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Nightmares Film Festival: 2018 Lineup Announced

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NIGHTMARES FILM FESTIVAL UNVEILS COMPLETE 2018 PROGRAM

For horror fans, Christmas has come three months early — in the form of the Nightmares Film Festival 2018 program, presenting 24 features and 164 shorts over the four-day event running Oct. 18-21 at Gateway Film Center in Columbus.

True to its “#BetterHorror” motto, the program is jammed top to bottom with a mix of premier genre films from around the globe. Across the 188 films, there are dozens of world and North American premieres, a short accompanied by live in-theater music, projects from genre favorites, a Stephen King block and even a new documentary section.

“We’re on a never-ending, worldwide quest to discover the films that are reshaping the boundaries of horror — bold voices, new visions of terror, films that haunt you,” said co-founder and programmer Jason Tostevin. “That’s how we build every Nightmares, and this may be our best lineup yet.”

The features lineup is stacked with the world premieres of some of horror’s most anticipated new movies, including white-knuckle thriller The Final Interview from Fred Vogel (Toetag Pictures, August Underground); twisted kidnap nightmare The Bad Man from Scott Schirmer (Found, Harvest Lake); ‘80s-style horror anthology Skeletons in the Closet from Tony Wash (The Rake); and paranoia-fueled apocalypse tale Haven’s End from Chris Etheridge (Attack of the Morningside Monster).

North American feature debuts include The Head from the director of ThanksKilling, about a medieval monster hunter; Christmas horror-comedy The Night Sitter; action-horror creature feature Book of Monsters; and mistaken-identity comedy-thriller Kill Ben Lyk.

Horror legend Bill Lustig will open the festival with a brand new 4K restoration of his classic, Maniac. New cult director Jason Trost (The FP) will attend with The FP 2: Beats of Rage.

Nightmares also continues its tradition of presenting one of the top genre shorts programs in the world. This year’s short films include horror, thriller, midnight and horror-comedy blocks playing throughout the festival.

The festival also introduces its Recurring Nightmares section this year, a category that showcases the newest shorts by festival alums.

The fest’s legendary Midnight Mindfuck block also returns. The section, called “one of the most dangerous and challenging programs at any festival” (The Film Coterie), will present Trauma, a harrowing tale grounded in the darkest parts of Chilean history, and La Puta es Ciega (The Whore is Blind), a surreal and violent exploration of the streets of Mexico.

“Every aspect of Nightmares is filtered through the question, what would excite us as fans?,” said co-founder Chris Hamel. “We don’t think there’s a better experience for makers and lovers of horror than the four days of Nightmares Film Festival.”

The 13 finalists in both the Nightmares short and feature screenplay competitions were also announced. The ultimate winner in each competition will be announced at the awards ceremony on Oct. 20.

Nightmares begins Thursday, Oct. 18 at 7 p.m. and runs until Sunday night, Oct. 21. Fans who are ready to make the pilgrimage to Columbus, Ohio will find a limited number of passes still available for the festival at gatewayfilmcenter.org/NFF.

Hope Madden and George Wolf are proud to be among the jury panel for Nightmares Film Festival, one  of the top horror film celebrations in the world. It has been the number-one rated genre film festival on submission platform FilmFreeway for 30 consecutive months.

 

 

