The Terror-Fi Film Festival returns this month to bring some of the best genre gems to Aotearoa cinemas
This year’s Terror-Fi Film Festival lineup once again features a bunch of NZ premieres (a dozen, by our count), offering the first—and perhaps only—chance to see these horrors, thrillers, sci-fi and assorted oddities in cinemas where they belong. Standouts include one of the year’s best horrors in When Evil Lurks, brutal-sounding Fantasia Film Fest winner Megalomaniac, Heather Graham and Barbara Crampton in darkly comic horror Suitable Flesh—and whatever the hell Hundreds of Beavers is (the clue is probably in the title).
Plus, there are retro screenings of Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988) and the extended cut of Roland Emmerich’s Stargate (1994)—as well as free sessions of NZ shorts.
The Terror-Fi Film Festival kicks off in Wellington, Auckland and Christchurch on October 25th with NZ premiere screenings of Five Nights at Freddy’s. Wellington then gets underway from October 26-29 (plus a Halloween screening), with the fest hitting Auckland November 2-5 and then Christchurch November 9-14. See below for the full line-up of features and visit the Terror-Fi website for screening times.
Five Nights at Freddy’s
Based on the wildly popular horror game series, this film adaptation follows a security guard who begins working at Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza—only to discover there’s something creepy going on with the fast food joint’s animatronic creatures.
Cobweb
Lizzy Caplan and Antony Starr lead this family horror (a horror about a family, not G-rated family-friendly) that sees a young kind plagued by a tap-tap-tap coming from inside his bedroom wall.
Red Rooms
Best Picture winner at Fantasia, this thriller follows a woman increasingly obsessed with the high profile trial of a serial killer, who seeks out a piece of the puzzle—the video of a murdered 13-year-old girl, to whom she bears a disturbing resemblance.
Birth/Rebirth
A grieving mother makes a shocking discovery in this horror—a morgue technician has secretly brought her daughter back from the dead. Together, the pair enter into a deal that forces them both down a dark path of no return.
Time Addicts
Two friends in debt to their dealer say yes to a sketchy job to pay off their last hit in this sci-fi comedy, but find themselves mixed up with a new drug that sees the user time travel when it’s smoked—separating the two friends in time and setting off alarming new events in the future.
When Evil Lurks
Full-on horror from Demián Rugna (Terrified) is a gruesome tale of possession, in which two brothers abandon the proper rites of exorcism, and a demonic possession begins to spread—causing those affected to inflict pain on their loved ones (or their own selves).
You’ll Never Find Me
Single location horror-thriller set at a caravan park sees a young woman appear at a resident’s door late one night, seeking shelter from a violent thunderstorm. The longer the night wears on, the more difficult she finds it to leave, while her host begins to question his own grip on reality…
Hundreds of Beavers
In this silent supernatural winter epic, a drunken applejack salesman must go from zero to hero and become North America’s greatest fur trapper to defeat hundreds of beavers.
Suitable Flesh
Looking a tribute of sorts to Stuart Gordon (Re-Animator), Heather Graham stars in this this campy, Lovecraftian, 80s-inspired horror-sex-comedy, revealing to her doctor (Barbara Crampton) a bizarre tale of sexual obsession, supernatural terror, and extreme violence.
Megalomaniac
“A lush piece of cinema whose intent is to disturb and it succeeds at every turn,” said the Fantasia Film Fest jury of this extreme horror when they awarded it top prize last year, the challenging tale of a notorious Belgian serial killer’s children—who pick up where he left off.
The Artifice Girl
A small team of special agents discovers a revolutionary computer program that uses a digital child to catch online predators in this sci-fi thriller, one that puts the program’s creator at risk of being seen as a potential perpetrator himself.
Maggie Moore(s)
Jon Hamm, Tina Fey and Ted Lasso‘s Nick Mohammed star in this crime investigation comedy based on a true story, which sees a police chief faced with the back-to-back murders of two women with the same name. Hamm’s Mad Men co-star John Slattery directs.
Killer Klowns from Outer Space
Circus clowns turn out to be murderous aliens in this cult sci-fi comedy-horror classic, bursting with creative practical effects. The Klowns have crashlanded on Earth in a rural town, where they capture unsuspecting victims in cotton candy cocoons for later consumption.
Stargate
Roland Emmerich’s 1994 block-busting franchise starter sees James Spader unlock the code of an interstellar gateway to an ancient Egypt-like world, and travel there with Air Force Colonel Kurt Russell and his team. They arrive on a planet ruled by the despotic god Ra, who holds the key to the Earth travellers’ safe return.
