Hexes & Lasers.

Two things I wanted to share with you. First, the full line-up of this year's Hexploitation Film Festival was announced yesterday.

There are several titles I'm intrigued by including Eduardo M. Clorio's I Wish I Wish, Preston DeFrancis's Ruin Me & Toor Mian & Andy Collier's Charismata, as well as the Hamilton Premiere of Chad Archibald's The Heretics.

We're also serving up some terrific shorts, running the gamut between festival favourites like Justin Harding's Latched and Mike Marrero & Jon Rhoads' Buzzcut and world premieres Niall Shukla's A Doll Distorted and Mike Pereira's Zandavi Lives. I'm also fond of Isreali import My First Time from Asaf Livni.

HexFest goes down at The Staircase Theatre from March 23 to 25. For more info, click here.

Secondly, I wanted to make you aware the Laser Blast Film Society (of which I am a card carrying member) has a spiffy new website. Check it out by clicking the image below.

Best Horror of 2016

Here we are at the finish line of a year that if you're like me probably glad to see the ass-end of. So many shitty things in the news that it's hard to comprehend them all. I wish things had been better because for me personally, it was a pretty good year. My second short film Lively scored Canadian distribution and I produced two more that will hopefully see the light of day in 2017. I finished my long-gestating feature script and joined the programming teams of three different film festivals. Not too shabby. But we're here to talk movies...

It has been an up-and-down year and if I'm honest, a lot of the most resonant pieces of genre I've ingested have been outside of film (Limetown, Life Is Strange, Inside, Black Mirror, Channel Zero), but that's not to say there weren't some fantastic horror movies released. I would normally offer up five titles, but since I put The Witch on 2015's list, I can only nominate four that went above and beyond.

Raw
France, Dir: Julia Ducournau

Bold and veracious, this deserved every bit of praise it received at this year's Midnight Madness. Putting aside the circus of the premiere's “medical emergencies” its importance to the genre should not be overlooked. Using the platform of a coming-of-age film, Raw is every bit as evocative as modern classics Let The Right One In and Ginger Snaps.

Under The Shadow
Iranian/UK, Dir: Babak Anvari

This Persian powerhouse really took me by surprise when I saw it back in April. The comparisons to Jennifer Kent's The Babadook are valid, but I would propose that Anvari's film is even better pound-for-pound as it relies less on its production design to deliver the creeps. As if the backdrop of war-torn Iran wasn't unsettling enough, the addition of a supernatural element leads to almost unbearable amounts of tension. This is a terrific piece of horror filmmaking.

The Invitation
USA, Dir: Karyn Kusama

I adore this movie and have not seen suspense this well utilized in a long time. This movie took something as benign as a dinner party and through sharp writing and pace managed to keep me on the edge of my seat. I knew the what, but my anticipation of the when, why and how kept me razor focused. I'm so impressed by how well this movie is put together, as even something as small as where someone stood during a scene caused me so much anxiety.

Train To Busan
South Korea, Dir: Yeon Sang-ho

Let's all admit it. We're all a little bored of zombies now that they've passed their saturation point. Yet even despite this, Train To Busan still manages to be all kinds of awesome. There's an energy to this movie that you can feel when you watch it with a crowd. While it's true that the unique location provides some freshness, it's also the colourful characters (and there are a lot of them) that really give life to this movie. I think you may be as surprised as I was by how much heart it has -- where did all these feels come from???

Honourable Mentions

If you had said to me a year ago, “Hey Jay, your best of list next year is going to include a Polish musical adaptation of The Little Mermaid” I'd have asked what you were smoking and if I could have some. However, that is absolutely the case. Agnieszka Smoczynska's The Lure is tremendous. Even on a second viewing I was amazed by how much confidence and swagger Smoczynska shows in her debut! The Lure is an absolute joy!

This year, I finally got to see The Void. It was thankfully exactly what I was hoping for. It rose beyond homage to actually exist as one of those crazy creature fests we grew up watching in the eighties. I'm extremely proud of Steve Kostanski and Jeremy Gillespie for what they accomplished here.

I was glad to lay my eyeballs on some cool indies this year, most notably Perry Blackshear's They Look Like People and Billy O'Brien's I Am Not A Serial Killer. Both were able to portray mental illness in a tangible and non-sensationalized way while weaving some fine storytelling.

I was also really impressed with 10 Cloverfield Lane. Dan Trachtenberg directed the shit out of this movie. His three leads (John Goodman, Mary Elizabeth Winstead and John Gallagher Jr. - what a year for that guy with Hush and The Belko Experiment also on his 2016 resume) put in some of the best performances this year in my opinion. Say what you want about where the movie eventually goes, but this was a super taut thriller.

Lastly, I just wanted to bring up what a solid year it was for genre-related documentaries. In addition to the uber-creepy Beware the Slenderman, we also had a pair of great docs about the medium itself in The Frankenstein Complex and 24 x 36.

Moving onto the negative side of things, I am afraid I saw an unusually large number of things I didn't care for this year like the mind-numbingly dumb Yoga Hosers, the mind-numbingly gross The Greasy Strangler and that unconvincing not-as-clever-as-it-thinks-it-is bore Safe Neighbourhood. For the latter, I'm not usually in the minority when it comes to these things, but now I get the mindset of those people who sat in the corner and rolled their eyes at the praise heaped on Cabin In The Woods and You're Next. Except those two movies were awesome. Safe 'Hood can ess a dee.

