Sci-fi Marathon

The MIFF’S all-night marathon will play obscure, mind-blowing, underappreciated movies that push boundaries

The marathon kicks off with Dead-end Drive-in, Brian Trenchard-smith’s 1986 adaptation of Peter Carey’s story ‘Crabs’, about a drive-in cinema that is really a concentration camp. A Boy and His Dog from 1975, based on Harlan Ellison’s novella, is an incredibly weird post-apocalyptic comedy about a horny teenager (Don Johnson) and the telepathic dog who finds him women in return for food. The ingenious Timecrimes (2007) is a low-budget Spanish thriller in which a man accidentally stumbles upon a time loop. Shinya Tsukamoto’s Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989) is a logicfree black-and-white nightmare in which a salaryman’s body gradually turns into scrap metal, complete with a huge drill for a penis. David Cronenberg’s trippy 1999 film Existenz concerns a videogame designer (Jennifer Jason Leigh) hiding out in her own created universe after an assassination attempt. The Visitor (1979) is an extremely odd Italian-american production with an all-star cast that features a demonic little girl, Jesus Christ, detectives, basketballers and an army of bald children; the cast includes film directors John Huston and Sam Peckinpah. Finally, Nothing Lasts Forever is a 1984 arthouse comedy, in which an artist in New York under a state of martial law takes a trip to the moon in a bus driven by Bill Murray. After a long night of bizarre films, it will make as much sense as any other movie. Astor Theatre, Sat Aug 12, 9.30pm. $38-$40.