London’s FIlm4 FrightFest is an annual celebration to be envied (by me, every year). The FrightFest team consistently announce an incredible lineup devoted to anticipated premieres, buzzing fest titles andthe most exciting part of any festdiscovery hopefuls. This year, joining Tales of Halloween, Cherry Tree, Turbo Kid, Nina Forever and rep titles like Captain Kronos, Your Vice is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key and The Reflecting Skin is an abundance of brand new horror and brand new talent.
Film4 FrightFest 2015 marks its 16th year with its largest line-up ever. From Thurs 27 August to Mon 31 August, the UKs leading event for genre fans will return to the Vue West End, Leicester Square to present seventy-six films across five screens, plus a host of special events. There are eighteen countries representing five continents with a record-breaking sixteen European premieres and twenty-six UK premieres. In addition, there is a further Discovery strand at The Prince Charles Cinema, signalling a welcome return to FrightFests spiritual home.
Highlights are vast, so below simply find the hefty list of titles. For tickets and so much more, visit FrightFest. What are you looking forward to?
Film4 FrightFest
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Film4 FrightFest #1
A Christmas Horror Story
Directors: Grant Harvey, Steven Hoban, Brett Sullivan. Cast: William Shatner, George Buza, Zoé De Grand Maison, Caprice Bauer, Rob Archer. Canada 2015. 100 mins.
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas as FrightFest presents some festive fright in this Yule-be-sorry anthology set in the small town of Bailey Downs. High school students investigate a mysterious homicide that occurred the prior holiday season, a couple notices their young son is acting strangely after a snowy forest trip to cut down a traditional tree and one family are stalked through a winter wonderland by Krampus, the Xmas demon. Meanwhile at the North Pole, Santa is fending off zombie elves… TALES FROM THE CRYPT meets SILENT NIGHT DEADLY NIGHT for frosted Jingle Bell Shock.
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Film4 FrightFest #2
Aaaaaaaah!
Director: Steve Oram. Cast: Steve Oram, Julian Rhind-Tutt, Toyah Willcox, Noah Fielding, Julian Barratt. UK 2015. 80 mins.
Alpha Male Smith and his Beta, Keith, move to take over a local community. They hook up with restless Female, Denise, igniting a deadly feud in which emotions run high and deep-seated grudges resurface amongst the tribe. Are we not men? Or are we simply beasts? Steve Oram, the actor/writer from SIGHTSEERS and KILL LIST stars in his long-awaited debut feature with a host of his friends. Get ready for the most unusual celluloid primal scream - an anarchic, hilarious, disturbing and touching look at the human condition. THEMROC meets PINK FLAMINGOS in the Cult Movie of the Year.
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Film4 FrightFest #3
Afterdeath
Directors: Gez Medinger, Robin Schmidt. Cast: Miranda Raison, Sam Keeley, Daniella Kertesz, Elarica Gallacher, Lorna Nickson Brown. UK 88 mins.
Five young people wake up on a beach washed up by the tide. Where are they? What brought them there, and what are the strange creatures that surround them? All this and more will be revealed in this beautifully executed, award-winning first feature, chock full of exciting new acting talent, from Gez Medinger and Robin Schmidt – future genre names to keep a sharp eye out for.
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Film4 FrightFest #4
Another Me
Director: Isabel Coixet. Cast: Sophie Turner, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Claire Forlani, Rhys Ifans, Geraldine Chaplin. UK 2013. 86 mins.
A top flight cast and a cult Catalan director (THE SECRET LIFE OF WORDS, ELEGY) bring the bestselling Young Adult novel by Cathy MacPhail to the screen. British schoolgirl Fay’s father is dying, so getting the role of Lady Macbeth in the school play is a welcome diversion. Then she becomes aware that someone is following her every move. Who could be so cruel as to taunt her at this sad time? Soon evidence suggests she is being haunted by the dead twin she barely knew existed in a hard-hitting and affecting mystery dealing with apparitions, doppelgangers and mind games.
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Film4 FrightFest #5
Awaiting
Director: Mark Murphy. Cast: Tony Curran, Diana Vickers, Rupert Hill, Peter Woodward, Adrian Bouchet. UK 2015. 90 mins.
Take a horrifying journey of introspection into the depths of base human nature and the capabilities of twisted minds. Morris is a recluse with mysterious psychotic tendencies, whose life changes when his innocent daughter Lauren rescues one of his intended victims and befriends him at their remote Yorkshire farmhouse. Soon travelling businessman Jake realises he is stranded with no chance of ever being allowed to escape and that his presence in the house is gradually revealing an epic clash of wills. Worse, the descent into darkness will unearth unexpected secrets from the past and signal a host of future shocks.
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Film4 FrightFest #6
Banjo
Director: Liam Regan. Cast: Laurence R. Harvey, Dan Palmer, James Hamer-Morton, Dani Thompson, Vito Trigo. UK 2015. 82 mins.
Meet Peltzer Arbuckle, a bullied office employee, humiliated by his megalomaniac boss, teasing colleagues and cheating partner. Stuck in his mundane, nightmarish reality, once news about an embarrassing sexual accident circulates the workplace, Peltzer decides to put up with his misery no more, and conjures up his childhood imaginary friend Ronnie who manipulates him to exact gruesome revenge on his tormenting co-workers. As the body count rises, Peltzer must either run away from his past or take control of his future, battling between sanity and madness in a twisted tale of infidelity, revenge and snapped banjo strings.
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Film4 FrightFest #7
Bite
Director: Chad Archibald. Cast: Elma Begovic, Jordan Gray, Annette Wozniak, Denise Yuen, Lawrene Denkers. Canada 2015. 90 mins.
While on her hen party getaway to exotic Costa Rica, bride-to-be Casey gets a seemingly harmless bite from an unknown insect while bathing in an idyllic jungle pool. But after returning home with matrimonial cold feet, she starts exhibiting alien behaviour as what crept under her skin starts taking hold. Between physical transformation and wedding anxiety, Casey succumbs to her new instincts and begins creating a hive that not only houses her translucent offspring, but also feeds on flesh. Cronenbergian body horror returns to the genre with a bang in this fearless fusion of slime, shivers and shock.
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Film4 FrightFest #8
Bloodsucking Bastards
Director: Brian James O'Connell. Cast: Fran Kranz, Emma Fitzpatrick, Joey Kern, Jacquelyn Palmquist, Pedro Pascal. USA 2015. 86 mins.
If you think you've ever had a bad day in the office, think again! Work life is a killer in this comedy horror from the popular Dr God Comedy team. For Evan, played by Fran Kranz (CABIN IN THE WOODS) girlfriend problems and work woes are already causing him headaches – the last thing he needs is a vampire infestation to cap it all off. This fast, funny and very bloody feature slayed them in the aisles at its US Slamdance screenings.
