¡QUÉ HORROR! 2016

Candidate #17

GOKSEONG

(THE WAILING)
(May 2016)

But they were terrified and frightened, and supposed that they had seen a spirit. And He said unto them, “Why are you troubled? And why do doubts arise in your hearts? Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I myself. Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.”

--Luke 24: 37-39

With that Biblical quote, Na Hong-jin’s Gokseong kicks off, as a remote mountain village in South Korea becomes the site of brutal incidents of murder.

Sporting some of the conventions of Korean cinema (the tonal potpourri, the largely ineffectual dunce who passes off as the protagonist, the excellent cinematography--courtesy of Hong Kyung-pyo*), Gokseong is a disturbingly effective horror/thriller hybrid.

And while I may not agree with some of the things it ultimately says, that doesn’t take away from the fact that Na kills it with this one…

* Some of the other directors Hong has also shot for include Bong Joon-ho [Madeo (Mother) and Snowpiercer], Kim Min-suk [Cho-neung-ryeok-ja (Haunters)], and Kim Jee-woon [the “Memories” segment from San Geng (Three)].

(The Wailing OS’ courtesy of impawards.com.)

AFTERTHOUGHTS (59)

59.1 CRUISING TRIBECA 2008 (2)
The line-ups for the Discovery and Midnight sections of this year’s Tribeca Film Festival have been announced, and the films that have piqued my interest are:

Discovery
La Habitación de Fermat (Fermat's Room), directed and written by: Luis Piedrahita and Rodrigo Sopeña. (Spain)
The walls are closing in—literally—on four brainiac mathematicians with shadowy pasts in this muchotense debut. A sexy virtuoso, a hardheaded hottie, a doleful drunk, and a middle-aged merrymaker have all been brought together by the mysterious Fermat to solve their most profound equation yet: Why is someone trying to kill them?

Sita Sings the Blues, directed and written by Nina Paley. (USA)
Using a variety of colorful animation techniques, writer-director Nina Paley wittily interweaves the story of Sita, the leading lady of the ancient Sanskrit epic Ramayana, with the story of a modern American woman struggling to keep her marriage afloat.

The Wild Man of the Navidad, directed and written by Duane Graves and Justin Meeks. (USA)
Based on real-life journals, this intelligent retelling of an old urban legend, shot in a ’70s-style B movie aesthetic, focuses on a Texas community terrified by a mysterious creature inhabiting the nearby woods.

Midnight
The Cottage, directed and written by Paul Andrew Williams. (UK)
A kidnapping plot goes horribly awry when two brothers and their potty-mouthed hostage stumble into the wrong farmhouse in this gory horror-comedy.

Dying Breed, directed by Jody Dwyer, written by Michael Boughen, Rod Morris, and Dwyer. (Australia)
Inspired by the legends of a 19th-century cannibal and an extinct tiger, this brutal horror-thriller centers on four friends who find out that something—or someone—murderous lurks in the rain-slogged Australian bush.

From Within, directed by Phedon Papamichael, written by Brad Keene. (USA)
Evil comes from within in this smart, supernatural thriller, set in a small extremist evangelical town that is mysteriously afflicted with serial suicides.
Up-and-coming cast includes Elizabeth Rice, Thomas Dekker (Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles), Laura Allen (Dirt), and Rumer Willis.

Killer Movie, directed and written by Jeff Fisher. (USA)
A reality TV director copes with a spoiled celebutante and a show gone haywire when a masked killer starts bumping off the crew in this slasher-movie satire from a director who did time working on The Simple Life.

You can find the complete lists of the Discovery and Midnight sections of the 2008 TFF here.

59.2 REMAKE REMIX RECYCLE (1)
Those of you who frequent the Iguana probably know that I love me my Hideo Nakata. One of his films that I haven’t yet had the opportunity to see though, is Joyû-rei (Don’t Look Up; a.k.a. Ghost Actress).
Apparently, though Nakata was approached to helm an English-language remake of Joyû-rei, the man now taking the director’s chair is Fruit Chan. I guess things didn’t work out with Nakata, which is, on the one hand, sad.
On the other hand though, I love me my Fruit Chan too, so I’m looking forward to this one; Chan directed my favourite segment of Saam gaang yi (Three… Extremes), “Dumplings,” an extended cut of which was also released as the feature film, Gaau ji. (Try and catch both, if you’re able.)
In the English-language Don’t Look Up cast, one Henry Thomas, who once upon a time, bicycled across the face of the moon with E.T.
Shooting begins April 14 in Los Angeles.

(The Cottage UK quad courtesy of bloody-disgusting.com; The Cottage image courtesy of telegraph.co.uk; Joyû-rei OS courtesy of lapuertaoscura.com; Three… Extremes OS courtesy of impawards.com; Dumplings DVD cover art courtesy of amazon.co.uk.)