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Fantastic Fest 2023: 100 YARDS: A Grand, Character-Based Martial Arts Epic
The Chinese film industry in recent years has not really been putting out stuff that compels me in the ways that the glorious golden age of Hong Kong cinema used to. Between the government censoring the kinds of ideas and styles that can really be explored and the push towards massive blockbuster cinema that can be sold globally, I’ve been more often than not put off by tons of GCI, superheroic antics, and the like. Call me old fashioned, but I’m simply more interested in seeing grand and gorgeous stories from the Chinese film industry. Some of those massive epics they’re cranking out are actually quite good, but it took something like 100 Yards to come along to remind me of what I love about Chinese martial arts movies.
Loaded to the gills with talent that I’m frankly not super familiar with, 100 Yards feels exciting as a calling card (at least for me) for the talent involved. Written and co-directed by Xu Haufeng, it turns out my unfamiliarity with Haufeng is not for lack of accomplishment, but rather simply my own ignorance. 100 Yards was also co-directed by someone named Xu Junfeng, who has no presence on IMDb, but Haufeng came up as a novelist and writer (The Grandmaster) who began directing movies years back. 100 Yards certainly displays the clarity and confidence of a filmmaker who has something to say with his characters and a knack for dynamic, clean, classic martial arts sequences.
The film is quite sprawling, with a bit of a Game Of Thrones vibe in its obsession with succession and control of various houses. We meet Jacky Cheung’s Young Master and Andy On’s Apprentice early on when their father and master, respectively, tasks them to duel at his deathbed for control of their martial arts school. This will be the first of seemingly dozens of duels, interspersed with trickery, politics, lessons learned, and romantic melodrama. I’d be disingenuous if I claimed to understand everything that was going on in this 1915-set tale, as it felt like lots of very time period and culture specific things were happening that my western ass isn’t informed enough to have all the context for. But that shouldn’t scare fellow westerners away because I’m here to tell you that the story is loaded with strong characters and twists and turns and keeps you invested even if you might not catch it all.
There’s not really a villain in 100 Yards. Jacky’s the heir apparent of the school, and Andy’s the top protege. At times the story seems to be about the “young master” learning about the real world out from under the protective eye of his father. At other times it seems to be about the “apprentice” discovering the final remaining secrets of a hidden martial arts form that is only spoken of in whispers. At other times the fairly prominent female roles in the film are explored and 100 Yards wrestles with not only the succession of the young master and apprentice but also the women in power in the martial arts circle and what they must do to preserve what they have.
What’s great about 100 Yards is it explores a whole bunch of potent human and societal issues all whilst whipping a ton of ass. I’ve been digging deep into classic Shaw Brothers titles for the last couple of years and while there’s virtually no end to the amount of martial arts prowess in those titles, gripping narratives are fewer and farther between. Here we aren’t just stringing together plot points to get to the next action set piece, but rather digging into a particular time and place and doing the “what to do now that the master has passed away” trope with a thoughtfulness and attention to character work that really matters. The action is clean, crisp, and cool as hell. But the characters are also fleshed out and more than simply embodiments of their martial arts styles. In the end our guys kind of settle into a new future and a new reality they’ve forged on their own, rather than simply inheriting what had come before. It just takes a dozen or so badass battles to get there.
And I’m Out.
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FANTASTIC FEST 2023: CONANN is a Queer Fantasy Epic through Bertrand Mandico’s Phantasmagorical Glitter Covered Lens
Easily one of my most anticipated films at this year’s Fantastic Fest was Bertrand Mandico’s follow up to the surreal lesbian acid western After Blue – Conann. His latest uses some of the same actors, settings and even characters, from his recent short Rainer, a Vicious Dog in a Skull Valley, that was the story of a stage director (Christophe Bier) producing a female version of Conan the Barbarian during the pandemic. Exploring similar themes of that short – what an artist will endure for their art – the director makes a pact with the humanoid dog faced demon Rainer, to get his play made and it doesn’t go well as things do when pacts with demons are made. This is the same demon that shows up in Conann, which could be interpreted in two ways – Conann is the meta theatrical adaptation of said play, or that the character of Rainer has a special interest in this specific subject and that is why he appeared to this particular director as well.
Conann begins in ancient Cimmeria as envisioned through Bertrand Mandico’s phantasmagorical black and white glitter covered lens. A 15 year old Conann (Claire Duburcq) is taken as a slave by a tribe of all female barbarians after her mother is killed in front of her by their leader, Sanja (Julia Riedler). When Sanja’s leather jacket clad dog faced advisor Rainer (Elina Löwensohn) takes a special interest in the young girl, seeing her as someone who will become the “most barbaric of all the barbarians”, he assists Conann to begin her ascendancy to power, documenting it with his ever present camera, a stark contrast to the more period fantasy medieval surroundings. There’s a lot to unpack here as the film’s first act comes to a close as Conann not only poisons Sonja’s regime of troops, but is then killed by her 25 year-old self.
