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Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with my thoughts on REC 2 or [rec] squared or however you type it.
I’m a big, big, big fan of the first REC. It gets the award for best use of the “recorded footage” off-shoot genre of horror. REC 2 is the rare sequel to not only live up to the first film, but expand the mythology in a satisfying way.
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Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with the next pair of Fantastic Fest reviews! Both are foreign flicks, one was big on my radar before the fest and the other was completely not. Not unsurprisingly the unknown film turned out to be one of the most entertaining movies I’ve seen of the festival and the bigger film was a let-down.
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Ahoy, squirts! Quint here reporting on more Fantastic Fest goodies!
Harry was loudly singing the praises of an unknown film from a new set of filmmakers that debuted at CineVegas called THE REVENANT. He loved that film so much he pressed Tim League and the Alamo’s crack team of Fantastic Fest programmers to consider it for Fantastic Fest.
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Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with Muldoon who works behind the scenes with us here at AICN when he's not off hunting raptors on Isla Nublar. He caught a low budget ultra-Indie horror flick at Fantastic Fest and was worried it might get overlooked by the higher profile flicks, so he wrote this up for your reading pleasure.
Enjoy his take on YESTERDAY!
Yo, so here's my review. Let it be known, I have a very odd taste in movies apparently, so be warned...
YESTERDAY
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Annette Kellerman here with my take on a much talked about film here at Fantastic Fest...
PARANORMAL ACTIVITY.
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Ahoy, squirts! Quint here to give you my thoughts on George A. Romero’s SURVIVAL OF THE DEAD.
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Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with my thoughts on ZOMBIELAND and THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS from Fantastic Fest. Let's start with the undead, shall we?
I’ve seen ZOMBIELAND twice now if that tells you anything.
Yes, I love it. Yes, it’s as good as everybody says it is. And yes, there’s a surprise appearance that if you don’t know of by now do your best to keep it secret.
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Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with my first day of Fantastic Fest activities to report on! Fun day, let’s get started!
VAN DIEMEN’S LAND is was the original name the Europeans used for the island of Tasmania and serves as the setting for this cannibal tale.
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Ahoy, squirts! Quint here to quickly post up the lovely (and super about-to-burst pregnant) Annette Kellerman's thoughts on an Australian cannibal flick called VAN DIEMEN'S LAND. I am actually in the process of writing about this one myself, but I just got beat to the punch by pregnant woman! Damn, I need to train up, I'm getting slow!
I find that I agree pretty much on every level with Annette's review, but I'll go into specifics in my Day 1 report, which will go up before I sleep. Until then, here's Ms. Kellerman!
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Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with a new update on the looming Fantastic Fest, one of the best, most kick-ass weeks of genre, cult and just plain ol' fantastic films to hit any theater in any country every year.
This is only wave 2 and there's still a lot more surprises in store, including things that won't be announced. There's always a bit of trickster to the fest courtesy of one Mr. Tim League and one Mr. Harold Knowles and their band of merry men.
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Hey folks, Harry here - Day 6 will become a legendary day at FANTASTIC FEST 2007 - as it was the single most frustratingly wonderful day. What was frustrating? Well at every juncture, you had the choice of 3 wonderful films to see. I like to think I chose the best path... yet, everyone I talked to feels the same way about the path they chose yesterday. Here ya go...
Largely, Day 6 has been the best for me, with four films spanning documentary, sci
-fi, and horror.
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The Tale of How (3.5 stars)
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Hey folks, Harry here - got a great day of films to dive into - will chat later, for now, here's Augustus...
Day 5 has come and gone with little to report. I saw one film for the second time, and the later timeslots were films I'd already seen or been warned to avoid. So, I'll try to go ahead and bore you with my impressions of Aachi and Ssipak and my delayed reaction to Southland Tales.
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Tyger (4 stripes)
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Tyger is a glorious 4-minute short by Guilherme Marcondes based on the poem by William Blake (a favorite of my school, whose mascot is the Tiger) "Tyger tyger burning bright in the forests of the night. Oh what fateful hand or eye could match thy fearful symmetrye." Live action, puppetry, and computer animation combine to bring to life an enormous tiger that stalks the city streets, magically turning everything into a forest.
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Hey Folks, Harry here - this is one of the number one films that I most wanted to see at the fest - sadly, I think I'm going to have to catch it on a screener. However, from everything I've heard - its fantastic. And why wouldn't it be, Moebius is one of the greatest living artists - and he's a nice guy. Well, let's take a look at Banzai's review, shall we?
Moebius Redux: A Life in Pictures
This is easily the best film I've seen at Fantastic Fest thus far. It also became an instant addition to my list of favorite documentaries. You don't have to be a fan of Jean "Moebius" Giraud to enjoy this film. This is a fast-paced and engaging character study of a brilliant and eccentric artist. And even if you've never heard of the man, you'll be stunned by his story, and by the influence his work has had on everything from Blade Runner to Tron.
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Hey folks, Harry here - Pretty much agree with Augustus Gloop here - except on DAI NIPPONJIN which radiates genius from orifi I didn't know existed! It's super-mega-uber-genius! And I feel sad that Augustus Gloop was a Sleepy Baddie, but he was nodding in the lobby before the film, so it shouldn't surprise me that he was Sleepy Baddie in the movie. If I may, I recommend the Chocolate Covered Espresso Beans. Taste good lickin' and keep you tickin'!!!!
Alrighty! Halfway through this beast, and I've finally had a chance to get some rest, restore some perspective, and freshen up for the next four days. Sunday brought two secret screenings and "Son of Rambow".
