Meet director Yoshihiro Nishimura (left) and producer Yoshinori Chiba, two of the Japanese filmmakers behind the some of the most insane splatter comedies to hit the festival circuit. Check out these insane not-so-safe-for-work trailers for Tokyo Gore Police, Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl and Mutant Girl Squad for proof.

Legendary special effects artist Greg Nicotero and filmmaker Frank Darabont (The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile and The Mist) discuss the upcoming The Walking Dead TV series.

...and (left to right) Laurie Holden (Silent Hill, The Mist, Fantastic Four) and Emma Bell (Frozen)...

...as do (left to right) Jon Bernthal (World Trade Center) and Andrew Lincoln (Human Traffic, Gangster #1, Love Actually).

The crowd by the Warner Brothers' booth gets rush-hour-on-a-subway thick.

A great Toy Story couple's costume.

Some forthcoming Universal monsters toys.

My personal Comic Con highlight: getting a picture with Joe Dante and Roger Corman!

Every year San Diego hosts the world's biggest gathering of the geeks when Comic Con takes over the city for the better part of a week. Of course, it hasn't just been about comics for a long time; it's really more of a massive pop culture fair now, with a huge share of the action aimed at moviegoers and gamers. Consisting of hundreds of vendors, scores of panels, preview screenings, countless celebrity signings, sprawling parties and fan attendance at over 130 000, there's talk of moving it some where bigger, like Vegas.

Everyone wants to go to Comic Con, it seems. I was lucky enough to be there again this year, and I've brought back pics to give movie fans a look at what geeky goodness was on display. Really, though, it only shows a tiny fraction of the sensory overload that is the San Diego Comic Con.

Universes collide as a cylon faces down R2D2 in the second floor atrium.

Corey Feldman catches me trying to catch his good side during a media round table for the upcoming Lost Boys: The Thirst. (Yep, they made a third one...)

If I could arrive and leave Comic Con in a ride of my choosing, the Ecto-1 would be it. The crowds and small aisles made it tough to get a larger shot. Note the wear 'n' tear on the hood, from the shoot presumably.

Thursday night's party for Machete was held in a parking lot and featured free tacos, beer and tequila; an assortment of restored and modified classic cars and motorbikes; scantily-clad dancing girls; a graffiti demonstration; and actual biker gang members.

(Left to right) writer/director Robert Rodriguez and stars Danny Trejo and Michelle Rodriguez introduce a clip of the film and thank various collaborators.

And if you want to put a miniature Danny Trejo in your house, this statue of Machete will be released in September.

Tobin Bell (a.k.a. Jigsaw) from the Saw franchise takes part in a Q&A before a preview for the next, seventh(!) and last movie in the series (so they claim), which will be in 3-D.

Craig Glenday, Editor in Chief of the Guinness Book of World Records was on hand to present the filmmakers with a record for "Most Successful Horror Series." Director Kevin Greutert looks on.

If a parade of red swim suited revelers suddenly come around the corner, it can only mean one thing...

...and that's the arrival of The Hoff himself, David Hasselhoff, who sang, danced and tested out his plastic surgery in the sun, while promoting is new reality series.

(That's it for now; more Comic Con 2010 celebs, toys, fan costumes and general pop culture tom foolery to come.)

-Dave Alexander

Down Terrace

(Ben Wheatly)

Imagine the offbeat, character-driven comedy of the Coen Brothers crossed with the working class-themed dramatic realism of Ken Loach and you’ve arrived at Down Terrace.

Ben Wheatly, who honed his skills working in British television, directed and co-wrote this very matter-of-fact story of a family of gangsters trying to root out a snitch in their inner circle. Most of the, er, action takes place in their very average-looking house, where father, mother and grown up son have very typical family squabbles, drink tea and overall live a very mundane life… aside from the fact that they keep killing off those around them.

The everyday-ness of it all is somewhat reminiscent of The Sopranos, the crime drama has a bit of a Blood Simple feel, but it’s dry and subtle as the British version of The Office. The performances are excellent all around (particularly Robert Hill and co-writer Robin Hill, the real life father and son duo who play a very antagonistic father and son here), but the tone may be a bit too slight for either fans of gangster flicks or comedies. I’d say that’s what makes the film such a unique gem. You never know quite where it’s going – in a good way.

Heartless

(Philip Ridley)

If you don’t know who Philip Ridley is, well, you might have a tough time finding out. His last film (he spends much of his time directing live theatre), which came out fourteen years ago, was The Passion of Darkly Noon, and his one before that, The Reflecting Skin (1990) has never been on DVD. The latter title, a truly beautiful, bizarre and morbid prairie gothic tale, starring Viggo Mortensen, is one of my all time favourite films, so I was more than a little excited to see this one, about a young London man with a heart-shaped birthmark on his face who makes a pact with the devil to have it removed.

