Hey folks, Harry here... Saw MIGHTY WIND and will respect the no review policy of that screening. But I will say I agree with some of the recent reviews that have appeared on this site, rather than Monki here. But I'll save final judgement till the film is finished, but at this point, it has a lot of work to be done. As for the other two... Well RAISING VICTOR VARGAS just got a trailer posted at Apple.Com and BUBBA HO-TEP, you know my opinion. It is currently the most marketable moneymaking genre film in existence that I know of without distribution.
Monki here again with my reviews I promised you.
A Mighty Wind. According to the guy who introduced this movie, I’m not supposed to review it; this was an incomplete draft of the film. Eh. It was a LOT of fun. The movie is hilarious. Eugene Levy can have my firstborn. Fred Willard can have my second and third.
I enjoyed the hell out of this one and I will definitely be looking forward to the completed film upon release.
After that I caught an absolutely fantastic movie called Raising Victor Vargas. This is a simple story about a kid named Victor who lives on the east side ofNew York City. It’s the story of his life over a few weeks during the summer. He lives with his grandmother and younger brother and sister. Simple enough, right? This was a very character driven piece, and it was outstanding. The acting in this movie is INCREDIBLE. I was blown away by the work of the rather young cast. Aside from the grandmother, nearly everyone in this movie was under the age of 20. I was reminded a lot of the movie ZigZag, which I caught at the last SXSW. Amazing acting all the way around. The grandmother in this movie was superb.
The movie follows Victor as he falls for a girl he meets at the local pool early in the summer. Slowly he works his charm on her and they fall for each other. The chemistry between these two actors, Victor Rasuk and Judy Marte was outstanding. The movie includes one of the hottest kisses I’ve ever seen on screen.
If you can find this one, go see it. If you can’t find this one, rent ZigZag and wait for this one to reach your local theatre.
To close the evening off, I finally got the chance to see Bubba Ho-Tep. It seems like everyone at SXSW had already seen it, but I was psyched as hell to check it out. Good lord it did not disappoint.
What pitch sold the premise of a black JFK and aging Elvis Presley fighting against a mummy that sucks the souls of elderly out of their buttholes??? This movie was so incredibly badass that I found myself just laughing at myself when I got caught up in it. I mean, I was watching a movie where JFK and Elvis are fighting a mummy for Christ sakes!
Bruce Campbell defines cool. My god this man is a living legend. He was perfect as the King. Ossie Davis was freakin’ great too. I can’t imagine anyone doing it better.
For the love of crap, someone buy this film and give it proper distribution. I met Don Coscarelli at a panel and he was an incredibly nice guy, shy even! He has made an amazing film here and it will easily earn its share.
In closing, I think I’ve hit all of the really “major” films at SXSW this year, but I’ll throw a few reviews up for the ones I catch over the next few days. Stay tuned for more!
-Monki
