News

Directors include Huang Hsin-yao, Tom Lin Shu-yu, Lam Sum, Ng Ka-leung and Daishi Matsunaga.

Taiwan’s Golden Horse Film Project Promotion (Fpp) has revealed a diverse selection of 46 films for its 2023 project market, including directors Huang Hsin-yao, Tom Lin Shu-yu and Hsu Chih-yen from Taiwan, Lam Sum and Ng Ka-leung from Hong Kong and Daishi Matsunaga from Japan

The market is scheduled to take place from November 20-22 during the Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival with a the total prize pool of nearly $250,000 (Nt$8m), including a grand prize worth $32,000 (Nt$1m). All projects in the selection are eligible to...

Movies have always used a range of cliches and tropes to deliver fans more of what they want. Many of the best tropes in cinema can actually be traced back to some iconic twists that had audiences impressed and wanting more. A great twist can either set up a sequel, demand audiences watch it a second time or shock audiences that the story went in a direction it did, causing a range of emotions.

Many of these twists become tropes that are very much a staple of the genre and, for audiences, it's only a question of when the trope will make its appearance. In fact, some are apparent to everyone from the first scene. Twists are what make many of the best films so iconic, and continue to be used to great effect. While they may be predictable, they're also a key ingredient in making certain stories work.

Related:...

British thriller Femme was also on the prize list.

The Fantasia International Film Festival in Montreal has revealed the winners of its jury awards, with Canadian cyber thriller Red Rooms (Les Chambres Rouges) named best feature in the event’s Cheval Noir competition section.

Red Rooms also won the best screenplay prize for Quebec writer-director Pascal Plante, the best score award for Dominique Plante and one of the two outstanding performance awards for Juliette Gariépy.

The Cheval Noir best director award went to Sam H Freeman and Ng Choon Ping for their UK thriller Femme, whose Nathan Stewart-Jarrett won the other outstanding performance award.

The Fantasia International Film Festival in Montreal is more than halfway through its 27th edition, which is running from July 20th through August 9th – and over the weekend they unveiled their list of Fantasia Film Festival Awards winners, with major honors going to the likes of Red Rooms and Stay Online.

Our own reviewer Tyler Nichols gave Red Rooms a 9/10 “amazing” review (you can read it Here), so it makes sense to hear that the film racked up multiple awards, including Best Feature, Best Screenplay for Pascal Plante, Best Score for Dominique Plante, and Outstanding Performance for Juliette Gariépy. We haven’t had the chance to see Stay Online yet, but that movie did earn the Best First Feature award for director Yeva Strelnikova.

Red Rooms is about what happens when the case of a serial killer who streamed his murders in the “red rooms” of the Dark Web goes to trial,...

Japanese filmmaker Junji Sakamoto to receive the Screen International Star Asia Lifetime Achievement Award.

The New York Asian Film Festival (Nyaff) has revealed the features that will compete for its Uncaged Award and announced that Japanese filmmaker Junji Sakamoto will receive the Screen International Star Asia Lifetime Achievement Award.

The nine-strong competition for best feature film at the festival, running July 14-30, will include the world premieres of Hong Kong horror Back Home and Chinese films Flaming Cloud and Redemption With Life.

Back Home is a suspense horror that marks the feature directorial debut of Nate Ki and stars Anson...

In “The Myriad of Faces of the Future Challenges” Indonesian cinema is revisited by the Milisfilem Collective’s Yuki Aditya and I Gde Mika in search for the political commentary on the country. The filmmakers have tightly scrutinised the contents of films made in Indonesia during general Suharto’s New Order regime. The outcome of that investigation is a hectic 90-minutes long film essay which interrogates the contemporary history of the country. Clips from various productions are then repurposed in a fragmentary fashion and commented upon by the filmmakers in the voice-over, thus creating the eponymous myriad.

The Abandoned is screening at International Film Festival Rotterdam

Another recent Indonesian film, “Tropic Fever”, also used archive footage. In the case of “Tropic Fever”, the point was to reclaim the country’s colonial history through the footage originally shot by the Dutch rulers. Although the directors set out with a subversive idea in their mind,...

