Get ready to be shocked by what Lloyd Kaufman has to say about the new Troma film #ShakespearesShitstorm in this exclusive interview recorded virtually during the 2020 Fantasia Film Festival! Tune in to hear all the juicy details about his latest release, streaming on January 15, 2025 on Troma Now. Bumpers and Aside A.I. Voiceover …
Fantasia 2020
Like many film festivals in 2020, Fantasia decided to go virtual this year. I would say that they were successful in this regard with its VOD and “live” screenings via the Shift72 powered Festival Scope platform. Combined with Q&As and panels streamed over Zoom and Youtube, the experience almost felt like a proper film festival. …
A nurse and a vengeful father try to survive a Halloween night home invasion in For the Sake of Vicious. Romina (Lora Burke) is a single mother and nurse, who returns home one Halloween night and finds that it was broken into by Chris (Nick Smyth), who has a hostage in the form of Romina’s …
A scientist ends up with his consciousness split into separate personalities in Minor Premise. Ethan (Sathya Sridharan) is a neuroscientist, who is under immense pressure by Malcolm (Dana Ashbrook) to complete the work of Ethan’s late father in creating a device to control human consciousness. Using himself as a guinea pig, Ethan has discovered that …
A French family struggle for survival during the American Civil War in Savage State. In the midst of the American Civil War in 1863 Missouri, French colonists Edmund (Bruno Todeschini), his wife Madeleine (Constance Dollé), freed slave Layla (Armelle Abibou) and daughters Abigaëlle (Maryne Bertieaux), Justine (Déborah François), and Esther (Alice Isaaz) seek safe passage …
A woman desperately tries to recover his missing son in Bring Me Home. Jung-Yeon (Lee Young-ae) has spent the last six years looking for her missing son Yoon-su. Soon after her husband dies in tragic car crash, Jung-Yeon receives a lead about a boy matching Yoon-su’s description and the Mansun Fishing Spot. Jung-Yeon arrives to …
A shy and awkward young woman falls in love with an amusement park ride in Jumbo. Jeanne (Noémie Merlant) is an awkward young woman, who works nights at her local amusement park. One night Jeanne is amazed when one of the park’s rides, which she nicknamed “Jumbo,” comes to life before her eyes, with Jeanne …
A recently paroled man tries to rebuild his life in The Five Years of Success. Freshly released from prison, X (Santiago Segura) has committed himself to live on the straight and narrow and making a success of himself. With his parole officer Emma (Isidora Goreshter) watching his every move, X quickly finds a job at …
A couple attempts a Satanic ritual to bring back their deceased grandson in Anything for Jackson. Audrey (Sheila McCarthy) and Henry (Julian Richings) Walsh are a couple who are willing to do anything to bring back their two-year-old grandson Jackson, who was killed along with their daughter in a car accident. To achieve this, they …
Take a journey through Europe in decline in Undergods. Street scavengers K (Johann Myers) and Z (Géza Röhrig) load dead bodies into their truck in a plague-ridden city and tell each other stories about their routines. This includes Ron (Michael Gould) and Ruth (Hayley Carmichael), a couple in a loveless marriage who enters into a …
A Filipina nurse encounters supernatural entities at the house of the woman she’s caring for in Sanzaru. Evelyn (Aina Dumlao) is a young Filipina woman, who has just started a job as a live-in nurse for dementia suffering Dena (Jayne Taini). Evelyn has also come into the care of her nephew Amos (Jon Viktor Corpuz), …
A teenager gets more than she bargins for when she participates in a sleep study in Come True. Sarah (Julia Sarah Stone) is an 18-year-old plauged with nightmares, who decides to participate in a university sleep study headed up by Jeremy (Landon Liboiron). Things initially start off well, but Sarah’s nightmares begin to get worse …
The folks at Troma Entertainment return with a new film lampooning the bard in #ShakespearesShitstorm. Elonzo “Big Al” King (Abraham Sparrow) is the head of the pharmaceutical Avanbard Incorporated, who is planning to launch his new drug “Safespacia” aimed at Millenials suffering from “entitlementia.” While on a cruise to celebrate the launch, the staff of …
Two siblings experience strange occurrences at the farm of their dying father in The Dark & The Wicked. Louise (Marin Ireland) and her brother Michael ((Michael Abbott Jr) put their lives on hold to return the farm of their mother (Julie Oliver-Touchstone) and father (Michael Zagst), the latter of whom is on his deathbed. However, …
