The Serpent's Skin screens June 26 as part of the Friday Night Weird underground cinema showcase at Dairy Arts Center. Courtesy: Dark Star Pictures
We’ve all been there. You’re settling into a Friday evening on the couch with your favorite movie buddy. You’ve got the perfect spread of snacks, a six pack of something crushable and an elite blanket-to-pillow ratio. Then comes the dreaded question: “What do you wanna watch?”
You fire up your streamer of choice and cycle through carousels of C-level blockbusters, exhausted IP and sequels to sequels you didn’t want to see in the first place. So you switch to the other half-dozen services you pay for each month, only to find more dreck.
Even if you do happen across that elusive perfect title, you’ll probably get served a “Watch Next” ad right before the film’s climactic fade to black — a sin against art so wicked it should carry a penalty of public execution by Martin Scorsese.
You find yourself at a familiar crossroads. Should you go for the fourth rewatch of One Battle After Another, or just throw in the towel and fire up the latest season of Love on the Spectrum?
We don’t have to live this way. That’s why Caribou Current catches up each month with Shay Wescott of the Dairy Arts Center to tell you all about the off-the-wall offerings coming to Friday Night Weird, the nonprofit’s weekly underground cinema showcase. No subscription required.
How much do you know about Croatian history? If you’re like most Americans, the answer is probably not a lot. All the more reason to do yourself a favor and check out Fiume o morte!, Croatia’s official entry for Best International Feature Film at the 98th Academy Awards.
Offering what press materials call “a defiantly punk direct-action history lesson,” this genre-bending documentary from Igor Bezinovic tells the story of a 16-month military siege on the city of Fiume (now Croatia’s Rijeka) led by Italian poet, dandy and war fetishist Gabriele D’Annunzio.
“This is pretty far from what I might include in a shorthand definition of Friday Night Weird as a program, but that is also what keeps it exciting,” Wescott says. “It’s the lively spirit, European absurdism and radical sense of playfulness used by Bezinović to tackle heavy subjects like fascism, propaganda and militarization that make Fiume o morte! worth the watch.”
Trapped in an endlessly looping Tokyo subway corridor, a lost man (Kazunari Ninomiya) sets out to escape his strange purgatory by finding the elusive Exit 8. The rules of his quest are simple: “Do not overlook anything out of the ordinary. If you discover an anomaly, turn back immediately. If you don’t, carry on. Then leave from Exit 8.”
Not too complicated, right? Problem is, these “anomalies” cut to the heart of the protagonist’s deepest anxieties — and may include everything from bleeding walls to an infestation of rats with human-like features. The film may be adapted from a 2023 indie video game of the same name, but Wescott says you shouldn’t expect standard franchise fare from this singular thriller by director Genki Kawamura.
“Exit 8 is not just unsettling in its fantastically minimalist approach, it’s also a great use of the elements of cinema to make a compelling horror film,” Wescott says. “It adds effective storytelling, expressive performance and inspired set design to make its case for why it exists — and why it deserves to be seen.”
The irony of screening a film called Normal at Friday Night Weird isn’t lost on Wescott. But there’s a lot more to the latest collaboration between Bob Odenkirk and John Wick creator Derek Kolstad than the title may suggest.
This neo-Western shootout from director Ben Wheatley follows an unassuming substitute sheriff with a spotty past (Odenkirk) who uncovers a troubling secret after responding to a bank robbery in the sleepy Minnesota town of Normal.
“It’s a great reminder that Westerns and action movies are genre movies too and deserve the same platform as well executed sci-fi and horror,” Wescott says. “Normal is bizarre, chaotic and delightfully violent without ever being mean spirited; it’s a midnight movie that knows exactly what it is and is in welcome company here.”
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter about their upcoming film Teenage Sex & Death at Camp Miasma, trans filmmaker Jane Schoenbrun had some choice words for the industry.
“Every major studio and distributor passed on the film, and I think it’s because of the limits of what kinds of queer and trans stories are deemed commercial or not commercial,” they said. “When I look around in our ‘post-woke, post-Biden’ era, I don’t see any other trans artists getting budgets, and that’s a fucking shame.”
Enter 21-year-old filmmaker Alice Maio Mackay. Her new movie The Serpent’s Skin may not have the funding of an A24 hit like Schoenbrun’s I Saw the TV Glow, but her second collab with fellow trans artist Vera Drew (The People’s Joker) shares a similar penchant for retro risk-taking as it unwinds a supernatural story of a young woman (Alexandra McVicker) who escapes her transphobic hometown only to accidentally summon a demon through a neck tattoo.
“Mackay is the real deal with a truly authentic voice, making unapologetically trans stories — and she has been doing so since she was a teenager,” Wescott says. “If we want to make room for more voices like Schoenbrun’s, then we can start by championing artists like Mackay who are persisting and thriving despite the limitations of the industry.”
