FrightFest 2017: Cult of Chucky’s World Premiere Leads a Stellar List of Horror

Jonathan Barkan |

Jun 30, 2017

London’s annual FrightFest film festival has revealed its 2017 lineup; and they’ll be bringing a mix of new, unreleased titles as well as screening a few horror classics!

The big reveal is that Don Mancini’s Cult of Chucky will be having its world premiere at the event with Mancini, Jennifer Tilly, Fiona Dourif, and apparently Chucky himself in attendance! I’m guessing that means Brad Dourif will be there as well, but who knows what tricks they have up their sleeves?

Another incredible world premiere? Leatherface, the long-awaited prequel to Tobe Hooper’s 1974 classic The Texas Chain Saw Massacre!

Having their European premieres will be Adam Wingard’s Death Note, Mickey Keating’s Psychopaths, Trent Haaga’s 68 Kill, Caroline Labrèche & Steeve Léonard’s Radius, and more. The full list of films can be found below.

Tickets will be available right here beginning July 1st.

Thursday, August 24th

Cult of Chucky
Director: Don Mancini.
With: Jennifer Tilly, Fiona Dourif, Andy Barclay, Alex Vincent, Michael Therriault.
USA 2017. 91 mins
Confined to an asylum for the criminally insane for the past four years, Nica Pierce is erroneously convinced that she, not Chucky, murdered her entire family. But when her psychiatrist introduces a new therapeutic “tool” to facilitate his patients’ group sessions – an all-too-familiar “Good Guy” doll – a string of grisly deaths begins to plague the asylum, and Nica starts to wonder if maybe she isn’t crazy after all. Andy Barclay, Chucky’s now-grown-up original nemesis races to Nica’s aid. But he’ll have to get past Tiffany, Chucky’s bride, who will do anything, no matter how deadly or depraved, to help her beloved devil doll.

Death Note
Director: Adam Wingard.
With: Margaret Qualley, Lakeith Stanfield, Willem Dafoe, Shea Whigham, Nat Wolff.
USA 2017. 101 mins.
Based on the famous Japanese manga written by Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata, YOU’RE NEXT/THE GUEST director Adam Wingard’s remake follows high school student Light Turner who comes across a supernatural notebook with the power to kill any person whose name he writes in it. Intoxicated with his new godlike abilities, Light launches a secret crusade and begins to kill those he deems unworthy of life. Soon, the student-turned-vigilante finds himself pursued by a reclusive detective known only by the alias L and a deadly game of cat and mouse begins to end his reign of terror.

Psychopaths
Director: Mickey Keating.
With: Ashley Bell, James Landry Hébert, Angela Trimbur, Larry Fessenden, Mark Kassen.
USA 2017. 85 mins.
The paths of multiple serial killers cross over one single, blood soaked night. Which psychopath will survive through to morning? Follow the soul of a recently executed serial killer as he descends back to earth and possesses his many followers beneath the full moon. There’s Alice, an escaped mental patient who thinks she’s living in the 1950s glamour world, Blondie, a beautiful seductress who lures men down into her suburban basement, the Midnight Strangler, first seen claiming a victim in a seedy hotel, and an enigmatic masked contract killer who stalks the city with his own deadly agenda.

Redwood
Director: Tom Paton.
With: Nicholas Brendon, Tatjana Nardone, Mike Beckingham, Muzz Khan, Jessica Jane Stafford.
UK 2017. 80 mins.
After some bad news back at home, musician Josh and his girlfriend Beth head out to a secluded national park in search of some clarity on the situation they’ll face when they return. But the couple get more than they bargained for when they ignore the advice of Park Rangers and venture off the trail, coming face to face with The Redwood’s legendary wildlife. REDWOOD brings a fresh spin to a well-worn mythology to create an edge of your seat horror movie that will shred your nerves and have you thinking twice about going camping again.

Friday, August 25th

Freehold
Director: Dominic Bridges.
With: Mim Shaikh, Javier Botet, Mandeep Dhillon, Kola Bokinni, Michael McKell.
UK 2017. 80 mins.
The feature debut from acclaimed commercials director Dom Bridges and written by Rae Brunton (the OUPOST franchise) is a dark urban morality tale with an underlying streak of jet black comedy. Hussein, a wide-boy estate agent, doesn’t realise he’s sharing his apartment with a forgotten stranger, a master of concealment… until his malicious campaign of deranged sweet revenge starts to really hit home. A roof above our heads is a basic human need so why are we all fighting each other over it? A genre riff on home invasion chillers and a searing comment on the cut-throat housing market.

Sequence Break
Director: Graham Skipper.
With: Chase Williamson, Fabianne Therese, Audrey Wasilewski, Lisa Long, Lyle Kanouse.
USA 2017. 81 mins.
ALTERED STATES meets VIDEODROME in a surreal sci-fi romance written and directed by one of FrightFest’s favourite people, Graham Skipper, star of ALMOST HUMAN, THE MIND’S EYE and BEYOND THE GATES. A reclusive video arcade technician encounters strange metaphysical forces that result in bizarre bio-mechanical mutations when a new console appears in his shop. Reality itself threatens to fracture as he works to solve its mystery and the new chaos that has entered his life as he hurtles towards a shocking self-realization. Let the haunting kaleidoscope of stunning colour, grotesque visuals, stylish fright and disturbing horror begin!