Jim Sturgess is perfectly cast as photographer Jamie Morgan, who yearns to meet a girl who’s not repulsed by his wine-coloured birthmark. In the midst of a rash of hideously violent crimes, seemingly committed by literal demons, Jamie finds himself in a (again, literally) hellish apartment building where Papa B (a seriously frightenng Joseph Mawle) makes him an offer he can’t refuse. (Oh Jamie, have you never read a story or watched a movie about a pact with the devil? These things never work out well…)

Although it’s well worth seeking out for the excellent cast, original storyline and some great visuals, the uneven tone makes this the least of Ridley’s films. Sometimes dead serious, sometimes unexpectedly comedic, it feels like different writers were given different scenes to write in the same film.

Regardless hopefully we don’t have to wait another fourteen years for Ridley to resurface.

Kuroneko

(Kaneto Shindô)

FanTasia also plays a small selection of classic films, and, like Heartless, Kuroneko is by a writer/director who made one of my all-time favourite movies, Onibaba (1964). Kaneto Shindô made this one in 1968 and it’s basically a companion piece to Onibaba. Both movies are set in a similar time in Japan’s war-torn past, where ruthless samurais and the supernatural mix. Here, a band of swordsman comes upon a house in the woods, and the grubby, starving men rape and murder the mother and daughter-in-law who live there, burning down the home with them in it. A black cat licks at the bodies in the charred remains, and soon samurais who travel at night in the area are being lured by an enchanting young woman back to a house in the forest, where they meet their ends. When a war hero samurai is given the task of killing the demons, he makes a shocking discovery that divides his loyalties.

Like Onibaba, Kuroneko is gorgeously photographed in black and white, features an amazing, haunting soundtrack of sparse drumbeats and creepy percussion; mixes the erotic, the violent and the supernatural in an atmosphere of otherworldly desperation; and technically it’s near perfection.

I’d be surprised if Criterion, which put out Onibaba, hasn’t already picked this up for a North American DVD release. Amazing, Shindô, who is almost a 100, is still alive and making films, so let’s hope he does a commentary for this masterpiece.

-Dave Alexander

My sojourn to Montreal to take in a week of the FanTasia film festival has ended, so now it’s time to get into some of the actual films… well, not quite.

Before that, let’s talk Poe. This year’s FanTasia program included a two-night run of Nevermore: An Evening With Edgar Allan Poe, performed in Montreal’s gorgeous former movie theatre, the Rialto, which dates back to the silent era. Poe was the original Master of Horror, of course, and countless film adaptations of his stories have been produced, but what makes this live theatre performance particularly special for film fans?

Easy: the horror film powerhouse trio of director Stuart Gordon, actor Jeffrey Combs and writer Dennis Paoli. If you’re more than even the most casual of horror fans, you’ve seen Re-Animator, the very loose 1985 adaptation of the H.P. Lovecraft story, which was co-written by Paoli and Gordon, directed by Gordon and starred Combs as the comically narcissistic and mad scientist Herbert West. The trio teamed up again for From Beyond (1986), The Pit and the Pendulum (1991) and the Masters of Horror series episode The Black Cat (2007). Beyond that, Gordon has also directed a whack of cool low-budget films, including Dagon, The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit and Edmond; Paoli did the screenplay for Abel Ferrara’s underrated 1993 Bodysnatchers (yes, an Invasion of the Body Snatchers remake); and Combs has been in all kinds of things, including a whack of Star Trek episodes, from more than one of the latter-day series.

For a couple years now, they’ve been touring around Nevermore: An Evening With Edgar Allan Poe and I’ve been dying to see it. The one man show – which is close to two hours long – has Combs as Poe performing a recital of his work, but self-sabotaging the evening by drinking and bad mouthing his peers, eventually spiraling into a stumbling state of self-loathing and despair. Combs gives the definitive Poe performance, gripping the crowd with his passionate delivery, flair for bringing the writer’s words to life and (often comical, often crushingly self-destructive) faux drunken bravado. It’s a captivating display of cryptic, wounded humanity, and obviously the closest thing a Poe fan can get to hearing the author, who died in October of 1849, read his own work.

