On my second festival day I watched two movies in a row, coming-of-age ghost story JAMIE MARKS IS DEAD and the SAW-without-gore challenge thriller 13 SINS. JAMIE MARKS IS DEAD

I always hoped it was you, Adam.

Jamie Marks, teenager from a run down smalltown in north east America, is found dead under a bridge. Porst mortem he gathers more sympathy than ever in his lifetime. There he served as punching ball or was simply just ignored. Something keeps him from finding peace and his ghost appears, searching contact to Gracie, who found his corpse during rock gathering and runner Adam. He never bullied Jamie in school but also didn't do anything to prevent it from happening. Adam wants to help him and befriends the dead Jamie.

The movie is really tricky to summarize as I simply didn't understand most of its story. A lot is hinted at, even more is left open and some dialogues and scenes simply don't make any sense. JAMIE MARKS IS DEAD can't decide in which direction it wants to go - Coming of Age, Coming Out, family drama, ghost story - as soon as one path is trodden on, it changes completely. Through all of it stumbles the most annoying spirit since Casper, the friendly ghost who loses every bit of spookiness as soon as he opens his mouth. It does not make a big difference that Jamie Marks is indeed dead, he just has even worse make-up and clothes than Adam's other schoolmates.

Don't get me wrong, usually I praise movies who dare to leave the Hollywood mainstream safety of spoonfeeding every little thing to a lazy audience. But when the lights are switched on and I am left with a bunch of questions without even being remotely interested in finding their answers because I don't care about the plot or the protagonist something has gone wrong.

There is a twist at the end which is so forseeable it doesn't really count. All characters besides Adam and Jamie are so flat and forgettable that they could just have been left out. That's also valid for Adam's mother, played by Liv Tyler, who does not really fit into the urban scenery and whose fate doesn't contribute anything to the story. That's a big paycheck that could have been spent otherwise.

The movie, based on the YA novel ONE FOR SORROW,  has raked in good reviews, so maybe I'm just not grokking  supernatural YA drama - I couldn't really warm up to THE LOVELY BONES (book, not movie) neither.

What's a bit bizarre is that Noah Silver as Jamie looks a great deal like Daniel Radcliffe in HARRY POTTER and his two buddies played by Cameron Monaghan and Morgan Saylor are a tall red-head and a girl with bushy hair. Coincidence? Another open question which I don't care to find the answer to.

4/10 rocks

13 SINS

Congratulations! You have been selected to be part of a one-of-a-kind game show!

Losing one's job never happens at the right time but for insurance salesman Elliot it couldn't have been any more wrong. There's the wedding with his pregnant fiancée (TRUE BLOOD'S Rutina Wesley) around the corner, his stubborn dad to care for and his intellectually disabled brother who will be institutionalized without Elliot's insurance. He is fired because his boss thinks he "lacks balls" and indeed he isn't even able to swat an annoying fly while waiting at a red stop on a deserted crossing in the middle of the night. Then he gets a very strange phone call: for killing the fly he will be awarded 1000 dollars. For eating the fly it will be even more.

And thus begins a game with 11 more challenges which Elliot all has to master to be rich at the end .All crimes he will commit during the games will be off record if he wins tells him the mysterious gamemaster on the phone. And there will be plenty, arson one of the more harmless. Elliot tumbles down a spiral of the meanest game of dare one can imagine and soon starts to lose himself on the way down.

13 SINS is the work of a German director, Daniel Stamm. I saw his mockumentary THE LAST EXORCISM during the Fantasy Filmfest 2010 and rather liked it. After the very dragging JAMIE MARKS I was very glad that 13 SINS immediately starts with a bang and you know exactly what you're in for: action fueled psycho games which are either cringeworthy or so crazy and/or morbid that you have to laugh about them. The escalating speed of the movie reminded me of BRAKE (FFF 2012) but other than BRAKE the twist at the end of 13 SINS does not completely ruin the movie. Global conspiracy is part of the plot after all and some twists have to be expected.

Good entertainment with not too much artistic value but worth a watch, especially because of the protagonist (Martin Freem... um, Mark Webber), a good shot of black humour and impeccably timed comedy (you know it works when the whole audience laughs just because a text ringtone pipes up).

I was a bit disappointed, though, when I found out the movie was a remake of the Thai movie 13 BELOVED (13 เกมสยอง). Why do movie makers still think a Western audience can't stomach good Asian cinema? 7/10 flies Today I will watch AMONG THE LIVING (as far as I understoond STAND BY ME in French) and centerpiece WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS, a vampire comedy I am really looking forward to.

