An NPC in the Grand Theft Auto world senses something important is missing from his uncanny valley.
DEEP HISTORY WITH RAITIS AND LAURIS ABELE, THE “DOG OF GOD” DISCIPLES
Tucked away in the bowels of the Concordia building, we had the pleasure of sitting down with the Abele brothers, as well as their art and animation director, Harijs Grundmanis, and Madi Madara, who voiced the esteemed Baroness.
Latvia, Livonia, language, and lore are all illuminated in this conversation with the creative team from Dog of God.
FANTASIA 2025: APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: F*CKTOYS (2025)
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DIRECTED BY: Annapurna Sriram
FEATURING: Annapurna Sriram, Sadie Scott, Damian Young, François Arnaud, Brandon Flynn
PLOT: A sex worker learns she’s under a curse, and must come by one-thousand dollars for a sacrificial ritual to banish the black magic.
WHY IT MIGHT JOIN THE APOCRYPHA: Sure, sure, it’s got leather-bondage cops, ritual sacrifice, a golden phallus, and so on. But what truly makes F*cktoys an odd duck is that its dirty NC-17 veneer encloses a warm-hearted romantic comedy adventure that shines through from underneath the sleaze.
COMMENTS: Outside the cinema, an individual in a hazmat suit haphazardly scrubbed any and all surfaces with a cleaning brush. The doors opened, and the house was packed by jolly rowdies from all different walks of life. (Some of them rather different indeed.) Much scurrying to and fro, as Fantasia staff ushered key people to key places. A hush, and a roar, and the presenter intoned the title “F*cktoys!” (without the asterisk.) Enter Annapurna Sriram, beaming with excitement. Few could deny her her joy, for she was about to exhibit her film to a Fantasia audience—an audience that couldn’t have been a better fit for F*cktoys if it had been lab-grown for the purpose.
Our hero’s journey begins, ends, and never departs from the mystical alternate 1990s reality of “Trashtown.” There is plenty of trash, scattering the roadways, littering overgrown industrial facilities, and filling the sordid interiors. The plucky heroine, known only as AP, receives shocking news from a shockingly fabulous fortune teller: she must somehow gather a wad of cash (and a baby goat) to rid herself of ill fortune. With her good friend Danni in tow (unexpectedly, as AP was fairly sure this buddy had snuffed it), she rides, hustles, and endures many trials on her path to deliverance.
That path is strewn with odd sex, odd venues, and oddballs. Danni takes a gig catering to sexuo-philosophical celebrity James Francone (not to be confused with a similarly named individual), shutting him up about his water-coloring through use of a lubed fist. AP’s client-friend Robert apologizes for culminating so quickly (but then, “I’m, like, 90% gay”). A robbery (hah) goes awry, the screw turns, and AP is forced to cater to a mysterious gentleman known as “The Mechanic”: a true sweetheart, and loving to the core—apart from his penchant for sexual mutilation.
This all unfurls to the beat of a bouncy quest-comedy, with AP haplessly—but cheerily—sliding from one fun or strange or dangerous set piece to the next. Special note should be made of Sadie Scott’s performance as the best friend, Danni. Gender-ambiguous, rough-and-tumble, their energy and zeal makes them reminiscent of Toyah Willcox’s “Mad” character from Derek Jarman‘s Jubilee. Danni’s tragic fate is equaled in intensity only by their love of AP (and of donuts).
As befits a journey on a moped, F*cktoys is a bit of a bumpy ride. Most of its parts work, however—the extended Robert-ex-machina scene alone is worth the price of admission—and overall, the pieces fit together with cheerful clunk and whirl. It was made lovingly for our kinds of people, John Waters kinds of people: joyful perverts, joyful outcasts, and joyful subversives. So if you want to smooth the corners of some square in your life, trick them into a F*cktoys screening and watch as they uncomfortably squirm their prudishness away.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
POD 366, EP. 128: FANTASIA 2025, PART 1
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Discussed in this episode:
Ash (2025): Read Gregory J. Smalley’s review. Flying Lotus‘ sophomore sci-fi feature comes to Blu-ray (and DVD). Buy Ash.
Danger: Diabolik (1968): Read Alice Stoehr’s review. Mario Bava‘s 60s psuedo-psychedelic spy/superhero oddity is now out in on 4K UHD in a suitably lavish edition from KL Classics (standard Blu-ray also available). Buy Danger: Diabolik.
Magnetosphere (2025): A girl who can see music and hear colors moves to a new city, joins a performance of “Pirates of Penzance,” and meets a goofy handyman. A family comedy about synesthesia is certainly unusual, to say the least. Buy or rent Magnetsophere on VOD. Magnetosphere official site.
