Editor’s note: My review originally ran during SXSW earlier this year, but we’re posting it again as the film hits theaters this weekend. Some filmmakers, no matter how hard they may try to appeal to the masses, can never escape the label of acquired taste. Others don’t even try though instead preferring to speak to a smaller and more receptive core audience. Kevin Smith is a good example of the former. Rob Zombie is a better example of the latter. Zombie makes movies for himself, and he’ll be the first to tell you that not only will the majority of viewers hate his films but that he simply doesn’t care. That’s more than evident in his four previous features as they presented worlds filled with ugly and foul violence while being devoid of humor and joy. His new film, The Lords of Salem, continues that trend of not giving a damn, but something is visibly and unexpectedly amiss. Rob Zombie has discovered how to have fun…even if some of it is unintentional.

Editor’s note: Rob’s review originally ran during SXSW last month, but we’re re-running it as Evil Dead officially hits theaters starting tonight. When a remake of Sam Raimi‘s seminal horror film was first announced it was met with a fair share of understandable skepticism. The hostility was tempered somewhat by the inclusion of Raimi, Robert Tapert and original star Bruce Campbell in the producers’ chairs, but still people wondered if that bloody magic could be recaptured. The answer is a tentative and extremely gory “yes.” Kind of. Somewhat. Unless you’re someone who prefers their horror films to be smart and scary in addition to being creatively bloody. Five friends head to a cabin in the woods (surprise!) looking for both a fun vacation and a place to help one of their own kick a bad drug habit. But withdrawal is the least of their problems when a bloody basement and a skin-bound book are discovered beneath their feet. Soon an evil entity is causing violent and messy mayhem in the form of extreme acts of self-mutilation and murder. And tree rape. Can’t forget the tree rape.

SXSW 2013 ended ten days ago, but the memories live on thanks to the great friends we met, delicious food we ate and fantastic movies we had the pleasure of seeing. (Our intrepid interviewer, Jack, also has a strange rash to remind him of the dangers of 6th Street after dark.) You can catch up on our coverage of the films and the talents, but as a final goodbye to this year’s fest we want to highlight some of the movies we enjoyed the most. Rather than simply list the best of the fest though we’ve chosen to look at our favorites as lessons learned, things we discovered and/or talking points that other filmmakers could probably learn from as well. It’s worth noting that my personal favorite of the fest was Shane Carruth’s Upstream Color, but since it was already my #1 film at this year’s Sundance I decided to highlight two other excellent movies instead. Keep reading to see what Jack Giroux, Kevin Kelly, Neil Miller, Luke Mullen and I learned about the movies of SXSW 2013.

Good Ol’ Freda, an engrossing character study of Freda Kelly – the Beatles’ secretary, head of the fan club, and living time capsule of Beatlemania – is only Ryan White’s second feature documentary, but he’s already making a name for himself in the world of non-fiction. His first film, Pelada, premiered at SXSW in 2010, and he’s already hard at work on his third film, one that focuses on the lawsuit challenging California’s controversial Proposition 8 making its way to the Supreme Court. During SXSW, I sat down to talk with White and producer Kathy McCabe about the difficulties and surprises of documentary filmmaking, especially when it comes to the Beatles.

Hey, did you guys know the economy sucks? It’s pretty evident from the price of gas to the unemployment rate to the housing market that we’re still not out of the woods yet. So it’s the perfect climate for a movie critiquing how money rules all and offers peace and stability to those who desperately crave it. Cheap Thrills is both thriller and dark comedy at the same time. The lead character is Craig (Pat Healy), a regular guy doing his best to provide for his wife and small child, but his best isn’t good enough, and with an eviction looming he loses his job at a mechanic shop. Hurting from being kicked while he’s down, he heads to the nearest bar to drown his sorrows. He runs into Vince (Ethan Embry), an old friend he hasn’t seen in awhile, and the two are drawn into a conversation with Colin (David Koechner) and his wife Violet (Sara Paxton) who are celebrating and throwing money around the shithole dive bar. But it’s when Craig and Vince head back to the couple’s house that the stakes go way up and the money really starts flowing… as long as Craig and Vince are willing to play along. Colin and Violet are rich and bored. So they’ve decided to find two people and pit them against each other to see how far they’ll go for money. Will you punch that guy in the face for $50? How about for $100? Or a $1,000? These

Coming-of-age films are often centered around something big like death or sex, but most people grow up with hurdles built on somewhat lesser obstacles. Tony Phillips (Tony Vespe) is one such person. His high school years are winding down, his friends are moving on and his mother is reminding him that college life is right around the corner, but the challenge facing him right this minute is his absolute love for all things Halloween. Writer/director/wunderkind Emily Hagins is a twenty-year-old filmmaker who made her first feature at the age of 12 and scored a nationwide distribution deal with her last film, My Sucky Teen Romance. Her new movie, Grow Up, Tony Phillips, once again presents a casual, charming and youth-centric world, but she makes some important steps forward in her professional growth too. Unfortunately though it’s a bit of a “one step forward, one step back” situation.

