PIFF After Dark 2012

PIFF After Dark is back! The 35th Portland International Film Festival runs Feb. 9th-25th. The After Dark screenings will take place on Feb. 17th-18th and the 24th-25th at 11:30pm at Cinema 21. We're extremely excited about the lineup this year, featuring four excellent genre films that push cinematic boundaries. The official lineup:



Headhunters (Norway)- Roger Brown is Norway's most successful headhunter, recruiting personnel for powerful corporations. But as successful as he is, it's not enough to keep up with what he thinks his wife needs. So to keep things afloat, he uses his job to find wealthy people he can steal art from. When the master conman sets his sights on a priceless painting, it's owner turns out to be a former mercenary with a terrible secret, and Roger is in for much more than he could have imagined. His client has excellent hunting skills, leading to a perilous journey rife with gunfights, mountaintop car chases, and bloodthirsty pit bulls. Based on the bestselling Norwegian novel, this violent and twisted thriller is packed to the brim with nail-biting set pieces and surprising plot revelations guaranteed to keep you on the edge of your seat. Plays Friday 2/17 at 11:30pm at Cinema 21. Advance tickets are HERE.



Let the Bullets Fly (China) - In remote 1920's China, a gang of bandits pose as traveling government officials. When they descend on a small dusty town, they find themselves at odds with a mysterious and powerful mobster (Chow Yun Fat). Instantly suspicious of the "officials", the mobster sets into motion an intricate battle of wits, resulting in multiple double crosses, all executed at a lightning quick pace. As action packed as it is hilarious, this film is a throwback to the Hong Kong action heyday of the 80's and 90's, with a nod to classic American westerns. Plays Saturday 2/18 at 11:30pm at Cinema 21. Advance tickets are HERE.



Kill List (UK) - A truly unique crime thriller that unravels into terrifying horror! Jay, a retired hitman, is trying his hand at a normal family life. But when the money starts to dry up, he decides to take on one last high-paying job and enlists his old partner Gal. The mysterious client only gives them a short list of names, no whys, and they set out to execute the "kill list". It doesn't take long before they realize that they are involved in something far more sinister than simple assassinations. The increasingly bizarre job begins to create confusion and paranoia, until the pair are plunged into a horrific world of violent terror. Plays Friday 2/24 at 11:30pm at Cinema 21. Advance tickets are HERE.



Invasion of the Alien Bikini (South Korea) - Young-Gun is a lonely man who spends his nights protecting the innocent as a self-appointed no-budget crime fighter. "Disguised" in a raincoat and bad fake mustache, one night he fights a gang of hoodlums and saves a strange beautiful woman. Shaken up, the woman asks to come back to his apartment, where he soon finds that there is extraterrestrial involvement at work. Featuring kung fu fights, a gorgeous woman with tentacles, and an extremely erotic game of Jenga, this inventively stylized film was made for budget of less than $5,000, and is a testament to the power of creative independent filmmaking. Plays Saturday 2/25 at 11:30pm at Cinema 21. Advance tickets are HERE.



Click here for more information on the 35th Portland International Film Festival

Schedule

Friday Feb. 18th at 11:30pm at The Hollywood Theatre
Rubber
Advance tickets are HERE

Saturday Feb. 19th at 11:30pm at The Hollywood Theatre
Outrage
Advance tickets are HERE

Friday Feb. 25th at 11:30pm at Cinema 21
Mutant Girls Squad
Advance tickets are HERE

Saturday Feb. 26th at 11:30pm at Cinema 21
The Revenant
Advance tickets are HERE

All information including movie descriptions is below. The 34th Portland International Film Festival is presented by the Northwest Film Center. Full program, party details, and tickets can be found HERE.

PIFF After Dark 2011

Welcome to the official blog of the "PIFF After Dark" series of the 34th Portland International Film Festival! This series will focus on new genre films that push cinematic boundaries. The series is programmed by Dan Halsted, organizer of the Grindhouse Film Festival and founder of the 35mm Shaolin Archive. Here is the official lineup:



Rubber - On a quiet desert landscape, a car approaches and rolls to a stop. A man climbs from the trunk, and tells us that this is a movie that exists for no reason. Then, a group of people paralleling the film's audience watch through binoculars...as a tire slowly comes to life. This is Quentin Dupieux' film Rubber. A surreal tale of a psychotic tire out on a telekinetic murderous rampage. No one is safe: small animals, police officers, and innocent bystanders all fall victim to the tire's violent fury. Between head explosions, a beautiful brunette becomes the object of the tire's affection, and one character asks the question that has surprisingly crept into every audience member's mind: "Is the tire going to get laid?"




Outrage - Takeshi Kitano is back in top form with this ruthless and violent yakuza thriller! Kitano stars as Otomo, a stoic mid-level yakuza boss. When two top mob bosses form an alliance, the entire yakuza world is in danger of erupting in a war, and Otomo is instructed to keep the criminal families in balance by any means necessary. What follows is an intricate web of betrayal filled with sudden bursts of realistic violence. This modern Japanese Godfather is masterfully directed by Kitano (Violent Cop, Fireworks), proving himself once again to be one of the great Japanese directors of our time.




Mutant Girls Squad - Rin is a Japanese high school girl living a typical teenage life. This all changes on her 16th birthday, when her father informs her that he is a mutant, and she has inherited his mutant gene. Moments later, government special forces break into her home, and blow both of her parents to bits. Suddenly Rin’s dormant mutant abilities are awakened, and her arm transforms into a sharp, knife-encrusted claw! Fleeing and fighting her way though her hometown, she discovers a group of girls who were also born as mutants, calling themselves the “Hiruko". The girls all wear sexy outfits, and have different special abilities: one can transform her arms into swords, one can grow tentacles from her fingertips, and another can grow a chainsaw out of her body. The team hone their skills under their demented leader for one purpose: to take revenge on the humans who have persecuted them for ages. Action packed, hilarious, and outrageously violent, this is Japanese splatter cinema at it's finest.




The Revenant - When Joey's best friend Bart is killed in action in Iraq, Joey is unsettled at the funeral, but not nearly as much as when Bart shows up the next night undead on his doorstep. Not knowing how he has come back to life, the two friends discover that Bart is a "Revenant", somewhere between a zombie and vampire, and needs blood to survive. To keep him "alive", they start preying on the dregs of society, and inadvertently start cleaning up the neighborhood, becoming modern vigilantes. This all works well and good until the criminals and drug dealers they've killed begin to come back from the dead with only revenge on their minds. Reminiscent of Shaun of the Dead, this is one of the best horror films to come along in a decade.

The 34th Portland International Film Festival is presented by the Northwest Film Center. Full program, party details, and tickets can be found HERE.

Trailer Mania!

Quentin Dupieux's film Rubber, about a psychotic tire out on a telekinetic murderous rampage:






Takeshi Kitano's ruthless new yakuza film Outrage:






Witness the cinematic insanity of Mutant Girls Squad:



The 34th Portland International Film Festival is presented by the Northwest Film Center. Full program, party details, and tickets can be found HERE