It’s been a busy week here at 366 Weird Movies as we relocated our world headquarters from one undisclosed location to another one down the road. Even though our offices are now stacked high with mountains of unopened boxes containing Guy Maddin DVDs, unsold Jack Nance Eraserhead wigs, and surplus cow organs coated in fine layers of Cheetos dust (sounds odd, until you realize that our lab technicians need them for validating copyright issues), we’ve still managed to put together a fine slate of exemplary weird content for you to peruse in the coming week. First, we noted that the studio we have our biggest love/hate crush on— Troma—has just dumped (a most appropriate verb in this case) a load of their back catalog onto YouTube for free viewing. We’ll provide a short guide to navigating this wealth of cinematic offal for your viewing pleasure. Next up, guest columnist Jesse Miksic (of the impressive pan-media blog Benefit of the Doubt) brings us a critical essay on the 1985 cult fantasy Return to Oz. We didn’t forget that July 4 marks the 236th anniversary (has it really been that long?) of the United States declaring independence from ol’ King George III. What better way to celebrate Independence Day than with a review of Meshes of the Afternoon (1943), the revolutionary declaration from the mother of domestic independent cinema and of the American avant-garde, the great Maya Deren?

Due to what our web host terms “unscheduled maintenance,” last Pipeline we neglected to bring you our installment of Weirdest Search Terms of the Week, but promised you a double shot this week. True to our word, here’s two weeks worth of the strangest search terms that clogged up our server logs the past fortnight.

• a girl opens a box and becomes wierd movies
• weirdness i am weird
• anti drugs dream world camping wake wings jail or bs movie
• movie where kids where salves of senor (note to the guy who’s been repeatedly searching for this term for the past two months: we nominated you, you can stop now)
• weird man eating fanny aliens movie
• robot boy reals nakeds sexys bigs boobs

Our dual winners for the past two weeks are “hollywood romantic movies bigboobs movies two much bad boys boobs” (you had us at Hollywood romantic big boobs movies) and “satans’satanic whacky chess game ride” (weird due to redundancy: what kind of wacky chess game ride would Satan have other than a satanic one?) Thanks to all the horny schizophrenic non-English speaking Googlers who participated in the contest, and see you next week!

One more thing: here’s how that ridiculously-long-and-ever-growing reader suggested review queue stands: “Meshes of the Afternoon” (next week!); “My Wrongs 8245-8249 and 117″; The Hour-glass Sanatorium [Saanatorium pod klepsidra] (out of print in Region 1, but we’ll keep looking); Liquid Sky (re-review);  Fantastic Planet; “Twin Peaks” (TV series); Society; May; Little Continue reading WHAT’S IN THE PIPELINE →

Our weekly look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…

Trailers of new release movies are generally available on the official site links.

IN THEATERS (LIMITED RELEASE):

Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012): A six-year old girl named Hushpuppy contracts a fever, which ushers in the apocalypse and a plague of prehistoric creatures called aurochs. Benh Zeitlin’s debut feature is the arthouse festival hit of the season, and will start its theatrical run in New York and Los Angeles this week, appearing in major cities throughout the country throughout July. Beasts of the Southern Wild official site.

NEW ON DVD:

Numero Deux (1975): Sexually explicit postmodern portrait of a dissolving marriage from Jean-Luc Godard. The action plays out on two video monitors, which are juxtaposed and superimposed in different ways throughout this cinematic experiment. Buy Numero Deux.

Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (2011): A group of policemen and a suspect patrol the Anatolian countryside one long night searching for a victim’s corpse.  It looks like an arthouse police procedural but critics hints at something deeper: NPR’s Ella Taylor describes it as “an existential fairy tale set in a nocturnal netherworld…” This year’s Palme D’or winner (the last two Cannes champions have been Certified Weird—will the trend continue?) Buy Once Upon a Time in Anatolia.

Sound of Noise (2010): A music hating cop tries to silence a band of avant-garde percussionists who are planning to stage a performance art symphony in the public spaces of Stockholm in this quirky Swedish satire. It’s won a few awards on the festival circuit and is often described as “absurd.” Buy Sound of Noise.

FREE (LEGITIMATE RELEASE) MOVIES ON YOUTUBE:

Tommy (1975): Read our capsule review. Who better to direct a psychedelic rock opera about the deaf, dumb and blind kid who sure plays a mean pinball then the always tasteful and restrained Ken Russell? Watch Tommy free on YouTube.

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.

Apologies, no what’s in the pipeline for this week—we had server issues earlier today and were working on restoring the site instead of composing this post! Besides, we haven’t necessarily decided what we’ll be featuring next week…

OK, one tidbit: we’ll tell you how original Certified Copy (2010) is…

Next week we promise two weeks worth of weird search terms!

