DAY 1 – Wednesday 30th April
We arrived in Rio in time for breakfast and then proceeded to chill out in the hotel until later. We received our invitation to the opening screening of George A Romero’s DIARY OF THE DEAD, which was the only theatrical screening the film will receive in Brazil. It was screened in Rio’s Cine Odeon BR, a gorgeous 1930’s Art Deco cinema which had been restored in recent years.
As it was the second time I’d seen Diary, I’m pleased to say I enjoyed it more a second time. The central characters are still annoying, but seeing it with 400 excitable Brazilian zombie fans somehow made it all make sense.
Afterwards, we went for drinks with the festival team, who have been very kind and accommodating since we arrived. Everyone is really keen to tell me how much they love Harvest, which means a great deal to me. The screening is on Friday at 7pm, so we will see how it goes down. We’re screening before Italian gorefest LAST HOUSE IN THE WOODS, which I’ve not seen, so it should be great.
Tomorrow is a strong selection of movies, including MULBERRY ST, AUTOMATONS, TIMECRIMES and a selection of Riofan shorts. I can’t wait.
DAY 2 – Thursday 1st May
Kicking off the day was Jim Mickle’s MULBERRY STREET, which I had seen at Dead By Dawn 2007. I wasn’t especially taken with the film when I saw it then, but a second viewing revised my opinion. The film is a quality, low-budget debut with impressive camerawork and performances and shows what can be achieved with a little ingenuity.
AUTOMATONS is a similarly low-budget but completely different sort of beast, from Larry Fessenden’s Glass Eye Pix. An amalgam of fifties sci-fi, German expressionism and experimental techniques, it tells the story of two warring factions of humans and their robot soldiers. Though not exactly a success at all times, it manages to create a bleak mood, not dissimilar to the early works of Darren Aronofski and David Lynch and uses a combination of video and film to capture the film’s dystopian atmosphere.
The selection of RIOFAN SHORTS I saw were really strong, including IN THE WALL, starring Erin Brown (Sick Girl) in a riff on The Tell Tale Heart, PREMATURE, which left me a little disappointed but had some really striking visuals (including some goop seeping out of walls which was gross) and closing off with Phil Mucci’s THE LISTENING DEAD and SNIP, which reaches new levels of grossness.
DAY 3 – FRIDAY 2nd MAY
The day has arrived for the World Premiere of my film HARVEST. It seems that today is British horror day, with screenings of THE VANGUARD and THE ZOMBIE DIARIES preceding my film.
After a short introduction from RIOFAN programmer Fernando, I gave a short introduction to the film. I was relieved to see that the Digibeta of the film looks great, and the film seemed to be well-received, with a short applause after the credits.
As mentioned previously, we screened with THE LAST HOUSE IN THE WOODS, a very gory Italian homage to Texas Chainsaw Massacre, with high quality effects by Sergio Stivaletti. The film occasionally descends into too much homage, but there are some entertaining gags.
After the screening several people complemented me on the film, with one saying she wished it was longer and that she thought it was better than Last House. There is apparently a review of the screening online on a blog (in Portugese) so the festival guys are going to translate it for me…
After my screening, we stayed around for screenings of Pakistani zombie film HELL’S GROUND and BLOOD CAR, a very peculiar indie horror comedy about a guy who converts his car to run on human blood due to a fuel drought,
Following the films, we went on for a late dinner and then to a club that amongst other things was playing Arctic Monkeys, Kaiser Chiefs and Depeche Mode. I travel all the way to Rio and go to a club and they’re playing Arctic Monkeys. I can’t escape those bastards…
DAY 4 – Saturday 3rd May
After getting home at 6.45am, a few hours sleep was much needed. Flash forward to 3pm and I got up, ready for a double bill of movies in the evening.
The short that won the Cutting Edge film competition at Dead By Dawn, Richard Gale’s CRITICIZED was first. This film is fantastic, a highly effective tale of a film critic’s violent torture at the hands of a disgruntled filmmaker whose film he trashed.
Seeing it a second time, I still can’t figure out how they did some of the effects. Suffice to say that there is some ocular trauma in this film that Fulci would be proud of.
Sadly, technical hitches meant that JACK BROOKS: MONSTER SLAYER could not be shown until later, so Chilean actioner MIRAGE MAN was shown in its place. I had considered catching this film in one of its other screening slots, but I’m so glad that I did manage to see it. One of the freshest movies I’ve seen in a long time, MIRAGE MAN tells the tale of a young man who takes it upon himself to become a masked avenger to fight crime on the streets of Santiago. The fact that he is just an ordinary guy (albeit a hard-as-nails one) keeps the audience gripped as there is no guarantee he will prevail. The action sequences are brilliantly choreographed and are scored with wonderfully retro tunes, evoking the memory of the 1970s Spiderman TV series.