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Film4 FrightFest #9
Body
Directors: Dan Berk & Robert Olsen. Cast: Helen Rogers, Alexandra Turshen, Lauren Molina, Adam Cornelius, Larry Fessenden. USA 2015. 75 mins.
A tight, smart, gripping, funny thriller brought to life with strong performances and a sharp visual eye. Three girlfriends head out for a wild night during the Christmas holidays, but their jaunt is about to turn deadly. Cali suggests they crash her rich uncle’s mansion since he’s out of town and soon they’re partying the night away. However there’s something Cali hasn’t told her BFFs and a series of questionable choices leads to an accidental death. Soon the fear of possible reprisals finds the terrified trio embarking on a course of action from which there is no return.
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Film4 FrightFest #10
Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter
Director: Brian Clemens. Cast: Horst Janson, Caroline Munro, John Cater, Ian Hendry, Wanda Ventham. UK 1972. 91 mins.
When a young maiden is drained of blood in the village of Durward, Captain Kronos is summoned to find the root cause. With his hunchback and gypsy dancer assistants in tow, Kronos traces the bloodsucker curse in the Hammer cult swashbuckler where ‘The Avengers’ TV series writer Brian Clemens made his directorial debut. Devised by The House of Horror to be first in a comedy adventure cycle featuring the evil-fighting hero, and starring prominent Scream Queen Caroline Munro, this rapier-witted, cleverly constructed and freewheeling mix of serial antics and Grand Guignol was one of Hammer’s best shots at 1970s rebranding.
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Film4 FrightFest #11
Cherry Tree
Director: David Keating. Cast: Anna Walton, Naomi Battrick, Sam Hazeldine, Patrick Gibson, Minnie Phipps. Ireland 2015. 90 mins.
Faith’s world is turned upside down when she finds out her father is dying. When the mysteriously alluring Sissy Young becomes her field hockey coach, Faith finds a compassionate spirit and much-needed mother figure. Little does she know that Sissy is the head of a centuries-old witches' coven using the fruit of an ancient cherry tree in a secret ritual that restores life. And soon Sissy has enticed Faith into making a fateful bargain that is about to change everything… From David Keating, the director of the critically acclaimed neo Hammer horror WAKE WOOD, comes another blood-freezing rural nightmare. -
Film4 FrightFest #12
Contracted: Phase II
Director: Josh Forbes. Cast: Alice Macdonald, Matt Mercer, Najarra Townsend, Elisha Yaffe, Charity Daw. USA 78 mins.
In 2013 Film4 FrightFest premiered the ferocious body horror CONTRACTED to great acclaim. In this shocking sequel the fear escalates as the sexually transmitted outbreak worsens and threatens to engulf all humanity. Prepare for some wince-inducing sequences of body horror and beyond which will have you squirming in your seat.
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Film4 FrightFest #13
Curtain
Director: Jaron Henrie-McCrea. Cast: Danni Smith, Tim Lueke, Martin Monahan, Rick Zahn, Preston Lawrence. USA 2015. 74 mins.
Danni moves into a New York apartment and starts sprucing the place up. She doesn’t know the previous tenant committed suicide in very strange circumstances. Nor does she know there’s a mysterious portal to another dimension in the bathroom that’s hungry for…. shower curtains! But where does this unusual gateway hidden behind the white tiling lead? That’s what Danni and her ‘Whale Saver’ chugger workmate Tim decide to find out. It’s an investigation into a unique phenomenon full of surprise and unimaginable horror as they both enter The Yonder in a stunningly directed, creatively devised and quirky oddball gem.
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Film4 FrightFest #14
Curve
Director: Iain Softley. Cast: Julianne Hough, Teddy Sears, Madalyn Horcher, Penelope Mitchell, Drew Rausch. USA 2015. 86 mins.
From the Blumhouse of hit horrors (home of THE PURGE, INSIDIOUS, PARANORMAL ACTIVITY and SINISTER franchises), a dark chiller loaded with unexpected twists and shocking turns. Bride-to-be Mallory is driving to Denver for her wedding when her car breaks down on a deserted highway. Accepting help from Good Samaritan Christian, she offers the handsome charmer a lift after he fixes the engine. But soon Christian’s sick agenda become clear and to avoid his clutches she deliberately crashes the car in the mountains. Trapped in her overturned vehicle, she must use every trick in the book to escape the predatory hitchhiker.
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Film4 FrightFest #15
Deathgasm
Director: Jason Lei Howden. Cast: Milo Cawthorne, James Blake, Kimberley Crossman, Sam Berkley, Daniel Cresswell. New Zealand 2015. 90 mins.
From the producers of HOUSEBOUND and FRANKENSTEIN’S ARMY, a splatstick shocker full of brutal, bloody, fanatical fun. When metal-thrashing outcast Brodie meets a kindred spirit in Zakk, they start their own band Deathgasm. Soon the duo’s resentment of the suburban wasteland leads them to sheet music said to grant the Ultimate Power to whoever plays it. But the music also summons the ancient evil entity Aeloth The Blind One who threatens to tear apart existence itself. With their classmates and family inhabited by demonic forces that turns them into psycho killers, can the wicked force be stopped devouring all mankind?
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Film4 FrightFest #16
James Wan's Demonic
Director: Will Canon. Cast: Maria Bello, Frank Grillo, Cody Horn, Dustin Milligan. Megan Park. USA 2015. 83 mins.
Director James Wan brought his magic touch to SAW, INSIDIOUS, THE CONJURING and FAST & FURIOUS 7. Now the ANNABELLE producer puts his name to another super-shock supernatural mystery. In the aftermath of a horrific massacre where five college students were brutally murdered inside an abandoned home, Detective Mark Lewis and psychologist Dr. Elizabeth Klein question the lone survivor of a ghost-hunting excursion that seemingly went horribly wrong. The amateur paranormal activists were simply seeking proof of poltergeist phenomenon at the supposed haunted house. But what started out as a harmless pursuit turned into something truly terrifying.
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Film4 FrightFest #17
Emelie
Director: Michael Thelin. Cast: Sarah Bolger, Joshua Rush, Carly Adams, Carl Bailey, Thomas Bair. USA 2015. 80 mins.
When their regular babysitter calls to say she’s unavailable, the Thompsons find a last minute replacement to look after their three kids Christopher, Sally and Jacob while they celebrate their 13th wedding anniversary. But no sooner have the unconcerned parents pulled out of the driveway than it becomes clear that Anna is no ordinary babysitter. As the evening creeps along the children begin to realise they might be in serious danger from the very psychologically disturbed woman who has invaded their home. Unnerving and superbly performed, this tense thriller announces director Michael Thelin as a genuine genre talent to watch.
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Film4 FrightFest #18
Estranged
Director: Adam Levins. Cast: James Cosmo, Amy Manson, Nora-Jane Noone, James Lance, Craig Conway. UK 2015. 88 mins.
