Ah, the Toronto International Film Festival. If there’s a better festival, I haven’t been able to gain access to it yet. The eponymous Midnight Madness program, which hosts some of the festival’s most esoteric, bloody and gloriously genre filmmaking have announced their lineup this year, and It’s A Doozie. Some serious star power will be staying up until 3AM at the good old Ryerson Theater this year. From the press release:

“This year’s Midnight Madness lineup is a showcase of some of the most highly anticipated thrillers and chillers of the year,” said Colin Geddes, TIFF programmer. “Bloody proms and zombies seem to pop up as main themes, but I’ve made sure to inject some truly bizarre action into the mix with animated plastic toys from Belgium and Russ Meyer inspired fighting femme fatales.”

The Diablo Cody-penned Megan Fox horror film Jennifer’s Body will open the program. Some early standouts in the Madness set are Daybreakers with Ethan Hawke, George A. Romero’s new zombie film Survival of the Dead, [REC] 2, Ong Bak 2: The Beginning with Tony Jaa and Australia’s The Loved Ones.

Hit the jump for a list of all the films and a brief synopsis.

Jennifer’s Body Karyn Kusama, USA
World Premiere
Jennifer’s Body tells the story of small-town high-school student Jennifer (Megan Fox) who is possessed by a hungry demon and transitions from being “high school evil”gorgeous (and doesn’t she know it), stuck up and ultra-attitudinal to the real deal: evil/evil. The glittering beauty becomes a pale and sickly creature jonesing for a meaty snack, and guys who never stood a chance with the heartless babe take on new lustre in the light of her insatiable appetite. Meanwhile, Jennifer’s best friend, Needy (Amanda Seyfried), long relegated to living in Jennifer’s shadow, must step-up to protect the town’s young men, including her nerdy boyfriend Chip (Johnny Simmons). Written and executive produced by Oscar®-winner Diablo Cody (Juno).

A Town Called Panic Stéphane Aubier and Vincent Patar, Belgium/Luxembourg/France
North American Premiere
An outlandish animation style captures the absurd wit and surreal adventures of plastic toys Cowboy, Indian and Horse.

Bitch Slap Rick Jacobson, USA
World Premiere
In this campy action comedy from the creators of Xena and Hercules, three hot-blooded women try to uncover some booty in the desert using feminine charms, fists and machine guns.

Daybreakers Michael Spierig and Peter Spierig, Australia/USA
World Premiere
Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe and Sam Neill star in this sci-fi horror about a future populated by vampires where humans are the minority.

George A. Romero’s Survival of the Dead George A. Romero, Canada
World Premiere
Master director George A. Romero returns to his world of the undead, this time pitting two feuding clans in the middle of the fallout of a zombie epidemic.

The Loved Ones Sean Byrne, Australia
International Premiere
A troubled teen’s prom dreams are shattered by a series of painful events that take place under the mirrored disco ball, involving syringes, nails, power drills and a secret admirer in this wild mash-up of Pretty in Pink and Misery.

Ong Bak 2: The Beginning Tony Jaa, Thailand
Canadian Premiere
Martial-arts superstar Tony Jaa stars in and directs this epic tale of revenge set hundreds of years in the past. Featuring a huge cast and hordes of elephants, this prequel takes Jaa’s skills to the next level, showcasing him as a master of a wide range of martial-arts styles – while proving him to be a promising director as well.

[REC] 2 Jaume Balagueró, Paco Plaza, Spain
North American Premiere
In the follow-up to the acclaimed [REC], a SWAT team enters the old apartment to control an epidemic with terrifying results.

Solomon Kane Michael J. Bassett, United Kingdom
World Premiere
From Robert E. Howard, the legendary creator of Conan, comes this tale of a savage mercenary in sixteeth-century Century England who owes the devil his soul and seeks to redeem himself by fighting evil.

Symbol Hitoshi Matsumoto, Japan
International Premiere
Japanese comedy superstar Hitoshi Matsumoto (DAINIPPONJIN) stars in and directs this absurd and outlandish comedy about a man trying to escape a unique dilemma.

(via TIFF)

Martyrs

Opening Date: n/a

TRAILER: Trailer

ACCOMPLICES: Official Site

The Charge
martyr (Greek μάρτυς “witness”)

Opening Statement
It took me days to summon the courage to even write about Martyrs. The French need to be quarantined before their cinematic horror films destroy us all.