SHORT SCREENPLAY FINALISTS

Boo – Rakefet Abergel

Mourning Meal – Jamal Hodge

Hiking Buddies – Megan Morrison

Living Memory – Stephen Graves

#dead – Derek Stewart

The Burning Dress – Sam Kolesnik

For Good Behavior – Ron Riekki

Air – Dalya Guerin

Invidia – Vanessa Wright

Minotaur – Michael Escobedo

Pancake Skank –  Savannah Rodgers

The Callback – Sophie Hood

The Farm – Cate McLennan

FEATURE SCREENPLAY FINALISTS

Patience of Vultures – Greg Sisco

People of Merrit – Adam Pottle

The Shame Game – Greg Sisco

Rise of the Gulon – Matt Wildash

Left Of The Devil – Stephen Anderson

Bartleby Grimm’s Paranormal Elimination Service – Dan Kiely

Kelipot – Seth Nesenholtz

The Coldest Horizon – Jeffrey Howe

Throwback – Rachel Woolley

Resurrection Girl and the Curse of the Wendigo – Nathan Ludwig

The Caul – Sophia Cacciola & Michael J. Epstein

The Devil’s Gun – James Christopher

Residual – Tyler Christensen

HORROR FEATURES

The Bad Man

Skeletons in the Closet

Livescream

The Night Sitter

Book of Monsters

Maniac 4k

Confessions of a Serial Killer

The Head

Never Hike Alone

The Field Guide to Evil

THRILLER FEATURES

The Final Interview

Kill Ben Lyk

Clementina

Be My Cat: A Film For Anne

The LaPlace’s Demon

Alive

Betsy

Haven’s End

Dark Iris

MIDNIGHT FEATURES

Beats of Rage

Camp Death III in 2D!

Trauma

La Puta es Ciega

More Blood!

RECURRING NIGHTMARES A

Killing Giggles

The Unbearing

Let’s Play

Amy’s in the Freezer

One Hundred Thousand

Anniversary

Apartment 402

Enough

E-Bowla

Vampiras Satanicas II: The Death Bunny

42 Counts

RECURRING NIGHTMARES B

Galmi

Syphvania Grove

Rites of Vengeance

The Scarlet Vultures

Music Lesson

Thousand-Legged Terror

BFF Girls

Gut Punched

Basoan

HORROR SHORTS A

Ayuda

Bathroom Troll

Don’t Drink the Water

The After Party

Masks

Here There Be Monsters

Don’t Look Into Their Eyes

Heartless

El Cuco is Hungry

HORROR SHORTS B

Little

Save

Childer

Conductor

All You Can Carry

Made You Look

The Desolation Prize

Doggy See Evil

Spectres

Goodbye Old Friend

There’s a Monster Behind You

Blondie

HORROR SHORTS C

Ding Dong

Oscar’s Bell

Red Mosquito

Goodnight Gracie

Baghead

Wyrmwood

Avulsion

House Guests

The Last Seance

Three

HORROR SHORTS D

The Bloody Ballad of Squirt

The Chains

One Dark Night

Fears

Midnight Delivery

I Beat It

Mama’s Boy

Alien Death Fuck

Hell of a Day

Vonnis

The Dark Ward

Mystery Box

THRILLER SHORTS A

4EVR

Nocturne

The Noise of the Light

Short Leash

Instinct

Where’s Violet

Tutu Grande

THRILLER SHORTS B

Lady Hunters

Smiley’s

Headless Swans

A Death Story Called Girl

Dead Cool

You’ll Only Have Each Other

THRILLER SHORTS C

The Box

Salvatore

Witch’s Milk

Post Mortem Mary

Spurn

Esther

They Eat Your Teeth

They Wait for Us

MIDNIGHT SHORTS A

CLAW

Mayday

The Hex Dungeon

I Am Not a Monster

Gentlewoman’s Guide to Dom.

Blood Highway

Sock Monster

The Monster Within

Viral Blood

No Monkey

MIDNIGHT SHORTS B

Imagine

Fetish

The Jerry Show

Proceeds of Crime

Television

Mother Fucker

Ding-Dong

Night Terrors

The Thang

Rift

Häxan

MIDNIGHT SHORTS C

Tears of Apollo

Nightmare

The Mare

Mother Rabbit

Lipstick

Human Resources

Blood and Moonlight

Suicide Note

Enjoy the View

Freelancer

STEPHEN KING DOLLAR BABIES

The Things We Left Behind

I Am the Doorway

OHIO SHORTS A

The Borrower

Below the Trees

The Sewing Circle

The Choice

What Comes Out

Beyond Repair

Occupied

Hell to Pay

Who’s There

OHIO SHORTS B

Down the Hatchet

The Green Lady

Not From Around Here

Den

The Cat

House of Hell

Dodo

Cry Baby Bridge

SHORTS PAIRED WITH FEATURES

Marta

The Party’s Over

A Thing of Dreams

Mother of a Sacred Lamb

Dual

What Metal Girls are Into

My First Time

Canine

Latched

Offerings

Jingle Hell

Arret Pipi

Entropia

Helminth

Cabin Killer

American Undead

The Thing about Beecher’s Gate

Phototaxis

Best of Me

HORROR COMEDY SHORTS

Amigos

Netflix and Chill

Attack of Potato Clock

Foxwood

Rattle

Bitten

Heavy Flow

Sell Your Body

The Infection

Blood Sisters

Shit … They’re All Vampires

Late

There’s One Inside the House

For Your Queue

I Don’t Want to Go Out—Week of September 24

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I know you didn’t really dig Solo, but if you’re on the fence (or you skipped it), maybe give it a second look. Definitely no need to see Uncle Drew, but if you missed Izzy as she got the F across town, now is the time to rectify that situation. Here’s the low down on what’s new in home entertainment.

