Fantastic Fest Reviews: The Coffee Table and Mushrooms

The 2023 edition of Fantastic Fest has come to a close and ComicBook.com once again covered this celebration of niche and genre cinema from around the world. We have two more reviews from the event are with more thrillers from around the globe, with the Spanish dark comedy The Coffee Table  and the Polish thriller Mushrooms. Here are two quick reviews from this year's Fantastic Fest.  

The Coffee Table review 

Filmmaker Caye Casas, who co-wrote the screenplay with Cristina Borobia, delivers one of the most pitch-black comedies in years with The Coffee Table, harkening back to the likes of Todd Solondz's 1990s hits Welcome to the Dollhouse and Happiness. By pushing the audience into the most uncomfortable places possible, Casas has crafted a unique movie that manages to deliver intense levels of awkward comedy as well as tension that manages to keep up the pace for nearly the entire run time of the movie.

The Coffee Table focuses on a bizarre afternoon in the life of new parents Jesús (David Pareja) and Maria (Estefanía de los Santos), whose day starts bad when he picks out an incredibly ugly coffee table at the furniture store and it only gets worse from there. Without spoiling anything, not only have you never seen a movie that has a central plot conceit quite like The Coffee Table, but there's probably a reason why that's the case. Things get dark quickly in this movie and its biggest strength is that it's able to keep you on the edge of your seat with how long its grim secret can remain hidden. 

Unfortunately, the tremendous build-up that The Coffee Table has leading to its final minutes doesn't quite live up to what everything before it was setting up. As the clock ticks down and it becomes clear that the ending is nearly there, the movie doesn't give itself enough time to really settle into the devastation of its conclusion, with a final 90 seconds that is so flat and stilted, it almost seems like it came about later. Audience members who find themselves able to withstand a typhoon of cringe will certainly want to test their mettle with The Coffee Table, but sensitive viewers will want to avoid the lifetime scars it has to offer.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Mushrooms (2023) Review

Much like finding an actual mushroom, Mushrooms is a small surprise that popped up at Fantastic Fest. An original drama-thriller out of Poland, Mushrooms follows an old woman (Maria Maj) walking through the woods searching for mushrooms, only to discover a pair of lost wanderers that need help getting out of the forest. As their journey progresses, though, it becomes clear that they might not be entirely truthful about their intentions. 

Paweł Borowski directs this film, which manages to keep your attention for its very brief run time, a mere 75 minutes. What's so spectacular about the film is something that many low-budget movies fail at: masterful direction that manages to navigate the story but also keep its contained, isolated setting in check. Borowski is able to keep the audience's sense of direction oriented at all times, even if the larger backdrop of the entire movie is just the woods and more woods. Sequences play out with both camera movement and character reveals while never feeling like the same openings in a forest are being redressed  

Mushrooms' biggest strength, knowing the simple story it's telling and how to navigate it, is also its only real weakness. A movie this compact with a gut-punch ending has all the feel of a classic episode of The Outer Limits or The Twilight Zone, meaning that its 75 minutes could likely be condensed to 40 without losing much. It's still an interesting watch, however, especially as it approaches its final sequence and puts its hand on the table.