AfterDarkHorrorfest Tagged Articles at Cinematical

There are a few positive reviews of The Broken floating around from Sundance 2007 and elsewhere, but I wanted to add an endorsement tied to its berth in this year's installment of the fledgling After Dark Horrorfest, which runs this week. In past years I've been generally disinterested in the Horrorfest programming, which has seemed heavy on schlock, but The Broken seemed intriguing, so I ventured out and saw it on Saturday.

You know the cliche that something or other "sent a chill down my spine"? People who use that phrase -- including me -- usually do so metaphorically. This time I mean it literally. There are moments in The Broken that sent a physical chill running through my body. I'm not ready to call Sean Ellis's sophomore feature a great film; after one viewing, I'm not sure it makes total sense. But it is genuinely, supremely creepy. Fans of the genre should give the After Dark folks some of their hard-earned cash this week.

I should say that this is decidedly my kind of horror film: slow, moody, with little gore, few jolt scares, minimum exposition, and a maximum of atmosphere. (It also does another thing that I love, which is have events unfold on a small, personal scale while suggesting that something far larger in scope is happening.) In other words, it may not be for all tastes. It's original enough not to have a direct analogue, but in terms of mood and the types of scares it offers, think a quieter version of last year's The Strangers, with supernatural elements. And scarier.

Horrorfest's website, including participating theaters and a trailer for The Broken (that I wouldn't recommend watching, as it gives away too much without giving you a sense of the film) is here.

Hey, what do you know, it's already the second weekend of 2009! Only 50 to go before 2010! Most independent-film distributors took a break the last couple weeks (as did most of mainstream Hollywood), but they're getting back into the swing of things now, and the Indie Spotlight is here, as always, to let you know what's playing beyond the multiplexes.

Your indie selections this weekend are: Cargo 200, Just Another Love Story, Silent Light, Yonkers Joe, and the After Dark Horrorfest 2009. Keep reading for the scoop on each of them.

Silent Light (pictured)
What it is: A quiet, slow, contemplative drama about a case of adultery in a small Mennonite community in northern Mexico.
What they're saying: I reviewed it for Cinematical at the Portland International Film Festival last year and described the cinematography as breathtakingly beautiful, the story simple and mesmerizing. I'm one of the 83% of critics at Rotten Tomatoes who liked it. Make no mistake, though: It's a slooow movie -- on purpose. The idea is to become absorbed in the thoughts and feelings of the characters.
Where it's playing: New York City (Film Forum).
More info: The official site is lovely to look at it, if nothing else.

It's about to screen during the After Dark Horrorfest, but before it does, a creepy trailer for Slaughter has hit the net and you can check it out above. Not to be confused with this Slaughter (which is, rumor has it, on hold), the film focuses on two girls who befriend each other. The one has an abusive ex, so she moves to her new friend's family farm. Unfortunately, one horror is traded for another.

The film is a mixture of the premise of how well we know our roommates and their families, and the modern-day interpretation of a true story that happened a century ago. What story that is, however, is under wraps -- supposedly to avoid spoiling the film. It looks pretty cool, and it's certainly a mystery to solve. Which true story is it!? Gah ... The curiosity! They took exactly the right angle to lure me in -- my obsession to read up on the true stories behind truth-based films. But what about you?

If you're itching to find out, the film premieres at the fest on January 9th.

When the After Dark Horrorfest popped up in November of 2006, I caught about half of the offered 8 Films to Die For, despite a transparently sensationalized campaign of just how horrendously extreme these titles must've been to get such a specialized release. My experiences ranged from not bad (The Abandoned and The Gravedancers) to pretty dreadful (Penny Dreadful), but between the ratio of enjoyment that year and the yanking of actually-possibly-horrific Frontier(s) the next, I just passed entirely in 2007.

One might assume that, in an effort to meet me halfway, the Horrorfest has skipped out on itself this year, but while this is technically true, it's merely shuffled away into the doldrums of this coming January 2-9 instead. Scott Weinberg had already pointed out that The Broken and The Butterfly Effect 3 were among this year's (next year's?) selected batch of titles, and now The Hollywood Reporter reports that From Within -- about a rash of suicides in a small town -- and three After Dark productions: the aforementioned Effect, Slaughter, and Perkins' 14.

That leaves three more titles in the running. Any guesses? Just remember now: they can't be too scary.

