Manchester, England.
Grimmfest.
Day One.
This year’s festival kicks off with the screening of a remastered classic, Stuart Gordon’s Re-Animator, which Entertainment Weekly has called “One of the greatest horror film of all time.”
Based loosely on H.P. Lovecraft’s Weird Tales novella “Herbert West–Reanimator,” the film helped launch the career of Barbara Crampton, this year’s Grimmfest guest of honor.
But Grimmfest isn’t just about the classics. Among the new films screening today are Await Further Instructions, which looks to be a dark blend of horror and science fiction worthy of The Outer Limits and Black Mirror. Here’s the setup:
“A dysfunctional family awakes on Christmas morning to discover they’re sealed inside their house by a mysterious black substance. On television, a single line of text reads: ‘Stay Indoors and Await Further Instructions.’”
Await Further Instructions had its world premiere at Chicago’s Cinepocalypse Film Festival last June and has been getting strong notice ever since. At Grimmfest, its screening will be followed by a Q&A session with director Johnny Kevorkian, screenwriter Gavin Williams, producer Jack Tarling, and star Grant Masters – all taking part in what will be the film’s UK premiere.
Naturally, the big event on my list this week is the UK premiere of Nightmare Cinema, scheduled for 4:15 PM Saturday at the Odeon Great Northern Theatre. I’ll be on hand to take part in a Q&A session immediately following the film.
I plan to post periodically throughout the festival, so be sure to stop back soon. I expect some exciting developments as I get into the thick of the festivities.
And speaking of exciting developments, I’m even now in the process of working with W. H. Horner Editorial and Design to revamp this website. In the weeks ahead, we’ll be cooking up some new banner and page designs to reflect some of the things that have come out since the release of the Veins Cycle books.
First up is a new 21st Century Scop banner (above).
As much as I liked how the previous banner (Scop with Stratocaster) provided a likeness of the contemporary minstrel-storyteller, I felt it was time for an image that better reflected the direction this blog has been going in recent months.
The new banner makes use of a Jason Zerrillo illustration for the story “The Death Lantern,” which appears in Voices: Tales of Horror (recently re-released in a second edition from Fantasist Enterprises). The banner features a man backlit by the glowing lens of a film projector, his face illuminated by the reflection of a movie screen. Since my recent posts here have dealt with film as well as story and song, the change seemed fitting. What do you think?
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