Radius
Directors: Caroline Labrèche & Steeve Léonard.
With: Diego Klattenhoff, Charlotte Sullivan, Brett Donahue, Nazariy Demkowicz,Terry Ray.
Canada 2017. 87 mins.
Liam wakes from a car crash with no memory of who he is. As he makes his way into town to look for help, he finds only dead bodies, all with strange pale eyes. Liam’s first assessment is that a virus is present in the air and starts taking every precaution. But he soon discovers the horrible truth: anyone who comes within a 50-foot radius of him dies instantly. Then he meets Jane with whom he seems to have some sort of bizarre connection. However neither is prepared for the terrifying and appalling truth that binds them together.

68 Kill
Director: Trent Haaga.
With: Matthew Gray Gubler, AnnaLynne McCord, Alisha Boe, Sheila Vand, Sam Eidson.
USA 2017. 93 mins.
Chip (Matthew Gray Gubler, star of ‘Criminal Minds’) is a hapless nice guy who pumps sewage for a living and is completely infatuated with his out-of-control girlfriend, Liza (AnnaLynne McCord). Realizing she wants a better life outside of their trailer park, Liza informs the besotted Chip of her plan to prosperity: jack the $68,000 currently residing in her sugar daddy’s safe and take off together for greener pastures outside of Louisiana. But when their robbery attempt goes crazily wrong, she shows her true, off-kilter colours to her beloved, complicating both their relationship and Chip’s own upstanding sense of morality.

Leatherface
Directors: Julien Maury & Alexandre Bustillo.
With: Stephen Dorff, Lili Taylor, Nicole Andrews, Sam Strike, Sam Coleman.
USA 2017. 90 mins
Want to know the shocking incidents, twisted psychology and outrageous bloodshed that led up to THE TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE, the classic 1974 horror? Well, if your nerves can stand it, directors Julien Maury and Alexandre Bustillo, the duo who helmed the extreme French masterpiece INSIDE, will take you on one of the most terrifying experiences of your life in this stunning prequel. Four teenage patients escape from a mental institution, kidnap a nurse and take her on a road trip to hell. Pursued by a deranged lawman bent on revenge, the human skin-masked monster is about to appear…

Dead Shack
Director: Peter Ricq.
With: Lauren Holly, Valerie Tian, Donavon Stinson, Lizzie Boys, June B. Wilde.
Canada 2017. 85 mins.
Take a typical Amblin Entertainment movie from the 1980s and flip it into stark terror and that’s this dark comedy shocker from an exciting new Canadian director Peter Ricq, creator of the animated television series ‘The League Of Super Evil’ and ‘Freaktown’. A group of teens on a weekend getaway at a secluded cabin in the woods soon find themselves fighting off a serious threat to their lives. Not only that they must save their hard-partying, drunk and stoned parents from a predatory neighbour who is hellbent on feeding them all to her undead family.

The Glass Coffin
Director: Haritz Zubillaga.
With: Paola Bontempi.
Spain 2016. 75 mins.
Dressed for the occasion in an elegant evening dress, Amanda enters the huge and luxurious limousine waiting in front of her house to take her to the gala where she will receive a prize for her acting career. Suddenly the windows are tinted black, Amanda’s cell phone is disabled and she cannot open any of the doors. And then a voice, distorted by a metallic filter, starts a series of lurid, invasive and shocking commands. Trapped inside her glass coffin unless Amanda wants some really unpleasant things to happen to her, she had better do whatever the sinister voice asks.

Good Match
Director: David Chirchirillo.
With: Lili Simmons, Noureen DeWulf, Chase Williamson, Jack Cutmore-Scott, Brandon Scott.
USA 2017. 90 mins.
An Internet-dating playboy’s life spirals out of control after meeting a woman online in a darkly funny, yet disturbing horror suspense thriller. A look at modern dating techniques and the way people use the Internet to inform and often needlessly complicate their lives. From director David Chirchirillo, the writer of CHEAP THRILLS, a postmodern FATAL ATTRACTION for the Tinder Generation, which builds upon expectations, and then completely shatters them. No one is who they seem, nothing plays out the way one thinks it will, and by the shocking end, one is left questioning their own lives as a result.

Mindhack
Director: Royce Gorsuch.
With: Chris Mason, Scott Mechlowicz, Spencer Locke, Faran Tahir, Brandon Scott.
USA 2017. 106 mins.
A brilliant scientist is on a mission to hack the human mind to save humanity from its own catastrophic errors and is pushed to do whatever is necessary to complete the assignment. An extraordinary visionary experience about the inner conflicts of being a culture-jamming creator, director Royce Gorsuch’s kaleidoscopic mindbender is an astonishingly visual tour de force about the cacophony of voices in our heads pushing us, confusing us, mixing signals, the ego, reason, and the mistaken evils which might come from accomplishing the goal. An inner space odyssey through reconciliation, forgiveness and self-sacrifice for the greater good.

Our Evil
Director: Samuel Galli.
With: Ademir Esteves, Ricardo Casella, Sonia Morena, Anthony Mello, Luara Pepita.
Brazil 2017. 92 mins.
A man with spiritualist powers is told by his mentor that a demonic entity is returning to destroy his daughter’s soul and that he should take drastic measures to prevent this from happening. So in the seedy underbelly of San Paolo, the desperate exorcist searches for the one person who will carry out his wishes for a large fee and no questions asked. Enter a serial killer poised to protect his daughter from the evil spirit lying in wait. A tremendously ambitious and brutal directorial debut from newcomer Samuel Galli evoking the shock of THE SIXTH SENSE and THE EXORCIST.

