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Capsules

IT CAME FROM THE READER-SUGGESTED QUEUE: THEY SHOOT HORSES, DON’T THEY? (1969)

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DIRECTED BY:

FEATURING: , Michael Sarrazin, ,

PLOT: In Depression-era America, people take part in an exhausting dance contest for a big prize of $1500.

Still from They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969)

COMMENTS: Long before the pop phenomenon “Squid Game” and contemporary reality shows, one New Hollywood flick used contests and challenges as the perfect metaphor for a materialistic and overly competitive society. They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?, based on the 1935 Horace McCoy novel, is the product of a specific Hollywood period characterized by creativity and vision. In the late 1960s and 1970s, American mainstream cinema, inspired by the French New Wave and theories regarding auteurist cinema, produced a series of socially-conscious, well-regarded masterpieces. Horses happens to be one of them.

The setting is the poverty-stricken America of the 1930s. The plot revolves around a group of people taking part in a dance competition for couples, which promises a big prize of $1500 for the winners. Jane Fonda plays the cynical, hardened Gloria. By happenstance she meets Robert (Michael Sarrazin) and chooses him as her dance partner for the competition. These two are the protagonists of our tale, and by following them in their struggle we get to know some other couples from the dance floor as well.

Each participant carries their own misfortunes and desperation, and, at least for a while, the competition seems like an escape from their burdens. Not only does it promise rewards, but it conceals everyone’s misery in beautiful costumes and an elegant, festive atmosphere. The question is, is the contest really exploiting them? Their struggle for survival becomes a show for the masses, while the event gradually reveals its face as a deeply humiliating farce. Mental and physical breakdown is part of the program here, and in the end, that failure is what the paying audience wants desperately to consume.

Despite the absence of graphic imagery, within such a competitive and oppressive environment there is a certain dynamic that recalls  the microcosm of ‘s Salo, the 120 Days of Sodom (1975). Contestants try to appeal to the authorities—the event’s producers—through implied sexual favors. At the same time, the relationship between Gloria and Robert hints at a typical Hollywood romance, only to wildly subvert it by revealing its the fakeness and the process behind its construction. The uncommon narrative technique of flash-forwards suggests a tragic finale that only reveals itself fully towards the end.

All in all, this is a solid recommendation for everyone interested in classic cinema and movies with strong elements of social critique. It reveals the exploitative mechanisms at work behind the star system, and the show business, attacking even its own home, Hollywood. And although it takes the form of a tragic fable, it doesn’t lose its realism. It may not be a weird movie, but it is a subversive one for sure.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“A sordid spectacle of hard times, a kind of existentialist allegory of life.”–Variety Staff, Variety (contemporaneous)

(This movie was nominated for review by Brett Warwick, who said “I’m a little surprised that Sydney Pollack’s 1969 fever-dream masterpiece… wasn’t mentioned.” Suggest a weird movie of your own here.) 

They Shoot Horses, Don't They?

They Shoot Horses, Don't They?

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    FANTASIA 2026: APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: GODHEAD (2026)

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    DIRECTED BY: 

    FEATURING: Al Warren, Sarah Coffey, Kimball Farley, Luke Speakman

    PLOT: Fraternal twins enter a Catholic church and demand the priest shoot one of them so that the Holy Spirit may be set free.

    Still from Godhead (2026)

    WHY IT MIGHT JOIN THE APOCRYPHA: Rapaport again slides an odd one across our desk, as his sophomore effort kicks off Funny Games-style before converting into fully blown mystical madness.

    COMMENTS: What is the Holy Ghost? One would think that the metaphysical world is sufficiently inscrutable without theorizing about an entity that lacks substance in a realm that is already beyond the perceivable. A more-vaporous vapor, it travels without constraints in a realm already lacking any constraints mortals might conceive. Though utterly incorporeal, this Ghost can apparently still be trapped in a vessel—a human vessel no less. And although its selfhood cannot be fathomed, even we lowly, three-dimensional meat-and-bone creatures are aware that no one, nothing, wants to be trapped.

    This musing is amongst the prerequisite considerations when approaching Mark H. Rapaport’s sophomore feature, Godhead. Creepy twins, named Firstborn (Sarah Coffey, slipping around the screen with serpentine malevolence) and Secondborn (Kimball Farley, trapped in his own spastic discomfiture), seem all too familiar with the “primary” third of the Godhead. The Creator; the twins claim It speaks to them. A small town priest (a mild and exhausted Al Warren) knows the triune Son, and also has an earthly son (Luke Speakman), a boy found as an infant found in a shopping basket on his doorstep and now stowed away in the back rooms of the church. A night-long journey through menace, hope, despair, and impossibility develops between these four characters.

    Godhead has a delightful, temporally ambiguous style. Low tech, the story often plays like a classical Hollywood morality tale (and that title font, oh yes). Cinematographer William Babock is on board once more, whipping up stark church imagery to contrast with the occasionally-seen “other” world from whence came the uncanny siblings. There is an odd sense of humor sprinkled about. While the priest is berated by Firstborn, Secondborn earnestly helps him with a dust pan as the priest fretfully sweeps the church. A delightful scene with the boy-in-the-backroom features a static-glowing television; the director slips in an exchange which encapsulates anticipated reactions to his movie: “I’m not sure what this is.” “I do not like it.”