If you’re in the San Diego area at the end of the year, you can catch Nevermore here. Other presentations pop up on Combs’ official site, here. However, if you’re in the vast majority, and won’t be able to see Nevermore, yet really want to see Combs as the doomed author, you gotta get your hands on the aforementioned Masters of Horror (the series that ran for two seasons in 2005 to 2007, in which each episode was an hour-long movie directed by a notable “master of horror”) installment The Black Cat (here). It combines the Poe story of the same name with Poe himself (Combs, obviously) being driven murderously mad by the black cat that’s inspiring the famous tale. It’s the best episode in the series, and soars on the strengths of Combs’ increasingly manic performance, the inventive storytelling device and classy direction. Combs, Paoli and Stuart: The Masters of Poe.

-Dave Alexander

 

Do you like films about kung-fu, mutants, gangsters, aliens, magic, vigilantes, ghosts, maniacs, the undead, rock ‘n’ roll, and all manner of monsters? How about films featuring kung-fu mutants or undead vigilantes? If you’re like me and this kind of cinema gets you stoked, you need to get yourself to the annual FanTasia film festival in Montreal. Every July, for three weeks, the fest hosts well over a 100 features, dozens of world or North American premieres, shorts programs, free outdoor screenings, lectures, filmmakers from all over the world and other guests of honour. Every year I look forward to going to FanTasia, and every year I’m frustrated that I can only stay for a small portion of it, usually a long weekend.

This summer, however, I’m vacationing in Montreal, so I’m around for ten glorious days of the festival, which means even more of the cinematic mayhem that draws filmmakers, programmers, media and fans from all over the world.

Among the highlights for 2010: a program called Subversive Serbia, which features some very confrontational and controversial genre films from that country, some of which have never been seen outside of Europe before now; A screening of Jean Cocteau’s Blood of a Poet with musical accompaniment from Steven Severin of Siouxsie and the Banshees; a 25th anniversary screening of Re-Animator, with director Stuart Gordon, writer Dennis Paoli and star Jeffery Combs in attendance; a performance of Comb’s one-man play, Nevermore: An Evening With Edgar Allen Poe (directed by Stuart); and the Eastern premiere of the recently rediscovered and restored (25-minute longer) director’s cut of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis. Weird, diverse and unparalleled in terms of cinephile geek-outs.

But, it’s more than that. The reason FanTasia – now in its fourteenth year – thrives, is not only because it features a killer line-up of films and events, takes places in a city that boisterously supports the arts (seriously, you can sell out multiple midnight screenings in huge theatres on week nights!) and has a diverse roster of guests, but also because of its approach to the overall festival experience.

Many film fests are all about private parties, velvet ropes, tightly controlled press conferences, paparazzi and other things designed to separate artists, industry types, press and fans. Sure, FanTasia isn’t attracting the likes of Brad Pitt (although it did host a surprise sneak peek of Inglourious Basterds last year, with Eli Roth hosting), but it’s not unusual to have a beer on a patio with the filmmaker whose movie you just watched. Or to chat with major directors and stars from other countries. Or to even get your own movie projected kick-started because you’ve met the right like-minded person. There’s a very relaxed, accessible and international atmosphere to FanTasia that makes it the ideal festival experience for the newcomer and the jaded veteran festivalgoer alike.

Add Montreal's historical sights, the amazing food and other festivals running concurrently with FanTasia (such as Just for Laughs) and it’s a perfect genre cinephile vacation getaway, as long as you don’t mind a little heat and humidity. (I recommend one of the several hotels with A/C and a pool that are within walking distance from the festival – plus there are FanTasia rates, see here.)

I’ll give a sampling of some of the insane films I’ve watched in my next post. In the meantime, remember: Montreal and movies go together like butter and popcorn, or, for the locals, like French fries and cheese curds.

Is it possible to be bitten by a spider and not be the subject of a Spider-Man joke? I can now tell you from first-hand experience – no. Last week, at night while I was sleeping, something bit me on the foot, presumably an arachnid. The afflicted area became red and swollen, then it became purplish and really painful, then I went to the emergency room and got an IV drip full of antibiotics. I worked from home for a day, at which point my co-workers began referring to me as “Spider-Dave,” one of them re-wrote the Spider-Man theme to be about me (“Is he strong?/Listen, bud/He’s got a beard and prairie blood”) and one of our designers Photoshopped the above picture (thanks, Justin).

The jokes about super powers were relentless (“I didn’t see you at your desk, so I looked up at the ceiling”), as they should be, really – I mean, how often d’ya get the opportunity? Anyhow, no super powers were forthcoming, unless you count laying-on-the-couch-more-than-usual-for-a-few-days an unusual strength.

That’s OK, though because I’d look terrible in spandex, I’m not fond of heights and being a superhero would seriously cut into my movie watching time. Imagine never being able to get through an entire film due to tingling? “I know I should save those kids from the burning apartment building, but dammit, there’s only twelve minutes left in Police Academy 5 and I need to know how it ends.”