Click the film title to read the full review:

Izzy Gets the F*ck Across Town

Solo: A Star Wars Story

Uncle Drew

The Seagull

The Screening Room

Screening Room: Sons of Witches

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We are back and digging through the wild array of movies out this week: The House with a Clock In Its Walls, Fahrenheit 11/9, Assassination Nation, Lizzie, Pick of the Litter plus all that’s fit to watch in home entertainment.

Listen to the full podcast HERE.

New In Theaters, Slider

We Call BS

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Fahrenheit 11/9

by George Wolf

Michael Moore may set up his latest film by asking “How the F did we get here?”, but thankfully Fahrenheit 11/9 isn’t just another empty load of hand-wringing on the perils of ignoring the “economic anxiety” of the heartland.

Moore has much more legitimate axes to grind, and not just about Donald Trump.

In fact, after a compelling open that reminds us how sure we were that Trump was never going to win in the first place, Moore shifts his focus entirely.

From the water crisis in Moore’s hometown of Flint, Michigan, to striking teachers in West Virginia to the school shooting in Parkland, Florida to a history professor at Yale and beyond, the provocateur filmmaker is after the converging forces that made Trump possible, and the dangers of continued complacency.

The film is at turns enraging, funny, chilling and inspirational, a rallying cry for a populace that may still be interested in maintaining any “aspirations of democracy.”

At his worst, Moore can be self-aggrandizing and overly eager to connect certain dots. Here, outside of one needless stunt at the Michigan governor’s mansion, he’s at his most forthright and committed.

Beyond the question of how we got here lies the bigger problem of how we get out. Moore presents a wide-ranging and compelling argument that the answer starts with, in the words of the Parkland student activists, “calling BS.”

He calls it on the myth of “real America,” and unveils his film’s true target is not Trump, but a government that can rule by minority.

Plutocratic cronyism, unabashed appeals to bigotry, and spineless capitulation from the “opposition party” have led to a voter apathy rooted in hopelessness. Amid flashbacks from Roger & Me, Moore’s 1989 debut, we see the counter lies in “mobilizing for freedom, not safety.”

And if we don’t?

History points to some very unsettling answers.

Accuse him of preaching to the choir if you want, but that’s not who Moore is most interested in reaching. Pairing lessons from the past with hope for the future, Fahrenheit 11/9 is his plea to get invested and mobilize.

 

For Your Queue

I Don’t Want to Go Out—Week of September 17

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Bigger, badder (like seriously badder) dinosaurs and a pleasantly off-kilter take on the Western both available this week. We’d say go with the Western, but you know, if you have a thing for dinosaurs…

Damsel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6t07LFf5hQ

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom

New In Theaters, Slider

Gaslight Anthem

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A Simple Favor

by George Wolf

Stephanie is a suburban single mom who keeps an “oopsie” jar for swearing and volunteers for everything at her son’s elementary school.

Emily is passionately married, drops frequent f-bombs and has a painting of her vajayjay hanging in the living room.

But a play date for their sons leads to an unlikely friendship in A Simple Favor, a crazy fun mystery with plenty of surprises up its sassy sleeveless number.

The first may be seeing the director is Paul Feig, who made his name with blockbuster comedies such as Bridesmaids and Spy.

So, he’s doing dark thrillers, now? Nope, he’s doing a satirical comedy with strong women, nice diversity and a pretty sharp bite.

Perky Stephanie (Anna Kendrick – perfect) and glamorous Emily (Blake Lively – ditto) share martinis and secrets until Emily turns up missing. Steph provides case updates on her Mommy vlog (“cookies and origami” help to ease the strain!) while spending more and more time watching Emily’s son and “comforting” her husband (Henry Golding from Crazy Rich Asians).

You’ll guess some of what comes next, but there’s plenty you won’t, unless you read Darcey Bell’s source novel. Screenwriter Jessica Sharzer (Nerve) shapes it for the big screen as a Gone Girl for the gaslight age, where ridiculousness is a default setting, all information is equally true/false and irony is a security blanket never far out of reach.