Facts of the Case
A young girl, Lucie (Mylène Jampanoï) is found bloody, tortured and half-naked, nearly catatonic from unspoken horrors and placed into a hospital for emotional rehabilitation. As she grows up under care, she learns to function again with the help of her friend, Anna (Morjana Alaoui). The two girls become fast friends, and Anna is committed to helping Lucie purge her demons, no matter the cost.

Fifteen years later, Lucie is out for vengeance, seeking out those who kept her chained up so many years ago. With Anna’s help, she tracks down the family responsible for her torture—or so she believes—and reaps terror upon them. But the further Lucie descends into revenge, the more confusing events become for both girls. Sinister forces are at work.

The Evidence
Martyrs is destined to become an infamous film before people even get to see it. After being hit by the French equivalent of an NC-17 rating, France’s Society of Film Directors jumped on the protest wagon to attack the ratings board and get the film shown. Considering that this rating has never been dropped on a genre film in all of French cinematic rating history, it was quite the hum-drum. People are going to hear about this film, amazing things like “the film so scary that France tried to ban it!” and all manner of silliness. To set the record straight: Martyrs is a unsettling film, but it is not the penultimate horror film.

It’s something entirely worse.

There are two distinct films at work in Martyrs, and each one has their pros and cons, but both are out vying for the intellectual destruction of the other. It makes for an interesting cinematic experience to say the least; like having lunch with homicidal in-laws. The first part is a by-the-book horror film, the kind the French have been getting very good at making as of late: lots of blood, lots of gore, a crazy incongruous plot full of screams and jumps and a terrible disregard for human life. Just as the audience is starting to get warmed up to it, surprise! Another movie appears right when you would expect Martyrs to end. It runs on for a long time, brutally dragging out an already torturous horror experience into… something. It becomes something entirely uncomfortable and disorienting; something upsetting and visceral and mean.

I have never seen or heard of a horror film quite like Martyrs. Lauded and hyped-up to be “the” definitive French horror film, a film so emotionally wrenching and shocking to put the current crowning champion, Inside (À l’intérieur) out to pasture. Well, no, not even close; Inside is still the “oops-I-crapped-my-pants” champion of intense French horror in my book for on-screen violence. That’s not to say that Martyrs doesn’t terrify the hell right out of me. It just does it it in a wholly unexpected fashion.

As horror films go, Martyrs has the right stuff—a nice plot that borders on the absurd without actually being so, crazy shotgun-toting protagonists who shoot a whole lot of people full of holes, and a creepy monster tale that slowly metabolizes into view. Then, the ground opens up, and we go from the standard slash-and-scream film into something David Cronenberg would huddle in a corner after seeing. Martyrs is profoundly upsetting, in part because of this horrendous 180-degree shift; audiences reeled at the screening like they had just gotten whiplash. The cheers and cries of fear and delight at the carnage and gore and chases were soon replaced by awkward squirming, wandering gazes and uncomfortable silences. There were more than a few boos after the screening, and with good reason.

Once you have seen the film, you will understand, but without spoiling every bit of the story, it is difficult to truly explore and dissect exactly why Martyrs is so disorienting to audiences. Imagine if in the finale of The Sopranos, the cast suddenly started to sing and dance in a Rodgers and Hammerstein-styled musical number with kisses and hugs and fireworks… and then the show ended. Audiences would be in shock. Sure, there is a noticeable lack of singing, kissing and hugging in Martyrs, but this style of emotional derailment has been harnessed quite brutally. We go full-tilt from a mindless slasher film into a profound and disorienting examination about sin, pain, the afterlife, human tolerances for torture and the notion of martyrdom in one of the most uncomfortable and unsettling thirty minutes of film I have ever bore witness to.

This film digs deep. The disruptive finale tarnishes Martyrs from being a “great” film by the traditional definition, but director Pascal Laugier has sacrificed his own film in order to explore something else entirely; something primal and disturbing that transcends the simplistic set-up of his own film. Before audiences even realize it, we are trapped in a windowless room, being tortured and beaten and mutilated beyond all recognition. And that’s about as close as spoilers as I’m prepared to go.

Forget mindlessness—Martyrs tries to put a method to the madness of modern-style torture porn, and it just makes your skin crawl. The “torture porn” genre survives on its camp, its inherent absurdity and its removal from reality. Imagine the same on-screen brutality laden with existentialism and philosophical meandering as to why all these teenagers needed to be dismembered slowly, agonizingly, and with great prejudice, and then did it again and again and again. Trying to explain such madness just makes it so much more upsetting, so much more real. There’s torture, and then there’s the crazy @#$% going on in Martyrs, and the latter is so much worse.