While this particular kill easily signifies the death of innocence. Conann’s lust for power triggers a 10 year cycle of reinvention and reincarnation, every 10 years as she continues up the proverbial ladder. The film uses this aspect that each new Conann is played by a different age appropriate actor to explore a few metaphors, the most pertinent and obvious being the sacrifices forced upon a woman of oneself to rise to power in the patriarchy. When Conann finds love, she takes a reprieve from ancient Cimmeria and her quest for power in the Bronx in the late 90s. It’s here the film sheds a bit of its metaphorical baggage and takes on a more intimate and autobiographical point of view. After an accident, this Conann, who is a stuntwoman in this time, is laid up at home recuperating, when she is caught cheating on her significant other.
Conann is then forced to make a choice by Rainer, between her blood drenched glory still awaiting her, or love, which throws the rest of the film into a downward spiral with the story reaching the depths of hell. Conann’s perversions only grow from there, as the fantasy elements are used to expand or highlight particular metaphorical readings of the story. The film is as dense as it is lush, with each new iteration of Conann telling its own distinct story. You could easily just pull apart the five different Conann’s and derive a meaning for each woman’s life and cause for having to kill herself in continually grotesque and horrific ways. This vicious cycle continues until the film reaches its gut-turning pinnacle set piece that reaches back to the price an artist is willing to pay for his art. It’s here at the culmination of the film, that it shows how truly vicious and grotesque the cyclic nature of Conann’s existence has become.
Like its protagonist Conann is so much more brooding and ambitious than After Blue with Bertrand Mandico toying with time, narrative and character here in ways that multiply the interpretations of this tale the more you gaze into Conann’s infinite abyss. The visceral and captivating story is one of love, regret and art and the price paid for all three. It’s not a particularly easy pill to swallow, or pleasant to look at, but that’s kind of the point here, nothing is pleasant, and nothing is easy as it seems. My only hope after viewing Conann is that Bertrand Mandico has something equally or more impressive to cap this fantasy sci-fi trilogy off with, because bringing these two together could easily make this a queer work for the ages.
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Criterion Review: THE TRIAL
The piece below was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the art being covered in this piece wouldn’t exist.
Orson Welles’ staggering The Trial enters the Criterion Collection this week with a 4K UHD release as worthy of deep exploration as the film itself.
In one of the set’s supplements, Filming “The Trial”, Welles conducts a lengthy Q&A session at the University of Southern California. He fields questions from the mundane (“how much did the film cost?”) to the deeply personal and philosophical (talking about whether or not he believes in the existence of evil in the world). He proves to be the ultimate raconteur, mixing thoughtful answers with casual humor. Even the question about the budget, arguably the least interesting Q&A topic, elicits a compelling answer when Welles says he spent $80,000 of his own money and that he didn’t actually make anything on The Trial. One thing that comes up a couple times here and elsewhere throughout the release is Welles’ claim that The Trial is his best film. True or not, The Trial is as rewatchable and dense as anything Welles produced.
Beginning with one of the best opening sequences you’ll ever see, the film kicks off with the literal and figurative awakening of Josef K. (played by Anthony Perkins) as he is arrested for unnamed reasons. In a lengthy, circuitous conversation that grows increasingly harrowing, K finds himself entering a hellish descent with no escape. Throughout the picture K impotently rages against the bureaucratic machinery that can, and will, swallow up anybody at any time it so desires. In the Q&A, Welles says “I see monstrous bureaucracy as the villain of the piece,” and the cynicism inherent in that statement trickles down to the people that keep the machine running. The metaphor of a man waking up and immediately being subsumed is full of so much righteous anger that it practically pulsates through the screen. That verve drives K forward, propelling him deeper and deeper into a man made Hell from which there is only one escape.
By his own account, K is a rule follower, punching in, doing his work, punching out, then going to sleep in order to do it all over again. Early in the film K fondly describes the systemic hoops in place to keep the average person from getting to him. Like the average person he is, K is perfectly content getting along just to get along. Once he finds himself on the opposite side of that dynamic, he becomes a leper. K talks a lot throughout the film about following the rules, guidelines, procedures, and protocols, be it himself or other people. The futility of passivity has turned K, and us, into suckers dangling over the steels jaws of “the system.” The joke it of all being that we’ve been told all along that systems like the government or justice are in place to protect us and bring some sense of order to the world, when really the main purpose of “the system” is self-preservation.
Perkins is tremendous in the film, his tall and gangly body oozing with unease at all times. He plays K as a ball of nerves, and each revelation, conversation, and twist of the plot just knots him up even more. Clarity only brings more confusion and Perkins’ physicality is a perfect vessel for this. K doesn’t seem to fit in anywhere he goes, often literally. Welles frames K so that he towers over nearly everyone he encounters. Welles also uses tighter shots with K’s head nearly at the top of the frame, as if it’s closing in on him. In wider shots, K feels like a man floating through space. Both shots create a claustrophobic feeling. Welles simultaneously emphasizes the idea it’s impossible for K to fit in anywhere or exert any control over his situation. When K walks through never ending rooms or stands in the towering courtroom, he may as well be floating through space or the ocean.
