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Another Hole in the Head: 7 NIghts of Sci Fi, Fantasy and Horror
June 9-15
2p-12a
$10
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If the myriad traumas of daily life in the big city get to be too
much, and it seems like only neuron-shattering screams or a trip to
an alternate universe will ease your mind, then Another Hole in the
Head Film Festival is just what the mad doctor ordered. Once again
HeadFest presents the finest in contemporary horror, horror-comedy,
sci-fi and dark fantasy with more than 30 films from America and
abroad, all the mayhem that fits on a celluloid print.
Closing Night, a gut wrencher, oops, I mean a belly-buster
After eight days of cinema fantastique, the Festival comes to a gut-
wretching close with FEED, the latest film from Brett Leonard, lauded
director of THE LAWNMOWER MAN and MAN THING. Phillip is a hotshot
cyber-crime investigator who one day - while policing the underbelly
of the Internet amidst the usual porn and pedophiles - finds a
suspicious website of "feeders" and "gainers" - the weird world of
fat erotica, a sexual subculture where fat admiring men ("feeders")
seek out obese women ("gainers"). It seems the last "gainer"
mysteriously disappeared after hitting 600 pounds. Phillip tracks
down the site to Toledo, and heads to Ohio. Pushed over the edge and
alone, and as the truly monstrous nature of what the "feeder" is
doing emerges, Phillip becomes an avenger beyond the call of duty -
and sanity.
A frightful foursome of World Premieres
HoleHead is pleased to present the world premiere showings of four
fantastically dark and sometimes funny new films. With DEFENCELESS: A
BLOOD SYMPHONY, Australian underground master Mark Savage offers one
of the most extreme examples of horror cinema - a dialogue-free tale
of brutal revenge that springs from a watery grave. Acclaimed indie
filmmaker Michael Hurst (THE DARKROOM, HOUSE OF THE DEAD 2) crafts a
supernatural hospital-themed thriller complete with sexy nurses
welding gigantic hypos in ROOM 6. With STARSLYDERZ, former SFSU film
student Garrin Vincent helms an incredibly lo-budget, drugged out sci-
fi tale of buggery in space, featuring a soundtrack from Santa Cruz's
Estradasphere. In an old school camp-o-rama blood fest, IndieFest
alumnus Jay Lee (NOON BLUE APPLES, THE AFFAIRS OF GOD), returns to
slash, drown, spear, rip, squish and burn people with the horror-
comedy romp THE SLAUGHTER.
Gothic thrillers and ghostly horror - many reasons to lock the door
behind you
Sometimes you naively read an ancient spell out loud, you
optimistically talk to a insane stranger or you innocently travel to
the countryside for a well-needed rest - whatever the reason for
impending doom, HeadFest proffers a potent pile of Gothic thrillers
and ghostly horror tales to keep you alert and on the edge of your seat.
With BROKEN, British filmmakers Adam Mason and Simon Boyes craft a
relentlessly dark and disturbing tale that pits a young mother
against a vicious and sadistic sociopath in the heart of a dark and
endless forest. Don't be mislead by the title of Todd Kniss' BLOOD
DEEP, it is not an over-the-top gore-fest, instead it is a smartly
plotted, stylishly filmed gothic thriller set in small-town America -
with a healthy dollop of bloody mayhem and more than a few surprises.
Based on the novel by award-winning horror writer Jack Ketchum
(Ladies Night), Chris Sivertson's THE LOST weaves the bleak beauty of
BADLANDS, the teen tension of THE RIVER'S EDGE and the brutality of
STRAW DOGS into a tangled web of sex, drugs, and serious violence. In
THE HAMILTONS, local filmmaking wunderkind The Butcher Brothers spin
the twisted tale of an almost picture-perfect American family -
siblings who have recently relocated to a quaint town in Northern
California but cannot help kidnapping and torturing the neighbors.
Three college friends reunite at a funeral, and accidentally invoke
an old-time curse leading to a month of ghastly supernatural
visitations in Mike Mendez's THE GRAVEDANCERS. Brian Avenet-Bradley
offers a contemporary ghost story that will scare the hell out of you
in DARK REMAINS. If creepy, grotesque ghost stories are your thing,
then check out Mark Duffield's directorial debut, GHOST OF MAE NAK, a
contemporary remake of an ancient Thai fable that features a female
ghost with a huge hole in her head that uses all of modern Bangkok as
her weapon. Speaking of the supernatural, Andrew Leman's THE CALL OF
CTHULHU, based on the story by H. P. Lovecraft, is a black & white
silent epic about a young man who discovers an ancient race of
dormant creatures as well as strange cult goings-on around the globe.
Two rarely screened hirsute classics arise from the dark and shaggy
vaults
For a brief period in the late 1970s European art film collided with
two disparate genres, exploitation cinema and hardcore pornography.