Closing Statement
This is one of those rare occasions where a film has inspired a negative reaction in me, but in doing so has actually endeared me to the film. Many people will be turned off by the sudden unexpected tonal shift in Martyrs, expecting simply to have their external senses tortured and tweaked, but Martyrs goes much, much deeper. This is a torturous film in the most literal sense of the word; making it through is tantamount to punishment. But in a good way—really, it’s hard to explain. Fans of deeply visceral and introspective horror will definitely want to give Martyrs a look.

It is unlikely Martyrs will receive theatrical release in this country, but The Weinstein Company has purchased distribution rights to the film, so keep an eye out on the Dimension Extreme label in months to come—a DVD release is all but assured. Then, you can watch Martyrs back-to-back with Inside and never leave your house again.

The Verdict
Mind-numbingly unsettling, but a turning point in horror cinema for fans that can stomach it.

7/10

Detroit Metal City

Opening Date: 08/23/2008 (Japan)

TRAILER: Trailer

ACCOMPLICES: Official Site

The Charge
No music, no dreams.

Opening Statement
Based on the hit Japanese manga, Detroit Metal City is an all-singing metallic boot kick to the face. Now this is what a romantic comedy is supposed to be like! Full of death metal and Gene Simmons! Rock on!

Facts of the Case
Negishi Soichi (Ken’ichi Matsuyama, Death Note) is a small-town farm boy who is making his way to Tokyo for the first time. He yearns to be trendy, playing Swedish pop songs about love, cheese tarts and his special sweetie. While attending university, he joins the songwriter’s club and practices his acoustical set, but fails to make a career. Flash forward a few years later, and the gentle Negishi has found musical success… just not the kind he ever imagined!

Negishi has been transformed into Sir Johannes Krauser II, a death metal god of the most unholy caliber, rising up from the bowels of hell to fornicate with your mother! The front man to DMC (Detroit Metal City), Japan’s underground death metal sensation, his career is skyrocketing—except that Negishi can’t stand metal! Unfortunately, his overbearing manager (Yasuko Matsuyuki) forces him to stay in the band, under penalty of severe beating. The meek Negishi is trapped, unable to fulfill his musical dream.

But when a chance encounter re-introduces him to his longtime crush Yuri (Rosa Kato) he tries to break free from Krauser and forge his own path. Desperate to hide his shameful identity from Yuri, he juggles between his two lives, and manages to mess up both badly. DMC fans are not so easily satiated, and when word gets around that the infamous Demon God of Rock and Roll, Jack Ill Dark (Gene Simmons from KISS) is retiring with one last world tour, Krauser will be forced to battle for the pride of Japanese heavy metal… whether he wants to or not!

The Evidence
Let’s get it right out the way: Detroit Metal City might be the best movie I’ll see at TIFF this year, if judged only by sheer audience enjoyment and satisfaction. People were practically on their feet cheering this absurd musical comedy, watching the schizophrenically nerdy Negishi juggle his two identities. Krauser is clad in iron, wears ghastly white makeup with the word “KILL” written on his forehead, and shreds the guitar riffs with his teeth while screaming lyrics of rape, sodomy, murder and destruction. After the makeup comes off, Negishi plays nauseatingly adorable acoustic songs on the street corner, but fails to attract any attention. His band keeps pushing him higher and higher, but in doing so, it means abandoning Negishi’s musical dream.

This film has to be seen to be believed. If the plot summary sounds insane, there is a very good reason for this. A non-stop barrage of physical comedy gags, absurd plot points, horrifically terrible music (both metal and pop) and the goofiest plot imaginable somehow congeals and molds itself into the funniest, most enjoyable, most riotous cinematic experience imaginable. The plot is so ridiculous, so absolutely over-the-top that audiences literally could not stop laughing. Thank goodness the film was subtitled—otherwise nobody would have heard a word of dialogue. The sheer impact of the film cannot be notarized here in a mere review; it is all in the glorious assembly of the sight gags, the physical comedy, the outrageous facial expressions and the oh-so-violent death metal lyrics about raping mothers. Honest, it’s funny!

Teen icon Ken’ichi Matsuyama plays double roles as the painfully gaudy Negishi and the outrageously offensive Krauser, and if it wasn’t spelled out for audiences repeatedly, you would have no idea they were played by the same actor. He is utterly hilarious in both roles; painfully naïve and overpoweringly horrific, with near-perfect manga-styled pantomime. Every facial expression is a riot.

