Feb.6-16th Boston Science Fiction Film Festival Preview 2

2015 Boston Science Fiction Film Festival Feb. 6-16th
"The Boston Science Fiction Film Festival and Marathon (“Boston SciFi”) is an 11-day cinematic event held at the historic Somerville Theatre from February 6th to the 16th. The 2015 edition marks our 40th anniversary as the oldest genre fest in America.
The first nine days consist of a film festival that emphasizes emerging directors with distinct visions from around the globe. The Festival concludes with The Marathon (a.k.a., “The ‘Thon”), a 24-hour orgiastic motion picture endurance test featuring classic, new and schlock films. Think of it as binge viewing with 700 close friends. It starts at noon on the 15th and ends at noon on President’s Day." - Bostonscifi.com
  This year's event It looks like there is a nice lineup coming together and I will be attending as many of the films as possible. Great thing about this festival is you can approach it a couple different ways. You can buy the Festival Pass as I did and attempt to see lots of features or you can purchase single film tickets, either way you will get to enjoy great NEW science fiction. The Festival pass also gets you into the 24 hour Movie Marathon Sun-Mon 15-16th which is the classic sci-fi fans favorite event.

Matt Mercury (2014)
February 7^th, 2015 1:00pm
Director(s): Bill Hughes  Runtime: 65 Minutes
"Matt Mercury is given the task of hunting a disgruntled super-genius named Professor Brainwave and recovering the stolen Earth before it becomes enslaved by a race of giant brains. If this isn't enough of a chore, Matt must also chase after an old flame!
With Short: "Tugger the Ship" (22 Minutes)" --bostonscifi.com
Twitter 

@MattMercuryMov

 Facebook Page

  History of Time Travel (2014)

"Director(s): Ricky Kennedy 

Runtime: 72 Minutes(NE Premiere) A fictional documentary about the creation of the worlds first time machine, the men who created it, and the unintended ramifications it has on world events.
With Short: "The Time We're In" (26 Minutes)" --bostocscifi.com

Facebook Page

 On Twitter  @RNKFanArt

Uncanny (2015)

"February 7^th, 2015  7:00pm
Director(s): Matthew Leutwyler Runtime: 91 Minutes

(World Premiere) The world's first "perfect" Artificial Intelligence begins to exhibit startling and unnerving emergent behavior when a reporter begins a relationship with the scientist who created it. Starring: Mark Webber (Scott Pilgrim), Lucy Griffiths (Winter's Tale, Robin Hood) and Rainn Wilson (The Office)." --bostonscifi.com
Facebook Page

Twitter @UncannyMovie

Suicide or Lulu and Me in a World Made for Two (2014)
"February 7^th, 2015  9:15pm
Director(s): Christian Carroll 
Runtime: 105 Minutes 

(East Coast Premiere) An inventor creates a camera that can duplicate what it films. Using this camera he attempts to capture and preserve a moment of happiness between himself and his lover in the hope that his duplicate self will be happy forever if the recording is projected in an endless loop." --bostonscifi.com

Trailer Here

Boston Sci-Fi Film Festival accepting submissions!

We have done the impossible, and that makes us mighty. ~ Firefly

Accepting Submissions! Have a film you wish to submit to our judges? Then please check out our WithoutABox page. We do give like previous entrants & local films! Help Wanted! We're looking for some folks to help out. Drupal savvy, social media mavens, web searchers, marketers and more. Please contact us BostonSciFi@gmail.com 40 for 40 First 40 To Get Thon Tix for $40 We're kicking our 40th year off with a special! The first 40 folks who send us a ticket order for this year's 'Thon will get each ticket for $40, less than last year and 15% off this year's Early Bird price, which is cheaper than regular prices. Not available on the web. Web sales start this Friday. Send check, payable to: Zeotrope Media 106 Jeremy Hill Rd Pelham NH 03076. Some new wrinkles coming this year will be workshops for filmmakers, a couple of parties as well as some surprises to be announced shortly. And now is the time to start sending in suggestions. Don't just limit it to 'Thon films. If you've read about something new or even seen something, send it along. It takes longer than one would think to assimilate these babies.

