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):
Mood Indigo (2013): A wealthy bachelor inventor falls in love with a woman who has a flower growing in her lungs. The latest from Michel Gondry stars erstwhile Amelie Audrey Tautou; diabetics and the whimsy-averse are being warned to avoid this cutesy confection, but rest assured we’ll forge ahead and tackle it (it’s in our reader-suggested review queue, but we’d surely hit that even if it wasn’t). Mood Indigo official site.
FILM FESTIVALS – Fantasia (Montreal, Canada, Jul. 17- Aug. 6):
As its name implies, Montreal’s Fantasia Festival originally began as a showcase for fantastic films from Asia; it has since morphed into a major event on the genre cinema calendar, a venue so big that geek event movies like Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy hold special pre-release screenings there. Not that they’ve let mainstream success get to their heads; there’s still more rare weirdness to be found at Fantasia than at just about any film festival on the globe. We make watchlists from Fantasia’s programming, and we’re always saddened when only half of the most daring films find meaningful distribution in the U.S. We’ve been following a number of 2014’s entries as they slowly make their way across the festival landscape: Bill Plympton’s Cheatin’, the post-apocalyptic love triangle in The Desert, the inflated-head indie rock comedy Frank, the horror-of-Hollywood allegory Starry Eyes, Gregg Araki’s White Bird in a Blizzard, and Terry Gilliam‘s long-awaited The Zero Theorem. Here’s the stuff that’s new to us (along with a couple of the odder highlights from the festival’s blaxploitation and Shaw Brothers revival programs):
- Bag Boy Lover Boy – A photographer specializing in unusual human specimens takes a hot dog vendor for his muse; the synopsis evokes the work of seedy underground New York filmmakers like Paul Morrisey. Screening July 23.
- “La Buche de Noel” – The insane animated adventures of Indian, Cowboy and Horse (A Town Called Panic) continue in this 23-minute Christmas-themed short. Screens July 31.
- Darktown Strutters (1975) – A rare blaxploitation/comedy/musical about a black female motorcycle gang fighting white supremacists led by a Colonel Sanders clone. This oddity is very rare—almost legendary—so catch it July 27 if you can.
- Demon of the Lute (1983) – A kung fu maiden sets out to destroy the titular instrument with the help of the Three Armed Beggar and Old Naughty (who wields a giant pair of scissors). One of the craziest-sounding of the classic Shaw Brothers features screening at Fantasia; this one plays July 19 & 26.
- Honeymoon – Well-reviewed psychological thriller about a groom who finds his new wife acting strange after the nuptials. Screens July 22.
- I Am a Knife with Legs – Absurdist microbudget musical comedy about a pop star hanging out from a fatwa; the programmer’s synopsis uses the word “weird” to describe it more than once. Catch it July 25 only.
- Jack et la mécanique du coeur – 3-D animation described as a “Gallic surrealist fairy-tale musical with a dash of Gothic macabre and a streak of steampunk.” It appears that it is playing in French only with no English subtitles on July 26.
- Koo! Kin-dza-dza – An animated remake of the satirical 1986 Soviet cult sci-fi comedy about two Russian men teleported to a desert planet. Playing August 2.
- Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter – A backwards Japanese woman mistakenly concludes that the movie Fargo is a documentary and sets out for Minnesota to discover the lost ransom money. July 23.
- The Man in the Orange Jacket – An employee kills his rich boss and assumes his identity, only to be haunted by surreal occurrences. Screens July 27.
- The Mole Song: Undercover Agent Reiji – Takashi Miike‘s latest is a comedy about an undercover cop, with animated sequences and “surreal fight scenes.” Catch it July 19.
- Nuigulumar Z – The English translation, Gothic Lolita Battle Bear, may explain why this title caught our fancy; the less sane of two movies making their North American debut from the ludicrously prolific Noboru Iguchi. Screening July 20.
- Puzzle – Masked figures invade a school and force the adults to play strange and deadly games; are local bullies behind it? July 26.
- Real – A man uses technology to enter the subconscious of his beloved as she lies in a coma, where he encounters “philosophical zombies” and other strangeness, in Kiyoshi Kurosawa‘s latest. Plays August 3.
- The Satellite Girl and Milk Cow – A satellite transforms into a cyborg and romances a brokenhearted man who has metamorphosed into a cow; the animation style resembles Hayao Miyazaki with a more surreal bent. Screens July 19.
- Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song – Arguably the first, and certainly one of the strangest, blaxploitation movies ever made, Melvin van Peebles’ explosive race revenge fantasy is as much avant-garde as it is exploitation. See it on the big screen July 23.
- Thou Wast Mild and Lovely – A hired hand has an affair with the farmer’s daughter in what the director herself describes as “an intimate magical realist erotic thriller.” Screening July 19 & 21.
- Zombie TV – Sounds like a sort of Japanese version of Kentucky Fried Movie themed around the undead; Twitch‘s Todd Brown is quoted as saying it “provides the viewer with a respite from one kind of weirdness by punching them in the face with another.” July 19 only.
Fantasia Film Festival home page.
NEW ON DVD:
Scanners (1981): A good Scanner (a telepath with the power to literally blow people’s minds) infiltrates a gang of evil Scanners. This gory cult favorite, made by David Cronenberg before he fully transitioned out of his upscale exploitation mode, is something of a surprise acquisition for the Criterion Collection. Buy Scanners [Criterion Collection]
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SX_Tape (2013): A couple play sex games in a spooky abandoned hospital, which proves to be a bad idea. We wouldn’t have taken any notice of what looks like a sex-heavy found-footage horror if not for an (actually negative but prominently displayed) review claiming the movie “dives face first in the deep end of weirdness.” Buy SX_Tape
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Under the Skin (2013): Read our capsule review. Trippy visuals highlight this minimalist arthouse sci-fi hit in which Scarlett Johansson plays an alien who hunts lonely men on the moors of Scotland. Buy Under the Skin
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NEW ON BLU-RAY:
Scanners (1981): See description in DVD above. This combo pack includes two DVDs. Buy Scanners [Criterion Collection Blu-ray/DVD combo]
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SX_Tape (2013): See description in DVD above. Buy SX_Tape [Blu-ray]
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Under the Skin (2013): See description in DVD above. Buy Under the Skin [Blu-ray]
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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.
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