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World of horrors
The Boston Fantastic Film Festival probes the globe for thrills
BY CHRIS FUJIWARA

There’s no shortage of fright-flick festivals in Boston, especially in October. But the Boston Fantastic Film Festival, a project of the Brattle Film Foundation and the estimable writer/scholar/cinephile Steven Jay Schneider, promises something a little different: annual programs of unusual horror and fantasy films from around the world. The inaugural festival, which runs this Friday through next Thursday at the Brattle Theatre, boasts a tantalizing line-up of US and area premieres as well as films that, even to most horror fans, will be unknown quantities.

Schneider recently edited an anthology about world horror and fantasy films, Fear Without Frontiers (FAB Press). The essays spotlight unheralded filmmakers like China’s Maxu Weibang and Cuba’s Jorge Molina, genres like Singapore’s "pontianak" (female-vampire) films and German "krimis" (thrillers) based on the novels of Edgar Wallace, and horror-film traditions and insurgencies in France, South Korea, Indonesia, and elsewhere. It’s a terrific book that avoids the common pitfalls in criticism of such movies: "golden turkey" condescension; mystifying exoticism; and the blend of anti-intellectualism, sexism, racism, and homophobia served up by much fan writing.

Schneider approached the selection of films for the festival with the same seriousness he brought to his book. Reached in Los Angeles, he explains, "We wanted geographic diversity and high quality. And we wanted to be broader than just horror. Many of our selections don’t fall squarely into any single genre. That’s why we like the word ‘fantastic,’ reminiscent of the French term ‘fantastique,’ and to us connoting imaginative extremes, gothic and romantic traditions, the uncanny, the terrifying, the marvelous, and the supernatural in any form."

Particular attention is lavished on Japan, which is represented by six films, most of them from the past two years — including the opening-night feature from newcomer Takashi Shimizu, Ju-On: The Grudge (2003; Friday at 7:30 p.m. and Saturday at 5 p.m.). "Japan has such a rich tradition when it comes to horror narratives — not only in film but also in literature and more ‘folk’ traditions — that their writers and directors are able to draw on very rich resources. The Japanese also have a good understanding of how to engender powerful emotional effects using subtle gestures and emphasizing the unseen rather than simply overloading the audiences’ senses all the time."

Among the films in the series, does Schneider have any special favorites? "Tough question! I’m so happy with the films we’ve got here that I don’t think I could narrow down my list of favorites very well. Ju-On: The Grudge, Love Object, In My Skin, Love from Mother Only — all of these are amazing, highly original, creative, challenging, and disturbing films. And by the way, it’s hard to beat the festival’s three revivals: Alien, The Haunting, and the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre."

If this first festival is a success, Schneider hopes to expand next year’s offerings. "We would like to extend the BFFF to two weeks and add panel discussions, guest filmmakers in attendance, jury prizes, and other events. More programming of older genre films from around the world is one of our main goals. An Edgar Wallace ‘krimi’ series would be amazing, as would a Singapore ‘pontianak’ series, Indian horror, Turkish horror, Filipino horror, and so on. Most of these movies have never been available in North America in any form, and the festival can serve a very valuable purpose by presenting them on the big screen, often for the first time here."

The Boston Fantastic Film Festival kicks off this Friday, October 17, with Robert Wise’s The Haunting (1963) at 5 p.m.; Takashi Shimizu’s Ju-On: The Grudge (2003) at 7:30 p.m.; and Tobe Hooper’s The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) at 10 p.m. The festival runs through next Thursday, October 23, at the Brattle Theatre, 40 Brattle Street in Harvard Square. For complete schedule details, call (617) 876-6837, or visit www.brattlefilm.org.


Issue Date: October 17 - 23, 2003
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