Something terrifying is happening off the coast of a remote fishing town in The Block Island Sound. Harry Lynch (Chris Sheffield) is a man who becomes concerned when his fisherman father Tom (Neville Archambault) begins acting rather strangely. However, Harry’s concern increases when Tom vanishes overnight and he and his sister Audry (Michaela McManus) fear …
Three kids help their grandfather find his missing cow in The Old Man Movie. Priidik, Aino, and Mart are three brothers who are dropped off at their grandfather’s farm for the summer. Every morning the villagers gather around grandfather’s barn for milk from his prized cow, who he does not treat very well. When Priidik …
A female journalist decides to take bloody vengeance against online trolls in The Columnist. Femke Boot (Katja Herbers) is the writer of a newspaper column, who is the victim of relentless and vile criticism via social media. Despite being advised by fellow writer and boyfriend Steven Dood (Bram van der Kelen) to “never read the …
A cabaret singer encounters a mermaid washed up in the City of Lights in A Mermaid in Paris. Gaspard Snow (Nicolas Duvauchelle) is the primary singer at the Flowerburger, a cabaret club run by his family, which has fallen on hard times. One night, Gaspard encounters an injured mermaid named Lula (Marilyn Lima), who has …
A man finds himself thrust into the funeral ritual for the father a woman he just picked up in a bar in Kriya. Neel (Noble Luke) is a nightclub DJ, who picks up a woman named Sitara (Navjot Randhawa) following a set. He ends up following her home to find Sitara’s mother Tara Devi (Avantika …
A young woman develops suspicions about her friend during a trip to a cabin in Bleed with Me. Rowan (Lee Marshall) is a shy and awkward woman, who accompanies her co-worker and best friend Emily (Lauren Beatty) on a trip to a cabin with Emily’s boyfriend Brendan (Aris Tyros). Things come off to a rocky …
The farms of two families are affected by a fracking operation in Unearth. George (Marc Blucas) is a mechanic undergoing hard financial times and is unable to provide for his daughter Heather (Rachel McKeon) and Kim (Brooke Sorenson), the latter of whom has a young infant. George lives next door to Kathryn Dolan (Adrienne Barbeau), …
A 50 year old woman has a sexual awakening in Marygoround. Mary (Grazyna Misiorowska) is a grocery story worker, who has started to go through menopause, which she begins take hormone treatments for. That, combined with the sudden visit of her niece Helena (Helena Sujecka) results in in the still virginal Mary having an increased …
A young man tells a story about an incident at a bar in The Oak Room. On a snowy night, while closing his bar, Paul (Peter Outerbridge) inexplicably visited by Steve (RJ Mitte), who has been drifting for three years and owes a huge debt. While waiting until it’s time to collect, Steve decides to …
David Arquette tries to redeem himself to the world of professional wrestling in You Cannot Kill David Arquette. In 2000, while promoting the film Ready to Rumble, David Arquette was infamously booked to win the WCW World Championship. This move ended up infuriating the wrestling world and stalling Arquette’s acting career. Nearly two decades later, …
Students at a boarding school wake up in a dark purgatory in Detention. It is 1962 and Taiwan is under martial law, where anyone caught with books containing Communist or left-wing thoughts were banned and those caught with them were punishable by death. Wei Chong-Ting (Jing-Hua Tseng) is a student at Greenwood High School and …
A self-help author is tormented on a nightly business by a home-invading killer in Lucky. May Ryer (Brea Grant) is a notable self-help author, whose latest book hasn’t been selling as well as her first. One night. May discovers a masked invader at her house and her husband Ted (Dhruv Uday Singh) matter-of-factly mentions that …
The staff of a department store is terrorized by sentient killer blue jeans in Slaxx. The hip department store Canadian Cotton Clothiers is preparing for their Monday Madness sale and the launch of their new self-adjusting Super Shaper jeans. Libby (Romane Denis) is freshly hired by store manager Craig (Brett Donahue) and joins other staff …
A nurse finds herself in the middle of an organ harvesting operation gone wrong in 12 Hour Shift. Set in 1999 Arkansas, Mandy (Angela Bettis) is a nurse preparing to work a double shift. Aside from stealing drugs from her patients, Mandy is involved in an organ harvesting operation with her co-worker Karen (Nikea Gamby-Turner) …
