If your tastes stray more toward the mild than the wild, never fear: Anomaly’s got’cha covered! We’re not exclusively a horror festival, so here are five of this year’s films that might be for you, as they avoid excessive blood, guts, gore, and explicit terror.
Note that tastes and sensitivities vary wildly, so please read the Content Warnings for more details. Additionally, the short films the precede the features are paired thematically, and not necessarily also deemed “safer.”
River
Wednesday, Nov. 8 • 6:30pm
A sweet and soulful time-twisting comedy.
Director Junta Yamaguchi takes the micro time loop premise of his 2021 Anomaly Audience Award-Winner Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes and applies it to an even larger canvas, as the guests and staff of a Japanese inn find themselves living the same few minutes over and over and over again. Somewhere in those repeating, all-to-brief moments, they confront questions of life, love, and their own mortality.
Content Warnings: light blood, suicide
Japan / 2023 / 86 mins / In Japanese with English subtitles
Molli and Max in the Future
Friday, Nov. 10 • 8:30pm
An imaginative sci-fi rom-com that spans galaxies.
Molli and Max keep finding themselves drawn into each other’s orbits, and find that dating is awkward no matter what year you’re in or which planet you find yourself on. A classic will-they-won’t-they romance matched with cleverly lo-fi effects, it’s “When Harry Met Sally” with aliens, robot warriors, and space witches.
+ FILMMAKER Q&A with Molli and Max in the Future director Michael Litwak and producer Ben Murphy.
Content Warnings: tentatcles
USA / 2023 / 93 mins
Riddle of Fire
Saturday, Nov. 11 • 5:00pm
A chimerical, modern-day fairytale that feels like a lost-then-found 80s children's classic.
Screening on 35mm film! Three free-roaming, feral children spend their vacation riding on their dirt bikes, wielding paint guns and creating chaos. One day their sick mother sets them on a journey to fetch a blueberry pie - one made with a speckled egg. But as fables tend to go, a simple task soon becomes an epic journey through a series of side-quests, a chase through the wild woods at night, and eventually a confrontation with a powerful witch and her coven.
Shot on 16mm with a dreamy aesthetic, this story unfolds languid and warm like a long summer day.
Content Warnings: puke, taxidermy, violence (an adult punches a kid)
USA / 2023 / 1 hour 53 mins
The People's Joker
Saturday, Nov. 11 • 8:00pm
A subversive queer and trans coming-of-age origin story.
The film that defied a major Hollywood studio. Writer, director, and editor Vera Drew enlists the assistance of 100 different artists — blending live action, 2D animation, stop-motion, and CGI — to create a hilarious and deeply personal riff on superhero movies, gender identity, stand-up comedy, and the power of a good laugh.
Content Warnings: suicide, blood, drug use, homophobic slurs, abuse, child abuse, transphobia
USA / 2022 / 92 mins
Robot Dreams
Sunday, Nov. 12 • 7:00pm
A bittersweet animated love story about “interspecies” friendship.
Seeking companionship, a lonely dog mail orders himself a robotic best friend. The pair bond on their adventures around a colorful cartoon version of 1980s New York City, but when circumstances force them to separate, will they find a way to be together again?
With stunning hand-drawn animation, a tuneful soundtrack, and no spoken dialogue, Robot Dreams looks at what makes us happy, as we face the world together or separated from those we love.
Content Warnings: abandonment, depression and loneliness