However, nothing came close to my dislike for Mickey Keating's Darling. It is a mess in concept, in tone and almost everything else. It has been a while since I've seen something so unapologetically pretentious and I'm not having any of it.

So, that's another three-sixty-five down. Have a great New Year and I'll see you back here next week to rundown all the horror goodies coming up in 2017. 

Under The Shadow.

Last weekend, I attended the fourth edition of LEFT (Lost Episode Festival Toronto) to catch a screening of Babak Anvari’s Under The Shadow. After its successful showing at Sundance – and my missing it at Fantasia – I was very excited to see what all the fuss was about.

Tehran, 1988. Shideh (Narges Rashidi) must not only protect her daughter Dorsa (Avin Manshadi) from the constant bombing attacks, but also a supernatural force that has set up residence in their tenement complex. 

Under The Shadow was an excellent film. I had expected to enjoy it, but I had no idea it was going to be such an exceptionally well rounded piece of work. Everything about this effort was top notch, right down to the eighties production design. Although, the themes were so timeless, it could’ve just as easily been set in present day.

I’d heard about the comparisons to 2014’s The Babadook and they are valid, as both tales involve a mother and child, supernatural forces and have metaphorical underpinnings. However, Under The Shadow was far less flashy, and I believe that worked in its favour. A lot of The Babadook’s appeal was in its visual style and production design, whereas this relied solely on its characters. I also saw shades of 2002’s Dark Water in here too, but this was way more articulate and affecting.

Narges Rashidi (right) & Avin Manshadi in Under The Shadow

The way Anvari was able to convey so much about the political climate and attitudes in such a short time was really impressive. Using the tenement building in which Shideh lived as a microcosm of Tehran itself, where communities were orphaned of their able-bodied men through conscription, was really interesting to me. As her complex emptied out, she and her daughter became more vulnerable to the unknown force lingering inside.

The more I think about it, the more I appreciate how well it all linked together. Rashidi was terrific in this film, and her character was extremely well written. It wasn’t a surprise to see that she was credited as a writer, as there was a perspective here that no man would have been able to duplicate.

As a genre film, this movie packed a punch due to its double-pronged approach. It had several conventional scare moments, including one or two well conceived jump scares, but there was also an underlying sense of dread throughout. Imagine living in a place where you could be blown to bits at any moment. Anvari used this to full effect by making even the most mundane scenes thick with tension. There was an early scene where Shideh was talking on the phone, but the shot was a lot wider than it needed to be to frame in the large window behind her. All I could do was stare at it, sure that an explosion was going to shatter it at any moment. Tremendous stuff.

I was also pleased that there was limited CG used in the film. The scares, for the most part, came from the threat to the main characters, and that’s how it should be. And thankfully, Anvari didn’t go for that one last jump scare, something that’s almost required in North American scare flicks these days. Under The Shadow was highly effective and concentrated on all the right elements that make a great horror film.

Lastly, I just wanted to give a shout-out to Johnny Larocque and LEFT for an impressive line-up this year. They may not be as visible as some of the other genre fests in Toronto, but with the acquisition of high profile titles like Under The Shadow, they soon will be. Excellent job, guys!

A Hellmouth Holiday.

After checking out the solid actioner Momentum, I made a last minute decision to get back in line to see The Paz Brothers' horror film, JeruZalem.

Two friends Sarah (Danielle Jadelyn) & Rachel (Yael Grobglas) are vacationing in Jerusalem, when the biblical End of Days suddenly rocks the city.

At its core, JeruZalem is a pretty standard found footage horror film, but there are some elements that really elevate it.

The first is the use of Google Glass, which Sarah puts on at the beginning of the film. By making the lenses prescription – and having her bag carrying her other pair of glasses subsequently stolen – the filmmakers cleverly circumvented any logistical problems about why she continued filming once all hell broke loose. Additionally, because we were privy to Glass's HUD, the Paz Brothers also found new ways to visually relay exposition and story through the device. How this tech could potentially pull up anybody's Facebook profile via facial recognition may have been the scariest part of the movie.

The calm before the storm.

Secondly, the location is breathtaking. The movie travelled throughout Jerusalem and as everything was first person, you really felt like you were walking the streets with the characters. I was quite impressed by how much footage they captured – in holy places and the like – and found out later they filmed under the guise of a documentary to grab that stuff.

The performances were natural and solid across the board, though Sarah did get a little whiny towards the end. She was also the one making the majority of the bad decisions, which was cause for frustration. And while it is true the “Z” in the title is bit of a misnomer, I can see why they tried to incorporate it into their marketing campaign.

Lastly, you have to take into consideration that, apart from Aharon Keshales & Navot Papushado (the duo behind Rabies and Big Bad Wolves), this is the first full blown horror film to come out of Israel. JeruZalem's production values rival much of Hollywood's output, so if these are Israel's baby steps into genre territory, then we in for some great things when they really get their legs under them.

Many feel zombies and found footage are both played out tropes, but I say JeruZalem is worthy of your attention.