Copyright © 2014 Boston Sci-Fi Film Fest, All rights reserved. You are getting this email because you're signed up to be part of the Boston Sci-Fi family. Our mailing address is: Boston Sci-Fi Film Fest 106 Jeremy Hill Rd Pelham, NH 03076 Add us to your address book unsubscribe from this list    update subscription preferences  Copyright © 2014 Boston Sci-Fi Film Fest, All rights reserved. You are getting this email because you're signed up to be part of the Boston Sci-Fi family. Our mailing address is: Boston Sci-Fi Film Fest 106 Jeremy Hill Rd Pelham, NH 03076 Add us to your address book unsubscribe from this list    update subscription preferences

Boston Scifi Festiaval Day 7

Boston Scifi Festiaval Day 7 - This day was a wash for me the all programmed films were rescheduled because we had a pretty significant snow storm here in the Northeastern US.  So I can take one day to rest, sit by the wood stove and sip cocoa.


Valentines Day is Friday and I plan to meet my sweetheart for a delicious meal at the Best Lebanese restaurant in the New England Café Barada so I will be missing the 5pm showing, but Garen being the great guy he is will let me see that short program at another time. So I will do coverage on that set but not until later. I hope you are all bringing your significant other to Fridays 7 or 9pm shows.


Have a great one. Eddie

Upcoming Events in February!

Hi folks for you in the Boston area here are a few events coming in the next few weeks.

Happening on two weekends in Somerville and Cambridge from my friends at the Flat Earth Theatre Company.

From my friends at All Things Horror Online:
                                           February 8th: "Horroritca" With Pinup Dolls On Ice & More 

Saturday February 8th 7pm

The Somerville Theater Microcinema

"Horroritca" w/

Pinup Dolls On Ice & the short films 

Legitimate, Eroticide & More

$10 at the Door**

And of course the BIGGEST event of the Month.

http://bostonsci-fi.com

Boston Science FictionFestival 3

The Boston Science Fiction Festival is in full swing providing a steady stream of features and shorts to New England audiences, festival passes and passes to the Movie marathon can be found at the their website. Individual tickets to screenings can be purchased at the Somerville Theatre up until time of show.

Day 3 and I only went in for the shorts program. I already saw the film pig which was after this program and decided that staying for the third feature Neader-Jin so the apologies to the makers of that film in not giving it a look.
The program consisted of four longer shorts all may have been longer than 10 minutes. Here are the thoughts on those.

Geners (2011) from Sweden and by Tumpum Peters was a futuristic look at society where gene modification is a privilege only the wealthy have. Those who have been change and are not rich must take inhibitors so that their benefits can not be used. The film explaining this is really the look at two characters, Gener Girl (Mai Yamamoto) and the Gener Cop (Billy May) who wants to arrest her for not going to "relaxed controls" to inhibit her illegal modification. A chase and and long fight sequence was very cool to look at with extended underwater effects and at times freedom from gravity. The little twist in the end was okay but really it was the action that made this interesting. So hats off to Tumpum Peters on making a decent entry.

Mistaken (2011) - Story about a music star Nick mayers (Andreas Wilson) who on the night of his big concert gets the idea that he is the only real person in the world and everyone around him, only exist because he does. So he decides to skip the concert since no one is real but in the process of trying to escape the situation freaks out. Taking a reporter as a hostage (Jenni Banarjee) he tries to get away, he ends up in a hotel room in a standoff with police. There is a twist but it sort of was expected because it is sci-fi and we have seen a lot of these. The effects in this film are very good and the direction by Arsen Sarkisiants is tight and effective.

Breakaway / Backdown (2010) Director Ralph Morang from Maine was present at this screening and certainly his love of the subject of space came through in this almost monologue. When I say space I mean off the earth and the main character, Cleo (Scarlett Ridgeway Savage) in the film is talking to the girl fixing her shoe, Jane (Katie Fitzpatrick) on the video phone about her time off the planet. Wrapped in the story is a personal story about her relationship while away, her motivations to go and her decision to come back to earth. Although well received at the showing I found the extensive expository monologue a bit tedious but to each their own.

The shortest and also the one I like the most was called Mobius (2011) excellently filmed story about a photographer whop wants to report on the killings on the US border. Unfortunately for him he ends up in an infinate cycle of thing going horribly wrong for him.