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Hey folks, Harry here with Day 4 from Augustus Gloop. Again, we're not always seeing the same films - but we are enjoying one helluva FANTASTIC FEST! Here he is with the latest that he's seen. I'm off to get down there for the next screening. Adios...
Whew! It's actually 6:15am on Day 4 as I write these reviews for my selections from Day 3. Nothing like watching movies all day long followed by 3 hours bullshitting outside the Drafthouse about current and previous years' screenings, whether 300 sucked or didn't suck, and whether it means The Watchmen is going to suck. Now, it's noon as I finish. Having fallen asleep on the keyboard, I have to delete a couple hundred lines of the letter 'o' and elaborate on a couple of things before I send this off and get myself back down to the drafthouse for the next secret screening. Hard to believe we're not even at the halfway mark!
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Hey folks, Harry here with the second day of Augustus Gloop's Fantastic Fest coverage. For some reason, he didn't gorge himself like he did yesterday - going for just a double feature. But he seemed to make it a good double feature. SPIRAL has distribution from ANCHOR BAY and is directed by Adam Green and the "star" of his earlier film HATCHET and the upcoming James Cameron epic AVATAR - Joel David Moore. And FLIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD is a hokey fun piece of fluff that seems to have been put in the NEW LINE pipeline to feed off the success of SNAKES ON A PLANE, but then when that didn't perform, it went into the straight to DVD land - it's release is coming in October, I believe. Here ya go...
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Hey folks, Harry here at Fantastic Fest in Theater 1 getting ready to watch the Chilean Superhero Martial Arts movie... MIRAGEMAN. Meanwhile, other Fantastic Fest fans are sending in their thoughts - like this from Augustus Gloop who is going at it hardcore at the fest! Though we seem to be seeing totally different films thus far. Here ya go...
Hi Everybody! Great to see all my wonderful geek brethren in the halls of Mecca on South Lamar for the Unholy Revival that is Fantastic Fest III. For those of you who could not make the pilgrimage, I am back with my complete coverage of the selections that I have been doomed to enjoy.
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Annnnnnd, round three. (ROUND ONE HERE and ROUND TWO HERE)!
Okay, this one ain't for the faint of heart, so here's the disclaimer. If you are pregnant, have a heart condition, weak bladder, are under the age of 18, attend any type of weekly services or have ever found me offensive at all, you might wanna turn the fuck around right this god damned second. Seriously. This is about to get ugly. I'm gonna use a lot of bad words and describe things that will etch themselves on the back of your brain for days. And they're not even things of my own vile graymatter. This is stuff that offended me. If the thought of something so repugnant that it offends a guy like myself scares a little bit of pee out of you, the following films are nothing you should ever gaze upon, much less think about. Ever.
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Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. Fantastic Fest is slowly approaching. If you’ve been in Austin holding a pre-ordered badge you’ve been getting a helluva lot of access to free and early Fantastic Fest/AICN related screenings already. Consider them appetizers for the buffet of gore, bullets and precious bodily fluids that we call Fantastic Fest.
The final schedule has locked and in the last minute Tim League and the good folks programming the festival locked in some good titles. Of the titles that just locked, I’ve seen SON OF RAMBOW and it is awesome. It’s worth buying a badge just by itself.
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Hey folks, Harry here... Fantastic Fest is doing something rocking fun this year for it's bumpers. We're letting filmmaking kids make them! Sure, we could get past luminaries of FANTASTIC FEST to make something, but we wanted to unleash the wide-eyed minds of tomorrows future filmmaking freaks - and let them go a little crazy. So here's the details - and we all look forward to what you guys have in mind!!!
"REEL HEROES:" THE FANTASTIC FEST TRAILER COMPETITION
(Austin, Texas) Fantastic Fest has partnered with AMD and the Austin School of Film (www.austinfilmschool.org) to present "Reel Heroes: the Fantastic Fest Trailer Competition." Youth filmmaking teams will embark on a mission to conceive, write, make the costumes, film and edit a short film featuring an original concept superhero. The film must explain the powers of the superhero and conclude with the aforementioned character turning to camera and saying "(Name of superhero) welcomes you to Fantastic Fest."
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Hey folks, Harry here... I'm driving along MoPac beginning the start of a 9000 mile Rolling Roadshow trip with a "Just Married" sign in our back window. Yes... This is my life... and I love it. I'll be updating from the road - just as I did when I was with Father Geek and Kublakhan.... This time though - it's a psuedo-honeymoon. But one of the things I'll be doing from the road is helping to program FANTASTIC FEST - with Tim, who is also on the road, in a different vehicle - on a different mission. Hope to see you along the way - or at FANTASTIC FEST this September. Here's the latest...
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Hey folks, Harry here - The 3rd Annual FANTASTIC FEST is being announced!!! Right here, Right Now! Woo-hoo! Below you'll find out the hows to get your film seen at Fantastic Fest - last year was amazing and hopefully this year, your films will help it be even moreso! So get to submitting!
FANTASTIC FEST IS BACK
Dates have been announced for the 3rd Annual Fantastic Fest in Austin, Texas, September 20-27. Fantastic Fest is fast becoming the premiere genre film festival in the United States, but don't take our word for it, take it from some of this year's attendees.
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Hey folks, Harry here with the last nips and tucks on FANTASTIC FEST. This has been a lot of work to put together for all of us, but nothing in comparison to the work these various filmmakers have dedicated themselves to, to bring the films to our
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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
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Hey folks, Harry here... I tell ya what - as one of the team of folks planning out this year's FANTASTIC FEST, it's been a blast. However, the hardest part is to not talk about the films we've scored that we have to wait to announce, for various re
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