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):

Escape from Tomorrow: A middle aged man follows two jailbait teen girls through an increasingly fantastic and surreal theme park. We never thought Disney would let this movie, which was shot on their property guerrilla style without permission, see the light of day, yet here it is. Simultaneously released on video on demand. Escape from Tomorrow official site.

FILM FESTIVALS – Sitges Film Festival (Sitges, Spain, Oct. 11-20):

Alhough Sitges has a fine slate of fantastic films as always, we’ve seen most of the offerings at other film festivals (a handful of the features are already out on DVD here in the U.S.). Here are a few notable films we noticed that appear to be debuting there:

• 3x3D – Three renowned filmmakers—France’s still-kicking Jean-Luc Godard, England’s reclusive Peter Greenaway, and Portugal’s nearly-local Edgar Pêra—experiment with the possibilities of 3D filmmaking beyond the Hollywood blockbuster. Screens once only, on Oct. 15.
• Abductee – The wildly uneven splatterpunk farceur Yûdai Yamaguchi tries his hand at a serious speculative Cube-like drama, about people who are abducted and imprisoned with only a numeric tattoo and a black stone as clues to their fate. Oct. 15.
• Cheatin’ – Bill Plympton‘s latest weird animated feature is about a woman who, with a magician’s help, takes the shape of her paramour’s ex-girlfriends. Oct 18.
• Goltzius & The Pelican Company – speaking of Peter Greenaway, his latest lavish feature film is based on a Renaissance engraver’s depictions of Bible stories. Oct. 11.
• The Taking – A man wakes up tied to a tree with a stranger, menaced by an odd family, in this horror that’s said to have a Lynchian feel. Oct. 17.
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• Vic+Flo Saw a Bear – A couple of lesbian ex-cons hole up in a backwoods cabin but are besieged by strange visitors. Oct 15 & 16.
• Wrong Cops – A comedy about cops-gone-wrong from Quentin Dupieux; the cast includes Eric Wareheim, Marilyn Manson, and former “Twin Peaks” spouses Grace Zabriske and Ray Wise. Oct 15.

Sitges Film Festival official site.

NEW ON DVD:

Night Train to Terror (1985): See description in Blu-ray below.

Resolution (2012): A buddy ties his meth addict pal up in a cabin in the woods for an involuntary detox, and things get weird in this low-budget meta-horror that earned some comparisons to The Cabin in the Woods. The Village Voice’s Nick Schager even claims it puts Cabin to shame. Buy Resolution.

Suzune Evolution [AKA The Parasite Doctor Suzune: Evolution] (2011): The long-awaited sequel to Suzune Genesis is finally here! We never did figure out what Suzune Genesis was, but it’s from Japan, concerns a “parasite doctor,” and the DVD cover has women in tight black leather and maid’s costumes on the front cover, so we figure we’d dig it. Buy Suzune Evolution.

NEW ON BLU-RAY:

Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life (1983): The least-successful, grossest and most sketch-oriented of the Python’s three original sketch films, Meaning of Life os still memorable for it’s exploding gluttons and paeans to the sanctity of sperm. This “30th Anniversary Edition” includes an hour-long reunion with the surviving Pythons. Buy Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life [Blu-ray].

Night Train to Terror (1985): In the train ride framing sequence, God and Satan argue over the fates of various mortals. Their debates are illustrated by three full length movies cut to fit into a 20 minute time slot (sacrificing character development where necessary, but keeping all the gore and nudity); the result is an incoherent train wreck of a movie that nevertheless manages to make it to Blu-ray before Celine and Julie Go Boating. Buy Night Train To Terror [Blu-ray + DVD].

Resolution (2012): See description in DVD above. A DVD + Blu-ray combo pack. Buy Resolution [Blu-ray + DVD Combo Pack].

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):

Argento’s Dracula 3-D (2013): A 3-D version of the Dracula story from revered horror icon Dario Argento. The pre-release bashing of this troubled production has been going on for years, since the first uninspiring teasers were released; let the post-release bashing begin. Dario Argento’s Dracula official Facebook page.

Bad Milo! (2013): Psychotherapy reveals the source of Duncan’s stress: a killer demon named Milo has taken up residence in his lower intestine. Simultaneously available on video on-demand. Bad Milo! official site.