Tseng Ying-ting’s thriller opens with pyrotechnics lightning up the New Year Eve’s sky to Yazoo’s 1982 smash hit “Only You”, an uncharacteristically romantic environment for a suicide attempt. This sequence is the introduction into the movie’s key character, police officer Wu Jie (Janine Chun-Ning Chang) whose plans of ending it all are derailed when a teenager appears out of nowhere and starts banging on her window pleading for help. Her car is actually parked close to the popular gathering spot at the river bank, and Wu decides to get out and see what made the teenagers leave the place in panic. It is there she discovers a bloated corpse washed up on shore. Hit by the paradox of a dead person saving her life, Wu chooses to solve the case despite the anguish she is experiencing at work.

The Abandoned is screening at...

Martyrs Lane will stream exclusively to Shudder on September 9 in the US, Canada, UK, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand, as well as via the Shudder offering within the AMC+ bundle where available.

Check out this clip:

In this unsettling ghost story, Leah, 10, lives in a large, old house with her family but can’t quite work out why her mother seems so distant. At night she is visited by a mysterious guest, who might be able to give her some answers. With a new challenge every night, Leah is rewarded with bits of knowledge that, when pieced together, threaten to shine a dangerous light on both the truth in her nightmares and of the world she lives in.

Written and directed by Ruth Platt, and expanded from her 2019 short film by the same name, Martyrs Lane is a deeply personal film that explores love and grief through a dark and captivating ghost story.

Quake Enhanced Trailer: "Announced today during QuakeCon at Home, in celebration of 25 years since the release of the dark fantasy first-person shooter, an enhanced version of the original Quake is available today on PC, Xbox One, Xbox Game Pass for console and PC, PS4, Nintendo Switch, and backward compatible on Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5. Native Xbox Series X|S and PS5 versions bringing native 4K at 120 Fps will be available soon as a free upgrade.

The Original Quake, Enhanced

Experience the authentic, updated, and visually enhanced version of the original Quake.

Featuring resolutions up to 4K and widescreen resolution support, enhanced models, dynamic and color lightning, anti-aliasing, depth of field, and the original soundtrack and theme song by Trent Reznor. There has never been a better time to relive or experience Quake for the first time.

Online, Cross-play, & Local Multiplayer and Co-op

Fight through the dark fantasy base...

Sienna Sayer as Rachel – Martyr’s Lane Photo Credit: Shudder

Launching on AMC Networks’ Shudder on September 9th is Martyrs Lane.

Ahead of its Shudder launch, Martyrs Lane will World Premiere August 19th as part of the 2021 Fantasia International Film Festival and celebrate its UK Premiere August 20th with the Edinburgh International Film Festival.

In this unsettling ghost story, Leah, 10, lives in a large, old house with her family but can’t quite work out why her mother seems so distant. At night she is visited by a mysterious guest, who might be able to give her some answers. With a new challenge every night, Leah is rewarded with bits of knowledge that, when pieced together, threaten to shine a dangerous light on both the truth in her nightmares and of the world she lives in.

Written and directed by Ruth Platt, and expanded from her 2019 short film by the same name,...

Exclusive: Minka Kelly has joined Harvey Keitel, Sam Worthington and AnnaSophia Robb in the cast of Eytan Rockaway’s (The Abandoned) upcoming biopic Lansky, about the infamous gangster Meyer Lansky, a contemporary of Bugsy Siegel. As previously announced, Keitel plays the notorious Lansky.

Also rounding out the cast are Orange Is the New Black‘s Jackie Cruz, John Magaro (The Big Short) who plays the younger Lansky, David Cade (upcoming Michael Shannon movie Swing) as Siegel, David James Elliot and Alon Aboutboul.

Shooting is currently underway in Alabama, with Voltage Pictures handling international sales at the upcoming European Film Market in Berlin.

Rockaway wrote the script depicting Lansky in various stages of his life. It’s partially based on his father Robert Rockaway’s interviews with the real-life Lansky, which were part of his extensive research into America’s key crime figures.

Exclusive: Divine Rights Media’s Mike Landry has partnered with Derek S. Jancisin to option the rights to Andy McDermott’s bestselling Wilde/Chase book series. The hope is to hatch a franchise, beginning with the first book in the series, The Hunt for Atlantis. Aaron Berg has been set to write and produce along with Landry, with Jancisin exec producing. The latter intends to finance development and is a managing director and Wealth Management Advisor at Merrill Lynch in Pittsburgh. This marks his first foray into film production.

