Fantastic Fest is already halfway done here in Austin, and Monday night the best of the fest were honored at the Fantastic Fest Awards. It’s the only awards ceremony in existence (certainly the only one we’ve heard of) where the winners have to chug a beer before they can accept their award...except for horror category judge Barbara Crampton, who chugged wine, and comedy judge Doug Benson, who smoked a bong.
Two of this year’s big winners were also two of the most provocative and nudity-filled features of the entire festival: Sweeping the horror categories this year with awards for Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Screenplay, Best Director, AND Best Picture was Here Comes the Devil (2012), director Adrin Garca Bogliano’s movie about a mother (played by Mexican pop star Laura Caro) who discovers that something is very, very wrong with her children after they are lost overnight while on vacation. Oh, and it also has the most gloriously gratuitous lesbian scissoring scene we’ve seen in a while.
The Fantastic Features category was dominated by the Lithuanian sci-fi movie Vanishing Waves (2012), including Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Picture and Best Actress for Jurga Jutaite, who won for her performance as the coma patient whose memories (among, ahem, other things) are probed by research scientist Marius Jampolskis. If you like your somber sci-fi melodramas punctuated with lots and lots of artfully shot sex, then Vanishing Waves should be on your radar.
Other winning films of special interest to skin fans are Crave (2012), about a crime scene photographer whose twisted fantasy life starts bleeding into the real world. Co-star Emma Lung resembles a cross between Katie Holmes and Aubrey Plaza, and goes nude in three separate scenes in the film.
Also honored at Fantastic Fest this year is American Mary (2012), whose star Katharine Isabelle (Ginger Snaps, Freddy Vs. Jason), who received a special jury award for her coolly sinister performance as medical student turned underground body modification surgeon Mary. And yes, she chugged her beer like a champ.
Join us again tomorrow for more from Fantastic Fest right here on the Mr. Skin blog!