I’ve seen The Trial a handful of times over the last couple weeks as I’ve tried to get my head around it to find something unique to say. The deeper into the movie I go, the more my head spins. That’s meant as a compliment, because Welles packs so much into the film that you can watch, examine, and excavate it as much as you want and still feel like you’re just scratching the surface. Being in over your skis with regard to The Trial practically makes it an interactive experience.
For those wanting to fully immerse themselves in the experience of The Trail, Criterion is happy to oblige. The highlight of the special features is the aforementioned Q&A, recorded in 1981, 20 years after the film’s release. The perspective Welles has on the film, adapting (and altering) Franz Kafka’s novel, and filmmaking in general is invaluable. The commentary track by Welles’ scholar Jospeh McBride is quite academic in terms of analysis and insight. As someone who spent a great deal of time with Welles, McBride only brings a uniquely personal perspective to him commentary. Rounding out the supplements are a pair of interviews with Welles, DP Edmond Richard, and actor Jeanne Moreau, as well as an essay by novelist Jonathan Lethem.
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FANTASTIC FEST 2023: WHEN EVIL LURKS is a Gleefully Grotesque Possession Flick
Demián Rugna’s gory latest diabolically plays by its own rules
Fantastic Fest is a titan of a genre film festival, and every year, my standouts tend to be the films that weaponize their genres by blending them to make something new and memorable. Several years ago, Demián Rugna shocked fest-goers with the wild ride of Terrified, which attempted to reinvent haunted house films and anthologies by focusing on a case of specters taking over an entire Buenos Aires neighborhood. Now, the Argentinean auteur returns with When Evil Lurks, a veritable kitchen-sink horror film that opens wearing inspirations like The Exorcist and Evil Dead on its sleeves before blowing the barn doors off our expectations of what a possession film can do and how it goes about doing so.
Set in a world that’s seemingly abandoned the idea of churches altogether in the wake of viral possessions, rancher brothers Pedro and Jimmy (Ezequiel Rodríguez and Demián Salomón) discover that an ailing neighbor has become one of “the rotten,” and that a professional exorcist has turned up very much bisected on the property. Trying to follow the rules of how to dispose of the possessed, the brothers and the landowner drag the rotten from their home and abandon him out in the remote countryside. However, Pedro’s attempts to protect his alienated family from the spread of evil instead bring possession to their doorstep…now, Pedro and Jimmy must run like hell before a fated apocalyptic conclusion threatens to swallow everything in its path.
Rugna’s nasty-as-hell followup to Terrified is a ruthless road movie that isn’t afraid to destroy anything in its path on the way to showing its audience a great time. Telegraphed via multiple early bloody curveballs, Rugna quickly decrees that almost nothing is sacred in When Evil Lurks–from the smallest animals and kids to the largest adults and vehicles. The scope of the film is also far greater than Terrified, quickly jettisoning a contained ranch locale for multiple packed neighborhoods, tucked away estates, and the creepiest rural school, all hinting at a larger universe that’s already tried and failed to reckon with the realities of demons running amok. To ground us, Rugna and his creative team efficiently establish the rules by which his characters attempt to live–namely how any direct acts of violence, especially using guns, against the “rotten” are forbidden, lest even more dire consequences occur. However, the sheer unpredictability of how effective these rules may be when combating said evil makes When Evil Lurks a supremely stressful watch–even as Rugna’s deliberate subversion results in some of the film’s most repulsive belly laughs.
Boy howdy, is When Evil Lurks hilarious in precisely the ways that’d make more polite society run screaming down the aisles. Elaborate sight gags involving axes, goats, cars, digested bodies, small children, dogs, and an even longer laundry list of victims and perpetrators offer anything in When Evil Lurks an equal opportunity for gleeful dismemberment. However, Rugna never loses sight of the emotional toll all of this madness is taking on his cast, especially Pedro. The greater his body count rises, the more unhinged yet determined Pedro becomes in the name of keeping those who are left safe from diabolical harm. With how seriously the violence in the film is taken, Rugna can have things both ways–in that the plentiful gore can reach Evil Dead levels of absurdity but still have a serious emotional impact on the characters it affects.
Upending myriad expectations regarding possession films and general decency, When Evil Lurks is a gut-churning good time that still manages to pack in a bitingly cynical emotional wallop. Rugna’s film is bleak and unrelenting, but it recognizes that nothing in a hopeless-as-hell universe can stop us from finding a dark chuckle among sheer chaos.
When Evil Lurks had its United States premiere at Fantastic Fest 2023. IFC Films will open the film in theaters on October 6th, followed by a streaming premiere on Shudder.
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Fantastic Fest 2023: ONE PERCENTER is Elite Self Aware Action Cinema
Could anyone on earth have beaten up Bruce Lee in his prime? Who was really the fastest gun in the west? Could my Dad have beaten up your Dad?!
These questions are both the stuff of legend, and the content of playground posturing among children.
