CIFF: F*ckload of Scotchtape And Consuming Spirits

By Rob Christopher in Arts & Entertainment on Oct 8, 2012 3:20PM

Consuming Spirits, directed by Chris Sullivan

F*ckload of Scotchtape is a would-be noir musical directed by Columbia College professor Julian Grant. Benji, a young man with self-confessed "daddy issues," goes on a rampage of vengeance after being cheated out of $50,000, stopping now and then to screw a stripper and/or sing songs. The title is the about the only clever thing about this nasty, pointless mess. It features a collection of characters who are both repellent and uninteresting, starting with the protagonist, whose purple prose narration is so verbose it makes Terrence Malick seem like Marcel Marceau. Weird tonal shifts (from campy to gory to heartfelt) coupled with a dogged insistence on shooting the musical interludes in the drabbest way possible add up to a movie as confused as Benji's sexuality.

F*ckload of Scotchtape screens 8 p.m. Oct. 18 ($14/$11 discount), 9:30 p.m. Oct. 20 ($14/$11), and 1 p.m. Oct. 23 ($5). Julian Grant scheduled to attend each screening.

Consuming Spirits is School of the Art Institute animator Chris Sullivan's mesmerizing, darkly humorous chronicle of the complicated family lives of several disturbed citizens in a small Appalachian town. There's the aging host of Gardener's Corner, a radio show; a few employees of the local newspaper The Daily Suggester; and the mother superior of the local convent-slash-insane asylum. And there's plenty of alcoholism, poisoning, and amputation involved; kind of like a Handsome Family song come to life.

Call it backwoods baroque. This sure isn't Pixar. In fact, it's not really like any other animated film we've seen. Taking nearly fifteen years to complete, the film combines animated pencil drawings, 3-D models, and cutout animation with a densely layered soundtrack to tell its complicated story, a stubbornly analog aesthetic that's both beautiful and unsettling. As wondrous as it is, at 135 minutes it does wander in the final third and could do with some pruning. But Sullivan, who also wrote, produced, and contributed voices and music, takes the audience on quite a journey. Consuming Spirits is the kind of movie that really does see the world in a completely individual way.

Consuming Spirits screens 7 p.m. Oct. 16 ($14/$11). Chris Sullivan scheduled to attend. Other screenings are 9:30 p.m. Oct. 19 ($14/$11) and 3 p.m. Oct. 22 ($5). All screenings are at AMC River East 21 multiplex (322 E. Illinois St.)