angela bettis Tagged Articles at Cinematical

The first time Lucky McKee and Angela Bettis got together, it was in the service of a project called May, a stellar little horror flick that I've been forcing on people since I saw it several years back. The film was well-regarded enough to earn Mr. McKee a spot on the roster during Master of Horror's inaugural season -- and the guy stuck with what works. He hired Ms. Bettis (again) and they delivered Sick Girl, one of the first season's very best episodes, if it's me you're asking.

So now comes the old switcheroo: The new movie is called Roman, and it comes from director Angela Bettis. Her leading man is her former director, of course: Lucky McKee. I was psyched to catch Roman at last September's Fantastic Fest, but I'll warn my fellow May-lovers right now: If you walk into Roman expecting just a gender-reversal take on McKee's first flick, you're in for a disappointment. Roman is a fairly slow-moving (yet still interesting) story of a lonely guy who accidentally murders a girl before, well, going off the deep end, emotionally.

I dug the flick well enough to offer a recommendation, if only to the serious genre fans, and now it seems I'm not the only one who liked the thing: According to DavisDVD.com, Echo Bridge Home Entertainment will be releasing the Roman DVD on March 27, and that's pretty good news indeed. Despite the presence of two very talented filmmakers, Roman is precisely what we mean when we call something a "tough sell," so it's cool to see the flick hit the streets in one form or another. Expect the requisite commentary, deleted scenes, etc., but (I'll say it again) do not go in expecting May Part 2 -- or you just might hate the movie.

The official Cinematical presence at the 2006 Fantastic Fest was the wonderful Jette Kernion, and I think she managed to bang out about eight reviews ... while the fest was still running! I saw JK everywhere, from the queues to the parties to the local barbecue pits. Frankly I think her coverage rocked the house, and I'm not just saying that because she let me butt in line with her for The Beach Party at the Threshold of Hell.

But since the FF guys were cool enough to welcome Cinematical with such eerily open arms, I figure it's only right to share my favorite movies, moments and memories of mayhem from the 2006 FantFest. And so I shall.

The Best Flicks

Simon Rumley's seriously disturbing The Living and the Dead, the Swedish vampire flick Frostbite, Adam Green's fun-time slasher throwback Hatchet, William Friedkin's compellingly intense Bug and the quietly cool haunted Brit flick Lie Still. I also had an unexpectedly good time with Mel Gibson's Apocalypto -- and although I'd already seen Abominable, The Host, The Fountain, Pan's Labyrinth and Severance, they're all films I have no problem recommending. Oh, and William H. Macy's performance in Edmond ... wow.

I also trekked away from the festival to enjoy a good portion of Feast -- which was negated by my plane ride home. Lindsay Lohan's Just My Luck was the in-flight movie, and that flick packs perhaps the worst screenplay I've dealt with in three years. Stunningly bad.

Oh, and right before I nodded off every night, I watched just a little bit more of The Office: Season 2. If you don't watch this show, you're plain old robbing yourself of multiple peals of bulky laughter. And why would you want to do that?

This should come as no big surprise: I have kind of a crush on Angela Bettis. It was her beautifully askew performance in Lucky McKee's May that pushed me over the deep end, but the young actress has done some really fine work elsewhere: a small turn in James Mangold's Girl, Interrupted, the only sign of life in Chuck Russell's Bless the Child, and a really fantastic Carrie White in the mini-series of King's Carrie. Plus she was in that Toolbox Murders remake that was actually rather fun.

So obviously I'm a Bettis fan, and not just because she's strangely (very) sexy and dabbles mainly in the horror department. Her next flick will be Scar, which Production Weekly describes as a hi-def 3-D project about a young woman who returns to her home town only to be haunted by some seriously horrific memories. Jed Weintrob will be directing from a script by first-timer Zack Ford. Scar begins production in Calagary on October 3rd.

Ms. Bettis also provides the voice of the title character in The Woods, which (finally) hits the market on ... October 3rd!

A lot of people have taken to calling the Masters of Horror series a Showtime production, but the truth is that the experiment was born over at Anchor Bay. Series creator Mick Garris had the idea to snag a bunch of the finest horror-makers under the sun, have each one direct an hour-long mini-movie, and then let the Gorehounds devour the goods through the magic of DVD. But then Showtime got involved, and they aired 12 of the 13 episodes between last December and March of this year. (The 13th episode, Takashi Miike's Imprint, was deemed too harsh by the Showtime folks, which means you won't be able to see it till the DVD hits shelves.)

Unfortunately, Anchor Bay has taken a fairly money-hungry approach to releasing Masters on DVD: Two episodes hit stores yesterday, available individually or as part of a 2-pack. But with a list price of $16.98 apiece (which means a retail cost of about 11 bucks each), it seems that the horror faithful are expected to dole out about $150 if they want the entire season. (By comparison, my 13-episode collection of the brilliant Firefly set me back only about 40 bucks!) But hey, nobody's saying you have to buy 'em all, right? We horror geeks aren't ravenous completists and ferocious collectors ... are we? (To be fair, if the first 2 DVDs are any indication, each release promises to come stocked with loads of extra goodies, so at least we're getting some value for our money.)

Anyway, to commemorate the DVD debut of the series (well, the first two episodes) I thought it might be helpful to give our readers a Masters Guide -- despite the fact that I've seen precisely ONE episode of the show so far! Click below for a list of all the actors, the Masters, the release dates, all 13 plot synopses, and a variety of trivial hoo-hah intended mainly for the hardcore horror freaks.