And they’re the questions on the mind of writer/director Yûdai Yamaguchi as he spins his yarn in One Percenter. I can’t say for sure, but it feels like this is a project written specifically for star Tak Sakaguchi (Versus, Re:Born, Bad City). If it wasn’t, Tak is the perfect fit for this phenomenal action spectacle, and I almost couldn’t imagine it starring anyone else. Most akin to something like JCVD or One Cut Of The Dead, One Percenter is very much a movie about movies, in which Tak plays Toshiro, a purist action star who daily lives in existential crisis regarding martial arts purity and on screen mastery. Toshiro found early career success with a film called Birth, in which he explored the creation of pure on screen action, but which didn’t meet his standards. It’s now been ten years and his filmmaking career is sputtering, even if his dogged pursuit of martial arts mastery has not. This is the quest he is on, to be among the 1% of martial arts practitioners to truly master their art. It’s not going very well.
When we meet Toshiro, he’s squandered his last favor on the set of a film that looks shockingly similar to the Rurouni Kenshin films, and he and his last few disciples are fired… which spurs even his last devotees to depart. All except for Akira, who sticks around and vows to shoot a true, pure action spectacle with Toshiro. On their last possible investor meeting, they end up on an island that could be the perfect remote location for their film. Unfortunately, they soon run into his former disciples who are also scouting there for a big studio feature. Soon, there are also rival gangs of warring yakuza there as well, searching for a stash of cocaine hidden there by their recently deceased boss and creating a succession frenzy. It’s the perfect opportunity for Toshiro to test his mettle. Is he a crazy person striving for an impossible dream, is he just totally bought in to his own bullshit, or is he truly faster than a speeding bullet? Yakuza island combat antics meet filmmaking foibles, and all of it entertains mightily.
Waffling back and forth between earnest and hilarious, authenticity and intentional artifice, real martial arts versus screen fighting, One Percenter walks an incredible tightrope of tone and for the most part nails it throughout. This is an action fan’s dream movie, because fans of Bruce Lee or Jackie Chan or Tak himself will have so much to appreciate about the craft of action movie making, and a more casual viewer will simply have a rip roaring yakuza action comedy to enjoy. Tak shotgun blasts between taking the piss out of himself and truly honoring the martial arts he has dedicated his life to. One Percenter somehow manages to have its cake and eat it to, delivering blistering commentary on the fakery of martial arts cinema and simultaneously demonstrating the raw power the medium has to demonstrate and elevate true martial arts like Bruce Lee’s Jeet Kun Do, which Tak is a practitioner of in real life.
Tak has found in One Percenter a role that will be a major benchmark in his career and he absolutely commands the screen throughout. I’ve always found him to be incredibly compelling; cooler than cool. But I’m not sure he’s had a role this definitive in many years. Here, Tak comes across as a Jet Li type of star, someone who has endless charisma and talent, but also someone who has something to say and wants to communicate his philosophies and priorities in life through this incredible art form called “the movies”. I’m not super familiar with writer/director Yûdai Yamaguchi’s work personally, though I see he’s highly involved in the High & Low films, which I’ve heard are incredible. That said, I have to imagine that action director Kensuke Sonomora (Hydra, Bad City, Baby Assassins), one of the best in the world at what he does, and on a hot streak to boot, is part of the reason this film sings as pitch perfectly as it does. One Percenter is coming at you from an elite team of world class action filmmakers and they’ve got something to say. It’s pure action filmmaking confidence executed on a level most in the world could only hope to achieve.
Both humorous takedown and love letter to on screen action, One Percenter will no doubt prove to be one of the great action films of 2023.
And I’m Out.
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Fantastic Fest 2023: STRANGE DARLING: Don’t Read This Review [Spoiler Free]
![Fantastic Fest 2023: STRANGE DARLING: Don’t Read This Review [Spoiler Free]](https://i0.wp.com/cinapse.co/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/STRANGE_DARLING_4PRESS-1.jpeg?resize=1140%2C1011&ssl=1)
If you’re into serial killer cinema, you’re going to want to check out JT Mollner’s Strange Darling. And that is all you honestly want to know about the film going into it. Strange Darling is a textbook example of a film you should view as unsullied as possible. In fact, the lone plot summary provided to Fantastic Fest audiences is “One day in the twisted love life of a serial killer”. I pity whoever needs to one day cut a trailer for this gem and sell the movie to wide audiences without giving away too much. So, with all that said, you may not even want to read this review. It’s a nasty and enjoyable and gorgeously made film that you’ll want to see for yourself. I’m going to review it, though, and I’m going to stay pretty militantly spoiler free.
Alamo Drafthouse founder Tim League shared that he personally programmed this title for this year’s fest; something he rarely does anymore these days. But one can see how League felt compelled to bring this one into the Fantastic Fest fold. The writer/director here is a guy named JT Mollner, who’s done some shorts and a feature called Outlaws & Angels in 2016. I can’t say I’d heard of Outlaws & Angels before, but it looks like a bit of a DTV western that was apparently shot on film (like Strange Darling was) and frankly I’m going to want to seek that movie out after seeing his latest. Lord knows I love a good DTV film, and a good western.
