1353 – Cosmos (2019)

Cosmos is the debut feature film for directing brothers Elliot & Zander Weaver, who were inspired to make a movie about space scientists after several years of producing broadcast documentaries on the Apollo Program. Cosmos had no funding or budget – all equipment was either owned prior to filming or borrowed, all locations were lent and all cast and crew worked on the project without a fee.

With the exception of scoring the film, directing brothers Elliot & Zander Weaver, took on all major production roles including: screenwriting, prop making, lighting and camerawork, sound recording, editing, sound designing and sound mixing, VFX, poster art and trailers creation. (imdb) – rt

1351 – In Fabric (2018)

… coordinates: “kaleidoscopic montage of ‘70s department store imagery, set to synths in the warm, ethereal vein of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop” b

In Fabric is a 2018 British horror comedy film, written and directed by Peter Strickland. It stars Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Hayley Squires, Leo Bill, and Gwendoline Christie. (wiki)

In Fabric‘s gauzy giallo allure weaves a surreal spell, blending stylish horror and dark comedy to offer audiences a captivating treat. (rottentomatoes)

“In this oneiric oddity, consumerism is everything, ultimately devouring even the consumer – while the real horror is the exploitative means of production, carefully kept underground beyond the sight of bourgeois shoppers above.” Anton Bitel

“In Fabric is a haunting ghost story set against the backdrop of a busy winter sales period in a department store and follows the life of a cursed dress as it passes from person to person, with devastating consequences..” (imdb)

1350 – The Art of Self-Defense (2019)

The Art of Self-Defense is a 2019 black comedy thriller film written and directed by Riley Stearns. It stars Jesse Eisenberg, Alessandro Nivola and Imogen Poots. (wiki)

After he’s attacked on the street at night by a roving motorcycle gang, timid bookkeeper Casey (Jesse Eisenberg) joins a neighborhood karate studio to learn how to protect himself. Under the watchful eye of a charismatic instructor, Sensei (Alessandro Nivola), and hardcore brown belt Anna (Imogen Poots), Casey gains a newfound sense of confidence for the first time in his life. But when he attends Sensei’s mysterious night classes, he discovers a sinister world of fraternity, brutality and hyper-masculinity, presenting a journey that places him squarely in the sights of his enigmatic new mentor. Audacious and offbeat, The Art of Self-Defense is an original dark comedy that takes toxic masculinity to absurd extremes. (rottentomatoes)

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imdb

1336 – Little Misfortune (2019 video game)

timespace coordinates: 1993 Sweden

Little Misfortune is an interactive story, focused on exploration and characters, both sweet and dark, where your choices have consequences. Sharing the same universe with the cult video game Fran Bow, created by the visionary dev-duo Killmonday Games.

steam   /   Over the Garden Wall

1330 – Ruiner (2017 video game)

timespace coordinates: cyber metropolis Rengkok / nightscapes and industrial jungles of a grit-tech 2091

Ruiner is a brutal cyberpunk top-down shooter / isometric slasher video game developed by Polish indie game studio Reikon Games and published by Devolver Digital. The game was released for Linux, PlayStation 4, Windows, Xbox One on 26 September 2017. Omri Pettite of PC Gamer stated that “Ruiner is gorgeous, a sensory feast inspired by the works of cyberpunk’s 1980s heyday, in which a silent, masked protagonist travels through the nightscapes and industrial jungles of a grit-tech 2091. Underneath, a thumping top-down action game delivers sword-sharp combat, the familiarity of its design offset by the constant urge to simply stand still and drink everything in.”

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS (MINIMUM): Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system /  OS: Windows 7/8.1/10 x64 / Processor: Intel Core i5-760 (4 * 2800) or equivalent / AMD Athlon II X4 645 AM3 (4 * 3100) or equivalent / Memory: 4 GB RAM / Graphics: GeForce GTX 460 (1024 MB) / Radeon HD 6850 (1024 MB) / Storage: 10 GB available space

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wiki   /   steam

1327 – In the Mouth of Madness (1994)

timespace coordinates: 1990’s New Hampshire

“reality isn’t what it used to be…”

In the Mouth of Madness is a 1994 American horror film directed and scored by John Carpenter and written by Michael De Luca. It stars Sam Neill, Julie Carmen, Jürgen Prochnow, David Warner and Charlton Heston. Informally, the film is the third installment in Carpenter’s Apocalypse Trilogy, preceded by The Thing and Prince of Darkness.

The film pays tribute to the work of seminal horror writer H. P. Lovecraft, with many references to his stories and themes. Its title is a play on Lovecraft’s novella, At the Mountains of Madness, and insanity plays as great a role in the film as it does in Lovecraft’s fiction. The opening scene depicts Trent’s confinement to an asylum, with the bulk of the story told in flashback, a common technique of Lovecraft. Reference is made to Lovecraftian settings and details (such as a character that shares the name of Lovecraft’s Pickman family). Sutter Cane’s novels have similar titles to H.P. Lovecraft stories : The Whisperer of the Dark (The Whisperer in Darkness), The Thing in the Basement (The Thing on the Doorstep), Haunter out of Time (The Haunter of the Dark/The Shadow Out of Time), and The Hobbs End Horror (The Dunwich Horror), the latter also referencing Hobbs End underground station from Nigel Kneale‘s Quatermass and the Pit.

The film can also be seen as a reference to Stephen King, who, like Lovecraft, writes horror fiction set in New England hamlets. (wiki)

imdb

1324 – Strange Days (1995)

timespace coordinates: 1999, turn of the century (near-future) Los Angeles (racial war zone / New Year’s Eve party) 

Strange Days is a 1995 American science fiction thriller film directed by Kathryn Bigelow, written by James Cameron and Jay Cocks, and produced by Cameron and Steven-Charles Jaffe. It stars Ralph Fiennes, Angela Bassett, Juliette Lewis, and Tom Sizemore. Set in the last two days of 1999, the film follows the story of a black marketeer of SQUID discs, recordings that allow a user to experience the recorder’s memories and physical sensations, as he attempts to uncover the truth behind the murder of a prostitute.

Blending science fiction with film noir conventions, Strange Days explores themes such as racism, abuse of power, rape, and voyeurism. Although the story was conceived by Cameron around 1986, Bigelow found inspiration after incidents such as the Lorena Bobbitt trial and the 1992 Los Angeles riots that followed the Rodney King verdict.

Strange Days was a commercial failure and almost derailed Bigelow’s career (…) Nevertheless, the film’s critical standing has improved over the years, with many fans feeling that the film has been overlooked by a casual mass audience and misguided critics.

The scene where the crowd celebrates the turn of the new century at the end of the film was shot at the corner of the 5th and Flower streets, between the Westin Bonaventure Hotel and the Los Angeles Public Library. Over 50 off-duty police officers were hired to control an assembled crowd of 10,000 people, who had to pay $10 in advance to attend the event. The film-makers also hired rave promoters Moss Jacobs and Philip Blaine to produce performances featuring Aphex Twin, Deee-Lite, as well as “all the cyber-techno bands they could garner”.

In 2015, The Washington Post editor Sonny Bunch felt that Strange Days was still relevant, comparing the imagery captured by the SQUID units to that of first-person shooters or cellphone videos on YouTube. He added that events such as Jeriko One’s murder and the subsequent coverup of the crime contribute to activist movements like Black Lives Matter, and that their media documentation amplifies their reception and consequences. (read more: Themes)

wiki   /   imdb