    Rapaport and his tight cast alternate between punches of shock (gunplay in the sanctum is frowned upon, I can assure you), feints of deceit (a pair of hearse-bound conversations tip this film into hard-R-rating), and a third act which darts seamlessly, and often, between the mundane and the divine. The climax ratchets from one kind of weird into another. I did not expect Rapaport to be so gracious to his own creations. But that is within the dimension of possibility when you are a filmmaker: you are your own movie’s Godhead.

    WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

    “[T]he film’s commitment to its own strangeness will also be the dividing line… plenty of films chase weirdness without understanding how to shape it. Rapaport does.” — Chris Jones, Overly Honest Reviews (festival screening)

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    FANTASIA 2026: APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: DANCE FREAK (2025)

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    RecommendedWeirdest!

    DIRECTED BY: Robby Rackleff, Alan Resnick

    FEATURING: Robby Rackleff, Megan Koester, Sheila Mears, Jamel Johnson

    PLOT: Obie’s crummy life becomes dangerous when a mysterious freak appears in town to murder those caught up in his hypnotic moves.

    Still from Dance Freak (2026)

    WHY IT MIGHT JOIN THE APOCRYPHA: I’ll pitch this as “The Residents Present: Guy Maddin‘s Jekyll & Hide“, to give you an approximate idea what to expect.

    COMMENTS: There are few sacks sadder than Obie. He is timid, depressed, seems to own only one sweatshirt, and cannot build a bird house to save his life, no matter how much coaching—both practical and existential—his teacher provides. To add to his woes, his go-getter girlfriend, Dorty, a young woman with a big heart, a big club, and mayoral aspirations, dumps him. And now, enter the Dance Freak: a humanoid entity whose motion and rhythm crushes the heads of anyone who dares gaze upon its wondrous moves.

    Dance Freak is a masterful example of the possibilities encountered when creativity slams into the wall of zero resources. Obie’s town is a ghost town, populated by quietly angry people (or, in the case of the Salad Gang, loudly angry). Obviously animated birds attack and peck at the protagonist, and mist permeates the peripheries. Special effects crumble and melt into themselves and into each other, reflecting not only Obie’s fractured mind but also the “just add another layer” attitude that runs throughout the production. The Dance Freak itself is nothing more than co-director, co-screenwriter Robby Rackleff (who, incidentally, was wearing the Dance Freak’s khaki slacks on the film’s opening day); if you’re looking for something below Z-grade for your monster, you can’t do better than have one of the filmmakers just jamming his unchoreographed body onscreen to the unheard strains of a famous piece of pop film music.

    The one professional actor (the directors words) is Sheila Mears, playing Dr. Dilly Gorgul. She earns her fee and then some as an evil scientist who exemplifies the excitement that draws someone to expanding knowledge in the first place: science is cool, especially mad science. Her giddiness is a refreshing novelty amidst the trip-wire tempers and hyper-caffeinated visuals. Most importantly, she still fits in with the milieu as a slightly plus-person alongside all the other heightened townsfolk, from father-issues Detective Gittit to Megaman, Obie’s manager who suffered from a filthy childhood that interfered with his one true love of drinking clear water fresh from the tap.

    Rackleff and Resnick thread a tricky needle in this microbudget bit of madness: for the story of Dance Freak, there needs to be hyperbolic imagery and acting, but also enough relatability to keep the viewer invested. For the look of Dance Freak, there needs to be consistent “otherness” that doesn’t break the bank. And while not every movie needs to have a moral, Dance Freak opts for one, taking on itself the further task of showcasing the three possible paths we face when our life is in a rut: keep digging in, break something, or build something. We would do well to remember that there is a potential Dance Freak in all of us; will we dance for destruction—or creation?

    WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

    “100 minutes of pure irreverent nonsense in a gorgeous visual package that utilizes what appears to be old-school compositing, direct animation, and trippy transitions to augment some gnarly distortions, repurposed glue guns, and an out-of-body skin suit that’s as much a prison as it is a home… Would I watch it again? No. Should you watch it once? As long as you’re prepared to wonder whether you’ve had a stroke.”–Jared Mobarak, The Film Stage (Fantasia screening)

    Capsules

    CAPSULE: THE FEELING THAT THE TIME FOR DOING SOMETHING HAS PASSED (2023)

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    The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something is Gone is available to purchase or rent on-demand.

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    The fourth installment in the “Pete’s Perverted Pix” series.

    DIRECTED BY: Joanna Arnow

    FEATURING: Joanna Arnow, , Babak Tafti

    PLOT: Ann, a middle-aged single woman, has an unsatisfied lust for dominant men, but most of the men in her life are dispassionate duds.

    Still from The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed (2023)

    COMMENTS: The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed ties with Your Vice is a Locked Door and Only I Have the Key for the film I have reviewed with the most cumbersome title. “TFTtTfDSHP” will serve as the abbreviation.

