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I've spent a lot of time ranting about negative things over the last few weeks, so I thought I'd change it up a bit and focus on the sunny side of life.

In the previous Dangerous Days column, I talked briefly about supporting genre filmmaking outside the mainstream Hollywood system, including independent and foreign features. Today, I'm going to do an overview of some of the amazing looking films coming out in those categories.

First stop, Mexico. Believe it or not, my geekdar is telling me that Mexico is going to be the new hotbed of sci-fi filmmaking for the next few years. With directors like Guillermo Del Toro, Alfonso Cuarón and Alejandro González Iñárritu already representing Mexican film incredibly well in Hollywood, it's no surprise that a new generation of Mexicans are being inspired to push the boundaries of what audiences expect to see coming out of their country.

"Sleep Dealer" -- This is the Mexican film that is highest on my geekdar at the moment, a cyberpunk flick by first-time director Alex Rivera in which workers south of the border link to a network via grafted body ports to perform virtual labor for American corporations. While American cyberpunk and sci-fi in general have become trite and formulaic at this point, "Sleep Dealer" has the benefit of actually being genuine.

Immigration, exportation of labor and exploitation of economically unstable regions are issues that hit close to home for Mexicans, so this film might just actually have something real to say. And it just looks cool as hell.

This one has been making the festival circuit rounds, and so far, the reviews have been very positive.

"2033" -- Francisco Laresgoiti, another first-time director, is releasing this socio-political sci-fi film later this fall. Not much info on this one yet, but it looks to be set in Mexico City (renamed "Villaparaiso") in 2033 when the country is ruled by an oppressive military regime that controls its citizens with an addictive beverage called Pactia.

The production stills hint at a "Gattaca"-esque aesthetic, and the story has a "V for Vendetta" style of rogue vs. the machine vibe with a bit of a Catholic twist (this is Mexico, after all), so sounds good to me!

"Day and Night" -- In a similar vein to "2033" is this movie by yet another first-time director, Alejandro Molina. This one is also about an oppressive government, but this one has modified the DNA of its citizens so that half of the population lives by day, and the other half by night in order to deal with the epidemic of overcrowding.

Again, not much information on this one, but it should be released some time this year.

"Before the Fall" -- Hopping over the pond for another Spanish language flick, this one is called "Before the Fall," but was released in its native Spain as "Tres Dias."

In this film a meteorite is heading straight for Earth and will collide in 72 hours, leaving no survivors.

At first glance, it sounds like the plot to "Deep Impact," but I'm told the events that unfold are less Hollywood blockbuster than they are eerie, end-of-the-world slasher horror. Set in the small isolated town Laguna, in the south of Spain, the story follows a young man named Ale and his family as they deal with the despair and hysteria of impending mass destruction.

This got a limited release in the United States last November, and should be available on DVD soon.

"[REC]2" -- If you missed my first Dangerous Days column, I talked about a little Spanish horror movie called "[REC]" that was recently remade for American audiences as "Quarantine."