The Circuit

March 13, 2008

Fantasporto 2008: First Weekend Highlights

by Mateo Perez & Nicolas Tamargo/Variety Team, Oporto

Of first-weekend standouts, Spanish hand-held camera chiller 'Rec' drew a one-minute ovation. "Rec" and Takashi Miike's samurai-cowboy "Sukiyaki Western Django" weren't maybe the most anticipated films in the fest's early going but undoubtedly they were among the most celebrated first-weekend screenings.

"Rec"'s director Jaume Balagueró underscored the importance of its half-improvised script. Cool as a cucumber in the carpa, character actress Manuela Velasco hardly seemed as scared as she declared she was while shooting.

Cult vidgames "Resident Evil" (http://www.res-evil.com/re4/) and "Call of Cthulhu" (http://www.callofcthulhu.com/) meet in a truly horrific fully-immersive cinema screen experience in the oppressive corridors and frenetic survival action of "Rec". "Rec"'s Lovecraft-like ending just rocks.

Thomas Dunn's disturbing "The Ungodly" and Kim Ki-duk's introspective "Breath" also played well, enjoying well-deserved moments of glory. The gore overkill and general nonsense of Dario Argento's "Mother of Tears" caused more embarrasment than anything else.

Variety Team, Oporto
Mateo Perez & Nicolas Tamargo

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Fantasporto 2008: Chills and Thrills of Portugal's Main Creep-Meet

by Mateo Perez & Nicolas Tamargo/Variety Team, Oporto

In Oporto, shady, half-ruined sinuous alleys give way in a beat to wide traffic-clogged boulevard. Oporto's historic center bizarely mixes urban decay with early twentieth century architectural magnificence, aptly creating a modern Lovecraft-ish setting for one of Europe's biggest fantasy fests.

Fantasporto's main venues lie deep in the heart of the city. The Rivoli Theater's comfy wifi chill-out bar, replete with squishy pouf-cushions, offers shelter to festgoers who emerge from a main hall set off by bleeding columns and projected virtual lurking spiders which take red carpet catwalkers unaware.

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Some like it hot: Press conferences take place in a huge - and hot-as-a-greenhouse when the sun's high - plastic carpa-marquee outside Rivoli, Cidade do Cinema.

Cult classics like musical parade "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" or the mind-boggling "Forbidden Planet" were screened at the charmingly creepy Teatro sá da Bandeira, a chainsaw's throw from Rivoli.