I Saw the TV Glow (2024 | USA | 100 minutes | Jane Schoenbrun)

Jane Schoenbrun’s mesmerizing follow-up to We’re All Going to the World’s Fair feels like an overstuffed Pandora’s box of familiar elements, burst open and mutated into something unnerving, resonant and stunningly original by a unique new cinematic voice.

On the face of it, it’s the story of Owen, a directionless kid (played in childhood and adolescence by Ian Foreman and Justice Smith respectively), immersing himself in an old TV series called The Pink Opaque, and finding his burgeoning addiction to the show shared with and enabled by the older, more intense Maddy (Brigette Lundy-Paine).

Schoenbrun’s definitely mirroring their own very personal quest for identity as a non-binary trans person through Owen’s attempts at self-examination. But the end product represents a multi-layered Rorschach Test that hits home as a psychological horror movie, and as an exploration of consumerism, platonic friendship, impending adulthood, art as an extension of self, and the nightmare of conformity smothering individuality. Best of all, it’s delivered with the most stunning and darkly magical audio-visual palette this side of Mandy. Catch it in a theater if humanly possible: It’s resolutely your loss if you don’t.

No additional screenings at the Festival: Now playing in theaters, and opening at SIFF Cinema Uptown May 24.

Dragon Superman (1968 | Taiwan | 90 minutes | Satoru Kobayashi, Shah Lo-hui)

SIFF’s archival festival presentations never disappoint, and a good share of the time, they’re nothing short of revelatory. So it goes with Dragon Superman, in which an investigative reporter in Taiwan follows the trail of The Cosmos Gang, a masked band of criminals prone to robbery and murder. Said reporter also, as it happens, moonlights as ass-kicking masked hero, Dragon Superman. Two-fisted action, plot twists, and cliffhangers galore ensue.

It’s all delivered by co-directors Kobayashi and Lo-hui at a machine-gun rapid fire clip, with equal parts rattletrap silliness and incredible skill. There’s film noir-inspired stylishness to burn in some of the lighting and compositions here, some exhilarating stunts and action, and a sense of ’60s pop art coolness that belies the movie’s crisp black and white photography. Hot take: this crazy refurbishment of western pulp literature and genre film packs more undiluted fun into its 90-minute run time than all of the Marvel movies released in the last five years, combined. Here’s hoping its rescue from obscurity leads to a serious cult following.

No additional screenings at SIFF.

Oddity (2024 | Ireland | 98 minutes | Damian McCarthy)

Irish writer/director Damian McCarthy’s spent the better part of a decade honing his skills on a series of clever and creepy short films: Fans of the locally grown, internationally renowned Bonebat Comedy of Horrors Film Festival have been enjoying his output for years. That training ground’s proven to be an especially fertile one.

Oddity represents just one of an entire crop of great recent horror films boasting twists and impact that defy discussing in detail without diluting their impact considerably. Suffice it to say that it begins with the quiet melancholy of a grief-rooted ghost story before it morphs into something very, very different. A couple of times.

It also just might be the scariest movie I’ve caught in a theater in many a moon, delivering a succession of jump scares that had a packed festival screening at the SIFF Uptown screaming and leaping out of their seats with stunning frequency. I’m sure there were greater films that played SIFF 2024, but I can’t envision any of them delivering their desired intent with such complete efficacy.

No additional screenings at SIFF.