10 Days of Fright at the Screamfest Horror Film Festival

Julianne Ishler

Get your Halloween spirit sparked with L.A.’s annual Screamfest, the largest and longest running horror film festival in the United States. The 10-day festival, known to popularize commercial films such as Paranormal Activity and A Tale of Two Sisters, is considered to be the “Sundance of Horror” by critics. From October 14th-23rd, the festival will showcase new movies in the horror and sci-fi genres from American and international independent filmmakers.

The festival will premiere 55 different films this year in the categories of horror feature, horror short, super short (under 10 minutes), documentary, animation, and student horror film. Films are accepted in categories of Best Feature, Directing, Cinematography, Editing, Special Effect, and Musical Score. There are also special categories for Best Animation, Best Short, Best Documentary, and Best Student Film. At the end of the festival, an awards ceremony will be held honoring the best of the best.

Some of this year’s films include shorts such as Alone, which revolves around a young woman living alone in a huge apartment only to find another man is living amongst her. Feature films include the work of up and coming director Richard Bates, Jr., debuting his new film Suburban Gothic, which stars Kat Dennings (2 Broke Girls), Matthew Gray Gubler (Criminal Minds), and Ray Wise (Twin Peaks). Following this screening, a Q&A session will be held with the director and actors. Many more frightful features and scary shorts will premiere as well.

Events will be held throughout the duration of the festival. The first day of the festival will be the screening of the film Parlor and will feature a kickoff party after that on the evening of Oct. 14th. Admission to the screening and party can be bought at a discounted rate of $51.80. Parlor is a feature film directed by Kenny Gage and Devon Downs, following six college students vacationing in Eastern Europe who get sucked into a psychotic tattoo artist’s side business. Should you only wish to attend just the party, tickets can be bought on an individual basis for $46.65. The party will serve alcohol and food, and guests must be 21+ to drink.

Patrons have the option of buying film admission in the form of individual tickets, a full movie pass, or a full festival pass. Tickets to individual films are $10, (plus a $1 processing fee.) The All Movie Pass is being sold for $206.28, and grants admission to all films screened during the Festival, and you get to skip the lines. The Full Festival Pass is being sold for $309.27, and the pass allows you to skip the lines and attend as many screenings, parties, presentations, and events as you want. In addition, it grants admission to the closing night awards presentation. 

Screamfest started in 2001 and was founded by film producers Rachel Belofsky and Ross Martin. The duo looked to give writers and filmmakers of the horror genre the opportunity to have their work recognized and showcased. Now, it has grown into Hollywood’s number one horror show.

Screamfest will be held at the TCL Chinese Theatre October14th-23. For more information about Screamfest, visit their website.