The books follow the dangerous exploits of New York-based archeologist Nina Wilde, who teams with cavalier ex-Sas British bodyguard Eddie Chase. Jancisin intends to finance along with additional partners, and they hope to engage in a multi-continent shoot in 2020. In the first book, which was published in 2007, an eccentric billionaire sends Wilde and Chase on a globe-trotting race to discover...

Another year has come to an end, which means it's time for the Dread Central staff to weigh in with their picks of the best and worst of 2013's horror offerings. We're giving you a full dozen lists this time, and per usual they come in a variety of formats, each reflecting the unique styles of our writers.

We've also compiled them to come up with the year's overall winners and losers. We averaged out the top and bottom five vote getters on everyone's lists, and here are the results:

Best: Maniac

Runners-up: The Conjuring, Evil Dead

Worst: Texas Chainsaw 3D

Runners-up: The Purge, The Last Exorcism Part II

Check out the Dread Central staff's Best of and Worst of lists for 2013 by following the links below!

[Andrew Kasch]

[Anthony Arrigo]

[Brad McHargue]

[Buz "Danger" Wallick]

[Debi "The Woman in Black" Moore]

[The Foywonder]

[Gareth "Pestilence" Jones]

[Jinx]

[MattFini]

[Scott "Doctor Gash" Hallam]

[Staci Layne Wilson]

[Uncle Creepy]

Andrew Kasch's Picks

Stoker: Chan-wook Park delivered some next-level filmmaking and his best film since Oldboy with his U.

The madman behind Dead Shadows is bringing his latest two films - The Dark Zone and The Black Gate - to this year's Afm, and we've got some new sales art for both of them and more. Check it out!

The Dark Zone Synopsis (directed by David Cholewa)

It is the year 2066.

The earth is dying. The oceans are lifeless, the ice caps barely a memory. It is a world of starving billions where fresh water and even oxygen have become increasingly precious commodities. Poised on the brink of disaster, mankind realizes that the only hope for our species is to leave our home world and move out among the stars.

The United Nations colony ship Mayflower is en route to a recently identified earth-like planet orbiting Proxima Centauri (or 'Prox' for short), a red dwarf in the Alpha Centauri system – 4.2 light years from Earth. The new world, christened Tycho...

Tiff’s Midnight Madness program turned 25 this year, and for two and half decades, the hardworking programers have gathered some of the strangest, most terrifying, wild, intriguing and downright entertaining films from around the world. From dark comedies to Japanese gore-fests and indie horror gems, the Midnight Madness program hasn’t lost its edge as one the leading showcases of genre cinema. In its 25-year history, Midnight Madness has introduced adventurous late-night moviegoers to such cult faves as Richard Linklater’s Dazed and Confused and Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs. But what separates Midnight Madness from, say, Montreal’s three and half week long genre festival Fantasia, is that Tiff selects only ten films to make the cut. In other words, these programmers don’t mess around. Last week I decided that I would post reviews of my personal favourite films that screened in past years. And just like the Tiff programmers,...

Frankenstein’s Army is coming! Prepare for the zombot coup d'état by checking out our recent interview with co-writer/director Richard Raaphorst and star Karel Roden.

Richard Raaphorst is a Frankenstein's Frankenstein. From designing the film's creatures and characters to directing and story ideation, it was Raaphorst's vision that brought Frankenstein's Army to life. With shouts of "It's Alive!" the film itself is part diesel-punk, part zombie film, and part Nazploitation flick, certainly a taboo subject in Raaphort's homeland of the Netherlands, which was occupied by the Germans during the war (complete with their own SS).

But from this grim history Raaphorst spins a fantastical scenario: a way to stop the Reich with an army of "zombots." What if the grandson of the great Frankenstein was involved? What if a crew of soldiers stumbled into his "castle" and were attacked by his creations? Told in first person, which lends to...

The madman behind Dead Shadows has started a new company and is bring two new projects to Cannes 2013 - The Dark Zone and The Black Gate. Read on for the first details and sales art for both!

