FrighFest 2024 CINEWORLD LEICESTER SQUARE Main Screen
FILM PROGRAMME
CINEWORLD LEICESTER SQUARE Main Screen (790 capacity)
THURSDAY AUGUST 22
5.30pm OPENING FILM: BROKEN BIRD (World Premiere)
Director: Joanne Mitchell. With: Rebecca Calder, James Fleet, Jay Taylor, Sacharissa Claxton. UK 2024. 96 mins.
FrightFest celebrates one of its beloved supporters and genre savvy creatives with their feature debut as director. As a writer, producer and actor, Joanne Mitchell has appeared at FrightFest in many guises in such banner attractions as INBRED, BAIT, EVIE, WOLF MANOR, BEFORE DAWN and ATTACK OF THE ADULT BABIES.
Sybil Chamberlain (Rebecca Calder) works in a funeral parlour as a professional mortician. She has spent her life looking for love. Brought up as a privileged carefree child, at the age of ten she lost everything in a tragic accident. A darkness fell over her as the bright lights of her life were snuffed out swiftly and cruelly. Now an emptiness, an aching loneliness prevails, a gloomy void which she seeks to fill. Reality and reason are slipping away from Sybil and her dark desires are becoming more insatiable and progressively more out of control
8.10pm TEST SCREENING (World Premiere)
Director: Clark Baker. With: Amy Hargreaves, Rain Spencer, Drew Scheid, Jeanine Jackson.
USA 2024. 84 mins.
Summer, 1982, and in a small, declining Oregon town, excitement has been building for days. A Hollywood studio is holding a test screening of a new blockbuster movie in the local cinema. Could it be the new John Carpenter, the latest Steven Spielberg, another STAR TREK? Four lifelong friends can’t wait to take their seats for the preview. But rather than a toe-dip screening, the film they watch is actually a mind-control experiment that has terrifying and devastating effects on the community. Get ready for the sci-fi high of the year asTHE THING meets SOCIETY in a ‘Stranger Things’ universe.
10.25 THE INVISIBLE RAPTOR (English premiere)
Director: Mike Hermosa. With: Mike Capes, Sean Astin, Sandy Martin, Chad Bullard. USA 2023. 112 mins.
The hit of FrightFest Glasgow bites back! The Tyler Corporation figured out how to genetically engineer a prehistoric raptor, but they didn’t stop there…they also made it invisible. Unfortunately, he’s a really smart invisible raptor. After easily breaking out of its enclosure, it’s now up to washed-up, amusement park paleontologist Dr. Grant Walker and hapless loner Security Guard Denny Denielson to stop the predator before it wreaks havoc on the entire community of Spielburgh County. With the help of local celebrity chicken farmer Henrietta McCluckskey and Grant’s old flame Amber, they uncover the truth behind the mysterious apex predator.
FRIDAY AUGUST 23
10.15am AN TAIBHSE (THE GHOST) (International Premiere)
Director: John Farrelly. With: Tom Kerrisk, Livvy Hill, Tony Murray. Ireland 2024. 93 mins.
1852: Éamon and daughter Máire embark on a tranquil caretaker role at an isolated mansion during the unforgiving winter months. But their peaceful assignment unleashes a nightmare of supernatural proportions as a malevolent force awakens within the mansion’s walls, stirring dark secrets from the past. With every creaking floorboard and flickering candle, suspense tightens its grip, leaving sanity hanging by a thread.
Produced by six-time Oscar nominee Jim Sheridan and directed by award winning John Farrelly, AN TAIBHSE is the first Irish Language Horror film ever made. A bone-chilling tale set against the haunting backdrop of Ireland’s infamous famine era.
12.45pm BOOKWORM (European Premiere)
Director: Ant Timpson. With: Elijah Wood, Nell Fisher, Michael Smiley, Morganna O’Reilly. New Zealand 2024. 103 mins.
Precocious eleven-year-old Mildred escapes her humdrum existence reading literary adventures, with a long-dreamed quest to capture proof of a local mythological beast known as The Canterbury Panther. When an unusual accident occurs, Mildred’s long absent father Strawn Wise, a washed-up magician, comes to look after the daughter he’s never met. Agreeing to take her on an ill-advised camping trip to find the beast, it becomes the ultimate test in family bonding leading the duo on a string of increasingly absurd and treacherous escapades.