Strange Darling feels like the kind of movie that is a showcase for talent on the rise. Mollner very much announces his arrival with confidence here, and creates a bit of a calling card for his stars Willa Fitzgerald and Kyle Gallner. I personally was not familiar with Fitzgerald, though she’s worked quite a bit and I had apparently seen her in Reacher. This is a full on star making bravura performance as “The Lady”; the kind of performance you look back on 20 years later and say, “this is where Willa Fitzgerald really broke out”. Kyle Gallner literally has screen credits going back over 20 years but has been on the rise and popping onto peoples’ radars quite a bit in recent years with Scream and Smile. This marks a confident star turn for Gallner as well. Worthy of note: Not only was Strange Darling shot on 35mm Kodak film, but it was also shot by first time cinematographer and longtime star of the silver screen, Mr. Giovanni Ribisi! Mollner and Ribisi shoot the hell out of the film and it looks marvelous. Featuring original music from Z Berg, the film sounds as good as it looks as well.
I think it’s very safe to say that Strange Darling fits squarely into the serial killer genre and it also reveals little to say that it is somewhat of a “cat & mouse” style film, a two-hander between hunter and hunted. It’s the kind of film that is so well written and so confidently realized that it makes you feel like there will never be an end to the potential riffs and new ground a smart filmmaker can bring to a well-trodden genre. Mollner tells us early on that this tale will be told in 6 chapters, and while I love that kind of thing, it often comes off as a Tarantino homage more than a true tool for a writer to tell a great story. But Mollner doesn’t really seem to be aping or evoking Tarantino at all, and instead puts his own spin on exactly what information he reveals to his audience at exactly what time. And it’s frankly pretty delicious.
Strange Darling is a good time at the movies. It’s dark and disturbing and deals honestly with serial killing. It’s also playful and alternately keeps you laughing and guessing and on the edge of your seat. There’s undeniable talent assembled behind and before the camera, putting you in good hands for the ride it’ll take you on. You’ll want to go into Strangle Darling knowing as little as you can, but you’ll most definitely want to go into Strange Darling.
And I’m Out.
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FANTASTIC FEST 2023: THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER is Flanagan’s Fiendish Farewell to Netflix
The vast library of Edgar Allan Poe becomes a supernatural hunting ground in Mike Flanagan’s final Netflix series
Stills courtesy of Netflix. When it was announced in April 2017 that Mike Flanagan and his creative team would follow up their gut-churning adaptation of Gerald’s Game with a full-on limited series adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House, my initial reaction was both ecstatic and skeptical. While Flanagan’s already impressive roster of features had already brought me to terror and tears in equal measure, the idea of a horror series felt antithetical to what made the genre so devilishly potent to me. Like comedy, horror felt like a genre whose impact felt inextricably tied to its brevity–and to prolong these shocks to ten hours’ worth of immediately binge-able content seemed like it would deaden the overall impact.
I was so damn happy that the Flanagan crew proved me wrong not just once, but four times over the course of Flanagan’s TV tenure on Netflix. From Hill House to Midnight Club, Flanagan’s skill as a storyteller flourished in ways that the trappings of feature films would only limit. His care for each of his characters became augmented by the increased regular presence of his devoted cast, all of whom turned in intriguing new shades to their developing horror personas with each subsequent series. Deciding a favorite of the four is a Sisyphean battle–the only reason one stops championing one boulder is so they can go back to the bottom of the hill for the other three.
Which makes me so happy to report that The Fall of the House of Usher is a welcome new challenger to the fray. Building off of the last half-decade of tremendous horror storytelling, Mike Flanagan and his regular team of players close out a jaw-dropping era of TV terror with an Edgar Allan Poe adaptation that’s terrifying, tender, and a ton of fun.
“Once upon a midnight dreary…”
Like the best of Edgar Allan Poe, The Fall of the House of Usher looms under the specter of death from frame one. Six deaths, in fact. In the wake of escaping conviction in a towering lawsuit, Fortunato Pharma CEO Roderick Usher (Bruce Greenwood) inters the last three of his six children–all of whom passed away within the two weeks since the trial’s beginning. Assistant D.A. C. Auguste Dupin (Carl Lumbly), Usher’s failed prosecutor, receives a call from the billionaire that evening inviting Dupin to Usher’s ramshackle childhood home. Usher’s longtime litigious viper Arthur Pym (Mark Hamill) won’t be there to stop either man from the business at hand: Roderick’s sought-after confession to decades’ worth of crimes. To Roderick, however, there’s a more important confession to make: revealing to Dupin just how each member of the House of Usher met their grisly demise–and the sinister connection all of them have to the mysterious Verna (Carla Gugino).
Akin to how The Haunting of Hill House and Bly Manor created a tapestry of the collective works of their original authors’ source material, The Fall of the House of Usher draws from the macabre well of Edgar Allan Poe’s entire body of work–spanning everything from throwaway lines in poems to creatively deconstructed characters and elements from novellas and short stories. As such, each episode of The Fall of the House of Usher grants individual actors in Flanagan’s company such delicious scenery to chew. While each story in Usher is compelling in its own right, English majors and fans of weird tales will have a particularly great time seeing how Flanagan anticipates and delightfully subverts just where one thinks these particular characters will meet their grisly end.
