Vexille

Sunday Sept 9th
11:59pm
Ryerson

It's the not-to-distant future. 20 years ago Japan opted out of a global treaty to not do crazy crap with technology, re-isolating itself from the world 300 years after the British opened up her ports with ship's cannons.

Now a UN or NATO or something task force, S.W.O.R.D has to break in to Japan to apprehend an officer of a shadowy mega corporation, what will they find? Has Japan gone all crazy with technology? Will westerners have to intervene to save Japan from herself? Is there a lesson we could perhaps apply to today's situation? Will we see the same stupid giant metal desert worms over and over and over and over again? Yes.

The best thing about this movie was the soundtrack.

George A. Romero's Diary Of The Dead

Saturday Sept 8th
11:59pm
Ryerson

So this is a Romero zombie movie. There's a zombocalypse, there are these kids, they drive around country roads, they go in creepy deserted buildings, there are gory deaths and zombie splatternation, also a deaf Amish guy, it's pretty great.

Early in the film, the characters are shooting a mummy movie in the woods, and one of the crew complains "it's just a stupid monster movie" and the film school teacher retorts "ah, but with an undertone of social commentary" har har har. I found this one a little too heavy handed. ZOMG, TEH MAIN$TREAM MEDIA IS DEAD, OR IS IT ITSELF A ZOMBIE? WE NEED TO GET ON THE YOUTUBES AND BECOME THE MEDIA OURSELVES, IT'S THE ONLY WAY TO GET THE TRUTH OUT THERES!

Also, weirdly, the zombie special effects in this were too good for my tastes. Zombie movies are about ridiculous completely over the top gore, but when it's hyper realistic CG over the top gore, it's not as much fun as when there's a guy standing behind the zomb-actor with a squeeze bag full of stage blood.

Frontiere(s)

Friday September 7th
11:59 pm
Ryerson

I'm pretty worried about France. You remember a while ago when there were riots and young men burning cars in the streets of Paris? That sort of thing doesn't just happen overnight, there has to be a long period of quiet unrest before something like that bubbles up.

Anyway Frontieres is a movie about Muslim immigration to France, and the extreme right-wing backlash. Of course, because it's a midnight madness movie, this takes the form of a carfull of young crooks fleeing to a house in the country, where they find a throwback family of Nazi freaks and they all get in to a gory Texas Chainsaw Massacre style confrontation in the mines and toolsheds beneath the farm.

The Mother Of Tears

Thursday September 6th
11:59pm
Ryerson

The real opening night gala. This was a crazy supernatural gore-horror about witches descending on modern day Rome because someone unwisely opened an ancient urn. The first death of this years Midnight Madness program was a disembowelment by demons, then strangulation with entrails for good measure, a good omen for the rest of the festival.

Hollywood Chinese

Thursday September 6th
8:15 pm
Varsity

This was a neat little documentary tracing the portrayal of the Chinese peoples in film from the beginning of cinema and the experience of real Chinese actors and "yellowface" actors up to the present day. Some really great anecdotes and life stories.

The Q&A after the film was just embarrassing for Toronto. Only three questions were asked, the first was just a weird rambling non question, the second was a good question, but was asked too quietly, so the director didn't really hear it and thus didn't answer it, and the third person just started talking and kept on talking, with no question in sight, until literally shouted down by the audience.