Freddy/Eddy
Director: Tini Tüllmann.
With: Felix Schäfer, Jessica Schwarz, Greta Bohacek, Alexander Finkenwirth, Katharina Schüttler.
Germany 2017. 94 mins.
After being accused of beating up his wife, Freddy finds himself in the biggest crisis of his life. No one will believe him that the real culprit is his twin brother Eddy who supposedly died at childbirth. Has Eddy really returned from the dead intent on destroying his perfect life? As violent events escalate and Freddy becomes more caught up in a paranoid nightmare, he needs someone to believe him. But how do you prove someone who used to be a product of your own mind is truly alive? A critically acclaimed, award-winning and spine-chilling psycho suspense thriller.

Veronica
Directors: Carlos Algara & Alejandro Martinez-Beltran.
With: Olga Segura, Sofía Garza, Arcelia Ramírez, Horacio Castelo, Juan Salvador Fernandez.
Mexico 2017. 81 mins.
A reclusive female psychologist who has stopped practicing medicine, decides against her better judgment to take the case of disturbed Veronica de la Serna, a young woman whose previous therapist has mysteriously disappeared. As a condition of their cure agreement, the intrigued psychologist requires Veronica to stay with her in her remote country house for the duration of the treatment. But Veronica proves to be a stubborn patient trying to outsmart her doctor every chance she gets. Prepare for startling Alfred Hitchcock-style twists and Brian De Palma-type turns as both will discover what lies behind their shared deepest secrets.

Voice From the Stone
Director: Eric D. Howell.
With: Emilia Clarke, Marton Csokas, Caterina Murino, Remo Girone, Lisa Gastoni.
USA/Italy 2017. 94 mins
Verena is a young nurse hired to help a mute young heir in an isolated castle in 1950s Tuscany. Self-assured and tender she must nevertheless persuade Jakob that “the dead do not speak” and he must stop listening at the castle walls in the hope of hearing his mother’s voice murmuring in the stones. But as her relationship with Jakob’s formidable father Klaus gradually shifts from cautious reserve to growing passion she delves into the background of his concert pianist mother. And the deeper she goes the more she begins to believe she too hears whispers from beyond the grave.

Return of the Living Dead III
Director: Brian Yuzna.
With: Kent McCord, James T. Callahan, Sarah Douglas, Melinda Clarke, Abigail Lenz.
USA 1994. 97 mins.
Colonel Reynolds and his group of government scientists continue their work on re-animating the dead for military use. His son Curt and his girlfriend Julie use Dad’s security pass to sneak in and watch the proceedings. Later when father and son have a disagreement, Curt and Julie take off on a motorcycle and Julie is killed in an accident. Grief-stricken, Curt takes her body to the lab and brings her back to life. But then Curt must help Julie deal with her new zombie existence as military agents and local gang members try to hunt them down.

Dhogs
Director: Andrés Goteira.
With: Carlos Blanco, Alejandro Carro, María Costas, Melania Cruz, Antonio Duran Morris.
Spain 2017. 85 mins.
The intimacy of a hotel room. The immensity of a desert. A desolate gas station. In these picturesque settings, hideous crimes occur under the cold stare of unexpected protagonists that show the dark, twisted and perverse sides of human existence. But what if there was only a thin line between victims, criminals and spectators? Aren’t we all morbid monsters when you get down to the nightmare nitty-gritty? Dazzling and provocative, DHOGS is a very borderline and compelling mind disorder, marking the impressive debut of a director destined to become a major talent in the genre universe.

King Cohen: The Wild World of Filmmaker Larry Cohen
Director: Steve Mitchell.
With Martin Scorsese, J.J. Abrams, John Landis, Joe Dante, Rick Baker.
USA 2017. 110 mins.
Buckle up for the true story of writer, producer, director, creator and all-around maverick, Larry Cohen (BLACK CAESAR, GOD TOLD ME TO, Q THE WINGED SERPENT, THE STUFF, PHONE BOOTH). Told through compelling live interviews, stills and film/TV clips, the people who helped fulfill his vision, and industry icons such as Martin Scorsese, John Landis, Michael Moriarty, Fred Williamson, Yaphet Kotto and many more, including Larry himself, bring one-of-a-kind insight into the work, process and legacy of a true American auteur. Few can boast of a career as remarkable or prolific, spanning more than 50 years of entertaining audiences worldwide!

Fanged Up
Director Christian James.
With: Daniel O’Reilly, Lauren Socha, Steven Berkoff, Lucy Pinder, Vas Blackwood.
UK 2017. 85 mins.
Orange is the new Dracula. Daniel O’Reilly, aka controversial comedy character Dapper Laughs, makes his feature film debut in a vampire comedy destined to make everyone Carry On Screaming. He plays a wrongfully arrested lovable rogue thrown into a high-security prison for the weekend when his blood group is revealed to be very rare. But once incarcerated in this horror penitentiary, there’s no way out as the warden is a top-level bloodsucker, the guards are his pet zombies and the inmates are their unwilling victims. Get ready for hi-jinks in clink, slammer shivers, big house laughs and jail house shocks.