BOOKWORM gloriously reunites the COME TO DADDY team of star Elijah Wood and director Ant Timpson.
3.15pm GHOST GAME (International Premiere)
Director: Jill Gervargizian. With: Emily Bennett, Kia Dorsey, Zaen Haidar, Vienna Maas. USA 2024. 90 minutes.
Discovering his girlfriend, Laura, has been secretly taking part in an internet challenge involving breaking into homes and living undetected alongside the residents, Vin wants in on the next adventure. The target? Halton House, an infamously haunted manor that’s just been bought by a new family. Once the thrill-seeking couple enters the house, chilling unexplained incidents begin to happen. It seems Laura and VIn aren’t the only thing haunting the old manor. As the new owner descends into madness posing a danger to the family, the encounter becomes more than a game and more a battle for their own survival.
6.00pm SHELBY OAKS (UK Premiere)
Director: Chris Stuckmann. With: Camille Sullivan, Keith David, Michael Beach, Sarah Durn. USA 2024. 99 mins.
When the four investigators of the popular YouTube channel ‘‘Paranormal Paranoids’ go missing in the abandoned town of Shelby Oaks, Darke County, everyone thinks it’s a hoax to promote ratings. But twelve years later there is still no sign of any of them or a rational explanation for their disappearance so Mia decides to independently search for her beloved sister Riley, the star of the show. As Mia uncovers new and disturbing leads related to Riley’s mysterious exit, she uncovers evidence of a hidden supernatural evil dating all the way back to her and Riley’s childhood.
8.30pm TBC
11.00pm HAUNTOLOGY (International Premiere)
Director: Parker Brennon. With: Nancy Loomis, Samantha Robinson, Naomi Grossman, Zoey Luna. USA 2024. 103 mins.
Jazmin takes her fearless runaway younger sibling Venus on a road trip and shares the most chilling tales surrounding their Ohio hometown. And each place they visit has its own ghost story and queer perspective: trans woman Julian casts a spell to become her ideal self but the dark spirit unleashed tries to invade her life; a troubled married couple find a love beyond the grave; an up-and-coming art gallery is forging paintings of a deceased artist with very bloody consequences; and a journalist secures an interview with the eccentric owner of a haunted Victorian mansion.
SATURDAY AUGUST 24
10.15 SURVIVE (UK Premiere)
Director: Frederic Jardin. With: Emilie Dequenne, Andreas Pietschmann, Lisa Delmar, Lucas Ebel. France 2024. 90 mins.Julia and her loving husband are celebrating their son’s birthday on their yacht in the middle of the ocean. When a violent storm nearly capsizes them, the family awakens in a post-apocalyptic desert land. For the Earth has undergone a tragic polarity reversal that has drained all the water from the seven seas. And danger lurks in every nook and cranny that once were hidden depths. When an unexpected tragedy strikes Julia must save her children in a new world where crazed humanity and hungry creatures from the abyss now hunt for human flesh.
12. 35pm THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE DEMETER (UK Premiere)
Director: André Øvredal. With: Corey Hawkins, Aisling Franciosi, Liam Cunningham, David Dastmalchian. USA 2023. 118 mins.
Never shown in the United Kingdom until now, TROLL HUNTER and The AUTOPSY OF JANE DOE director André Øvredal’s stunning shocker based on ‘The Captain’s Log’ chapter, from Bram Stoker’s classic 1897 novel ‘Dracula’ is a visual delight in the Universal Studio Monsterverse tradition. On board the Russian schooner Demeter, 24 unmarked wooden crates are being transported from Carpathia to London. But as cargo animals and the crew start turning up dead, a mysterious stowaway sets out to convince the doomed sailors they’re dealing with more than just a rabies outbreak, something more in the supernatural realm.
3.25 DEAD MAIL (International Premiere)
Directors: Joe de Boer, Kyle McConaghy. With: Sterling Macer Jr., John Fleck, Tomas Boykin, Micki Jackson. USA 2024. 105 mins.
