After the unfortunate death of their son, a married couple impulse purchases a ready-to-assemble cabinet through a questionable internet ad.
Content Warning: This short contains strong violence.
WEIRD HORIZON FOR THE WEEK OF 10/26/2018
Our weekly look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs and Blu-rays (and hot off the server VODs), and on more distant horizons…
Trailers of new release movies are generally available at the official site links.
IN THEATERS (LIMITED RELEASE):
Border (2018): A border agent uses her preternatural sense of smell to sniff out smugglers. This Swedish magical realist piece did earn one “wonderfully weird” quote among its overwhelmingly positive reviews. Border listing at Cineuropa.
Suspiria (2018): The long-anticipated remake of the witchy Certified Weird original, with Dakota Johnson and Tilda Swinton. Critics are calling it “crazy“; in L.A. and N.Y.C. this Halloween week, expanding nationwide next week. Suspiria official site.
FILM FESTIVALS – Ithaca Fantastik Fest (Ithaca, NY, 10/26-11/4):
For a film festival that’s held in the middle of nowhere—apologies to Cornell grads if that sounds like a slight—Ithaka Fantastik has assembled a fine slate of arty genre films. There are no significant debuting films; most of the lineup is second-runs from Fantasia or Fantastic Fest (with a few from Sundance and even Cannes sprinkled in). This year’s roster includes Cam; Samuel Benchetrit’s French black comedy about a man who thinks he’s turning into the titular Dog; a feature-length expansion of one of our previous Saturday Short picks, “Prospect“; the insane “geki-mation” of Violence Voyager; Aaron Schimberg‘s Freaks “update,” Chained for Life; Portugal’s surreal soccer-based satire Diamantino; the supernatural police procedural Luz; Joel Potrykus‘ filmed Pac-Man marathon Relaxer; the apocalyptic Starfish; Seven Stages to Achieve Eternal Bliss By Passing Through the Gateway Chosen By the Holy Storsh, presumptive front-runner for 2018’s “longest title in a cult comedy “award; New Zealand’s comic Mega Time Squad. Even if there’s nothing new or exclusive, it’s a late-season treat for locals, and serves as a kind of “best of” compilation of the year’s oddball festival offerings. And this year only, don’t miss a special Halloween screening of The Tingler, in PerceptoVision!
Ithaca Fantastik Fest home page.
NEW ON HOME VIDEO:
Night of the Demons (1988): Read our review. This ridiculously absurd haunted house supernatural slasher makes perfect Halloween fare. Now out in a newly restored, limited edition steelbook Blu-ray with a new commentary track from the director and cast, with the previous two commentary tracks carried over along with a host of other extras—Citizen Kane didn’t get this kind of Blu-ray treatment. Buy Night of the Demons
Sorry to Bother You (2018): Read our List Candidate review! Directed by rapper Boots Riley from way out of left field, Sorry is an absurdist racial satire set in the ultracapitalist world of telemarketing. Already out on VOD, it’s now on DVD and Blu-ray, with a commentary by Riley and other treats. Buy Sorry To Bother You
CERTIFIED WEIRD (AND OTHER) REPERTORY SCREENINGS:
The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975). We won’t list all the screenings of this audience-participation classic separately. You can use this page to find a screening near you.
- Multiple locations, 10/28-10/30 – Spirited Away (2001). Check Fathom Events for specifics.
- Austin, TX, 10/31 – Pink Flamingos (1972). At the Alamo Drafthouse (South Lamar).
- Columbus, OH, 10/28 – Evil Dead II (1987). At Gateway Film Center.
- Dallas, TX, 10/30 – Nosferatu (1922), with a new score by the Invisible Czars. At the Texas Theater.
- Dallas, TX, 10/31 – Suspiria (1977), preceded by a live ballet performance. At the Texas Theater.
- Denver, CO, 10/28 – The Phantom of the Opera (1925) with Vampyr (1932) (double feature) and a live score by Hands of Midnight. At the Alamo Drafthouse.
- Denver, CO, 10/29 – Videodrome (1983). At the Alamo Drafthouse.