A rural community suspects one of their own of witchcraft in The Curse of Audrey Earnshaw. In 1973, a protestant village of mostly Irish immigrants have been suffering from many tragic afflictions. The only exception is Agatha Earnshaw (Catherine Walker), who owns the only prosperous farm in the area. Agatha also has a teenage daughter …
The legend of the most dangerous amusement park of all time is recounted in Class Action Park. Gene Mulvihill is a former Wall Street tycoon, who in 1979 opened up Action Park in the small town of Vernon, New Jersey. With no regard for conventional rules, Mulvihill populated this water park with some of the …
A zombie outbreak occurs at a plastic surgery hospital in Yummy. Alison (Maaike Neuville) is a very self-conscious woman, who travels with her mother Oksana (Taeke Nicolai) and boyfriend Michael (Bart Hollanders) to Klinika Krawczyk in order to receive a breast reduction operation from Dr. Krawczyk (Eric Godon). However, the test subjects of a “rejuvenation …
A woman runs from a predatory man in the woods in Hunted. Eve (Lucie Debay) is a French actress who meets a seemingly charming Man (Arieh Worthalter) in a bar, who helps her to fend off a guy trying to pick her up. However, it soon turn out that this stranger is a sexual predator, …
A family fights to survive a demonic presence in the funeral home where they live in The Undertaker’s Home. Bernardo (Luís Machín), wife Estella (Celeste Gerez) and stepdaughter Irina (Camila Vaccarini) all live together in Bernardo’s funeral home, which is also home to a number of spirits that haunt them a night. However, the nightly …
A loner becomes obsessed with the webcam model he chats with every night in PVT Chat. Jack (Peter Vack) is a young man living in a grungy New York City apartment, who spends his days playing online Blackjack and his nights chatting with webcam models. His favourite model is San Francisco dominatrix Scarlet (Julia Fox) …
Two sisters compete for the attentions of a man who may or may not be a vampire in Climate of the Hunter. Alma (Ginger Gilmartin) is a somewhat mentally unstable woman currently staying at the family cabin with her sister Elizabeth (Mary Buss). They are soon joined by their old childhood friend Wesley (Ben Hall), …
Two brothers join a special acting agency to take down a cult in Special Actors. Kazuto (Kazuto Osawa) has aspirations to become an actor but has a problem of frequently fainting while under stress. One day Kazuto is reunited with his younger brother Hiroki (Hiroki Kono), who introduces Kazuto to the “Special Actors” agency, which …
A newly widowed woman in a plague-ridden 17th century English village finds herself accused of witchcraft in The Reckoning. Grace Haverstock (Charlotte Kirk) is a woman in 1665 England, who is mourning the death of her husband Joseph (Joe Anderson), who has hung himself after contracting the great plague, leaving Grace alone with her infant …
An isolated film editor is tormented by his mysterious neighbour in 2011. The Tenant from 2011 (Émile Schneider) is a young film editor currently working on a feature film The Burning Flesh for independent director Hugo (Hugolin Chevrette). However, the tenant begins to fall into his anxieties through recurring nightmares and the actions of his …
The cult fandom of the Evil Dead franchise is explored in Hail to the Deadites. In the decades since its 1981, Sam Raimi’s The Evil Dead and its sequels have developed a rabid fanbase who want to connect with anyone and everyone connected to the franchise. Filmmaker Steve Villeneuve travels the horror convention circuit, talking …
A heroin junkie gets his mind literally fried after he is abducted by aliens in Fried Barry. Barry (Gary Green) is heroin abducted lowlife in Cape Town, who walks out on his wife Suz (Chanelle de Jager) shortly before he goes on a drug bender and gets abducted by aliens, who take control of his …
This review was originally published as part of my coverage of the 2020 Canadian Film Fest Full Disclosure: I have personally known Justin McConnell since 2012 and I was an Indiegogo contributor for this documentary Filmmaker Justin McConnell uses his own experiences as a jumping-off point for a discussion on how the independent film business works …
A grim mortician tells macabre stories to a prospective young protege in The Mortuary Collection. Montgomery Dark (Clancy Brown) is the resident mortician at the Raven’s End Mortuary, where every corpse tells a story. After a funeral service, Montgomery meets a young drifter named Sam (Caitlin Fisher), who is interested in the open position at …