Welcome! What is your cinematic background, i.e. movies and theaters that have shaped your current tastes? I spent many a Friday and Saturday Night at the San Ramon Drive-In in Dublin CA, watching Clint Eastwood, Robert Altman, etc. and years of my youth in the semi-derelict mezzanine of the Neptune discovering foreign and classic film. How bout yerself? What were your favorites at SIFF 2006?

Hey David! I grew up in the OC/LA area of SoCal during the late 70s and 80's, also spending about 5 years in Hawaii during my pre-teen/teenage years, and finally ending up back in Cali at the Nuart, Lido and a few Edwards theatres that catered to indie/out-of-mainstream filmgoers. My mainland filmgoing was mostly in the multiplexes of the time. Being a child of more mainstream filmgoing parents, I didn't get a lot of indie and foreign film exposure in my early youth. In Hawaii, though, I did get a very surface taste of Asian cinema at the Maui Mall's single theatre (at the time) on Saturday mornings. They had a chop socky series that was cheesy as all get out, but would eventually lead to my more diversified interest in the additional pleasures of Asian and other international cinema...the learning experience being that foreign did not always equal boring or difficult to understand. Upon returning to the mainland, some of my first ventures into the less mainstream films included "The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover", "Sex, Lies and Videotape", "Shirley Valentine", "Drugstore Cowboy", "My Own Private Idaho", "Delicatessen" - as I type these titles, I realize that I've seen too many to even try and provide a fair sampling of my tastes, but those are just a few. As for my favorites of SIFF 2006 (I'll try to keep it to my creme de la creme): I haven't mentioned any midnight fare yet, so let me just go on record as having loved "Evil Aliens" for all of it's violent and irreverent silliness, and "Isolation" for it's creepy, deadly serious throwback to good ol' fashioned gooey horror. "Host and Guest" was another favorite in the "unlikely friendships" department (which also has me looking forward to the same director's 2007 entry, "My Friend & His Wife"). "Half Nelson", in a similar category, was simply outstanding. I loved "Allegro" for the way that it quietly crept up on me emotionally while visually distracting and dazzling me. "This Film is Not Yet Rated" and "The Heart of the Game" were both terrific documentary features. Oh, heck...while I'm at it, I should also mention that I could have done without the wasted potential of "Four Stars", a virtually laugh-free French "comedy" with a very ironic title. "The King", an exercise in sheer, depressing tedium, also had me looking for an exit route. As is habit for me, I have now listed closer to ten films from SIFF 2006 instead of the aforementioned 5 or so (haha). Oh jeez...it is 1:20am, already? Thanks for asking for more details and for the warm welcome!

Welcome! It's good to have another horror film aficionado blogging for us.

And yes - where the hell is Son of Ash, Raimi? What is he doing wasting his time on this whiney superhero nonsense? Seriously. ;)