The “8 Films To Die For” returns to selected theaters with 8 new horrors on January 29th. This is the fourth year of the After Dark Horrorfest, and looks to be an awesome line up. I talked with Sara Finder a couple days, Director of Horrorfest. She gave me a little background on After Dark Films, and how they put together each years release.
It started a little over four years ago when Lionsgate noticed Courtney Solomon’s An American Haunting. Mr. Solomon and Lionsgate made a distribution deal and started looking at horror films from all over. Checking out events like Sundance, New York, and Toronto Film Festivals he discovered many great horror movies that deserve a theatrical release. Within four months of collaborating with Lionsgate, the first After Dark Horrorfest was set to go. Included with the 8 movies every year, After Dark Films throws in a foreign film too. Sara made special mention about the movie Frontiere(s). Its an After Dark Films movie. The movie was never included in the horrorfest because the MPAA wanted to cut it down to fit into an R rating. The films need to be rated R to make it into the festival.
Sara says, “We refused to cut the movie down, so we pulled it. We wanted to put the movie out as it should be seen. Its an incredible film. It ended up getting its own release.” She went on to say that it is probably one of her favorites and she highly recommends it.
You can keep checking the website for updates and more info on the movies. Trailers, pictures, and everything you need to find out where the movies are playing in your area. Also, if you don’t have the option to see these in the theater, don’t worry. All 8 of the movies will be released for rental and purchase towards the end of March.
Listed below are the movies and links to the After Dark Films and Horrorfest websites to check out. As well as links to Facebook and Twitter. Be sure to also check out the movies from Horrorfest 1, 2 and 3.
“Its the 4th year of After Dark’s Horrorfest. We’re back!” – Sara Finder, Director of Horrorfest.
Dread
Staring – Jackson Rathbone, Shaun Evans, Laura Donnelly, Hanne Steen
Synopsis – This is the second in Clive Barker’s Book of Blood franchise. Three college students making a documentary about what people dread in life. But they have no idea that their partner Quaid, witnessed his parents being murdered by an axe-wielding lunatic and wants to make others experience his own personal horror.
Hidden
Staring – Arthur Berning, Knut Morten Brekke, Gabriel Gjonnes.
Synopsis – Kai Koss unwillingly returns to the small town he ran from 19 years ago. His cruel mother has recently died, and left him the house he grew up in. He means to leave as soon as he has made all the necessary arrangements, but with his heritage comes dark and deadly secrets, and he soon finds himself tangled up in a series of event that seem beyond anyone’s control.
Kill Theory
Staring – Don McManus, Ryanne Duzich, Teddy Dunn
Synopsis – Are you capable of the unthinkable? That’s the question seven college students face when they visit a secluded vacation home to celebrate graduation and are put to a horrific test by a mysterious killer. By 6 am the following morning, only one of them can remain alive. Whoever that person is will be allowed to walk away with his or her life. However, if morning comes and more than one is still breathing, everyone dies.
Lake Mungo
Staring – Rosie Traynor, David Pledger, Martin Sharpe
Synopsis – In Lake Mungo, sixteen-year-old Alice Palmer drowns while swimming in the local dam. When her body is recovered and a verdict of accidental death returned, her grieving family buries her. The family then experiences a series of strange and inexplicable events centered in and around their home. The Palmers seek the help of psychic and parapsychologist, Ray Kemeny. Ray discovers that Alice led a secret, double life.
The Final
Staring – Marc Donato, Jascha Washington, Whitney Hoy, Justin Arnold
Synopsis – Dane, an awkward student with a deadly vendetta and suicidal tendencies, leads a group of outcasts who plot to avenge the years of humiliation they faced by the popular students at Hohn High School. Employing ideas inspired both from their classes as well as from horror films they watched, the outcast turn the tables on the popular students who made sport of them.
The Graves
Starring – Clare Grant, Jillian Murray, Bill Moseley, Tony Todd
Synopsis – On their last weekend together, Megan and Abby Graves are lost in a remote part of the Arizona desert where they are lured to Skull City Mine, an abandoned mine town. But they soon learn Skull City is anything but abandoned, and there’s no way out. The sisters are now prey, forced to unleash their most primitive instincts in a desperate, all-out battle for survival against unspeakable horrors, both human, and supernatural.
The Reeds
Starring – Scarlett Alice Johnson, Geoff Bell, Will Mellor
Synopsis – A boating party loses its bearings and cuts through the vast reedy tidewater in search of the main channel. After the first casualty by a freak accident, the boat runs aground. One by one the friends are terrorized by young punks and killed by a hooded man with a gun. There is no escaping this vast waterway, a place of endless return, presided over by Croker who killed a group of young people decades before and initiated the hellish curse which traps all who take passage on the Corsair Star.
Zombies of Mass Destruction
Staring – Janette Armand, Doug Fahl, Cooper Hopkins, Bill Johns
Synopsis – In ZMD, a conservative island community is under attack! Port Gamble, Washington is being overrun with braineaters, and the people seem powerless to stave them off. A rag tag band of rebels led by Frida (Janette Armand), an Iranian college student suspected of being an Iraqi terrorist, and Tom (Doug Fahl), a gay business man who has returned to town with his partner to come out to his mother, tries to turn the tide and push the invading hoards of undead back.
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