January is forced to return home after six wild years abroad. A road accident has left her wheelchair-bound with amnesia. Not only has she forgotten her family, but also her childhood and is surprised to discover her home is a stately country manor. Trying to settle in with boyfriend Callum at her attentive side, she becomes even more distant from her family, who just want their old daughter back. The trouble is she cannot remember who that person was, or why she fled in the first place. Now she must learn all over again how terrible relatives can be.
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Film4 FrightFest #19
Farhope Tower
Director: April Mullen. Cast: John White, Tim Doiron, Evan Williams, April Mullen, Lauren Collins. Canada 2015. 82 mins.
Five paranormal investigators venture into the infamous Farhope Tower, known for its dark history of unexplained suicides, with dreams of landing a Reality TV deal. But they get more than they bargained for when they enter the strangely ever-changing layout, lair of the most powerful spirits they’ve ever faced. For once inside the derelict structure an omnipresent evil begins manipulating the team, and the higher they climb the more everything spirals out of control. For heaven’s sake, don’t go up! From the filmmakers behind 88 and DEAD BEFORE DAWN 3D comes a classy chiller to leave you super-creeped out.
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Film4 FrightFest #20
Final Girl
Director: Tyler Shields. Cast: Abigail Breslin, Wes Bentley, Alexander Ludwig, Logan Huffman, Cameron Bright. USA 2015. 85 mins.
Ever since she was a young girl, Veronica has been groomed by her mentor to become a lethal assassin, her sights set on devil-may-care murderers who think they are above the law. Her latest targets are a pack of wild child American Psychos who love nothing more than hunting distressed female prey in the woods. But when the wolf pack is manipulated into picking Veronica as their latest victim, they learn pretty fast they chose the wrong girl. Famed photographer Tyler Shields makes his feature debut with an exciting and stylish mash-up of SCREAM horror mythology and LA FEMME NIKITA.
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Film4 FrightFest #21
Frankenstein
Director: Bernard Rose. Cast: Xavier Samuel, Danny Huston, Carrie-Anne Moss, Tony Todd, Maya Erskine. USA 2015. 89 mins.
Mary Shelley’s immortal beloved lives again in CANDYMAN director Bernard Rose’s stylishly smart update of the classic myth set in present day Los Angeles. Adam is artificially created with a revolutionary 3D printer by married research scientists. But when bodily malfunctions relegate him to the scrapheap, Adam faces nothing but aggression and violence from the world around him as he discovers the true nature of humanity. Told from the Monster’s perspective and showcasing a stunning central performance by TWILIGHT star Xavier Samuel, this brilliant adaptation also gives horror icon Tony Todd his best role in years as blind hobo Eddie -
Film4 FrightFest #22
Future Shock! The Story of 2000AD
Director: Paul Goodwin. Cast: Pat Mills, Grant Morrison, Neil Gaiman, Kevin O’Neill, David Bishop. UK 2015. 105 mins.
Welcome to the unruly anarchy of 2000AD: the Galaxy's Greatest Comic. This enlightening and enjoyable documentary tells the story of the UK science-fiction comic that changed the face of the industry. First published in 1977, it was violent, anti-authoritarian, blackly funny and above all, idiosyncratically British. A comprehensive overview of its history, a warts-and-all look at the highs and lows, a peek inside the creative process of its most famous creators, and a funny, moving and passionate chronicle of how a band of talented eccentrics assembled to create a visionary and extraordinary comic that’s still a game-changer 36 years on.
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Film4 FrightFest #23
Goddess of Love
Director: Jon Knautz. Cast: Alexis Kendra, Monda Scott, Elizabeth Sandy, Woody Naismith, Ray Grady. USA 2015. 96 mins
Jon Knautz, director of past FrightFest favourites JACK BROOKS: MONSTER SLAYER and THE SHRINE, now invites you to feel the horrendous pain of heartbreak. Enter into a baroque vortex of madness when an emotionally unstable stripper is shattered after being dumped by her boyfriend. Brian was the love of Venus’ life and the thought of him having an affair with another woman begins her volatile descent into the dark side of psychosexual insanity. Co-writer Alexis Kendra plays Venus with startling insight in an erotic thriller that’s sexy and shocking in the super-stylish tradition of Brian De Palma and Roman Polanski.
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Film4 FrightFest #24
Hawk The Slayer
Director: Terry Marcel. Cast: John Terry, Jack Palance, Shane Briant, Patrick Magee, Ferdy Mayne. UK 1980. 90 mins.
The Kitsch Klassic is back on the screen where it belongs! Thrill to John Terry as handsome Hawk saving witches from pig farmers. Boo nasty Jack Palance as his one-eyed evil brother Voltan when he kidnaps a nun and puts her in a cage. Cheer as Hawk enlists a group of misfits to save her, including a brawny giant, an elfin archer, a conniving dwarf and a mystical blind enchantress. An awfully good sword and sorcery fantasy unlike any other, honestly! And one the filmmakers are hoping to make a sequel to if they can raise enough money.
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Film4 FrightFest #25
Hellions
Director: Bruce McDonald. Cast: Chloe Rose, Robert Patrick, Rachel Wilson, Rossif Sutherland, Luke Bilyk. Canada 2015. 82 mins.
After putting himself firmly on the genre map with PONTYPOOL, director Bruce McDonald returns with an atmospheric and impressive Halloween horror. Teenage Dora Vogel is coming to terms with an unwanted pregnancy. Yet to reveal the news to her mother, she simply wants to forget her current situation by partying Halloween night away. Putting on her angel costume she waits for her boyfriend to arrive. Instead, a malevolent group of monstrous pumpkin-headed trick-or-treaters come knocking with intentions of taking the unborn life inside her. Now Dora must use her sharpened survival instincts to endure the sinister demonic army until dawn.
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Film4 FrightFest #26
Hellraiser
Director: Clive Barker. Cast: Andrew Robinson, Ashley Laurence, Clare Higgins, Doug Bradley, Sean Chapman. UK 1987. 93 mins.
Popular horror writer Clive Barker proved he could direct with scintillating charnel house style in the film version of his novel ‘The Hellbound Heart’. A surreal, claustrophobic and graphic shocker laced with perverse chills, when an Oriental puzzle box is opened it leads the various owners to thresholds of sensual pleasure and pain. There lurk the Cenobites, leather-clad, disfigured angels from hell, whose sadism knows no bounds, especially the one they call Pinhead. Full of fearful flair and outrageous imagery, Barker’s cult sado-masochistic delight brought a sobering atmosphere to late 1980s horror and became a bona-fide genre classic.
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Film4 FrightFest #27
Hostile
Director: Nathan Ambrosioni. Cast: Julie Venturelli, Luna Belan, Shelley Ward, Anatolia Allieis, Nathan Ambrosioni. France 2015. 90 mins.