The manga in Japan is red-hot right now; the first printing flew off the shelves and vanished into the ether, and the cinematic adaptation has been perfected by director Toshio Lee (longtime comedic cohort of Beat Takeshi). The spirit of manga has been perfected in the cinematography and composition, without the film feeling overly artificial. At no point does Detroit Metal City feel enslaved to its source material; the film feels fresh and fun and completely unrestrained. This is not to say the film is without criticism; the story runs slightly long, the ending is never in doubt, and it suffers from those predictable clichés that all romantic comedy manga adaptations suffer from, but its sheer enthusiastic glee cannot be denied. The flaws actually make the film more endearing.

And oh, the absurd situations poor Krauser/Negishi finds himself in, like running back and forth between a PR appearance as Krauser and a date with Yuri, and mixing up his menu order/speech/costume. Or when Negishi returns home to the farm, only to find to his horror that his young brother is now a die-hard DMC groupie and refuses to perform any chores around the farm. Luckily for the family, a fortuitous midnight visit from Krauser puts things right. And by the time Gene Simmons shows up at the end as the fabled Death Metal God to perform battle against Krauser, forget about it—Detroit Metal City is just too insane for words. But in a good way. Oh, in such a good way.

Closing Statement
As comedies go, this is a rousing success of a film, absolutely in love with its own creative vision, and every absurd twist or clichéd gimmick sparkles and shines with overwhelming exuberance. Detroit Metal City is the perfect example of how the most hodge-podge of genres, absurd ideas and musical fallacies can combine into the most unique and unexpected of cinematic treasures.

The Verdict
A darling of a film, an absolute must-see.

9/10

Midnight Madness makes it all worth it. This program is where the naughty bits end up. It features the weirdest, most wonderful and freakish genre films from all corners of the world. If a movie has zombies, ninjas, samurai swords or serial killers, it might end up anywhere… but if it has all of them, Midnight Madness gets it. Of all the various programs featured at TIFF, Midnight Madness is the craziest, and most enjoyable from a sheer visceral standpoint. For the price of admission, it is the most fun you can have in a movie theater without a crate of water balloons and naked girls. Every screening is packed to the rafters full of ravenous genre fans who literally tear the cinema apart.

Titles for this year’s program are listed after the jump, courtesy of TIFF:

JCVD Mabrouk El Mechri, France/Luxembourg/Belgium
International Premiere
Jean-Claude Van Damme stars as Jean-Claude Van Damme in the comeback story of one of the biggest action stars in movie history. When a trip to the post office lands the down-and-out Van Damme smack-dab in the middle of a dangerous heist, the “Muscles from Brussels” is exposed as an ordinary guy, complete with fears, contradictions and hopes. What can he do when the gun pointed to his temple isn’t filled with blanks? JCVD finds himself at the turning point of his life as a presumed hero.

The Burrowers JT Petty, USA
World Premiere
A horrific take on John Ford’s The Searchers, director JT Petty (S&MAN, TIFF’s Midnight Madness 2006) tells the story of a band of men who, in 1879, set out upon the plains of Dakota to find and recover a family of settlers mysteriously taken from their farm. Expecting the offenders to be a fierce band of natives, the group prepares for a routine battle. But, upon discovering strange holes in the ground, they soon realize that the real enemy is stalking them from below.

Deadgirl Marcel Sarmiento and Gadi Harel, USA
World Premiere
In this kinky, funny and chilling exploration of friendship, morality and the horror of growing up, two teen boys discover the naked body of a long-forgotten girl in a sealed basement of an abandoned asylum. They quickly realize something far more mysterious is at play when the girl, who they presumed to be dead, begins to exhibit signs of life. When they decide to keep her, their twisted teen fantasy soon erupts into a desperate and dangerous battle of wills between friends. As word of their dark secret threatens to spread, the boys are forced to decide how far they are willing to go to get what they want, and at what cost.

Sexykiller Miguel Martí, Spain
World Premiere
A serial killer is loose at a medical school in Spain, and nobody suspects that the culprit is Barbara, a sexy, fashion-obsessed student whose hunger for blood can’t be satiated by what she gets in anatomy class! She’s Paris Hilton with the mind of Hannibal Lector. But when her fellow students’ experiment to discover the killer’s identity goes terribly awry, Barbara’s victims start coming back to life. Add in some zombies and chainsaws for a bloody spin on the term “fashion victim.”

