The film festival year gets wrapped up in style, as Night Visions Maximum Halloween 3015 -festival brings to table its wicked mixture of genre film in Helsinki from Wednesday November 4th until Sunday November 8th.
44 feature films, mostly premieres, will be screened in Maxim and Kinopalatsi film theatres during the five day festival. Night Visions will also be the last festival to be organised in the atmospheric Maxim, so grab your chance.
Gaspar Noé’s sexual melodrama Love will probably test the boundaries of some people. Despite all the apparent shock value (sex in 3D!), I do believe there’s an honest, deep film here. And Takashi Miike’s vampire action comedy? Oh yes please! Yakuza Apocalypse will be one definitely worth checking out. Roberto Minervini’s The Other Side offers a raw depiction of American white trash reality.
There’s a strong emphasis on documentaries this year and they do sound intriguing: Wes Orshovkski’s The Damned: Don’t You Wish We Were Dead tells the story of the first British punk band to release a single and an album. Calum Waddell’s 42nd Street Memories bites into the 1970’s and 80’s jagged movie culture in New York. And my personal favourite, Kevin Derek’s The Real Miyagi explores the legend behind the most memorable character of the Karate Kid films. Wax on, wax off.
The festival’s opening film will be Eli Roth’s Sundance-hit Knock Knock, starring Keanu Reeves as a family man, whose dark fantasy turns into his worst nightmare. Other key movies at the festival are Jason Lei Howden’s Deathgasm, which continues New Zealand’s brilliant traditions in horror comedy and also the American remake of the French cult horror film, Martyrs (dir. Kevin & Michael Goetz).
The classics selections honour genre greats who have passed during the year. Director Wes Craven will be remembered with a special screening of A Nightmare on Elm Street. The iconic actor Christopher Lee’s memory will be honoured with the screenings of Horror of Dracula (dir. Terence Fisher, 1958) and The Wicker Man (dir. Robin Hardy, 1973).
The final program of the festival will be published on Thursday 15th of October on the festival’s website www.nightvisions.info.
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