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| The Bulgarian horror/thriller Roseville opens the 2014 Cellar Door Film Festival. |
CDFF 2014 opens with the feature presentation of Roseville, which is the first horror/psychological thriller ever from Bulgaria. (And a North American premiere!) Opening night includes a local emerging talent before the Balkan flick, for Roseville will be preceded by the short film Beauty Sleep by Andrew Robinson. Beauty Sleep, which draws inspiration from genre masters like David Lynch and John Carpenter, comes to Cellar Door after premiering at the Toronto Independent Film Festival.
The feature presentations also include the Canadian horror
film Dys- from director Maude
Michaud. Dys-, which one of my
programming colleagues amicably referred to as the “punch in the face” of the
programme, is a visceral and distinctly feminist body horror film. It’s not for
the faint of heart!
Fantasy fans will enjoy the Sunday screening of The Dragonphoenix Chronicles: Indomitable
from Greek director Thanos Kermitsis. Dragonphoenix,
like Roseville, highlights emerging
talents in the genre scene, for the film is the first Greek epic fantasy. The film has
been pleasing audiences around the world and we hope film fans in the 613 are
just as enthusiastic.
CDFF finishes with a happy ending thanks to the surreal
horror/thriller/western/queer/comedy The
Samurai from director Till Kleinert and starring Michel Dierks and Pit Bukowski (Lore, Shifting the Blame). This crazy genre-bender should appeal
to fans of the Vanguard fare at TIFF or anyone especially in the mood for something
strange and unusual. It’s a lot of fun.
In addition to the features, Cellar Door presents a range of
shorts across genres and countries. Highlights include the Tarkovsky inspired Stalker’s Dream, the Canadian psychological
thriller We Wanted More, and the
animated fairy tale The Cold Heart.
CDFF includes two other Ottawa shorts in addition to Beauty Sleep, the philosophical The
Phoenix by Carmelo Zucco and the Twilight Zone-y Experiment 467 by up-and-comer Dylan Hunt-Weeks. Experiment 467 effectively uses Ottawa’s
Diefenbunker as eerie and atmospheric setting. Both local filmmakers will
attend Sunday’s shorts screening for Q&As and Maude Michaud will also be
present on Saturday to chat Dys- with
local film fans, if CDFFers want to enhance the festival experience with
post-screening discussions. My only complaint is that, as a programmer, I can't review these films!
The full line-up for the 2014 Cellar Door Film Festival is
as follows:
Opening Night
Friday, Nov. 7 at 7:30pm – Club SAW
Roseville
Dir. Martin Makariev, Bulgaria, horror/thriller, 120 min.
Starring: David Chokachi, Elena Petrova, Kalin Vrachanski,
Lydia Indjova, Plamen Manassiev.
Synopsis:
November 18, 1985. Police found four bodies in an isolated mountain hut
Roseville. One of the guests, a young man named Vasil is missing. The case is
still labeled "unsolved." The film takes an artistic interpretation
based on direct and indirect police information: Vasil came to honeymoon in
Roseville with his wife. Soon afterwards he feels a strange presence in his
nightmares and becomes paranoid, but is also very attracted to the place and
refuses to leave. He realizes that he was predestined to come in Roseville.
When the others realize that Vasil has changed, it's too late to leave.
Beauty Sleep
Dir. Andrew Robinson
Canada (Ottawa), experimental/horror, 12 min.
Canada (Ottawa), experimental/horror, 12 min.
Starring: Maura Stephens, Randy Mars, Christine Lachance
Synopsis: Beauty
Sleep follows Mary Lynn's haunted 9-5 descent into an opera of horrors with new
sobering eyes.
Saturday, Nov. 8 at 7:30pm – Club SAW
Dys-
Dir. Maude Michaud, Canada, horror, 99 min.
Starring: Shannon Lark, Alex Goldrich, Dega Lazare, and Lynn
Lowry
-Synopsis: A strange disease is plaguing the city. Hoping to
escape contamination, Eva and Sam, an estranged married couple, are forced to
barricade themselves in their apartment despite the palpable tension between
them. Now forced into isolation in their small living space, they struggle with
their own frailty in a world that can only offer the worst horrors imaginable.
-Winner: Audience Award for Best Canadian Feature, 2014
Fantasia Film Festival!
-Director in attendance!
-Director in attendance!
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Dys- screens with:We Wanted More
Dir. Stephen Dunn
Canada, psychological thriller, 15 min.
Canada, psychological thriller, 15 min.
Starring: Christine Horne, Skyler Wexler, Angela Asher
Synopsis: An indie-rock singer loses her voice on the precipice
of her first world tour.
-Review from TIFF
-Review from TIFF
Sunday, Nov. 9 at 12:00 pm – Club SAW
The Dragonphoenix Chronicles: Indomitable
Dir.Thanos Kermitsis, Greece, fantasy, 126 min.
Starring: Yannis Roumboulias, Constantina Georganta, Meletis
Georgiadis, Kiriakos Korogiannis
Synopsis: Ιn an Age of Darkness, the mighty Dragonphoenix
Empire rules the World of Elebros with an iron fist. Dragar, a mighty warrior
from the North, is a slave, taking part in brutal pit fights for the pleasure
of the Empire's noblemen. His body is there, but his mind is back at his
homeland and the wife he left behind. Dragar manages to escape captivity and
takes hostage the daughter of a General, the spoiled Valeria. The General sets
up a manhunt to bring back his daughter. The way back home will be filled with
dangers and difficulties for Dragar and the spoiled Valeria. Dragar will have to
face the past, the present and the dark future which lies ahead but he shall be…
Indomitable.
