After the two excellent Thursday movies, the Russian action film Sword Bearer disappointed on many levels. Born with a blade that emerges from his right hand, Sasha spends most of the movies as a defective Wolverine, slashing his way through people, guns, and trees. Due to his power and a wicked temper, Sasha spends his life as an outcast until after a chance meeting he falls in love with Katya, portrayed by the beautiful Chulpan Khamatova. Thanks to Sasha’s predilection for getting into fights and slicing people up, both the mob and police are looking for him.

The pacing, plot, and acting (except for the excellent Leonid Gromov, who plays the cop in charge of finding Sasha) are atrocious. Either there is too much exposition and story detail in scenes that are abundantly clear or the inverse in parts that are murky. The ludicrous romance between the leads plays like something out of a softcore Cinemax film. Sasha and Katya meet on the stairwell outside of her apartment where he is hiding. They flirt for a few moments then start kissing. After three different sexual encounters, they finally learn each others name. Overally melodramatic, Sword Bearer even ends with a sunset!

I learned three things about Russia from watching this movie:

1) Russian girls are easy.
2) There are random piles of money everywhere.
3) Gangsters are the same the world over.

Thankfully, my second movie excelled or I might not have come back to the Festival. The Backwoods, a joint Spain, English, and French production, follows two English couples as they vacation in rural Spain. While there, they uncover a young girl locked within a closet in a seemingly abandoned house. Several of the locals come looking for the girl that the couples are hiding. As you might imagine, trouble ensues.

Well paced, plotted, and acted, Koldo Serra directs a top notch thriller, very much in the vein of Straw Dogs. While all the actors were good, as expected Gary Oldman stole the show as the understated Paul, the English leader. The Backwoods, set in 1979, takes advantage of the era to create a true feeling of isolation as the townspeople close in on the tourists.

Serra was in attendance and introduced in broken English the movie.

The director/screenwriter stayed around after the film and answered audience questions.

When asked, "Why 1979?", he replied, "I hate movies with cellphones."

On how he convinced Oldman to star in his film: "[When I first met Gary I told him], Hi Gary. I like Dracula."

Serra revealed that Oldman speaks NO Spanish, yet in the film he sounds fluent. He learned his lines phonetically. (Oldman had both English and Spanish lines)

Also, in regards to Oldman, Serra revealed that the film’s budget was four million dollars with two million of that going to Oldman.

After someone commented that next time he comes to Fantastic Fest, Serra should bring the two sexy, gorgeous leading ladies (Aitana Sánchez-Gijón, Virginie Ledoyen), who both appear nude in the film, the screenwriter admitted that the "first scene I wrote was the naked scene and wrote the rest of the movie around it."

Days before the Festival began, Lions Gate picked up the film for US distribution.

NEXT: Scrambled neurons