El Monstro Del Mar! review by Yasmin Vought screens 10 September

Described as an Ozploitation genre film, Stuart Simpson’s El Monstro Del Mar is a tale of three foxy rockabilly babes - hired assassins hiding away in a seaside village after a big job. Amazonian goddess Beretta (Nelli Scarlet) appears to be the leader of the pack, and has a dominance and presence on screen that forces you to pay attention - or else she will probably slit your throat and feed you to her two sidekicks! Beretta‘s punk rock attitude (Nelli is the frontwoman of Melbourne band, The Scarlets) is reminiscent of Suburban Mayhem beauty Katrina Skinner (played by Emily Barclay) and is complimented by the more subdued nature of Blondie (Karli Madden)and the sexual allure of the Morticia-meets-Elvira raven haired vixen, Snowball (Kate Watts).

The leading ladies are quite believable in their parts, almost as though they were plucked straight from their crème Cadillac, cruising around the streets of Melbourne, cranking The Cramps on their stereo. After watching El Monstro Del Mar, I want to join their crew and drink whiskey with them and go on a sexy car stealing, killing rampage on the South coast.

However, it’s not all fun and cruising, because just when we think that the girls are indestructible, they get themselves into a bit of trouble in this apparently not so sleepy seaside town by swimming in the forbidden beach. Channelling The Mighty Boosh’s tale of Ol’ Gregg, there is something deadly and frightening that lurks beneath the sea, and it’s not happy about being disturbed. Without spoiling the plot too much, this film quickly becomes a monstrous revenge film that would make Tarantino and the residents of Tromaville equally proud.

The combination of ass-kicking babes reminiscent of Russ-Meyer femme revenge flick, ‘Faster Pussycat, Kill, Kill’ together with an amped up killer alt-country, rockabilly soundtrack to boot, make this film well worth your time and your pretty little pennies. If only to witness the sexy black and white opening title, or the frightening death skull dream sequence toward the middle. The cinematography is also quite exquisite and filmed almost entirely with an over saturated and highly contrasted film stock, giving the film a surreal and fantastical atmosphere. I half expected to see some Western clad Mermaids emerging from the waters, but let’s save that for the sequel (fingers crossed).

El Monstro Del Mar is showing this Saturday at the Factory Theatre in Marrickville at 4pm and will be followed by an exclusive Q&A with Writer and Director, Stuart Simpson and the Monstro crew.

Introducing Sydney Underground Film Festival's resident blogger Yasmin Vought

We're really pleased to welcome our second blogger to the pages of the SUFF blog.

Yasmin Vought is a Sydney based film critic, writer and entertainment journalist. Her work has been published in websites such as Rotten Tomatoes, IGN, Machete Girl and Carnival Askew, to name a few.

Yasmin's passion for underground cinema and her contempt for the everyday mainstream film goes hand in hand with the feel of the Sydney Underground Film Festival. The films that Yasmin is most looking forward to at this years festival are: 'Bill Hicks: The American Story', 'Biker Fox', and 'Trash Humpers'. Stay tuned for her upcoming pre-festival film rants on the SUFF blog later this week.

Interviews with Sydney Underground Film Festival staff #1 - Stefan Popescu

We'll be putting a few mini interviews forward here so you can get to know us a little better over the coming weeks.

First off the rank is one of the festival Directors, Stefan Popescu:

When did you start SUFF, and why? 2007 - mainly because there was no forum for alternate film in Sydney. All the cool cinemas were dying out, the major festivals were busy securing future years' funding by being super safe and commercial, and frankly we couldn't get our fix of cinema culture beyond the usual McMovies that were being pushed. So we got off our butts and started the Sydney Underground Film Festival, knowing that there was a community that would respond and support us.

What got you interested in underground film? Watching horror films at the age of 7. At seven years of age I learnt that moving image = fiction, and what you see on screen is very different from reality. So, for me cinema is a safe forum to explore, celebrate difference, experience strange things and venture to the outer crevices of your psyche - and I think alternative and underground cinema does this.

What have been some pitfalls that you've learned from in running a festival like this? Don't tell your friends that you program the festival, because when you don't select their film you'll find out that they are not really your friend after all.

What have been your highlights? Aiding a culture of cinematic difference to exist and being part on an international community of wonderful filmmakers and cinephiles! Filmmakers are beautiful, generous and fun creatures! And the more disturbing their films are the nicer the filmmakers are.