If you're like me, you 1) assumed the Fantasia International Film Festival just showed Disney's Fantasia on a loop for a few days; and 2) are a moron, because how would that even work? It turns out Fantasia is a "genre" festival -- horror, sci-fi, martial arts, weird comedies, anime, gross stuff,...

(Screened at the 2018 Fantasia Festival; distribution plans not yet announced.) Owing to the slippery definition of the word and our robust (for the time being) First Amendment, it takes a lot to get arrested for "obscenity" in America, let alone actually convicted. A few performers and...

(Screened at the 2018 Fantasia Festival; opens July 20 in U.S. theaters) Unfriended: Dark Web has no connection to 2015's Unfriended except that they adhere to the same format: Both unfold in real time entirely on someone's computer screen via their Skype sessions, Facebook chats, and so...

(Screened at the 2018 Fantasia Festival; now playing in U.S. theaters and VOD) The Night Eats the World ("La nuit a dévoré le monde") has a different mood from most zombie films, which proves to be refreshing. It's less mayhem-oriented, quieter, more drama than horror (though not without its...

“She really is so hard on herself,” remarks a relative of the titular character in Kent Jones’ Diane. A gaggle of cousins have come to Diane’s rescue after a drink to unwind for self-care spirals into raging drunkenness. Diane can easily attend to the needs of others, but when it comes to...

In The Great Pretender, Mona (Maëlle Poesy-Guichard) insists that her autobiographical play is honest but her ex-boyfriend (Linas Phillips) says it's "confessional.” “Is there a difference?” she asks. “Yeah, honesty is hard,” Nick replies, vocalizing a standout theme in the 2018 Tribeca...

Not only are the SXSW programmers an astute bunch of film enthusiasts who scour the globe for the finest in independent cinema … they also really dig horror flicks. Of course you'll always find a solid batch of scary, suspenseful movies tucked away in the "Midnight" section (every good film...

“Growing up can be a little bit scary and weird,” explains Kayla (Elsie Fisher) in one of the YouTube videos that frame Bo Burnham’s Eighth Grade – and also, it seems, articulating one of the many running themes in this year’s SXSW Film Festival slate. That’s not terribly surprising, as...

On Saturday, March 10, every film that screened in The Paramount - SXSW’s premier venue in downtown Austin – was directed by a woman. It was representative of this year’s lineup, with the strongest showing (at 33% of features and 59% of shorts) of female filmmakers in the festival’s...

MOVIES: "American Animals" "Arizona" "Assassination Nation" "Beast" "Blindspotting" "Clara's Ghost" "An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn" "The Guilty" "The Happy Prince" "Hereditary" "Juliet, Naked" "Leave No Trace" "Madeline's Madeline" "Mandy" "Night Comes...

Like most film festivals, Sundance has a competition section. A lot of festival-goers are also sports enthusiasts, and this gives them something to gamble on. Winning the Grand Jury Prize is a figurative feather in a movie's metaphorical hat, sure to be mentioned in the film's marketing and in...

Last week was the fifth edition of Beyond Fest, Los Angeles’s most popular genre film celebration. Over the course of 11 days, the historic Grauman’s Egyptian Theatre in the heart of Hollywood played host to a diverse mix of new, classic, and forgotten movies of the horror, action, sci-fi, and...

This year's Fantastic Fest was packed with surprises, sexual deviancy, revenge, and sorrow, and that was just on Twitter. The movies were likewise full of intrigue -- it was a good lineup, everything else aside ("How was the film festival, Mrs. Lincoln?") -- but the 13th edition of the Alamo...

We'll talk about the behind-the-scenes turmoil at Fantastic Fest in another wordpile. In the meantime, here are reviews of some of the notable films that played there. They don't have U.S. release dates yet (except as noted), but we'll let you know when they do. Tigers Are Not Afraid A tough,...

A certain breed of movie fan knows immediately why something called The Overlook Film Festival would be held at a place called the Timberline Lodge. The Timberline Lodge? In Oregon? Why, that's the place that stood in for the fictional Overlook Hotel in Stanley Kubrick's movie version of The...