FrightFest

Anyone else fell that, in the main screens at least, there was a distinct lack of horror this year? I know the definition is quite broad, but there were a number of films that I think many would struggle to classify as part of the horror genre - The Guest, Sin City 2, Shockwave Darkside (barely a film, let alone a horror film), Faults, Open Windows, The Signal.

Not that it's ever a bad thing to have variety, but I wonder if we'll see a shift away from horror to more of a 'fantastic' films festival?

That said, I thought the line-up was incredibly strong this year, with only a handful of titles dipping below three stars for me.

It was certainly a wider variety than in the past. My favourite films of the festival turned out to be either actual horror (Starry Eyes, Alleluia) or horror comedy (Housebound, Dead Snow 2), but I really enjoyed some of the thrillers, especially Faults and The Harvest. Frankly they put on 64 movies so the breadth is going to be much greater than when they showed, say, 20.

I think it's fair to say that FrightFest is more of a 'genre' festival rather than straight 'horror' one.

I, for one, am very pleased that it incorporates such a wide cross section of movies. Otherwise it would likely mean diluting the quality of the festival's overall content and risk being very repetitive.

Its closest comparative festivals, Fantasia, Sitges and Fantastic Fest are equally broad in their remit. And, before anyone points out that the festival is called FrightFest, I'd point out that Fantastic Fest doesn't only show 'fantasy' movies either.

Some variety is good, but the cost is that Frightfest loses some of its identity. And the worst thing is watching something that isn't horror and is terrible. Non-horror should have a much higher bar to clear. Sin City 2 and The Signal were both disappointing and didn't deserve to play at Frightfest, certainly not in such prime positions, while Shockwave Darkside didn't deserve to play in any festival ever. They could have been swapped out for The Canal, Julia, Digging up the Marrow or Creep, and the festival would have been much better for it.

I have no problem with the good mix of films this year. A little bit of sci-fi thrown in is always good with me. Variety is the spice and all that.

I had a real sense that the festival is evolving in a good way and loved the extra choice and availability the new disco set up provided. I have now been to FF 8 times (5 on a full weekend pass) and in previous years saw a total of 2 disco films. This year I saw 4 and all of them corkers - The Canal, Coherence, Showpieces and Nightmare On Elm Street. It was great to have so much choice. Sure, I missed some good films, but I look forward to doing my FrightFest 'homework, to catch up on them.

Honestly I'd rather have a broader selection than risk opening the floodgates to a morass of horror jetsam, there's some really terrible stuff out there... The horror.......

I've never been a Disco-lover, but it's not because of the selection, which looked superb this year, it's because I don't want to miss something unexpected on the main screen. Like many of us, I then gauge opinion on what I have to see later and catch up. In fact, that's a brilliant idea. I'm going to set aside a weekend in a few months, to run a private back-to-back of a bunch of the ones I missed, sort of a Frightfest redux.

I think it was a good balance this year.
It was almost like a Tivo or Sky-plus experience this year, with the opportunity to really personalise your schedule.

However I did make much more of an effort this year to attend disco screenings and was really glad that I did. Several of my absolute favourites came from those; Exists, Truth or Dare, etc and especially "House at the end of time" which impressed everybody that saw it. Why "House" wasn't on the main screen whilst others were (*cough*Shockwave*cough*zombieholocaust*cough*) is an absolute mystery, but you felt like you had discovered something special when you made some of these choices. Even if I did sacrifice "Dead Snow 2" for something else...

But back to the original subject of out-and-out horror. "Truth or Dare" was one massively sick (but fabulous) puppy and easily fulfilled the "Serbian"/"Centipede" WTF movie-slot, and "Green Inferno" was suitably knuckle-chewing for those who hadn't seen it (and I hadn't, and thoroughly enjoyed it).
I think the "hard-core" stuff was still there, you just had to look for it...

Frightfest has always had a broad variety of films.

There's usually some kind of dark edge but we've had lots of science fiction, thrillers (A Bittersweet Life was probably the best FF film ever) and even the odd straight-up action movie like Born to Fight (I doubt we'd stray that far from the horror genre nowadays).

I'd be absolutely fine with 100% horror but not if it meant showing a load of dross just to fill gaps in the schedule.