It Stains the Sands Red
Director: Colin Minihan.
Cast: Brittany Allen, Juan Riedinger, Merwin Mondesir, Kristopher Higgins, Andrew Supanz.
USA 2016. 92 mins.
First came the massive hit GRAVE ENCOUNTERS and the sci-fi shocker EXTRATERRESTRIAL… and now comes the most unusual, thrilling and unexpectedly moving Walking Dead movie ever from director Colin Minihan and co-writer Stuart Ortiz, aka The Vicious Brothers. After a horrendous flesh-eating apocalypse, Las Vegas wild child Molly finds herself stranded in the desert with a ravenously relentless zombie hot on her high heels. Forever trying to give it the ingenious slip, the lone stalker has no need of rest and soon it becomes her only physical contact in a world gone mad haunted by her dark past.

Fashionista
Director: Simon Rumley.
With: Amanda Fuller, Ethan Embry, Eric Balfour, Alex Essoe, Alexandria DeBerry.
USA 2016. 110 mins.
RED, WHITE AND BLUE, then JOHNNY FRANK GARRET’S LAST WORD and now comes uber-eccentric director Simon Rumley’s latest Austin, Texas, based shocker. A hypnotic and bracing exploration of identity, body image and transformation, this sleekly demented De Palma-esque nightmare is set in the vintage clothing world where hipster shop owners April and Eric find their marriage tested when she begins to suspect her husband of having an affair. Her suspicions confirmed, April seeks sexual validation with the very mysterious and kinky Randall setting off a chain reaction of stylish fever dream madness, en vogue fantasy role-playing and chic ultra-shriek.

Exhume
Director: Scott Poiley.
With: William Haze, Alice Rietveld, Sarah Sculco, Tony Senzamici, Matthew Nardozzi.
USA 2016. 78 mins.
From the producer of the past FrightFest hits LAST SHIFT and CASSADAGA, a shocking story based on true events. Patrick and his wife Karen Connor are hired by the state of Florida to exhume bodies resting under a closed down reform school. But the probationary facility had an infamous past and was known for the sadistic torture and murder of young boys in the early 1900s. Some of the case histories are so horrifying they just can’t stay buried and the excavation is met with unnatural forces causing the Connor family to question their own sanity and will to live.

Nightworld
Director: Patricio Valadares.
With: Robert Englund, Jason London, Gianni Capaldi, Lorina Kamburova, Diana Lyubenova.
Bulgaria 2017. 92 mins.
FrightFest is delighted to present the latest movie from one of our favourite South American directors, Patricio Valadares, auteur of HIDDEN IN THE WOODS and DOWNHILL, starring horror icon Robert Englund. When former LAPD officer Brett Anderson takes a job as head of security at an old apartment building, he experiences a series of bizarre and terrifying events. Once he delves deeper into the building’s sinister history and investigates its shadowy owners and past employees, Brett soon uncovers a malevolent force nestled deep in its bowels that will do anything to be set free into our world.

Replace
Director: Norbert Keil.
With: Barbara Crampton, Rebecca Forsythe, Lucie Aron, Sean Knopp, Adnan Maral.
USA 2017. 101 mins.
From first-time German director Norbert Keil and the visionary mind of Richard Stanley (HARDWARE, DUST DEVIL), featuring horror diva Barbara Crampton (RE-ANIMATOR, YOU’RE NEXT), a stylishly viral love story about reverse aging. Afflicted with a dermatological disease that causes her skin to crumble away, young and beautiful Kira discovers she can replace it with the skin of other girls. However the treatment is expensive and debilitating but rather than watch her body fall apart Kira makes a deadly decision. Accompanied by her lover she embarks on a murder spree so she can have a constant supply of donors.

Saturday, August 26th

The Bar
Director: Alex de la Iglesia.
With: Blanca Suárez, Mario Casas, Carmen Machi, Secun de la Rosa, Jaime Ordóñez.
Spain 2017. 104 mins.
It’s life as usual at Amparo’s bar in central Madrid. Trini thinks she can hide her fruit machine addiction, homeless Israel is cadging food and Elena stops for coffee just after being cursed by a gypsy woman. Then one customer is fatally shot as he exits the bar and panic takes over. What’s going on? Who is responsible for the crime and why are there people wearing HAZMAT suits in the square? The latest blackly comic chiller from Alex de la Iglesia, director of DAY OF THE BEAST and WITCHING AND BITCHING takes you on the starkest survival journey.

Alone
Director: David Moreau.
With: Sofia Lesaffre, Stéphane Bak, Jean-Stan Du Pac, Paul Scarfoglio, Kim Lockhart.
France 2017. 96 mins.
From David Moreau, co-director of ILS/THEM, artist Bruno Gazzotti’s best-selling French/Belgian comic book becomes a major motion picture epic. After going to a funfair the night before, Leila wakes up in an empty city. Where are her parents? Where has everyone gone? Thinking she must be the sole survivor of an unthinkable catastrophe, she wanders the weirdly deserted streets. Until she meets four other mystified strangers. Together they hole up at a plush hotel, and set out to understand what has happened, why they are surrounded by gigantic boiling clouds and what these apocalyptic events actually mean.

