Fantasia Film Festival is back as an in-person event in 2022! There’s over 80 films being offered during the course of the two week event in Montreal, Quebec, and if I was to average two a day, that’s barely scratching the surface. There’s also all the special events, panels, and shorts to consider and they will be held at the Concordia Hall, J.A. de Sève cinemas, the Cinémathèque Québécoise, Cinéma du Musée and McCord Museum.
Ticket pre-sales will open at the end of this week, on July 9, 1:00 EST, and people travelling this event might want to consider booking their hotels now. Anyone still concerned about the pandemic are advised to still wear face masks and use personal descretion until the Health Authority declares otherwise.
The film to begin the festivities is Polaris, a Canadian sci-fi eco-adventure and I get the feeling its a work that’ll rival the cult film, Turbo-Kid (2015). I’m glad to say that I got the early bird ticket on a few flicks. One work I admire is The Witch 2: The Other Side (review link), which received limited screenings across North America courtesy of Well GO USA. Another is The Girl From The Other Side which first screened at Fantasia 2019 as a short, and this year, it’s been expanded to a feature length movie! It’s a parable that I throughly enjoyed (review link) when it played at the Los Angeles Asian Film Festival a few months ago. All the detailing in this work really must be seen on the big screen!
And for those people who have been following this event for years will find The Deer King from 2021’s in-person event is finally headed to theatres. It’ll be playing at the same time as Fantasia at select cities first before expanding to others later this month. I’ll have a review so those who missed out can decide if they should see this movie or Girl From The Other Side. There’s a few familiar elements to be found in both, especially when concerning relationships forged between a surrogate father and a young girl. I’m always fascinated with how this trope gets reinvented by filmmakers. Perhaps, I’ll find something similiar at Fantasia 2022.
In part two, I’ll focus on the top five animated movies to look at. It’s tough to decide on which works are more attractive than others when there’s nine films. Fantasia Film Festival’s Sci-Fi, Comedy and Horror offerings are always top-notch choices, and I don’t have a cloning machine to let me check out everything. On my list of works to must see are:
Alienoid
August 1, 2022
In mediaeval Korea, in the final days of the Goryeo Dynasty, two Taoist warrior-mystics—clumsy swordsman Mureuk and gunslinging Lee Ahn—strive to gain possession of a legendary holy sword. In modern times, a long-hidden secret—that extraterrestrials have been locking up alien prisoners inside living human bodies—threatens to explode into the open, causing serious problems for the enigmatic Guard and determined police detective Moon Do-seok. When a portal in time is torn open between the two moments, chaos erupts in a whirlwind of blades, bullets, brute force, and arcane fury!
Anime Supremacy!
July 24, 2022
The anime industry of Japan is enormous, with 200 new TV shows and two trillion yen in revenue each year. For seven years, soft-spoken yet strong-willed Hitomi Saito has climbed the ranks, and is set to direct a series for the first time. At the same moment, the difficult but undeniably brilliant director Chiharu Oji is set to make his big comeback after almost a decade.
The hit series that made Oji famous is what inspired Saito to jump into the anime field, and her goal is to match, and even surpass, his success and relevance. Her chance has arrived. Their two programs are both scheduled to debut in the same prime-time Saturday slot, and after Saito challenges her rival on stage at an anime convention, the two production teams each set out to outdo one another, because there can only be one number-one!
Dreadstream
July 23, 2022
It’s been six months since Shawn Ruddy (Joseph Winter) pulled a stunt on his “Wrath of Shawn” livestream that got him in legal trouble and cost him his sponsors. Now he’s aiming to make a comeback by outfitting himself with all manner of camera and computer gear, and locking himself in the haunted Pratt House for a night. The place has a tragic history involving suicide and murder, and we watch through his assorted lenses as he makes his way through the spooky rooms, waiting for something ghostly to occur. But he’s not prepared for what will happen when he finds out he’s not alone in the old place, and the house’s awful past comes back to torment him.
Freaks Out
July 28
War-torn Rome. Occupying Nazis are increasing their explorations into harnessing occult forces for weaponry. Their searches lead them to the sideshow attractions of the Mezza Piotta Circus—Fulvio (an unrecognisable Claudio Santamaria, appearing as a towering, werewolf-like being), Matilde (Aurora Giovinazzo), Cencio (Pietro Castellitto) and Mario (Giancarlo Martini). With powers beyond the explanations of science, all are outsiders of a sort, formed into a troupe that’s become family. Soon, they will be fighting for their lives, as well as everyone else’s, in the most unusual superhero film you will ever see.
I Like Bats
July 25
Polish actor/director Grzegorz Warchol (THREE COLORS: WHITE) helms this 1986 production that combines splashes of black comedy with jolts of old-school horror for a slyly contemporary take on the female bloodsucker mythos. Katarzyna Walter stars as a happily single young vampire who works in her aunt’s curio shop when not feeding on various suitors, stalkers, and sleazebags. But when she falls for a handsome psychiatrist and checks into his luxury sanitarium to cure her condition, she’ll discover that love may be the ghastliest curse of all.
Next Exit
July 18 2022
One day in a future so near it may well be next Wednesday, everything about the ways that we relate to death changes. Research Scientist Dr. Stevenson (Karen Gillan, OCULUS, GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY) has discovered that “ghosts” are demonstrably real, in that existence continues beyond the end of physical life. Through her groundbreaking technology, deceased persons can now be identified and tracked in the afterlife. A call goes out for volunteers to further her research.
