I love the Tribeca Film Festival.  I love seeing these films with audiences that love cinema.  It's better than sitting with a bunch of 20-something children crammed in a multiplex watching whatever intelligence insulting big-budget piece of crap is out there with its overabundance of special effects, bad dialogue & plot holes large enough to drive a car through.

The following are the films I saw at this years Tribeca Film Festival:

REEKER
This is an atypical slasher film about a bunch of college students on their way to a rave.  They find themselves in an apparent ghost town, fleeing a specter that stinks of death.  Written & directed by Dave Payne, Reeker contains a twist ending that shows M. Night Shamaylan how it should be done.

RIKIDOZAN
This is a fine biopic about the wrestler who first brought western-style wrestling to Japan.  Rikidozan restored post-WWII pride to Japan by getting Americans to lose to him.  Sadly, drugs & paranoia ruined his personal & professional life & he was stabbed by a yakuza hit man, but Rikidozan shaped puroresu (Japanese for pro wrestling) & the fruits of his labor are still visible today.

PUNK: ATTITUDE
This documentary by Don Letts chronicles punk's evolution from the Rockabilly antics of Jerry Lee Lewis & Chuck Berry to what presently passes for punk & it comes from the mouths of the people who were part of it.  Jello Biafra, Chrissy Hynde, Henry Rollins, Thurston Moore, David Johansen & Siouxie Sioux share their memories & opinions of the music & attitude that shaped great bands & left its mark on the US & the UK.  The attitude is showcased in bands like The Stooges & the Sex Pistols as well as the DIY zines that sprouted around this revolutionary music.

LAY DOWN OLD MAN
This 1 wasn't all that great.  This was a documentary about the Crips & the Bloods of LA.  Director Nemo only interviewed a small handful of OG's & none of them were sympathetic in their tales.  They showed the downside of being an old gangsta & little else.

SHUTTER
The best was saved for last.  This horror film from Thailand is similar to the Ring, 1 Missed Call & The Grudge in that it features a pissed off ghost seeking revenge on the living who did it wrong.  It also taps in on the phenomenon of shadow spirits in photographs.  Directors Banjung Pisanthanakun & Parkpoom Wongpoom have made the scariest film I've ever seen.  With flashes of unsuspecting fear that leaps out of the screen, this film must not be watched with the lights on in order for its audience to experience its full terror.  The viewer must surrender to the discomfort this picture will give them in order to enjoy it properly.  If you find this movie playing near you, run to see 2 hours of near pant-soiling horror that makes the mainstream American horror genre look like the shiny joke that it is.

R

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