be a form of poetry. It uses images and music, strung together by certain intellectual concepts that should make you feel - to have an experience - more than to sit and watch a story. However, just because something intends to be poetic and unique doesn't automatically mean it's good. I found absolutely no redeeming quality in this film - no reason at all that would indicate it should be watched by anyone. This is probably the only movie I've ever seen that has given me such a severe reaction, and the only one I've ever encountered where, when I hear that someone likes it, it's really beyond my ability to comprehend - I can do nothing but shake my head in disbelief and disappointment. Unlike Strings, where I recognize that there will be many people who will absolutely love it, The Wild Blue Yonder is a film I would never recommend to anyone. Ever. Under any circumstances.

The only other movie at the festival that neared my level of hatred for this was one particular entry in the Bloodshots competition, but I certainly won't mention which one.

Marebito & Pulse

Just boring. I am quite fond of Japanese cinema, but I'm afraid I'm just getting tired of these cookiecutter Japanese ghost movies with the dark figures moving unnaturally to creep out the viewer, etc. It works a couple of times, but I've had my fill of it, and the same formula has been recycled countless times by now in films like this. We all know Ring's haunted video tape. Then we have Pulse's haunted internet. Another horror movie convention I'm getting tired of (and this one is true for American movies as well) is the camcorder. I've grown weary of all these movies with video cameras turning up, depicting eerie footage. Is anybody else behind me on this one? Marebito uses the old camcorder bit almost exclusively. However, it's not the plot conventions that bother me so much as the story arc and the tone of this genre. The stories take the same turns, regardless of the scenario, and the tone never varies. Nearly all of them feel exactly the same.

It seems like the more time I spend in Japan, the less I enjoy Japanese ghost movies. I guess it's just not my brand of scary. I was bored to tears by both of these movies.

Hope I wasn't too hard on anyone's favorite movies... I imagine a number of people would have a list exactly the opposite of mine, but that's nothing unusual.

Seikima