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INTERNATIONAL Eye Candy: Charlie & The Chocolate Factory on Quaaludes? Giant Crabs Are Attacking France!!!
International Eye Candy January 28, 2010-01-28 Yes, two weeks have come and two weeks have gone and that means it is time for another edition of International Eye Candy. It’s a doozy this time out, too. We’ve got giant crabs attacking France, rock and roll legend Lemmy, new African sci-fi backed by one of Neill Blomkamp’s producers, Ben Kingsley going Bollywood, and a sample reel from an upcoming Filipino film that left me scraping my jaw off the floor. But enough with the tease! On to the real thing!
We begin with that Filipino film. Titled OJT – for On The Job Training – it’s the latest from director Erik Matti. Matti has long been a favourite on the genre fest circuit, cranking out a series of low budget, usually trashy but always fun genre pictures within the Filipino studio system. Well, Matti exited that system a little while back to set up his own shop, OJT is the latest product of that endeavour, and if this is the result then I wish he would have made the move years ago.
Based on an actual phenomenon in the Philippines in which prison guards are bribed to temporarily release prisoners who then work as hit men – really, this happens, it hit the Filipino press earlier this week that some politicians have been doing exactly this to eliminate rivals – OJT follows a pair of these men, the elder training the younger to replace him when he is released permanently, in a sort of arthouse-action film that looks to me like the greatest film that Johnnie To never made. I love, love, love this reel.
Belgian neo-giallo AMER has been seen in these pages before but it’s back now with fresh goodies. The film has a theatrical release coming soon in France and, to prepare the masses for what is coming, they have released a trio of clips from the film to French TV, two of which have since turned up online. Love a bit of Euro-cult? Then you have a new favourite movie.
Fresh from a successful festival run in its native Canada – and still on the prowl for a US debut – is surreal skateboard comedy MACHOTAILDROP. We ran a truly bizarre promo for this one in the IEC a while back – it was just an old lady dancing and it made me laugh very, very hard – and now it’s back with an actual, proper trailer. CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY is already kind of on acid, so this is kind of like CHARLIE on quaaludes.
Several years back now, Japanese director Tetsuya Nakashima won a host of fans around the world with KAMIKAZE GIRLS, a Technicolor creation with wildly over the top art design that tracked the friendship between a biker chick and a frilly Lolita girl. It was a bizarre, bubble gum experience and totally addictive. Next, Nakashima tackled issues of domestic abuse in MEMORIES OF MATSUKO, a film that was every bit as visually lush as KAMIKAZE. Then came his kids movie PACO AND THE MAGICAL PICTURE BOOK which, of course, was even more bold and colourful. Because it was magic. Get the idea here? So what is a guy like Nakashima going to do with a story about a high school teacher on a mission to avenge the death of her daughter while teaching a class that includes her killer? The film is called KOKUHAKU and –beyond just the revenge theme – also touches on HIV and extreme social isolation. It’s probably the darkest material Nakashima has addressed so far and he’s reining himself in a bit, if the teaser is any indication. Which in his case means that things are still sumptuously shot but that everything is run through a deep, metallic blue filter. Yeah, I want to see this.
Do not watch the trailer for Lithuanian action-comedy ZERO II if you dislike breasts, men trying to look imposing while wearing only a bath robe and people being shot in amusing ways. Because this trailer has all of these things. The film is the sequel to one of Lithuania’s most commercially successful films and I’m not sure if I’m more surprised by the fact that Lithuania has a commercial film industry or that they’re this damn good at it.
Oh, Ben, you may be a knight but that doesn’t make you any less a man-whore. That makes you Sir Whore to me, I suppose. Despite being widely considered one of the finest actors of his generation Ben Kingsley has a long, long tradition of doing just about anything for a pay check, a character trait that led to his appearance in BLOOD RAYNE, among other gems. And what he’s appearing in now – with Bollywood mega-star Amitabh Bachchan, no less – is TEEN PATTI, an Indian gambling thriller that looks suspiciously similar to 21. But Bollywood never nicks story ideas, right?
Some films need very little introduction. GIANT CRABS ARE ATTACKING FRANCE!!!
The Holy Grail in Hollywood right now is whatever film will be the next PARANORMAL ACTIVITY. Something dirt cheap that packs in the scares and will pack in the audiences. May I suggest that Uruguay’s LA CASA MUDA may be just that, albeit only in Spanish speaking territories. Not only a single camera first-person perspective film, LA CASE MUDA takes the immediacy of that form a step further by by a single shot, single camera, first person perspective film. Not only that, they shot the whole thing on a digital still camera rather than a true video camera, which allows for greater portability and the ability to get into tight spaces. And not only that, this thing looks really damn good. Both as in it looks like it was shot incredibly well and like the film itself is legitimately frightening.
I’m at a bit of a loss on how to summarize Turkish writer-director Reha Erdem other than to compare him to a Hungarian director that most will not have heard of, either. But believe me when I say that Erdem’s KOSMOS has a striking resemblance to the work of Gyorgy Palfi (HUKKLE, TAXIDERMIA) that I mean it as a very great compliment. A film that looks earthy and visceral and down in the dirt while also tapping into the fantastic and magical, KOSMOS is something of a beautiful conundrum and I find the trailer to be one of the most compelling and hypnotic I have come across in ages. The film will soon be premiering at the massive Berlinale so I expect to be hearing a great deal more about Erdem soon.