Equally fascinating is how bitingly contemporary Flanagan, co-showrunner Trevor Macy, and their writer’s room have made these stories. Transporting them far from their two hundred-year-old context, Team Usher interweaves Poe’s endlessly relevant themes of madness and dread with more modern concerns of the opioid crisis, the growing divide between rich and poor (affluenza is a delightful Sword of Damocles here), medical ethics, the growing reach of AI and algorithms when it comes to content (one can’t help but sense some parting shots with Flanagan’s studio on the road to Amazon). Such modern relevancies further illustrate how ripe Poe’s work is for such critical and creative revival–with Poe’s deeply cynical yet reverential view marrying quite well to Flanagan’s signature brand of compassionate terror. In an approach that blends Succession and The Devil and Daniel Webster (to borrow from another classic of Americana), The Fall of the House of Usher is viciously funny even as it makes you crawl out of your skin–before reducing you to tears when you least expect it.
Much like how Usher feels like a culmination of Flanagan’s storytelling prowess while at Netflix, the ensemble cast is packed with returning players each at the height of their acting skills. The Usher family–including Greenwood, Mary McDonnell, Samantha Sloyan, T’Nia Miller, Rahul Kohli, Kate Siegel, Henry Thomas, Ruth Codd, and Sauriyan Sapkota–feels less like a family and more like a pack of opportunistic wild beasts cloaked in Chanel and Gucci. While the series ends up dividing the cast as their stories further isolate them in their own respective spells of madness, Usher crackles with life when these characters brandish verbal daggers all in one room. The family truly feels like a dynasty on its last legs–and all of these family members are too blind to their own bitter contradictions to face reality. Notable turns are Siegel’s Camille as the family’s quick-thinking PR rep, endlessly spinning the Ushers’ violent deeds into glowing media coverage; Sloyan’s Tamerlane, bringing her own Paltrow-style Goop knockoff brand to market by any means necessary; and Thomas’ “Froderick,” the Usher’s ‘eldest boy’ whose extreme desire to please masks a truly insidious nature that aligns more with Roderick than most might assume.
However, it’s Carla Gugino’s Verna who walks away with the entire series. Already a legendary Flanagan lead from Gerald’s Game and Hill House, Gugino finally gets the chance to play a wholly antagonistic role in Flanagan’s sprawling universe. While the best surprises of Verna are still to come, Gugino’s Verna morphs and bleeds into the Ushers’ lives in a chameleonic way that evokes the best of Tatiana Maslany in Orphan Black. Gugino’s Verna also gives Flanagan the opportunity to distill the best of Poe’s moral and psychological contradictions into a terrifyingly tangible and active presence, with Verna’s compelling moral quandaries creating the path that leads the show’s characters deeper into hells of their own design.
And hellish this series can truly be–with Team Flanagan taking the mic drop endings and twists of Gerald’s Game, Hill House, and Midnight Mass to disturbing new heights. What makes these shocks so satisfying is the amount of care put into the character work that precedes it–that the violent delights of the Ushers have undoubtedly earned the violent ends that are borne of them. It’s what made me fall so deeply in love with Gerald’s Game, Hill House, Bly Manor, Midnight Mass, and Midnight Club–and to watch how the series reaches such high-pitched, apocalyptic ends while never losing sight of the beating, compassionate heart of Usher makes Flanagan’s final Netflix outing a truly beautiful Fall to behold.
The Fall of the House of Usher premiered its first two episodes at Fantastic Fest 2023, with the entire eight-episode miniseries provided for review. The Fall of the House of Usher premieres in its entirety on Netflix on October 12, 2023.
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FANTASTIC FEST 2023: ENTER THE CLONES OF BRUCE is a Hilarious Deep Dive into Brucesploitation
David Gregory who directed the excellent doc Lost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley’s Island of Dr. Moreau is back at Fantastic Fest with his latest, a comprehensive look at the Brucesploitation phenomenon, Enter the Clones of Bruce. The film begins as expected with a brief snapshot at the life and meteoric rise of Bruce Lee and the vacuum it left when he died shortly before the release of the film that would assure his bonafides as an action icon, Enter the Dragon. Gregory smartly manages to convey how the world instantly fell in love with the charismatic martial artist on screen when he only had handful of completed action films, and 15 minutes of one unfinished left in the can at the time of his passing. Reminiscent of the Aussie film docs by Mark Hartley, Clones is a hilariously informative and unconventional deep dive into one of the most bizarre sub-genres in action that manages to grab you with its look at the men chosen to possibly be the next Bruce Lee.
Using the stages of grief as a narrative framework, the film begins to tackle this hunger, by a world grieving for the loss of the master, that had enterprising upstarts rather than looking for the next Bruce Lee. Keep in mind this was a world before home video and the internet. We are then introduced to the international cast of characters and their Bruce Lee inspired alter-egos that were an attempt to fill his shoes and make a few bucks. What could have been simply a fun poke at this bizarre trend, has each man portrayed as a real person offered a faustian bargain of becoming film stars by simply changing their name, their look and replicating the mannerisms of the deceased star they looked up to. This all transpires while we are treated to the greatest hits of all the best and most insane aspects of this sub-genre. From fighters with snakes for hands(!!), to the masterpiece of Brucesploitation epics The Dragon Lives Again that has Bruce Lee fighting alongside Popeye against James Bond, Emanuelle and COUNT DRACULA in Hell no less.