Have you seen that Key and Peele sketch where the one guy is helping the other guy move and hasn’t heard of dubstep? You should, it’s hilarious. It also represents pretty much the entirety of my knowledge of dubstep. So a film with a synopsis that includes the words “underground dubstep” isn’t exactly up my alley. And yet, Snap was one of the most interesting films to play SXSW this year. Part of the film’s success lay in its structure as a good old fashioned character study. The character in question is Jim Whitman (Jake Hoffman), a quiet, socially inept guy whose only outlet is creating his own dubstep mixes in his apartment. His one friend, Jake (Thomas Dekker), is constantly pushing him to get out and do more, to interact with people, to date someone. Sometimes Jake comes off as empathetic but more often than not he badgers, insults and annoys Jim until his anger gets the best of him. When Jim finally starts dating a girl (played by the beautiful Nikki Reed) from the battered women shelter where he repairs computers, things start to look up. But when the relationship starts to fizzle, Jim takes a dark turn towards a destructive conclusion.

SXSW is an interesting place to see Touba, which won a jury prize for cinematography at the film festival this week. I almost feel bad for thinking of the event in religious terms recently while spotlighting the Alamo Drafthouse as a place of worship many of us make a “pilgrimage” to at least once a year. Touba is in fact about the annual journey known as the Grand Magaal, which brings millions to the titular sacred city in Senegal for three days of thanksgiving. These legitimate pilgrims are Mourides, followers of an order of Sufism begun in the late 19th century by Amadou Bamba, a leader of Gandhi-like significance for his peaceful resistance against French colonial rule. Bamba also founded Touba as a holy site following a vision experienced there, and it’s grown to become a prominent urban center in Africa and the second largest city in the nation. It’s especially packed during the Grand Magaal, of course, with devout outsiders paying respects at Bamba’s resting place, meeting with the current leader (caliph) to receive blessing and, of course, attending prayer at the Grand Mosque.

Imagine waking up in the middle of the night to strangers who pull you from your bed, handcuff you and put a cloth sack over your head. The last thing you hear as they toss you screaming into the back of a van is your mother saying “I love you.” This is how we meet Brad Lunders (P.J. Boudousqué). He’s a teenager mired in a life of drug dealing and other criminal acts, and after a recent incident that resulted in a death his mother has chosen an extreme option intended to keep Brad out of jail. He’s been shipped off to a “residential treatment program for troubled youths,” but while that sounds like a professional and responsibly run place, it just may be anything but. Coldwater is a beautifully acted and shot drama about troubled kids forced to grow up quickly by even more troubled adults. It’s an engaging eye-opener that moves from dramatic character piece to minor thriller, but while successful overall it’s deflated by the script’s structural problems and minimal emotion.

Do you remember how old you were when you saw and were amazed by a great magician (live or on TV) for the very first time? Of course you don’t. As with Creme de Menthe and handjobs, the awe surrounding your first exposure to the world of magic quickly fades when you realize that the reality behind the promised wonder is far less exciting than you thought. That and there are far better alternatives, too. But movies about magic are a different beast all together. Not only can they use additional trickery like editing and special effects to impress viewers, they can also add a narrative that explores the power of illusion in our lives. Think The Prestige, where ambition leads to an illusory success. Think Penn & Teller Get Killed, where illusions are used to comment on societal gullibility. Or, as in the case of The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, magic can be used as an inconsequential backdrop for mediocre comedy.

“Based on a true story.” Those five words, or others that convey the same meaning, can have a strange effect on our expectations for a film. Suspension of disbelief isn’t necessary since the story, minus vague parts of it that may been changed for dramatic effect, actually happened. That idea seems to stick in the back of our minds as an audience, informing our constant judgements on the film’s qualities. But what if a film doesn’t start with those oft-maligned words? Well, then that film should have to operate in some realm of believability wherein it establishes rules by which it then plays. Unfortunately, Hours feels like a ‘based on a true story’ film that gets bogged down by reality and Paul Walker‘s acting.

On paper, Scenic Route sounds like a student film: two buddies on a road trip get stranded in the middle of nowhere, and have to come to terms with their differences, while facing the possibility of death. It’s not tied to a specific location, there are only two characters, for the most part, and it’s basically a lot of talking. In the hands of any other actors, it might have slipped easily into that student film territory. But who would have ever known that Josh Duhamel and Dan Fogler would have such great chemistry together?

Director E.L. Katz‘s Cheap Thrills was the first movie to get picked up for distribution at this year’s South by Southwest, and it’s also the third movie in a row actor Pat Healy has had at the festival, following Compliance and The Innkeepers. All three movies have featured Healy in a starring role, but, according to Healy, that doesn’t mean he still isn’t crashing on people’s couches to make it to a film festival.

