19th November 2008.

Just back from Trieste and the Science+Fiction Festival organised by Daniele Terzoli, Lorenzo Betuzzi and our Film 4 FrightFest lovelies duo Chiara and Giovanni Barbo. If you attend our August events you may have bumped into them at some point because they are terrific supporters of FrightFest, the reason I was invited over to Italy again from November 11 – 16. My job was to introduce director Juan Antonio Bayona because THE ORPHANAGE received its belated Italian premiere at the festival. JA was on fine form as usual and despite an Air Italia strike delaying his arrival from Rome for six hours, gave his usual entertaining display

I helped Trieste secure MUTANT CHRONICLES and ended up introducing that too because director Simon Hunter was stuck in Los Angeles preparing for the US release in January. Shockingly thrown away in the UK, I seem to be one of the few critics who like Simon’s brave experiment using digital download as opposed film. Like the now ubiquitous MARTYRS, also on show at the Cinecity Multiplex venue, it’s a love it or hate it experience.

Speaking of MARTYRS as one continually seems to these days, director Pascal Laugier’s friend and first assistant director on his debut SAINT-ANGE/HOUSE OF VOICES, Franck Vestiel turned up to present his own debut EDEN LOG. That’s the movie none of us really liked at FrightFest Glasgow last February. Teddy-bear Vestiel was well aware of that fact but was very gracious and extremely funny about it. “You have a strong point of view, I much prefer that to bland praise”, he told me. I really warmed to Vestiel, and have asked him to attend a future Frightfest, only if he makes a good movie next time. “Oh you mean like DISCO”, he laughed, “I heard from Pascal about your appalling taste in French movies”. But Vestiel could do a lot worse than the Village People bio-pic currently in Paris prep.

The other French invitee was Marc Caro on hand promoting DANTE 01, his derivative mix of SF and Biblical myth. He was nowhere near as nice though. His intro to the movie was this: “I made DELICATESSEN for vegetarian people. I made DANTE for hot people. My next film will be for bamboo people”. Okay…. After that no one really wanted to talk to him at the daily lunch get-togethers at the seafront Café Tommaseo.

Other FrightFest alumni were THE DEAD OUTSIDE director Kerry Anne Mullaney and her co-writer/producer Kris Bird. Trieste marked the Scottish virus movie’s first post FrightFest showing and they were rewarded with a Special Jury Mention at the closing prize giving. The delighted twosome soon settled into the Italian way of life in one of my personal favourite festival locations. And I made sure I took them to my preferred ice-cream parlour Zampollis Trivia fact. Kerry served as a soldier in Bosnia.

DARK FLOORS also got a great local reaction. A shame we couldn’t do our Lordi-in-Leicester-Square concert idea after UK distributor Tartan went tits-up during the planning stages. Heavy Metal freaks also turned out in big numbers for the laughably preposterous, Hammer retro CHEMICAL WEDDING even though it was Iron Maiden singer/co-scripter Bruce Dickinson everyone wanted to see rather than fuddy-duddy director Julian Doyle.

Other films attracting sizeable audiences were director Aleksander Melnick’s TERRA NOVA, attending Trieste with his producer son Anton, best described as a Russian BATTLE ROYALE meets ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK. Alex Riviera’s SLEEP DEALER, a low rent Mexican MATRIX, had its fans too. But Nicolas Lopez’s life-as-a-comic-book SANTOS struck out like it did at both Sitges and Austin.

Winner of the Asteroid for best film was one of my 2008 favourites, F. Javier Gutierrez’ TRES DIAS/BEFORE THE FALL. A terrific tale of a man seeking vengeance for murder as the world ends, it deserved to do so much better in its native Spain. In fact star Mariana Cordero bitterly told the audience Gutierrez has had to find work elsewhere in her otherwise warm acceptance speech. The Urania D’ Argento award for lifetime achievement went to Ray Harryhausen. The stop-motion genius delighted fans during his hour-long videoconference exchange in the restaurant at the Hotel Urban Design, the festival’s guest base.

Kim Newman was in attendance as usual signing just published Italian edition copies of his novel ‘Dracula Cha Cha Cha’. And Spanish journalist Carlos Aguilar was hyping his ‘John Philip Law: Diabolik Angel’ book, with co-author Anita Haas, completed just five weeks before the cult actor’s sudden death. Full of wonderful pictures and salacious gossip, this Spanish/English book is published by Quatermass and worth tracking down.

Which allows me to end on another reason why I was in Trieste to present Bayona. To promote my Guillermo del Toro book that now has a title – ‘Clockwork Fables: The Fantasy Worlds of Guillermo del Toro’. That’s the one he wanted and it’s the lavish FAB Press published tome you’ll be able to read roughly two years in the future just as THE HOBBIT Part 1 is getting ready for release

Until next time…