Fantasia Reviews: “The Columnist,” “Unearth,” “Special Actors,” and “The Paper Tigers”
By: Joseph Perry (Twitter - Uphill Both Ways Podcast)
Dutch horror comedy The Columnist (De kuthoer) involves columnist and author Femke Boot (Katja Herbers) being hounded by online trolls who disagree with her, and she becomes obsessed with their negative comments to the point that, when she discovers that her neighbor is one of the mean-spirited posters, she kills him and keeps one of his fingers as a trophy. Thus begins Femke’s journey from mousey to murderer, as she seeks revenge on the men who make horrible comments and even death threats to her.
Director Ivo van Aart’s feature boasts razor-sharp black comedy with a serious feminists'’ message about online misogyny at its heart. Herbers in a terrific performance leads a great cast, including Claire Porro as her socially and politically conscious teenage daughter Anna and Bram van der Kelen as horror author — and Femke’s current flame — Steven Dood. Highly recommended, The Columnist is chock full of Hitchockian mirth and mayhem.
Two neighboring rural families, one financially desperate enough to give into fracking on their property and the other so steeped in tradition that they refuse to give in to big oil companies, are at odds in Unearth, an environmental horror film codirected by John C. Lyons and Dorota Swies.
Kathryn (genre stalwart Adrienne Barbeau giving an acting clinic in a meaty role), the matriarch of the Dolan family, wants to hand her corn farm down to her adult son Tom (P.J. Marshall) and her granddaughter Christina (Allison McAtee). George Lomack (Marc Blucas) is trying to support two daughters — teen mom Kim (Brooke Sorenson) and college student Heather (Rachel McKeon) — while earning a meager income from his failing auto garage business. George allows a gas company to begin fracking, and Kathryn demands that her family cut the Lomacks out of their lives because of it, despite intrigue and drama connecting the two families that dominate much of the first two acts. Once something lying dormant far beneath ground level is brought to the surface by way of the local water supply, gooey body horror kicks in with well-rendered practical effects, as does engaging suspense.
Both a social drama about the economic plight of rural Americans and an effective horror film, Unearth is a highly recommended effort featuring superb performances by its ensemble cast.
Special Actors is the second fun comedy delight full of surprises from Shin’ichirô Ueda, the writer/director behind festival darling and fan favorite One Cut of the Dead. Down-on-his-luck Kazuto (Kazuto Osawa) faints at confrontation, which makes gainful employment, along with his dream of becoming an actor, difficult. He happens upon his estranged younger brother Hiroki (Hiroki Kono) when the latter hassles a man and his girlfriend on the street. Hiroki lets Kazuto know that the incident was a ruse, as he is part of an acting troupe that helps people with unique situations, such as impressing girlfriends (as was the case just mentioned) and laughing at movies in the cinema to make them seem funny. Things get wilder and wackier when a young woman hires the troupe, which now includes Kazuto, to save her family’s inn from a scamming cult.
Like One Cut of the Dead, Special Actors has a huge heart behind its whimsical humor, making for a viewing experience during which and after you can’t help but smile. Even when you think you have figured out a twist, Ueda takes a different, enjoyable path. Go in as cold as possible to this one, give yourself over to its quirky characters and likable cast, and expect a joyous time.
Another winning comedy with a big heart is The Paper Tigers, writer/director Quoc Bo Tran’s martial arts dramedy about three men, once young kung fu trainees but now middle-aged men who have drifted apart from both training and each other and who must reunite to avenge the death of their sifu. Danny (Alain Uy) is a divorced workaholic who isn’t doing the best job raising his young son, Hing (Ron Yuan) is injured and living on disability, and Jim (Mykel Shannon Jenkins) is a Brazilian jiu-jitsu/MMA trainer. When their former sifu Master Cheung (Roger Yuan) dies under mysterious circumstances, the three reluctantly band together again to solve the puzzle of how he really died, which leads to physical confrontations with some upstart punk martial artists, their old rival from back in the day, and more.
Tran successfully combines poignant drama about separation, responsibility, and relationships with comical moments and stirring kung fu action, the latter of which is played straight during fight sequences. The result is a heartwarming effort that offers protagonists in whom viewers can really get invested, a modern updating on kung fu cinema tropes, and a true feel-good film filled with winsome performances and first-rate storytelling.
(This review article is in memory of VideoScope Publisher and Editor Joe Kane.)
The Columnist, Unearth, Special Actors, and The Paper Tigers screened as part of Fantasia, which ran August 20 through September 2, 2020.
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