615 Film finally covered the Chattanooga Film Festival this past month, and over the course of the weekend it was in-person, this critic could see why this festival in particular is a dream destination for independent filmmakers on the rise; from its co-founders Chris Dortch Sr. and Chris Dortch II’s passion for movies and the event’s variety of parties and specialty screenings to their strict but reasonable refusal of projects that use generative AI in any capacity. This year saw the stateside premiere of a Japanese shark horror-action-comedy on the 50th anniversary of the release of Jaws, a trio of parties hosted by Utopia Distribution and a sheer amount of visiting filmmakers whose works had already premiered at other major genre festivals like Slamdance and South By Southwest. The Chattanooga Film Festival has cemented itself as a place for the next big names in film direction to play their work, and if word of mouth continues to spread about what this festival offers in both the in-person and virtual realms of their programming, the Chattanooga Theatre Center will be packed to the brim with film fans and filmmakers alike for years to come. With that, here’s a look at the films this critic got to see at this year’s Chattanooga Film Festival!
Pavements (Alex Ross Perry, 2025) ★★★
Music documentaries are fun to watch but can often be made on a conveyor belt with a simple structural formula established by the former VH1 docuseries Behind The Music, so leave it to Queen of Earth and Her Smell director Alex Ross Perry to turn the genre on its head and then some with Pavements, a rock-doc and musical biopic about the birth of the indie-rock band Pavement in the late 80s upon the union of frontman Stephen Malkmus and guitarist Scott “Spiral Stairs” Kannberg. But Pavements is more than just your standard music documentary chronicling the rise of Pavement in the 90s independent music scene as well as their reunion tour in 2022, because those arcs are juxtaposed with the making of a musical biopic about Pavement the band entitled Range Life with Joe Keery playing Malkmus, rehearsals for an off-Broadway musical called Slanted! Enchanted! made up entirely of Pavement songs, and even a Pavement museum full of artifacts from the band’s heyday, from the mud-stained clothes they wore on their ill-fated Lollapalooza show to even a band member’s toenail.
When it’s a music doc, Pavements successfully informs newcomers to Pavement’s unique brand of rebellious, cheeky slacker rock and its origins in the California suburbs, as well as their offbeat sense of humor which came out in their performances like their postmodern appearance on Space Ghost Coast to Coast and the time they spent on The Tonight Show With Jay Leno screeching like banshees instead of singing their top hits. Pavements is also hilarious when it’s telling the story of Range Life, which often makes the point of how Hollywood both overthinks the musical biopic subgenre while underthinking about their subjects, with one clear example coming when Joe Keery admits to a consultant that he wants to get a photograph of Stephen Malkmus’ tongue because it will help him nail his performance. The comedy also comes through in the editing in an early instance where Pavement rehearses a song about zombies, but then the film cuts to a 90s performance of the same song, before transitioning to a funny rehearsal of Slanted! Enchanted! where the dancers look like zombies while practicing a routine.
And yet, Pavements often makes the same jokes over and over ad nauseum, rendering the documentary into a one-note effort. Alex Ross Perry has repeatedly voiced his frustration about how difficult it is for him to get financing for his movies at this point in his career, but Pavements just gets lost in Perry’s own self-importance to the point where he even puts himself on screen as the director of Range Life. It’s also worth noting that a lot of the jokes may not land for non-fans of Pavement the band, and the movie has so much going on that Perry’s intent can be difficult to discern. But what is clear over the course of Pavements is the artistic search for a authentic identity in the increasingly capitalistic and superficial hellscape that is Hollywood, and with a clever syncing of audio from multiple productions of ‘No More Absolutes’ across many mediums, as well as loving recreations of the subject’s music, Pavements reminds us to look for the artist’s passion for their material in everything they do.
The Harbor Men (Casey T. Malone, 2025) ★★★1/2
Based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Casey T. Malone is a multi-time alum of the Chattanooga Film Festival, and his latest film, The Harbor Men, is a prescient neo-noir set in a coastal dystopia where dockworkers are put in charge of keeping a waterborne virus from spreading into the mainland. One of these harbor men is Stephen Dorre (Aidan White), a cynic and conspiracy theorist longing to patch things up with his ex-wife Maya (Anieya Walker). But one day, Stephen comes into possession of a briefcase after its carrier was murdered before his eyes on the docks, with its contents leading him toward private investigator Franklin Crank (Randall Paetzold) while raising inner questions about his own worldview.
What makes The Harbor Men stand out is the hallucinogenic tone Malone employs to this story as director, from the jump cuts in the editing throughout a stark raving mad monologue from Oracle Jim (Gian Chivas Pogliano) that sets the thematic stage and incendiary cutaways of black hooded figures that these men see during their insanity caused by the virus, to gorgeous black and white cinematography that presents these docks as a place where its tenders have abandoned all hope, as well as psychedelic animated sequences and a musical score rooted in dark, pensive jazz. Malone’s latest does wear its influences on its sleeve from Bela Tarr to Twin Peaks, and some may not look past how unlikable Stephen is as a character, but his journey toward learning empathy in The Harbor Men is worth a watch for those who can.