Yes this is real.
What I didn’t expect was the fact that Gregory tracked down all these men behind the likes of Bruce Li, Bruce Leung, Bruce Liang and Dragon Lee to name a few who detail what it was like at the height of this craze, the lives before and now after. While it was definitely an effort to exploit film goers, with the lure of a lost Bruce Lee performance, the fact that they would put Bruce’s name on posters for these films didn’t help either. But what we soon discover is this exploitation wasn’t simply relegated to those theater goers either, as we find out these men would be shooting sometimes two to three films simultaneously for next to nothing, only to discover THAT footage had also been cannibalized into a fourth and fifth film as well they hadn’t been paid for. There is a bitter sweetness recounted about this experience that the men are quick to recognize, that this fame wouldn’t have been possible without Lee’s legacy and the impact it had on their lives.
The film also takes a look at those whose stars rose thanks to their screen time in Enter The Dragon, my personal favorite being Angela Mao Ying who played Lee’s sister in the film and had left the industry 30 years ago. Gregory tracked her down and she discussed her time on set with Lee along with such genre icons as Eric Tsang and Sammo Hung who also appear and share their perspectives on the impact Lee had on the Chinese film industry as a whole. This allows the camera to push back a bit into the film industry in Hong Kong and China at the time and how Bruce reinvigorated the entire industry with a world that now wanted Kung-fu films thanks to Enter the Dragon. We get to see some of these massive Chinese studio compounds in present day that were used for the likes of Shaw Brothers and Golden Harvest now in ruins. The only person missing oddly from this doc was Bolo Yeung, who is very much out there in the convention circuit. While he didn’t face Lee in Enter the Dragon, he was a regular participant in Brucesploitation films giving fans a what if, the two had squared off.
Of course the film ends with the final stage of grief, acceptance, as the world is introduced to the next Chinese action star who was an uncredited henchman in Dragon, Jackie Chan. While we know how the story goes from there, it’s getting there that this doc does a downright impressive job at deconstructing thanks to the perspectives on those that participated in a insane sub-genre that could never happen today. This is partially thanks to time and the obvious love put into this all encompassing doc that gives the ultimate cliff notes on the nearly hundred films churned out during this period. As a fan of Lee, this topic has always been a bit of a blind spot because I didn’t know where to start. But l left this film not only with a clear grasp of the players, but their stories and a list of films I needed to check out.
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THE GIRL FROM RIO: Jess Franco’s Jet Set Bondsploitation Epic Swings onto 4K UHD
1969’s The Girl from Rio aka Future Women just hit 4K UHD thanks to Blue Underground and if you haven’t seen this swinging Jess Franco Bond knock off, you’re in for a treat.
The film is one of the more restrained films I’ve seen from the Spanish director, who’s best known for his rather prolific catalog of 207 films that mostly reside in the torrid realm of sexploitation. What makes Rio odd is its lack of skin, especially considering that it was made in partnership with producer Harry Alan Towers, who also produced his Marquis de Sade inspired outings. Towers produced not only Spanish, but also Italian sexploitation pictures, and famously produced some of the Laura Gemser films that would later be rebranded as Black Emanuelle titles. That being said, this is a rather tame R rated actioner, but that doesn’t make it any less great by any stretch of the imagination.
Like most of Franco’s films, the director uses a real location, that of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil to elevate his Jet Set Bondsploitation film that has our 007 proxy, Richard Stapley (Richard Wyler), fleeing to Rio with $10 Million in stolen money. This has every criminal outfit in the area after him including Sumitra (Shirley Eaton/Goldfinger) and her army of gorgeous women warriors who hope to use the money to take over the world. Technically, this film is a sequel to The Million Eyes of Sumuru (1967), and features Sax Rohmer’s Sumuru character (renamed Sumitra in the English dub, strangely obliterating all references to the character). While there’s a bit of a twist at the halfway point, the film is a fun romp into the world of Jess Franco by way of this secret agent tale that doles out its story in equal parts camp, parody and the kind of luridly fetishistic Franco subtext you’d expect.
For those that dig old school Bond and James Franco, there’s a lot to appreciate here with its pulpy action supplemented by a bizarre 60s rogues gallery of villains of course with plenty of girls and guns. While Wyler isn’t the strongest lead, he’s luckily surrounded by a cast of characters led by Shirley Eaton who definitely makes up for his lack of gravitas. Also the film later adds Marta Reves’ Ulla who quickly shifts gears from damsel in distress to a co conspirator to Wyler’s Stapley. My personal favorite however of the eccentric cast, has to be the delightful Elisa Montés who plays Masius (George Sanders) accountant/girlfriend, whose cheeky presence is accentuated by her collection of cunning little psychedelic inspired hats.
