PopHorror Let's Get Scared
What a great night for horror fans. Nightmare Cinema was an amazing film to kick off the 2018 Fantasia International Film Festival. I will go so far as to call the first segment of the film a perfect movie, and I’ve only said that a couple of times in my life. I walked blindly into an anthology situation. I’ll tell you flat out without sugar coating it that I’m not a fan of anthologies. Despite my personal bias, this festival opener sure delivered.
The Thing In The Woods
The first segment in the anthology, The Thing in the Woods, directed by Alejandro Brugues, changed my life. It seems excessive to say, I know, but the first film out of the gate was just so. The crowd screamed, laughed, gasped, and cheered. Only in commercials have I seen a crowd react this way to a film. To be a part of it was magical.
My jaw was on the floor from the moment it began. It takes every horror film you ever saw and cuddles it just enough to make it its own. What Alejandro and his team did was make a film that finally answers the question: how can a film ever top Cabin in the Woods? Not only did they top it, but they raised the bar exponentially. This film, in my opinion, was a masterpiece, and they did it in half the time. This one gets my gold star of the bunch.
Mirare
The second segment in the Nightmare Cinema anthology, Mirare, which was directed by Lifetime Achievement winner Joe Dante, was a story about plastic surgery with a distinct Twilight Zone feel. A soon-to-be wife with a facial deformity due to a childhood car accident is offered a surgical correction by her fiancé, an overzealous doctor. The main character moves from surgery to recovery, but things slowly take a turn when she realizes this simple operation was anything but. There seems to be something dark and nefarious happening in this hospital. The ending was good, but could have been great if had really taken the leap and went full on Mother!
Mashit
The third segment, Mashit, directed by Ryuhei Kitamura, actually got me into a bit of trouble with people sitting next to me. Apparently, my groans of unrelenting discontent were too much for some to handle in my ever vocal manner. This was a possession film gone awry. Don’t get me wrong I, love a good possession flick. But the point of this film was maximum shock value with no real shock.
The priest (who at first I thought was Ray Liotta, but in the end was just discount Ray Liotta) hooks up with an attractive nun. They get interrupted mid-love making. What follows is a hodgepodge of odd events. If I chronicled them, you probably wouldn’t even believe me. The end is something out of a rejected Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode. Rejected for good reason. The effects were well done, but the story was confusing and recycled at best. It was my least favorite of the bunch.
This Way To Egress
The fourth segment in Nightmare Cinema, This Way to Egress, directed by David Slade, is up for debate. I discussed this one at length at the pub with fellow critics afterwards. It was strange, and received in many different ways. Most of the people I spoke with were at odds with it. I suggested that if it was not in black and white, and rather in hyper-color, with the blood and gore instead of dirt and decay as the original insinuated, it would have made more of an impact. There were a lot of things that made this one an unnerving candidate, but color would have probably sold it. The film is about a mother who loses her kids in a waiting room and her subsequent search for them takes her through a nightmarish scenario where every scene is more bizarre than the last. This film has a wild storyline and and unique feel to it.
Dead
The fifth segment in the series, Dead, directed by Mick Garris, should have been flipped with the first film as it would have made a much better opener. A tragic Bruce Wayne scenario plays out where a kid is the sole survivor of a brutal robbery. His undead mother keeps trying to coax him into being dead with her, while Kesha tries to convince him not to die. The robbery guy is hell bent on leaving no witnesses, but is initially thwarted by a nurse telling him that visiting hours are over. The kid sees dead people for a bit, then the original killer tries to finish the job again. Is it all a dream at the end? Find out for yourself.
Nightmare Cinema Final Thoughts
Nightmare Cinema has a little something for every type of horror fan. It even has Mickey Rourke! It was a truly great opening film to kick off the 2018 Fantasia International Film Festival lineup that will no doubt land on a number of Best Horror of 2018 lists. I’d sit through it all again just to watch Alejandro’s masterpiece one more time.