Hot Spring Shark Attack (Morihito Inoue, 2025) ★★★★1/2
There are two sides of the Japanese cinematic spectrum: the balls-to-the-wall, rapid-fire ridiculousness of relentless action, and the quietly moving, introspective dramas from the likes of Ryusuke Hamaguchi. See if you can guess where Hot Spring Shark Attack falls upon reading its premise: after a massive condominium complex is built in the town of Atsumi (with a giant 3D printer on its roof, no less), hot water springs spontaneously form above ground, allowing sharks to burst onto the surface from out of nowhere and kill innocent civilians. It’s up to Mayor Mangan Kanichi (Takuya Fujimura), Dr. Mayumi Kose (Yuu Nakanishi), and the monoymned Macho (Sumiya Shiina) to stop these sharks from destroying their town.
For those who came away from Tommy Wiseau’s latest film Big Shark thinking he was trying too hard to replicate the accidental success of his disasterpiece The Room, Hot Spring Shark Attack quenches one’s thirst for a new entry in so-bad-it’s-good cinema and then some in a relentless hybrid of Jaws with the production value of Power Rangers. Yes, the visual effects are terrible. Yes, the plot line is ridiculous. Yes, the acting is over the top and the footage isn’t entirely color corrected. But what ascends this glorious piece of Japanese camp is its earnest attempt to say something about the consequences of gentrification and capitalism on the environment, writer/director Morihito Inoue’s commitment to its ridiculousness with an RRR-level sincerity, and wild action sequences full of captivating nonsense that tops itself in blissful absurdity one scene after the other. If Utopia plays their cards right with releasing this and puts it in front of the right people, Hot Spring Shark Attack has all the elements to be a modern-day midnight classic.
The Craft (Andrew Fleming, 1996) ★★★★1/2
Horror writer/director Peter Filardi attended this year’s Chattanooga Film Festival not only to screen his latest short horror-comedy Damn Handy (the results of which are hilarious and relentlessly entertaining), but also for a special screening of a 4K restoration for The Craft, the late-90s cult classic he co-wrote with the film’s director Andrew Fleming. The film follows teenager Sarah Bailey (Robin Tunney) who moves with her father and step-mom from San Francisco to Los Angeles only to fall in with a trio of outcasts rumored to be witches. Upon their discovery of Sarah’s remarkable abilities, Bonnie Harper (Neve Campbell), Rochelle Zimmerman (Rachel True) and Nancy Downs (Fairuza Balk) invite her to be the fourth witch in their coven, and use their camaraderie to better enrich their lives, only to be corrupted by the powers of their magic to the point of putting their friendship and lives at risk.
It’s easy to see how The Craft has gained the massive cult following that it has over the past three decades, starting with the compelling characterization. Filardi said during the post-film Q&A that he had based each of them from Greek goddesses, and that’s apparent in his writing; visual motifs toward the end point to Nancy as a younger Medusa while Sarah’s pursuit for love from Chris Hooker (Skeet Ulrich) alludes her to a high-school age Aphrodite. A lot of attention is also given to each of these women in regards to their dimensionality and character arcs; Rochelle is tired of putting up with racism from a bleached blonde classmate, Nancy wants to have her mother’s strength to endure the pain of living with her abusive father, Sarah aims to fill the proverbial hole in her heart left by her mother who passed away in childbirth, and Bonnie yearns for the complete removal of the scars on her back brought about by a horrific fire.
And all four of these leads are made sympathetic and endearing with the engaging work from all four actresses; one can feel Bonnie’s desire to be rid of her disfigurement in Campbell’s pained recanting of a spell during a moment of intimacy with her sisters in witchcraft, meanwhile Fairuza Balk ascends Nancy Downs from a cool-looking goth girl into horror icon status with her relentlessly sinister energy. The Craft is also fascinating for how well it grounds the intricacies and rules of witchcraft in realism. Filardi noted that there was a Wiccan consultant throughout the writing and production processes who signed off on his and Fleming’s ideas with little alteration, and it’s simply fun to learn which colors of candles cast a love charm, or how ribbons are used to cast binding spells. A few VFX shots don’t age well and it does take time for the stakes to take shape, but once they do, The Craft morphs from an empathetic push for female camaraderie into a heartfelt plea for female self-love and inner strength still relevant even today.
