The Imagine Festival is back in NYC, running from October 15 through the 24th. Last year, the festival brought us the wonderful Sleep Dealer along with director Alex Rivera, and introduced me to two of my favorite shorts, Transgressions and Lone. But here's what I'm excited about this year...

Wormhole Chaser
A wormhole opens in your apartment, who you gonna call?

"Wormhole Chasers" trailer from Imagine Science Films on Vimeo.

In Search of Memory
Imagine Festival also has a lot of strictly science documentaries. I'm delighted to see more of this memory-dabbling, partly because I'm just in love with this little bow tied scientist.

In Search Of Memory (Trailer) from Imagine Science Films on Vimeo.

Sizzle
This is a mockumentary about a documentary team shooting a film about Global Warming. While some of the jokes fall a bit flat, I like the idea of skewering something that we just can't stop making films about... especially if there's some sort of Polar-Bear-on-Man action.

"Sizzle: A Global Warming Comedy" Trailer from Imagine Science Films on Vimeo.

Extropy
A geneticist discovers the key to stopping the aging process, and now we can live forever, or die by his hands.

Extropy - Trailer from Imagine Science Films on Vimeo.

Quantum Quest
A lot of the films at the festival look good. However, Chris Pine, Samuel L. Jackson, and James Earl Jones' CG Quantum Quest does not. In a distant galaxy, an alien named DAVE had to SPACE SURF across the universe to give a gem ball message and protect the Skynet computer from Terminator 4. The video I found looks totally unfinished, so don't judge it on that. Judge it on the fact that the main character from an alien world is named DAVE. I may actually go see this just out of sheer self-hating curiosity.

We'll keep you updated as the festival gets closer, because there are still many more movies and shorts that we're excited by such as The MisInventions of Milo Weather and Naming Pluto.

Growth
In Non-Festival News, the trailer for Growth is out, looking all sorts of B-movie lovely. Basically, the world is being attacked by slimy under-the-skin parasites so mayhem and skin-cutting ensue. And, why yes! That is the guy from Charmed! And, no! That is not the Diabetes fella.

Poster:

Synopsis:

In 1989, a breakthrough in advanced parasitic research on Cuttyhunk Island, gave scientists a jump in human evolution. Initial tests proved promising as subjects were experiencing heightened physical and mental strength and awareness. But, something in the experiment went horribly wrong and the island mysteriously lost three quarters of its population...

Jamie Akerman fled the outbreak, which took her mothers life, twenty years ago. She now returns with her boyfriend and step brother, to sell the family property. There, they uncover the key to Jamie's disturbing past, and have to fight a new strain of parasite that has emerged, to threaten the island once again.

The theme of this year's Burning Man was "Evolution," inspiring a great deal of art, vehicular and otherwise, centered around the animal kingdom. On the more retrofuturistic side of things, this year's Burning Man also featured the "Raygun Gothic Rocket" as an installation, which, contrary to festival rumors, didn't actually take off.

[Burning Man]

Photo by dko1960
Photo by Jon Sarriugarte
Photo by Jon Sarriugarte
Photo by juuuulllliiiieeeeeee
Photo by gir sushi
Photo by TWITA2005
Photo by Anamorphosis

Here is an exclusive first look at the slightly-less-bloody-than-we-expected-but-still-pretty-hot poster from Vampire Girl Versus Frankenstein Girl. You may remember the buckets o' blood trailer for this little flick we ran last week, and the film will be screening at this year's delightful New York Asian Film Festival, which just released their full schedule. There's plenty to see, so make sure to check it out. We're particularly excited about The Clone Returns Home and The Forbidden Door (which will have it's American premiere at NYAFF on June 27th. Also on that same night is the infamous Tokyo Gore Event, which wild zombie horses couldn't keep me away from). Tickets are on sale now.

Salvage
Thanks to Quiet Earth for pointing out this viral beauty. Sex, blood and infectious zombie-like diseases are rampant in this little trailer for the foreign film Salvage. Here's the official synopsis:

When a shipping container washes ashore, its deadly cargo escapes to wreak havoc on a suburban neighborhood. Is this a terrorist attack or something more sinister? As the military enforce a quarantine, a mother must overcome all the odds to save her estranged daughter.

Trailer (slightly NSFW)
Salvage-Trailer

Zombie Christ
Zombies have overrun the world, and now the Son of God has to save humanity, again. It looks kitchy to say the least.