Attack of the Adult Babies
Director: Dominic Brunt.
With: Joanne Mitchell, Kate Coogan, Sally Dexter, Andrew Dunn, Charlie Chuck.
UK 2017. 80 mins.
From Dominic Brunt, director of BEFORE DAWN and BAIT, a satirical and sexy shocker unlike anything you’ve ever seen before. A home invasion forces two teenagers to break into a remote country manor and steal Top Secret documents. Little do they know the stately pile is also the venue where a group of high-powered middle-aged men go to take refuge from the stresses of daily life by dressing in nappies and indulging their every perverse nursery whim. Or that this grotesque assembly intends to refuel the world’s economy by very sinister, sick and monstrous means. Time for a change…

Hatchet 10th Anniversary Special Event
Director: Adam Green.
With: Kane Hodder, Parry Shen, Tony Todd, Tamara Feldman.
USA 2017. 85 mins
To celebrate a decade of the franchise, writer/director Adam Green is returning to FrightFest with the World Premiere of a new HATCHET containing never before seen footage and extended death sequences cut from the film before its 2006 festival run in anticipation of the ugly battle producers feared they would face with the US ratings board. Those ongoing fights made history in 2010 when they pulled HATCHET 2 from US theatres in its opening 48 hours. See the version of Victor Crowley that you’ve never seen before as he paints the Cineworld screen red in all of his slashing glory.

Game of Death
Directors: Sebastien Landry & Laurence Morais-Lagace.
With: Sam Earle, Victoria Diamond, Emelia Hellman, Catherine Saindon, Nick Serino.
Canada 2017. 73 mins.
JUMANJI meets BATTLE ROYALE in the goriest game changer. Seven millenials discover an obscure electronic board game and decide to test their wits against it. Positioning their fingers on respective buttons, they each receive a pinprick and a few drops of their blood trickles towards the centre of the board. An on-screen message flashes that now a grand total of 24 people must be killed as quickly as possible or one of them will be randomly eliminated via head explosion. It’s kill or be killed as they either turn on each other or start searching out innocent victims.

3rd Night
Director: Adam Graveley.
With: Jesse McGinn, Robert Hartburn, Bruce Denny, Connor Gosatti, Rose McKenna.
Australia 2017. 72 mins.
A young couple decides to move to an Australian orchard surrounded by natural bushland to escape the madness of modern life. But they soon get the feeling their property is being watched by someone with sinister intentions. Then they find out their house has a past history and that after terrorizing his victims for a couple of days the unknown Watcher always kills his victims on the 3rd night. Tick, tock, time is running out… Informed by the classic horrors LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT, ROSEMARY’S BABY and THE WICKER MAN, this outback shocker is based on true events.

Mansfield 66/67
Directors: P. David Ebersole & Todd Hughes.
With: John Waters, Mamie Van Doren, Dolly Reed, Kenneth Anger, Tippi Hedren.
USA 2017. 85 mins.
From the producers of ROOM 237, a super Hollywood Babylon-style documentary about the final years of movie goddess Jayne Mansfield’s life and untimely death. Was that ill-fated car crash really caused by a curse after her alleged romantic dalliance with Anton LaVey, head of the Church of Satan? Packed with fabulous talking heads and dazzling clips from the Marilyn-in-Waiting’s film career, this is a quintessential look at the 50s tabloid star as a precursor to the feminist advances of the 1960s, as a woman who tested the limits of then acceptable female behavior and as ‘the first reality TV star’.

Diane
Director: Michael Mongillo.
With: Jason Alan Smith, Carlee Avers, Dick Boland, Margaret Rose Champagne, Jim Thalman.
USA 2017. 82 mins.
Stephen King and Brian De Palma meet Gus Van Sant and Elmore Leonard when Steve, a disabled war veteran, discovers the dead body of beautiful singer Diane in his back yard. Soon his fascination with her photographic image has turned into an obsession in an audacious supernatural horror thriller telling a compelling and honest story about the human condition. The prime suspect in the puzzling crime, Steve is scrutinized by the police, hassled by Diane’s widower and attacked by self-righteous neighbours as the malevolent ghost of Diane begins to work a dark spell that leads to strange and startling revelations.

Ruin Me
Director: Preston DeFrancis.
With: Marcienne Dwyer, Matt Dellapina, Eva Hamilton, John Odom, Chris Hill.
USA 2017. 87 mins.
Every Halloween, more extreme haunted attractions open for business, each promising even more thrills. Some have taken this to a whole new level. Welcome to Slasher Sleepout: The Ultimate Horror Movie Experience combining camping, haunted house, and an escape room into one extreme 36-hour event. Six strangers are hooded, dropped in the middle of the woods, and must survive a simulated horror movie. Alexandra, the only participant who has never even seen a horror film, reluctantly tags along with her boyfriend. But when the other campers start to die before their eyes, Alex becomes the star of her worst nightmares.

Death Laid an Egg
Director: Giulio Questi.
With: Gina Lollobrigida, Jean-Louis Trintigant, Ewa Aulin, Jean Sobieski, Renato Romano.
Italy 1967. 104 mins.
See them tear each other apart and then see what they do with the pieces! Avant-garde director Giulio Questi’s proto-giallo is one of the most astonishing Italian genre movies you will ever see and we are showing it here for the first time in its longest version. Essentially a blistering satire on the advertising industry it revolves around a sexual deviant and serial killer of prostitutes married to a rich poultry rancher, breeding wingless and headless chickens to maximise profits, who plans to run off with his secretary. Shocking, surreal and sexy, you’ve never seen anything like it!

Mountain Fever
Director: Hendrik Faller.
With: Tom Miller, Anya Korzun, Julien Caplan, Julien Michel.
UK 2017. 81 mins.
Inspired by the action cinema of James Cameron and the minimalism of Nicolas Winding Refn, a fatal flu virus devastates Europe in an ice-cold thriller examining human behaviour in a time of crisis. City boy Jack takes refuge in the Alps but he’s ill-equipped to survive the harsh winter. Things only get worse when renegade Kara breaks into his house and commandeers his dwindling food supplies. His inept plan to get rid of her disintegrates when outsiders also invade, turning his captor into his only ally. As a siege ensues Jack must choose a side if he hopes to survive.

