Film Fests and Contests: A Talent Scout, Fantasia, HP Lovecraft Festival and A Night of Horror

I had some stuff come up this morning and I was seriously considering skipping this post. However, I had already laid out a bunch of stuff, so I figured that I'd quickly go through them.

As some of you know (regular readers and friends), we've been working on a "Dead Harvey TV" project. So, I was looking into different ways to get the idea out there and I came across "A Talent Scout", you can find the site here. Basically, they're a contest for aspiring TV writers and they also do consulting and management, things like that. I wasn't going to go the 'contest' route, but, hey, why not? Just a thought for all of you - a lot of industry people aspire to work in TV, as it's not project to project work, it's like having a full time job. A lot of people want to be staff writers and lots of actors want regular work on TV. I bring up the thought because everyone seems to focus on feature length scripts and the film world.

Fantasia International Genre Film Festival is coming up this summer and they're currently accepting submissions. However, that's not what this is about. I received an email from them and they would "like to let you know about 2 releases from Evokative Films, a new film distribution company that speaks right to the Fantasia crowd. HANSEL & GRETEL, A South-Korean film by YIM Phil-sung, was released on March 6th at AMC Forum and will play until March 19th, so there’s only 4 days left to see the film on the big screen! The copy will then go to Toronto to play at the AMC Yonge & Dundas from March 27th. THE KILLER (LE TUEUR), a film by Cédric Anger that had 2 sold-out screenings at last summer’s Fantasia, is now available on DVD". I don't know much about either film, but I thought it was worth bringing up. However, if you're not in Toronto, you won't be able to check out "Hansel & Gretel" on the big screen, but look for it on DVD in the next few months.

Residing in the "probably too late to bring up" folder, The HP Lovecraft Festival, which takes place in Oregon in October, has spawned a mini fest, which starts today in Seattle. If you're in the area, you should go check it out. They're calling it The HP Lovecraft Film Fest, Best of Fest Seattle. So, it starts today, March 20, then ends Thursday the 26th. For more information, go to the HP Lovecraft Festival site, which can be found here.

Lastly, on the other side of the planet, the A Night of Horror International Film Festival, taking place in Sydney, Australia, starts on Wednesday, March 25 and runs until Friday, April 3rd. It's a huge, huge festival over there and it's worth checking out. Well, if you live in the area, I guess. It may be tough and expensive to put together a trip to get over there now. For more information, go to their site, which can be found here.

That's it for the week... have a great weekend and we'll see you next week!

Film Fest Friday: Shriekfest, Fantasia Fest and Dead by Dawn

No, I didn't forget to post something yesterday, I just didn't have the time... sorry. Spare time is a luxury these days and a lot of mine has been going into working on our "Dead Harvey TV" project... which is moving along, by the way. Since I'm on the topic, the pilot is done and it was screened to good reviews. Granted, those reviews were from other people in the indie horror scene, but they were good. Now, we're polishing up a bit of a press kit, making some copies and are about to send it off to a few places. Don't worry, we'll be sure to keep you posted. (early draft of poster idea to the right, there - needs a bit of work, I know)

So, this post is going to be a mix of film fest updates and links... I happened to come across a few interesting things that I felt like sharing.

First off, for guys like us, it's a fairly embarrassing weekend at the box office, I gotta say. The biggest movie out is "Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience", followed by "Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li", which is, yes, based on the video game. Further, next week is fairly soft, as far as DVD releases are concerned... but I'll get to that on Monday. So, go check out "Friday the 13th" in the theaters, if you get a chance!

Now, for film festival announcements... it's time for Shriekfest Film Festival's call for entries. It's one of our favorites of the year and they're now going on to their 9th year, if you can believe it. The festival takes place October 1st - 4th, 2009 and they do networking events throughout the year in LA. So, go check them out at shriekfest.com.

Fantasia Fest, which takes place in Montreal, Canada, July 16th - August 3rd, now has their call for entries open, as well. Fantasia's one of the big ones and it's something that you should attend, if you can. For more information, go to their site at fantasiafest.com.

Lastly, on the festival front, tickets for Dead By Dawn, which takes place in Scotland, are finally going to be available on Tuesday... I think. All the emails they send are fucked up and cryptic. Like, here's a quote from their last email, "The utterly fantastic news is that Passes for this year's Dead by Dawn and Spawn of Dawn will go on sale from 11am on Tuesday March 3rd". Actually, after reading it out of context, I guess it's not that bad... but you should read the whole thing. Anyhow, the festival is April 30th - May 3rd and for more information on it, go to deadbydawn.co.uk.

Now, on to some interesting tidbits that I found on the internets...

Check out this awesome quote: “Success will return to Hollywood once again when the gutted creative process and talent is re-established at a bearable cost. And it will be on the shoulders of the creatives, not the accountants, that a return to greatness is achieved”. That's actually from Drake Pruitt's blog post on Peter Bart's article from Vanity Fair and there's links to both in this post from IndieFlix. It's not long, but it's a great read and great news for us indie guys. There ARE people shaking this industry up... so, just stick with it and it'll pay off.