By the time the technical problems had been sorted out, I was a little tired and I have to say that JACK BROOKS was a bit of a disappointment. I have a feeling I dozed off a little bit, which is a shame as I was looking forward to this one. If it comes around on a festival or DVD at home I’ll probably give it another shot, but on first viewing it was quite slow to get going at the beginning and was quite corny in places. The general consensus is that this will win the competition, but for me, either MIRAGE MAN, TIMECRIMES or END OF THE LINE should win ahead of JACK BROOKS.
As the only film on Sunday’s schedule I wanted to see was MIRAGE MAN, I am taking the opportunity to do some sightseeing tomorrow and picking up the festival baton again on Monday. Getting up early and then staying out until 6.30am takes its toll after a while so I reckon Sunday should be a quiet one…
DAY 5 - Sunday 4th May
Today we took the opportunity to do a little sightseeing, and took a day off from the fest. We took in a meal at a local barbeque restaurant in the evening and ate every conceivable type of meat which was an experience.
DAY 6 - Monday 5th May
As the deadline for Fantasia in Montreal is today, and the fine folks at RIOFAN offered to help send HARVEST via their Fed Ex account to get it in as close to the deadline as possible. It was quite expensive but the Fantasia guys have been in touch too to say that as long as the film is with them within the week then it’ll be fine.
The only movie I saw today was END OF THE LINE. Having seen the film at DEAD BY DAWN 2007, I already knew I liked Maurice Deveraux’s tale of religious nutballs on the Montreal subway system, but a second viewing confirmed it. I adore this movie. It’s the sort of film I dream of making some day. And to date there is no DVD release anywhere in the world. WTF?
DAY 7 – Tuesday 6th May
This morning we opted for a tour of two of Rio’s most famous attractions – Corcovado Mountain (the location of the statue of Christ the Redeemer) and Sugarloaf Mountain (with its precarious-looking cable cars which were featured in 70’s Bond cheese-fest MOONRAKER)
Today has been our hottest day so far, and one of the clearest, which was a bonus as the statue of Jesus that looms over the city is virtually impossible to see on a cloudy or misty day. Today was fine though, and the incredible views were all around.
In typical geek fashion, when the sun is shining, I choose to sit in a darkened room watching movies. Today was no exception and I opted for a double bill of Austrian and American horror. Unfortunately, this double bill was the first disappointment of the festival.
First off, I went to a 3pm screening of ON EVIL GROUNDS. I hadn’t expected to have the benefit of subtitles on this one (as most foreign language films in the fest are subtitled in Portuguese only) but thankfully it did. Sadly, it didn’t help the film, which I found to be an uneasy mix of horror and comedy that is neither funny nor scary. A pre-credits sequence with the lead character puking violently all over the floor sets out the film’s mission statement from the off, but the promising premise of a couple of psychos who kidnap a couple who turn out to be as deranged as they are was wasted at every turn.
The second film in this theatre of disappointment was TRAILER PARK OF TERROR. The basic story is a young woman living in the titular trailer park makes a deal with the devil, kills all her fellow residents and then torches the place. From then on the trailer park is cursed and becomes a hellpit of cannibalistic redneck zombies. Sounds good, yeah? Well it’s not.
The opening sequence of lead character Norma’s fall from grace via a spot of violent revenge is the only highlight in this cheap-looking mess of a movie. The arrival of a busload of problem teens on their way to Jesus camp only serves to make the film more annoying. When they arrive at the trailer park from hell and accept the offer to stay over, it’s only a matter of time before they’re getting offed in various ways. Musical interludes from a rockabilly blues-riffing zombie bubba also irritate.
Basically, you know you’re in trouble when the best thing you can say about a movie is that the lead actress sort of looks like Jamie Priestley.
After that we went for dinner and then I headed back to Estacao Botafogo to meet the festival directors for some post screening drinks.
DAY 8 – Wednesday 7th May
The late nights are beginning to catch up with me, so I opted for a long lie in to rest up in preparation for tonight’s Mojica screening.
Jose Mojica Marins was a director I was aware of in the world of weird cinema, but until now I didn’t know about how huge he is in his native Brazil.
Via his alter ego of Ze De Caixao (Coffin Joe), Mojica has established himself as a real-life bogeyman, striking fear into the hearts of Brazilian people since the 1960’s. I’ve now seen first hand how terrified of him the older generation are, and also how loved by younger generations he is at the same time.
Tonight’s screening of his first horror film AT MIDNIGHT I’LL TAKE YOUR SOUL was the first of two tribute screenings in conjunction with receiving a lifetime achievement award from the festival.
And that was it. My first (and hopefully not last) taste of having my work screened in an international film festival. It was an incredible experience and if I can afford it, I'll hopefully be back next year for RIOFAN 2009.
