02 October 2013

October 2nd

The ABCs of Death (2012) directed by Nacho Vigalondo & Adrián García Bogliano & Ernesto Díaz Espinoza & Marcel Sarmiento & Angela Bettis & Noboru Iguchi & Andrew Traucki & Thomas Cappelen Malling & Jorge Michel Grau & Yudai Yamaguchi & Anders Morgenthaler & Timo Tjahjanto & Ti West & Banjong Pisanthanakun & Bruno Forzani & Hélène Cattet & Simon Rumley & Adam Wingard & Srdjan Spasojevic & Jake West & Lee Hardcastle & Ben Wheatley & Kaare Andrews & Jon Schnepp & Xavier Gens & Jason Eisener & Yoshihiro Nishimura
Like every anthology film ever made in the history of the Universe, this is a mixed back.  Segments of note:

"D is for Dogfight" It's a dogfight filmed entirely in slow motion, except one of the dogs is a human boxer instead.  There's a twist ending to achieve the "death" requirement of the film's title, but that doesn't matter much at all.  It's just strangely fascinating to watch a man and dog fight in slow motion.

"F is for Fart" The first in a series of "we're Japanese, aren't we so weird?" shorts.  All of the shorts from Japan in this film seem to be hellbent on living up to the country's stereotype of producing fucked-up shit.  This one involves a schoolgirl and her teacher enjoying each others' farts more than previously thought possible.  Not really fitting for a horror anthology.

"G is for Gravity" A waste of time.  It's a first person view of a guy falling off of a surf board and presumably drowning in the ocean.

"H is for Hydro-Electric Diffusion" I'll admit, I've never seen a short film specifically made for the furry audience before, so that alone was interesting.  It's a live action Tex Avery cartoon.  Not really horror, but I liked it.

"L is for Libido" A man is forced into a series of masturbation races.  The loser gets a spike through his body.  Original and utterly messed up.  Of course, I liked it.

"M is for Miscarriage" Offensively lazy.  A woman is unable to flush her fetus down the toilet.  Presumably, Ti West took the money they gave him to make this, pocketed it, and filmed this thing with his girlfriend, a cellphone, and some leftover steak.

"O is for Orgasm" One of my favorite segments.  A pure art piece involving sex, bubbles, and cigarettes. Again, not really horror, but beautiful to watch.

"R is for Removed" Probably my favorite segment.  A man chained to a hospital bed has a strip of skin removed from his badly scarred back.  Technicians develop it into a piece of 35mm film.  It gets stranger from there.  The whole segment remind me of a nightmare.  Not a Freddy nightmare, though, but close to the type of a nightmare people really have where things don't quite make sense, but they are scary and disturbing, anyway.

"S is for Speed"  Cool, in a Sucker Punch sort of way.

"U is for Unearthed" A first person view of a vampire being hunted and killed.  I especially liked when the head was cut off and we're forced to experience decapitation from the first person perspective.  Unique.

"X is for XXL" I think I've seen this concept before several times, but it was done very well.

"Y is for Youngbuck" It's been a while since I've nearly vomited from watching a horror movie.  But, yeah, the old pedophile licking up a pool of sweat on the bleachers left from a junior high school basketball team just about got my dinner to exit my body the wrong way.  Also, beautifully shot with a great score.

"Z is for Zetsumetsu (Extinction)" The final "Japan is weird" segment.  It was fun, in an over-the-top way.  It involved naked salarymen, naked female Nazis with giant penises, and Dr. Strangelove.  Yes, I get it, Japan is kooky.

Watched: stream on Netflix.

2 comments:

  1. H is for Hydro-Electric Diffusion has my attention...

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  2. "ABCs of Death" was, what some might call a "hot mess." About a third of the shorts were worth-while, with the rest either being boring (I for Ingrown), pointless (G for Gravity, P for Pressure), or obnoxiously weird-for-weird's-sake (All the Japanese stuff). I really liked U for Unearthed and T for Toilet. Because I'm a total softie, I think I still gave it a 7/10.

    They've already announced a sequel and it already has a better line-up of directors then the first one.

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