Our weekly look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…

Trailers of new release movies are generally available on the official site links.

IN THEATERS (WIDE RELEASE):

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter: Ax-slinging Honest Abe emancipates some vampires from their heads in this historical horror rushed out to beat 2013’s Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Notices are pretty bad (words like “insipid” were fairly common), but it does seem at least a little bit weird. Directed by Timur Bekmambetov, but many people will notice Tim Burton‘s name on the film as producer and consider this his second strike this summer (after a Dark Shadows that was so disappointing we gave it two negative reviews). Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter Facebook page.

IN THEATERS (LIMITED RELEASE):

To Rome with Love: Woody Allen drifts from Paris to Rome to tell an anthology of Italian tales: two separate critics characterize the storyline featuring Roberto Begnini as an ordinary citizen thrust into the celebrity spotlight as “surreal.” The prolific Allen has already scripted his next two romantic comedies set in European capitals: Bratislava Brats will appear in 2013, and Neurotic Intellectual Affair in Oslo is slated for 2014. To Rome with Love official site.

IN DEVELOPMENT:

“Barbarella” TV series: Cult director Nicolas Winding Refn plans to turn the 1960s cult comic book “Barbarella” (which was already adapted into a cult movie with Jane Fonda) into a TV series. We suspect the idea has cult potential. Although we would welcome seeing a well-done Barbarella on the small screen, we’re not as enthused about the idea of the talented Refn taking a vacation from feature films. Deadline breaks the news.

Coyote (est 2012): Described as an “art-horror feature” about “an insomniac writer whose sleep-deprived hallucinations distort reality as paranoia drives him to extreme violence.” From the folks involved in making last week’s Saturday Short, Crabs in a Dollhouse, it’s already met its modest $4,000 crowdfunding target, so we expect this to be a go.

NEW ON DVD:

Attenberg (2010): An awkward and alienated young woman who studies humanity through mammal documentaries learns about sex from her only friend. Part of the New Weird Greek cinema, it’s in our reader-suggested review queue and so we’ll be getting to it very soon. Buy Attenberg.

The Disco Exorcist (2011): In revenge for dumping her after a one night stand, an evil priestess causes a demon to possess a 1970s swinger’s new porn star girlfriend. The self-aware grindhouse throwback movie is already becoming a cliché, but as long as they keep making them we’ll keep watching them—when there’s nothing good on TV, at least. A sequel, The Brother of the Disco Exorcist, is already in development. Buy The Disco Exorcist.

“Driver x4: The Lost and Found Films of Sara Driver” (1981-1994): The complete films of Driver: You Are Not I (1981) is an adaptation of a Paul Bowles story about an escaped mental patient; Sleepwalk (1986) is about a typsetter who finds Chinese fairy tales coming to life as he transcribes them; When Pigs Fly (1993) is about a pair of female ghosts (one played by Marianne Faithful); and The Bowery (1994) is a ten-minute short about the titular bum-haunted Manhattan street. Auteur Driver is obscure even to us, but we hope to cure that deficiency soon. Buy “Driver x4: The Lost and Found Films of Sara Driver”.

The FP (2012): Post-apocalyptic spoof where rival gangs fight in a desolate urban wasteland, dominating the bands of survivors through their mastery of dance video games. Released via the new distribution arm of the fantastic Alamo Drafthouse theater, which we fear may end up being the coolest thing about the movie. Buy The FP. Buy The FP [Blu-ray].

Keyhole (2011): The latest Guy Maddin talkie stars Jason Patric as Ulysses, a gangster on the run, journeying through his labyrinthine house trying to find his wife (Isabella Rossellini). This is a Maddin film’s quickest appearance on DVD after release; we’re not sure if that’s a good sign or a bad one. Buy Keyhole.

NEW ON BLU-RAY:

The FP (2011): See description in DVD above. Buy The FP [Blu-ray].

Keyhole (2011): See description in DVD above. Buy Keyhole [Blu-ray].

FREE (LEGITIMATE RELEASE) MOVIES ON YOUTUBE:

The Castle of Cagliostro (1979): A thief seeks to rescue an imprisoned princess from the Count of Cagliostro’s castle in order to find a treasure. This early comedy/adventure from renowned director Hayao Miyazaki features cruder animation and PG-rated language and violence, but is as imaginative as any of his later work.

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.

Our weekly look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…

Trailers of new release movies are generally available on the official site links.

IN THEATERS (LIMITED RELEASE):

The Woman in the Fifth (2011): Psychological (?) thriller about a down-on-his-luck writer (Ethan Hawke) who meets a mysterious woman while trying to reconnect with his young daughter after a divorce. This looks like one of those stories where it’s hard to tell whether it’s actually weird or not without either seeing it or reading a detailed spoiler-laden review. The Woman in the Fifth official site.

