Festivals: Fantastic Fest
Fantastic Fest 2024 Review: MADS, Wide-Eyed Descent Into Apocalypse
One of my favorite films of Fantastic Fest 2024 was this taut piece of single-take cinema from France. An already high teen visits his dealer hoping to score the latest designer drug. But before he can get to the ,...
Fantastic Fest 2024 Interview: FRANKIE FREAKO Director Steve Kostanski
I should start by saying I’m a Steve Kostanski stan. Does that make me a Kost-FAN-ski? In any event, his name on a project automatically elevates my interest. This is especially true when he’s in the director's chair. Manborg (2011),...
Fantastic Fest 2024 Review: DADDY'S HEAD Is a Dangerous Place
Friends who express curiosity about my love for horror films are often surprised to hear that, beyond the thrills and chills they provide, I also find them comforting. There are the obvious childhood associations born of discovering them when I...
Fantastic Fest 2024: BRING THEM DOWN, THE RULE OF JENNY PEN Among Winners
With a couple more days left in the madness that is Fantastic Fest this year's award winners were announced by the festival. Christopher Andrews' drama thriller Bring Them Down, starring Barry Keoghegan and Christopher Abbott was awarded Best Picture...
Fantastic Fest 2024 Review: WHAT HAPPENED TO DOROTHY BELL? It Will Happen to Everyone
As found footage has firmly established itself as a genre, its foothold on the public imagination (and on that of filmmakers) bears scrutiny. The excellent documentary The Found Footage Phenomena (2021) and books such as Found Footage Horror Films by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas...
STRANGE HARVEST Trailer: New Faux-Doc Horror From GRAVE ENCOUNTERS' Stuart Ortiz
A faux true-crime documentary about two detectives pursuit of an infamous serial killer named Mr. Shiny, who terrorized Southern California for almost two decades. Strange Harvest will have its world premiere at Fantastic Fest soon. The trailer has gone...
HOUSE OF SPOILS: Official Trailer And Poster Revealed
From Blumhouse, House of Spoils follows an ambitious chef (Ariana DeBose) as she opens a restaurant on a remote estate where she battles kitchen chaos, crushing self-doubts… and a haunting presence who threatens to sabotage her at every turn. ...
DADDY'S HEAD: New Poster And Key Set For UK Horror
In the wake of his father’s untimely death, a young boy is left in the eerie solitude of a sprawling country estate with his newly widowed stepmother. Struggling to navigate the overwhelming task of parenthood, his stepmother grows distant, leaving...
Fantastic Fest 2024: THE RULE OF JENNY PEN, NEVER LET GO, TERRIFIER 3 to Kick Off
Every fall, soon after the Toronto International Film Festival and just before the New York Film Festival and the Sitges Festival Internacional de Cinema Fantastic de Catalunya, Fantastic Fest arrives to take our blues away with eight days of cinematic...
Fantastic Fest 2023 Review: TOTALLY KILLER, '80s Slasher Meets BACK TO THE FUTURE
Meeting your mother when you’re both teens can screw seriously with your head (e.g., the Back to the Future trilogy). Meeting your mom as a teen when there’s a serial killer targeting your teen mom and her circle of friends,...
Fantastic Fest 2023 Review: THE WAIT (La espera), Visually Captivating Horror Western About Greed and Grief
Directed by F. Javier Gutierrez, the rural thriller stars Victor Clavijo, Ruth Diaz, Manuel Moron, and Luis Callejo.
Friday One Sheet: WHEN EVIL LURKS
No point beating around the bush on this one, California's Mocean design house goes full on distressed red sky and deep black shadows for slow burn Argentinian possession horror, When Evil Lurks. The tagline, "There is no point in praying" is...
Fantastic Fest 2023 Review: V/H/S/85, Mixtape Horror Anthology Improves on Its Predecessors
Over the last decade, six standalone entries, two unlikely spinoffs, and even a limited series, the V/H/S anthology series has functioned as an efficient delivery system for period-specific horror, extra-gnarly, gory kills, and nightmare-inducing imagery. The series has also served...
Fantastic Fest 2023 Review: ONE-PERCENTER Delivers Brutal 'Real Action'
The 85-minute One-Percenter, the new film from Meatball Machine writer/director Yudai Yamaguchi, opens with an extended series of intercut interviews and behind-the-scenes segments that feel like a DVD extra, centering on the intensity and combat abilities of action star Takuma...
Fantastic Fest 2023 Review: TRIGGERED (Topakk), Brutal Action Highlights Flick From The Philippines
Richard Somes directs the Filipino action movie.
Fantastic Fest 2023 Review: JACKDAW Drives Through in This Fast and Compact Thriller
Oliver Jackson-Cohen stars in a noir action-thriller, directed by Jamie Childs.
Fantastic Fest 2023 Review: RAGE (Rabia), Growing Tension And Fear Gives Way to a Bloody Finale
Alan survives his mother's death, forced to hide by his father in a secluded housing unit.
There, he discovers hidden messages that reveal his father is a werewolf. Alan has to do
something before the next full moon catches up with them.
Fantastic Fest 2023 Review: STRANGE DARLING, A Joy Ride to Remember
After a brief prologue that promises – both via text and voiceover – a dramatization of the true story of the final killings of the most unique American serial killer of the 21st century, we are treated to a mesmerizing...
Fantastic Fest 2023 Review: THE LAST STOP IN YUMA COUNTY, Lovely Little Genre Exercise That Grows Too Big
The feature debut of writer/director Francis Galluppi makes the most of its single location setting for most of its runtime, and only falters when it takes steps to leave that place behind. That place is a sizable diner attached to...
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CRUMB CATCHER Teaser: Indie Thriller Bound For Fantastic Fest Picked up For World Sales
Chris Skotchdopole has spent ten years working with the fine folks at Glass Eye Pix. They are all set to make their directorial debut at Fantastic Fest with their thriller Crumb Catcher. A festival teaser has been sent out, check...
