Another year, another fine crop of films. Although the festival has grown to the point where it now shows movies in theaters outside of Tribeca, the spirit remains. All we have to do is pay to watch films & a community with a crater in it gets some much deserved money.
On with the reviews!
SAM'S LAKE: Written & directed by Andrew C Erin, Sam's Lake is a predictable horror film that retains its spookiness. The music sets the mood that provides the occasional jump & twitch during the flick about a young woman who takes a group of her friends to her family's lakeside cabin. It's also in the same set of woods where an escaped mental patient murdered his whole family.
 HATCHET: This is horror as it should be done. No CGI. All the gory effects are done in the camera the old fashioned way. The story takes place during Mardi Gras when a heartbroken young man decides to leave big-boobied Bacchanalian delight for a nighttime swamp tour. Unfortunately that part of the bayou is home to Victor Crowley, a Jason-like deformed killer (played by Jason himself, Kane Hodder). Mayhem ensues as Crowley picks people off 1 by 1. Adam Green's diologue & direction are sure to make him a successful director.
COCAINE COWBOYS: Director Billy Corben paints an atypical picture of the drug business. Chronicling the cocaine wars of the late 70's & early 80's in Miami, Cocaine Cowboys shows the negatives of the cocaine business. But it also shows that the lucarative narcotic helped build Miami from a sleepy retirement community to a thriving Metropolis. This is not a public service announcement. This is a tale told by those who made it out alive. The world is NOT yours.
SHEITAN: French director Kim Champion serves up this freaky little mind fuck of a film about French raver kids who stumble across the birth of the antichrist. Inbred farm people are creepier than the actual scares in this movie but the gore will make you retch.
ROCK THE BELLS: This documentary follows the chaotic events leading up to the last full performance of the Wu-Tang Clan. Promoter Chang Wiesberg has a sincere love of music & so he attempts to get the Wu-Tang for their first full performance in years. But a love of music sometimes isn't worth the aggrevation. Between latecomers trying to hop the fences, technical difficulties & Ol' Dirty Bastard getting cracked up, it's a hard goal to pull off. But despite a 90 minute delay, the crowd kept cool in the hopes that the Wu would show up in full force. Wu-Tang delivered. My people, if you with me, where the fuck you at?
THE GROOMSMEN: Edward Burns turns out his latest romantic comedy with an great cast (Jay Mohr, John Leguizamo, Brittany Murphy, Donal Logue, & Matthew Lillard). Burns plays a man in his mid-thirties about to wed & have a family. Burns tackels this latest generations inability to grow up in the manner of generations past. the laughs propel the audience through the unease caused by reluctance. Burns is a New york filmmaker who is a perfect for this festival & this film has the homemade flavor.
JONESTOWN- THE LIFE & DEATH OF PEOPLES' TEMPLE: This documentary pulls no punches as it unravels the saga of Jime Jones & Peoples' Temple. Audio & video footage seized by the FBI along with interviews with former temple members weave the tapestry of something that started out as a good idea & ended as mass murder. The film causes unease in the viewer, as it should, but it clears up many misconceptions about the Jonestown Massacre. This was not mass suicide. It was murder commited by a religious zealot.
FIRST SNOW: Guy Pearce stars in this Mark Fergus film about a pompous salesman whose life grinds to a halt when a roadside psychic predicts Pearce's impending death. Pearce's increasing paranoia has merit as an old friend is paroled & may have murderous intentions. Fergus' visuals are stunning & puts viewers right inside the tension, close enough to make you shiver.
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