You may not know the name of South African producer and effects wizard Simon Hanson but believe me, you almost certainly are aware of his business partner with whom Hanson is currently co-directing a feature, Sharlto Copley. Another effects whiz, Copley made his feature acting debut as the lead in Neill Blomkamp’s DISTRICT 9. Ah. See where this is going now? While we’re on the topic of Blomkamp, this is probably also a good time to point out that Hanson did effects work on Blomkamp’s ALIVE IN JOBURG – the short that would be expanded into DISTRICT 9 – which he also produced. Yeah, he runs in those circles and they are good circles to run in.
Hanson’s in the news these days as the producer and effects man behind PUMZI, a scifi short currently screening at Sundance. From Kenyan writer-director Wanuri Kahui the film is set in a post-apocalyptic world in the aftermath of the Water Wars and serves sharp notice that the wave of African film is only just beginning.
And now for something completely different.
Cree film maker Neil Diamond – as opposed to the lounge singer of the same name – made a huge impression on me at the Toronto International Film Festival with his film REEL INJUN. A documentary on the portrayal of Native Americans in Hollywood, I went into REEL INJUN expecting something dry but informative. Instead I got something hugely entertaining, very funny, loaded with big time stars looking back on some odd moments in their careers, insightful, and deeply heartfelt. And also very informative. Seriously, even if you don’t like docs, check this one out. It’s very, very good.
We’ll stay on the doc tip a moment longer with the trailer for LEMMY, a look at the life of – you guessed it – Motorhead’s Lemmy. If you like your music loud and your language salty, then this is the trailer for you. Because it has plenty of both. Devil horn salute!
And, once again, we take a hard turn into the land of something completely different. In this case that means a trek off to the land of Danish art film with the trailer for SUBMARINO, the new drama from Thomas Vinterberg. Once best known on these shores as one of the co-founders of the Dogme 95 movement with Lars Von Trier, Vinterberg has since proven himself as one of the most consistent (read: good) directors of serious fare in Europe. This one tracks two brothers – one a drunk, the other a junkie - trying to reconcile their relationship. Jakob Cedergren – a big personal favourite – stars.
Yes, that’s Peter Dinklage wielding not one but two sawed-off, double barrelled shotguns in new cult western THE LAST RITES OF RANSOM PRIDE and, honestly, that would’ve been enough for me but the producers have gone and given me Dwight Yoakum, Kris Kristofferson, and my favourite guy from DEADWOOD, too, all of them in a package they promise will play like Peckinpah meets Tarantino. Trailer says it may just live up to that boast, too.
What’s that? You’re in the mood for a good bit of crime fiction? Well, we’ve got just the thing ... Brit crime-noir trio RED RIDING has won a huge amount of acclaim across the pond. A trilogy of films adapted from a popular novel about serial killings that spanned decades – the three component parts of the trilogy are labelled simply by dates – and the investigation into them, this is like the darker, edgier cousin of LIFE ON MARS with a cast that boasts the likes of Sean Bean and Paddy Considine. Starting next week those in New York will be able to see all three on the big screen, shown sequentially on a single ticket, and while the rest of us will have to wait a bit longer the trailer has arrived and looks stellar.
Johnny Nguyen hits people very well. He’s one of only two people in the world to fight both Jet Li and Tony Jaa and was the guy in the suit for the first two SPIDER-MAN movies. Then he went to Vietnam, where he wrote, produced and starred in a little film called THE REBEL that would become the all time Vietnamese box office champ before scoring a worldwide release. THE REBEL aint the Vietnamese champ any more, though. Know why? Cause Nguyen and THE REBEL co-star Veronica Ngo just reunited on screen for THE CLASH and kicked their own asses. That takes skill.
An earlier trailer for this one appeared in an earlier edition of International Eye Candy but it’s back with a second, longer effort now.
Alexandre Franchi’s THE WILD HUNT could easily be subtitled WHEN LARPERS ATTACK. Any man who attempts to make Live Action Role Players look menacing has stones the size of a house, in my opinion. And any man who actually pulls it off has talent even bigger. And Franchi has done just that, setting a serious minded thriller within the world of large scale, live action role play. The film was a surprise hit at the Toronto International Film Festival and the theatrical trailer has recently emerged in the lead up to a theatrical release here in Canada.
Would you like to learn to say ‘Nigerian hooker’ in Norwegian? Let TOMME TONNER teach you how! The trailer for the new gangster-comedy from the team behind Nazi-zombie comedy DEAD SNOW has appeared in these pages before but at that time it was Norwegian only, which meant that huge majority of us had to guess at what was going on and miss all the jokes. I remedy that now with an English subtitled version.
And, finally, we end with a piece of utter trash. New from the directors of WEREWOLF EROTICA (really), it’s ARMY OF WOLVES. You’re welcome.
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