There's an article, more like a blog post, in the LA Times on how Carl Icahn is looking to tighten his grip on Lions Gate Entertainment, here's a link. Now, we all know who Lions Gate is... horror and horror DVD's, primarily, are a cash cow for them. They had a week third quarter, but just recently won the week at the box office with "Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail". Did I mention they also do the Tyler Perry films? They also distribute kids films and work-out videos, but that's besides the point. You know who they are and indie horror distribution is a big, big thing for them. So, who's Carl Icahn? Well, he's a billionaire financier, corporate raider and private equity investor. He's worth about $14Billion. He's a director at Blockbuster, has had significant holdings in Time Warner, he tried to take over Marvel Comics at one point and he just upted his stake in Lions Gate to just over 14%. That is, of course, just his entertainment related ventures, he does lots of other shit, too. I just find it very interesting that he's so interested in them... must be something there.

So, that's all I got for this week... now go get your drink on this weekend and we'll see you next week!

Horror Film Fest Updates... More Fantasia, Fangoria's Weekend of Horror and Hollywood Film Fest

Here's a few updates from the world of horror film festivals and conferences... a few big ones this week...

Fantasia is going on as I type this, running from July 3rd until July 21st and I just decided to head over to their site to see which horror films they're screening this year... and they're screening some pretty kick-ass ones. There's a few that I haven't really heard much about, such as "Babysitter Wanted", "Pig Hunt" and "The Objective", but there also screening some of the most anticipated horrors of the year, including "All the Boys Love Mandy Lane", Frank Henenlotter's "Bad Biology", "From Within", "Midnight Meat Train" and "Repo! The Genetic Opera". If you go to the site, then click on "Films + Schedule", you can get lots of information on all the films...

HOLLYWOOD FILM FESTIVAL AND FILM THREAT NEED YOUR GENRE FILMS! - This is a big festival and they just announced their call for entries. That link is to an article that was on Film Threat's website, who happens to be a sponsor. They're also sponsored by STARZ!, as well... so you've got some pretty good names behind it and one of them is a distributor. Whether or not you want to enter your film or just attend it, it's worth checking out. Here's a blurb from the article that describes it: "The Hollywood Film Festival, presented by STARZ, will mark its return on October 22, 2008, to the state-of-the-art ArcLight Theatres in Hollywood for a twelfth annual, weeklong series of screenings, seminars, competitions, awards and a special presentation of "Genre Cinema". Together with Film Threat and Chris Gore, the festival announces the "Call for Entries" for this year's Hollywood Horror, Sci-Fi and Fantasy Film Festival."

Fangoria's Weekend of Horrors Lastly, Fangoria's Weekend of Horrors 2009 site just went live, you can go check it out at that link there. It travels around to a few cities and you can catch it in Chicago March 6-8, L.A. April 17-19 and New York June 5-7. They promise gruesome guests, vendors, film room, creepy contests, eerie exhibitors... and more.

Film Fest Friday - Fantasia and some other updates...

You know, we're loyal guys over here at Dead Harvey and we're always trying to help out. If we've covered a film or talked to a filmmaker, we tend to follow them to see what they're up to, check in once in a while and do what we can to support them. So, we checked in with Jason Noto, the guy behind "Butcher's Hill", to see how it was going. If you remember, they had shot a kick-ass short film that was to be entered in festivals and he planned to use that short to get financing for a feature, based on that short. Here's a link to our original post where you can read about it, check out the trailer and everything. It just screened at the Dead by Dawn festival to a packed theater and it's recently been picked up to be screened at the upcoming Fantasia festival, as well... so, this is actually going to work out as a great segue because I was planning on talking about Fantasia this week, anyhow. In any case, good work Jason and we look forward to seeing the feature...

Fantasia started in 1996 by screening Asian films and anime and they promptly expanded into genre films from around the world and, since then, have grown into one of North America's largest genre festivals, featuring many North American premeires. It's also a place where films may screen in pre-final-cut condition, just to be there, find distributors or build buzz. Unfortunately, they're no longer accepting submissions for the 2008 festival, but it's a great festival for networking and, well, just seeing some cool shit. It takes place July 3 - 21 this year and you can find more information on what it's all about at their website.

Also, I've got some new festivals to add to the listings and a few updates:

We've got the new dates for Shockerfest, which is entering its 4th year. It's going to be held October 3-5, 2008 at the Galaxy 12 Theatre in Riverbank, CA. They are currently accepting submissions in three genres: Horror, Sci-Fi and Fantasy and will take mini-shorts, shorts and features. Here's a link to the entry form on their site.

Not sure how this one snuck past us, but we just found out about Thriller! Chiller!, which takes place October 23rd - 26th at the Wealthy Street Theatre in Grand Rapids, MI. They are currently accepting submission, you can register through Withoutabox here. They give out awards such as: best feature, best short, best fx, best one-liner, best student film, best "thrill" and best "chill".

Lastly, because it's in the comment section, I'm going to add Sci-Fi-London, which will be taking place in April of 2009. Sorry, I just missed the last one... this is more exclusively sci-fi than it is horror, if you couldn't tell from it's name. However, sci-fi and horror are pretty closely linked, so we'll give it it's due. The festival started primarily because there wasn't anywhere for low-budget, interesting or foreign science fiction films. Its purpose is to show films that you're not likely to see in the UK at all, or that are going to be difficult to get hold of. They're not accepting submissions now, you've gotta wait until October...