It has been kind of quiet around here but the Fantasy Film Fest rolled around again and therefore I will throw in a few movie reviews during the next days.

I missed the Opening Night this year because the movies did not really kindle my interest, so the FFF 2014 started one day later for me with the horror comedy SUBURBAN GOTHIC.

Raymond doesn't have an easy life. As chubby, bullied teenager he finally managed to escape the suburbian nightmare of his hometown and start fresh in a city college. But now he can't find a job and has to return to his roots. In the city he was hip, back in Redneck country he is just again the oddball. As if it wasn't bad enough to live in his old room again he is plagued by visions of ghosts and the dead just like when he was a child.

Soon Raymond finds out that there is some serious haunting going on in his parents' home and with Goth Girl and bar owner Becca he starts investigating. Much to the dismay of his father who does not hide that he was and is deeply disappointed by his son. But if Raymond will not help the spirit to rest the life of his family is in danger. A lot of wacky and embarassing situations have to be solved until the ghost can find peace - and Raymond, too.

SUBURBAN GOTHIC has a superb cast whose members are mostly known from television. Matthew Gray Gubler (CRIMINAL MINDS) plays hipster Raymond and even in purple overalls, neckerchief and indie haircut manages to avoid falling into the clichè trap ("No, I'm not gay, but I take it as a compliment"). The best dialogues are between him and Ray Wise (TWIN PEAKS, HIMYM), who plays Raymond's father Donald, a man so thoroughly ignorant, nasty and cold that everyone who encounters him dislikes him with a passion. Kat Denning (BROKE GIRL) is a wonderfully sullen partner in crime, constantly annoyed and quick to lash out with her fist.

The horror element sweetens the deal but serves mostly as backdrop for bizarre situations and humour, although there are a few genuinely scary moments. The cheaply made CGI doesn't really help, though and the movie wouldn't have lost anything if they just stuck to light and makeup.

The movie entertains until the end with a colorful mix of loveable and hateable characters and some classical Poltergeisty moments.

"The time has come for vengeance!"

Not many movies start with a shooting between the police, a silver painted Jesus, a green soldier, Spongebob and Minnie Mouse and get even weirder after that. But what's a man to do? José (Hugo Silva) has a hard time. His divorced wife is always nagging about alimony and thinks he isn't a good role model for his 8 year old son Sergio. Naturally the only sensible solution for his plight: rob a jewelry store dressed as street artist and flee over the French border. On their way to freedom Josè, his accomplice Tony (Mario Casa) plus their hapless taxi-driver and passenger stop in the village Zugarramurdi, famous in Spain for its connection to the witch trials. But of course, witches aren't real - or are they?

If I had to describe WITCHING AND BITCHING in one sentence I would say: Take QUICK CHANGE, add FROM DUSK TIL DAWN and replace the vampires with witches. Spanish cult director Álex de la Iglesia (THE LAST CIRCUS) gleefully throws his helpless characters right into the claws of a crazy witch trio (the maiden, the mother and ... the other one to quite Granny Weatherwax) who want to use little Sergio for an ancient ritual and the other men as snacks. Screaming and flailing they somehow manage to wriggle themselves out of seemingly hopeless situations, just to tumble even deeper into chaos. Thrown into the mix are two rather incompetent police officers and José's furious ex-wife.

The movie is nothing for the faint of heart, both regarding the special effects and the way de la Iglesia plays with cliches about men, women and their relationships. Bodyparts are thrown around like candy, the women are portrayed as overemotional and oppressing while the men are struggling, weak and making one stupid decision after the other. Taking this with a grain of salt and you get a colourful, quick-paced horror-comedy which lets you see some of the powerful women of history and a very famous fertility symbol in quite a different light.

Bottom line: A funny, if not too deep, flick with lots of situational comedy, bizarre characters and settings and tons of slapstick gore. While you won't lose any sleep over it you will be very well entertained.

"All the vampires have vanished miraculously - along with the vampire hunters"

"I belong to the front, you belong to the tail!"

SNOWPIERCER plays in the not-too distant future. A chemical that was supposed to stop global warming has turned Earth into an ice desert where no life is possible anymore. The last survivors of mankind have found shelter in a self-sustaining high-tech train which dashes round and round through the permafrosted world.

In the train's tail the economy class passengers have to live under dire conditions, with only sloppy protein bars to eat, no sunlight and hardly any private space while in the front the first class passengers live in splendour. They control the resources of the train with a firm hand and armed soldiers. Rebels are punished hard. But a conspiracy is brewing in the last wagons. With the help of a secret ally from the front, the tailenders want to overthrow the brutal regime.

