Hagazussa: A Heathen's Curse (2017) Ithaca Fantastik 2017

Making the rounds of numerous genre festivals around the globe I somehow completely missed HAGAZUSSA despite it playing close to home. It wasn't until the film make a trip some six hours from my home that I finally caught up with a film I had been told was chilling and hauntingly beautiful.

The film is the story of a young girl who lives on the outskirts of a village in 15th century Germany. When he mother dies she is forced to grow up on her own remaining an outcast as a resulto her isolated life and the fact that her mother had fits. Years later after she grows up and has a daughter of her own things take a turn  for the worst and a seeming supernatural force is released...

...or something.

While certainly looking spectacular the story of HAGAZUSSA never fully comes together. Things happen, kind of. People do things, occasionally in real time, but nothing quite adds up to much because we are never clued into anything. This is not the result of the scarcity of dialog, rather its simply we never see enough to piece it all together. Watching the film I kept attaching my thoughts to the story  and characters instead of having the film inform me. It was as if I was making up a story for the images instead of being told a tale.

While I don't hate the film I really don't care for it either. To me it's a kind of missed opportunity. my kvetching aside I know that some people have loved the film so feel free to give the film a go.

Top Knot Detective (2017) Ithaca Fantastik 2017

Aaron McCann and Dominic Pearce's mockumentary TOP KNOT DETECTIVE is one of the coolest films of the year. A dead on perfect send up of the type of crazy shows that filter out of Japan that leave audiences scratching their heads and giddy with delight.

The premise of the film is that in the 1990's there was a Japanese TV show called TOP KNOT DETECTIVE that lasted one season. The show started out as a more or less straightforward samurai/detective show made by a singer who didn't know how to make films and it morphed into weirdness not long before a series of odd and tragic events stopped production. The show then disappeared and only exists in VHS copies that were made when the show aired in Australia.

Owing to the weirdness of some TV shows from Japan it is entirely possible that if you didn't know that the film was a joke that you would think it was real. Nothing we see in the clips from the show from dancing girls, a Kamen Rider like character, splurting blood or just the general arch acting would make you think it wasn't real. Everything looks right even the VHS clips (which apparently come from ful  episodes that were shot  by the directors in Japan).

Everything come together and as a result the film is screamingly funny. This is the sort of film where the more you know of what is being sent up the funnier it is. In all seriousness this film spoofs or kids pretty much everything you can think of relating to Japanese culture and ow it's perceived by non-Japanese which results in a steady stream of laughs.

Most amazingly the film is so well done that the film can be seen as not really being funny simply because it gets everything so right that you're tempted to take it all straight.

I loved this film a great deal. I loved it so much I wish I had seen the film at something like the New York Asian Film Festival where the place would have been full of people on the right wavelength to get the film.

If you are a fan of Japanese genre films or TV the film is a must...and its a must even if you just like well done comedies.

Destined for cult status TOP KNOT DETECTIVE plays at this years Ithaca Fantastik and is highly recommended.

Ithaca Fantastik starts today and runs through next weekend

Ithaca Fantastik is one of the coolest genre festivals I’ve run across in the almost 8 years I have been covering film. While not has huge as something like Fantasia or Fantastic fest Ithaca makes up quantity with quality.

And quality is something they have in spades. Every year looking at the schedule I find I want to see everything. And while I may not like every film, I know why they screened everything. There is always something unique and worth seeing in every film they run.

How good is the festival? Mondocurry has made the trek from NYC for the festivities, thus shaming me greatly because I should have done the same thing.

I have no idea what to say other than if you live anywhere in the world and can get your butt to Ithaca New York you need to go.

To motivate you here are some reviews of the films we’ve seen previously

Expect a bunch of coverage of some of the other films they are showing.

The full schedule and ticket information can be found here.

A DAY
THE ENDLESS
NOVEMBER
SEQUENCE BREAK
DEATHLINE
MON MON MONSTERS

ITHACA FANTASTIK ANNOUNCES FULL LINEUP AND ART SHOW FOR 2017 EDITION!

Don't miss our full program of features, shorts and events for the 6th edition happening in upstate NY this November!

​ Ithaca Fantastik returns with our Festival Favorite & Midnighters blocks, spotlight on Bill Lustig's BLUE UNDERGROUND, THE STRANGE COLORS OF GILLES VRANCKX art show and much, much more!