Genre filmmaker Vincenzo Natali takes a whipping for his taste. Up to now the director of Splice has only made original properties, no adaptations, sequels, or reboots. Natali may be adapting Neuormancer and High Rise at the moment, but even there he isn’t taking the easiest path. Both are niche properties, something Natali is well-aware of when it comes to the two books (and to his own films). At this year’s South by Southwest he premiered what he considers his most accessible movie yet, Haunter. Natali describes the subversive ghost story as a mix of Igmar Bergman and John Hughes, making for an odd but promising sounding combo. We spoke to Natali about the film before the festival, and here’s what he had to say about Haunter, the difficulty of making movies nowadays, and more:

It’s rare to exit a film utterly flabbergasted by the incompetence it displays on almost every level, and that’s especially the case when the filmmaker has proven themselves more than capable in the past. Dennis Iliadis directed the Last House on the Left remake a few years back, and goofy microwave denouement aside, it’s a surprisingly effective film. Regardless where you fall on the overall quality side of it though there’s little argument against it being a well shot and strongly told movie. Which is why it’s a palpably disappointing surprise to see his latest film, Plus One, exhibit a lack of skill almost across the board.

Is there any pop culture subject that’s been more exhaustively covered through documentaries than The Beatles? Both John Lennon and George Harrison have received excellent posthumous documentary treatments, and the band as a whole enjoyed one of the most comprehensive official docu-treatments in rock history with the 8-part Beatles Anthology. It seems like we’ve got the most popular band in modern history just about covered, right? Not so fast. Of the many (repeated) stories told about The Beatles time and again, there have also been stories about those who surrounded the band, who took essential roles alongside the margins in making The Fab Four exactly how we perceive them to be today. George Martin is now one of the best-known producers in the history of rock n’ roll. Manager Brian Epstein is viewed as a martyr of a former England that criminalized homosexuality. The Hamburg-based romance between pre-fame Beatle Stuart Sutcliffe and photographer Astrid Kircherr has been immortalized in rock history (specifically through Kircherr’s iconic black-and-white photographs of the band in their earliest years). And now another previously sidelined story has been brought to the fore. Ryan White’s second documentary feature, Good Ol’ Freda, chronicles the life and work of an important but rarely discussed member of the close-knit world of The Beatles: Freda Kelly, Epstein’s secretary and the head of The Beatles Fan Club.

Upstream Color isn’t for everyone, a fact that writer/director/star/composer/producer/co-financer/editor/whatever-other-production-job-is-out-there Shane Carruth is quite aware of and wants people to know. To go about doing so, Carruth is handling the marketing himself, making it more a part of the story, rather than a selling tool. The Primer director went to great lengths to make Upstream Color, as shown by the extensive amount of credits he has on the movie. That behind-the-scenes ambition shows onscreen, something Rob Hunter and most critics agree with. The movie has a normal three act structure, but what Carruth does with that old formula is to tell the usual connective tissue and key moments through music, cinematography, and silence, instead of blaring exposition. Carruth spoke to us about his lyrical style, Upstream Color‘s narrative, and why there’s no Chaos Theory speech from Jeff Goldblum in the movie:

Spring Breakers…is not the film people are expecting. Even cinephiles familiar with Harmony Korine‘s polarizing nature will be taken aback by the man’s newest creation. For one thing, it’s Korine’s most entertaining film to date, and “fun” isn’t exactly his forte. His usual strength is his willingness to write reprehensible people, and here, he shows them off with blinding neon lights, particularly James Franco sporting corn rows and a higher energy than he’s ever attempted before. Korine has made a movie about one of the scariest, funniest, and most subversive vacations in recent memory. The vacation involves four college girls: Faith (Selena Gomez), Brit (Ashley Benson), Candy (Vanessa Hudgens), and Cotty (Rachel Korine). This year they don’t want to stay in their small town for spring break again. They’re desperate to leave. So desperate that  Brit, Candy, and Cotty get the idea to rob a restaurant to fund their trip. They succeed, leading the four girls to a hellish place called “Florida.” Faith — the religious girl of the group — describes the place as spiritual to her grandmother both before and after Korine shows bros and bro-ish girls partying at their most obnoxious. Spiritual and peaceful this place, and film, are not.

It’s become pretty fashionable these days for people to retroactively bash movies that enjoyed honest and deserved praise upon release. Wes Craven’s Scream has received such a backlash in recent years, as both a lesser movie and a less influential one, and it’s fairly inexplicable. Sure it has some issues, but the movie remains a fun, scary and smart take on the slasher genre that has rarely (if ever) been duplicated. But it also came out seventeen years ago. You’re Next aims to enjoy the same prestige by giving the genre a real kick in the ass with thrills, chills and a fresh take on it all, but while it misses the mark in some important areas it comes far closer than most. And bottom line? It’s a fun and bloody good time at the movies.

It took far too much time for Shane Carruth to make his followup to Primer. The near-decade wait for his second feature didn’t come from laziness, since Carruth spent time working on an expensive project that next took off, and which I foolishly didn’t ask about. Fortunately, Carruth wanted to talk about where he’ll go after Upstream Color, a movie that lives up to the hype. While speaking with Shane Carruth at Southwest by Southwest, he gave us an insight into his mindset for his third movie.