On a desolate county road, a bound man crawls towards a remote postal box sliding a blood-stained plea-for-help message into the slot before a panicking figure closes in behind. The note makes its way to the county post office desk of Jasper, a skilled “dead letter” investigator, responsible for tracking lost mail and returning it to its sender. Investigating further, Jasper meets Trent who has taken up residence at the same men’s hostel. When Trent unexpectedly shows up at Jasper’s office, it’s clear he has a vested interest in the note, and will stop at nothing to retrieve it.
6.15pm TRAUMATIKA (World premiere)
Director: Pierre Tsigaridis. With: Rebekah Kennedy, Ramen Navet, Emily Goss. Susan Gayle Watts. USA 2024. 87 mins.Employing multiple first-person point-of-view shots to immerse the audience in traumatic childhood experiences, the question is, why is little Mikey terrified of his mother? Maybe it’s because of the evil inside her? Mikey’s night terrors become reality when his mother begins showing signs of demonic possession. What he’s about to experience will haunt him for the rest of his life and claim countless lives across generations.
8.30pm STRANGE DARLING (European Premiere)
Director JT Mollner. With: Willa Fitzgerald, Ed Begley Jr., Robert Craighead, Kyle Gallner. USA 2023. 96 mins.
One day in the twisted love life of a serial killer told in six chapters. The Demon is a relentless male predator tracking an injured woman through the Oregon wilderness. The Lady is trying to outsmart her attacker, but with each tense moment, she grows weaker and less able. For he’s a deranged man on a mission, and it’s only a matter of time before he captures his prey… With a meticulously crafted non-linear narrative structure, and a killer premise that unfolds with incredible intrigue and suspense, take a twisty rollercoaster ride with the most unpredictable chiller of the year.
11.00pm MEMBERS CLUB (World Premiere)
Director: Marc Coleman. With: Dean Kilbey, Perry Benson, Steve Oram, Peter Andre. UK 2024. 90 mins.
Wet Dreams, a middle-aged male stripper group has hit rock bottom. After a string of disastrous gigs, the gang considers disbanding. Alan, the group’s happy-go-lucky front man, takes over the business and books the boys a lucrative and mysterious gig in rural Essex. But when the group arrive at the desolate club, their night quickly takes a dark turn when they find themselves tangled up in a plot to raise a murderous 16th century witch from the dead.
SUNDAY AUGUST 25
10.30am THE LAST ASHES (UK Premiere)
Director: Loïc Tanson. With: Sophie Mousel, Timo Wagner, Jules Werner, Luc Schiltz. Luxembourg 2023. 120 mins.
1838: one year before Luxembourg gains her independence from Dutch occupation, it’s a nation ravaged by way, famine and disease. But one Northern clan, the Graffs, offers food, sanctuary and safety to those who are willing to submit to its weird rules, odd customs and strange rituals. When Hélène realises her duty is to simply bear children, she flees, dooming her parents to be murdered in cold blood. Returning to her native village under a new identity after 15 years, Hélène is looking for revenge and, alone, she is ready to do anything to destroy the Graff family.
1.20pm DOCUMENTARY: THE LIFE AND DEATHS OF CHRISTOPHER LEE (World Premiere)
Director: Jon Spira. With: Peter Serafinowicz, Harriet Walter, Peter Jackson, Joe Dante. UK 2024. 104 mins
Genre icon Christopher Lee is brought back to life in an innovative documentary by director Jon Spira (ELSTREE 76) using fresh interviews, archive material and multiple forms of traditional and cutting-edge animation. The world famous actor is mainly known as Dracula and transitioning from Hammer Horror mainstay to a distinguished career encompassing James Bond and the STAR WARS and THE LORD OF THE RINGS franchises. Less well-known are his aristocratic and operatic Italian roots, wartime experiences in the British military, post-war Nazi-hunting adventures and heavy metal rock singing. All revealed here in this superb tribute to a horror legend.
4.00pm AZRAEL: ANGEL OF DEATH (UK Premiere)
Director: E.L. Katz. With: Samara Weaving, Vic Carmen Sonne, Katariina Unt, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett. USA 2024. 85 mins.