Like many kids, I was obsessed with superheroes, particularly Spider-Man. When I was about four, my parents took me to a Levis store in Lloydminister to meet “Spider-Man,” and I’ve still got the autograph and the little button he gave me.” There’s a point in one’s young life where you actually imagine the possibility of being a comic book hero and try to figure out what your life would be like. Would I get out of school to save people? Would I be allowed to tell mom and dad my secret identity? Would I still have to eat zucchini? Please make me not have to eat zucchini.

Sitting around in a hospital for hours gives one plenty of time to think about REALLY IMPORTANT stuff, so I wondered what would happen in the Spider-Man movie about my life, if I’d been bitten by a radioactive creepy-crawly. Then I recalled the Jack Black Spider-Man parody from the MTV Movie Awards and realized that would be the best I could hope for, but without a kiss from Sarah Michelle Gellar.

However, there is a new Spider-Man movie in the works, a reboot, which is ridiculous seeing as the last one came out in 2007. (Then again, that one’s so bad it shouldn’t really count…)

Instead of wishing to be Spider-Man, now I’m wishing for an anti-Spider-Man Spider-Man movie – some reason to care about this shameless cash-grab reboot. For starters, I figure that Wes Anderson (The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou) should direct it – he’s great with colours, likes very quirky characters and can really bring out the pathos of someone grappling with a great sense of responsibility. Father figures play huge in Anderson’s films too, and Peter Parker’s central pathos is that his actions led to death of his own father figure, Uncle Ben.

I think the bad guy should be Mysterio this time around, and he should be sardonically-voiced voiced by Bill Murray. Anjelica Houston could be a world-weary Aunt May and maybe Gene Hackman could do a turn as J. Jonah Jameson. Mary-Jane? Hmmm... maybe Christina Ricci?

Sure, a lot of the film would be self-analyzing conversations, comedic self-loathing and the search for acceptance and redemption, but it’d be a helluva lot better than, um, say, a dance sequence at a jazz club.

Wes Anderson’s Spider-Man, now that would actually get me stoked about a reboot. Then again, I’m also full of spider poison, so take anything I’ve said here with a few grains of radioactive salt.

-Dave Alexander

Can’t a western just be a western? Although the western was the most lucrative and virile genre for decades, it largely petered out in the late-‘70s/early-‘80s after it became really self-aware and basically ran out of ways to evolve. There will always be an audience for ‘em, though, and some continue to get made (The Unforgiven, Open Range and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford being three important examples), unfortunately the few “westerns” that show up in the multiplexes are mostly pseudo-westerns, where the genre itself is just novelty dressing.

You’ve got Young Guns, which is really a teen heartthrob action movie; Bad Girls, a Charlie’s Angels-in-the-old-west kinda story; Posse, a modern blaxploitation in the old west tale; Back to the Future III, a blockbuster sci-fi adventure-comedy; Wild, Wild West, a blockbuster sci-fi action-comedy; and The Missing, Ron Howard’s supernatural mystery/drama set in the old West, as some examples. Most of these films use the well-established clichés of the genre, such as shoot-outs, horse chases or saloon fights, to give a spin to a story that could otherwise be set modern day. And most of them are awful because of it. (Back to the Future III actually works pretty well because the story itself is actually about modern technology in an old world, and it puts some pretty clever spins on the juxtaposition.)

None of these movies are as bad as Jonah Hex, though. Being a bit of a fan of the comic book (which ironically later became just Hex when the character was transported into a futuristic post-apocalyptic setting – mwah! Glavin!), I spat in the face of better judgment and went to see it in the theatre. And, yes, I would’ve had a better time being kicked in the neck by a horse. Currently, it’s got my vote for worst film of the year.

It’s terrible in many,many different ways: the dull direction, the horrible editing that seems to smash two or three different, separately shot, versions of the plot together, the gaping logic and character inconsistencies, the unfinished-looking computer effects and the non-presence of Megan Fox – despite the glaring presence of the Megan Fox corset-boobs that are attached to her. I could go on, but, in short, it rained creative horse apples in the theatre that night. (With the exception of star Josh Brolin, who tried his darndest to sell the character, even with all that rubbery scar makeup on his face.)

What does need to be pointed out is the worst offense of all: the pointless modernization of the story. If the Hex character, with his standard Old West hero deadly aim, trusty horse and dog sidekick, plus – PLUS! – his non-standard supernatural knack for communicating with the dead, dodging bullets and surviving shotgun wounds, wasn’t powerful enough, some jackass (maybe one of the screenwriters, maybe not) decided he needed super-weapons.