The New Wave of French horror cinema has arrived and at its vanguard is 14 year-old director Nathan Ambrosioni. Meredith Langston always longed to have children. She finally makes this happen when she adopts two young adolescent girls. However, her now idyllic world sours rapidly and dream veers to nightmare when she quickly finds that she is unable to cope with their increasingly strange behaviour. Desperate, she seeks the help of two journalists working for a local TV programme ‘SOS Adoption’. Unfortunately it is all for nothing, especially when the reporters discover that there is another presence in the house.
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Film4 FrightFest #28
Howl
Director: Paul Hyett. Cast: Ed Speleers, Shauna Macdonald, Rosie Day, Sean Pertwee, Duncan Preston. UK 2015. 95 mins.
Young ambitious ticket collector Joe is overseeing the last train out of London on a dark and stormy night - the usual collection of passengers on board from the obnoxious teen to the workaholic businesswoman. Suddenly the train screeches to a halt in a forest after hitting something on the tracks, but the investigating driver never returns. Realising an unknown and dangerous threat is lurking in the woods the disparate group of strangers must work together in order to survive a common feral enemy. Hairy horror and bloody action adventure from Paul Hyett, director of THE SEASONING HOUSE.
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Film4 FrightFest #29
III
Director: Pavel Khvaleev. Cast: Polina Davydova, Lyubov Ignatushko, Evgeniy Gagarin. Russia 2015. 89 mins.
During the outbreak of a mysterious deadly epidemic ravaging a rural European village, sisters Ayia and Mirra promise their dying mother to look after each other. When Mirra also falls victim to the disease, a desperate Ayia realizes that conventional medicine is not the answer. And at Father Herman’s house she discovers a Shamanic book containing spiritual healing rituals and clings to the hope this therapy will save her sister. But the mystical cure involves complete immersion into the victim’s deepest subconscious. What demons lie in wait for Ayia in this beautiful homage to Russian fairytales and Tarkovskian surreality?
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Film4 FrightFest #30
Inner Demon
Director: Ursula Dabrowsky. Cast: Sarah Jeavons, Kerry Ann Reid, Andreas Sobik. Australia 2015. 84 mins.
Want to know what the next big Australian horror thing is after THE BABADOOK? Well, it’s this stunning and highly unusual shocker featuring a tour-de-force central performance by Sarah Jeavons in her first starring role. She plays teenage Sam abducted one night along with her younger sister by a feral serial-killing couple. Escaping from the boot of their car, she finds refuge in an isolated farmhouse, only to discover it is home to even greater horrors. As the spectre of her own mortality looms large, Sam must confront a nightmare scenario where the building terror twists in ever astounding directions.
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Film4 FrightFest #31
Jeruzalem
Directors: Doran Paz, Yoav Paz. Cast: Tom Graziani, Yael Grobglas, Danielle Jadelyn, Yon Tumarkin. Israel 2015. 87 mins.
Old testament legend meets new terrorist reality in the latest shock sensation from the burgeoning Israeli horror explosion combining traditional cinema and ultra-realism with modern technology. While visiting Jerusalem, three American tourists find themselves trapped within the city walls as an apocalyptic event spreads throughout the holy enclave. For Judgement Day, the worst prophesy in the bible, is coming true and the terrified trio are on the inside capturing every bloody moment. Will they escape before all Hell breaks loose and the Dark Angels extinguish the light? Watch and marvel as the Paz Brothers put the grim in pilgrimage.
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Film4 FrightFest #32
Landmine Goes Click
Director: Levan Bakhia. Cast: Sterling Knight, Spencer Locke, Kote Tolordava, Dean Geyer, Nana Kiknadze. Georgia 2015. 100 mins.
Three American tourists are crossing the desolate mountains in the formerly war-torn republic of Georgia. Daniel has just proposed to Alicia and has asked Chris to be his best man, so they stop to take a celebration photograph. Chris steps to the right, the step goes click and he finds himself standing on a landmine. From that moment on Chris cannot move or he’s dead. But then secrets are revealed, dark motives uncovered, an outside threat appears and the real nightmare unfolds. For what happens on that terrifying afternoon will become a harbinger of doom for all lost innocence.
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Film4 FrightFest #33
Last Girl Standing
Director: Benjamin R. Moody. Cast: Akasha Villalobos, Danielle Evon Ploeger, Brian Villalobos, JD Carrera, Ryan Hamilton. USA 2015. 91 mins.
She survived a brutal massacre, but lost her life. What happens to the final girl once the credits have rolled? Five years ago, a masked killer brutally murdered a group of friends. Since then, Camryn, the lone survivor, has tried to make sense of the homicidal events and struggled to reclaim her shattered life. Wracked with guilt and paranoia, can Camryn ever have a normal existence again or is she destined to cope alone forever? Part slasher movie, part character study, take a penetrating and intimate look at what happens to the remaining true victim of every horror movie.
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Film4 FrightFest #34
Madman
Director Joe Giannone. Cast: Gaylen Ross, Tony Fish, Harriet Bass, Seth Jones, Jan Claire. USA 1982. 88 mins.
Submerse yourself in Grade A 1980s exploitation with this splatter lip-smacker from grindhouse heaven. The North Sea Cottages summer camp for gifted children is reopened as a counsellor-training centre. Over the campfire, the group leader recounts the bloody episode that got the place closed down – a rampage by the demented farmer ‘Madman’ Marz who killed his family, escaped a lynch mob and is said to still haunt the woods if his name is uttered. Guess what? It is and he does! Beautifully photographed, boasting great gore effects and scary suspense, the urban legend of axe-murderer Madman Marz lives on.
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Film4 FrightFest #35
Most Likely to Die
Director: Anthony DiBlasi. Cast: Heather Morris, Ryan Doom, Perez Hilton, Chad Addison, Tess Christiansen. USA 2015. 81 mins.
DREAD, CASSADAGA, LAST SHIFT and MISSIONARY director Anthony DiBlasi returns to make you SCREAM and scream again with a sly and scary homage to the 1980s slasher genre. ‘Glee’ star Heather Morris and ‘Celebrity Big Brother’ enfant terrible/showbiz gossip blogger Perez Hilton are part of a 10-year High School reunion hosted by a disgraced ice hockey player. Soon the party takes a deadly turn when one-by-one the former classmates, each with a secret shared history, turn up dead according to their senior yearbook superlatives. Who is the masked psycho with the razor-sharp mortarboard and what exactly is his problem?
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Film4 FrightFest #36
Never Let Go
Director: Director: Howard J. Ford. Cast: Angela Dixon, Rami Nasr, Nigel Whitmey, Lisa Eichhorn, Velibor Topic, Heather Peace, Sarah Perles, Sanita Simms, Glenn Salvage, Samantha Bolter, Michael Xavier . UK 2015. 93 mins.
A whiplash thriller in the lean, mean TAKEN tradition from Howard J. Ford, Director/Co-Writer, of the past FrightFest favourites THE DEAD and THE DEAD 2: INDIA. Former FBI agent, now single mother Lisa Brennan, takes a holiday to escape an unhappy love affair and painful family memories. But in a heartbeat is not only faced with a daughter kidnapped by human traffickers, but also faces murder charges and must keep one step ahead of the foreign police. Fasten your seatbelts for spectacular twists, startling turns and breathless suspense in a jolt-a-minute journey no mother should go on!
