Wishing I was in Belgium, Part One (Offscreen Film Festival)

From Belgium, courtesy of Cult Reviews and our good, dear friend and fellow film freak Gert Verbeeck, comes this report about the Offscreen Film Festival!

A year has come and gone and Offscreen Film Festival is ready to kick off the third edition of their annual festivities. From the 4th of March to the 21st, this year’s program will again take you on a voyage across extravagant cinematographic landscapes. A trip down Japanese, European & Italian genre cinema from past days as well as an introduction to some freshly released films from today’s world cinema.

“Film fans with a taste for the unconventional and the unusual, rejoice!”

In this news flash you’ll find the trailer of this year’s edition, a blurb from Offscreen’s website explaining briefly what all you can expect and to get your cinephilic juices flowing, we’ve compiled a photo gallery with some poster art & movie stills all related to the films on Offscreen’s 2010 program.

Images often say more than words, so we’ll leave it at that. Now proceed and go click on some things below… and be amazed!

Fool's Views (2/8 - 2/28)

Hello all,

Somehow or other, being gainfully employed by a flurry of out of town gigs has played absolute havoc with my movie watching. (Looking back at 2009, I was already at an overall count of 70 films at this point whereas we are barely over half that thus far.) Not that I’m looking for a return to the unemployed days of yesteryear, but I’ll be thankful when my current stint at the Cleveland Auto Show (aka the “Cars on Carpet Extravaganza…with Ferris Wheel”) has ground to a halt and I can spend more nights at home in front of the tube with the snuggly femalien and her homemade super-soup. Stay tuned.

For now, we present tales of a house full of hot bitchy co-eds, a hotel with serious hidden charges, and two early 70s shapeshifting furballs for your reading pleasure. As always, feel free to leave your two cents worth – we’ll make sure you get some change back…

Enjoy!

Fool's Views (1/18 – 2/7)

Hey kids,

Due to out of town work obligations (thank you Detroit Auto Show and Winter X-Games), I was not able to watch much at all for the last couple weeks of January. However, upon my return to the not-so-sunny climes of Chicago, I managed to nibble down a dozen flicks, including QT's inspiration for his now-Oscar nominated flick, two other statuette nominees, as well as all four films in the AIRPORT series, Adam Green's new film, and three Masters of Horror eps of wildly varying quality.

As always, feel free to leave your two cents worth - we'll make sure you get some change back. Enjoy!

Hey Hollywood, you suck. (WOLFMAN poster art)

Hey folks,

Our good friend Jon Kitley at KITLEY'S KRYPT weighs in on Universal's marketing team's decision to go from using kickass, genuinely intriguing poster images such as these:

Fool's Views (1/11 – 1/17)

Hey kids,

Wow, almost on schedule and all first time viewings! Sometimes I even impress myself. This week, we take a look at a couple of lesser-known horror items and a recent sci-fi programmer, alongside flicks with chicks on skates, kicks with big dicks, Sherlocks with six-packs and a double barreled blast of Italian gunpowder. Enjoy!

As always, feel free to leave your two cents worth – we’ll make sure you get some change back.

Fool's Views (1/1 - 1/9)

Howdy, troops,

Welcome to the first FVs of the New Year. After the madcap flurry of the last few weeks, it's a bit of a relief to only have to weigh in on a mere seven films at a single sitting. Here's hoping we can keep that schedule intact, eh?

Couple new horror flicks this week, both of the vampiric variety, as well as a glance back at one of the genre's legends in a less-than-legendary outing. As well as sci-fi ventures large and small, musicals and documentaries, there's something for everyone!

As always, feel free to leave your two cents worth - we'll make sure you get some change back.

Enjoy!

Civilian 2009 Wrap-up and Year-End Stats!

So, having addressed the horror genre (which composed more than half the year's viewing time), I figured it only fair to give credit to the rest of the flicks. Again, all of the films listed below were encountered for the first time from January 1 to December 31, 2009 (i.e. no repeat viewings were eligible), with my top picks denoted with an asterisk.

FOR PREVIOUS YEARS' RECAPS, CLICK HERE

2009 TOTALS:
472 films, 276 1st time views, 289 horror, 38 cinema

(2008 Totals: 384, 278, 226, 39)
(2007 Totals: 409, 284, 260, 40)


TOP 10 2009 CIVILIAN RELEASES
Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)*
Hurt Locker, The (2008)
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
JCVD (2008)
Gomorrah (2008)
No Impact Man (2009)*
Not Quite Hollywood (2008)
Star Trek (2009)
Up (2009)*
Wrestler, The (2008)

Dr. AC's 2009 Horror Wrap-up Extravaganza!

Howdy troops,

After much deliberation, here's my assessment of the horror year that was. All of the films listed below were encountered for the first time from January 1 to December 31, 2009 (i.e. no repeat viewings were eligible). To accommodate and acknowledge as many films as possible, I've broken them down into various categories in alphabetical order, with my top pick denoted with an asterisk.

CLICK HERE FOR PREVIOUS YEARS' RECAPS 

As always, feel free to toss in your two cents worth - we'll make sure you get some change back. Thanks for the past year of rapping and chatting - looking forward to more of the same in 2010!


2009 TOTALS:
140 1st Time Horror Views (out of 289 total)

TOP 20 (or so) 2009 HORROR RELEASES


Antichrist (2009)
Baghead (2008)
Children, The (2008)*
Dead Snow (2009)
Deadgirl (2009)
District 9 (2009)
Donkey Punch (2008)
Drag Me to Hell (2009)
Eden Lake (2008)
Grace (2009)
House of the Devil (2009)
I Sell the Dead (2008)
Last House on the Left, The (2009)
My Bloody Valentine 3D (2009)
Paranormal Activity (2009)
Pontypool (2008)
Splinter (2008)
Thirst (2009)
Trick ‘r Treat (2008)
Uninvited, The (2009)
Zombieland (2009)