So, we see Hex level a town via the massive, fully automated, dual Gatling guns mounted on his horse(!?!). Later, he buys grenade launcher pistols. But, I guess it, like, only makes sense, seeing as the bad guy (a very slumming John Malkovich) has a super-bomb he’s trying to destroy the nation’s capital with – on July 4th no less!!! It’s a hilariously failed attempt to modernize the story with a terrorism plot.

There are decades of Hex stories to draw upon, and no need to toss in a bunch of contemporary gadgetry. At all. Y’see, there’s a level of drama to the western genre in the whole man-vs.-nature/the dangerous frontier theme, which is lost when you add weaponized horses and magic exploding cannonballs [slaps head, shakes fist at sky]. There’s really nothing worse than that kinda crap in a western, or in any period film, for that matter (e.g. Van Helsing).

The bigger issue, really, is that Warner Bros. didn’t trust a western to be just a western (because of the relentless need to market to teens). Screw the comic book fans, screw the western fans. Unsurprisingly, the result is a mess that appeals to know one at all, outside the hardcore Megan Fox boob-watchers, of course.

So why bother making the movie in the first place?

-Dave Alexander

Say hi to Samantha, she’s not quite two weeks old, she’s done her baby-ly duty by being painfully cute, and she made me an uncle – yay!

My brother and his wife have their work cut out for them, raising a child in world that has changed so radically since the previous generation, notably the access that young 'uns have to information and media. Aside from the obvious dangers that presents, how do you choose what you expose your kidlet to? Not just to keep her safe, but to try to make her, y’know... cool? That’s my job – be the cool uncle.

It pains me to be on the other side of the country right now. Flights back to Edmonton from Toronto this summer are way too expensive compared to last year, for some reason, so I won’t get to see Samantha until December, most likely. At least that’ll give me plenty of time to make a list of movies she needs to see when she’s old enough for a viewing experience that goes beyond shapes, colours and noises (although that pretty much describes the highlights of most movies at the multiplex at any given time – yeah, I saw Jonah Hex this week).

Where to start…where to start…where to start? Hmmmmmm…

I think a good introduction to the post-Teletubbies/Wubzy/Doodlebops/whatever-other-shows-strain-one’s-masculinity-with-their-very-names world is Finding Nemo. Even if you can’t yet follow the story, there are plenty of fun shapes, cheery colours and stimulating noises for the young viewer – not to mention, adults can dig it too. (I want to state for the record right now that it’s not my problem if my brother and sister-in-law have to buy their child a clown-fish afterwards – cool uncle amnesty.)

When she’s older, I’d like to introduce her to Monsters vs Aliens, not just because monsters fighting aliens is way cool when you’re a kid (or adult), but the main character Ginormica, is a great role model for girls, teaching them that it’s OK to be different, you should accept others for who they are, and – the best part – it’s perfectly OK to be an independent woman and not marry a jerk-nut weatherman.

After that, Wall-E, with its cute robots and vital messages about being kind to the Earth and your own body. Sea creatures, monsters, aliens, robots – I’d say that’s a pretty good mix so far.

But traditional animation is a must too – can’t just feed the kid computer graphics. I’m not one for most traditionally animated Disney movies, though, as few things on this earth are worse than singing cartoon animals (that doesn’t include Madagascar, which is pretty hilarious yet has a bit of singing). Kids may love that stuff, I can’t condone it in good conscience. No, cool uncle will bring over a copy of Brad Bird’s Iron Giant – an anti-militarism movie featuring a friendship between a young boy and s giant weaponized robot that wants peace. There’s no need to assume that just because she’s a girl, it should be all princesses, mermaids and unicorns (although, eventually she’ll need to see The Last Unicorn, of course).

Other traditional animated movies in baby Samantha’s future will hopefully include the imagination-sparking Fantasia, Spirited Away (or anything by Hayao Mayazaki) and any of the Dr. Seuss specials, starting with How the Grinch Stole Christmas!  And, one day, later down the road, Charlotte’s Web, naturally. And absolutely no Shrek! I'll spare her the shameless mugging and badly dated pop-culture references.

Ack, the list is getting huge and I haven’t covered live-action yet! What about the Muppet movies? Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory? Microcosmos? Jacob Two-Two Meets the Hooded Fang? The NeverEnding Story? The freakin’ Wizard of freakin’ Oz?!? I didn’t realize this cool uncle business was going to be so much work!

Good thing you’re worth it, Samantha – welcome to the world. (And congratulations, Brad and Erin.)

-Dave Alexander