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ESCAPISM FILM FESTIVAL LANDS U.S.
THEATRICAL PREMIERE OF
THE PUNISHER (1989) WITH DIRECTOR MARK GOLDBLATT IN ATTENDANCE
FESTIVAL PRESENTS SEVEN NORTH CAROLINA PREMIERES
Durham, N.C. – The ESCAPISM FILM FESTIVAL, produced by the
Carolina Theatre of
Durham Inc, celebrates its 5th anniversary with a new look, a new focus
on genre films and seven North
Carolina premieres. The festival takes place Friday, October 17 through
Sunday, October 19, 2008. Ten-
Pass tickets go on sale at 11:00 a.m. on Friday, September 26, 2008,
and individual tickets go on sale at
11:00 a.m. on Tuesday, October 7, 2008. Tickets can be purchased at the
theatre box office or online at
www.carolinatheatre.org. The Carolina Theatre box office is located at
309 West Morgan Street in
Downtown Durham. Call 919-560-3030 to purchase tickets. Box office
hours are weekdays from 11: 00
a.m. to 6 p.m. and from 6:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. On weekends the box
office is open from 1:00 p.m. to 9:00
p.m. The box office is also open one hour prior to show time.
ESCAPISM began in 2003 as an action, adventure and animation festival
and has transformed
this year into a blistering celebration of wildly irreverent genre
films from around the planet in the
infamous tradition of the “Midnight Madness”
program at the Toronto International Film Festival and the
“Danger After Dark” program at the Philadelphia
International Film Festival. Action-adventure, science
fiction, fantasy, exploitation, animation, comedy, and cutting-edge
thrillers are equally intermingled with
anniversary screenings and eclectic filmmaker retrospectives. From a
spirited reassessment of Walt Disney
Classics to adrenaline-fueled explorations of independent and Hollywood
extravaganzas, ESCAPISM is an
ode to sheer artistic audacity. The festival delivers a central
assertion about movies: namely that art can be
interpreted in infinite ways and that genre filmmaking, so long
unfairly sandbagged by American movie
power brokers and critics, can be just as idiosyncratic, relevant and
rich as so-called “personal”
filmmaking.
In addition to presenting the U.S. theatrical premiere of the 1989 film
The Punisher, the
festival will also be presenting seven North Carolina premieres,
including Eden Log, Jack Brooks, Monster
Slayer, Let the Right One In, Midnight Movie, Not Quite Hollywood,
Takeshi Miike’s Sukiyaki Western
Django and Surveillance from director Jennifer Lynch. The festival
kicks off on Friday, October 17 with
the twentieth anniversary screening of John Carpenter’s They
Live, followed by prolific Japanese director
Takeshi Miike’s modern take on the spaghetti western with
Sukiyaki Western Django. The highlight of the
festival takes place on Saturday night when director Mark Goldblatt
will be in attendance to present the
U.S. theatrical premiere of The Punisher. Completed in 1989, the film
did not receive a theatrical release in
the United States because the film’s U.S. distributor (New
World Pictures) went bankrupt, and the film
went straight to DVD, although it did play in theatres throughout the
world. The 35mm print is the
director’s cut as well as his own personal print and includes
all of the shots that he was forced to trim for an
MPAA “R” rating version in the U.S. due to
so-called “excessive violence.” Goldblatt will also
be in
attendance for a twentieth anniversary screening of Dead Heat, a
combined explosive action thriller and
gory zombie comedy that features one of the last film appearances of
Vincent Price.
This year Escapism fans have the distinction of being one of the first
festival audiences to screen
two of this year’s biggest hits from the Toronto
International Film Festival, Eden Log, a sci-fi movie from
France, and Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Oz
Exploitation, a documentary that about
Australian films and filmmakers in the 70s and 80s, months before other
audiences in America. Other
highlights include Surveillance, a film directed by Jennifer Lynch, and
Dogs of Chinatown, directed by
local filmmaker Micah Moore who will be in attendance for the screening.
The Escapism Film Festival began in 2003 showcasing action, adventure
and animation genre
films with screenings of features and shorts by ground-breaking
animators and action-adventure oriented
filmmakers. Past festivals have featured Satoshi Kan’s
groundbreaking Millennium Actress, the director’s
cut of the cult film Donnie Darko and a screening of Ghost in the Shell
II, the first anime film to compete
for the Palme d’Or. The 2005 festival featured the U.S.
theatrical premiere of Soul Searcher, a sweeping
fantasy-action epic. Other highlights include the screening of noted
Korean director Park Chan-wook’s
Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance and a presentation of the 1953 classic The
War of the Worlds. The festival
was on hiatus in 2006 and returned with a new direction in 2007 by
inviting actors and directors to attend,
including William Lustig, who presented the uncut version of Maniac and
the 20th Anniversary reunion
screening of The Monster Squad with actors Andre Gower and Ashley Bank
in attendance.
Screeners, images and press credentials are available. Please contact
Elisabeth Branigan at
(919) 560-3040, ext. 263 or elisabeth@carolinatheatre.org. Press
credential requests must be submitted by
Thursday, October 16 at 5 p.m.
Complete
information about the 2008 Escapism Film Festival is available at
http://festivals.carolinatheatre.org/escapism.
Ten-Pass tickets go on sale Friday, September 26 at 11:00 a.m. at the
Carolina Theatre Box
Office for the 2008 Escapism Film Festival which takes place Friday,
October 17 through Sunday, October
19, 2008. Ten-pass tickets are $55 prior to the festival and $60 during
the festival. Single tickets go on sale
on Tuesday, October 7 at 11:00 a.m. and are $8. The box office is
located at 309 West Morgan Street in
Downtown Durham. Tickets are available by calling the box office at
919-560-3040. Box office hours are
weekdays from 11: 00 a.m. to 6 p.m. and from 6:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. On
weekends the box office is open
from 1:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. The box office is also open one hour prior
to show time. Tickets are available
online at www.carolinatheatre.org. The Carolina Theatre of Durham, Inc.
is a 501(c) (3) non-profit
organization.
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The Carolina Theatre of Durham is a non-profit arts center dedicated to
bringing quality film and live
performances to the Triangle Community. Live performances at the
Carolina Theatre are supported in part
by the North Carolina Arts Council, an agency funded by the state of
North Carolina, the National
Endowment for the Arts, and the A.J. Fletcher Performing Arts Fund of
the Triangle Community
Foundation. |
