Let’s start from the beginning, shall we?
My Mom, Dad (who had just arrived recently), and myself planned to leave for the much anticipated film festival, FrightFest on Thursday August 27th.
For those of you unaware, FrightFest is a genre film festival that specializes in showcasing 30+ of the latest horror films from across the world over the course of five days.
Throughout the weekend, the cinema is packed with serious fans, special guests, surprise previews, horror premieres, and buckets of blood. If you’re a fan of the genre, it’s basically pure nirvana.
The festival was set to kick-off at 6:30 on Thursday evening, so we planned that leaving for London at about 10am would give us ample time to both check-in to the hotel and make it to the festival on time.
Well firstly, I awoke at 10:30am to find everyone else still asleep. After seeing how we had totally missed our aim, I jumped out of bed and quickly woke them up. So much for leaving at 10am…but wait, it’s not over yet.
Another event that made its way onto the itinerary was participating in a family ceremony that involved our new-born in the family having her hair cleanly taken off. Don’t ask why, I’m still trying to figure out the reasoning behind it myself. I think it has something to do with cleansing the baby, or at least something along those lines.
Here are some priceless caps taken after the shaving:
So after a very looong, but quite pleasant shaving session and an unnecessary tea break, we jetted out to London at a ridiculously late 4pm.
Due to the madness called the London traffic, we didn’t end up getting to the EMPIRE CINEMA till 7:30.
As I rushed in, the opening film for the festival was well deep into its running time. The
opening film was the world premiere of the slasher picture, HATCHET II.
The hype amongst horror fans prior to the premiere at FrightFest was quite strong. Although I wasn’t able to catch the first hour of the film, the final half was ridiculously gory fun, filled the creative and atmospheric horror setpieces that really got the audience into the slasher vibe.
After the screening, director Adam Green and three of his cast members, including Kane Hodder, Tony Todd, and Danielle Harris took the stage for a Q&A.
During the session, I was able to ask a question to Adam Green, inquiring what his influences as a filmmaker were. He responded that Alfred Hitchcock and Steven Spielberg (boo!) were his prime heroes. I was awarded two cool posters for asking a question, and was able to get Adam Green and Kane Hodder to sign them after the screening. I guess asking questions does pay off!
Here's a quick picture I took with Adam Green:
The next film in the line-up was a new Australian horror film called PRIMAL.
This one I didn’t enjoy too much. It was filled with over-the-top screams, overuse of slow motion, and trumped by a really weak cast of characters. Although there were some really interesting ideas floating in the film, concerning a battle against nature and such, nothing ever materialized. The climax was surprisingly shocking, though. 6/10.
At 11:30, the final film of the night was the upcoming British vampire film, DEAD CERT.
One of the unique things the film was supposedly showcasing was its mix of the vampire genre with a gangster twist. Unfortunately, the actual result turned out to be quite sloppy. It seemed as if it wanted to master both genres, but just ended up failing in both. The characters came off very clichéd and the plot wandered down the predictable path very early on. FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, it wasn't. 5/10.
After the film, the director and cast participated in a Q&A. Two of the lead actors in the film had actually provided voices for characters in Infinity Ward’s MODERN WARFARE 1 and 2, and showed up for the screening.
But, there was only one problem; I didn’t know how they looked. I could only recognize them by their voices. I mean it was a video game after all.
So using my spidey senses, I just closed my eyes and listened in. Suddenly, I heard the voices that reflected their characters in MODERN WARFARE. Afterward, I reluctantly inched forward to the chosen suspects, and reluctantly presented them with MODERN WARFARE to sign. I was quite relieved to find out I was right when they gladly signed my copy. Getting my copy of MODERN WARFARE 1 and 2 signed by both of them was just plain wicked, considering how amazing those two games are.
We ended up leaving the EMPIRE CINEMA at 2am and crawled out of Leicester Square and returned at the hotel at very late 2:30am.
The next day was going to showcase at least 6 films back-to-back, laced with signings, interviews, and all sorts of things horror, all starting at a very early 10:30am. It seems like sleep was going to be something I would need to stock up on.
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