I just discovered a small, hopefully frightening film festival happening over this weekend. I’ve also got some information about the upcoming Berlin & Beyond festival later this month.
As I write this, I haven’t yet seen a single film in either of these festivals.
Horror over Zoom
Over the last weekend, SF IndieFest scared us about climate change with the virtual Livable Planet Film Festival. For the next weekend, the same organization wants to scare you again – this time for fun. Remember, these are the folks who also run the Another Hole in the Head festival.
The Warped Dimension festival opens Friday night and closes Sunday. Unlike other virtual festivals, this one sticks to a schedule. All the movies will be streamed via Zoom, so that everyone can watch them together and respond. If you’re concerned about the quality of Zoom video and audio (especially audio), well, so am I.
Perhaps that’s why the price is so damn good. Friday evening, you get a double bill for only one dollar. For another dollar, you can watch another double bill Saturday. On Sunday, you can get a whole day’s worth of scary movies for the price of…you guessed it – one dollar. That’s only $3 to see every movie in the festival.
Are these movies any good? I don’t know. But they have titles like 13 Knives, Companion, and The Diabolical Schemes of Thadeus Jackson.
That German Festival
As far as I know, last year’s Berlin & Beyond Film Festival was the only Bay Area festival that took place in movie theaters instead of the Internet. So, it’s appropriate that this year’s Berlin & Beyond will host the first festival screening in a real theater. On Saturday, May 29, the Vogue will actually screen films as part of the festival. As I write this, I don’t know which movies will be so honored.
The festival opens Tuesday, May 25, and closes Sunday, May 30.
Like most of the film fests during the pandemic, movies will also be screened at the pop-up Fort Mason Flix drive-in. The films to be screened outdoors are Sisters Apart, Lessons of a Dream, and Nowhere in Africa.
I haven’t seen any of the films in this celebration of Germanic cinema yet, but a few of the films seem tantalizing:
- Enfant Terrible: A Rainer Werner Fassbinder biopic.
- Berlin Alexanderplatz: Speaking of which, Fassbinder directed a version of Alfred Döblin’s novel in 1980. This new version is directed by Burhan Qurbani.
- Narcissus and Goldmund: I loved Hermann Hesse’s novel when I was young. I’d like to see the film version.
- My Wonderful Wanda: A comic satire from Switzerland.
[Note: When I first posted this article, Berlin & Beyond’s website lacked links to individual films. Now that this has been fixed, I’ve added the links.]
I hope to preview a few Berlin & Beyond films, soon. I’ll let you know.
Bayflicks 
“As far as I know, last year’s Berlin & Beyond Film Festival was the only Bay Area festival that took place in movie theaters instead of the Internet.”
The 2020 editions of Noir City & Mostly British Film Festival screened (in their entireties) at the Castro and Vogue, respectively.
Thanks for the correction.