protean depravity

Here are some short reviews from the past month. Writing this post I realized that I've been reading A LOT OF short stories and I'm in a proper short story fever! If that speaks to you, I hope you find something to your taste, enjoy!

Barely rested from the last film festival, here I am planing for the next one, the wonderful Fantasy Filmfest Nights  (April 16-19) which impresses with a truly fantastic selection that makes me wish I could see all of the films featured. But the budget is tight, and time isn't endless, so I have to make choices. Although I made my choices generously, I probably still won't be able to see all of the pictures below, especially as I still have to go to work, notably on Saturday. The day is for working but we have nights to watch films and I'll try to fill them with screenings.

Laura Casabé's latest film "The Virgin of the Quarry Lake" was one of the feature films competing for the first place at this year's Final Girls Berlin Film Festival,  and was among my absolute favorites. Thus, I wanted to unpack this work and see how it was stitched together from two short stories by grand-master of horror Mariana Enriquez, Our Lady of the Quarry and The Cart both from her 2009 collection The Dangers of Smoking in Bed . Let's first take a look at the short stories, and then the film. There are possible spoilers, so maybe read the stories, watch the film, as usual.

The Final Girls Film Festival Edition 11 is over...  The post-festival blues still lingering, here I am with a massive back pain the one week of sitting in City Kino Wedding bestowed me, thinking back of the awesome time I had. Being in the jury and contributing to determine the winner amongst the feature movies, all the great people I met, chatted, watched movies with, discussed those movies and connected... It would be no exaggeration to say I had the time of my life, and even though I didn't cry, I certainly understand fellow jury members who were hit hard by the melancholy. On the picture you see is all that's left from the good days: a lot of stickers and business cards, flyers for the Leiden B-Movie Festival in August, the festival program in which we're all featured, a tote bag, my name tag, and one piece of print art I bought from Henna Räsänen who was sitting at the table next to us, the Otherland table, during vendor day on Sunday. Let us first start with the shor...

I have been meaning to write this post for quite some time now and have been postponing, then came the FFF White Nights, and then Berlinale, and also lots of work, and yada yada yada, and it's kind of late, but finally here I am scribbling something, because I don't want to keep putting off reviewing this movie to the point that it's too old to be relevant, and the second part of the 28 series, The Bone Temple, deserves it. It is such, such a good film all around. Let's analyze it then! (OBVIOUSLY SPOILERED REVIEW)

As I've written before, this year's Berlinale was a bit frustrating and not all that amazing, but I was able to watch a couple of films nonetheless (even though most of them at the Uber Hall which is cold, and too big, and uncomfortable). I don't want to complain too much, though, I was still able to see nice films, just not super good ones. So this year there's no winner since none of the pictures struck me as great or wonderful or whatever. Here's a short overview of my film haul.

Enjoy the latest short reviews! 

Well, I'm going to say it out loud, this year's Berlinale is a dud. Insanely quickly sold out tickets, a lukewarm selection of films, a lack of genre pictures in its program, and finally idiotic comments from the jury... Berlinale is already a fail and makes me want to look ahead for other festivals. Honestly, I'm not sure I'll give it much space in my future life, I think I'd rather save my leave days for the FFF and the Final Girls Berlin. Sorry for the rant.