    TFTtTfDSHP is a deadpan comedy and a character study that’s almost too candid in dissecting the mind of the frustrated kinkster in the wild, driven to settle for the nearest thing to warmth in a cold world. Can a film be considered weird based on one performance? Writer/director/lead actress Joanna Arnow bares all in a story that’s at least a bit autobiographical (right down to having her real-life parents play her parents), while acting out a study in frustrated feminine sexuality. Her performance is so fearlessly open that it’s nothing less than heroic. This is one of the most honest portrayals not only of real-life alternative lifestyles and sexual expressions, but of 21st-century cultural frustrations in general. At the same time, Arnow, even while casually fingering herself while naked at the breakfast table or costumed as a pig-slave, keeps a firm grasp on her character’s humanity and dignity. She makes it clear that her Ann is actively the agent in her own world, seeking something better for herself. Her definition of better just happens to be different from most of ours.

    For those of you who wonder “why do people want BDSM in the first place?”, films like this and Secretary provide clear answers. Secretary’s Lee has a psychologically damaged background and deals with it by engaging in thrilling, edgy fantasies so spicy that an ordinary relationship won’t cut it. In TFTtTfDSHP, Ann lives in a millennial-gray world of trivial humiliations and disrespect. She’s the black sheep of her family, her coworkers take sadistic joy in making her work life miserable, and she lives a lonely, friendless existence in a threadbare apartment in an indifferent city. A couple of hours of bedroom role-play is her only chance to feel like a whole person, to be the focus of somebody else’s attention for awhile. Her character comes off as a whiff anhedonic, hitting like MTV’s Daria all grown up to discover that adult life is just as miserable and unfulfilling as she expected it to be. Feeling intentionally humiliated, degraded, or objectified at least gives her the chance to feel something.

    Even in gratifying this small pleasure, Ann is frustrated. We start with her ongoing nine-years-long relationship that amounts to being the booty call for Allen (Scott Cohen), an aloof, uncaring galoot who treats her like a piece of furniture. She’s desperate to mold Allen’s indifference into deliberate sadistic intent, but Allen is a man so devoid of imagination that he can’t even think up good scenarios when Continue reading CAPSULE: THE FEELING THAT THE TIME FOR DOING SOMETHING HAS PASSED (2023) →

    Capsules

    CAPSULE: MOEBIUS (2013)

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    Recommended

    DIRECTED BY:

    FEATURING: Cho Jae-Hyun, Seo Yeong-ju, Lee Na-ra

    PLOT: The wife of an adulterous husband takes revenge on their son.

    Still from Moebius (2013)

    COMMENTS: Families are dysfunctional in Asian Extreme Cinema. A typical example is‘s infamous Visitor Q (2001). There are even more transgressive movies to be found, however, like Moebius perhaps the most disturbing piece in Ki-duk Kim’s   provocative filmography. Here, the South Korean auteur further develops his pessimist worldview on human relationships and family dynamics. Let’s dare to take a closer look.

    The story is divided into three acts. The plot revolves around an archetypal family including the Mother, the  Father and the Son. When the Mother can’t stand the Father’s extramarital affair—with a woman played by the same actress—anymore, she takes revenge on their Son, castrating him. The events following this criminal act play out like a symbolic Freudian coming-of-age tale, showcasing the Son’s attempts to cope and the Father’s guilt and attempts to help.

    Kid-duk nods to Euripides’ “Medea” from the beginning: Mother uses her child to punish the husband. This is only the beginning, however, not the climax. The events of this perverted family saga and boyhood tale include gang rape, kinky sex, masturbation with rocks and knives, and even a bit of incest. Despite the surrounding chaos there are touching moments of tenderness to be found in the way the altruistic Father tries to support his Son. But the tragic finale cannot be avoided.

    Buddhist spirituality is portrayed as a means to redemption. In Ki-Duk’s masterpiece Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and… Spring (2003) an old monk dictates that lust is sinful because it brings jealousy and therefore crime, while a monk’s lifestyle brings comfort. Moebius further develops that thesis through a darker parable, and can be viewed as an origin story of sorts for a monk with similar convictions.

    This is Kim Ki- Duk’s boldest piece not only because of the grotuesqueries he presents, but also because of the way he directs the actors. There isn’t a line of dialogue in the whole film. Characters communicate physically, through violent or sexual acts, grunts of pain and pleasure—or both simultaneously—and tremors. They become wild animals and in the most intense moments. When the three characters confront each other, their positions recall sculpturess from the Hellenistic Period, like the famous Laocoön Group.

    All in all, this is a difficult film to recommend because of its graphic scenes and heavy subject matter. It is essential, however, for Kim Ki -Duk completionists, and perhaps the work from his late period that stands out the most.  Moreover, it will appeal to fans of film parables that aren’t afraid to confront the darker corners of the human psyche and sexuality, in the vein of ‘s Antichrist (2009).

    WHAT THE CRITICS SAY: 

    “Moebius is almost weird enough to be a creation myth, and that’s no small accomplishment.”–Sherilyn Connelly, The Village Voice (contemporaneous)

    Moebius

    Moebius

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