Banned all over the world and mostly unseen for 25 years, Polish
director Walerian Borowczyk's infamous THE BEAST (1975) is one of
these deliriously delicious cinematic hybrids. The Fest is proud to
screen a brand-new uncensored 35mm English-subtitled print of this
notorious exploration of the underlying mythology of Beauty and the
Beast. Featuring a giant hairy monster with a huge erection pursuing
a nubile young woman through the forest for sex, the film was
originally conceived as only a segment of the director's better
known, and widely seen, IMMORAL TALES. Borowczyk expanded the idea
into a feature length exploration of the decaying European upper
class, politics, perversion, and animal husbandry. Borowczyk died of
heart failure in February of this year and we believe THE BEAST is a
fitting tribute to the director who went on to sexploitation fame
with such genre classics as EMMANUELLE 7: THE STREETWALKER and SEX
LIFE IN A CONVENT.
Also set for a special revival screening is John Boorman's 1974
stoned sci-fi classic ZARDOZ, the story of how - in the future -
Ireland and the world may be saved by one man (Sean Connery in all
his hairy glory, sporting only a tiny Speedo). The year is 2293, and
Earth has been divided into two distinct camps. The Brutals are a
race of crude, violent people who live in a desolated area known as
the Outlands. Their population is kept under control by an elite
group of killers known as the Exterminators. The Exterminators
worship a pagan god called Zardoz who comes to them in the form of a
giant stone head that floats into their domain and spews guns and
ammunition out of its mouth. One of the Exterminators, Connery,
begins to question his faith in Zardoz and stows away inside the
mouth of the giant head to see where it will take him.
Two more revivals: a director's cut, and a gem of pyschedelia
Julian Richards is best known for his disturbingly funny cannibalism
mockumentary, THE LAST HORROR MOVIE. HeadFest is delighted to unveil
the director's cut of DARKLANDS, Richards' extremely rare debut film
from 1996. Set in the industrial wastelands of Wales, DARKLANDS
follows a journalist as he investigates the mysterious death of his
friend's brother.
Bruce Kessler's SIMON: KING OF THE WITCHES is a rarely-seen and never
released on DVD 1971 indie underground gem starring Andrew Prine
(Barn of the Naked Dead). In psychedelic California, Simon is a
cynical warlock who lives in a storm sewer and wants to rule the
World and soon has a series of misadventures with rain, a floating
red light, pot dealers, evil Wiccans who don't like to be teased (led
by Ultra Violet), and a big tree.
Trifecta from the East, tantalizing and terrifying
From Japan comes RAMPO NOIR. Akio Jissoji and Hisayasu Sato, two of
Japanese cinema's most extreme and visually expressive cinematic
reprobates, join newcomers Suguru Takeuchi and Atsushi Kanekoto to
craft surreal and often disturbing adaptations of four classic
stories by Edogawa Rampo, the literary architect who established the
foundations of modern Japanese mystery and horror novels. RAMPO NOIR
is the Festival's Opening Night selection on June 9. The fun
continues with an after-0party at The Legion of Decency (address tba
at the film screening).
Also from Japan is Yudai Yamaguchi and Junichi Yamamoto's MEATBALL
MACHINE, a cyberpunk romance about two lonely factory workers who
while experiencing the first blush of love have their lives altered
forever as tiny annoying aliens invade the earth.
South Korea presents Young Man Kang's THE LAST EVE, possibly the
world's first avant-garde theological martial arts love story.
Combining stories from the Bible with time-traveling, kick-ass Muay
Thai fighting, sexy evil seductresses, severed genitals, planetary
death by comet, and kung-fu demons THE LAST EVE is a wonder to behold.
Back from the dead and ready to feed on your head
Reportedly the first zombie movie from Greece, Yorgos Noussias's EVIL
is a contemporary re-working of DAWN OF THE DEAD. The delirious low-
budget splatter fest provides just enough plot and characterization
to deliver blood-drenched action, and hugely satisfying, lip-smacking
zombie fare. A plague of hungry walking dead try to eat a group of
random strangers in downtown Athens. They must band together to
combat the flesh-eating hordes. Also on the Fest slate is Nick
Poppy's short-mockumentary ZOMBIE-AMERICAN. Starring Ed Helms from
the The Daily Show, this plea for tolerance, aims to clear up many of
the terrible stereotypes and misconceptions we have about zombies and
myriad challenges they face in today's society.
Extra Curricular activities could get messy with "The Texas Chainsaw
Massacres: Live"
When your throat is soar from screaming and your knees get tired from
knocking it's time to head over to "The Texas Chainsaw Massacres:
Live" on June 14 at CellSpace. HeadFest is co-presenting a special
preview of this original play inspired by both actual historical
events of the Seventies as well as classic horror movies like the
original TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE and A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET.
Filled with loud chainsaws chaotic screaming, multiple
dismemberments, and an extraordinary amount of blood, "The Chainsaw
Massacres: Live" promises a heart-pounding good time. The Whiskey
Dick Darryls provide live music beforehand, followed by a raffle
drawing to award a lucky few the chance to get on stage and be a part
of the show. "The Chainsaw Massacres" continues a limited run at
CellSpace from June 29 through July 7.
----/ Venue Info /------------------------------------------------------
Roxie Cinema
3117 16th St
SF
----/ Additional Info /-------------------------------------------------
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
415.820.3907
http://www.sfindie.com
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