Tag: Fantasia Film Festival

Jesters or Trickster Spirits? These “Game Changers” Play with History!

Ultimately, the story is about The Six Matryred Ministers whom the recently annotated King Sejo wants forgotten.

Game ChangersBy Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

Played at Fantasia Festival 2020.
Region 3 DVD is available to order on YesAsia USA and International.


SPOILER ALERT

Newly anointed King Sejo (Hee-soon Park) is quite the pickle in Jesters: The Game Changers. He’s dethroned the former prince, his nephew Danjong, in his rise to power and in order to sully a good reputation, he recruits Deok-ho (Jin-woong Cho) and his gang of talented con artists (Jesters, in this translation) to spotlight all the good he can do.

They use strangely modern techniques to make their special effects. Honestly, it’s these moments which make this film shine. Viewers may scratch their heads at how 15th century Korea has access to electric lights but I figure what they used are smoke and mirrors inside different types of containers to make their illusions. With creative thinking, anything is possible, including projecting Buddha on a cliff side or seeing Deok-ho on an ancient treadmill.

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Highlights from My First Fantasia

There’s a mini festival within a festival if you spend your time exploring the talents featured here.

Game ChangersBy Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

Playing at Fantasia Digital Film Festival 2020 On Demand till Sept 2. Buy your virtual ticket here.

Fantasia Film Festival may seem short with feature length animated works this year because one title was pulled. My response is to check out the My First Fantasia Programme. There’s more than enough pieces to sate anyone’s appetite! Plus, the other packaged presentations include mini tales of fantasy, sci-fi and experimental works. There’s a mini festival within a festival if you spend your time exploring the talents featured here.

Realistically, the Annecy International Animation Film Festival is the event for fans of this medium. When my love for this genre outweighs Asian works, I had to do a marathon run of this particular set of works this weekend. I’m particularly interested with seeing what emerging talents from around the world are offering. Some are certainly ready to be noticed by Studio Ghibli, Studio Canal, Cartoon Saloon, or even PIXAR.

A few shorts are repeated in the other themed sets; they only help reinforce the concept being presented. Some are animated in CGI, others are hand drawn, a few are stop motion and the rest use a blend of other techniques—which include clay, Adobe Animation (formerly Flash) or otherwise. They are all used to great effect to convey a sense of wonder, whimsy or surreal.

This list highlights the pieces which I found the most engaging from each themed package:

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Playing at Fantasia 2020: The Prophet And The Space Aliens

Rael may be kooky. He’s not at all spooky. The cult is hardly ooky. What we see in The Prophet and the Space Aliens is simply about family. That’s where this documentary shines. We see the people as they are together rather than the devotion which follows this self-proclaimed prophet everywhere. 

Game ChangersBy Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

Playing at Fantasia Digital Film Festival 2020 on August 23, 2pm. Buy your virtual ticket here.

Rael may be kooky. He’s not at all spooky. The cult is hardly ooky. What we see in The Prophet and the Space Aliens is simply about family. That’s where this documentary shines. We see the people as they are together rather than the devotion which follows this self-proclaimed prophet everywhere. 

Although this person believes in UFOs and that all the major figureheads from world religions are from space, the insights offered don’t say too much why. As for explaining the other nuances of how this life path works, none of it comes through as preachy. Viewers are left to decide if this oddball religion is for real or not. For the most part, this film by Yoav Shamir is more biopic than gospel.

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On Crazy Samurai Musashi and Wishing for a Video Game Adaptation

Crazy Samurai Musashi Movie Poster

By Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

Playing at Fantasia Digital Film Festival 2020 On Demand till Sept 2. Buy your virtual ticket here.

Yuji Shimomura’s Crazy Samurai Musashi is—as the title suggests—an insane attempt in making a movie in one continuous shot. It has the feel of a video game since the camera is mostly focussed on our warrior as the center of attention and everyone rushes to him for a chance at delivering a fatal swing of the sword. I’m reminded of Bushido Blade for the PlayStation.

Sometimes the angle changes, and that’s usually to get in a closeup shot of Musashi (Tak Sakaguchi). Thankfully, there are a few pauses in the carnage to deliver dialogue and give viewers a chance to breathe.

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Hail to the Deadites! On Fandom & The Evil Dead

Writer/Director Steve Villeneuve must have spent at least three years filming this work.

Game ChangersBy Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

Playing at Fantasia Digital Film Festival 2020 On Demand till Sept 2. Buy your virtual ticket here.

We have plenty of documentaries made about how Sam Raimi‘s Evil Dead franchise still influences the horror genre. The latest, Hail to the Deadites, is specific about this famous film trilogy and goes in a different direction–it’s about the fandom than the films itself.

I wish there was more to the segment on Evil Dead the Musical instead of the cursory look. It’s rare to get an insight to why some theatre producers adapt a franchise to a live stage show and I’m just one of the lucky ones to know of a regional troupe who let me down the basement and reveal how they manage as they tour and perform in the Pacific Northwest. Strangely, Chris Bond, one of the creators behind this musical, was not interviewed. Instead, we have horror historian Michael Gingold, film professor Andre Loiselle and filmmaker Chris Alexander break down other parts of the fandom.

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Fantasia Digital Fest 2020 – The Vintage Tempest’s Top Picks!

Fantasia Digital Fest 2020 PosterBy Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

The 2020 Fantasia International Film Festival is taking place online! It will run from August 20th to Sept 2nd, and the producers behind this event worked hard with Festival Scope and Shift72 to ensure that for Canadian audiences, they will have an experience to remember.

According to Fantasia’s FAQ: Unfortunately, we can’t make new films available across the world without potentially hurting their future distribution and exhibition options, which is a key concern to us. The only exception is Troma’s latest, an interpretation of William Shakespeare’s The Tempest, which will be available to audiences in Canada and the United States.

Signing up to this event is easy. All anyone has to do is to visit Fantasia’s website and make an account. Options exist to make a wish list, and tickets can be pre-purchased early for those shows with a set time of broadcast, or viewed at leisure, beginning August 20th. The showtimes advertised on Fantasia’s PDF Guide and social media platforms and the like are listed in Eastern Standard Time.

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