It's been almost a week since I finished AICN's filmgeek-revered "Butt-Numb-A-Thon" in Austin, Texas. Only now am I able to sit down and put "pen to paper" about it. 13,000 apply to go, a little over 200 are invited. This year, I was one of the lucky few. Lots of free stuff, great film-loving people, and best of all... more great, unexpected film than you can shake several sticks at. They don't tell you, going into the Butt-Numb-A-Thon, what you're going to see... you pays your money and you takes your chance from 12 noon Saturday to 12 noon Sunday. 24 hours of movies, without stopping for more than five times for fifteen minutes each. I, for one, left very happy. Here's a quick(?) rundown:

To begin with, there was a video greeting from the jungles of Mexico in which Mel Gibson introduced the world premiere of his APOCALYPTO trailer. It's an ambitious project that looks phenomenally challenging and epic; a story about pre-Aztec cilivization that's fascinated people for generations. Go Mel. Maybe people will shut up about THE PASSION after this. For a while.

The first full film was THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME with Fay Wray, featuring many of the players from the original KING KONG. To get us in the mood for what was coming...

Following that was a presentation by RAY HARRYHAUSEN PRESENTS about their upcoming Edger Allen Poe shorts, which look really well-done and should provide a lot of stop-motion goodness in a few months when the first are completed.

Next was the debut of a teaser for a concept of a resurrection of another Merian Cooper project - the one he never finished but that Ray Harryhausen and Harry from AICN are looking to complete.. that's WAR EAGLES.

Then came what we were all waiting for - keep in mind there were several days until KING KONG would be unleashed to the rest of you. Peter Jackson sent us a video intro apologizing for being unable to attend, and made up for it by offering us a showing of KONG. Now, let me say that I expected nothing from this film.

I thought, "eh, King Kong, big monkey, take it or leave it."

Sorry, but I did.

Then I saw it. This is the film I've... you've... we've all been waiting for, for a long time. It's passionate, heartfelt, exciting, joyous, meaningful, and it's a multi-million dollar Hollywood epic. When, oh when do directors honestly care this much about their subjects? If only every film that got made were made by someone who so obviously loved every moment. If you don't see KONG, right away, you are cheating yourself out of something good. It beats the hype... well, what could beat THIS hype... but it does work magic on you. I saw NARNIA last night and...well, more to come on that.

The next thing to flicker onscreen was a Betty Boop cartoon, PARADE OF THE WOODEN SOLDIERS. It turned out to be a brilliant segue from KONG to the next feature, FOOTLIGHT PARADE from 1933. Like KONG, set in NYC in 1933. This, however, was a Busby Berekley Musical. James Cagney was the coolest man on earth, and Ruby Keeler never got the work she deserved. This was a great film I enjoyed far more than I expected to.

Next was a MASTERS OF HORROR entry, there were two of these. The first, SICK GIRL, was directed by Lucky McKee and starred Angela Bettis - two things that saved it from being what it may've been (and the later MOH entry was). Just another old-fashioned Lesbian sci-horror piece with bugs and larval infestation, you know, like you used to get on CBS near Christmas.

I can't say enough about the next feature, SYMPATHY FOR LADY VENGEANCE - a Korean film I knew nothing about going in. I expected something wholly different. For anyone who has ever felt a twinge of hurt when you hear a story about a terrible, hurtful crime against a child and longs in the dark places in your heart for true justice; this film will lead you to that place, through it, and to the other side. You should see this - it's a marvelous exploration.

Next... THE PROFESSIONALS - I had it in my notes what time it was by this point, but I've lost them. I do remember I took my first caffeine pill at this point. THE PROFESSIONALS is one of the great Westerns, I was told, but I was not ready for a Western at this point. It took a short while for it to suck me in completely, but any movie that has Lee Marvin and Burt Lancaster AND has the balls to offer up a VERY convincing Jack Palance as a Mexican revolutionary, well.. you have to watch. Actually a prescient film about the nature of revolution.

Then came DISTRICT 13. I saw the DVD for this in stores in Monaco, and all I knew was that it was a Luc Besson film and that it had apparently been huge in France. That was enough to disinterest me. However, it's an amazing action film without any wire-fu or Hong Kong... fuey.... It'll be released in the US sometime in 2006. I have to recommend it, even though it was made by the French.