Boston Science Fiction Festival 2

The Boston Science Fiction Festival is in full swing providing a steady stream of features and shorts to New England audiences, festival passes and passes to the Movie marathon can be found at the their website. Individual tickets to screenings can be purchased at the Somerville Theatre up until time of show.
Day two started with a series of shorts, the problem with the short programs is if I don't take good notes I am really at a loss to remember all that was shown. I do remember these.
Grounded - a wonderfully strange and simple film about an astronaut crash landing on exosolar planet. The idea was original and the execution of the effects was exellent. You can see something at this Grounded VFX Breakdown
One Jump From Home - with director Robert Lypka in attendance to answers question this little space story lacked polish but as a first project was a decent entry.
Nexus - A bit of a predictable little story of insanity, what starts as an experiment in isolation is revealed to be insanity. Unfortunately this story has been done way too many times.
Chorebot - A sad but also heartfelt story about a robot and the dog he cares for.
The Looking - This one fits right into my liberal paranoia. The story of alien invasion told through a NA meeting. It was a bit talky to get all the political ideas out but in the end eyes were opened. Of course how could it not be preachy when it is a therapy group.
No Relation - Heady and concise presentation of ideas about and also by writer Philip K. Dick, I feel a full documentary coming. (You can hope)
Blind Spot - Wonderful look at how our problems sometimes cause a blind spot, even at the end of the world.
The first feature was a local (Massachusetts) entry called "In the Renaissance" an atmospheric story of an apartment building that lives and breathes and births children. The idea was solid enough with the caretaker and children of the building. Director Damien Ober creates a great moody feel that really holds you, for a while. The characters though are a bit one dimensional and the tone stays the same throughout the film. Unfortunately the movie is driven by the character of the apartment building instead of a true protagonist that the audience can get behind which made it hard to get behind this one in the end. Ober though does show talent and it will be interesting to see what he does in the future.

The second feature was the World premiere of the film Folklore by writer / director Justin Calen Chenn was a funny enjoyable story about a government agency designed to keep track of mythic beings on earth. Chenn mines the idea for some wonderful; interviews with a wild range of characters, an android, shapeshifter, alien twins, a vampire, Chinese God, werewolf, Icelandic troll, a Unicorn, a time traveler and a sea nymph. In the question and answer session Chenn said there were many more ideas but you have to limit it to make the movie's length reasonable.
The interviewers Collins Jahn (Brad Roller) and Merle Eppis (Laura Waddell) are spot on as straight man and comedic sidekick. Waddell is particularly enjoyable playing off the slightly exasperated exterior Roller holds so well. The character coming in for interviews make the film with highlights and in particular, the recently separated alien twins Collees (Rachel Rath) and Risa Ipsett (Sherill Turner) who banter and complete each other sentences while still drawing the difference that made them want to explore being separate beings. The over the top time traveler, Taryn Kamas (Napolean Ryan) in his pink shorts and bow tie was hilarious in his bombastic expressions of the coming end to the world we know. The unicorn in human form Eatha Haemm was so spot on it was scary. Actress Maria Olsen pulled off a physical performance that left you not needed to see her transform into a unicorn to believe it.
The beauiful Paulie Rojas plays the sea nymph Nairie Sleen who is destined to fall for our guy Collins Jahn. She channels Audrey Hepburn through a series of clips of her trying to find the offices. When they finally meet it is inevitable that they fall in love.
This was an enjoyable film really a perfect enrty into the festival. We all can look forward to this talented d writer / director Justin Calen Chenn in the future. The actors were all very good and I am sure we will see many of them also.

Boston Science Fiction Fest and Thon

I am gearing up for 10 days of Science fiction which will completely take over this blog. This year's Fest and 'Thon happen Feb. 10-20, 2012 at the Somerville Theatre in Boston, MA. You can get information about this GREAT event in a couple places, on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/BostonSciFi and at their own website http://bostonsci-fi.com/

Everyone should buy tickets and attend!

Science Fiction Shorts Night 1

The Boston Science Fiction Film Festival - This new event connected to the Boston Science Fiction Marathon Feb. 14-15 noon to noon is a wonderful addition. Each night from now until the Marathon there will be a feature or a night of Shorts at 7pm at the Somerville theater. I encourage you to look into getting tickets for these events.

Night One of Shorts...

Theosaurology (2009) - Animated short about the nature of dinosaurs, and their super powers. Yes that's right superpowers, in fact when dinosaurs realized what they were the awesomeness of them covered the planet and set off a superpowers race that eventually was their demise. In an effort to prove their awesomeness the pachycephalosaurus' used their mental powers to pull a meteor to the planet. Unfortunately it meant the end of these Super cool and totally awesome creatures. Alex Austin wrote this cute, under animated short.
Rating (6.3)

Empathy (2009) - Writer / Director Benjamin Pascoe executed this concise story about a man who learns a hard lesson in empathy. Shot in blck and white a father is having an ideal life with his beautiful daughter. Creating the too perfect images is a good turn in this case, forshadowing quickly that things can't be what they seem. When the little girl is hit by a car and killed Stanley must face the grief of loosing his girl. Cut to Stanley in a program that gives him these memories as part of an experiment to Punish(?) people who have killed others while drunk driving.
Rating (7.2)