In 2005, David Cholewa created DC-medias, a worldwide sales company. The company established a broad and high quality catalog of films that tackled all genres: Drama, Horror, Action, Thriller and more. In 2012 David founded a new production company, focused on genre efforts called Cryofilms along with César Ducasse from Addict Films (Dark Souls). That same year David Cholewa produced and directed his first feature Dead Shadows. Dead Shadows was shot in only 3 weeks, the movie had more than 100 CGI shots and practical effects.

The Dark Zone Synopsis directed by David Chowlea

The crew of the colonial vessel “Dreamscape" is on a 10 year journey. Its mission is to establish the first human colony outside of our solar system.

Here's something super cool you're only gonna see here, a one of a kind Frankenstein's Army action figure. Pity these aren't available for mass consumption just yet, but we'll keep our ears to the ground for you! Dig it!

Karel Roden (The Abandoned, Hellboy, A Lonely Place to Die) plays mad Nazi scientist Viktor, and the flick also features Alexander Mercury (The Golden Compass), Joshua Sasse (The Big I Am), Luke Newberry (The Heart of Me), Andrei Zayats (X-Men: First Class), and Hon Ping Tang (The Fifth Element).

Frankenstein's Army takes place toward the end of World War II, as Russian soldiers push into eastern Germany and stumble across a secret Nazi lab, one that has unearthed and begun experimenting with the journal of one Dr. Viktor Frankenstein. The scientists have used the legendary Frankenstein's work to assemble an army of super-soldiers stitched together from the body parts of their...

Director Richard Raaphorst once again took to his Twitter account today to unveil some more incredible artwork for his film Frankenstein's Army made specifically for this year's San Diego Comic-Con. Check it out right here, and let the drooling continue!

Karel Roden (The Abandoned, Hellboy, A Lonely Place to Die) plays mad Nazi scientist Viktor, and the flick also features Alexander Mercury (The Golden Compass), Joshua Sasse (The Big I Am), Luke Newberry (The Heart of Me), Andrei Zayats (X-Men: First Class), and Hon Ping Tang (The Fifth Element).

Frankenstein's Army takes place toward the end of World War II, as Russian soldiers push into eastern Germany and stumble across a secret Nazi lab, one that has unearthed and begun experimenting with the journal of one Dr. Viktor Frankenstein. The scientists have used the legendary Frankenstein's work to assemble an army of super-soldiers stitched together from the body parts of...

Director Richard Raaphorst took to his Twitter account today to unveil some incredible artwork for his film Frankenstein's Army made specifically for this year's San Diego Comic-Con. Check it out right here, and let the drooling begin!

Karel Roden (The Abandoned, Hellboy, A Lonely Place to Die) plays mad Nazi scientist Viktor, and the flick also features Alexander Mercury (The Golden Compass), Joshua Sasse (The Big I Am), Luke Newberry (The Heart of Me), Andrei Zayats (X-Men: First Class), and Hon Ping Tang (The Fifth Element).

Frankenstein's Army takes place toward the end of World War II, as Russian soldiers push into eastern Germany and stumble across a secret Nazi lab, one that has unearthed and begun experimenting with the journal of one Dr. Viktor Frankenstein. The scientists have used the legendary Frankenstein's work to assemble an army of super-soldiers stitched together from the body parts of their fallen comrades...

Two more comic book adaptations are being shopped at the big dance featuring everyone's favorite bad guys - Nazis - and of course nefarious zombies. Read on for the latest projects on their way from page to screen.

Screen Daily reports that producer Pierre Spangler (Underground, Superman) is taking two interesting horror projects to Cannes in order to complete financing.

The first is I Am Legion, which will be written by Richard Stanley and directed by Nacho Cerda (The Abandoned). The film is “a supernatural thriller set against the background of World War II. The film, budgeted in the $12m range, is targeting Romania for its shoot.”

The second project is The Zombies that Ate the World, which “is a futuristic saga set in a world where zombies walk among us and are relegated to the status of cheap labor. The film is being structured as a Canadian co-production to shoot in Canada.

Another delightfully disturbing bit of goodness has come our way from the now shooting Frankenstein's Army. Never let it be said that horror films aren't always there to lend you a hand when you need it!

On the Dutch website Horror.nl, they report that the film will have a theatrical release in the UK and its world premiere in Toronto. Even better? There will be no CGI effects, and from what we're hearing, the movie will be way over-the-top. Below you'll find an image of a mechanized zombie arm. Oh the joy! Thanks to DC reader Tump for the heads-up and translation!