- Denver, CO, 10/30 – Donnie Darko (2001) (theatrical cut). At the Alamo Drafthouse.
- Denver, CO, 10/30 – House [Hausu] (1977). At the Alamo Drafthouse.
- Ithaca, NY, 10/31 – The Tingler (1959), with seats wired for “PerceptoVision.” Part of the Ithaca Fantastik Fest. At the Cherry Artspace.
- Los Angeles, CA, 10/26 – The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971), with The Devil’s Rain (1975) (double feature). At the Aero Theater.
- Los Angeles, CA, 11/1 – Head (1968). At the Egyptian Theater.
- Louisville, KY, 10/26 – Female Trouble (1974). At the Speed Art Museum.
- Louisville, KY, 10/27 – Liquid Sky (1982). At the Speed Art Museum.
- New Braunfels, TX, 10/29 – Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992). At the Alamo Drafthouse.
- New York City, NY, 10/26 (midnight) – Marquis (1989). At Spectacle Theater.
- New York City, NY, 10/26-10/27 (midnights) – House [Hausu] (1977). At IFC Center.
- New York City, NY, 10/26-11/1 – Suspiria (1977) (additional midnight screenings on Friday and Saturday). At IFC Center.
- New York City, NY, 10/27 – The Boxer’s Omen [Mo] (1983). At the Metrograph.
- New York City, NY, 10/27 – Hour of the Wolf [Vargtimmen] (1968). At the Nitehawk Theater.
- New York City, NY, 10/27 – Suspiria (1977), with a giallo-themed costume party. At Videology Bar & Cinema.
- New York City, NY, 10/29 – The Trial (1962). At IFC Center.
- Oakland, CA, 10/28 – Nosferatu (1922). At the New Parkway Theater.
- Omaha, NB, 10/30 – Suspiria (1977). At the Alamo Drafthouse.
- Pittsburgh, PA, 10/26, 10/28-10/29 – Freaks (1932). At Row House Cinema.
- Pittsburgh, PA, 10/30 – Nosferatu (1922). At Row House Cinema.
- San Francisco, CA, 10/31 – Suspiria (1977). At the Roxie.
- Silver Spring, MD, 10/26-10/28, 10/31 – Suspiria (1977). At AFI Silver Theater.
- Silver Spring, MD, 10/27-10/28 – Nosferatu (1922). At AFI Silver Theater.
- Toronto, Ont., Canada, 10/27 – Phantasm (1979), with Don Coscarelli Q&A via Skype. At the Royal.
- Toronto, Ont., Canada, 10/31 – Possession (1981). At the Royal.
- Tuscon, AZ, 11/1 – Daisies [Sedmikrásky] (1966). At the Loft.
FREE (LEGITIMATE RELEASE) MOVIES ON YOUTUBE:
Carnival of Souls (1962): Read the Certified Weird entry! If you don’t consider this eerie exercise in monochrome anomie perfect Halloween viewing, then “I feel sorry for you… and your lack of soul.”
What are you looking forward to? If you have any weird movie leads that I have overlooked, feel free to leave them in the COMMENTS section.
355. LUNACY (2005)
Sílení
DIRECTED BY: Jan Svankmajer
FEATURING: Pavel Liska, Jan Tríska, Anna Geislerová
PLOT: A young man suffers recurring nightmares about white-coated men coming to seize him in the night. When he awakens the guests at a roadside inn as he thrashes about during one of these attacks, one man, a modern-day Marquis, takes an interest in him and invites him back to his manor. There, the Marquis troubles the traveler with macabre games that may be real or may be staged, then suggests he voluntarily commit himself to an experimental mental asylum for “purgative therapy” to cure his nightmares.
![Still from Lunacy [Sileni] (2005)](https://i0.wp.com/366weirdmovies.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/lunacy.jpg?resize=450%2C253 "Lunacy")
BACKGROUND:
- The script is loosely based on two Edgar Allan Poe stories: “The Premature Burial” and “The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether.” The character of the Marquis is obviously based on the Marquis de Sade.
