Midnight Dankness: Toronto's LoFi Remix Unofficial TIFF Pre-Game Hang
It was 2021 and most film festivals, big or small, were in an online only model. Perhaps due to its late summer sweet spot, The Toronto International Film festival managed a soft-hybrid, with a significantly reduced number of films, some of them at drive-ins or at un ultra low cinema capacity.
Because there were only a few Midnight Madness movies at that year's festival, MM programmer and Speed Racer superfan Peter Kuplowsky, rented the pandemic-shuttered Royal Cinema for the nights where there were no midnight screenings. He brought in the Racer Trash collective, a diverse bunch of film editors who remixed, mashed up, and outright demolished, pop cinema and cultural ephemera, and showcased them on the Twitch streaming platform. According to a The Verge piece at the time, Racer Trash started by the bored-creative need to crash the unlikely, but somehow still oddly obvious, Two-Lane Blacktop and The Wachowski's Speed Racer.
Setting up a live-chat on a large TV in the corner of the house, with a small, eclectic mix of locals and the few out-of-town TIFF goers who managed to navigate the festival in that strange year, spread out in the seats. It was my initiation in Racer Trash, and their portmanteau mash-ups at the time. Screened in double bills, I caught The ABBA-dook, Jennifer Kent's cult horror and unlikely LGBTQ-icon, The Babadook, set to the soundtrack of the worlds most famous Swedish group. There was also, You've got Nails, an eye-melting revisit cult-CanCon The Kids In The Hall: Braincandy, and an epic, thunderous remix of David Lynch's Dune (2021 was the year Denis Villeneuve's Dune was the biggest title at TIFF) thickly leavened with Spice Girls songs, and perfume ads, naturally.
The strobe-heavy, VHS noise, neon-rainbow aesthetic, devaluing ultra-expensive blockbusters, with cult TV commercials, surgery pop music, and extremely-online film memes in deliberate (and joyful) bad taste is entirely the point. Having people drop memes, make jokes, and other distracting chat on the TV is equally a part of that. Everyone in the screen, as well as watching online, is only partially committed to the experience, which is as much a vibe than a viewing.
Peter Kuplowsky told me recently, "I started the event on a bit of a lark. It was the pandemic, TIFF was screening less movies as a result and I was keen to showcase more strange art that I felt was pushing at the boundaries of conventions - even by cult film standards. I really thought it might just a one and done event, but the reaction was so positive, I felt compelled to make it a regular thing. It’s also no secret that attending TIFF has become a pricier proposition, so I liked the idea of providing a cult film event around the festival that was a little more accessible."
Year two became a remix of a remix, featuring a kind of extended pre-show of new remix waves. The Texas Chain-Ska Massacre was a certainly highlight, particularly because of the films closing film dance, but also was the more savagely funny Seabizkit. On a personal note, I despise Gary Ross's Seabiscuit so much, seeing it mangled beyond recognition to Limp Bizkit nu-Metal was sublime.
Afterwards, a secret screening of Zach Cregger's soon to be released Barbarian pleased the now full house at The Royal, that year. Given that the classic Toronto cinema had more or less died at this point, and had been reinvented as a live event venue, any time the classic repertory and film-loving crowd can fill that space for a movie experience is both rare, and special.
Year three may have somewhat de-prioritized the remixes, they were fewer and much shorter in length and much more generally broad, a portmanteau-free variety of bits and bobs. However, Sydney Pollack's Jeremiah Johnson, with oh so many of Robert Redford's signature glance at the camera, played well. This rhymed beautifully (and was recreated inside) that years most perfect film: The black and white musical comedy video-game and slapstick inspired comedy Hundreds of Beavers, itself a perfect blend of many eras of entertainment rethought with modern tools and purpose.
On September 4th, Midnight Dankness returns to The Royal Cinema with a fourth edition, which takes things up a notch to a full overnight marathon experience.
Peter again, "I think this year might be my favourite lineup with respect to its curation - there’s a really cohesive theme as the bulk of the films featured are portraits of regional artists passionately expressing themselves through their work, no matter whether it adheres to convention or good taste. To me that’s what Dankness is all about.”
Midnight Dankness aims to showcase eccentric and innovative works by filmmakers and artists, primarily those working outside mainstream channels or in defiance of conventions of form, aesthetics and good taste.
Tickets can be bought in advance here. (Or, at the door at 6pm, on September 4.)