The Czech shoot, portraying Viktor Frankenstein's efforts to turn around German fortunes by animating super soldiers from the body parts of the fallen, is Richard Raaphorst's helming debut and is before cameras right now (how we love saying that).

Karel Roden (The Abandoned, Hellboy, A Lonely Place to Die...

We have all been waiting patiently for a look at the goods from the now shooting Frankenstein's Army. Finally something juicy has come! See? Good things happen for those who wait. Dig it!

Over on Twitch they have an image/video on display showcasing a rather gory prop from Richard Raaphorst's upcoming flick courtesy of Special Effects Supervisor Rogier Samuels, who appeared last week on the Netherlands talk show "De Wereld Draait Door". Check out the image and hit the link below to watch the video.

The Czech shoot, portraying Viktor Frankenstein's efforts to turn around German fortunes by animating super soldiers from the body parts of the fallen, is Richard Raaphorst's helming debut and is before cameras right now (how we love saying that).

Karel Roden (The Abandoned, Hellboy, A Lonely Place to Die) plays mad Nazi scientist Viktor, and the flick also features Alexander Mercury (The Golden Compass...

Every so often we see an image and can't quite tell what we're looking at, but one thing is painfully apparent... whatever it is, it can't be good. Such is the case with the latest set photo from Frankenstein's Army!

The Czech shoot, portraying Viktor Frankenstein's efforts to turn around German fortunes by animating super soldiers from the body parts of the fallen, is Richard Raaphorst's helming debut and is before cameras right now (how we love saying that).

Karel Roden (The Abandoned, Hellboy, A Lonely Place to Die) plays mad Nazi scientist Viktor, and the flick also features Alexander Mercury (The Golden Compass), Joshua Sasse (The Big I Am), Luke Newberry (The Heart of Me), Andrei Zayats (X-Men: First Class), and Hon Ping Tang (The Fifth Element).

Frankenstein's Army takes place toward the end of World War II, as Russian soldiers push into eastern Germany and stumble across a secret Nazi lab,...

Czech actor Karel Roden will raise the dead in Richard Raaphorst's Frankenstein's Army.Best known on these shores for his role as Rasputin in Guillermo Del Toro's Hellboy, Roden has long been a go-to performer for genre films looking to add a bit of European flavor with key parts in Guy Ritchie's RocknRolla, Paul Greengrass' The Bourne Supremacy, Nacho Cerda's The Abandoned, Del Toro's Blade 2, Jerome Salle's Largo Winch, Jaume Collet-Sera's Orphan while remaining active at home as well, where he is regarded as one of the Czech Republic's finest, appearing this year in Oscar submitted Alois Nebel.In Raaphorst's Frankenstein's Army Roden will play the mad scientist Viktor, a doctor attempting to turn the tide of the war by digging up, augmenting, and re-animating...

With Frankenstein's Army finally filming, you can expect all sorts of cool stuff and announcements from now until the flick debuts. Next on tap: a lead has been found who will soon know what it feels like to be god!

According to Variety Czech tough-guy thesp Karel Roden (pictured right; The Abandoned, Hellboy, A Lonely Place to Die ) will play mad Nazi scientist Viktor in Frankenstein's Army, a Gothic WWII fantasy shooting near Karlovy Vary.

The Czech shoot, portraying Viktor's efforts to turn around German fortunes by animating super soldiers from the body parts of the fallen, is Richard Raaphorst's helming debut.

Roden is a "marvelously thrilling addition to our cast," said Greg Newman, executive vp of Mpi Media Group. Mpi/Dark Sky Films is lead producer along with Los Angeles-based Xyz Films and Pellicola of Amsterdam. Prague's Sirena Film is local co-producer.

The flick also features Alexander Mercury...

One of the scariest things to me is nature as it can be unpredictable and unrelenting. Prior to seeing the film, I simply thought that A Lonely Place to Die was just a survivalist horror film against nature. It is a survivalist horror film against the force of nature known as man and damn is it frightening.

Alison (Melissa George) and her friends go out to hike and climb in the Scotland Mountains when they discover a Serbian girl buried alive. Taking her with them and accepting responsibility, they end up putting themselves in a very unique situation. One that could get them killed. They are pursued and hunted by two men who have a motive behind the Serbian girl’s entrapment. What unfolds is a deadly cat and mouse game through the wilderness.