IN DEVELOPMENT:

Kafka (1991) director’s cut: Steven Soderbergh may have “retired” from making new feature films, but he hasn’t retired from making old ones. He’s reworking his own Kafka, his uneven sophomore feature that starred Jeremy Irons as Franz Kafka confronting the Illuminati. Word is it will be a major reworking; new footage was shot at the time he was making Side Effects (2013). Since Kafka has never been out on DVD, we’re looking forward to seeing this new and (hopefully) improved version reaching a larger audience. Read more about the Kafka director’s cut at Indiewire.

CROWDFUNDING:

Dollhouse (est. 2014, if funded): The story of the rise and fall of child star Junie Spoons, told using custom made dolls. Writer/director Nicole Brending promises it will be “psychologically surreal” and contain doll nudity. If there’s also doll twerking, we’d be willing to kick in a buck. Dollhouse on Kickstarter.

NEW ON DVD:

100 Bloody Acres (2012): Two brothers find themselves running low on the corpses they need to make their organic fertilizer, until they find three stranded motorists. This Australian horror-comedy reportedly puts a bloody new spin on familiar ideas, and the Twitch reviewer called it “completely bizarre.” Buy 100 Bloody Acres.

“Movies 4 You – Timeless Horror”: The main attraction here is 1958’s I Bury the Living, a Twilight-Zone style sleeper about a cemetery caretaker who discovers he has the power to make people die by placing a pin in a map of their burial plot. Rounding out the set are the silly The Snake Woman (1961), the British horror-mystery The Four Skulls of Johnathan Drake (1959), and “One Shot” William Beaudine‘s abysmal The Face of Marble (1946). Buy “Movies 4 You – Timeless Horror”.

An Oversimplification of Her Beauty (2012): An impressionistic, experimental, partially-animated portrait of a young artist and his desire for a beautiful woman. Probably the weirdest movie ever “presented by” Jay-Z. Buy An Oversimplification of Her Beauty.

The Room – Audience Reactions Documentary (2013?): According to the ad copy: “will give you a prove what did happen 10 years ago; how audiences reacted to The Room by Tommy Wiseasu with passion and good will; contrary to some media.” C’mon, this has to be a joke—right? Unlike The Room itself, this doc is not yet available on Blu-ray. Buy The Room: Audience Reactions Documentary.

The Wizard of Oz (1939) (75th Anniversary Edition): Read our capsule review. With only one special feature (a new making-of documentary), this 75th Anniversary edition is a downgrade of the 70th Anniversary Two-Disc Special Edition (and, to be fair, at $9.99 it is priced that way). If they keep removing features every five years, though, it’s just going to be a flip-book by the time the 100th Anniversary rolls around. Buy The Wizard of Oz: 75th Anniversary Edition.

NEW ON BLU-RAY:

The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec [Director’s Cut] (2010): In 1911 Paris, author/adventurer Adèle Blanc-Sec deals with a recently hatched pterodactyl. The Blu-ray “director’s cut” reportedly includes a brief nude scene that was not in the original DVD release. Buy The Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec [Director’s Cut] (BluRay/DVD/Digital Copy) [Blu-ray].

The Wizard of Oz (1939) (75th Anniversary Edition): See description in DVD above. Also available in a Blu-ray 3D edition, for those who can play the format. Buy The Wizard of Oz: 75th Anniversary Edition [Blu-ray].

NEPOTISM CORNER:

“The Mortal Triptych: Meeting Death in Three Elegiac Horror Films”: Frequent contributor Jesse Miksic wrote an article on approaches to death and grieving in dramatic horror films for berfrois.com; one of his three case studies is the Certified Weird Don’t Look Now. Read the complete article here.

FREE (LEGITIMATE RELEASE) MOVIES ON YOUTUBE:

Attack of the Monsters [AKA Gamera vs. Guiron] (1969): Two hot female aliens kidnap young boys, assisted by their pet monster, the knife-headed Guiron. Fortunately, flying nuclear turtle and friend of all children Gamera is on the case. Probably the most ridiculous of all the Gamera movies, which is saying something.

What are you looking forward to? If you have any weird movie leads that we have overlooked, feel free to leave them in the COMMENTS section.