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Film4 FrightFest #37
Night Fare
Director: Julien Seri. Cast: Fanny Valette, Jonathan Howard, Jonathan Demurger, Jess Liaudin. France 2015. 80 mins.
MANIAC COP meets TAXI DRIVER in a stark, stylish and chic collision of gore, fear and thrills from Gallic visionary Julien Seri, director of SCORPION. Two guys in love with the same mademoiselle on their way to a party duck out of a Parisian taxi without paying the fare. Very Bad Move as they have chosen the wrong driver to upset. Keeping the meter running the mystery motorist hunts them down all night long killing everyone that gets in his way. Soon Chris and Luc start to realise the driver has other far more shocking plans for their future.
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Film4 FrightFest #38
Night of the Living Deb
Director: Kyle Rankin. Cast: Maria Thayer, Michael Cassidy, Ray Wise, Chris Marquette, Julie Brister. USA 2015. 85 mins.
After a girls' night out, endearingly awkward Deb wakes up in the apartment of the most attractive guy in Portland, Maine. She's thrilled, but can't remember how she got there. Pretty boy Ryan only knows it was a mistake and ushers her out the door... into a full-scale zombie apocalypse. Now, a walk of shame becomes a fight for survival as the mismatched pair discovers that the only thing scarier than trusting someone with your life... is trusting them with your heart. Great one-liners, a fabulous soundtrack and terrific performances – a touching rom-zom-com delight from the director of INFESTATION.
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Film4 FrightFest #39
Nina Forever
Directors: Ben Blaine, Chris Blaine. Cast: Fiona O'Shaughnessy, Abigail Hardingham, Cian Barry, David Troughton, Elizabeth Elvin. UK 2015. 98 mins.
Rob is a supermarket shelf-filler who tried to kill himself after depression brought on by the sudden tragic death of his girlfriend Nina. Checkout girl Holly has a morbid fascination with pain and death and puts Rob on her want list. Sexual sparks fly when they do finally get together. There’s just one problem. Even though she’s dead, sarcastic Nina has no intention of letting go of her ex. But can Rob and Holly really cope with a forever zombie threesome? A sly and tender zom-rom-com about breaking up, moving on and getting over love and unorthodox relationships.
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Film4 FrightFest #40
Pod
Director: Mickey Keating. Cast: Lauren Ashley-Carter, Brian Morvant, Dean Cates, John Weselcouch, Larry Fessenden. USA 2015. 80 mins.
Ed and Lyla are so worried about their psychologically unstable brother Martin they head to the family cabin in the woods to stage an intervention. What greets them is a raving paranoid individual rambling about a government conspiracy that’s threatening his life and claiming he’s holding a military issue prototype ‘pod’ in the cellar. Is the veteran soldier having the complete mental breakdown they feared? Or could it really be true? Prepare for sustained shock and horrified awe in an intense, kinetic, in-your-face thriller-cum-hard-edged creature feature in this full-tilt family psychodrama that’s enthralling, terrifying and wildly entertaining.
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Film4 FrightFest #41
Rabid Dogs
Director: Éric Hannezo. Cast: François Arnaud, Franck Gastambide, Guillaume Gouix. Lambert Wilson, Virginie Ledoyen. France 2015. 90 mins.
In 1974, Italian horror maestro Mario Bava directed a brutal kidnap thriller that was never completed because a key investor tragically died. Finally taken off the shelf in 1996 and released with new footage by Bava’s son Lamberto, RABID DOGS was acclaimed as a minimalist noir masterpiece, one that would have put the cult director on a new career path. Now first-time director Éric Hannezo and THE HORDE co-writer/director Yannick Dahan take Bava’s template of a bank job gone wrong for three desperate criminals fighting for survival and weave a fast and furious, white-knuckle violent road trip. Hold on tight!
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Film4 FrightFest #42
Remake, Remix, Rip-off
Director: Cem Kaya. Cast: Cetin Inanc, Kunt Tulgar, Memduh Un, Giovanni Scognamillo, 2014, 96 mins
Forget the crazy Ozzies and the mad flavours of the Philippines – it’s now time for the Turks to show you exactly how it’s done. The Duke Mitchell Film Club is proud to present a story so crazy that it could only be true. Come and experience the golden years of Turkish cinema, where demand was high, technical know-how low and copyright law non-existent! Meet the maverick band of filmmakers who, armed with nothing more than a handful of cameras and written on the run scripts, remade some of the biggest blockbusters of the century (The Exorcist, Star Wars and more) with no regard for anyone’s safety, including their own!
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Film4 FrightFest #43
Road Games
Director: Abner Pastoll. Cast: Barbara Crampton, Andrew Simpson, Joséphine de La Baume, Frédéric Pierrot, Lou Castel. UK/France 2015. 90 mins.
Summertime and the living is deadly! Abner Pastoll channels AND SOON THE DARKNESS and MUMSY, NANNY, SONNY & GIRLY with his tense thriller feature debut set in rural France that touches every twisted nerve. When hitchhiker Jack rescues Véronique from a road rage altercation, the twosome decide to travel together for safety’s sake after learning a serial killer is cutting a murderous swathe through the region. Tired and hungry they decide against their better judgment to take up an offer to stay the night at a mysterious elderly couple’s mansion. Let the deranged, demented and bloody escapades begin…
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Film4 FrightFest #44
Scherzo Diabolico
Director: Adrián García Bogliano. Cast: Francisco Barreiro, Daniela Soto Vell, Jorge Molina, Milena Pezzi, Vita Vargas. Mexico/USA 2015. 91 mins.
The latest opus from LATE PHASES, HERE COMES THE DEVIL and PENUMBRA director Adrián García Bogliano is his brightest and best yet. Armed with a fine-tuned chokehold and penchant for piano sonatas by French composer Charles-Valentin Alkan, Aram (WE ARE WHAT WE ARE star Francisco Barreiro) is a bored and frustrated accountant wanting to improve his life status. So he puts into action an ingenious plan that includes the kidnapping of a teenage girl. But what starts as a carefully calculated strategy soon crescendos into his worst nightmare in this delightfully twisted black comedy thriller in the vintage Hitchcock tradition.
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Film4 FrightFest #45
Shut In
Director: Adam Schindler. Cast: Beth Riesgraf, Martin Starr, Jack Kesy, Rory Culkin, Leticia Jimenez. USA 2015. 90 mins.
Anna Rook is isolated from human contact in nearly every way, which is exactly how she likes it. Suffering from crippling agoraphobia and holed up in an old Victorian mansion on the outskirts of town, the people in Anna’s life can be counted on two fingers: her terminally-ill brother, Conrad, and the charismatic Meals-on-Wheels driver, Dan. But Anna’s home is about to be invaded by a trio of small-time criminals after a hidden stash of cash. She can’t bring herself to flee, but what the intruders don't realise is that agoraphobia is the least of her psychoses.