There are plenty of black comedic laughs to be found here, as well as clever plot twists and knowing nods to the expectations that come with roles of “wife,” “mother,” “career woman” and “friend.”

The running time starts to feel bloated by the third act, and the film flirts with joining the mundane fray it had been so giddily rising above. But it rallies for the win with a satisfying finale of comeuppance and LOL updates on how some characters have moved on.

A Simple Favor is not what the trailer makes you think it is – which turns out to be the perfect setup for a film with plenty of head fakes that lead to a mischievous good time.

Fright Club

Fright Club: Fractured Fairy Tales

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Nothing scared me as a child the way the story of Hansel and Gretel did. Do you know why? Because it’s fucking scary. But that’s the thing about fairy tales, isn’t it? There was always something—a big, bad wolf or a witch or a wicked stepmother—intended to frighten children. No wonder fairy tales make such rich fodder for horror movies.

Here are our picks for the best fractured fairy tale horror—either those films that reimagine an old fairy tale or those that are clearly inspired by them—recorded live at the Gateway Film Center.

5. Hansel & Gretel (2007)

This is a straightforward reimagining of a classic fairy tale. We’d compare it to Snow White: A Tale of Terror (1997), Deadtime Stories (1986), The Red Shoes (2005) and Tale of Tales (2015).

Director Pil-sung Yim’s reimagining of Grimm’s classic “into the woods” horror upends expectations by putting adults in the vulnerable position and giving children the power.

A young man facing impending fatherhood gets into a car accident next to a deep, dark and mysterious woods. He loses himself and is rescued by a lone little girl with a lantern.

From here, Yim’s sumptuous visuals and eerily joyful tone create the unshakable sensation of a dream—one that looks good but feels awful.

As our protagonist unravels the surreal mystery that’s swallowed him, Yim offers a parable—as fairy tales often do—about the value of children. But don’t let that dissuade you from this seriously weird, visually indulgent gem.

4. Black Swan (2010)

Based on the ballet Swan Lake, which itself is inspired by German folktales The White Duck and The Stolen Veil, Black Swan takes a dark turn.

The potent female counterpoint to Darren Aronofsky’s 2008 gem The Wrestler, Black Swan dances on masochism and self-destruction in pursuit of a masculine ideal.

Natalie Portman won the Oscar for a haunting performance—haunting as much for the physical toll the film appeared to take on the sinewy, hallowed out body as for the mind-bending horror.

Every performance shrieks with the nagging echo of the damage done by this quest to fulfill the unreasonable demands of the male gaze: Barbara Hershey’s plastic and needy mother; Winona Ryder’s picture of self-destruction; Mila Kunis’s dangerous manipulator; Vincent Cassel’s other dangerous manipulator.

The mind-bending descent into madness and death may be the most honest look at ballet we’ve ever seen at the movies.

3. The Lure (2015)

Here’s a great Eastern European take on reimagined Eastern European fairy tales, like Norway’s Thale (2012) and Czech Republic’s Little Otik (2000).

Gold (Michalina Olszanska) and Silver (Marta Mazurek) are not your typical movie mermaids, and director Agnieszka Smoczynska’s feature debut The Lure is not your typical – well, anything.

The musical fable offers a vivid mix of fairy tale, socio-political commentary, whimsy and throat tearing. But it’s not as ill-fitting a combination as you might think.

The Little Mermaid is actually a heartbreaking story. Not Disney’s crustacean song-stravaganza, but Hans Christian Andersen’s bleak meditation on the catastrophic consequences of sacrificing who you are for someone undeserving. It’s a cautionary tale for young girls, really, and Lure writer Robert Bolesto remains true to that theme.

The biggest differences between Bolesto’s story and Andersen’s: 80s synth pop, striptease and teeth. At its heart, The Lure is a story about Poland – its self-determination and identity in the Eighties. That’s where Andersen’s work is so poignantly fitting.

2. Der Samurai (2014)

This film is influenced heavily by fairy tales, especially the concept of the big, bad wolf, as are The Company of Wolves (1984), Big Bad Wolves (2013), and Freeway (1996).

