Fantasia's not all blood and guts; there are plenty of laughs to be had among the fest's voluminous genre offerings. Horror and comedy, after all, go together like chocolate and peanut butter, or machetes and human flesh. The three films in today's dispatch pay homage to previous horror-comedy maestros like Peter Jackson, Joe Dante, and more, with a welcome double dose of Canadian treasure Steven Ogg sprinkled in the mix.
But before we can Ogg-le one of Canada's best character actors, it's worth flying over to Estonia to see one of the fest's most riotous, chaotic surprises: Sander Maran's musical-horror-comedy-romance "Chainsaws Were Singing." Much like "Hundreds of Beavers" last year, "Chainsaws" carries with it a kind of anarchic DIY-indie energy, somewhere between Chuck Jones, "Monty Python," and "Brain Dead." The essential skeleton holding its two hours of chaos together concerns a "Texas Chainsaw Massacre"-like family of maniacs, including the sadistic but softhearted Killer (Martin Ruus), who sings about how much he likes flowers while he tears through unsuspecting victims with his trusty chainsaw. His latest victim is Maria (Laura Niils), a young girl who's just fallen in love with the heartbroken Tom (Karl Ilves) before being snatched away from him and thrown in the Killer's van. Bolstered by new love, Tom gets picked up by a wacky driver named Jaan (Janno Puusepp), who gleefully becomes his sidekick on his adventure to rescue his newfound paramour. Amputations, bukkake, and lesbian hedgehog attacks ensue.
As with the rough-and-tumble vibes of its presentation -- Raimi-esque crash zooms, wild Dutch angles, run-down props and costumes that really sell the 'made for five euros' vibe of the whole thing -- the songs themselves are charmingly unpolished, characters squeaking through increasingly absurd and bawdy lyrics with boundless enthusiasm. And the dumber the jokes get, the more they work: buffoonish cops blast away with reckless abandon while holding donuts in their mouths, and nearly every vehicle Tom and Jaan exit seems to explode behind them for increasingly dubious reasons.
That said, "Chainsaws" does lose a bit of gas in its middle act, as the threadbare structure struggles to sustain itself over two hours. We get long stretches in between songs, and some superfluous interludes including woodland bukkake-worshipping cults that don't seem to add much to the overall story besides a staggering refrigerator-based money shot. The Killer's family dynamics also get a little shaky, and a running joke about Killer's incestuous brother-couple Pepe (Ra Ragnar Novod) and Kevin (Henryk Johan Novod) teeter a little too uncomfortably into outright homophobia. Still, it picks right back up by the time Tom stages his rescue mission, and the last half hour lends more focus to the blood-splattered nonsense. It's not perfect, but it's certainly one of the most delightful watches of the fest. (See it with an audience, especially when they start clapping in rhythm to some of the ditties.)
The latest from Canadian filmmaker Lowell Dean ("WolfCop"), "Dark Match" takes its name from the industry term for a non-televised wrestling match meant to excite crowds before the main event. That's a fitting name for the film itself, really, as it feels like a warmup more than a full meal. It's got its charms, mind you: Dean's stylish camerawork and sly script really throw you into the ring in its opening minutes, using an ''80s-style TV promo to introduce us to our scrappy set of amateur wrestlers. Most notable among these is Miss Behave (Ayisha Issa), whose ambitions for a title are stymied by her rivalry with popular, white rival Kate the Great (Sara Canning) and the fact that, well, audiences aren't primed to root for a Black female wrestler. But she and her fellow underdogs agree to a dark match at a remote estate in the middle of nowhere for heaps of cash. It's there that a fellow wrestler (Steven Ogg) recognizes the man in charge: The Preacher (WWE legend Chris Jericho), a charismatic washout who's since assembled a cultlike following here. Only too late do they realize that the five element-based matches they've agreed to aren't just being televised: they're demonic rituals meant to summon Satan from the depths of hell.
There's a lot to like in "Dark Match," at least conceptually: Issa makes for a capable, fun lead, and the supporting performances from Ogg and Michael Eklund (as the team's weaselly promoter) carry a lot of the film's scrappy energy. The matches themselves are bloody fun, living somewhere between "GLOW" and "Saw" as the ring gets modified with flamethrowers, broken glass, and giant blowing fans that can trap and eviscerate each contender. But there's a feeling that Dean and co aren't going hard enough on the craziness; there's a groundedness to the suspense that makes it feel more like "Green Room" than something more ostentatious like the premise and '80s trappings require. Jericho makes for a mighty presence when he's on screen, but he's mostly sidelined until the end, which is a shame considering the marquee name he brings. That's probably a consequence of the stacked cast; the opening throws a lot of names and characters at you, but the match-by-match structure means character conflicts and beats often get pushed to the wayside or resolved far too early. (Still, there's a fun gag including one of Behave's compatriots, a luchador-like wrestler who's taken a vow of silence, that approaches the kind of silliness this should have worked towards.) Dean puts forth a game effort, but "Dark Match" doesn't quite earn its championship belt.
Still, we're not done with Steven Ogg, as our number two (heh) entry in his Fantasia double-bill, "Scared Shitless," brings us squicky, shitty Joe Dante creature-feature energy. Ogg plays Don, a down-on-his-luck plumber living with his layabout son Sonny (Daniel Doheny), whose mother recently passed of a stomach bug, turning the boy into an anxiety-ridden germaphobe. To shake Sonny out of his hypochondriac funk, Don decides to drag his boy along to his newest call: a plumbing problem in a remote apartment complex. Bad night for this kind of test, though, as the building is plagued by Don's most pernicious porcelain problem yet, a genetically modified creature secreted home by Dr. Robert (Mark McKinney, "The Kids in the Hall"). It's now on the loose and out for blood, hiding in the pipes and ready to execute some disem-bowel movements on every unsuspecting tenant.
To its credit, "Scared Shitless" is exceedingly lean at a cool 76 minutes; with its clean if unremarkable cinematography and unassuming low-budget charm, it's a future Tubi Original in the making. Director Vivieno Caldinelli makes great use of Brandon Cohen's leakproof script, giving us just enough setup of the characters and situation (Julian Richings makes a suitably oily appearance in the cold open) to get down to the bloodletting with little fuss. The victims don't get much to do before they're dispatched, really, but who cares? What little screen time they get is filled with fun gags like an older couple whose freaks definitely match (complete with the husband drawing "SLUT" in lipstick over his chest for date night) and another victim who gets pulled halfway down the commode headfirst. (The creature effects, courtesy of Canadian VFX legend Steven Kostanski, are stellar, though the design leaves a little to be desired -- it's mostly just a toothy tentacle reminiscent of a million '80s horror creatures of the apst.)
Ogg and Doheny have enviable father-son chemistry, Ogg, in particular, bringing his signature underbite intensity to his love and passion for toilet maintenance. However, Doheny struggles to keep the same energy with concierge Patricia (Chelsea Clark), who becomes an erstwhile companion/love interest in the latter half. Even so, the "Gremlins" energy abounds in this one, making for a sprightly, splattery romp you won't have to flush twice.
