fling93 loves fishies

Cinequest, Mindbenders

For those of you in the Bay Area (specifically, the South Bay), you probably know that Cinequest has started again. It’s a great film festival with tons of quality independent (maverick, they like to call it) flicks to choose from. I went to a whole bunch of them last year, and my favorites included Kuutamolla (Lovers and Leavers) and Den Osynlige (The Invisible) (Tuva Novotny appears again this year in Slim Susie).

This year, Ealasaid has a Cineblog 2004 site up, and, unlike me, is a professional movie reviewer, so she got to prescreen many of the films and review them, including a review of Spectres, which features Marina Sirtis (Troi from Star Trek: The Next Generation) and Dean Haglund (the member of the Lone Gunmen from The X-Files who looked like Garth from Wayne’s World).

The wife and I went with a friend last night to see the collection of short films they call Mindbenders, which are shorts that bend reality. The last time I caught it was two years ago, and more of them had a sci-fi flavor. This year the collection was more surreal. It airs again tonight (March 5th) at 11:15PM at Camera 3 in downtown San Jose (park at the garage at 3rd St. & San Carlos, which is right on top of the theatre, plus it’s free for evenings and weekends — the parking, not the theatre), so if you’re interested, here are my thoughts:

As usual, the collection of shorts had some winners and losers.

Elegy (dir. Jeffrey Travis)

The filmmakers had two weeks to come up with a rhyming film about a clown doing magic, and they came up with this, a pretty dark tale. I thought it was pretty good for two weeks, but the rhyming annoyed me. My wife really liked it, though that may have had more to do with the fact that she got more bored and irritated as the night wore on (Mindbenders really aren’t her thing).

Apotheosis (dir. Janet Wondra)

I was not impressed by this pretty simple tale of obsessive, unrequited love shot to look like an old classic film. The subpar acting really hurt it, and the incessant whistling didn’t help. My wife didn’t like it either, but my friend appreciated it.

Kerst (dir. Andrew Awes)

A well-made and clever little film about a hypnotherapy session gone awry. A great ending twist, and the title is more than just the main character’s name. We all liked this one.

Pol Pot’s Birthday (dir. Talmage Cooley)

Absurdist hilarity, and very well executed. It helps to know that Pol Pot was the genocidal dictator (the “killing fields”) who led the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. My friend didn’t get the humor, though.

Big Nose Baby (dir. Lee Miller)

Um, what the fuck? A home movie of a dog. And Miller is trying to pass this off as a short film? Doesn’t Cinequest have standards?

Tackle Box (dir. Matthew Mebane)

Starts out like it’s going to be sentimental and sappy, and then, in bizarre fashion (as befitting a Mindbender), goes somewhere else entirely. One of the better films, although the orchestral music was way over-the-top. My wife and I liked it, but my friend wasn’t as fond of it.

What About the Bodies? (dir. Simon Ellis)

Well, it’s really gross. If you can get past that, this is an absolutely hilarious film with lotsa surprises.

Back (dir. Sam Toy)

This one makes you think a bit about what it meant moreso than most of the others. It’s also a great-looking film. Solid production and great acting, and a surreal storyline. The main problem was that it’s too repetitive. The same series of events happens to two sets of people, and they could have greatly shortened the second depiction. My wife was really irritated by it, and also didn’t get what happened until I explained it. Of course, she was irritated and bored at this point and wanted to leave.

Parallel Passage (dir. Mandi Riggi)

Also a great-looking film, but I was not very impressed with this one. It seemed to care more about looking good than telling a story. I didn’t find the twist all that surprising, and the nudity seemed awfully gratuitous. My wife absolutely hated it. Don’t remember what my friend thought.

The Three of Us (dirs. Nirvan Mullick, Benjamin Goldman)

A real trippy and surreal stop-motion animated short that reminded me a lot of a Tool video (I love Tool’s videos), albeit not as dark. Not much of a plot, though, so I seemed to be the only one who appreciated it.

Note, All in All (dir. Torbjørn Skårild) was not shown. Overall, it was a pretty good collection, but not the strongest. Anyway, it airs again tonight (March 5th) at 11:15PM at Camera 3. You can actually sample a few of the shorts from Cinequest’s Mindbenders page.

Tonight, we’ll probably watch Awful Normal at 7:15 PM.

Update 3/12/04

We did see Awful Normal, liked it, and have a review of it here. I wasn’t so fond of Spectres, which I reviewed here.