Sunday, February 16, 2014

Jason goes to Indiefest--Day 9

Three more shows on Friday--Valentine's Day. Like every year since 2003 I've spent Valentine's Day at Indiefest. But this year I took my girlfriend there, and she dug it. So I'm not saying Indiefest is the perfect Valentine's date, but I will say that if you find a girl who thinks it is you should keep her.

First up was the short LOVES OF A CYCLOPS. A one-eyed guy sees the world very differently. A disgraced scientist attempts to bring his vision to the world through a series of experimental lenses. But then he (the cyclops) falls in love with former child star books-on-tape narrator. And things get weird. Hilarious, deliriously lo-fi, impossible to predict but somehow makes perfect sense.

Making perfect sense was definitely not a concern of the feature ASPHALT WATCHES. An animated Canadian (it's always the Canadians, isn't it) road movie. Allegedly based on a road trip filmmakers Shayne Ehman and Seth Scriver took in 2000, it's a trip across Canada with Bucktooth Cloud and Skeleton Hat. They meet...nobody you'd ever want to meet, starting with psychotic Santa Claus. The animation is intentional lo-fi flash animation and the story...goes nowhere and everywhere at the same time. It was so insane I didn't know whether to be bored or laugh hysterically. So I alternated between both. And mostly, in the end, I just concluded it was too damn long. Maybe that was because we had to rush over to the next show (which was sold out) but mostly it was because this kind of humor/insanity gets exhausting after about 30 minutes...and it went on for 94.

And then I initiated my girlfriend into an Indiefest tradition--the 80'S POWER BALLAD SING-A-LONG. Every Valentine's, we get liquored up (yay Jameson!) and play 80's Power Ballads on the big screen while flicking our Bic lighters and raucously singing along (if you can call what we do singing.) It always starts with Love Bites, and ends with Shot Through The Heart. And in between...there's a rotating playlist but several standards (my favorite being Meatloaf's I Would Do Anything For Love.) Of course, this is billed to cynics who aren't spending a romantic dinner with their sweetie. So bringing a date and being all kissy-face in front of those cynics is pretty fucking rude. Which made it all that much more fun for me.

And then we stuck around for the late show, a late addition that wasn't on the printed schedule--BOUNTY KILLER. In the future there is no government. Corporations run everything. And corporate heads put out hits on each other--the ultimate violent takeover. The two best--and fierce rivals--are Mary Death and Drifter. Throw in a goofy "gun caddy," cannibal gypsies, and a powerful business elite recognizable by their distinct yellow ties and how could it possibly get any weirder? Three words--Gary Fuckin' Busey--that's how! Stop reading this right now and just buy the damn Blu-Ray already (it's also on Amazon streaming, and I assume Netflix, etc. if you prefer streaming.)

Total Running Time: 301 minutes
My Total Minutes: 351,182

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