Midnight Madness... September Sanity!

TIFF [1999]

Trick Baby

For nearly a decade now, I've highly anticipated the "Midnight Madness" programme--essentially the dark "mirror image" of the otherwise prestigious TIFF--a ten-day marathon of the best, or at the very least "unclassifiable", in international genre cinema.

Originally held at the suitably seedy Bloor Cinema, MM was the North American launching pad for such future cult sensations as Peter Jackson's "Meet The Feebles", the frequently-banned Belgian serial killer mockumentary "Man Bites Dog", anime classics such as "Legend Of The Overfiend", and Alex de la Iglesia's "Accion Mutante". I'd encountered Liam Neeson at a screening of Richard Stanley's "Hardware", and once upon a time a still-unknown Quentin Tarantino could lounge around the lobby unnoticed while fans flocked to Tony Todd and Virginia Madsen after the premiere of "Candyman".

Since shifting locations to the comparatively posh Uptown Cinema, however, "Midnight Madness" seems to have lost its edge. Maybe it's harder to program a mini-festival of horror and cult cinema when homemade shockers like "The Blair Witch Project" become mainstream blockbusters--but I have to ask the programmers: where was Argento's "Phantom Of The Opera"?

My Pick:

Anders Ronnow-Klarlund's outstanding Danish thriller "Bestat" (aka "Possessed"), which manages to cleverly combine "Outbreak" and "Fallen" into a stylish nail-biter. With recent goodies like " Ole Bornedal's "Nightwatch", "Insomnia", and Lars Von Trier's "The Kingdom" (Von Trier's Zentropa Entertainment produced "Bestat"), Denmark has become quite the hotbed of quirky horror titles.

Runner Up:

Matthew Bright's "Freeway 2: Trick Baby" follows up his demented first feature "Freeway" (a serial killer spin on "Red Riding Hood", starring Keifer Sutherland and Reese Whitherspoon), with another fairy tale pastiche: this time, "Hansel And Gretel". In this "revisionist" interpretation to say the least, Crystal ("American Pie"s Natasha Lyonne), a bulimic criminal named for her mom's favorite drug, finds herself on the run through the "Black Forest" -- across America to Mexico--with serial killer/companion Cyclona in tow. Their destination? The "witch's house" of Sister Gomez ("Buffalo 66"s Vincent Gallo!), complete with lost children and, er…ovens. Bright is a young, energetic talent whose skill for assaulting audiences is only developing. Future Midnight Madness programmes will be better for it.

Turkey Of The Fest Nominee #1:

This year's MM showcased a surprising dud: the promisingly lurid documentary "Wadd: The Life And Times Of John C. Holmes" (not surprising, the only MM event to sell out on the first day of ticket sales). The life story of--yes, him--the prodigiously endowed late XXX star was enough to inspire the excellent "Boogie Nights", so why did it spawn such a tedious bore in the form of this shot-on-High Definition Video talking-head-marathon? Tame enough to be aired on A & E, "Wadd" is basically two very LONG hours of L.A.-based freaks and porno hacks informing us that Holmes was indeed a liar, drug addict, pedophile, and crook who shamelessly spread around the HIV virus, but "once you got to know the guy", he was okay (cue the tears). Riiiiiiight--and as the old cult film goes, "Even Hitler Had A Girlfriend". You'll do well to stick with the FREE sleaze from the E! Channel instead.

Real to Reel: The Anti-PBS

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