Boots on the Ground
Director: Louis Melville.
With: Tom Ainsley, Ian Virgo, Ryan McParland, Valmike Rampersand, Sally Day.
UK 2017. 86 mins.
Afghanistan October 2014. Five British soldiers, trying to stay alive on the last night of the Afghan War, face not only the Taliban, but also supernatural powers more terrifying than anything they’ve encountered before. As the night unfolds and their mission is finally explained to them, they find themselves engulfed in a labyrinthine nightmare and time-shift forces seemingly from another realm and century. One of the most innovative and challenging British movies of the year, shot with 360 degree style immersion techniques using head-cams, director Louis Melville’s twisting and turning squaddie shocker is a genre ground breaker.

To Hell and Back: The Kane Hodder Story
Director: Derek Dennis Herbert.
With: Bruce Campbell, Robert Englund, Cassandra Petersen, Adam Green, Sean S. Cunningham.
USA 2017. 108 mins.
Meet the man behind the Jason Voorhees and Victor Crowley masks. Kane Hodder is cinema’s most prolific killer and this gut wrenching but inspiring documentary tells you why. It’s the harrowing story of the stuntman overcoming a dehumanizing childhood filled with torment and bullying. After surviving a near-death burn accident he rose up through Hollywood’s horror ranks to become Jason in the FRIDAY THE 13th series making countless movie goers forever terrified of hockey masks and summer camp. After decades of watching Kane Hodder on screen here’s the uniquely human story about one of the genre’s most vicious monsters.

Where the Skin Lies
Director: Michaël Boucherie.
With: Tristan Beint, Amelia Bennett, Simon Rivers, Louise Williams, Georgia Winters, Nathan Wright.
UK 2017. 91 mins.
Six friends, bound together by a traumatic experience, travel up to the Scottish Lowlands for a relaxing reunion weekend. Soon a number of mysterious and horrifying events start to expose the cracks in their relationships. One by one they discover, through their tattoos, that trust runs but skin-deep and as day turns into night, not everyone will survive the ‘Game of Death’ they are forced to play.

Eat Locals
Director: Jason Flemyng.
With: Freema Agyeman, Charlie Cox, Mackenzie Crook, Eve Myles, Vincent Regan.
UK 2016. 100 mins.
Acclaimed actor Jason Flemying (DEEP RISING, HANNA, SOLOMON KANE, X-MEN: FIRST CLASS), makes his directorial debut with a bloodsucker chiller featuring the cream of British talent. In a quiet countryside farmhouse, Britain’s vampires gather together for their once-every-fifty-years meeting. Others will be joining them too; Sebastian Crockett, an unwitting Essex boy who thinks he’s on a promise with sexy cougar Vanessa; and a detachment of Special Forces vampire killers who have bitten off more than they can chew. This is certainly going to be a night to remember… and for some of them it will be their last.

Canaries
CANARIES pits a group of friends at a New Year’s Eve bash in the Valleys, hosted by Steve Denis, London’s 53rd-most-listened-to DJ, a returning local boy made good against an invasion task force of creepy time travelling aliens. In this darkly funny Welsh based Sci-fi horror comedy, the new year’s resolution on everyone’s lips is to stay alive.

Accountable
Director: Matthew Heaven.
With: Oliver Towner, Robert Eldridge, Lizzie Davies, Sam Kacher, Stefan Boehm.
UK 2017. 74 mins.
Driven by a fantastic performance from headliner Oliver Towner, ACCOUNTABLE proves what can be achieved on a micro-budget with imagination, a great twisty script and a commitment to quality production values. Warren Matthews is an angry and directionless young man struggling to contain his formidable temper. But before long circumstances cause him to reluctantly enlist the services of a local psychiatrist to help him confront damaging past events fuelling his future angst. A score must be settled according to his fractured psyche, someone must be held accountable. Keep your eyes on director Matthew Heaven, he’s one to watch.

Cold Hell
Director: Stefan Ruzowitzky.
With: Violetta Schurawlow, Tobias Moretti, Robert Palfrader.
Germany 2017. 92 mins.
The bastard child of 80’s serial killer films and Żuławski , ‘Cold Hell’ is a relentless, brutal and violent journey into the heart of dark Vienna. Özge is a cab driver – a second generation Turkish woman distant from all life & its parts. One day she witnesses the latest crime of a brutal serial killer from her apartment and finds herself the target of his insanity. But there’s a catch: Özge is no easy prey. She is tough and determined and oh, did we mention a brilliant kickboxer? Deftly mixing visually arresting sequences and smart character work, ‘Cold Hell’ is the serial killer thriller of 2017 , guaranteed to leave your heart beating fast and your eyes wide open.

This will be a violent clash the ancient city will never, ever forget!

The Duke Mitchell Club
Continuing the tradition of even-we-have-forgotten-how-many-years – The Duke is back at the FrightFest to cause as much filmic havoc as possible. What to expect? At this stage, anything goes! – From weird training videos to public safety announcements, from the latest sneak previews to favourite trailers, from music videos to God-knows-what – The Duke will fill the FrightFest screen with all manner of madness guaranteed to kick off your Saturday late night in style. As always The Duke has invited all his friends, too so no knows who might turn up!

Come and join everyone in a screening so wild you will doubt your senses afterwards. Come and see The Duke.