Cassandra
Dir. Guy-Roger
Duvert
USA/France, fantasy, 14 min.
USA/France, fantasy, 14 min.
Starring: Noémie Goetsch, Eric Kailey, Alex Freeman
Synopsis: Two thieves infiltrate a besieged medieval city to
get an artefact. They thought they had nothing to lose. They were wrong...
Sunday, Nov. 9 at 3:30 pm – Club SAW
“From the Basement of the World: Speculative Shorts”
Features:
Stalker’s Dream
(Le rêve du Stalker)
Dir.
Sébastien Corne, David Trujilo
France; sci-fi; 4 min.
France; sci-fi; 4 min.
Starring: Gwennaël Hertling, Mathilde Bourbin
Synopsis: In a world which lies in ruins, one man is trying
to survive. Both physically and mentally imprisoned, he is haunted by the
memories of a missing woman. Hope and despair entwine in a mystical and dark
perspective, which reflects the confusion of the character. This is an
experimental mix of music video and a short film, and is a tribute to filmmaker
Andreï Tarkovski and quotes the poem of his film Stalker.
Check Out Time
Dir. John Brennan
Hong Kong, horror, 8 min.
Hong Kong, horror, 8 min.
Starring: Barry O`Rourke, Andrew Ng, Peter Spurrier
Synopsis: A nervous westerner spends an increasingly
unsettling night in a rundown Hong Kong hotel before the true source of his
fears is revealed.
Experiment 467
Dir. Dylan Hunt-Weeks
Canada (Ottawa), sci-fi, 13 min.
Canada (Ottawa), sci-fi, 13 min.
Starring: Dan Desmarais, Brennan Martin
Synopsis: A lonely researcher learns of his cosmic
insignificance in this 'Twilight Zone' type film.
-Shot in Ottawa's Diefenbunker
-Director in attendance!
-Shot in Ottawa's Diefenbunker
-Director in attendance!
Ghost Dolls
Dir.Yuki Nishikata
Japan, fantasy, 15 min.
Japan, fantasy, 15 min.
Synopsis: One night, the doll’s maker Sosuke witnesses a
mysterious girl’s rampage through the display and he becomes fascinated by her.
From that moment, he incomprehensibly begins to hear the voice of the bizarre
doll, which has a tree growing from its chest.
To the Other Side
(Al otro lado)
Dir. Alicia Albares Martínez
Spain, fantasy, 19 min.
Spain, fantasy, 19 min.
Starring: William Miller, Ramón Barea, Carlos Álvarez-Nóvoa,
Xenia Sevillano, Eric Francés
Synopsis: Sara Sanabria, writer, and her lover, Adolfo
Santolaya, lived their lives absorbed by just one obsession: the belief that,
hidden in an abandoned mansion, there was a gate that ended in an unknown
dimension. Seeking the path of his retired teacher, Enrique will reach the
place where the track of the couple got lost.
The Phoenix
Dir. Carmelo Zucco
Canada (Ottawa), sci-fi, 15 min.
Canada (Ottawa), sci-fi, 15 min.
Starring: Brie Barker, James Bradford, Alex Cardillo, Howard
Rosenstein
Synopsis: Mars Reveille is a dying man whose life is now
moment to moment. He decides to undergo this miraculous procedure for the sake
of his grandson Ben.
-Director in attendance!
-Director in attendance!
The Cold Heart
(Das Kalte Herz)
Dir. Hannes Rall
Germany, animated, 29 min.
Germany, animated, 29 min.
Starring: Karl-Michael Vogler and Philipp Moog
Synopsis: A cautionary tale about greed-adapted from a
classic German fairy tale: The Black Forest. The film tells the story of a
young man who trades his warm heart for a cold stone in order to become rich.
Closing night
Sunday, Nov. 9 at 7:00 pm – Club SAW
The Samurai (Der Samurai)
Dir. Till Kleinert, Germany, thriller/queer, 77 min.
Starring: Michel Dierks, Pit Bukowski.
Synopsis: A wolf strives through the woods around an
isolated German village. Jakob the young local police officer is onto him, but
scents something more in the darkness. What he finds is a man, it seems, wild
eyed, of wiry build, in a dress. He carries a katana, a Samurai sword. When the
Samurai invites Jakob to follow him on his crusade towards the village, it
becomes Jakob's mission to pursue the lunatic to end this wanton destruction.
At the end of the night Jakob has experienced too much, is too far from whom he
once was. Something hidden has been unleashed to meet the first rays of
daylight.
Der Samurai screens with:
Rattan
Directed by Samuel Kiehoon LeeCanada, horror/comedy, 13 min.
Starring: Kimberly-Sue Murray, Matthew G. Brown, Amber
Goldfarb
Synopsis: A wicker rattan bicycle basket is possessed by the
spirit of a murderous pimp looking to get revenge on the hooker who killed him.
During its journey, the basket attempts to kill those who get in its way
including a bike thief, an office worker, and a baby!
Please visit www.cdff.ca for full information on this year’s
festival.
Doors open half an hour before the posted screening times.
Doors open half an hour before the posted screening times.
The 2014 Cellar Door
Film Festival runs Nov. 7-9 at Club SAW in Arts Court at 67 Nicholas St.