Two strangers, Rose (Katie Parker, ABSENTIA, THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE) and Teddy (Rahul Kohli, THE HAUNTING OF BLY MANOR, MIDNIGHT MASS), each struggling with personal demons, choose to sign up into the unknown. They will exit their earthly lives to become a part of history and to maybe, possibly, find something closer to happiness in wherever their afterlives may bring them. Fate has them splitting a car rental, and they embark on a drive across America to meet their destinies.
The Poe Morgue:
A Journey Into Fear With Film, Music and Theatre
Aug 1, 2022
No writer has influenced the horror genre more than Edgar Allan Poe. His vivid imagination has inspired hundreds of films in the last 110 years by directors such as Federico Fellini, Dario Argento, George Romero, Roger Corman, and Robert Eggers. Infused with creepiness, dread, fever dreams and ominous terror, Poe’s style is well suited for genre cinema.
His stories made their way to movie screens starting in the 1910s (with one of the first German art films, 1913’s THE STUDENT OF PRAGUE, which helped inspire the Expressionist cinema of THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI a few years later) and running through the 1930s, which saw multiple Bela Lugosi/Boris Karloff team-ups. Then, in the 1960s, Roger Corman built Poe-inspired films around Vincent Price, infusing them with macabre humour and a bright colour palette.
Relax, I’m From the Future
July 20, 2022
The world’s fate lies in the hand of a well-meaning time traveller from the future named Casper (Rhys Darby, OUR FLAG MEANS DEATH, WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS). Armed with only a form-fitting time-travel suit and his wit, Casper must find his way around the past since he can’t make it back to the future.
As he acclimates to our times, he meets Holly (Gabrielle Graham, POSSESSOR, IN THE SHADOW OF THE MOON), a queer, disillusioned punk who takes a liking to Casper. He reveals he’s from the future, things get better, and he’ll save the world. To prove it, Casper shows her a would-be cartoonist, Percy (Julian Richings, ORPHAN BLACK, SUPERNATURAL, EJECTA), who becomes a key element when things get messy with Casper’s plan. When Doris (Janine Theriault), an agent who rids the present of random time-traveers, gets wind of this, she’s determined to eliminate Casper, and the chaos created.
Shin Ultraman
July 21, 2022
Giant, unearthly monsters are appearing in Japan, and the government has created the S-Class Species Suppression Protocol, an elite agency dedicated to confronting and defeating this invasion by extraterrestrial lifeforms. But when an invisible electrical monster attacks the countryside, a giant, silvery alien being lands on Earth.
The titanic superhero, soon to be codenamed Ultraman, destroys the deadly beast quickly enough—but accidentally kills SSSP officer Shinji Kaminaga during the battle. Secretly assuming Kaminaga’s appearance, Ultraman joins the SSSP to help defend humanity, but as more menacing monsters from space arrive, the cosmic conflict can only become more confounding!
Space Monster Yangmagwi
July 23, 2022
Menacing, masked humanoids from another world are approaching Earth, and they haven’t come in peace. Their arrival coincides most inconveniently with the wedding plans of a handsome Air Force pilot. When the alien attackers drop a gigantic, remote-controlled cosmo-creep through our stratosphere, the jets take off to confront it, leaving our hero’s fiancée to weep with worry.
The couple’s special day may be cancelled forever, however, because the giant monster—a ludicrous, lop-eared, tongue-lolling, hobnailed horror nicknamed Wangmagwi (“Big Devil”)—deviates from its devastation of Seoul to scoop up the bride-to-be. Despite their evident difference in size, and species, and so forth, Wangmagwi develops an immediate, King Kong-sized crush on the pretty lady in the palm of its hand. Resolving this romantic dilemma—and saving the world, of course—will require some very daring maneuvers.
Tang and Me
July 24, 2022
Ken, a former doctor in training, has decided to give up everything since the tragic death of his father. In fact, he does nothing but play video games. One morning, he finds a small rusty robot named Tang behind his house and tries to chase it away. The droid follows him home and arrives just in time to see him kicked out by his wife Emi.
Tang is immediately attached to his new friend and doesn’t let go, but Ken wants to get rid of him as soon as possible by swapping him for a newer model to give to Emi. He fails miserably, but he meets a designer who sees something unique in Tang, suggesting that it can hold a lot more than its dilapidated frame suggests. He’s right on target, as thugs are already on their tail to take the robot. Ken and Tang’s journey soon turns into a perilous adventure where the notorious slacker must shake off his torpor, open his heart to his cute partner, and maybe even win Emi back.
Timescape
July 31, 2022
An alien ship chases a small plane, and both crash in the middle of the forest. The crash site is uncovered by Jason, a brave and bright boy, as he leaves his uncle’s house to try to find his parents, who have been missing for two weeks. He also meets Lara, a young girl who arrived on the scene just before him. On board the ship, while trying to escape from the alien who is trying to get back on board, they are inadvertently propelled into the past to the time of the dinosaurs, just before the moment when the asteroid hits the Earth and changes the course of existence forever. The artificial intelligence M.I.A., a small, outspoken flying robot, accompanies the two young people on their journey to find their way back to their time and place before the planet is hit.
What to Do with a Dead Kaiju?
Aug 2, 2022
The battle is over, and a brittle sense of relief settles over Japan. It has been ten days since the cataclysmic defeat of the gigantic monster that had wreaked havoc in Tokyo. The public alarms have ceased and the conscripted army is demobilising.
The mysterious force that slayed the beast, where no human military technology could, remains an enigma, but right now the main task is to pick up the pieces in the aftermath. There’s one piece, though, that presents a challenge—the enormous, rapidly decomposing carcass of the creature. Officer Arata of the Japan Special Force is assigned to the clean-up task force, an assignment made all the more complicated by political opportunism and romantic entanglements
