It’s that time again for my annual sojourn to Fantastic Fest, the annual Alamo Drafthouse week long love letter to horror, fantasy, sci-fi, action and just plain fantastic movies from all around the world. This year’s festival runs from Sept 18-25, here in Austin in the South Lamar location.

As in year’s past, I begin my coverage with a multi-part/day preview.

Fantastic Fest Preview Day Two

The Creeping Garden

Who says you need a work of fiction to take you to the far reaches of space to explore the unusual, beautiful and strange? Too often we forget that world around us is positively littered with the odd and the alien. So enter directors Jasper Sharp and Tim Grabham with their gorgeously photographed documentary The Creeping Garden to remind us.

Enter the world of the slime mould, a microbial life form that exists in thousands of species all around us but is seldom acknowledged or studied. Yes, the faint of heart will be warned off by their very name and, yes, they can be rather slimey. But viewed in time lapse macro photography – as they are throughout the film – these are weirdly alien and beautiful structures, pulsating with life as they form patterns and overcome obstacles with what scientists believe are signs of primitive intelligence.

And as compelling (read: odd) as the moulds themselves are they are nothing compared to the people who have built their lives around them. Sharp and Grabham take a sort of Errol Morris approach to their subjects – scientists, artists and amateur enthusiasts – leaving them free to wax poetic about their most unusual obsession leading the viewer to conclude that perhaps some of the humans around us are every bit as alien as the things that grow unseen in the dark and perhaps the world is a better – or at least more interesting – place because of it.(Todd Brown)

Man From Reno

Aki is a stranger in a strange land, a Japanese crime novelist visiting San Francisco when she finds herself drawn into a real life murder mystery. Knowing virtually nobody and adrift in an unfamiliar culture and city with only an aging sheriff to help, can her literary skills help her unravel the truth?

Having built a loyal following with a string of cross-cultural comedies, American indie director Dave Boyle (White On Rice, Surrogate Valentine) maintains his interest in all things Japanese in his fifth feature while also making a hard turn away from comedy and into noir. And the mystery format serves his fascination with the space where cultures meet and mingle very well indeed.

Gifted with a very strong cast including Ayako Fujitani (Gamera, Tokyo), veteran character actor Pepe Serna (with nearly 150 credits to his name you’ll surely know the face if not the name), and Takashi Miike veteran Kazuki Kitamura (possessor of the finest eyebrows in all of Japan) Boyle weaves a clever and engaging world, proving that his skills go well beyond the comedy arena where he made his name. A deft exercise in crime noir, The Man From Reno was the very deserving winner of the LA Film Festival’s Best Narrative Feature prize and we’re proud to present it to Fantastic Fest audiences.(Todd Brown)

The Hive

Adam jolts awake inside a boarded up infirmary with no recollection of who he is or how he ended up here.  With threatening sounds penetrating from the outside, Adam has no choice but to reach deep into his memories to try and piece together what has happened to him.  With the help of mementos he finds, Adam starts to piece together the puzzle that once was his life.  He remembers his best friend Clark, Clark’s girlfriend Jess, and the love of his life Katie, but there are other memories as well… Memories that couldn’t be his…