Day: March 23, 2023

Mister Organ is part of Make Believe Seattle, and it is playing on Sunday, March 26, 2023. 

Did you see Tickled?

I said, did you see Tickled? You know, the documentary, from several years ago? It was pretty good, and dived into a deep world that none of us really knew about until it was exposed in the documentary. It really asked some questions that I didn’t know I wanted answered.

So of course I am excited to see Mister Organ, a new documentary by the same director. And shit, what a title. What is this about? A guy who sells body parts? Is it about health care? Is it about someone who kills and murders?

I don’t know, but I am ready to unravel some very dark and decrepit things going on in New Zealand.

From a quick glance, everyone seems to have a normal number of organs here. 

So it turns out that Mister Organ is just about a person, named Mr. Organ. Nothing illicit with body parts. The director first came across him as he worked a “clamping business”. If a private business had a special area for parking, and people parked there for not the appropriate reason, he would drive up in his car and block them in, preventing them from leaving. And he would do that until they paid a large sum, and it was technically legal, because appropriate signs were posted at that business. It obviously left a lot of people upset, having to be slightly threatened and stuck into paying hundreds of dollars.

A viral video went on about this, which led the director to investigating this issue, and trying to report on it as a journalist. But he sued back, and the case went to court. The court was not in our directors favor, and Organ was apparently a very talkative, and enigmatic fellow. Despite the lawsuit, he wanted to still talk to our director, and it just…kept, going on from there.

This is a documentary where the director is actively investigating the subject, and the subject is aware of it, and aware of their conversations being recorded and filmed, and just things get weirder and weirder for our director.

Lies upon lies, a strange backstory, and a man who doesn’t shut up.

It is honestly, very hard to talk about this documentary, as it had a sort of meta feel to it the entire time. Was this whole thing a strange ruse? Did this situation lead to some exciting conclusions, or was it a total time sink the whole time? Why is he like that? These are various questions I have about it, and honestly, I won’t say all of them get answered.

If anything, Mister Organ is certainly an experience, and a wild trip if it is a trip you want to take.

Pursued is part of Make Believe Seattle, and it is having its world premier on Saturday, March 25, 2023. 

Pursued is one of the many films getting its world premier at Make Believe Festival in Seattle this week. What personally drew me in was not the few actor names I actually recognized, but the teenage sleuth feel of it all. I am sure it would have normal horror and thriller vibes throughout it. But high school students finding clues, and finding a killer? At the threat of their own lives? That could be fun.

I mean, I used to be a teacher. The high school students I know, for the most part, were very apathetic, even when it came to passing their classes, so it is always nice to see there are some students out there, even if they are fictional characters, who have passions and desires in SOMETHING.

Besides. Horror film that take place with high school students usually means we get to have deaths in the school, and hey, public schooling at this point already feels like death.

Is this old guy a clue? Is it her dad? Is it a killer? 

Lark (Madison Lawlor) is a high school girl, just trying to live her life, go to parties, and kick ass. Like everyone else. But one night she sneaks out, and when her dad was driving on the way to get her, he got into a car accident. Shit. Now her dad is dead, and it is sort of her fault. She has to carry that guilt.

Some time later, still in high school, we have her actively dating and doing things now, trying to live her best life. Her mom (Molly Ringwald), is finally in the dating game, and dating Mark Franc (Angus Macfadyen). Hey, that is a pretty generic sounding name. In general, Lark doesn’t like the sound of him, so she does her own googling.

And somehow, strangely enough, this leads her on a dark path. Where she finds out the identity of another Mark Franc, who just so happens to be a serial killer. But first she needs proof! She needs help! That way justice can be had. But soon Lark gets far too over her head, and her friends start dying, and she starts to get threats, and well. Hope she doesn’t ruin her mom’s new found happiness by also getting murdered, ya know?

Also starring Joel Courtney, Paul Sorvino, Sam Trammell, Miesha Tate, and Taylor Blackwell.

Same question. Is he the killer? He could easily just be a teacher getting home after working with assholes.

Lark in this movie is no Nancy Drew, but to be fair, the movie didn’t advertise that element at all either. It is just something I wanted. Did the lead solve some clues, and do some nice breaking and entering to solve a murder? Oh, you betcha.

But she also was still a teenager, who made bad decisions, and dug herself into a hole she did not know how to get out of.

Unfortunately for this hole, it felt more laughable than scary. There is always a suspicion of disbelief in these films, you know, murderers who are strong and apparently the best at covering up their tracks. But there was too much in this film for me to get over that fact, unfortunately. It wasn’t giving a film with supernatural elements, so having the murderer go “Halloween Kills” on a group of people who were bigger, stronger, and had him already trapped felt more annoying than anything, at what felt like a good an appropriate ending. [Editor’s Note: That scene in Halloween Kills I hated so much, and this movie is not really that close]. But the film instead needed to continue, and go further. It already felt like it was dragging at that point, but to make it go even more further felt like an awkward decision.

If it broke some cliches in the process, it would have helped. But instead we got still a pretty standard ending, after a less than exciting film. Even though it ended on a weak note, its mediocrity of a story wasn’t going to save it either. I would not pursue Pursued into theaters at any time soon.