Screamfest 2009

Screamfest, held annually in Los Angeles, came to a close this past Sunday, and as with all film festivals that means crowning the winners in various categories. There was no huge sweep this year, though the Spanish pre-apocalypse drama Before the Fall (Tres Dias) took home the most awards with a total of three; Best Editing (Nacho Ruiz Capillas), Best Actor (Víctor Clavijo), and Best Director (F. Javier Gutiérrez). I haven't seen the film, which was produced by Antonio Banderas and tells the story of a world with only 72 hours between itself and a planet-killing meteorite, but I've heard good things, which are now all the more confirmed by these accolades (though it's worth noting Before the Fall is not explicitly a horror movie).

Jocelin Donahue took home Best Actress, an award she certainly deserves considering she carried the excellent Satanic Panic film House of the Devil wonderfully. However, I'm not so on-board with the festival's decision to give The Human Centipede (First Sequence) Best Picture. I've seen the film about a mad doctor that surgically grafts three people together in a butt-to-mouth chain and I have to say it's nothing special. There's no question that it has a great, highly twisted concept, but it also has a weak setup, a weaker pay-off, and isn't all that challenging considering what the "plot" is. Dieter Laser is a riot as the insane man wanting to create a new kind of Siamese Twin, but beyond his performance there's little of interest to be found.

Every now and then a film completely sneaks up on you and delivers a nice, pleasant surprise. Such is the case with Forget Me Not, a movie I didn't even know existed before watching the trailer (embedded below). Though I suppose in this particular case, 'nice' and 'pleasant' aren't the most applicable words, as Forget Me Not doesn't look quite so warm and fuzzy.

Written and directed by first timer Tyler Oliver, Forget Me Not tells the story of Sandy, a gal who just wants to survive high school. But when friends of hers start disappearing on the weekend of graduation, Sandy realizes the culprit is most likely a girl her group of friends wronged long ago. Now before you start rolling your eyes at how familiar of a setup that is, give the trailer a watch below. Unlike what you'd expect from a basic description like that, the culprit in question isn't exactly alive, and she also doesn't exactly look like a ghost. Whatever she is, she doesn't look happy.

Carly Schroeder, looking a bit more grown up than in Jacob Aaron Estes' excellent film Mean Creek, plays the lead Sandy. She's joined by a handful of youthful faces from shows like "Hannah Montana" and "Drake and Josh", which reminds me how much I enjoy seeing actors go from playing teeny-bopers on the Disney Channel to playing teens who die horrible deaths. Call me old fashioned, but it's a bit of a guilty pleasure of mine.

If you live in L.A., or if you're flying in for the fest, you can catch the world premiere of Forget Me Not at Screamfest Thursday, October 22nd.

Written by Eric D. Snider

Should you find yourself in Los Angeles between Oct. 16 and 25 with your blood unchilled and your hair not standing on end, perhaps you should pop in at Screamfest and take care of that. The ninth annual Screamfest Horror Festival -- one of the largest such fests in the country -- announced its lineup today, with 20 features and five shorts programs all being hosted at Grauman's Chinese Theaters in Hollywood.

The opening night film is The Tournament, in which the world's top assassins (Ving Rhames among them) get together to kill one another for the entertainment of pay-per-view audiences. The closing night film is The Fourth Kind, starring Milla Jovovich as a psychologist studying a series of alien abductions in Alaska. So, you know. The usual stuff.

In between are films with delightful titles such as Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl (from Japan!), Necromentia, The Human Centipede, Mutant Swinger from Mars, and Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre (from Iceland!). And hey, what do you know, it's the long-awaited Cabin Fever 2 (no involvement from Eli Roth) and the not-at-all-awaited Wrong Turn 3: Left for Dead! And The House of the Devil, which I saw at Tribeca and kinda liked and which is by the same guy, Ti West, who made Cabin Fever 2! Why, there's something here for everyone! (Except children and old people.)

You can check out the Screamfest site for details on all the films and ticketing information.

[Via Fearnet.]