International Eye Candy
July 9, 2009

Has it been two weeks already? Why yes, yes it has, and that can only mean one thing. Once again, it is time to cull the pages of Twitch for the very best visual treats from around the globe. It's time for International Eye Candy.

The big title over the last couple weeks was, without a doubt, MACHINE GIRL director Noboru Iguchi's latest, ROBOGEISHA, which already received some love on the main page here at AICN on its way to becoming a viral phenomenon but there's plenty more out there. We've got French zombies, Australian cowboys, French diamond thieves, Japanese superheroes and a very foolish Thai man in a pit with a crocodile. Here we go!

Now, you may be thinking to yourself, "I've already seen the teaser for Jean-Pierre Jeunet's MICMACS A TIRE LARIGOT, and boy did it look good", and if you are, then you're only partially correct. You may have seen a teaser for MICMACS – another that has already received some love in these pages – but the day after that first teaser released the French marketers for the film lost their collective minds and released seven more. Yes, there are now eight of them in all, each devoted to a different character, and each of them providing ample proof that Jeunet has hit the sweet spot between DELICATESSEN and AMELIE with this one.

Find all of the MICMACS teasers here

Now, you may be thinking to yourself, "I've already seen the teaser for French blaxploitation throwback BLACK, and boy did it look good", and if you are, then you're only partially correct. You may have seen a teaser for BLACK – a film previously plugged in the ol' IEC column – but there's now a second teaser and the full theatrical trailer to show off.

MC Jean Gab'1 (I don't know how to say it, either) stars as a Senegalese-French thief called back to Africa to pull off a big diamond heist in this one and get used to seeing the charismatic star on screen – he also boasts a major role in the second DISTRICT B13 film. This one hits all the points that you'd want in a blaxploitation film but manages to do it all while also keeping things current. Nice.

Find the BLACK trailers here

Here comes the first of a few Australian entries in the IEC this week, this one being a trailer for Jonathan Nix's animated short THE MISING KEY. Nix has won himself a stack of awards around the globe and it's really not hard to see why. His work is richly detailed and a richly creative, this one set in a world where people have old-fashioned gramophones for heads and the young hero – and his clarinet-playing cat – are scrambling against sinister forces to enter a Venetian music competition. There's a surprising noir tinge to this one that I'm really rather fond of and the animation work is absolutely top notch.

Find THE MISSING KEY here

What the hell, we may as well stay in Australia a little bit longer. The second entry in our Australian trio is LUCKY COUNTRY, a film that starts off looking like a Western period drama of the family friendly type before it takes a turn and gets a whole lot darker. I don't think we're getting quite into PROPOSITION type territory here, but LUCKY COUNTRY definitely has an edge to it. Personally, I'm really loving this wave of Aussie westerns – VAN DIEMEN'S LAND is another recent example – as the history is similar enough to be familiar while different enough to be surprising and it just seems to be a genre that really meshes exceptionally well with the Aussie style of shooting and telling stories.

Visit the LUCKY COUNTRY here

And we finish our Australian trio with COFFIN ROCK, the latest thriller from the producer of WOLF CREEK. This one – about to have it's world premiere at the Frightfest in London – follows a married, childless woman, who has an affair with a strange young man and – whoopsie! – gets pregnant. Worse, the young man turns out to be rather a lot more than just strange and is soon turns obsessive and violent. It's the type of premise we've seen done before but COFFIN ROCK looks to do it exceptionally well.

Find the COFFIN ROCK trailer here

We mentioned MACHINE GIRL and ROBOGEISHA director Noboru Iguchi up above and it just wouldn't be right to go plugging Iguchi's work while overlooking his mad partner in crime, acclaimed effects man Yoshihiro Nishimura – the director of TOKYO GORE POLICE, now about to unleash his sophomore directorial effort, VAMPIRE GIRL VERSUS FRANKENSTEIN GIRL on the world.

I caught the world premiere of this one in New York a little more than a week back and while it's every bit as bloody and outrageous as you'd expect from Nishimura it's also very, very different. How different? This one's got no pretenses of being a horror film. No, it's a comedy. A romantic comedy. A teen, high school romantic comedy. Really. And it's a blast. A blast with a new trailer.

The VAMPIRE GIRL and FRANKENSTEIN GIRL compete for your affections here

Any fans of Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen out there? Yeah, me too. So I was somewhat surprised a few months ago when a visitor from Denmark told me that Mads wasn't the most talented actor in his family, that brother Lars was even better but international audiences had much of a chance to see him because he largely works on television. Well, here's your chance.

Lars is taking a rare theatrical leading role in HEADHUNTER, a new high end thriller set in the upper reaches of the business world. It's got the sort of icy precision and noir leanings that have made the recent wave of Danish crime films so appealing and, yep, Lars is looking rather good.

Find the HEADHUNTER trailer here

I'm not going to say much to lead in to this one, just that it's CG animated, it's horror and it very much lives up to its title of BLOOD TRAIL.

Get on the TRAIL here

A fan of THE NIGHT WATCH with a hankering for more high-concept Russian sci-fi? Here's one for you, the story of a Russian secret agent trained by an angel and following instructions sent back from the future to battle a crime syndicate in the presence. Originally titled SMERSH XXI, the current Russian title translates to FORBIDDEN REALITY and it's being sold internationally as THE INTERCEPTOR. But whatever you call it, they've spent a good amount of money on it, it's based on a novel by one of Russia's most popular scifi authors, it's the first part of a planned trilogy, there are a good number of high profile Russian actors in it and the effects are by the same team that did both THE NIGHT WATCH and THE DAY WATCH. Stuff goes boom.

Find THE INTERCEPTOR trailer here

What do international martial arts fans want? Well, I can't speak for all of us but I know that I've practically been begging for a decent film featuring Brazilian capoeira for years now. And, look! Here one is! It's called BESOURO – which translates to BEETLE – and it looks very, very impressive. Production values are great, using a mix of natural, unassisted fighting and wire rig, supernaturally tinted work.

Frankly, I'm surprised its taken this long for Brazil to produce a fight film of their own. Capoeira looks great on the screen and there is certainly no shortage of practitioners of the art down there. I can't wait to see this one …

Find the BESOURO trailer here

What else to international martial arts fans want? They want to see Tony Jaa get eaten by a crocodile, apparently. How else to explain the popularity of the recent French trailer for ONG BAK 2? No, he doesn't actually get eaten, but I certainly wouldn't have gone along with whatever they had to do to get that shot … shudder …

Find the new ONG BAK 2 trailer here

So, you're the producer of a popular and long running sci-fi action franchise that kind of shot its wad with the last installment by including eight different incarnations of your titular hero in the film. And you have to make a sequel. What do you do? Well, if the franchise is ULTRAMAN – now approaching its thirty eighth installment, a pretty staggering number – you go even bigger!

Bigger? Damn straight! Bad Ultraman incurs the wrath of good Ultramen on the home Ultra-planet, leading to a battle between FIFTY different Ultramen and ONE HUNDRED giant monsters! That's a lot of men in a lot of suits! So many that it could only be a MEGA MONSTER BATTLE!

Find the Ultra-Silliness here

And, finally, we end with the promised French zombies. The film is THE HORDE, an action-horror hybrid produced by FRONTIERE(S) director Xavier Gens that has been turning heads on the market circuit for the past year with a string of impressive promos and behind the scenes images. And, finally, the first teaser has been released to the public. Lots of zombies, that'd for damn sure, but will THE HORDE be able to live up to the expectations of those who have already dubbed it the European genre film of the year?

Find THE HORDE teaser here