Brooklyn Horror 2025: QUEENS OF THE DEAD to Open Borough Genre Fest, Full Lineup Announced

The Brooklyn Horror Film Festival (BHFF) announces today the full program for its 2025 incarnation, running 10 days this year in celebration of its 10th anniversary. The festival will run from October 16-25, with all screenings held at Nitehawk Cinema Williamsburg. Audiences are in for a jaw-dropping lineup of films and events, and here are some of the highlights: a special screening of Ernest Dickerson’s cult classic TALES FROM THE CRYPT PRESENTS: DEMON KNIGHT with the Leviathan Award Ceremony, honoring his film career. 

 

The Opening Night film is Tina Romero’s award-winning, Brooklyn-set horror-comedy QUEENS OF THE DEAD. The 2025 festival boasts the world premieres of Adam MacDonald’s zombie feature THIS IS NOT A TEST and Connor Marsden’s blood-soaked thriller VIOLENCE. The Festival will also feature the North American Premiere of Johanna Moder’s paranoid motherhood horror film MOTHER’S BABY. Other highlights include Avalon Fast’s mesmerizing sophomore feature CAMP as the festival’s Centerpiece Film. 

 

This year’s Closing Night feature is the ultra-violent and fast-paced KARMADONNA from director Aleksandar Radivojevic. Additional highlights include horror/sci-fi icon Bryan Fuller’s weird and whimsical new feature DUST BUNNY; Kenichi Ugana’s strange and disturbing new feature INCOMPLETE CHAIRS; a screening of the first three episodes from season two of THE CREEP TAPES; alumni Alice Maio Mackay’s latest feature THE SERPENT’S SKIN; Robbie Banfitch’s latest found footage feature TINSMAN ROAD; and Julie Pacino’s fever dream I LIVE HERE NOW. 

 

The festival’s signature sidebar programs return, starting with FEAR IN FOCUS: BLACK HORROR, which includes the North American premiere of James Ross’s PARASOMNIA, as well as retro screenings of DEF BY TEMPTATION and BUGGED! There will also be a sidebar for ZOMBIES!, which includes the 1974 blaxploitation film SUGAR HILL screening on 35mm, a 4K restoration of BRIDE OF RE-ANIMATOR in honor of its 35th anniversary, and the theatrical premiere of the uncut version of Tom Savini’s remake of the George A. Romero classic NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. Animated horror gets a spotlight with DRAWING ON FEAR, featuring a trio of heavy-hitters: the 1973 Japanese masterpiece BELLADONNA OF SADNESS; the 1981 cult classic anthology film HEAVY METAL; and the remarkable Czechoslovakian stop-motion dark fantasy THE PIED PIPER. The Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies will also return with a pair of special lectures: “Excessive Life: The Uncanny Vitality of the Zombie” from David Bering-Porter, an Assistant Professor at The New School, and “On Becoming a Horrifying Woman: Psychedelic Horror, Women’s Empowerment, and BELLADONNA OF SADNESS” from That Very Witch: Fear, Feminism and the American Witch from author Payton McCarty-Simas.