- Svankmajer wrote an initial version of the script that became Lunacy in the 1970s, but the Communist authorities refused to approve the film.
- This was the last film Svankmajer would work on with his longtime collaborator, costume designer, and wife, Eva Svankmajerová; she died a few months after the film’s completion. Among her other duties, she painted the deck of cards featuring Sadean tortures.
INDELIBLE IMAGE: It has to be one of Svankmajer’s meaty animations. We picked the scene of brownish cow tongues slithering out of a classical bust—including a pair escaping from the marble nipples—but we wouldn’t blame you for going with the sirloin marionettes instead.
THREE WEIRD THINGS: Meat bumpers; shirt unlocking door; human chickens
WHAT MAKES IT WEIRD: It’s got the Marquis de Sade, an asylum run by chicken-farming lunatics, and animated steaks dancing in between scenes. Despite that lineup, it may be Jan Svankmajer’s most conventional movie. The director calls it an “infantile tribute to Edgar Allen Poe” in his introduction—and is interrupted by a tongue inching its way across the floor.
Introduction to Lunacy (2005)
COMMENTS: The trailer explains that “Edgar Allan Poe + the Marquis de Sade + Jan Svankmajer = Lunacy.” It’s self-evident that combining these three uniquely perverse talents would produce something singularly strange; the fun in watching the movie is in seeing Continue reading 355. LUNACY (2005)
CAPSULE: ICHI THE KILLER (2001)
Koroshiya 1
DIRECTED BY: Takashi Miike
FEATURING: Tadanobu Asano, Nao Ohmori, Shinya Tsukamoto
PLOT: A sadomasochistic Yakuza relishes being hunted by a mysterious hitman named Ichi, hoping the killer will bring him to undreamed of heights of pain.
WHY IT WON’T MAKE THE LIST: Ichi is strange, for sure, but as important as it was in developing Takashi Miike’s cult and bringing his work before more round-eyes, it values gruesomeness and shock value over pure weirdness.
COMMENTS: Ichi is notorious for its violence and sadism, and rightfully so; but, as a Takashi Miike joint, it bears an undeniable brand of quality and style. Also, as is typical with Miike, it’s uneven, almost by design, changing from yakuza intrigue to gross-out torture fest to campy black comedy at the crack of the director’s whip. The complicated plot echoes both Yojimbo (in the way one character pits rival crime factions against one another) and Memento (in the way a vulnerable man’s memories are manipulated to make him a tool of vengeance). Tadanobu Asano gives a cool, cult star-making performance as Kakihara, the ruthlessly sadomasochistic villain with dyed blonde hair and unexplained facial scars that have carved his face into a perma-Joker grin. As with every Miike movie, it contains a few moments of transcendent gonzo poetry—my personal favorite being when Jijii (played by Tetsuo director Shinya Tsukamoto) strips off his shirt to reveal an improbably jacked physique.
Still, even Miike’s best movies tend to have troughs along with its peaks, and Ichi has a number of problems that prevent it from rising very far above its nihilistic base. The ostensible protagonist—Ichi of the title—is not at all believable as a legendary assassin; in fact, his prowess at killing is completely absurd in a way that doesn’t match, or serve, the serious and frightening tone of the Kakihara’s segments. Nor does the performance of otherwise fine actor Nao Ohmori fully exploit the sympathy one might have for the character, had he been portrayed in a less cartoonish manner.
Even more problematic is the film’s violence—not its extent so much as Miike’s inconsistent attitude to depicting it. At times, torture and cruelty are depicted with a realism that makes one cringe and empathize with the victim, while at other times it’s treated with a splatterpunk insouciance (as when a shocked face is detached from its head and shown sliding down a bloody wall). Sometimes these inconsistent tones coexist in the same scene: Ichi witnesses a brutal rape, with the victim’s face painfully swollen from a merciless beating, then dispatches the assailant by splitting him vertically from head to toe with his razor shoe. In some sense, alternating the absurd and realistic approaches to violence makes the scene more nightmarish, keeping the audience off-balance by mixing fearful anticipation with an unexpected result. I can appreciate this effect, to some extent, without actually enjoying or approving of it. The problem is that it’s more authentically sadistic to treat suffering as a joke than to face it head-on; Ichi too often takes on the sadist’s attitude that others’ pain is entertainment. Although torture and gore is pervasive and extreme throughout Ichi—including a man hanging suspended from hooks dug into his skin, among other atrocities—the violence in Miike’s previous Audition is far more harrowing and meaningful, because a fleshed-out human beings whom we can care about suffer (and inflict) it, instead of the pain being just a revolting exhibition occurring between two caricatures.