After Dark Horrorfest is a week of "8 Films To Die For" -- 8 new horror flicks released in theaters for one week only, November 9th through the 18th. Over the last month, contestants have performed at live auditions or submitted 90-second YouTube videos in the hopes of being crowned Miss Horrorfest 2007. The competition is now down to eight finalists. The chosen ones lived in a house together for days, Real World-style, and each competed in "chilling competitions" to win "$50,000, fame, glory, and a year of exotic travel as the reigning Miss Horrorfest!" The videos are on YouTube -- last year's contest proved to be the most successful in the site's history. The final three candidates should be announced tomorrow.

Of all the assignments I've had and interviews I've conducted, none have filled me with as much unease as my trip to the Miss Horrorfest House. I have a difficult time talking to girls as it is. It certainly doesn't make things any easier when they're covered in blood and holding chainsaws. These ladies are hardcore! I was concerned that I'd feel a bit out of place. 1) I'm not a big horror enthusiast. If I want to see people screaming and trying to stab each other, I'll go home for Thanksgiving. 2) Although I do own volumes one and two of The Cure's greatest hits, I am not at all comfortable in the Goth lifestyle. 3) My taste in erotica does not involve whips, chains, or ball gags.

Was I going to be able to find common ground with these people? Luckily, I was partnered for my interviews with the editor-in-chief -- excuse me, DEADitor-in-chief -- of a magazine called Girls and Corpses. Yes, girls and corpses -- together at last! As you can imagine, he was extremely familiar with the horror chick world, and he put me at ease very quickly. If you get a free second and don't mind getting fired from your job -- check out his site! The two of us spoke briefly with each of the eight finalists, discussed after the jump. It was a trip.

Maybe because I grew up watching way too many horror movies, I tend to be pretty critical. When it comes to horror I tend to lapse into a "been there, done that" state of mind. My misspent youth in the eighties was during the glory days of the holy trinity of horror franchises (Krueger, Voorhees and Myers), plus my friends and I managed to work our way through every horror movie that would show up at the local Blockbuster.

Usually most of your low profile horror flicks head straight to video, but sometimes movies manage to create enough buzz to help ease the transition from a late night guilty pleasure to big screen debut. IGN has a first look at the trailer for the new horror flick The Abandoned. The film was a part of the recent After Dark Horrorfest and was directed by Nacho Cerdà. The story centers on a woman who is looking for her parents and is brought to the spot of her mother's murder -- and in true haunted house fashion -- the house has plans of its own. The trailer looks promising, not groundbreaking mind you, but it would seem there's some scares to be had. Even the poster is kind of spooky, although porcelain dolls have always creeped me out, so it might just be me. The Abandoned opens February 23.

In a move that should absolutely thrill those (few) people who simply can't wait for the direct-to-video horror titles to hit the Blockbuster shelves, Lionsgate, Freestyle and After Dark Films have conspired to birth the After Dark Horrorfest, which is not a film festival at all, but a series of eight (or nine?) horror flicks that will hit about 500 U.S. movie theaters on November 17th. (Got all that?)

Well, the official site hasn't been all that forthcoming about the event, but those astute goregeeks at Bloody-Disgusting.com were able to break out the slate for the rest of us. Should you happen to reside somewhere near the specially-selected cities, these are the movies you'll be able to see:

1. The Abandoned -- It played Toronto. I missed it. Heard good things.
2. Dark Ride -- Slasher stalks an amusement park.
3. The Gravedancers -- Over and over I'm hearing good chit-chat on this one.
4. Infection -- The horror sites are assuming it's this Infection (which I liked), but maybe it's actually this Infection. We shall see.
5. Penny Dreadful -- A girl with autophobia has Mimi Rogers for a shrink. Cool title though.
   
6. Reincarnation -- Another piece of LG-owned J-horror.
7. Sisters -- Chloe Sevigny and Stephen Rea in a tale of conjoined-twin terror.
8. Unrest -- Young docs deal with haunted corpse. Saw it at Fantastic Fest: A little slow, but not bad.
9. Wicked Little Thing -- Also known as The Children, it's about ghost children.

All in all, a clever little attempt to get a few extra bucks from some flicks that are heading direct-to-video anyway. If The Gravedancers plays anywhere close by, it'll get my nine bucks. The rest ... I can probably wait for the DVDs.