The next couple of items were somewhat for the vanity of AICN - there was a teaser trailer for what will likely be an awesome 80s style horror flick 2GETHER 4EVER, and then the only missed note of the whole thing... another MASTERS OF HORROR feature, this time directed by John Carpenter, called CIGARETTE BURNS. It was co-written by one of the site's major contributors, and he's a great intelligent guy... but this piece does not represent him well. If you happen to catch it on Showtime this week, I'd like to know if maybe I was just tired. It was around 3 or so by this point, if I remember right.

However tired I was, I was shocked to my senses by the clip Eli Roth brought us from his upcoming film HOSTEL, he was watching the clip for the first time as well. This film, produced by Quentin Tarantino, looks to be very, intensely disturbing and grotesque. I'm so glad movies are scary again, beyond the cheap something-suddenly-jumps-out-and-some-loud-sound-cue-happens trend of the 90s. I don't know if I'll be able to stomach this one, however. I may spend a lot of time out getting popcorn. We saw about 25 seconds of it.

At this point, around 4 or 5, it was time for THE DESCENT - a British horror film that will be released in 2006 sometime by Lions Gate. Intense. There are moments in this film that require nothing beyond the reality of spelunking gone a little wrong to pull you to the edge of terror. It begins terrifying in its plausability. Then it ratchets it up, about 2/3 of the way in, by... well, I'm sure the ad campaign will spoil this. I hate modern media for that. I wish you could see this film as I did, knowing very little going in.

At this point, we're at our most tired. The audience is barely holding together, wanting to know what we'll see as our big finale. So what do they throw on next? STUNT ROCK! Harry shows this trailer every year and everyone laughs at it, as we did many amazingly hilarious old trailers this year, but no one ever thought they'd see the "genius" of the whole film. This film is utterly fabulous in a tragic, "what if some cross between Styx and Spinal Tap were a real band and were friends with a stuntman and decided to make a movie about that with no other plot" way... If you really want to make a room full of people who have stayed up all night watching movies writhe in wretched, blissful agony... make them watch STUNT ROCK.

Then ... DRUM. It's the sequel to the "blaxploitation masterpiece" MANDINGO. Now, watching this, of course it's racist and wholly ridiculous in many ways, but all the people who were saying "oh my god it's so wrong" and such... Well, watching this I felt nothing particularly racist beyond the inherent truth of what it portrayed. Yeah, they use the "n-word" a lot and treat the blacks horribly, breed them like cattle and make them do everything a human shouldn't do. What do you think slavery was really like? Probably a lot like that. Also, Warren Oates is a riot in thie film and delivers what might well be one of the great, understated b-film comic performances of all time. He delivers one line that, if you see this film, you'll be saying to friends an awful lot. This film, unfortunately, isn't generally intentionally funny... but is much funnier than many films that attempt to be.

Time came for the last film. Harry meandered on and on, teasing us with what it might be. V FOR VENDETTA, it turned out to be. We had the only copy of the film in the world airlifted to us and handcuffed to a Warner Brothers rep. The film doesn't open until March, and when it does... well, before I get into that...

Right before they started the final feature we saw what I now know to be a rare cartoon starring Donald Duck, DIE FUEHRER'S FACE. Watching a brownshirted Donald Duck "heil Hitler" 31 times in this anti-Nazi propaganda piece made me think I had finally passed through tired to delirium... but no, it's real. Do yourself a favor and find that and EDUCATION FOR DEATH and remind yourself of our past.

V FOR VENDETTA. I'm just going to agree with other remarks I've read from BNAT attendees and say I was not at all prepared for V FOR VENDETTA. I thought it would be awful, I thought it would be a far cry from the work of the brilliant Alan Moore (who wrote the book it is based on)... but... This is a film with the power to change things. When it is released it will be, I have no doubt, reviled by many in the media. Especially the far right. There will be attempts to discredit it. Anyone who sees it will be that much more affected by it, should that happen. This is the "uncompromised vision" you're always promised but never get when adaptations are made. Alan Moore is a great writer whose work has always been all but destroyed when adapted to film - LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN being probably the absolute worst one - so its only natural that after so many misses Mr. Moore has written off the idea of his work onscreen. Mr. Moore, this film nails it home. Harry Knowles himeself said it best: "This thing doesn't give two shakes of a pecker what the modern world is going to think. THEY NAILED IT!... They finally fucking nailed ALAN MOORE! ...When this film opens - this will be a political molotov cocktail. ...A vastly important and a brilliant film."

Not a bad way to leave it.

So now... onward to Christmas.