[  Mood: Very Sad ]
Sadly due to health issues, this will be my last report from Fantastic Fest 3. I’ve throughly enjoyed the Festival, and am saddened by my inability to attend the remainder.

On to my Day 6 thoughts.

Any similarities between Larry Fessenden’s The Last Winter and John Carpenter’s The Thing ends with the Arctic setting. No monster. Little action. The Last Winter at its heart is a taut, well scripted, superiorly directed eco-thriller, perhaps the best of the recent spate of global warming frightfests.

The North Oil Company sends an advance team of technicians doing prep work for the first oil drilling within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. As the permafrost melts and temperatures rise due to the environmental changes brought on by global warming, eerie and unexplainable events happen at the encampment: mechanical malfunctions, crew disappearances and reappearances, unusual weather phenomena, and odd smelling vapors emerging from the melting ice.

Stocked with workmanlike actors including Ron Perlman, James LeGros and Connie Britton, The Last Winter entertains and thrills. Larry Fessenden proves once again that he is among some of the finest and most exciting low budget horror artists working today.

Moebius Redux: A Life in Pictures, my second documentary of the Festival, beautifully recounts the career of the legendary Jean Giraud. Director Hasko Baumann, who was in attendance, introduced the film, but only after an Alamo Draft House employee informed the audience that Baumann sang the best karaoke version ever of "Werewolves of London" at a party the previous night.

The soaring Karl Bartos (of the famed Kraftwerk) soundtrack and the gratuitous use of Moebius images help Baumann establish from the start the proper tone and tenor to this excellent film. Through the extensive use of interviews with Moebius, H. R. Giger, Mike Mignola, Jim Lee, Philippe Druillet, Enki Bilal, Stan Lee, Dan O’Bannon, and especially Alejandro Jodorowsky, the film recounts the career of Jean Giraud from his Blueberry to Metal Hurlant to Incal and his film work from the failed Dune experience to Alien to Tron. The movie successfully touches on most aspects of his long career. Perhaps the most startling piece is the lengthy admittance by Moebius of his not widely known time with the Jean-Paul Appel-Guery cultists in Tahiti.

Upon the movie conclusion, Baumann answered questions.

When asked what inspired the project, Baumann said a German-French company commissioned the piece. "I’ve always been a big American comic fan and I didn’t know anything about [Moebius] when the project began."

Baumann encountered problems with interviewing the moody Moebius who would often change his stories. Also, as it is with most artists, Moebius’ wife was very protective and they often had to work out the interviews around her.

Keep an eye on this space because starting on Friday, this blog metamorphoses into my home for general observations from around the geek world. While waiting, be sure to check out my Dark Forces Book Group blog for other interesting oddities.