The Zombie Christ Trailer 1 from Adam Henderson on Vimeo.

Zombie Christ TV Special

The Zombie Christ TV Spot from Adam Henderson on Vimeo.

I dunno... I feel like it's time for an infusion of new zombie movies. I'll support this indie film and the scrappy gang that put it together, but I feel like I'm ready for something even more silly and random to be zombie-ized. I seems like it's all been done before and again. In fact, I was going to make a joke about "what about a zombie Dagwood?" and lo and freakin' behold even that has been done. So I put it to you, dear readers: What would you like to see zombie-ized that's never been done before?

You’re #1: Ian Ingram, Artist-In-Residence at the Carnegie Mellon Robotics Institute’s CREATE Lab, has mounted a 15-foot tall foam finger in Steelers colors atop the Andy Warhol Museum. The finger points to individuals who “high five” any of a number of smaller foam fingers placed throughout the city. The finger encourages viewers to try to figure out where the finger is pointing and explore new and familiar parts of the city.

Reach, Robot: Composer and choreographer Grisha Coleman created an interactive musical installation. As pedestrians walk through Pittsburgh’s PPG Plaza, a web of cables suspended above their heads reacts to their motions. Walking, pausing, stepping, and reaching all trigger various sounds in the installation, immersing passersby in the musical and spoken works of the city’s African-American writers and artists.

Shelter: Garth Zeglin is a researcher at the Carnegie Mellon Robotics Institute whose work includes developing bipedal walking robots. But “Shelter” is a kinetic fabric robot. Viewers are invited to sit on a chair in the middle of two concentric fabric tents, which function independently of each other and respond to human presence as well as changes in light.

Extreme Animals: The Video Game: Inspired by his former job as the mascot at a Chuck E. Cheese, Matt Barton’s projects frequently include animatronic taxidermied animals. The animals of this work, created with Paper Rad member Jacob Ciocci, play frenzied video games, murmuring at and reacting to the game’s action. They glance back at approaching visitors, but promptly ignore them, returning their attention to the television screen.

ABB Basketball Arm: Perhaps the most well-traveled of the BigBots, this former automobile welder now shoots baskets at science museums across the country. The robot shoots free throws, with the angle and velocity of the ball selected by visitors, demonstrating concepts of precision and repeatability as well as how a single robot may serve diverse purposes.

The Look-See Tree: CMU grad student Ally Reeves designed a “Roving Art Cart” transported and powered by bicycle. The attached tree trunk lures viewers towards one of its six mini theaters, which come alive when it senses a human presence. Each theater displays an animatronic scene of animals whose existence is impacted by modern life; birds chirp cell phone rings and animals gather objects from the city for their nests.

Green Roof Roller Coaster: Gregory Witt and Joey Hays decided potted plants need a little more excitement in their lives, placing several young trees in a handmade rollercoaster on the roof of the Children’s Museum. The coaster’s cars monitor the vitals of the thrill-seeking vegetation and make sure they’re having a good time.

Rise and Fall: Artist Jennifer Gooch explores the nature of patriotic symbols and the ebb and flow of a nation’s dominance. Flags run up and down flagpoles and anthems play in a set loop. Visitors can send one flag to the top, but eventually it returns to its preset cycle.

Double-Taker: A robotic arm simulates human gestures and eye contact as it observes people outside the Center for Arts, making the occasional eponymous double-take. CMU Professor of Electronic Arts Golan Levin creates ocular art that changes based on the way the viewer views it.

prototype for an infinite array of semi-autonomous percussive devises (or Crickets): Kinetic sculptor Keny Marshall has created a network of cricket-like robots that knock out a certain pattern when they are “alive” and go silent when “dead,” that state determined through the rules of John Conway's “Game of Life.” Just like real crickets, this installation produces constant changes in harmony, with the added benefit that you can turn it off.

Mower: An android’s dream might be John Deere’s worst nightmare. An allusive electric sheep wanders the lawns of the Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens, providing all the benefits of grazing animal without the need for a pooper scooper. Mechanical engineer and visiting professor at the Carnegie Mellon School of Art Osman Khan deliberately created a robot that solves a problem with already existing solutions.

The Robot 250 Festival ends July 27, although some events and exhibits continue into August.

[Robot 250]