Dir - Jang Jae-hyun
Overall: GOOD
The full-length debut The Priests, (Geomeun Sajedeul), from writer/director Jang Jae-hyun arrived the same year as his short film 12th Assistant Deacon from which it expands upon. Bringing schlocky exorcism motifs into South Korea has a novelty to it all on its own, but thankfully Jang weaves his familiar materials into something compelling, funny, and agreeably paced. It brings to mind the usual demonic possession movies that have endlessly spawned in The Exorcist's wake, with a little of Francis Lawrence's A-budgeted Constantine thrown in that focuses on some of the inner politics of Eastern Catholicism and the fun pairing of a rogue Father and a naive Deacon who through personal trauma, find a way to lock horns in squaring off against an ancient demon that of course has ensnared itself in a teenage girl. The first act dishes in the most humor where Gang Dong-won's bumbling religious student gets tasked with the job; a job that he takes seriously and proves more adept at as his research deepens. Kim Yoon-seok is equally interesting and amusing as the no-nonsense veteran who has the power of occult knowledge and unwavering faith at his disposal, all of which culminates in a lengthy final act that finally gets to the blasphemy-spewing eviction of the unwanted spirit. It goes big at this point, but the suspense and emotional turmoil are effectively kept in check.
Dir - Bert I. Gordon
Overall: WOOF
At ninety-three years old, Bert I. Gordon inexplicably returned to the director's chair with Secrets of a Psychopath, though any B-movie fans who may rejoice at such news will quickly be disappointed. That is because this digitally-shot, minuscule-budgeted sleaze-fest exist in a universe where people behave like people who do not exist in any plausible universe. Considering that Gordon penned the screenplay as well, it is sadly a case of a noticeably out-of-touch filmmaker who has not seen a contemporary movie in decades, or maybe has not even left his house to interact with anyone younger than him in as many decades. Mark Famiglietti looks like a typical, boyish CW hunk, playing a character who is impotent, traumatized, and in an incestuous relationship with his sister, (skin queen Kari Wuher), who just so happens to be twelve years his senior. Every plot point is hilariously "Huh?", from overtly attractive people hooking up, (and even marrying each other), with no safety net on a dating site, the cops having no idea how to follow-up on such obvious leads, Famiglietti burying a guy in his suburban backyard in broad daylight, Famiglietti getting aggressively picked up at a movie theater by an equally good looking lady who finds his childish cackles at race cars irresistible, and every character saying words that are so ridiculous and behaving in such cartoonishly illogical ways that the script would barely have to be tweaked to work in a Larry Blamire production. If not the worst movie ever made about a guy who bangs his sister and murders people, it is easily the most embarrassing.
Dir - Anita Rocha de Silveira
Overall: MEH
Brazilian filmmaker Anita Rocha de Silveira attempts her own aimless answer to David Robert Mitchell's also aimless It Follows with Kill Me Please, (Mate-Me Por Favor). Set in upper class Rio de Janerio, it follows, (nyuck nyuck), a similar shtick of adolescents existing in a hazy world where hardly any adults enter into frame, all while a serial killer or a slew of them are picking off young women around their own age. This captivates an entire school but not in any palpable way. Instead, these young women are drawn to the crimes either by unexcitingly gossiping, making Secret Hitler-styled games out of it, or in the case of the particularly aloof Valentina Herszage, letting them morph her persona into someone who would probably fall in line with the group of zombied-out car crash fetishists in David Cronenberg's Crash. Sadly though, there is no rhyme or reason to what transpires here, either aesthetically or narratively. Scenes linger on for ages and many of them could be argued as being pointless, but de Silveira's screenplay seems to thrive on such an agenda where only vaguely interesting and disturbing things are happening to young people that are going about their lives unchecked while danger is all but surrounding them. It is a difficult movie to crack yet unlike some of the surrealist cinema that it clearly channels, there is no oddball humor or emotional connection to be found.
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