This year’s FrightFest will kick off on 23rd August with Jenn Wexler’s post-modern slasher The Ranger (making her the first ever female director to open the festival) and close on 27th August with Gaspar Noé’s insane surprise Cannes-favourite Climax. And considering 2018’s London edition is backed by Arrow Video as the main sponsor, fans can expect even more top-shelf genre fun than ever before. Hold on to your butts.
The four horseman of the fest-pocalypse, Greg Day, Alan Jones, Paul McEvoy and Ian Rattray reunite again to take over the Cineworld Leicester Square and Prince Charles Cinema, marking FrightFest’s 19th year on the trot celebrating horror in London’s film centre. And the line-up is certainly a fan-pleaser, with over 60 premieres, plenty involving former festival favourites.
Sticking out on first glance is Pascal ‘Martyrs’ Laugier’s latest slice of French extremity Incident In A Ghost Land, Turbo Kid trio Francois Simard, Anouk Whissell and Yoann-Karl Whissell’s Sundance thriller Summer of 84 and Leigh Whannell’s US genre hit Upgrade. Not forgetting an appearance from Garth Marenghi himself, with Matthew Holness’s seriously freaky-looking debut Possum also taking to the big screen.
Hugely talked-about battle-rap crowd-pleaser Bodied, from music video maestro Joseph Kahn, will also make an appearance, as will the Lucky McKee-produced (and brilliantly titled) The Man Who Killed Hitler And Then Bigfoot, while we can only hope horror queen Barbara Crampton makes an appearance once more, with her latest Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich (running on a script from S. Craig Zahler) also taking a bow at this year’s fest.
On the less obvious side of the schedule, Chris Collier’s tell-all documentary about the festival itself, FrightFest: Beneath The Dark Heart of Cinema will have its world premiere, as will a whole host of brand new genre indies from first time directors, in the ‘First Blood’ strand.
And Wexler’s The Ranger included, this year promises to be another horror movie haven for female directors too, with the festival also championing Mitzi Peirone’s Braid, Aislinn Clark’s The Devil’s Doorway and, returning with a second encore screening after truly wowing crowds at FrightFest’s Glasgow edition, Issa López’s Mexican fairytale, Tigers Are Not Afraid.
To list every film we’re excited about here would take weeks, but rest assured, it seems that Arrow Video FrightFest 2018 is surely set to be the festival’s most crowd-pleasing to date. Set your countdown timers accordingly.
Arrow Video FrightFest 2018 takes place 23rd-27th August at Cineworld Leicester Square and Prince Charles Cinema. Ticket info and the full schedule can be found at http://www.frightfest.co.uk/.