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Film4 FrightFest #46
Slumlord
Director: Victor Zarcoff. Cast: PJ McCabe, Sean Carrigan, Sarah Baldwin, Brianne Moncrief, Neville Archambault. USA 2015. 87 mins.
Newlyweds Claire and Ryan have just moved into a new house. Both are hoping Claire’s pregnancy will be the cement needed to hold their already fraying relationship together. Little do they know their marital issues are the least of their problems. For unbeknownst to them, their scruffy, sleazy and lascivious landlord has installed numerous miniature cameras all over their home and has been spying on them from Day One. Then Ryan begins an office affair, and the landlord kits out the secret basement with chains and soundproofing. Something is going to give in this suburban shocker packed with nasty surprises.
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Film4 FrightFest #47
Some Kind of Hate
Director: Adam Egypt Mortimer. Cast: Ronen Rubinstein, Grace Phipps, Spencer Breslin, Maestro Harrell, Sierra McCormick. USA 2015. 83 mins.
What if your past came back for you as a fully formed, physical thing that was going to kill you? Tightly wound Lincoln is a favourite target for the local high school bullies. One day he violently snaps and is sent to the Mind’s Eye Academy, a remote desert reformatory. But the harassment doesn’t stop and in despair he accidentally summons the kindred spirit of Moira, a girl tormented to suicide in the same establishment, who is more than happy to take vengeance on his persecutors. Director Adam Egypt Mortimer calls his payback body counter “A feminist slasher movie”.
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Film4 FrightFest #48
Stung
Director: Benni Diez. Cast: Matt O’Leary, Jessica Cook, Lance Henriksen, Clifton Collins Jr., Cecilia Pillado. Germany 2015. 85 mins.
Every year wealthy Mrs. Perch throws a fancy garden party at her country villa. Caterers Paul and Julia are hired to organise the bar and buffet and think that’s all they have to worry about. Wrong! Mrs Perch’s illegally imported plant fertilizer has infected a local species of killer wasps and with the celebrations in full swing the swarm attack, lay eggs in their human prey, which then mutate into 7-foot tall predators with an attitude. Can Paul and Julia stop the insectoid nightmare and continue their stumbling romance? Get your buzz on with this enormously fun creature feature.
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Film4 FrightFest #49
Summer Camp
Director: Alberto Marini. Cast: Diego Boneta, Maiara Walsh, Jocelin Donahue, Andres Velencoso, Rick Zingale. Spain 2015. 81 mins.
Alberto Marini, producer of the [REC] trilogy, SLEEP TIGHT and THE LAST DAYS, turns director with a sly scaremonger loaded with witty visual touches, Spanish horror homage and gory shocks. Looking for fun times as counsellors at a European summer camp for children, four Americans never suspect their first experience abroad might be their last. For the rapid-fire spread of an extreme rage-inducing infection plunges the group into a dark vortex of horror and madness catapulting them into a race against time – and each other – to find the source of the mystery contagion and make it out alive.
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Film4 FrightFest #50
Sun Choke
Director: Ben Cresciman. Cast: Sarah Hagan, Barbara Crampton, Sara Malakul Lane, Evan Jones, Jim Boeven. USA 2015. 90 mins.
Horror comes screaming into the light in a masterpiece of mystery and menace. Janie (a career defining performance from ‘Freaks and Geeks’ Sarah Hagan) is just trying to get well. Recovering from a violent psychotic break, she’s subjected each day to a bizarre holistic health and wellness regimen designed, and enforced, by her lifelong nanny and caretaker. Finally granted permission to leave her LA house, Janie develops an obsession with Savannah to whom she feels an inexplicable yet profound connection. The obsession turns increasingly invasive, and wedges all three women into an ever-tightening, and progressively terrifying struggle for control.
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Film4 FrightFest #51
Suspension
Director: Jeffrey Scott Lando. Cast: Ellen MacNevin, Sage Brocklebank, Johannah Newmarch, Steve Richmond, Connor Fielding. Canada 2015. 87 mins.
The Night Daddy Came Home! Tormented at high school, Emily Hanson’s only escape is drawing graphic sketches depicting a crazed masked killer on a bloody rampage. Except the deranged maniac is her father who snapped eight years ago and is now locked away in a mental institution where Emily’s bullying classmates taunt she should be too. On the anniversary of his massacre, the In Crowd throw a party while Emily babysits her mute little brother. Little does she know she’s in for a night of unrelenting terror and madness, forced to confront her demons once and for all.
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Film4 FrightFest #52
Tales of Halloween
Directors: Darren Lynn Bousman, Axelle Carolyn, Adam Gierasch, Andrew Kasch, Neil Marshall, Lucky McKee, Mike Mendez, Dave Parker, Ryan Schifrin, John Skipp , Paul Solet. Cast: Lin Shaye, Pollyanna McIntosh, John Landis, Adrienne Barbeau, Greg Grunberg. USA 2015. 111 mins.
Join our celebration of all things Halloween with a host of past FrightFest guests both in front of and behind the camera with this spooky, scary and shocking omnibus. Ten tales of terror unfold in a sleepy American suburb on All Hallows Eve as ghouls, imps, aliens, goblins, demons, axe murders and serial killers roam the witching hour. You’ll meet Sweet Tooth, The Weak and the Wicked, Rusty Rex and the Grim Grinning Ghost in an anthology of power nightmares directed by the cream of the scream industry crop.
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Film4 FrightFest #53
Tenderness of Wolves
Director: Ulli Lommel. Cast: Kurt Raab, Jeff Roden, Margit Carstensen, Ingrid Caven, Wolfgang Schenck. Germany 1973. 82 mins.
Produced by wunderkind Rainer Werner Fassbinder, starring his German rep company and directed by Ulli Lommel who helmed THE BOOGEY MAN slasher classic. Art-house horror never looked as good as this skilful tribute to the silent NOSFERATU and Peter Lorre’s M detailing the pre-Hitler case of police informer Fritz Haarman, the paedophiliac homosexual rapist who killed 25 boys and sold their flesh as meat on the black market after sucking their blood. A fascinating portrait of murderous obsession and portrayal of the decadent nightlife and squalor of depression-torn Hanover, this poem to neo-expressionism is a masterpiece of the macabre.
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Film4 FrightFest #54
The Diabolical
Alistair Legrand. Cast: Ali Larter, Patrick Fischler, Arjun Gupta, Tom Wright, Chloe Perrin. USA 2015. 86 mins.