Sunday, August 27th

Killing Ground
Director: Damien Power.
With: Harriet Dyer, Aaron Pedersen, Tiarnie Coupland. Maya Stange, Aaron Glenane.
Australia 2016. 88 mins.
A young couple on a camping trip to an isolated beach discover someone has already pitched a tent and seemingly abandoned it. As time passes by and its owners don’t return, the newcomers start to suspect the worst. Then all hell breaks loose… thanks to audaciously interweaving storylines spanning two suspensefully distinct chronologies hours apart – and not for the faint-hearted. A brutal bushland nerve-shredder, Damien Power’s slow-burning shocker shares kindred spirits with WOLF CREEK and THE LONG WEEKEND in the Ozploitation annals, bolstered by raw and revelatory turns from a superb ensemble cast working the tension to fever pitch.

The End?
Director: Daniele Misischia.
With: Alessandro Roja, Euridice Axen, Claudio Camilli, Benedetta Cimatti, Bianca Friscelli.
Italy 2017. 100 mins.
Produced by the Manetti Bros, directors of the past FrightFest attractions THE ARRIVAL OF WANG and PAURA 3D, comes Romageddon. Claudio Verona is a young and cynical businessman. One day he gets locked in his Roman office elevator before an important meeting with a client. Soon this annoying obstacle will turn into a nightmare. For outside that metal cage a deadly virus has begun to infect and transform people into extremely violent and dangerous zombies. Claudio has to get out of his claustrophobic space but it seems the elevator is the safest place to be in the city!

Double Date
Director: Benjamin Barfoot.
With: Michael Socha, Georgia Groome, Danny Morgan, Kelly Wenham, Dougie Poynter.
UK 2017. 90 mins.
Meet innocent Jim, terrified of girls and on a reluctant quest to prove his manhood the night before he turns 30. He and his cocky friend Alex think they’ve hit the jackpot when they meet the beautiful sisters Kitty and Lulu, who seem up for anything on a wild party-fuelled night. They also have an incredible car. But little do they know that the feisty femmes fatales have their own shocking agenda in mind and have every intention of making Jim lose much more than just his virginity… Getting laid has never been so bloody difficult.

Mayhem
Director: Joe Lynch.
With: Steven Yuen, Samara Weaving, Steven Brand, Kerry Fox, Dallas Roberts.
USA 2017. 86 mins.
Lawyer Derek Cho is a driven employee at Towers & Smythe Consulting. He’s worked his way up the corporate ladder, but suddenly finds himself without a job after being stabbed in the back by a colleague. Enraged, Derek marches to his boss’ office – just as ID7, a virus causing the infected to lose their inhibitions, starts spreading through the entire building. Doors are locked, the government shows up and an 8-hour countdown begins until the viral contagion subsides. Time for Derek to finally get some real work done battling his way to the executive level before time runs out.

The Villainess
Director: Byung-gil Jung.
With: Ok-bin Kim, Seo-hyung Kim, Ha-kyun Shin, Jun Sung Bang.
Korea 2017. 123 mins.
Direct from the Cannes Film Festival 2017. Sook-Hee is a trained assassin who was born to kill. She was just a little girl when the training started in China. And after the death of her mentor, when the chance of starting a new life was given to her, she came to South Korea as a government agent. The National Intelligence Service promised her freedom after ten years of active assignments. So begins her new double life as a theatre actress-cum-hit-woman until the dark secrets from her past start to reappear. Then she gets a new mission and it changes everything.

Devil’s Gate
Director: Clay Staub.
With: Milo Ventimiglia, Bridget Regan, Amanda Schull, Javier Botet, Shawn Ashmore.
Canada 2017. 94 mins.
A wife and child have gone missing in the small town of Devil’s Gate, North Dakota. While all indicators point to husband Jackson Pritchard as the prime suspect, pushy outsider FBI agent Daria Francis instinctively feels something else is going on in this incestuous hamlet and together with deputy Colt Salter goes to investigate. And indeed they do track down Pritchard, a man caged in unrelenting darkness and despair. But nothing is what it seems in this mind-bending carnival of delights featuring hi-tone scares, unhinged performances, astonishing special effects, wonderful sound design and dizzying twists and turns.

Incontrol
Director: Kurtis David Harder.
With: Levi Meaden, Rory J. Saper, Anja Savcic, Brittany Allan, Christopher Rosamond.
Canada 2017. 82 mins.
You can be anyone you want to be! A group of university students discover a weird device that allows them to take control of others and experience the world through someone else’s body. As they push the machine’s abilities to its limits, they don’t realise their own lives have been manipulated and as they begin to question the device itself, they find themselves descending into a nightmare with no return. THE MATRIX meets THE SORCERERS in a compelling and provocative sci-fi horror exploring deep moral questions about psyche, personality, addiction and taking actions to their extreme outer limits.

Inside
Director: Miguel Ángel Vivas.
With: Rachel Nichols, Laura Harring, Stany Coppet, Ben Temple, Andrea Tivadar.
Spain 2016. 100 mins.
There is nothing fiercer than a mother’s love! From the directors of KIDNAPPED and SLEEP TIGHT comes the English-language remake of Julien Maury and Alexandre Bustillo’s extraordinary 2007 French extreme neo-classic A L’INTERIEUR. A recently widowed mother-to-be living in an isolated new home receives a most unwelcome visitor: a predatory woman who will stop at nothing to snatch her unborn child. Trapped and disorientated, the young mother must unleash all her reserves of strength to protect her baby and survive the night. With subtle tweaks and added shocks to the original story, expect a totally unexpected seat-edged nerve-jangler.