The Package (2009) - Ah, the days of VHS tape... Dave (Justin Hosking) and Lisa (Liza Catherine-Dennis) are having a horrible fight, well written and passionate by writer Tim Anderson. Director Oliver Waghorn keeps it simple and when Lisa leaves Dave is standing in what could be the aftermath of his relationship. A VHS tape is delivered to the door and Dave immediately plays it. It is him 40 years in the future, future dave relays how this is the moment he makes a string of catastrophic decision in his life. He is sending this tape back to tell past Dave how to avoid them. Good predictable laugh when the tape breaks in the player.
Rating (6.5)

Destination Day (2010) - Tim (Richard Pappas) travels back in time to fix a relationship before it goes wrong. Only can we really change the past and have it come out the way we want in the present? Writer Chris Lassig references Perth's Destination Day where people in the present invited time travellers to a gathering. No one showed up of course which leads one to believe that in the future 1. There is no time travel 2. Human don't exist 3. They have lost records of this event and thus can't visit 4. Have no interest or can't contact those in the past. or 5. anynumber of other reasons. This story though focuses on Tim and Valerie (Audrey Lamont) who work together and have slept together. This is the day after the intimate encounter where future Tim is trying to change the outcome.
Rating (4.9)

Operation Blast (2???) - It is 2017 and the war with the taliban continues, except now little turban wearing robots are attacking us and we are naturally defending ourselves with our own little GI Joe robots. This stop motion animation short by Jeffrey Hollins is cute but sort of pointless.
Rating (3.7)

VHS Reporter (2009) - Stange little film about a group of people coming together and waiting for a ride. Pretty much some introductions to some somewhat strange characters and then the twist that most of them are aliens heading back to space. Nothing really made this stand out.
Rating (3.7)

Dimensional Meltdown (2009) - Parallel universes where a man's girlfriend dies repeatedly and he can not deal. He travels through wormholes to try to change the outcome. Do these things ever come out well?
Rating (4.2)

Frank DanCoolo: Paranormal Drug Dealer (2009) - by Writer director Andrew Jones, Neo-Mega-Ultra Tokyo is the setting for this stylish story told through the investigating of reporter Holly Malone (Priscilla McEver). She follows leads at crime scenes to the Super Natural pill Pucher Frank DanCoolo (John Charles Meyer). He is sells his phsycic brain fluid but has to deal with the side effects of creatures from the other side crossing into this reality. A wonderful mix of 1940s style ratatat dialog, CGI and stop motion monsters this over the top short was a great way to end the night. Although I loved it this coul really not hit spots for everyone.
Rating (8.0)

Mutant Swingers From Mars (2003) Science Fiction

The Boston Science Fiction Film Festival - This new event connected to the Boston Science Fiction Marathon Feb. 14-15 noon to noon is a wonderful addition. Each night from now until the Marathon there will be a feature or a night of Shorts at 7pm at the Somerville theater. I encourage you to look into getting tickets for these events.

Mutant Swingers From Mars (2003) - This parody starts as a mockumentary celebrating the deceased movie maker Orton Z. Creswell (Pete LaDuke), with interviews with actors he worked with, clips from his movies and a short biography. Some of this first part was amusing although at times I was distracted by the makeup work to make the actors look older. The script in this area was good except some of the interview material seemed less focused than the narration. Certainly there were odes to B movie maker Ed Wood, and the film uses multiple references to real science fiction movies. In fact some of the funniest bits were the clips of Creswell movies all rip offs of real movies.

Then we get to see the Creswell film "Mutant Swingers from Mars" a standard low budget 50's era science fiction movie, or in this case a 2003 parody of a 50's movie. Martians come to earth to force a mad genius doctor to create a super swinging reanimated dude Fez Fleckman (also Pete LaDuke). He is to hypnotized women of earth for the purpose of the Martian men taking them back to mars and replacing their frigid females. There was an amusing similarity to the Coneheads including the female Martian hiss. The inept aliens actually pull off there plan. Things are going well except that a local cool Dude Rusty Rave (Michael East) keeps is creating a rivalry with Fleckman. They vie for the attention of beauty Mitzy Nussbaum (Colleen Nash) and Fez does well until he mentions Rave's name and then she comes to her senses and Fez has to re hypnotize her. Eventually there is a hip dual between the two for her affection. The Alien plans go wrong and Rave saves the day. The references in this film were fun as I watched I tried to name the other movies this one was quoting, but again the script was a bit unfocused. It makes sense in an Ed Wood kind of way. Writer / Director Michael Kallio does only a fair job here but should get some real points for getting this fun film made. It certainly looks like a good first early career outing.