Melissa George turns out a great female heroine that takes charge of the situation. The hunters...

Reader and contributor Gemma St. Clair returns this weekend with a new list of horror trivia:

1. Elvira: Mistress of the Dark: In the scene where Elvira is being burned at the stake, the flames were so hot that it melted Cassandra Peterson’s black wig.

2. Apt Pupil: When Stephen King heard Bryan Singer was to direct this film, he sold the rights for only $1.

3. Bowery at Midnight: In one scene there is a poster for the movie The Corpse Vanishes, which also stars Bela Lugosi.

4. Alice, Sweet Alice: This was Brooke Shields big screen movie debut.

5. Bad Taste: This was Peter Jackson’s first film. Not only did he direct, but worked on all the special effects, make-up, and built weapon replicas.

6. Nosferatu: Max Schreck does appear on screen before his character Graf Orlok is reviled to the audience. He can be seen briefly in...

Alliance VivaFilm is joining forces with the Fantasia Film Festival to give Hobo With A Shotgun the spectacular Cdn launch it deserves, and thanks to them we are giving away 10 double passes.

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On March 21st, Montreal will play host to the Canadian premiere of Jason Eisener’s epic feature debut Hobo With a Shotgun, starring the inimitable Rutger Hauer, and we’ve got ten (10!) double passes to give away! The screening, which will be hosted by Eisener along with producer Robert Cotterill, will also feature a bonus second feature: a glorious 35mm print of Ngai Kai Lam’s infamous 1991 cult flick Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky, along with a host of vintage grindhouse/exploitation trailers. Here is a caption from our review from Sundance…

“Hobo With a Shotgun delivers what it promises and will satisfy midnight movie gore-hounds. There is a blithe stream-of-self-awareness at play here, similar to what...

We haven’t heard much from Spanish director Nacho Cerda since his quite feature debut in The Abandoned. After shocking audiences with his amazing 28-minute short in Aftermath (out now on DVD from Unearthed Films and if you have the balls and stomach, please see it), horror fans might have forgot about his potential.

Variety is reporting Cerda is going to direct I am Legion, a WWII era story that has Nazis trying to control the powers of a 10-year-old vampire while Allied forces scramble to uncover how their own ranks have been infiltrated by Hitler’s elite. It’s based on a French graphic novel, and it sounds plenty of awesome to me.

The film is being scripted by Hardware‘s Richard Stanley, and is budgeted around $15 million. What are your thoughts on this project?...

It’s the first project in a new four-picture deal with Les Humanoides Associes, the French publisher best known for Metal Hurlant. Debuting in 2004, I Am Legion centers on a World War II plot by Nazis to control the powers of a 10-year-old vampire while Allied forces scramble to uncover how their own ranks have been infiltrated by Hitler’s elite. The Full House production will be directed by Spain's Nacho Cerda (The Abandoned) from a script by Richard Stanley (Hardware, The Abandoned). Humanoides partner Pierre Spengler (Superman) will co-produce the $13.4 million-$16.4 million film, which is expected to shoot late this year in Eastern Europe using English actors. The comic book series was originally published by Les Humanoïdes Associés in three albums, Le faune dansant (The Dancing Faun, June 2004), Vlad (January 2006) and Les trois singes (The Three Monkeys, November 2007). This was then translated into English by Justin Kelly and was...

The director of Aftermath is back with another flick on his plate, this time dealing with the subject of vampirism during World War II. You know, because there just wasn't enough horror going on in that time period.

According to Variety, fresh off a four-picture deal with Gallic comic book publisher Les Humanoides Associes, Paris-based Full House is making I Am Legion, an English-language vampire movie set during WWII that will be its first project.

Spain's Nacho Cerda (pictured right; The Abandoned) will be directing from a screenplay by Richard Stanley (Hardware). Revamping a 2006-07 comic book series, I Am Legion pits British Special Ops commandos and Romanian resistance fighters against Nazis, who use a 12-year-old vampire girl to spawn an army of evil.

Look for more on this one soon!