Ichi the Killer is one of those canonical cult movies (like Donnie Darko) that is constantly being restored, tinkered with and reissued in new home video editions. The latest on offer is the 2018 Blu-ray from Well Go USA, which bills itself as the “definitive remastered edition.” While it is reportedly an improvement on the 2010 Blu from Tokyo Shock, it lacks any significant supplemental features aside from the decade-old commentary track from Miike and original manga writer Hideo Yamamoto recycled from an old DVD release. In any release, it should go without saying to beware the English-language dub.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
(This movie was nominated for review by Caleb Moss, who called it “Pretty weird, more leaning on subtle absurdity, but when [Miike] goes for it, he can deliver some really great black comic intellect…” Suggest a weird movie of your own here.)
LIST CANDIDATE: MYSTICS IN BALI (1981)
Leák
DIRECTED BY: H. Tjut Djalil
FEATURING: Ilona Agathe Bastian, Yos Santo, Sofia W.D., W.D. Mochtar
PLOT: American author Cathy King, traveling to Bali to research a book about witchcraft, gets tricked by a witch she’s interviewing, who turns her into a flying head to serve her own needs.
WHY IT MIGHT MAKE THE LIST: Even taking into account that this is all about an island culture’s religious folklore located halfway around the world, Mystics in Bali is still way weirder than it needs to be. The cartoonish special effects pile on the low-budget charm while we’re besieged by visions of animal transformations, witch battles, and humans barfing live mice. How can we refuse to consider it?
COMMENTS: The province island of Bali, Indonesia, is one of the world’s most popular tourist spots, mixing some of the world’s greatest surfing and diving on water with one of the most colorful and flavorful traditional cultures on land. Indonesia is the proverbial land of a thousand gods and a million ways to worship them, with ancient animism and spirit temples cheerfully coexisting with modern Hinduism. This is the background for our story, Mystics in Bali. Much of the structure of its story is based in traditional Balinese and Malaysian folklore. From some of the stranger aspects of this mythology, imagine how wacky our own religions sound to a non-practicer out of context. That helps us keep a level head on our shoulders (sorry) during this wild, dark ride—even though this could not be called a normal movie in any culture.
American author Cathy (Ilona Agathe Bastian) is in Bali to study black magic, intending to write a book. Her friend and local guide Mahendra (Yos Santo) takes her into the jungle and introduces her to an ancient witch, the Queen of Leák (a discipline of black magic). The first time the Queen (Sofia W.D.) appears, she’s a cackling hag with flowing white hair and waggling long fingernails, who warns them that she has many appearances. (Note to The Blair Witch Project: ten minutes in and here’s our witch. Was that so hard?) The Queen agrees to take Cathy on as a disciple, provided Cathy and Mahendra return bearing gifts of jewels and bottles of blood to offer the Queen in tribute. They do, and she transforms into a long glowing tentacle emerging from the bushes to claim it. She orders Cathy to remove her skirt so she can inscribe an incantation on her thigh to imbue magical powers. From here on out she demands to see her new apprentice alone, since her escort makes the Queen suspicious. Note that she is referred to as the “Queen” throughout the movie, but there’s nothing regal about her; she’s apparently the queen of the swamp she lives in and of the black arts she’s mastered.
Cathy dutifully returns alone to begin her witch training. This involves nightly dances and rituals during which the Queen and Cathy Continue reading LIST CANDIDATE: MYSTICS IN BALI (1981)