Rating (5.2)

Sleep Dealers (2008) - Science Fiction

The Boston Science Fiction Film Festival - This new event connected to the Boston Science Fiction Marathon Feb. 14-15 noon to noon is a wonderful addition. Each night from now until the Marathon there will be a feature or a night of Shorts at 7pm at the Somerville theater. I encourage you to look into getting tickets for these event, if the rest of the movies are even half the quality of Sleep Dealers it will be a treat for anyone who comes.

Sleep Dealers (2008) - The setting for this film is a near future in Oaxaca Mexico, a young man named Memo (Luis Fernando Pena) is dissatisfied with his life. He seems destined to follow his father as an existence farmer on a small piece of family land. Once a more prosperous man his father now barely get by. The change on his fortunes came when the water source for the valley was privatized and the river dammed. Now the family pays most of their earnings for water to grow just enough food to live on. Here are a couple of very interesting ideas in the movie. The traditional turned upside down by a futuristic and not too unrealistic idea about resource management. Milpa farming of corn, beans and squash have been a tradition in Mexico through its history and the movie takes the time to recognize this. It is not using the location to exploit the character but to give a sense of them in the story to come. Memo sees this change with the dam as a trap and struggles with his father's idea about living on his own land at such a disadvantage. He would rather be somewhere else earning more money.
On his self constructed radio intercepting radio he hears the voices of people talking about working in the north for the Sleep Dealers. They are companies who import labor through virtual factories. Employees have implants that allow them to plug into a network that routes them to control machines in the United States. The labor force never has to actually be in the US, from the factories the workers all standing in a room can slaughter pigs in Iowa, to build a skyscraper in San Diego. Hearing about the success of the workers compared to sustenance farming is appealing to Memo. He listens in the evenings and dreams about a new life in the day.
One night while listening in of the airwaves he intercepts the signals of the US drone air force. This branch of the military is in charge of flying drone aircraft to enemy targets and destroying them. It has been popularized in a television show and unfortunately for Memo they trace his signal. This was another very interesting idea that is current but the movie takes to the next incarnation. No longer does the military just fight wars, but have been expanded into a corporate strike force protecting resources around the world being ship to the United States. They intercept the signal from Memo's house and put it on the list for investigation. When the drones arrive controlled by Rudy (Jacob Vargas) a new pilot serving in the military following in his families footsteps. A bit cliche for movies but certainly true for many servicemen of today. Rudy is commanded to blow up Memo's home, unfortunately Memo's father is in the house. Memo is at his uncles and sees the Drones show live and runs to try to save his father. The house is bombed and his father crawls out and looks into the drone camera, Rudy is ordered to kill him and does.
Two stories begin at this point, Rudy filled with doubt and guilt wants to know more about the man he killed and Memo without his father's will to hold him decides he must go north to earn money for his family.
We follow Memo as he moves north and meets a girl on a bus named Luz Martinez (Leonor Varela). She is a young woman who earns a living, collecting and selling her memories. She takes an interests in Memo and when she uploads her memories of him she is found by Rudy online. He thinking this young man is part of the story of his kill asks her to continue to collect information about Memo's father show he can be sure. There are again some very interesting ideas at play in Luz's relationship with Memo. On one hand she is doing business but because we are human she is also making emotional connections. The idea that she sells her memories of him is cold, but the thing this market finds valuable is that human connection. I think social networking is similar to this. In one way it is a superficial connection to more people on a daily basis but it also gives us more chances at actually making more deep connections if we choose to use it that way. Being human ultimately is about meaningful emotional interaction, we strive for that and feel healthy in our lives when it can happen. Social networks although allowing us to avoid deep contact also give us more opportunities to pursue them if we choose to.
Memo and Luz develop a fine relationship, she helps him get the implants he needs to work for the Sleep Dealers and gives him a friend in a strange place. He works and send money back to his family. Rudy learns that this is indeed the son of the man he kills and that he was not a terrorist and begins to doubt his mission. He decides to travel to Mexico and meet Memo. The storyline with Memo explores his work and draws a very nice parallel he is like the water in his home village a resource being drained by a foreign power for its gain but not a mutual one. Is this the solution the corporate world is looking for in our free market society? A workforce that is just a resource but not people?
The film climaxes with the meeting of Memo and Rudy and the interactions contained in that powerful relationship. Rudy agrees to do anything for Memo to somehow make up for his horrible error. I won't go into it here but it was satisfying.
Rating (9.3)