Live from Fantastic Fest: Blooming Excess, Adult Sexuality, and Fantastic Debates

Above: Jasper Sharp, author of Behind the Pink Curtain; the Alamo Drafthouse; Sean Donnelly (blue shirt), director of doc I Think We're Alone Now; Rian Johnson (glasses), director of The Brothers Bloom; Devin Faraci (glasses and beard), writer, CHUD.com, in the midst of debate; Jay Slater, English writer, ready to resolve a debate by boxing.

What qualifies a mainstream comedy like The Brothers Bloom to screen at Fantastic Fest, a festival reknowned for its horror, science fiction, fantasy, and other hard-core genre entries? One answer might be: 'Because co-founder Harry Knowles said so,' but even Knowles wondered if the film belonged in the program. The better answer might be: 'Why the heck not?' The best film festivals in the world are programmed by knowledgeable people who are passionate about presenting films they love to audiences who are eager to discover great new work.

In his introduction to the film, which was presented as the first "secret screening" of the festival (titles not revealed in advance; the shows always sell out anyway) on Tuesday evening, Knowles expressed his conviction that writer/director Rian Johnson "creates his own worlds." Certainly there are fairy-tale aspects to Johnson's featherweight con man tale, but I doubt anyone present really cared if the film "belonged" at the festival or not. The steady stream of visual gags drew near constant laughter, though I agree with James Rocchi that the film drags too long and, for me, edged too far into sentimental obscurity. The Brothers Bloom opens wide in January.

My screening day began with horror thriller Donkey Punch, a conventional yet refreshingly hard-edged dive into depravity that could be summed up as "threesomes never end well for anybody," a modern updating of the 80s slasher film notion that sexually active teens must pay for their sins by dying in repulsive ways. It's due for limited release in January.

Korean Western -- and just-announced Fantastic Fest Audience Award winner -- The Good the Bad the Weird has been highly touted for months (by me, among others). The only negative I heard was concern about its length, a thought echoed by our own Eugene Novikov. But the time flew by for me; this is defiantly not a plot-driven movie. This is not the best film I've seen by director Kim Ji-Woon (that would be A Tale of Two Sisters); still, it resists the temptation to slavishly imitate Spaghetti Western conventions and glories in its dizzying adventures, comedic asides, and spectacular action sequences.

"Behind the Pink Curtain" is a three-night retrospective of Japanese "pink" films, cheaply-made exploitation flicks intended for the "raincoat crowd" and featuring softcore sex at regular intervals. Why would anyone in their right mind program and/or watch these movies at a festival? Author Jasper Sharp, who has written a gorgeously-designed, exhaustively researched book by the same title that's just been published by Fab Press in the UK, explained that production companies offered filmmakers near-complete creative freedom to make the films, as long as they included the requisite sexual content. At the time, the barrier for anyone to work in the Japanese film industry was high, so some young would-be directors took advantage and some startling films resulted.

Blue Film Woman, which actually screened on Monday night, was a colorful, outrageous, campy trip, but Gushing Prayer, which played on Tuesday evening, was a bracing sojourn that comes across as an often-obtuse social commentary rathen than simple-minded sexual playtime. Not recommended for the unadventurous, films like Gushing Prayer open a window on an entire cinematic sub-genre that has been rarely seen or critically appreciated outside Japan.

Scott Weinberg saw movies too: "If a title like Tokyo Gore Police sounds amusing to you, then there's little doubt that you'll enjoy Yoshi Nishimura's Tokyo Gore Police, which is precisely what it sounds like -- and in very copious quantities. The plot doesn't matter all that much, but the flick seems to exist in a near-future Japan that's rife with privatized police forces, maniacal monsters, and enough over-the-top bloodshed to fill three crazy movies.

"On a slightly more conventional note we have Surveillance, which I'd describe as an above-average cable flick backed by a few decent twists and a rather unique performance by master character actor Bill Pullman. (And Julia Ormond is quite fun too, but you've probably never seen Pullman pull this kind of stuff before.) Surveillance tells the story of a few random killings that occur on an isolated roadside -- but when the (few) remaining witnesses are questioned by the FBI, they each tell a decidedly different tale. So it's a somewhat familiar movie with some surprises and just a dash of the Rashomon storytelling conceit. Not brilliant, but I enjoyed it for 90 minutes.

"And then we head back to Gore Country with the powerfully un-PC Feast 2, which picks right up where the first one left off and wastes no time in doling out the sticky stuff. Fans of the original may want to know that this equally outlandish sequel gives us more monsters, more mayhem, and more tongue-in-cheek mortality. I don't want to spoil any of the fun, but suffice to say this flick doesn't skimp on the splatter. And you probably won't believe how far the filmmakers are willing to go to wring an amused reaction out of you. Well, amused or simply grossed out."

A day of screenings was merely a prelude to another amazing Fantastic Fest Party that began shortly after midnight, this one themed as "Fantastic Debates." Taking place in the nearby South Austin Gym, the debates were moderated by a bespectacled, gently mocking gentleman (whose name I did not catch). Resolutions up for debate included: "CGI should be done away with," "George Lucas has lost his f---ing mind," "DVD is dead," and "Horror remakes are a good thing." Participants included eloquent writers Devin Faraci (CHUD), Todd Brown (Twitch), Jay Slater (Film Threat and others), and our own Scott Weinberg, but with all due respect to writers whose work I love, the highlights were provided by two debaters with considerable experience as debaters. Naturally, I didn't write down their names, but I'll call them "George Lucas-worshipping defender" and "Offensive Rich Guy." I haven't laughed that hard in a long time, and I didn't even have anything alcoholic to drink.

The debates concluded with three boxing matches (?!) among the participants, with Fantastic Fest Director of Programming Tim League standing in for Scott Weinberg, who begged off due to recent oral surgery. Tim fearlessly traded punches with the taller "evil Brit" Slater, bringing the day to a rousing conclusion in the same way that it had begun for me: in a furious exchange of punches.