- Uncle Creepy

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Remember Nacho Cerda? No? Well then, let me refresh your memory. The Spanish director put together the creepy compilation of shorts infamously known as The Awakening/Genesis/Aftermath. They're so popular that it's available on Blu-ray (and also highly recommended). But soon after, Cerda delivered the disappointing The Abandoned, a Filmax production released by an infant After Dark Films. It's been rough five years since Abandoned as us familiar with Cerda still have been clamoring for more. Thank the gods of (the original) Clash of the Titans as Cerda is attached to direct I Am Legion, an English-language vampire movie set during WWII. It will be the first project of a 4-picture deal between Gallic comicbook publisher Les Humanoides Associes and Paris-based Full House. Even more insane is that Cerda will be directing from a screenplay by mother effin' Richard Stanley, director of Hardware (as seen in last week's "Office...

When The Abandoned arrived on U.S. shores through After Dark Films, things were looking good for filmmaker Nacho Cerda. He had a promising vision and I always wondered where he ran off to. Well, Variety says he'll soon direct I Am Legion - a script written by Hardware and Dust Devil 's Richard Stanley. The story is based on an existing comic book of the same name. If the film gets rolling, expect a tale set during World War II that follows a group of commandos on a mission to prevent the Nazis from using a vampire (a 12-year-old girl) to create an army of the undead. Cerda also directed the ballsy short films Genesis and Aftermath .

The 2000's—the decade of iPods, social networking websites and economic hardship—were an interesting decade for horror movies, to say the least. You either loved them, or you downright hated them. From remakes, re-imaginings, reboots, restarts and resets to foreign imports to a resurgence of low-grade schlock, the 2000's were not without gore for fans across the globe....

At the end of the 90s, horror movies were almost non-existent. They were doing nothing new—trying only to steal the fame that Scream harnessed in 1995. Theatres were flooded with neo-Slasher knockoffs, and mediocrity ran amok. If it weren’t for The Blair Witch Project and The Sixth Sense, the 90s would have drowned in a sea of its own plainness. Once the 90s ended and the new millennium began, horror slowly glided on the watered-down plotlines of the should-not-be-classics of I Know What You Did Last Summer and Urban Legend,...

Bloody Disgusting learned that Filmax is now developing yet another horror/thriller. Tranquility Valley will be directed by Xavi Giménez, Cinematographer on various Filmax productions from Transsiberian to Fragile, The Abandoned and even The Machinist. In the film Richard doesn't know what to do with his sixteen year old son Dave; he's drinking, smoking dope, getting into trouble; sometimes not even coming home at night. Richard is desperate, he has to do something with him, and now! Dave is abruptly awoken by two men gripping him tightly. His father is standing in the room. Dave is dragged outside and off into a waiting car. More....

Monday, October 12

If you are not into the sun, sand and cinema that Spain’s Sitges (see last report here and go here for the fest’s official site) has to offer, the next best thing about this international film festival is the socializing. Hundreds of genre celebrities, fans and journalists have assembled in this coastal town, and this edition has witnessed such folks as Thirst’S Park Chan-wook, Tetsuo’s Shinya Tsukamoto, The Abandoned’s Nacho Cerdá (busy teaching in Barcelona, he tells me), Ghostbusters’ Ivan Reitman, [Rec] 2 helmers Paco Plaza and Jaume Belagueró (“Doing better at the box office in Spain than the first film,” Belagueró says), Day Of The Beast’s Alex de la Iglesia (looking very professorial), Orphan’s tiny terror Isabelle Fuhrman and Irreversible’S Gaspar Noé (whose controversial new film Enter The Void is debuting here), just to name a few.

Of all this terrifying talent,...

Monday, October 12

If you are not into the sun, sand and cinema that Spain’s Sitges (see last report here and go here for the fest’s official site) has to offer, the next best thing about this international film festival is the socializing. Hundreds of genre celebrities, fans and journalists have assembled in this coastal town, and this edition has witnessed such folks as Thirst’S Park Chan-wook, Tetsuo’s Shinya Tsukamoto, The Abandoned’s Nacho Cerdá (busy teaching in Barcelona, he tells me), Ghostbusters’ Ivan Reitman, [Rec] 2 helmers Paco Plaza and Jaume Belagueró (“Doing better at the box office in Spain than the first film,” Belagueró says), Day Of The Beast’s Alex de la Iglesia (looking very professorial), Orphan’s tiny terror Isabelle Fuhrman and Irreversible’S Gaspar Noé (whose controversial new film Enter The Void is debuting here), just to name a few.