The film is presented here uncut in 4K on a dual layer 66 GB UHD by Blue Underground, from a new scan from the original camera negative. The film was shot in the same “batch” as Eugenie and Justine, and looks just as good. The transfer is crisp, bright and clean with a well balanced contrast throughout. The groovy color palette here and mandatory gel lighting is accentuated by a layer of Dolby Vision that makes some of the costumes and scenes really pop.
The special features include an all-new audio commentary with film historians Nathaniel Thompson and Troy Howarth – this is informative and entertaining; “Rocking in Rio” – an all-new interview with Franco expert Stephen Thrower; and “Rolling in Rio” – interviews with director Jess Franco, producer Harry Alan Towers and star Shirley Eaton.
For folks looking to get their feet wet in the Franco Filmography, this definitely feels like a good gateway. While you get a good idea of his style, it feels about as mainstream as I think Franco could get. Girl from Rio is a rollicking adventure that for the most part works in spite of itself. The only hurdle for entry is probably the odd dubbing here that sometimes feels like parody. But once you’re acclimated to that and Franco’s dreamy zoomtastic cinematographic style, you’re all set to have a groovy good time. Being a Bond fan this definitely hit the sweet spot for me and gave a new appreciation for Franco watching this odd riff on the secret agent film, that as expected loses interest in its male lead altogether only to empower and entrust the film to a character that would normally be relegated to a femme fatale.
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BATMAN: MASK OF THE PHANTASM on 4K UHD – A Stunning Disc Worth the Upgrade!
For DC fans looking to find solace in a better era, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm hits 4K UHD in a modest special edition this Tuesday thanks to Warner Home Entertainment. The 90’s animated series – theatrical outing originally hit theaters in 1993, where I caught it at my local dollar theater – remember those? The film came out about a year into the life of the animated juggernaut that ran for nearly a decade, and was originally intended as a direct to video adventure for fans of the show. But given the show’s success, a last minute decision was made to release it theatrically, where it stumbled at the box office due to this last minute change. The film has since found its audience on home video, where it became a mainstay for fans of the series who, like myself, see it as one of the best Batman origin stories ever committed to film.
The film is a love story of sorts, that has Batman (Kevin Conroy) trying to figure out who is killing big crime bosses in Gotham. The problem for Batman is the killer is a fresh masked vigilante in Gotham called the Phantasm, who bears more than a passing resemblance to Batman’s black caped appearance. Because of this, those that have been waiting for the vigilante to break his code of never killing, think he’s finally lost that restraint and is now on a killing spree and needs to be stopped at all costs. This just so happens when Andrea Beaumont (Dana Delany), a mysterious woman from Bruce Wayne’s past returns to Gotham after having to flee when her father got in over his head with the Gotham mob before Bruce put on the cowl. While Batman gets to the bottom of the Phantasm’s reign of terror on Gotham’s underbelly, we get a flashback of the origins of this Batman showing us how close he was to hanging up the bat-suit thanks to Andrea.
What I think makes this one of the best origin stories is, for one we aren’t forced to watch pearls scattering in an alley while a young boy looks on, like we’ve seen countless times. Instead we watch a young man who after unexpectedly falling in love is being forced to make a choice of whether or not to keep a vow and a course he set before he thought happiness was an option. I think not only is that choice a bit more relatable, it’s played against Bruce looking back on this after he’s made a name for himself in Gotham. While Kevin Conroy’s iconic Batman is definitely the star here, Dana Delany’s Andrea Beaumont is a formidable presence in the film, as someone who could have changed Bruce’s life and we as an audience actually believe that compared to some other leading ladies in this canon. While the Phantasm is what got butts in seats, the tragic romance of Wayne and Beaumont and how that plays out sealed the film’s status as one of the best.
The 4K UHD presented by Warner is the best case scenario in my opinion when it comes to a traditional animation’s visual presentation. No recoloring/touch ups have visually been done and instead Warner’s attention was focused on capturing the best image possible from the source, which looks to be the original negative. This is from the color, to the contrast to the grain still present, along with brush strokes. I love when I am watching an animated film and I can make out the way a cell was painted, or the cell layers or the composting tricks used in a shot. That kind of clarity is on full display here and given the animation and art style of the show, there’s a lot to take in. The only special feature is a doc on Kevin Conroy, which is a posthumous look at his influence he’s had on the role while voicing Batman in almost every media you can imagine.
At 76 minutes Batman: Mask of the Phantasm manages to do more than most 3 hour super hero epics, because it just focuses on the humanity of these characters and that’s where most superhero films falter. While it is this story of the new big bad coming to Gotham, which alone could be a plausible narrative, it’s the love story that highlights how Bruce Wayne got here that drives the heart and soul of the film and that’s not an easy task in this sub-genre or animation. Bruce Wayne feels his most human here, since the love affair transpires before he’s been hardened by decades of patrolling Gotham and he hasn’t completely given himself over to the bat. I think that what if and seeing how Bruce found the character of the Batman makes this a different origin story. Because while he has made the vow and he has decided to fight crime, in the flashbacks the idea of Batman is just that, and it just so happens when he meets the love of his life.