The Psycho Ape Christmas Spectacular (est. Dec. 2024): The gang behind Psycho Ape are crowdfunding a one-hour, highly absurdist Christmas special. They are looking for a modest $10,000, and for $200 you can submit your own song or scene to be included in the film. The Psycho Ape Christmas Spectacular Indiegogo page,
Snorkeling (2023):Two teenagers experiment with an imaginary addictive hallucinogenic drug. We suspect the setup is mostly an excuse to try out various psychedelic effects. Debuting on VOD July 25. Snorkeling official site.
The Stuff (1985): Read Pamela De Graff’s review. Larry Cohen‘s consumerist satire gets a major 4K UHD (only) release from Arrow. Buy The Stuff.
WHAT’S IN THE PIPELINE:
No guest (definitively) scheduled for next week’s Pod 366, but we’ll return with more news about new releases and more recaps of Fantasia Festival 2025. Also on YouTube, Pete Trbovich drops another curated “Ten Weird Moments” video, this time for Pi (1998) (we rejected the idea of “3.141592… Weird Things” as irrational). In written reviews, Shane Wilson considers whether Thriller–Cruel Picture (1973) lives up to its title, Eugene Vasiliev covers the Eastern European scene with Poland’s The Peasants (2023), Gregory J. Smalley plans a trip to Ari Aster‘s Eddington, and Giles Edwards continues his Fantasia reports (expect more interviews, too). Onward and weirdward!
CAPSULE: ALMA & THE WOLF (2025)
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Alma & the Wolf is currently available for purchase or rental on video-on-demand.
DIRECTED BY: Michael Patrick Jann
FEATURING: Ethan Embry, Li Jun Li, Lukas Jann, Jeremie Harris, Kevin Allison
PLOT: Ren, a deputy in an out-of-the-way town, investigates a dog-killing wolf at the behest of his old high school crush, Alma.
COMMENTS: A word of advice: don’t go into Alma & the Wolf expecting a standard werewolf movie, or any standard horror movie, for that matter. Focus instead on Ethan Embry’s fine portrayal of Ren, a peaked-in-high-school separated dad struggling with a drinking problem. You’ll be much happier with that approach.
“Nothing good ever comes from here, but lucky for the wider world, nothing ever leaves,” Ren says of the rural town of Spiral Creek. Ren himself is a former high school pitcher whose career ended prematurely with Tommy John surgery and whose life has been in a downward spiral since. Now a failed husband and deputy cop who’s been on this rural beat forever without much hint of promotion, he’s pinned all his hopes on his son, Jack, who’s following in his athletic footsteps and has serious athletic prospects. Ren is also interested in Alma, who seems (at times) to reciprocate his feelings, despite being a hot mess alcoholic herself. (This is a very boozy movie). Rounding out the small-town cast are a newbie cop Ren can bounce backstory off, a comic relief sheriff more interested in promoting Buddhist breathing techniques than hard policing, and a handful of colorful, trashy yokels.
As good as the acting is—Embry, as mentioned, is excellent, and the rest of the cast supply no weak notes—the special effects are noticeably poor: the mangy wolf costume is neither realistic nor frightening, there’s a head-on-fire effect that looks like it might have been made in ChatGPT, and at one point the use of rubber glass to substitute for a shattered windshield is painfully obvious. Given that Alma is more focused on drama and psychology than actual horror, these slip ups aren’t fatal, but they do imbue the film with a sheen of cheepnis that’s out of step with the professionalism of the rest of the production.
The first weird thing that happens in the story occurs when Ren suddenly promises to kill the wolf for Alma, despite his obvious reluctance and his warning that they’re a protected species and it’s a “class C felony” to kill one. Then comes his first encounter with the wolf, followed by recurring hallucinations where he glimpses the lupine taunting him. As the movie continues, the weird stuff intensifies, from the relatively subtle (whispering voices) to the elaborate (a well-staged pagan dream sequence in the woods with Alma and the talking wolf at a pagan bonfire flanked by a pair of goat-people). By the time we reach the one hour mark, confusion reigns, as the narrative seems to be spinning out of control, and occasionally contradicting itself.
Alma & the Wolf‘s twist ending turned off a lot of people. That’s understandable for viewers who didn’t go in bargaining for a weird movie: the final act makes some of the events of the rest of Alma feel arbitrary and irrelevant, and if you get invested in certain red herrings, you could feel cheated. But although the movie doesn’t quite stick its landing—it’s not tightly scripted enough, and it could have used more foreshadowing—it’s far from as abysmal as its 4.6 IMDb rating would suggest. I admire the ambition and certain aspects of the execution—specifically the performances—and although I wouldn’t give it a general recommendation, I wouldn’t advise you to steer away, either. If you’re in the mood for a well-acted, modestly-budgeted, artistically ambitious psychological thriller, you could do worse than hunting down Alma & the Wolf.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY: