Snäggletooth

Singapore's Vaarallinen toured here a few months back, melting faces all over the continent with their perfectly executed Finnish hardcore worship. They blew the roof off of Blackwire here in Sydney, and left me wandering the streets at nine o'clock on a Wednesday night with nothing to do and a bad case of hardcore blueballs.

Vaarallinen's bassist and drummer are also two thirds of a ripping Motörpunk outfit called Snäggletooth, and to put it simply, if you love Motörhead, you already love this band by default. So far they've only released a three song demo, but Thaib (bass/vocals for Snäggletooth) told me there's a 12'' on the way. Get it here, scumbag!

Art of Annihilation

Whilst lurking behind the couch with Argento aficionado James Gracey the other day, I discovered this gorgeous set of limited prints that I will never own. These elegant and evocative Art Nouveau style prints, all beautifully rendered by "Malleus", are available through Dark City Gallery in the UK. The black and red variant of the Suspiria poster is the easy winner for me, but that Tenebrae design is incredible too.

ゴジラ 破壊する!

Wanna see that somber little G teaser from last year's Comic-Con? 

Yes. Yes you do.

pass: junkyard

HERE

PATRICK Q&A with Mark Hartley

Sydneysiders, Popcorn Taxi is hosting a screening of Mark Hartley's Patrick remake on October 9. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with director Hartley and producer Antony Ginnane. 

Mark is of course the local hero behind the awesome documentaries Not Quite Hollywood, Machete Maidens Unleashed! and the upcoming Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films, and I'm really pulling for him to kill it on his first horror feature (It's been getting some positive reviews out of Fantastic Fest this week!).

For anyone familiar with Aussie exploitation, Antony Ginnane's name should sound familiar too, having produced a ton of movies including Richard Franklin's original Patrick back in 1978. He also produced one of my favourite '90's movies, the Peter Weller starring SF/horror hybrid Screamers, which was adapted from a Phillip K. Dick story by the late, great Dan O'Bannon. 

Just like Craven's The Hills Have Eyes and Alex Aja's superior redux, I think Patrick is prime material for a remake. Although I'm fond of Franklin's '78 film, there's definitely plenty of room to expand and improve on the original's ideas and execution.

Patrick 2013's talent in front of the camera is looking good too. It's nice to see Sharni Vinson in another horror flick so soon after impressing in You're Next, and Charles Dance, so good in Game Of Thrones, will surely make a satisfyingly menacing mad doctor. Yeah, Patrick's gonna fuck him up.

I wish I was going to this myself, but I'll be at the VAARALLINEN show that night instead. For those inclined, details of the Patrick screening can be found here.

OBLIVIONATION

OBLIVIONATION is a brain meltingly raging hardcore punk band from Lowell, Massachusetts, in the U.S. of A. Most of the Mass. hardcore I'm familiar with is from Boston of course, so for interest's sake I looked Lowell up, and according to Wikipedia the town was the birthplace of the industrial revolution in the States. That's heavy. It was also the birthplace of a certain paragraph-challenged beatnik.

The thing about Oblivionation that sets them apart from the herd is that their searing, no-nonsense hardcore attack is backed up by some of the sharpest lyrics I've read in a while. The demo opener - "Compulsive Paranoia" - is the most perfectly articulated song about mental anguish since Black Flag's "Depression" (and the rest of side two of Damaged I guess). And as far as social critique goes, the next song on the demo, "Proud To Be Dumb", could pretty much be considered an anthem for our times:

You can read but you won't, you could care but you don't

Your culture's become comfortably dumb

Triumph of the will for a growing nation of imbeciles

Who don't have a clue about the world outside or what they'll do

When it's on their lap and they know they're screwed 

Since discovering their demo late last year I've basically played it to death, so I'm impatiently waiting for their upcoming LP, Language Of Violence, to drop. They have a new EP in the works too, and both should be out by the end of the year. Oblivionation are made up of ex and current members of some other great Mass. bands including Bloodkrow Butcher, Raw Radar War and Out Cold. Get their demo + more below...

Crippling fear, it's what I live with

新 ゴジラ!

Back in January 2011 I was enthusiastic about Gareth Edwards being handed the reins of Legendary's upcoming Godzilla. Since then the casting has instilled more confidence, as has the decision to bring Frank Darabont on board as a screenwriter. Now if today's leaked design is indeed legit, I'm feeling more positive than ever.

Lookin' good G!

NO STATIK

No surprise that this new track from No Statik is just as rad as all their other stuff. The only thing wrong with this band is that they aren't in front of me right now melting my face. This song is off their upcoming LP Unity And Fragmentation, which will be out in December on Iron Lung.

If you haven't heard this Oakland juggernaut yet, do yourself a favour and track down a copy of their LP Everywhere You Aren't Looking. It is inarguably one of the most powerful hardcore releases of recent years. And clear some space on your hard drive, because you'll also want to dig into bassist Robert's exhaustive tape blog Terminal Escape. 

CHEAP THRILLS

I caught E.L. Katz's directorial debut Cheap Thrills back in June at this year's SFF, where I thought it easily outshone some other outstanding movies like You're Next and Only God Forgives. If you've seen those two films, directed by Adam Wingard and Nicolas Winding Refn respectively, I'm sure you'll agree that's no mean feat.

Actually, seeing Cheap Thrills and You're Next at the same fest was cool, as Katz's and Wingard's careers have been closely intertwined. Katz wrote Wingard's first two features Home Sick and Pop Skull, as well as all of his early shorts. However, not to take anything away from Wingard, who's work I admire, it seems to me that it may be Katz who ends up being the more assured director of the two.

The plot of Cheap Thrills is simple, but seductive and riveting. Craig is a struggling everyman with a young family and a head full of worries. Facing eviction at home due to unpaid rent, his life completely implodes one day when he goes into work to find out that he's been laid off. Rather than go home and tell his wife that they are going to be on the street with their baby, he hits a bar to drown his sorrows. At the bar he bumps into Vince, an old friend who Craig hasn't seen in years. Vince is down on his luck too, but he's less interested in family and career than carrying on the partying lifestyle that the two friends enjoyed together as younger men. 

Sitting on a couch in the back of the bar is a couple, Colin and Violet. Obnoxious and arrogant, they're clearly wasted on coke and fuck knows what else. They are also flaunting their apparently surplus wealth with careless abandon. As the four people become acquainted, Colin starts to play a game with Craig and Vince. What little dares will they perform in the bar for an agreed some of money? Although the demeaning nature of the game is immediately evident to both men, they play along. The money is just too much of a temptation for well-meaning, but desperate Craig. On the other hand, cunning, opportunistic Vince sees the wasted couple as a potentially easy target. The game continues. Escalates. Then Colin invites the two men back to his place...

Although it's pretty obvious what direction the story is heading in, believe me when I say that the events that unfold are unpredictable, disturbing, and pretty sickening. Cheap Thrills is often hilarious, but that humour is mostly a brief, welcome respite from what is otherwise a very tense and uncomfortable experience.

That tension and discomfort is achieved through a whip-smart screenplay, written by David Chirchirillo and Trent Haaga, and a highly impressive little ensemble cast. The four main performances are uniformly excellent, making it difficult to single one out, but I'll have to hand it to David Koechner. His Colin makes a very complex antagonist, who is by turns sleazy, charismatic, vulnerable and extremely menacing.

This is an important film. It throws into sharp relief some of the most troubling aspects of our current society. The ever widening gap between rich and poor. The increasing popularity of degradation and public humiliation as a form of entertainment.

Honestly, nothing scares me in horror movies anymore, except for us. Humans. All the monsters that we've concocted are little more than tame reflections of tiny facets of our sick selves. Apex predator. Cunning killer. Master manipulator. For all the fictional horror we can think up, nothing compares to the single most deadly entity that we have yet encountered in all our known universe. Ourselves.

Finally, I'd just like to applaud director Katz's decision to end the movie on a powerful note, confirming beyond a doubt that this is subversive filmmaking in the truest spirit of punk. I won't spoil the surprise, but you'll know what I'm talking about when you see it.

Extinction

Join me in escaping the election tomorrow night, with a killer lineup of crust, hardcore and metal at Blackwire. Promises to be a crushing night, and a whole lot less depressing than staying home and watching the fiasco unfold on TV. 

Headliners ExtinctExist from Melbourne (ex-Pisschrïst) have a ripping demo out, available at Bandcamp here.

LEVIATHAN AGES

Just saw this at Twitch and had to share. A couple of trailers for an upcoming short called Leviathan Ages, directed by one Jon Yeo, featuring surrealist imagery that's both startling and trippy. I'm kind of taken aback, because the weird, floating geometric/machine things remind me of some vivid nightmares that I had some years ago. 

As someone who's always defending practical effects and bemoaning the overuse of CGI, I see stuff like this and realise that CG really is an amazing tool in the right hands (see also Neill Blomkamp). This isn't the most photo-realistic animation, but it is very cool!

Gay Kiss

With the exception of JFA and The Meat Puppets' first album, I've managed to remain shamefully ignorant about the Arizonan punk scene over the years. But ever since the state's draconian anti-immigrant law (SB 1070) made world news three years ago, it's occurred to me that it's a place that probably needs more punx.

I am now one more incredible band less ignorant about Arizonan punk, and unless you've already been devastated by the powerful urgency of Gay Kiss' hardcore assault, you're about to get schooled too. Since getting their 2012 album Fault a few months back, I've been spinning their tunes on a daily basis, which also includes a previous EP called Dumpster Rules and a three song 2013 tape release.

Musically they mix up insanely catchy hardcore (lots of cool time changes and breakdowns) with just enough AmRep style noise thrown in to make it interesting (but not enough to make it, you know, not hardcore). Also, the singer's growls and grunts give me goosebumps.

This nine song album will make you stand up and move with absolute ragers like "Storms" and "Compassionless", but when "New March" hits, I hope you don't like your TV too much, cuz it's going out the fuckin' window.

Pay what you want/can/probably should at Bandcamp.

THE GREEN INFERNO

"Rated R for aberrant violence and torture, grisly disturbing images, brief graphic nudity, sexual content, language and some drug use"

Welcome back Eli!

more

V/H/S/2

The anthology sequel that everyone's raving about is having it's theatrical run here, so the other day I headed across town to the one indie cinema that's screening it, only to find myself sitting alone in a completely empty theatre.

Given all the recent buzz for this, it was a highly anticipated movie for me, so it pains me to say that I found it to be somewhat of a disappointment overall, especially considering its horror pedigree. I really don't enjoy being negative, so I'm going to keep my grievances short.

Adam Wingard's smart and funny You're Next was one of my favourite flicks at this year's SFF, so I was a little let down to find his segment (Phase I Clinical Trials) feeling like a retread of the Pang brothers' 2002 creeper The Eye. After You're Next I was expecting something more inventive from Wingard.

To be fair, the next segment - A Ride In The Park - was genuinely amusing and sweet. Directed by Gregg Hale and Eduardo Sánchez, (the Godfathers of this whole sub-genre, if you don't count Ruggero Deodato), their gimmicky conceit of zombie mayhem as seen from the point of view of one of the ghouls did elicit a few chuckles. But again, I wasn't exactly wowed.

Hobo With A Shotgun's Jason Eisener turned in the weakest segment of the bunch with Slumber Party Alien Abduction. Honestly, despite its hyperkinetic pace and a few interesting visual flourishes, I thought it was just trite. Then again I wasn't the biggest fan of Hobo, so maybe I'm just not much of an Eisener fan.

Finally, Simon Barrett's wraparound - Tape 49 - didn't do much for me either. Some half decent prosthetics, and a close up of fake tits couldn't save this one from the pit of mediocrity.

Like I said, I really don't derive any pleasure from being negative, and I do admire what all these fine and talented people are attempting with the V/H/S flicks. Rather than pollute the internet with more nasty snark, I usually opt not to write about a movie if I don't like it, especially if I think the filmmaker's intentions are good (as I do here).

So why am I so willing to throw V/H/S/2 under the bus? Well, I'm not. Because buried in this mess of good intentions and mediocre outcomes is a gory little gem.

Timo Tjahjanto (of the gloriously violent Macabre) and Gareth Huw Evans (of the also gloriously violent The Raid) have delivered a mini-classic in Safe Haven. This little slice of Cult-worshipping, apocalyptic demonology is so utterly unhinged and eager to please, that it easily justifies the price of admission to V/H/S/2 on its own.

Epy Kusnandar is Father, the charismatic leader of a reclusive Jim Jones style Indonesian cult. Kusnandar seems to relish every second of his screen time, bringing an intensity and menace to the role that is a joy to behold. There's a mesmerising quality to his patriarchal/hostile performance that made me believe that this diminutive man could really instill awe and fear in people.

The simple plot follows a documentary film crew into Father's labyrinthine, rural compound, where they hope to uncover the truth behind some disturbing reports of sexual abuse within the cult. I'm not gonna spoil the fun, so suffice it say that what follows is a gleefully sadistic, creepy and ultra-gory trip to Hell. Fans of over-the-top Satanic horror will have a blast with this.

So Safe Haven saves the day (while simultaneously destroying the world), and it's got me really looking forward to Tjahjanto's upcoming Killers and Evans' highly anticipated The Raid 2. More Indonesian mayhem please!

Goblin 2013

Last month the mighty Goblin came to Sydney and played the Metro. Seeing them was one of those real bucket list moments for me, and the show not only survived my high expectations, but totally blew my mind. Walking home afterwards with a few beers in me, I felt like a grinning, giddy fanboy. I had just seen fucking Goblin live, and not at some big festival, but in a small venue!

The lineup on this tour consisted of original members Claudio Simonetti, Maurizio Guarini and Massimo Morante. Joining them on bass and drums were two younger guys who I didn't recognise, but looking at their Wiki page it appears they might have been Bruno Previtali (bass) and Titta Tani (drums).

This lineup just killed it. Simonetti and Guarini, both on keyboards, delivered all those throbbing, spooky, atmospheric sounds and melodies that are etched into every horror fans brain, Claudio in particular handling his rig with style and elegance to spare. Guitarist Massimo Morante, looking every inch the tripped-out proto prog rocker, was on point too, and it was amazing seeing him play the eerie opening of "Suspiria" on a mandolin. Adding further atmosphere to proceedings, the band was joined on stage by local Theremin wizard Miles Brown for the Phenomena theme.

After hitting the stage to thunderous applause, they set the mood with a full rendition of 1976's Roller, which was cool, but after that the black leather gloves were slipped on, the gleaming straight razor was picked up, and the band got down to serious horror business. 

What followed was a selection of choice cuts from Deep Red, Suspiria, Tenebrae, Phenomena, Sleepless and Dawn Of The Dead, and it was pretty fucking rad my fiends. I have to admit, I kind of lost my shit a little when they played the stuff from Dawn ("L'alba Dei Morti Viventi" and "Zombi" if I remember correctly, but I was pretty drunk by that stage. Did they play "Oblio" too or did I just dream that?)

Goblin are hitting North America later this year. Don't miss them!

Photos: Chris Evans

EXHUMATION

O.K. I'm gonna take another stab at this blogging shit. 13 months after my last post everything is unfamiliar and alien looking. Is this the same new interface that everyone was complaining about around the time I quit, or has Blogger updated again since then? I have no idea, and it all feels like a long time ago (it was).

I've been lurking around some other squalid corners of the internet, but looking around here I'm happy to see that many of my old comrades in arms are still writing and thriving. As for myself, I lost interest for a while due to lack of time. Ironically, a return to health (two years in remission!) necessitated a return to the work force, which resulted in my having less time and energy for this kind of thing. Well, fuck that. We all need a creative outlet, and - shoddy as it may be - this is mine.

I always made this up as I went along, so I don't really know what I'll be doing, but my plan is to focus a little more on music now. The balance of cinematic to musical content might be closer to 50/50 I guess.

I've seen a lot of movies and listened to a lot of music in the last year, so I feel like I have a ton of stuff to get off my chest.

Just one more thing that I need to say right now. My review for Prometheus below, is utter shite (UPDATE: it was giving me the shits so much that I just deleted the post. TAKE THAT PROMETHEUS!). I'm a pretty obsessive fan of both Alien and Blade Runner and my expectations for Scott's return to science fiction were... too high. The disappointment that I felt at seeing it was akin to a body blow. It really stung. The review below was written during the denial stage of my post-Prometheus Kübler-Ross trip. I've since moved on to begrudging acceptance with a lingering hint of resentment. 

Yeah, fuck that movie.

Eye Candy

Austin, Texas' Fantastic Fest is one of a number of North American and European film festivals that I've long considered to be the hallowed epicentres of genre fandom. I don't know if I'll ever make it to a Sitges, FrightFest, Fantasia, Midnight Madness, Toronto After Dark or Fantastic Fest, but I do know that as I read the programs for these legendary events each year I'll be filled with envy (and the usual longing for a bank account with more than three figures in it).

It's not all painful blue balls and a drool covered keyboard though, because every year Fantastic Fest does give me one thing that I can really appreciate... a nifty poster. Be it Kaiju, Cthulhu or tentacled alien demons, each year's poster is guaranteed to make me peer closely at my laptop screen and murmur "rad" under my breath.

I love the continuing motif of the cyclopean eye, but that in every other way each design is completely distinct from the others, both in illustrative style and palette. My favourite up to this point was the '09 poster featuring a very fucked up looking psychedelic demon... but I think this year's Mayan apocalypse design is the coolest yet.

Here's every FF poster going back to 2006, just in case you missed any. I couldn't find one for '05, the fest's inaugural year. Apologies to the artists for the lack of credits, it's late and I can't be bothered doing the research.

SFF 2012: Killer Joe

William Friedkin is a maniac.

It's a sad fact that as they get older, many great directors seem to lose the fire that once made their more youthful works so incendiary. Well, if Killer Joe is any indication of Friedkin's current psyche, it's proof positive that once vital directors can not only rediscover that flame, but reignite it into an explosive bonfire.

At 77 years young, Friedkin has made a film that many of today's Young Turks would do well to take heed of. Where 2006's Bug showed great promise, and an obvious desire to continue to grow as an artist, Killer Joe is, without reservation, a resounding success.

It shares an obvious kinship with other southern redneck thrillers like the Coen's Blood Simple (there's some Wild At Heart/Blue Velvet era Lynch at play here too), yet not once does it feel recycled or predictable. Killer Joe is wholly it's own beast... and what a depraved, blood-thirsty beast it is. This is black humour so utterly dark, that the only way I can describe it is Nihilist Comedy.

Speaking of which, it is without a doubt the funniest movie I've seen in a long time. When I wasn't picking my jaw up off the ground, during one of it's many completely insane what-the-fuck moments, I was just laughing my ass off (as was the rest of the packed audience... the entire theatre was roaring with approval). Thomas Haden Church in particular is hysterically funny. I was in stitches at almost every line he delivered.


Matthew McConaughey is pretty amazing in this. "Creepy" doesn't begin to describe his performance, and he joins Willem Dafoe's Bobby Peru as one of the most vile, menacing redneck villains of all time. Gina Gershon blew my socks off too. People always talk about "gutsy" performances, but hers here is the real deal. There's a lengthy scene in this that I can only imagine was very unpleasant for her to perform. You'll know it when you see it.

Then there's the violence. And the sex. And the shocking, horribly uncomfortable, sexualised violence. And Gina Gershon's bush. Killer Joe pulls no punches, and it's not hard to see why the MPAA gave it an NC-17 rating for "graphic aberrant content involving violence and sexuality, and a scene of brutality." Suffice it to say, you'll never look at KFC the same again (not that you should look at KFC anyway, it's gross).

The US distributor of this film should be applauded for refusing to bend over for the MPAA, choosing instead to support Friedkin's violent, nihilistic vision... no doubt at the expense of a larger take at the box office. Because of this, I encourage everyone to get out and support this one if it happens to come to your town. You won't regret it.

We just don't see many American movies like this one any more.

SFF 2012: Rampart

In Oren Moverman's Rampart, Woody Harrelson gives the performance of his career as Dave Brown, a late '90s L.A. cop whose modus operandi on the street is brutality and corruption, without the slightest twinge of conscience or remorse. This pig is so morally bankrupt that the Bad Lieutenant would probably rat him out to internal affairs.

If you thought Harrelson was menacing in Natural Born Killers, wait 'til you see him in this. The menace here is more internalised, but it never lets up for a second of his screen time, boiling away just below the surface, ratcheting up the tension to uncomfortable levels. It's a cliche, but Harrelson's officer Brown really is a walking time bomb. A spring loaded trap of barely controlled rage, imminent violence and universal hatred. In his own words:

"I am not a racist. Fact is, I hate all people equally."

Homophobe, misogynist, racist... this cop proudly wears his poisonous beliefs like a badge of honour. The trouble is, everyone around him is finally reaching the extent of their tolerance for his behaviour... and officer Dave Brown isn't heeding the warnings.

Rampart is an outstanding example of classic L.A. noire, solidly anchored by a sharp, caustic screenplay by James Ellroy - almost certainly his best to date (remember, he wrote the source novel for L.A. Confidential, not the screenplay). Harrelson deserves awards for this, but he isn't the only one to shine: Sigourney Weaver is also at the top of her game here in a relatively small part, and it's obvious that she's going to remain a force to reckon with as she moves into her senior years. The other star of this movie is the cinematography by Bobby Bukowski, which is just impossibly beautiful. Through his lens, the City of Angels has never looked better.

Rampart is powerful stuff. Highly recommended.

SFF 2012: Despite The Gods

Penny Vozniak's documentary Despite The Gods sits comfortably beside its brethren Lost in La Mancha and Hearts Of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse as a fascinating and poignant portrait of a passionate filmmaker struggling against the odds to achieve their dream. Except sometimes that struggle ends in something like Apocalypse Now, and sometimes it ends in... Hisss.

The film follows Jennifer Lynch's first foray into filmmaking since 2008's Surveillance (which was awarded Best Picture at Sitges), an Indian/American co-production called Hisss (with a working title of Nagin: The Snake Woman), which was shot entirely on location in India. Lynch is out of her element in an unfamiliar culture, and an even less familiar film industry, and it quickly becomes evident that she is struggling to cope with the pressures and stresses of this new environment. The production seems to be foundering from the very outset, and things only go from bad to worse as Lynch continues to slog through a grueling shoot that lasts many months.

Despite The Gods is often laugh-out-loud funny, providing a welcome counterbalance to the constant feeling that everything you're seeing on screen is about to implode in a very ugly way. I found Lynch to be very likable, in a good-humoured, self-deprecating sort of way. At the beginning of the film she speaks candidly of the cruelty she suffered at the hands of the press in the wake of Boxing Helena, and the tough years that followed, when amongst other things she cleaned houses for a living. Perhaps most poignantly, she also discusses her obviously painful memories of the time following her father's greatest failure, Dune (coincidentally his third feature too), when "he didn't speak for a year". Her fear of failure whilst recounting this is palpable and moving, and again, greatly endeared her to me.

As a consumer, it's easy to take the whole process of filmmaking for granted, so it's good to be reminded by documentaries like this that your two hours of enjoyment are often the end result of thousands of hours of painful, difficult and thankless toil for the cast and crew. Succeed or fail: hats off to them all.

Sydney Film Festival 2012

The SFF has kicked off for another year, and this time around I'll be posting a few quick capsule reviews of some of the films I see.

Unfortunately the fest got off to a lousy start for me when the screening of Maury and Bustillo's Livide turned out to be a complete fiasco. A word to the French distributors who provided the print: next time you send a film to a festival in a non-French speaking country, you might want to consider sending a print WITH FUCKING SUBTITLES. It was a theatre-full of righteously pissed off patrons who exited the screening five minutes into the film... but none more so than me. I've been dying to see this film for two years now, so needless to say I was LIVID with rage. Sorry.

Back tomorrow with reviews of Despite The Gods and Rampart!