Their charismatic and stoic leader is Curtis (Chris Evans, CAPTAIN AMERICA), a man haunted by self-doubts and a troubled past. At his side are old mentor-figure Gilliam (John Hurt, who was allowed to play both sufferer and tyran in the dystopias NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR and V FOR VENDETTA) and trainborn Edgar (Jamie Bell, BILLY ELLIOT), brimming with the eagerness of youth. The first step to revolution: Free the security technician Namgoong Minsu (Song Kang-ho, THE HOST) from the prison wagon - he has to open the doors between wagons for the rebels.

More you don't need and actually should not know about SNOWPIERCER because one of the things that makes this movie so good is the storytelling. Although the movie has everything what defines a Hollywood blockbuster - action, high-tech, a famous cast - Korean director Boon Joon-ho does not spoonfeed his audience in his first English movie with motivations and background story of the characters. Other than so many superficial Hollywood flicks he trusts the viewers' ability to draw their own conclusions. And therefore the movie serves plenty surprises, not only at the end.

Bottom line: After ten minutes the movie got me with its dynamic storytelling and interesting characters so hard that I needed to know how it ended. With each gate the rebels manage to open a piece of story and background is unearthed and together with Curtis I fought, suffered and baffled until the head of the train where the mysterious Wilson, inventor and train driver, lives and many secrets wait to be resolved.

A movie full of suspense and nuances which is very action loaded but never superficial. The focus is put on fleshed-out characters instead cheap drama. All of this makes it easy to ignore the setting, which is build on a rather flimsy logic frame, and just enjoy the (train) ride. Tilda Swinton's performance as Minister Mason, Wilson's Thatcher-esque right hand, is worth it alone.

ENEMY

"What is happening?"

It’s nearly spring and therefore time for the Fantasy Film Nights, the appetizer for the Fantasy Film Fest in September, which this year will go on for twelve (!) days.

I watched five movies this weekend - reviews follow bit by bit.

THE RETURNED

"These people are timebombs!"

I started the Nights with a horror movie by Spanish director Marco Carballo who appeared on the creepy scene with 2010’s EXORCISMUS

While most zombie movies deal with the outbreak as such or the struggling in the post-apocalyptic wasteland, the world in THE RETURNED has recovered. Not only that, ten years later the virus now is under control. People who survive a bite and the following treatment are called the Returned. As long as they get a daily injection of a protein that supresses the virus they can lead a normal life.

As with all potentially lethal, infecting diseases the Returned have to deal with prejudices, fear and stigmatizing. The movie focuses on Kate (Emily Hampshire) a zombie apocalypse survivor who now works as a doctor in a Returned rehab center and her partner, guitarist Alex (Kris Holden-Ried from “The Tudors”) who is one of the Returned but keeping it a secret. Their situation turns slowly more dire when stocks of the protein begin to run low. Kate has to secure Alex’ precious injections while facing the growing panic and aggression of the population and the decision which value whose life has.

The zombie genre has more or less explored everything there is by now and true surprises are rare. Therefore I looked forward to this perspective on a world after a zombie apocalypse. Unfortunately the very promising premise could not keep the high expectations I had. A lot of dramatic possibilities were left unexplored - ten years after a pandemic the world looks and works like before (just more blue) although the population was minimized even more dramatically than after the Black Death. The protagonist couple was set up to invoke pity and sadness but after a few very constructed situations which weren’t at all consistent to how the characters were pictured before I could not help being rather annoyed than moved by true tragedy.

The end is written to be gut-wrenching, but I have seen and read the same plot-device executed so much better that I was left unmoved. I could also not really warm up to Emily Hampshire’s acting and the overuse of the depth of field which quickly turned from enjoying a pleasing visual effect to headache inducing eye squinting.

Bottom line: An okay flick for a rainy night at home but no must-have in the zombie collection.

This has to be one of the coolest genre crossovers in a long time: Far West is a wuxia-western setting. There is fiction. There is music. And there will be a tabletop roleplaying game. What I really want now is a TV series, though.

Amazon's AutoRip-feature hit Germany today. If you are a German Amazon user and you log into your account you might find a nice surprise: each CD you bought since 1999 which is on the AutoRip catalogue has been added as MP3-rip to your account. In the US AutoRip is already live since January.

Dear Reader - Victory

So I discovered this band (or rather solo project by singer/songwriter Cherilyn MacNeil) a couple of weeks ago, and I guess it was love at first listen. Even now, I have difficulties listening to anything else.

Rooted in Johannesburg, MacNeil now resides in Berlin. Her music is pretty hard to describe and rather distinct. It's sort of alternative and minimalistic, and it has some slight African folk vibes to it.