SCREENINGS (Museum of Modern Art, New York City, June 15-18):

UFO in Her Eyes (2011): Chinese authorities try to turn their backwater town into a tourist magnet after a possibly crazy woman reports having seen a UFO. It’s described as “surrealist and ironic” and features Udo Kier as the English-speaking alien. MOMA described this screening as the film’s “U.S. premier”; we can’t find any mention of it playing on anywhere after it finishes this run. UFO in Her Eyes at MOMA.

FILM FESTIVALS: LOS ANGELES FILM FESTIVAL (June 14-24, Los Angeles, CA):

In the summer interval between Cannes and the Toronto International Film Festival, we keep coming across smaller film fests that have slates full of movies that didn’t make it to the bigger venues. Although we noticed some familiar titles at the LAFF—like the Southern-fired prehistoric monster apocalypse film Beasts of the Southern Wild, the 366-fave demented short Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared, and the impressionistic art-school infatuation piece An Oversimplification of Her Beauty—we noticed several new (and a few retro) names popping up that may be worth keeping an eye out for.

• The Banishment (2007) – Read Eugene Vasiliev’s lengthy analysis of The Banishment. This seldom-screened, dreamlike Russian drama about a man who finds his wife is pregnant with another man’s child plays as part of the “Films That Got Away” series. Screening June 24.
• The Compass is Carried by the Dead Man [La Brújula la lleva el Muerto] (2011) – A thirteen-year old Mexican boy tries to make it across a “subtly surreal desert landscape” in his quest to reach Chicago. June 16 & 18.
• Crazy and Thief (2012) – Cory McAbee pauses work on his long-delayed opus Werewolf Hunters of the Midwest to deliver this color film in which two kids search for a cardboard time machine by following a homemade star chart. June 17 & 19.
  
• The History of Future Folk (2012) – Two aliens are distracted from their plans to conquer Earth when they fall in love with bluegrass music and decide to form a band. June 15 & 17.
• A Night Too Young [Prílis Mladá Noc] (2012) -Two thirteen year old boys are invited to an adult party and watch the grown-up’s strange behavior with wide-eyed amazement. June 17-18.
• P-047 (2011) – From Thailand comes this tale of two young adults who break into other people’s apartments while they’re away for a lark. With fantasy sequences, it’s described by LAFF organizers as “mind-bending.” June 20 & 24.
• The Science of Sleep (2006) – Read the Certified Weird entry. Los Angelinos can treat themselves to this special screening of Michel Gondry‘s Certified Weird dream romance tonight only (June 15) at 7:30 PST.

Los Angeles Film Festival homepage.

NEW ON DVD:

Accident (2009): A Hong Kong killer nicknamed “the Brain” who assassinates targets by staging “accidents” turns paranoid and assumes someone is trying to kill him in the same fashion. Weirdness is uncertain but it’s described as one of those “reality or delusion?” movies. Buy Accident.

Don’t Go In The Woods (2010): An indie band goes into the woods and gets killed. This “slasher/musical” debut from Vincent D’Onfrio has been manhandled by critics and audiences alike, but the more we hear about it the more we suspect it might be somewhat surreal, even if only in a “so bad its weird” way. Buy Don’t Go In The Woods.

Harold and Maude (1971): Read the reader recommendation. The black comedy cult classic about the love affair between a death-obsessed teenager and an elderly holocaust survivor gets the Criterion Collection treatment it deserves. Buy Harold and Maude (Criterion Collection).

NEW ON BLU-RAY:

Accident (2009): See description in DVD above. Buy Accident [Blu-ray].

The Dark Crystal (1982)/Labyrinth (1986): Read our capsule reviews of The Dark Crystal and Labyrinth. A nice double-Blu of Jim Henson’s two oh-so-nearly-weird children’s puppet show fantasies. With an art booklet from designer/art director Brian Froud. Buy The Dark Crystal/Labyrinth [Blu-ray].

Harold and Maude (1971): See description in DVD above. Buy Harold and Maude [Criterion Collection Blu-ray].

FREE (LEGITIMATE RELEASE) MOVIES ON YOUTUBE:

Goth (2003): The synopsis promises it will “blur the boundaries between reality-driven horror and the hallucinatory style of ‘Requiem For a Dream.'”  Maybe, maybe not, but it definitely delivers lots of skulls and candles, bad gore effects, stilted line deliveries, and topless girls in black lipstick. According to this film,there are three rules to being goth: “embrace the darkness, kill your fear, and live for death.” Ironically, these are also the first three planks of Mitt Romney’s campaign platform.  Watch Goth free on YouTube.

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.