by SARAH ROWLAND

Festivals and homemade films abound throughout these coldest months, bringing some bright spots to the slushy season.

In April, just when you start to regain the feeling in your fingertips, possibly the funniest Canadian movie ever made, It's All Gone Pete Tong, will finally open. Montreal director Michael Dowse apparently wanted to "rip a new asshole in cinema" with his follow-up to Fubar. In this mockumentary, Dowse trades the Pilsner-swilling headbangers for coked-up DJ Frankie Wilde, who's living the life of a rock star in Spain when he suddenly loses his hearing, his trophy wife and his self-respect. England's Paul Kaye is bloody brilliant in this lead role. Pete Tong, the real life riches-to-rags former master of turntables makes an appearance as himself and Paul Spence (Deaner) plays an Austrian techno percussionist who delivers the final blow to Wilde's eardrum.

On Mar. 18, Sébastien Rose follows up his 2003 Comment ma mère accoucha de moi durant sa ménopause (How My Mother Gave Birth to Me During Menopause) with Ma vie avec mon père, a movie about two feuding brothers - one is a novelist with a serious case of writer's block and the other is a corporate pig. The two siblings are forced to move in with their down-and-out father to save his ass from financial ruin and premature death.

Festival fever

As for festivals, the 23rd annual Rendez-vous du cinéma québécois (Feb. 17–27) will showcase over 100 new films as well as a special homage to legendary filmmaker/art director Michel Brault. For more info, visit www.rvcq.com.

And break out the piñatas; the ninth edition of Festivalissimo, a salute to all things Spanish, will be held at Cinéma du Parc (March 1–13) with over 20 screenings. As an added bonus, more than half of this year's features are North American premieres and there will also be a special program celebrating seven decades of Brazilian cinema. Other highlights include a mockumentary, A Day Without a Mexican, by Mexico-born filmmakers Sergio Arau and Yareli Arizmendi, a piss-take exploring an imaginary California where all Latino citizens and immigrants, legal and illegal, have disappeared. Winner of the Best Feature Film award at the Berlin International Film Fest 2003, A Thousand Clouds of Peace by Julián Hernández will also heat up the screen with its portrait of a tormented 17-year-old boy who builds a fortress of fantasy to comfort his broken heart. Visit www.festivalissimo.net.

The International Festival of Films on Art (Mar. 10–20) celebrates its 23rd year by showcasing 250 movies from 25 different countries, all promoting the various disciplines through cinematic narration. For details, check out www.artfifa.com.

To honour Black History Month, the NFB will present several films and panel discussions. At the On Being a Black Woman in Quebec series (Feb. 15), Martine Chartrand will screen her animated short Black Soul/Âme noire. Visit www.nfb.ca/cinerobotheque.

Finally, from the people who drench you in blood every year with Festival Spasm comes another exclusively local freak show, the first annual Kombat québécois (Jan. 28 at Club Soda), which will screen 15 made-in-Quebec combat shorts including Sébastien Lépine's Beggar-Be-Gone, Christian Viel's The Hunter and Richard Mangemarais' Cumshot Hero. Google that one at your own risk or visit www.spasm.ca.

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