Me And Orson Welles
Dir: Richard Linklater
Starring Zac Efron, Christian McKay, Claire Danes

If you don’t know who Orson Welles is, there is no point in seeing this film. The movie is an unapologetic love letter to the beyond brilliant 20th century Renaissance man, and will do little for anyone unfamiliar with his eccentric personality. The film stars tween favorite Zac Efron as a young man who inadvertently finds himself acting in Orson Welles’ infamous production of Julius Caesar. Efron is ostensibly the protagonist, but he really serves no purpose beyond being surrogate eyes for the audience while walking through the world of Orson Welles. Actor Christian McKay portrays the great actor/director and he not only bears a striking resemblance to Welles, but gives inarguably the finest performance of any actor to ever play the role. At times it’s hard to believe you aren’t actually watching Welles and the movie is completely absorbing whenever he is onscreen. Unfortunately, Efron takes center stage most of the time and he is far too bland and limited as an actor to be anywhere near as compelling as McKay (Efron’s relationship with an underused Claire Danes is particularly uninteresting). Expect to see plenty of awards thrown at McKay over the next few months and deservingly so. Richard Linklater directs with his detached visual style, subtle character humor, and brilliant work with actors. Linklater is undeniably one of the least predictable filmmakers working today, and while Me And Orson Welles is hardly his greatest movie, it is still a worthy entry to his eccentric directorial cannon.—PB

Deadgirl
Directed by Marcel Sarmiento and Gadi Harel
Starring Shiloh Fernandez, Noah Segan, Michael Bowen

On a scale from 1 to “fucked up,” this dirty little horror flick gets an 11. First time directors Marcel Sarmiento and Gadi Harel pulled off a small miracle in securing financing for this one. The movie is about two teenage boys who discover a dead naked female body when exploring an abandoned mental hospital. Initially disturbed, they are soon discover that the girl is still alive and decide to have a little fun with the body while they can. It’s a sick premise and makes for easily one of the most disturbing films of the past few years. If told as a straight horror movie, this would be a borderline unwatchable direct-to-DVD nasty, but the filmmakers fill the story with a surprisingly large amount of dark humor and use the concept as a vehicle of exploring adolescent sexuality. This is not a movie for most people. It will appeal only to those who enjoy nasty horror flicks and those people will love it. It’s hard to imagine Deadgirl securing any sort of broad North American distribution, but expect to this become a cult favorite amongst the Fangoria crowd. Even if you hate this movie, there’s absolutely no way that you will ever forget it.—PB