Demons of the Mind
Director: Peter Sykes.
With: Patrick Magee, Paul Jones, Shane Briant, Gillian Hills, Robert Hardy.
UK 1972. 89 mins.
Blood will have blood. One of Hammer’s most interesting, intelligent and underrated shockers, director Peter Sykes’ gothic horror eschews their normal staples of Transylvanian twists and stitch-marked monsters for subtle pleasures infused with Freudian symbolism, surrealist mayhem and powerful perversion. In 19th century Bavaria, deranged Baron Zorn keeps his children Emil and Elizabeth locked up because he thinks they are possessed by tainted hereditary madness. It’s up to discredited psychiatrist Professor Falkenberg to unravel the dark family secrets involving incest, traumatic suicide and proxy fantasies in this satisfying and unusual late-period masterpiece from the iconic House of Horror.

Dream Demon
Director: Harley Cokliss.
With: Jemma Redgrave, Kathleen Wilhoite, Timothy Spall, Jimmy Nail, Mark Greenstreet.
UK 1988. 89 mins.
From the iconic Palace Pictures, who released EVIL DEAD and THE COMPANY OF WOLVES, the first chance for decades to see their British-produced challenge to the then US phenomena A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET. Nervous bride-to-be Diana Markham is tormented by bad dreams in which she decapitates her Falklands hero fiancé Oliver Hall at the altar. When she meets American punk Jenny Hoffman trying to resolve a childhood trauma experienced in the same house bought by newlyweds, all hell breaks loose. Soon they must enter a mirror-reversed world where nightmares are made progressively more monstrous, gruesome and more chillingly real.

Monday, August 28th

Imitation Girl
Director: Natasha Kermani.
With: Lauren Ashley Carter, Lewis Black, Adam David Thompson, Marsha Stephanie Blake, Sanam Erfani.
USA 2017. 84 mins.
The Girl Who Fell To Earth! A mysterious being appears in the desert and assumes the identity of the first person she sees – a magazine cover girl. Taken in by Iranian immigrants, she forms an understanding of her new surroundings, and comes to appreciate the beauty and the sadness of her new world. Now it’s time to reach out to Julianna, her world-weary earthly double, who knows all about glitz and grit working as an entertainer in New York City. For only by sacrificing themselves to each other can the cosmic twins complete the full portrait of a woman.

Still/Born
Director: Brandon Christensen.
With: Christie Burke, Jesse Moss, Rebecca Olson, Michael Ironside, Jenn Griffin.
Canada 2017. 87 mins.
For Mary, the joy of her infant son Adam’s birth is overshadowed by the devastating stillborn death of his twin brother Thomas. Concerned husband Jack relocates them to a spacious new home in secluded suburbia while Mary makes fast friends with their neighbor Rachel. But fresh faces, new surroundings, and even post-partum medication can’t spin Mary’s haunted motherhood mindset off its deepening descent into horrifying depression. Soon she’s convinced that an otherworldly evil wants to claim her remaining baby for its own. Is it madness or is something paranormal not going to stop until another child has been eaten alive?

Lowlife
Director: Ryan Prows.
With: Nicki Micheaux, Ricardo Adam Zarate, Jon Oswald, Shaye Ogbonna, Santana Dempsey.
USA 2017. 90 mins.
When a simple organ-harvesting caper goes awry, a twist of fate unites three of society’s forgotten and ignored: El Monstruo, a disgraced Mexican Wrestler working as hired muscle for the local crime boss; Crystal, a recovering addict desperate enough to arrange a black market kidney transplant to save her husband’s life; and Randy, a two-strike convict fresh out of prison, cursed with a full-face swastika tattoo and a best friend forcing him into a hare-brained kidnapping scheme. As their sordid, small-time lives collide, they must fight tooth and nail to save a pregnant woman from certain and gruesome death.

The Terror of Hallow’s Eve
Director: Todd Tucker.
With: Doug Jones, Caleb Thomas, Christian Kane, Juliet Landau, Sarah Lancaster.
USA 2017. 80 mins.
Fifteen-year-old Timmy Stevens is brutally beaten up by High School bullies on Halloween. Yearning for revenge while carving out a pumpkin head, unknowingly he summons up the evil spirit of the hideous Scarecrow. And before long Timmy has unleashed a mighty supernatural force offering to grant his dark desires to scare his hated enemies to death. Be careful what you wish for! From writer/director Todd Tucker (MONSTER MUTT), special make-up genius behind PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN, THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON, OUIJA, FRIGHT NIGHT 2 and GEOSTORM, a charmingly chilling, affectionately creepy, retro-styled horror for the ages.

Tragedy Girls
Director: Tyler MacIntyre.
With: Alexandra Shipp, Brianna Hildebrand, Josh Hutcherson, Craig Robinson, Kevin Durand.
USA 2017. 90 mins.
The freshest, funniest, most frightening slasher send-up since SCREAM. High school seniors Makayla and Sadie are obsessed with their social media presence as authorities on crime. Their interest in murder is more than just academic though as they are the hands-on type. Trapping a serial killer to foster a mutually beneficial partnership, they see their profile rise, along with the brutal slayings in their small town. Can their sociopathic friendship stand the strain of national stardom? Will their captive maniac play along? Who will be the prom queen? So many questions, and the answers are HEATHERS, hilarious and horrific.

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