2006 SF HOLEHEAD

Beginning June 8, IndieFest's third annual HoleHead Fest, serves up sardonic performance art, mind altering Japanese film, fantastic American fair, and more puns about gore and dread than you can shake a stick at. Though the film's opening night is not the traditional opening, (no film or following party), HeadFest shows off their interest in breaking traditions with the Rock and Roll Horror Show [Annie's, 6/8]. A musical stage production of THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE, the show is a genre bender, and promises fun, especially for the set that relish in their irony.

The opening night film (for lack of better description) RAMPO NOIR [6/9, 7pm] is in the "mind altering Japanese film" category. Organized much like a feature length experimental film, RAMPO NOIR is a detective story about a series of (literally) face melting murders somehow inexplicably tied to a mirror maker. Practicing an ancient method of mirror making, only a few women own his mirrors. Using poems by Rampo as something like chapter titles, the film's themes of nihilism, the duplicity of images, and the illusion of life, are implanted like cleverly placed art direction. Current and mysterious, RAMPO NOIR is a tricky film to be discussed over many cups of coffee.

If you're less interested in the Japanese mind bender, the most local flair this year comes in the form of a little, semi-conventional, anti-monster movie called THE HAMILTONS [6/12, 7pm]. THE HAMILTONS does things with the concept of the monster that bear resemblance to what CRONOS did back in 1992, but on a smaller, "we made this in Petaluma", kind of way. And I mean that with all the love in my heart, truly. (See one of my favorite local actors Larry Laverty briefly as the uncle of a missing girl.) The film uses some of its limitations to its advantage and does a few clever things with the house in which the story unfolds. A balanced coming of age story, corrupted by serial killings, metal illness, dismemberment and a "buried in the basement" story, THE HAMILTONS gently forces the horror film out of its old mold and into something less certain and altogether more enjoyable.

A truly traditional horror is not so easy to find in HeadFest this year, but the Thai film THE GHOST OF MAE NAK [6/11, 7pm] is one to watch if you like the time-honored models tales of terror. Two newlyweds buy a house in an old part of Bangkok only to be greeted by the ghost of a woman who is in quest for her soul. Taken away from her as she lay in her grave, Mae Nak's soul (or more tactilely, the front part of her skull) was removed and since she's sought revenge upon those who threaten her peace. Her ghost has a literal hole in her head, a trait playfully sought out by the programmers of HeadFest. See what I mean about the gore puns?

Some of the more exciting screenings offered by HeadFest come in the form of rarities from the 70's and beyond. My favorite of those I've seen has been SIMON KING OF THE WITCHES [6/11, 12:30pm]. Made by Bruce Kessler in 1971, this semi-psychedelic, counter culture monument to Christian angst follows an enigmatic magician around as he makes friends with the underground cognoscenti and plans to force his way into the infinitely powerful circle of the gods. It's hard to say what is more wonderful about the film: it's absolute literacy about magical practices or its sturdy grasp of the ambiguous. Though all of Simon's patrons treat him with incredulity, Simon's spells are all fantastically efficacious, and the mundane processes that lead to his success are fabulous! Of the films I've seen in all of HeadFest yet, this one is the one I've told everyone to catch while they can.

It should be mentioned that SIMON is not the only rarity on display. John Boorman's ZARDOZ [6/10, 12:30], released four years after POINT BLANK and just following his more familiar DELIVERANCE, this sci-fi oddity stars Sean Connery as the barbarian prince who must save a race of immortals from giving up on procreation. And if anomalous treatment of sexuality is what your after, the biggest winner of the bunch would have to be the ultra-rare French sexploitation film THE BEAST. Screening in honor of the death of director Walerian Borowczyk, the film is loosely inspired by Beauty and the Beast but with far more explicit tack on bestiality. A bizarre cross section of porn, horror, and art house, THE BEAST [6/9 11:30] is reason to stay up late.

Some more traditional horror fair for those seeking the tried and true, comes to you in international packages this year. BROKEN by Adam Mason and Simon Boyles resurrects the fears of the generation of girls brought up on THE WATCHER IN THE WOODS. A woman with a daughter is abducted and put into a coffin, where she awakes with stitches in her side. When she finds her way out of the coffin she's tortured by the woodsman and has to earn her survival only to be awarded a role as his slave. Never telling her where her daughter is, the mother/slave is desperate to escape and find her child. Another traditional, if effecting, film DARK REMAINS is about a couple that mysteriously and gruesomely lose their daughter (theme?) and move to the country to "get away." Promptly, the wife, who is a photographer, begins to see her daughter in the cabin. Walking around the locality of the cabin she takes photographs and sees ghosts in the photos. The number of ghosts grows as the couple nears a sacred date in May and with the help of a creepy local the couple is suitably and suspensefully threatened.

Closing HeadFest's substantial selection of offensive material is the most repugnant film of fest (that's not an award but it should be). FEED [6/15, 7pm], is an Australian feature that plays with our ideas of criminality and takes us 10 steps past our tolerance for "gross."  Every ticket to FEED should come with an airsick bag. And yet, as gross as it is, it's magnetic in a way far more intense than a traffic accident. The concepts of FEED are fascinating and your attention to it is compelled by its ventures of Cronenbergian logic to such a degree you can't pull yourself away. It's all kinds of schadenfreude.

Fortunate for us the minds that bend HeadFest are interested in more kinds of horror than just schadenfreude, and for this reason the fest can actually offer something even to those who aren't committed fans of the genre. 

If you're interested in a little modern horror primer, please look into our "3 Categories of Horror" in the History Section!