(Yet) Another Hole In The Head: Saturday

Aptly compared in the program materials to Clive Barker's Nightbreed, this Japanese feature balances sometimes wacky scenes of a strangely sympathetic monstrous family with lengthy scenes of yakuza corporate maneuvering (basically how we imagine internal meetings at some massive Silicon Valley companies). Though the monsters (referred to as Yokai) and the humans had lived together in harmony, a recent government initative employed anti-monster hit squads to slaughter the non-humans, with the epithet of "monster" employed liberally on both sides.

While this movie is slow to get going, it contains many intentionally (and some unintentional) hilarious moments, and the final confrontation between human and Yokai is glorious, campy fun and not to be missed. That is, if you're down for a dude in a werewolf suit doing Muay Thai (who isn't?) Catch Kibakichi on Monday June 6 at 7:15.

4:32 p.m.

Every time we go out between movies we're glad that we slathered on the self-tanner this morning. We're hoping that our artificial glow will fool people into thinking we spent this weekend out in the glorious weather, as opposed to the reclusive film nerd that we've become. OK, on to CL.one, a movie made for 25K by some dude in his parents' basement. We guess that's one person who gets outside even less than us.

6:53 p.m.

CL.one is a visually splendid film (though the transfer we saw at the Roxie seemed way, way too dark and was sometimes difficult to see -- imagine watching a DVD on a laptop with your screen at the wrong angle) with a deeply complex plot that has references to The Wizard of Oz, The Matrix, and Demolition Man. Set in a future where nuclear war has rendered humanity sterile, it centers around the efforts of a Cleveland government official to find a successful cloning methodology to continue the human race. Because if somebody's gonna do it, you know it's gonna be somebody from Cleveland.

Many of our mid-film concerns on the hard-to-follow plot were resolved by a not-quite satisfying conclusion. After the lengthy and convoluted journey 24-year-old producer, writer, director and editor Jason J. Tomaric took us on, we somehow expected a more gratifying pay-off. See for yourself at CL.one's next screening Tuesday, June 7 at 9:30.

7 p.m.

We're also developing the theory that except in rare cases, being the sole writer/director/editor/DP of your film isn't always the best idea, because without the checks-and-balances system of separate crew members, the editing seems less judicious. Like tearing off your own band-aid, it must be really hard to cut scenes you've written, directed, and shot, so we're certainly sympathetic, but we are beginning to feel that some of these talented auteurs need to hand some of the control over to others, for the greater benefit of their films.

7:12 p.m.

We're sore. How can we be sore? We've barely moved all damn day. Can we be getting bedsores?

7:15 p.m.

IndieFest founder Jeff Ross introduces Evil Eyes. Unfortunately, the director, who was expected to bring the proper cut of the film as well as participate in a post-film Q&A, was delayed and we're going to be subjected to the DVD version of the film submitted to the festival, instead. We think about leaving and seeing it later in the week, but we really want to see the 9:30 film and know if we leave now we'll have a hard time coming back. How we suffer for our craft!

9 p.m.

With a terrible audio track, an distorted ratio (everyone was far shorter and wider than they should have been) a running time code, it was not the ideal situation in which to see the film.

That said, we really liked the film and are seriously considering seeing it again on Wednesday, June 8 at 5:00, at which time we've been assured a 35 MM print with a clean audio track will be presented. Starring a darkly hilarious Adam Baldwin (who bears a startling resemblance to SFist Jer when he appears in the wrong ratio), Evil Eyes mines the same frustrated writer territory as Barton Fink and The Shining. Baldwin's desperate screenwriter is offered a job by (a freakin' hysterical) producer Udo Kier, who asks him to adapt the true-crime story of a director who murdered his wifer and in-laws. As his work on the script progresses, he comes to believe that he's developed the power to have whatever he writes come true.

We feel peevish at the crappy version of the film we saw (even though it wasn't IndieFest's fault at all, Jeff passed out vouchers for all dissatisfied customers, go Jeff!), but it was such a deftly comedic piece of horror our panties remained largely unwadded.

9:12 p.m.

We're sitting in the Roxie lobby editing this very piece when we hear the phrases "award winning blog" "she's here from SFist" and, most chillingly "she thought it was a little long". Leaving our aging PowerBook on the couch, we head out to see who is using our blog in vain, and see friend of SFist and IndieFest programming director Bruce Fletcher with Lee Perkins and Justin Paul Ritter of KatieBird, which we screened and reviewed last night. Bruce introduces us as we rack our brains in an effort to recall if we wrote anything too asenine about their film. We chatted with them until Bruce took the mike to introduce Jake West, director of the world-premiering Evil Aliens, which SF audiences are seeing even before the cast and crew of the film tonight and again on Monday, June 6 at 5:00.

11:22 p.m.

Bruce took the words right out of our mouths when he termed Evil Aliens a "new horror classic", no joke. In the post film Q&A, Jake admitted to the many homages and references throughout the film (some of the most notable being The Lost Boys, Dead Alive, and Phantasm), stating that this movie is a love letter to the films of his childhood, and it shows. Unrelentingly side-splitting, offensive, splatterific, and raunchy, Evil Aliens follows a British occult-investigation TV series as it goes to Wales to shoot a segment on an abducted woman who now claims to carry an alien baby. Needless to say, macarbe hilarity ensues. We're so happy to hear that this film has already found distribution, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't bail on work and see it on Monday.

11:53 p.m.

In the cab on the way home, some drunk girl started pounding on the window trying to get in. We are not kidding when we say that we nearly s**t our pants. Ordinarily against our nature, we beg our SO to spend the night at our place because we seem to be suffering from a scary-movie induced anxiety disorder.

We can't wait to go back and see some more tomorrow.