deadCenter 2023: Reflections and Highlights

The deadCenter festival opened Thursday with a couple of Oklahoma-based features What Rhymes with Reason from director, Kyle William Roberts and Hell Hath No Fury from deadCenter favorites, the Burns brothers. This time the Burns’ have switched roles, with Zachary in the director’s chair, and Jacob Leighton writing and lensing the film. What Rhymes with Reason tells a story that thematically deals with issues of teenage mental health through the filters of 80s adventure films (think Goonies, directly referenced, and Indiana Jones) and John Hughes coming of age films. Giselle Torres provides the standout performance in a supporting role. In Hell Hath No Fury, the audience is treated to 70s New Hollywood-styled story of a couple simultaneously planning to murder one another, but with Tex Avery producing. This transforms what could easily be just another high concept thriller into an absolutely wacky comedy of errors. Both leads, Leah N.H. Philpott and Jacob Snovel, bring incredible comedic timing to their performances and rise to Wile E. Coyote levels of hilarity aided by a belly laugh inducing sound design. All this wackiness combined with lighting direction similar to Scorsese’s Taxi Driver, makes for a great opener to the festival.

Friday’s festivities included two blocks of shorts and the feature Know Your Place. Zia Mohajerjasbi’s first feature film is fundamentally about gentrification and its impact on an East African immigrant community in Seattle. However, the film manages to avoid becoming didactic and its tendency to highlight exterior shots of a beautiful Seattle in fall with lingering interior shots of homes ranging from the condemned to the upper middle classes provides meditative space within the film. This space grounds the film as we get to know Robel played by Joseph Smith and observe him meet his internal and external challenges with all that absolute conviction and insecurity only available to teenagers. This film is worth watching as is its filmmaker whose career is just beginning.

The two shorts blocks I caught on Friday were the Avant-Garde and the Sinful Sinema shorts. Both were very well sequenced giving the audience a great ride. First, in the Avant-Garde category, the highlight was the first selection, Trap, directed by Anastasia Verber, produced by Saint Petersburg School New Cinema. To avoid spoiling I will only say what begins as a very stylish drama, becomes a combination meditation on violence and a Trap House dance video. I thought a lot about Gaspar Noe’s Climax watching this one, and hope to see a feature from Verber in the future. At deadCenter, Sinful Sinema shorts, generally means R-rated material that typically discusses topic inappropriate for Aunt Polly’s parlor. That is not meant to disparage a fascinating program of films here but to let the reader know what to expect if they should visit the festival in future. My favorite here was Campground which is a story of late middle age coming out, first loves, mixed with real-life documentary of a gay men’s campground. I wept.

Another short I loved that screened at the festival was Theo and the 22 by long time friend of the show, Caleb Vesely. Caleb has managed to create a blisteringly funny and insightful mashup of the Cohen brothers and Kevin Smith’s Clerks. Of all the Oklahoma shorts I saw, this has some of the best sound design also.

Saturday at deadCenter was a day with an incredibly packed schedule requiring attendees to be very strategic, and at times kill their darlings, in their viewing selections. With this going on there was also VR installation experience called The Future of Film (a judgement I will lay aside for another day). Several 360 degree films made up the experience raging from the JFK assassination, the resurrection of Christ, to several food documentaries. The most intensive of the installations was Body of Mine by Cameron Kostopoulos which deals with issues surrounding gender, and body dysphoria. Not only does the viewer look in a mirror to see themselves in different genders and body types, but also one hears stories of transfolk they reflect on their bodies. What results is a beautifully designed, spiritual, but anti-dualistic within a human body full of light and floral glory. This experience is one not not to miss at deadCenter.

The Feature film highlights of deadCenter Saturday were Quantum Cowboys and Onyx the Fortuitous and the Talisman of Souls. Onyx is a love letter to 80s children’s horror (think Beetlejuice and Ghostbusters) for those children who are now adults. Directed by Andrew Bowser (who also directed Worm from deadCenter 2013, a film I have been championing for years), this film looks great. Everything from the production design, to costumes, to the score, to the absolutely jaw-dropping puppets is perfectly to tuned to the overall aesthetic of a Goosebumps for Grown-ups. It’s a great party movie for Gen Xer’s and older Millenials. Now, to the best film of the whole festival, Quantum Cowboys. Astrophysicist turned director, Geoff Marslett has made a philosophically deep, hilarious acid Western with great performances from Kiowa Gordon and Lily Gladstone (Killers of the Flower Moon). The film deploys various animation styles over these performances into a brilliant brew of heady sci-fi, meta-textuality, humor, and heart. This film intends to be part of a series and I am on board to see whatever comes next.

The final headliner for deadCenter Sunday was Bottoms, which is a very clever teenage coming of age comedy in the spirit of Ten Things I Hate About You. There will be detailed reviews coming out later of individual films, but this dispatch is here to give the reader a sense of the festival as a whole. This year’s deadCenter was a delightful time and we here on the GoodTrash team have to hand it to all the staff, volunteers, and especially, to the programmers for putting on a great festival. I would name drop here, but I would not want to leave anyone out, but you know you are and I would just want to say thanks for curating a great slate of films.