Fantasia Reviews: ‘Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes’ and ‘The Sadness’

Inside The Film Room is covering the 25th edition of Fantasia International Film Festival with reviews of all the latest genre films. Contributing writer Joel Winstead shares his thoughts on two films he has seen during the festival.

“Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes”

“Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes” is a film that plays on the time loop trope, but in a way that you’ve never seen before. 

It is incredibly clever and entertaining to watch unfold, from both a technical and narrative standpoint, particularly due to its sweet story. 

The film is one long take with no cuts, which means that the cast and crew had to get creative when coming up with different methods to incorporate past and future versions of the characters within the single take. It’s incredibly fun to watch the ideas they came up with come to fruition on screen. Filmmaker Junta Yamaguchi’s ingenuity and technical prowess make a case for bigger and better things in his future. 

Unfortunately, the story itself relies too much on the characters telling us what’s happening rather than showing us. While the film’s one-take, one-location gimmick may be it biggest strength, it’s also a weakness, as even the film’s brief 71-minute runtime drags a bit, due to the limited location and having the camera follow the main character at all times.  Overall it’s definitely a film to look out for, if only to marvel at its inventiveness.  

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“The Sadness”

Canadian Filmmaker Rob Jabbaz has made his zombie movie response to COVID, and it’s a gruesome one. Set in modern day Taiwan in the middle of a pandemic, this fictional virus is about to mutate – and somehow it’s turning into something much more sinister than what the real world is already experiencing. 

What Jabbaz delivers is one of the most violent, sadistic and over the top zombie films, perhaps of all time. While this may satisfy fans of the genre, unfortunately at every point in the film the story is sacrificed for the sake of ultimate gore.

This film kneels at the altar of violence, so much so that eventually you just become numb to it. The more inventive and depraved the film becomes with the kills, the more I tuned out. The scenes just become vignettes in which to show more of your blood orgy and the story gets lost as it just turns into waiting for the next kill. 

There is a solid zombie movie in here somewhere, but even that was massacred. 

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