Check out the trailer for our retrospective spotlight on ITALIANO PSICHEDELIKO HERE!

Ithaca, NY, Oct. 17, 2017 – Ithaca Fantastik (IF) will unleash its sixth annual film festival Nov. 3–12 in Ithaca, NY. With little more than two weeks to go IF is announcing its full features and short film lineup. With 37 films from 20 countries, the IF team promises this year’s festival will be a Fantastik ride—so buckle up!

2017 has been a prolific year for genre films and IF programmers have narrowed the field to thrill every flavor of Fantastik fan. In LET THE CORPSES TAN, Belgian duo Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani pay visual homage to Italian gangster films. Marc Meyers’s award-winning MY FRIEND DAHMER, based on the graphic novel of the same name, follows the teenage years of the budding serial killer. Ryan Prows’s mesmerizing and gritty LA tale LOWLIFE takes viewers on a high-energy organ-harvesting misadventure. And Deborah Haywoods’s beautifully disturbing and deeply personal PIN CUSHION explores intergenerational bullying in a small but toxic English town.

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​Playing to a full range of IF6’s retrospective theme—Italiano Psichedeliko—with a contemporary eye, Rupert Jones’s murder-mystery, KALEIDOSCOPE, mesmerizes with lush visuals and amazing performances from Sinead Matthews and Toby Jones. Rainer Sarnet’s NOVEMBER plunges vanguard film-lovers into a surrealist maelstrom of faith, witchcraft, and love, while German tale FREDDY/EDDY ushers in a doubled and troubled soul from the mind of Tini Tüllmann.

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Any pure horror lovers in the room? Giddens Ko’s MON MON MON MONSTER blows minds with its thoughtful subtext on bullying dressed with gory violence. A Taiwanese echo to Haywoods’s PIN CUSHION, this film takes no prisoners. The same can be said about Gabriela Amaral’s FRIENDLY BEAST: What starts out as a classic social drama makes a sharp turn into more graphic territory demanding self-reflection. And for undead action, Robin Aubert’s LES AFFAMÉS—an art house Zombie film full of deep social commentary—is a brilliant homage to maestro George Romero’s ghoul metaphor.

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Sometimes, real life is more Fantastik than fiction. Brad Abrahams’s documentary, LOVE AND SAUCERS, tells the improbable story of David Higgins’ intimate love for an alien and the art that followed. For sheer genre joy, Australian mockumentary TOP KNOT DETECTIVE is Aaron McCann and Dominic Pearce’s madcap love letter to late-night Japanese television—from Lone Wolf and Cub and Mute Samurai to Message from Space and Space Sheriff Gavan.

IF completes this year’s smorgasbord with the crazies:  Adolfo Kolmerer and William James’s SNOWFLAKE, the prodigal son of Pulp Fiction and Synecdoche NY, with producer Eric Sonnenburg here for the sceening; Thomas Berg and Frederik Waldeland’s super-weird, laugh-out-loud VAMPYR VIDAR; and Jimmy Henderson’s JAILBREAK with its roots in HK martial arts cinema, Jean Paul Ly’s choreography, dynamic camerawork, and the incisive power of a Tony Jaa elbow strike. These films will inspire guilty pleasure and deep love with their absolute audacity and inventiveness.

IF also shines a spotlight on BLUE UNDERGROUND, Bill Lustig's distribution company, with the 4K restoration of Gary Sherman’s DEATH LINE, a direct transfer from the camera negative—as close as you can get to a director’s true vision! Another new 4K transfer, Bob Clark’s DEAD BY NIGHT, offers a deep meditation on the effects of war …with a zombie trope. Gary Sherman and Bill Lustig will present these respective films to a yet-to-be-blown-away audience!

Along with this incredible lineup, IF is excited to present its 2017 art show: THE STRANGE COLORS OF GILLES VRANCKX featuring the work of the Belgian poster genius behind art for Amer, The Strange Colors of Your Body’s Tears, LET THE CORPSES TAN, and more. Vranckx will appear as an IF special guest at the show’s opening reception on Thursday, November 9.

Learn more at ithacafilmfestival.com and follow IF on twitter @IFantastikNY or Facebook and Instagram at Ithaca Fantastik.