Detroit Metal City Toshio Lee, Japan
International Premiere
Based on the hugely popular manga series, Detroit Metal City tells the tale of Souichi, a sensitive and wimpy music geek who came to Tokyo from the country with the dream of becoming a fancy pop musician. But bubblegum dreams are crushed to a bloody pulp when Souichi is forced to front the satanic death metal band Detroit Metal City (DMC), whose trademark is eccentric makeup and destructive performance. Winning recognition as one of Japan’s top acts, DMC is challenged to a death metal duel by rock icon Jack IL Dark (KISS’s Gene Simmons). Souichi must battle for the title of death metal king while keeping Ms. Aikawa, his long-time crush with an affinity for shiny happy pop, unaware of his double identity.

Not Quite Hollywood Mark Hartley, USA/Australia
International Premiere
Free-wheelin’ sex romps! Blood-soaked terror tales! Blazing action extravaganzas! The same cultural explosion that gave birth to Australian art classics also spawned a group of demon-children – maverick filmmakers who thumbed their noses at authority, made their own rules and, in the process, unleashed films such as Razorback, The Man from Hong Kong, Patrick and Mad Max. A rip-roaring documentary on Australian genre cinema of the 70s and 80s, Not Quite Hollywood features Jamie Lee Curtis, Dennis Hopper, Stacy Keach, Quentin Tarantino and other celebrities sharing their love and memories of an unjustly forgotten cinematic era.

Acolytes Jon Hewitt, Australia
North American Premiere
When they discover the body of a murdered Canadian backpacker buried in the woods, three high school students trace the crime back to a suspected killer. Taking full advantage of their situation, they attempt to blackmail their suspect into killing again. Their target? A brutal bully – recently released from prison – who has victimized them all their lives. But as their scheme lures them into a violent and sadistic world, the vulnerable teens soon discover that rather than destroying their childhood nightmare, they have created one far deadlier.

Chocolate Prachya Pinkaew, Thailand
North American Premiere
Starring martial arts dynamo Jija Yanin, Chocolate reunites the director and action choreographer of the breakout Midnight Madness hit, Ong-Bak Muay Thai Warrior (TIFF 2003). Exiled from a powerful Thai crime syndicate following a passionate but forbidden love affair with a Japanese gangster, cancer-stricken Zin struggles to raise her shy, autistic daughter Zen. When she learns of some outstanding debts owed to her mother that, if collected, would pay for much-needed medical treatment, Zen sets out to collect from dangerous and reluctant debtors, soon realizing that years obsessively playing video games and watching action movies have transformed her into a martial arts savant.

Eden Log Franck Vestiel, France
North American Premiere
Inspired by Manga and video game imagery, Eden Log is a visually stunning sci-fi vision of a tomb-like underworld. A man regains consciousness at the bottom of a deep cave. He has no idea of how he got there, nor can he determine what happened to the dead man whose body he wakes up next to. Only one thing is certain – he must escape the menacing creatures that are pursuing him, and climb back to the surface through a cemetery-like world that has been abandoned by a mysterious organization called Eden Log.

Martyrs Pascal Laugier, France/Canada
North American Premiere
One night in the early 1970s, Lucie, a little girl missing for over a year, is discovered wandering by the side of a country road, unable to say anything about what has happened to her. Hospitalized, Lucie slowly learns how to live again with the help of Anna, a victim of terrible abuse at the hands of her own family. In no time, they are inseparable. Fifteen years later, with the help of Anna, Lucie sets out to wreak vengeance on the family she believes to be responsible for her capture and torture. A visceral and deeply disturbing exploration of what it means to be pushed to the limits of human endurance, Martyrs redefines the nature of horror cinema.

To be honest, my first reaction was a gentle shrug of the shoulders. Compared to past years, where Midnight Madness programs evoked immediate shouts of glee, nothing this year stands out as an immediate “must see”. Any year with no Takashi Miike film at MM bodes ominous.

Then again, it does have Jean-Claude Van Damme, playing… himself. And Martyrs shook an awful lot of people up at Cannes. And Chocolate will probably be a martial art explosion of awesome.

Okay, I’m getting myself excited. It just took a few minutes.

The Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 4th to the 13th, and the final release schedule won’t be seen until late August. Keep checking for updates, because we’ll be knee-deep in all things TIFF during the months to come. This will be Cinema Verdict’s first year covering TIFF independent of DVD Verdict, and we’re chuffed!

(via TIFF)