The Girl Most Likely To . . . (Lee Philips, 1973) ★★★★
The first of the Chattanooga Film Festival’s famous Red Eye secret screenings that this critic was able to check out was a double feature of made-for-TV horror films from the 1970s curated by Zack Hall, the Nashville-based programmer for the historic Belcourt Theatre’s midnight block. The first film he chose was the 1973 comedy/thriller written by Joan Rivers entitled The Girl Most Likely To . . . which follows Miriam Knight (Stockard Channing, in her first professional lead acting role), a beautiful young woman trapped in a hideous body. A sarcastic sense of humor and pursuit of knowledge has kept this ugly duckling sane throughout her relentless search for the right man, which has been so exhausting, that she’s transferred colleges five times in a three-year span. At State University, she shares a room with cheerleader Heidi Murphy (Susanne Zenor), tries to connect with pool player Fred Ames (Dan Spelling), football player Moose Myers (Larry Wilcox), and medical student Ted Gates (Fred Grandy), only to get humiliated at every turn, even by her on-again, off-again boyfriend Herman Anderson (Warren Berlinger), until a car accident puts her in a full-body cast, as well as plastic surgery that makes her beautiful. As soon as she reaches a full recovery, Miriam seeks revenge on everyone who shunned her, unaware that policeman Ralph Varone (Edward Asner) is hot on her trail.
The Girl Most Likely To . . . may not be a horror film in the traditional sense, but it’s a hysterical dark comedy with thanks in part to writers Agnes Gallin and the late, great Joan Rivers, who also provided the film’s story. The sense of humor here tows the lines of cartoonish absurdity and dry dementedness in equally hilarious fashion, with an instance of the former being Heidi’s tanning and makeout session with Moose during a lecture from their English professor David Tilson (Jim Backus, of Gilligan’s Island and Mr. Magoo fame). As for the latter style of levity, the voiceover is full of many golden lines dripping with jadedness and cynicism over how how women are only valued by their looks in 1970s society, such as a moment when Professor Tilson asks Miriam to tutor Moose, to which she responds, “I’d do anything for the football team,” while post-surgery, she looks at her new mirror reflection for the first time with the reaction, “When do I turn back into a pumpkin? What’s the catch?” To that point, it’s easy to see how Stockard Channing landed Grease four years later, because her performance in this TV movie isn’t cartoonish or over the top; rather, she delivers these dark quips with great nonchalance and deliciously deadpan delivery, and also displays Miriam’s morbid excitement in her facial expressions when she knows one of her plans is about to come to deadly fruition. The voiceover also provided by Channing can be unnecessary when it describes what the viewer is already seeing on screen, and the commercial breaks lend a hand toward the movie’s pacing issues, but other than that, The Girl Most Likely To . . . is a twistedly funny and goreless, but cathartic and feminist jab at our society’s irrationally high standards for beauty.
Mooch Goes To Hollywood (Richard Erdman, 1971) ★★★1/2
The second film in Zack Hall’s double feature of 1970s made-for-TV weirdness was Mooch Goes To Hollywood, a family film seemingly about a little mutt named Mooch (a dog named Higgins, who one hopes was compensated with a lifetime of Milk Bones) arriving to Hollywood with hopes of becoming a famous actress, but has no one to guide her except for her best friend Zsa Zsa Gabor, whose advice guides Mooch through the City of Angels in the form of a voiceover with the most confusing tip being, “it [success] is who you’re seen with, honey, but also keep your fur on.” Mooch trots down the Hollywood Walk of Fame and various coastal beaches, running into Vincent Price, James Darren, Phyllis Diller, Jill St. John and Jim Backus (who also co-wrote the film with Jerry Devine) along the way, but a sleazy opening voiceover from Richard Burton warns Mooch she is due to become just another victim of the Hollywood machine in its dehumanization of its denizens.
Mooch Goes To Hollywood is a TV movie made for the whole family on paper, but a midnight screening of it right after The Girl Most Likely To . . . opens the film up to interpretation as a surrealist statement about all the horrors that the film industry inflicts on women yearning to be the next big star, with Mooch serving as a quiet yet loud stand-in for how Hollywood sees its women as dogs that can tantalize audiences and make themselves money with their unique tricks, and Gabor’s voiceover representing the mutt’s idol and reason for pursuing fame and fortune in the first place. And there’s more to that than just what Mooch manifests thematically; at one point she looks up at a producer standing by her at a street corner and notices he’s making animal noises, while a scene at a veterinarian’s office sees people waiting with non-domesticated pets such as a chimpanzee, a goose and even a goat. At 55 minutes, the film just barely has the steam for this reading to stay strong for its runtime, but it struggles to stay consistent in tone; one minute the bizarre undertones are thick to the point of feeling haunting, but the tone is reminiscent of a contemporary, goofy animal-centered comedy with a happy-go-lucky musical score, and other times, it’s a silent movie full of slapstick. And yet, there’s something fascinating about the fact something with these ideas and this concept ended up on network television in 1971, as if Backus, Devine and director Richard Erdman had a hunch on Hollywood’s nefariousness toward women before anyone else, and broadcast their findings to American homes at a time when the general public wasn’t ready to hear about it.