About Ithaca Fantastik:

The Ithaca Fantastik festival is a 10 day film, art, and music festival beginning the first weekend of November in Ithaca, NY. Our mission is to bring the best of fantastic culture to Upstate NY by presenting a selection of the most anticipated international films, community organized concerts, and diverse art exhibitions.

INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION

Ithaca Fantastik First Wave

​​ITHACA FANTASTIK RETROSPECTIVE AND FIRST WAVE OF TITLES REVEALED FOR 6TH EDITION! Don't miss our spotlight on ITALIANO PSICHEDELICO with the 40th Anniversary of SUSPIRIA, mind-melting midnighters, CINEMA PUR miniseries, and more!

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​Ithaca, NY, September 19, 2017 - The Ithaca Fantastik (IF) festival returns to Ithaca, New York, November 3-12, 2017 with a carefully curated selection of new and classic genre films. With less than a month and a half to go, IF is announcing exciting changes, its first wave of titles, and a truly inspired retrospective!

Returning audiences will notice an expanded schedule as the festival grows from half a week to a full nine days. The festival’s two weekends will be dedicated to the best in current genre and festival cinema, with the week between featuring classic retrospective selections.

Our first weekend begins with the return of the CINEMA PUR miniseries, with gems that genre fans won’t want to miss! From Finnish action comedy SAMURAI RAUNI (Mika Ratto, Finland) to the hyper-real dark fairy tale TIGERS ARE NOT AFRAID (Issa Lopez, Mexico), audiences will be delighted by the variety the IF programmers are bringing to Central New York. Turkey and Canada are well-represented again this year, with the SXSW award-winner INFLAME (Ceylan Ozgun Ozcelik, Turkey), and the TIFF midnight madness selection THE CRESCENT (Seth A. Smith, Canada). The lineup wouldn't be complete without a little witchcraft—the IF team promises HAGAZUSSA: A Heathen’s Curse (Lukas Feigelfeld, Germany) will haunt viewers long after the screening. Rounding out CINEMA PUR, the documentary BIGHT OF THE TWIN (Hazel McCarthy, US), about the personal journey of avant-garde performance artist Genesis Breyer P-Oridge, interlaces belief and grief in a beautiful and unexpected way.

 

The 40th Anniversary of the Giallo masterpiece SUSPIRIA (Dario Argento, 1977) provides an excellent occasion to revisit Italian exploitation classics with fresh eyes. The festival retrospective, ITALIANO PSICHEDELICO, will focus on the amazing visuals these inspired directors put on-screen. Selections include late 60s to mid 70s Italian films SUSPIRIA (Dario Argento, 1977), AUTOPSY (Armando Crispino, 1975), LE ORME (Luigi Bazzoni, Mario Fanelli, 1975), BABA YAGA (Corrado Farina, 1973), DEADLY SWEET (Tinto Brass, 1967), as well as more titles to be announced in wave two!

Continuing our weekend lineup we have slasher comedy TRAGEDY GIRLS (Tyler McIntyre, UK), Tribeca award winner THE ENDLESS (Benson and Moorhead, USA), Graham Skipper’s directorial debut SEQUENCE BREAK (USA), Nordic ghost tale I REMEMBER YOU (Oskar Thor Axelsson, Iceland), and a twisted take on the timeloop trope A DAY (Sun-Ho Cho, South Korea). From start to finish, there will be plenty to captivate audiences whose tastes lie across the horror spectrum and beyond!

            

Ithaca Fantastik would not be complete without its midnight series, featuring the riveting zombie comedy ZOMBIOLOGY (Alan Lo, Japan) and the surprising BRAVE STORM (Junya Okabe, Japan), which can be best described as an inventive and improbable mix between Terminator and Evangelion.

Visit the IF website (www.ithacafilmfestival.com) and stay tuned for more Fantastik announcements and title waves soon!

Local artist Steve Ellis (The Walking Dead, The Only Living Boy, High Moon), once again perfectly captures the spirit of the IF retrospective with a custom illustrated poster.

About Ithaca Fantastik

The Ithaca Fantastik festival is a ten-day film, art, and music festival that takes place over the first weekend of November in Ithaca, NY. Our mission is to bring the best of fantastic culture to upstate NY by presenting a selection of the most anticipated international films, community organized concerts and diverse art exhibitions.