Of all this terrifying talent,...

With a screenplay credited to Karim (Subconscious Cruelty) Hussain, Richard (Hardware) Stanley and Nacho (Aftermath) Cerdà, and direction by Cerdà himself (making his long-awaited feature debut), you might expect The Abandoned to be some transgressive cinematic act of war, two hours of mind-twisting, boundary-smashing, subversive content that pushes the envelope until the screen actually bleeds.

In fact, the most shocking thing about The Abandoned is that it’s not just accessible, but it’s almost (gasp) mainstream. Its early scenes—in which film producer Marie (Anastasia Hille) is summoned to Russia on the eve of her 40th birthday by a peculiar solicitor (Carlos Reig) with information about her mysterious roots—wouldn’t play a note differently if they featured Julianne Moore and Bob Hoskins. So has Cerdà, the man who once made an entire film dedicated to necrophilia and postmortem mutilation, sold out and gone Hollywood?

The good news is that the answer is no.

The artwork and release dates for two anticipated films from Anchor Bay have finally surfaced over on Amazon; how fortuitous that you can just scroll down to the bottom and pre-order both of them through Evilshop!

First up on March 10th is Crowley, formerly known as Chemical Wedding. The film is the story of a mild-mannered professor who is taken over by the spirit of Aleister Crowley and does all sorts of nasty things around his unsuspecting campus, preparing to unleash the ultimate evil on the world.

You may recall that Crowley is the brainchild of Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson, who had the idea for the film knocking around in his brain pan for years before finally getting former “Monty Python” editor Julian Doyle to direct it. The results, from what I’ve heard, are mixed at best, but why listen to others when you can find out for yourself in a few months?...

Legendary UK TV film critic Barry Norman looks at the making of two early 90's Low budget UK horror movies. Jim Grooms 1992 cult horror-comedy Revenge of Billy the Kid and Cult director Richard Stanley's horror / sci-fi Hardware.

This segment is taken from the BBC's long running film show Film '90 (now obviously Film 2008). Barry Norman presented the show for 25 years starting in 1972 up until he left and in 1999 and was replaced by current host Jonathan Ross.

Though Hardware was slated as a Terminator rip off by some at the time it made a profit and Richard Stanley went on to make another film with a cult following the Namibian serial killer movie Dust Devil in 1993. DVD label put out a remasterd directors cut of Dust Devil in 2006 which you can still pick up from Amazon. However his career stalled when he was thrown off the set of the 1996 production of The Island of Dr.

tMF is thrilled to announce our upcoming interview with Canadian filmmaker Karim Hussain. We recently did a feature on his film La Belle Bête and wanted to find out more of his work. - - - - - - In the course of my research, I was quite curious about how he started as a filmmaker, and what sort of movies he likes to create. Apparently, the guy has a rather unique taste and you'll soon discover his types of movies and a chance to discover more about him and his views about filmmaking and the industry in general. Here's a sort of intro about Karim Hussain (http://www.myspace.com/whitehairandlight): I work in the movies, having written and directed a few of them such as Subconscious Cruelty, La DERNIÈRE Voix (The City Without Windows), Ascension and the latest one, La Belle BÊTE (The Beautiful Beast). I also work as a screenwriter,...

NEW YORK -- AfterDark Films has acquired North American distribution rights to Jorg Ihle's horror/action film The Tribe.

AfterDark partner Courtney Solomon and executive vp acquisitions and creative affairs Stephanie Caleb made a pre-emptive offer on the film after its promotional trailer was shown at the Berlin International Film Festival and closed the deal amid bids from several U.S. distributors during Presidents Day weekend. The project also was sold to ProSieben and Splendid Film for Germany, Quality for Mexico and Polar Star for Latin America.

The film, co-written by Ihle and producer Mo Ramchandani, follows a group of twentysomethings stranded on a deserted island who encounter humanoid creatures and must fight for their survival. It was shot on location in Costa Rica and Los Angeles.

Producer-distributor AfterDark, which launched a wide release of Solomon's An American Haunting last year and will distribute The Abandoned this weekend through its partnership with Lionsgate, plans a wide theatrical release of Tribe with a low-eight-figure P&A commitment.