From the producers of THE PACT and THE DIVIDE comes a highly unusual genre-blending shocker with a twist. Single mother Madison and her two children keep being awoken nightly by an increasingly strange and intense presence. Seeking help from her scientist boyfriend, they embark on a hunt to destroy the violent spirit that paranormal experts are too scared to take on. But what is Project Echo and why does that past experiment seem to be impacting on their frightening present? Find out in the wild and weird feature debut of genre-influenced commercials and music video helmer Alistair Legrand.
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Film4 FrightFest #55
The Entity
Director: Eduardo Schuldt. Cast: Daniella Mendoza, Rodrigo Fala, Carlos Casella, Mario Gaviria, Diego Seminario. Peru 2015. 80 mins.
THE RING goes ‘found footage’ Peruvian in a terrific example of the continually igniting South American new horror wave. A group of media students embark on a documentary project covering ‘Reaction Videos’ - filming people watching intense shock footage online to monitor their psychological effect. And they find one example so terrifying the viewers have all died in mysterious circumstances. But what exactly is on this gruesome Internet footage? Their search leads to an obscure corner of cyberspace known as the Dark Web, a Quechua curse dating from the Spanish Inquisition and a demonic power they cannot escape from.
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Film4 FrightFest #56
The Hallow
Director: Corin Hardy. Cast: Joseph Mawle, Bojana Novakovic, Michael Smiley, Colm Donnelly, Stuart Graham. UK 2015. 95 mins.
It’s the Sundance sensation that snared rising star talent Corin Hardy the plum job of directing THE CROW reboot. Tree surgeon Adam Hitchens moves with his wife Claire and infant son Finn to a picturesque millhouse in the Irish countryside. But their rural idyll soon turns into a terrifying fight for survival when they ignore local folklore legend and come under attack from forest-dwelling demonic monsters. Stylish and arresting, the ‘fake shemp’ credit reveals everything you need to know about this wicked cabin-in-the-woods blend of EVIL DEAD intensity, Lucio Fulci-type gore, white-knuckle scares and sustained mythic dread.
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Film4 FrightFest #57
The Hangman
Director: Adam Mason. Cast: Jeremy Sisto, Kate Ashfield, Ryan Simpkins, Ty Simpkins, Eric Michael Cole. USA 2015. 85 mins.
Chilling and convincing, FrightFest alumnus Adam Mason returns to the fold with a found-footage FUNNY GAMES. Arriving back from a two-week holiday, the Miller family unwittingly play host to a cold-hearted malevolent intruder who has broken into their home - and stayed there. Feeling violated, they have no idea he’s still watching their every move on surveillance cameras the meticulous interloper has secretly installed. Nor do they realise their true nightmares have only just begun. Horrors of the everyday reach a terrifying crescendo in this disturbing twist on the home invasion thriller bound to make your skin crawl.
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Film4 FrightFest #58
The Lazarus Effect
Director: David Gelb. Cast: Olivia Wilde, Mark Duplass, Sarah Bolger, Evan Peters, Donald Glover. USA 2015. 83 mins.
New-fangled pseudoscience meets old-time religion in this neo FLATLINERS marking the impressive narrative debut of documentary director David Gelb (JIRO DREAMS OF SUSHI). Classic horror themes about death, life and the soul are given a scary shot in the arm when a team of researchers believe they've discovered a serum that could resurrect the recently deceased. But before they're able to reveal their breakthrough to the scientific community, they get shut down accused of playing God. So they go rogue to recreate their experiments and when one of their number is accidentally electrocuted their journey into the afterlife unknown begins.
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Film4 FrightFest #59
The Lesson
Director: Ruth Platt. Cast: Robert Hands, Evan Bendall, Michaela Prchalová, Rory Coltart, Joshua Wedge. UK 2015. 98 mins.
Learning can be murder in writer/director Ruth Platt’s astonishingly bravura art-house horror, the no-holds-barred love child of Ben Wheatley, Harmony Korine, Ken Loach and Fritz Lang. Fin and Joel are two teenage wasters running wild in an arid rural landscape. But their bad education is about to take a turn for the intellectual best as someone at the end of their tether has decided to teach both schoolboys a lesson they will never forget. A dark, claustrophobic and bloody coming of age love story with a shock final destination, this morally challenging chiller will shake your well-ordered world.
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Film4 FrightFest #60
The Nightmare
Director: Rodney Ascher. Cast: Yatoya Toy, Siegfried Peters, Steven Yvette, Age Wilson. USA 2015. 82 mins.
From the acclaimed director of the Stanley Kubrick analysis ROOM 237, a perceptive look at the frightening condition that plagues many people. Sleep paralysis is a variety of dream state that seizes a person and makes them prisoner of their own ghoulish hallucination. This unique and startling documentary profiles a dozen such severely afflicted individuals and invites you into their brains via vivid reconstructions of their worst reveries. With its chilling anecdotes of sinister visions and horrifying dramatisations, this tricky balance of visceral fright and sincere investigation could be considered distressing, is rather bloodcurdling and may freak you out.
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Film4 FrightFest #61
The Reflecting Skin
Director: Philip Ridley. Cast: Viggo Mortensen, Lindsay Duncan, Jeremy Cooper, Sheila Moore, Duncan Fraser. UK 1990. 96 mins.
Philip Ridley's first feature film The Reflecting Skin remains one of the most distinctive and original debuts in British Film. Visually ravishing and - like all Ridley films (The Passion of Darkly Noon, Heartless) - a breathtaking mash-up of genres and tonal shifts, this 'nightmare of childhood' is open to endless interpretation. Set in a mythical 1950s rural Idaho, 8 year-old Seth is confronted by the horrors of mortality when he meets the seductive killers driving a black Cadillac, and the mysterious ‘vampire’ lady Dolphin Blue. Confronting us with our own primal fears of the dark - with luminous photography and a sumptuous soundtrack - Ridley's visionary and haunting film exerts a unique and timeless hypnotic pull.
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Film4 FrightFest #62
The Sand
Director: Isaac Gabaeff. Cast: Mitchel Musso, Dean Geyer, Nikki Leigh, Brooke Butler, Meagan Holder. USA 2015. 84 mins
Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water again, you can’t even get across the sand! BLOOD BEACH meets SPRING BREAKERS in an ace monster mash-up of smart nostalgia and up-to-the-minute visual effects. After an all-night graduation beach party, a group of hung-over students wake up under blazing sun to find their numbers somewhat depleted. An enormous alien creature has burrowed down deep and anyone foolish enough to make contact with the sand finds themselves at the mercy of a sea of flesh-eating tentacles. Will they ever be able to escape its carnivorous clutches?
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Film4 FrightFest #63
The Shelter
Director: John Fallon. Cast: Michael Paré, Lauren Alexandra, Rachel G. Whittle, Amy Wickenheiser, Gayle James. Canada 2015. 76 mins.
On a star-filled night, homeless Thomas seeks warm shelter. Still grieving his late wife, ruined and desperate, he comes across a vast house with the lights on and an inviting open front door. But the next morning, the premises will not let him leave. Destiny has brought Thomas to this place and now he must survive a very personal ordeal. For what appeared a safe haven turns out to be something far more malevolent. From Arrow in The Head blogger, writer and director John Fallon, a psychological horror show tapping into fears of the mind, body and soul.