Writer/director Till Kleinert’s atmospheric Der Samurai blends Grimm Brother ideas with Samurai legend to tell a story that borders on the familiar but manages always to surprise.

Jakob, a meek police officer in a remote German berg, has been charged with eliminating the wolf that’s frightening villagers. Moved by compassion or longing, Jakob can’t quite make himself accomplish his. But a chance encounter with a wild-eyed stranger wearing a dress and carrying a samurai sword clarifies that the wolf is probably not the villagers’ – or Jakob’s – biggest problem.

Pit Bukowski cuts a peculiar but creepy figure as the Samurai – kind of a cross between Iggy Pop and Ted Levine. As the cat and mouse game gains momentum, it appears the Samurai is here to upend all of Jakob’s inhibitions by eliminating anyone keeping him from embracing to his primal urges.

Kleinert’s sneaky camera builds tension in every scene, and the film’s magnificent sound design echoes with Jakob’s isolation as well as that of the village itself. And though much of the imagery is connected in a way to familiar fairy tales or horror movies, the understated approach gives it all a naturalism that is unsettling.

1. Pan’s Labyrinth (2006)

Guillermo del Toro’s masterpiece is Influenced visually and logically by fairy tales. It takes us to a fairy tale land but is not set on any existing fairy tale, not unlike Argento’s greatest work, Suspiria (1977), and Jee-woon Kim’s brilliant Tale of Two Sisters (2003).

But honestly, there is nothing on earth quite like Pan’s Labyrinth. A mythical cousin to del Toro’s beautiful 2002 ghost story The Devil’s Backbone, Pan’s Labyrinth follows a terrified, displaced little girl who may be the reincarnation of Princess Moanna, daughter of the King of the Underworld. She must complete three tasks to rejoin her father in her magical realm.

A heartbreaking fantasy about the costs of war, the film boasts amazing performances. Few people play villains—in any language—as well as Sergi Lopez, and Doug Jones inspires terror and wonder in two different roles. But the real star here is del Toro’s imagination, which has never had such a beautiful outlet.

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I Don’t Want to Go Out—Week of September 10

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Not the strongest week in home entertainment. Not the weakest one, either. Three entertaining if flawed flicks that you, if box office is a good estimate, probably didn’t see in theaters. Here’s the lowdown.

Ocean’s 8

Hearts Beat Loud

Superfly

New In Theaters

I Said, What’s In Your GD Wallet!

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Peppermint

by George Wolf

Jennifer Garner has been a screen sweetheart for enough years now that it might be easy to forget she rose to fame as the action star of TV’s Alias.

Peppermint is her bloody reminder, a corpse-strewn revenge caper with few surprises but plenty of ambitions for a new franchise.

Garner is Riley North, an LA mom whose husband and daughter are gunned down on orders from ruthless drug dealer Diego Garcia (Juan Pablo Raba). Riley is injured badly but survives the shooting, eventually giving the cops positive IDs on the three gunman….which bases the entire film on a contradiction.

The flimsy reason for the hit, along with the stories of Garcia’s mythic levels of evildoing, don’t jibe with his offer to buy Riley’s silence instead of buying her the farm. If only that were the film’s biggest problem.

The script from Chad St. John (London Has Fallen – woof) serves up heaps of one-note obviousness amid layers of cop cliche circle-jerkery.

“The FBI wants to talk..”

“The Feds?”

Yes, experienced detective, that’s a big ten-four!

Treasure troves of info result from 15-second phone calls, kids living on skid row sport gleaming white teeth, and the search for any authenticity in this film is DOA.

So, dead then?

Sigh…yes! And then there’s the matter of Riley’s particularly deadly set of skills. Suffice to say there are issues there as well, but thankfully not because we’re given yet another Taken knockoff.

With Taken‘s director Pierre Morel at the helm, it’s not a big leap to expect just that. Instead, Riley’s frequent baddie beatdowns set her up as a West Coast Equalizer, but Morel can’t cash that check, either.

The reasons to get invested in any of this are hastily assembled and unconvincing, and Morel’s action sequences seldom escape a bland auto pilot, but Garner makes a comfortable return to the action saddle. She casts Riley as a likable, if less-than-believable, anti-hero, and Morel manages to keep the focus respectably gritty, never sexualizing Garner beyond some seriously long-lasting lipstick.

High on body count but low on substance, Peppermint tastes like a strange blend of committed and lazy.