Guest Blog: A Preview of FEARnyc

By John Capo

Founder and Director, FEARnyc

I’ve often been asked where the inspiration for FEARnyc came from. I wish I had a snappier answer, but in all honesty it started from a love of horror movies. Ever since I was seven or eight years old, I remember going into the video store every day to rent a horror film. I remember being mesmerized by all the video covers with their ghoulish drawings and terrifying photos. My grandmother would often accompany me, and I’m fortunate to have a really cool grandma who’d let me rent just about any movie I wanted.

For the past two years I’ve produced the NYC Drone Film Festival, the world’s first film festival dedicated to movies shot by drones. It’s been a big success and in doing so I learned a lot about putting on a quality film festival. A year ago, I decided I would marry my knowledge of festivals with my love of horror and FEARnyc was born.

We’ve got a lot of buzzworthy new films in the lineup this year. I’m particularly excited to share our world premieres with the audience, including Shawn Burkett’s Don’t Fuck in the Woods, Scott B. Hansen’s The Possession Experiment and Drew Marvick’s Pool Party Massacre. It’s always exciting to introduce new films into the genre, and I’m particularly glad that all three directors will appear in person at FEARnyc to share their stories in our post-screening Q&As.

We’re also looking forward to the U.S. and regional premieres of films like Lex Ortega’s Atroz, which is our Opening Night Film, Jon Bristol’s Head, which is a slasher film with puppets, and Colin Toomey-Adams’ Lost Creek, a ghost story centering on a group of kids that’s reminiscent of Stranger Things and Stand By Me. The new Butcher Brothers film, A Beginner’s Guide to Snuff, is going to close out the festival.

[Related] This October’s FEARnyc’s Program is Massive

We have three fantastic documentaries lined up, including Unearthed & Untold: The Path to Pet Sematary, which offers a compelling backstory on the Stephen King film. Michael Stever’s Resurrecting Carrie looks at the Carrie franchise and the infamous Broadway musical that was a big flop. Both of these docs include interviews with luminaries like Piper Laurie and director Mary Lambert. Then there’s a documentary of a totally different kind, Rick Gawel’s Michael Myers: Absolute Evil, which reimagines the events of John Carpenter’s Halloween as if they really happened. It’s a trip.

The short films, in my opinion, are just mind-blowing. What these filmmakers are able to accomplish in a brief amount of time is incredible. As you can imagine, they run the gamut from big budget to bare bones, traditional to experimental, polished to raw. We’re showing Green Lake, a monster movie inspired by The X Files that’s directed by Derek Frey, the producer of Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride. We’re also looking forward to Bhargav Saikia’s Awakenings, which was previously seen at Cannes and has been killing it on the festival circuit. Plus there are screenings of the Canadian anthology film Accursed, the Italian fantasy The Eve, and dozens more.

I haven’t even mentioned our classic and iconic films. We’re stoked to present rare opportunities to see so many great films on the big screen, from The Lost Boys to Psycho to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. We’ve built a lot of hype around our screening of The Exorcist, which will include a séance with the audience led by psychic Jesse Bravo.  Our Hocus Pocus event is nearly sold out and features a Witch Party hosted by the hilarious Shirley U. Jest. We’ll close out the festival with a screening of the original Halloween and a Halloween party for the audience complete with games, candy bags, and prizes for best costume.

Fans of black and white horror will be happy to know that we’ll be showing many of the foundational films of the genre, including Nosferatu, Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Carnival of Souls and Plan 9 from Outer Space. We’re showing Faust with a live orchestra. And we even threw in Reefer Madness and Santa Claus Conquers the Martians for some good old-fashioned camp.

All in all, I’m really proud of what we’ve got in store and I think audiences are going to be taken on a fun ride. Tickets for the films are available at www.FEARnyc.com and Festival Passes, which include admission to all 65 films, are also available.