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Film4 FrightFest #64
The Unfolding
Director: Eugene McGing. Cast: Lachlan Nieboer, Robert Daws, Nick Julian, Kitty McGeever, Lisa Kerr. UK. 87 mins.
It is 2016 and a fearful world seems to be on the brink of a nuclear catastrophe. A researcher in psychical events and his girlfriend travel to deepest Dartmoor to investigate a centuries-old building. What they unlock and discover is way more than they could have ever bargained for. An exciting first feature from newcomer Eugene McGing, who expertly takes familiar tropes and gives them a fresh spin in this genuinely terrifying haunted house tale.
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Film4 FrightFest #65
These Final Hours
Director: Zak Hilditch. Cast: Nathan Phillips, Angourie Rice, Jessica de Gouw, Kathryn Beck, Daniel Henshall, Sarah Snook and Lynette Curran. Australia 2014. 87 mins.
It has taken the fantasy festival circuit by storm and now you can finally see what everyone has been raving about in this gripping look at the spectrum of human behaviour in the face of impending doom. The fiery effects of a crash-landed asteroid are wiping out the planet and heading for their last devastating stop: Australia. And there's nothing anyone in the coastal city of Perth can do but wait. And party. Go horrendously crazy. Or find redemption where they least expect it. Witness the last days of man on Earth in this amped-up, adrenaline-fuelled apocalyptic vision with balls.
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Film4 FrightFest #66
They Look Like People
Director: Perry Blackshear. Cast: MacLeod Andrews, Evan Dumouchel, Margaret Ying Drake, Elena Greenlee, Mick Casale. USA 2015. 80 mins.
Two once close friends meet up in New York after ten years. Christian is a hip marketer trying to increase his personal coolness. Wyatt has just left his job as a nunnery gardener. Wanting to reconnect, Christian asks Wyatt to stay over. But at 4 a.m. Wyatt receives a call telling him to prepare for war, leave the city and beware of infection. Should he protect his best friend from the impending apocalypse, or from himself? Audacious, unsettling, full of tension, emotion, creative boldness and heartfelt compassion, this brilliant feature debut is a master class in independent budget filmmaking.
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Film4 FrightFest #67
Turbo Kid
Directors: François Simard, Anouk Whissell, Yoann-Karl Whissell. Cast: Munro Chambers, Laurence Leboeuf, Michael Ironside, Edwin Wright, Aaron Jeffery. Canada/New Zealand 2015. 95 mins.
It’s 1997. In a post-apocalyptic world a young kid obsessed by comic books lives in an underground bunker and survives by scavenging in the Wasteland. His life is turned upside down when the evil Zeus who controls the water supply with an iron fist kidnaps his mysterious new friend Apple. And the reluctant hero must find the courage to face his fears if he is going to save her. Take a BMX bike ride into outlandish MAD MAX territory with an endearingly sincere romp through a pitch-perfect pastiche of hip 1980s popcorn flicks, giddy carnage, retro violence and touching romance.
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Film4 FrightFest #68
We Are Still Here
Director: Ted Geoghegan. Cast: Barbara Crampton, Andrew Sensenig, Lisa Marie, Larry Fessenden, Monte Markham. USA 2015. 83 mins.
The producers of THE HOUSE OF THE DEAD and CHEAP THRILLS serve up a tense ghost story in the Italianate Lucio Fulci/Pupi Avati tradition. After their teenage son is killed in a car crash, Paul and Anne move to the New England countryside to start a new life. But the grieving couple unknowingly becomes the prey of a family of vengeful spirits that reside in their converted funeral parlour home. And so begins a terrifying fight back against the living hiding a terrible secret and the malicious dead demanding a sacrifice that threatens to pull their cursed souls into hell.
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Film4 FrightFest #69
Wind Walkers
Director Russell Friedenberg. Cast: Zane Holtz, Glen Powell, Kiowa Gordon, Philip Burke, Castille Landon. USA 2015. 93 mins.
A group of friends and family descend into the Everglades swamplands for their annual hunting trip only to discover that they are the ones being hunted. A malevolent entity is tracking them and they begin to realise one of their party may be possessed by something brought home from a tour of duty in the Middle East – a demon of war so horrible and deadly they are unaware of its devilish presence. Or are they facing something even more unspeakable, a legendary Native American curse about to unleash its dreadful legacy of thirsting for colonial revenge by claiming more souls?
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Film4 FrightFest #70
Worry Dolls
Director: Padraig Reynolds. Cast: Christopher Wiehl, Kym Jackson, Samantha Smith, Kennedy Brice, Tina Lifford. USA 2015. 85 mins.
A brutal serial killer is finally gunned down in the middle of carrying out one last heinous act of bloody murder. In the maniac’s possession, a box of Guatemalan talismans, which mistakenly end up being sold as charm jewelry in Chloe’s Collectables thrift shop. Soon those who bought the Worry Dolls begin to act strangely out of character and cause another rash of senseless slaughter. An ancient curse is consuming the city and pits a hardened detective against the clock to save his 8 year-old daughter’s life. The latest horror thriller from Padraig Reynolds, director of THE RITES OF SPRING.
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Film4 FrightFest #71
Your Vice is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key
Director: Sergio Martino. Cast: Edwige Fenech, Anita Strindberg, Luigi Pistilli, Ivan Rassimov, Daniela Giordano. Italy 1972. 92 mins.
A keynote Giallo from Euro-thriller maestro Sergio (TORSO) Martino, starring the undisputed Queen of Italian Erotica Edwige Fenech, and rife with the genre’s beloved elements – substance abuse, gratuitous sex, hippie communes and bloody homicide spaghetti style. A burnt-out novelist haunted by the memory of his dead mother makes life miserable for his humiliated wife. When his mistress is found slashed to ribbons, the crime initiates a series of gory slayings that drives everyone to the brink of deranged insanity. Edgar Allan Poe meets Giallo in this alluring exploitation classic suffused with a decadent ambience, calculating cruelty and perverse twists.
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Film4 FrightFest #72
Zombie Fight Club
Director: Joe Chien. Cast: Andy On, Jessica Cambensy, Michael Wong, Terence Yin, Abby Fung. Hong Kong 2014. 95 mins.
The highly anticipated sequel to the splatterific ZOMBIE 108 finds stars Andy On and Jessica C escaping a zombie overrun apartment block in the corner of near-future devastated Taipei city. In the midst of this zombie holocaust, with all social structures on the brink of collapse, contaminated drugs cause hordes of rappers and strippers to become infected and join the aggressive flesheaters. When a SWAT team arrives on the scene, it seems the cavalry have arrived, but they only want the stash of drug cash in this boobs and blood mix of THE RAID and DAWN OF THE DEAD.