Many years following the apocalypse, a devout cult of mute zealots hunts down a young woman, Azrael, who has escaped her imprisonment. Recaptured by its ruthless leaders, Azrael is to be sacrificed to pacify an ancient evil that resides deep within the surrounding wilderness – yet she will stop at nothing to ensure her own survival. So Azrael makes a savage bid for freedom as her escape accelerates towards a vicious, revenge-fueled showdown. From E.L. Katz, the director of CHEAP THRILLS and Simon Barrett, writer of YOU’RE NEXT and GODZILLA X KONG: THE NEW EMPIRE.
6.15pm SAINT CLARE (UK Premiere)
Director: Mitzi Peirone. With: Bella Thorne, Rebecca De Mornay, Ryan Phillippe, Frank Whaley. USA 2024. 92 mins.
To the world, sixteen year old Clare Bleecker appears to be a normal teenager, A Catholic school student, an animal lover and devout vegan living with her grandparents. But like the small town Pickman Flats she lives in, Clare is more than she appears to be. Underneath her reserved appearance lives a sociopath with dissociative identity disorder – a serial killer. Based on the best-selling novel ‘Clare at 16’ by Don Roff, what secret lies hidden beneath Pickman Flats? And who is Clare really? If you want answers, well…there’s only one way to find out—even if it kills you.
+ UNSETTLED (UK Premiere)
Director: Bella Thorne. With: Bella Thorne, Jason Parks, Chris Zylka, Chris Santos USA 2024. 15 mins.
Showing for the first time in the UK, Bella Thorne makes her directing debut with a short film about a young gay man seeking to bring his tormentors to justice in Bible Belt Oklahoma. Bella is currently adapting this true story into the feature COLOR YOUR HURT.
9.00pm INVADER (International Premiere)
Director: Mickey Keating. With: Vero Maynez, Colin Huerta, Ruby Vallejo. USA 2024. 70 mins.
She feared the worst but never imagined how bad the worst could be… From director Mickey Keating (OFFSEASON, PSYCHOPATHS, CARNAGE PARK) and producer Joe Swanberg (V/H/S, YOU’RE NEXT) comes a lean, mean jolt of true crime horror. A young woman arrives in the Chicago suburbs and begins to suspect that something terrible has happened to her missing cousin. But she soon realises that her greatest fears don’t even begin to scratch the surface. Short, sharp and shocking, Keating cranks the terror up to eleven. Buckle up, you’re in for a bumpy, jumpy ride.
MONDAY AUGUST 26
10.30pm. THE DEAD THING (International Premiere)
Director; Elric Kane. With: Blu Hunt, Ben Smith-Petersen, John Karna, Katherine Hughes. USA 2024. 94 mins.
A neo-realist take on ‘The Invisible Man’ and a modern urban legend for the online dating era. Alex is a young woman lost in a series of meaningless connections who signs up to the Friktion dating app and meets the perfect match. Kyle is a charismatic and sensitive man and soon she’s falling in love. But Kyle hides a dark secret that turns their affair into a twisted and dangerous obsession. Unusual, unexpected and unique, THE DEAD THING is the best thing to happen to independent horror in a very long time.
1.00pm A DESERT (European Premiere)
Director: Joshua Erkman. With: David Yow. Kai Lennox, Sarah Lind, Zacary Ray Sherman. USA 2024. 100 mins.
The exciting and powerful feature debut from Joshua Erkman is a dark study in haunting nihilism, recalling 1970’s independent noir cinema. Driving across the American Southwest, struggling photographer Alex is hoping to revive his career and find inspiration within the vast landscape of deserts and abandoned roadside structures. A pit stop at an otherwise inconspicuous motel alters his plans, thanks to a younger couple whose devil-may-care attitude initially attracts Alex but quickly proves to be something more dangerous than he thought. Before long, what began as a restorative road trip descends into a nightmare that spirals beyond his control.
3.30pm LADYBUG (World Premiere)
Director Tim Cruz. With: Anthony Del Negro, Zachary Roozen, Scout Taylor-Compton, Charlene Tilton. USA 2024. 107 mins.
Grayson is a young artist on the verge of major international success. To work on his next collection, titled ‘Ladybug’, without distraction, he decides to stay at the remote cabin owned by his family. Needing major repair work done, he hires handyman Sawyer to fix the place up. But handsome Sawyer is hiding a terrible secret, for he was murdered by a homophobic serial killer and his spirit is haunting the cabin searching for long overdue justice. And now Grayson is being stalked by the same maniac responsible for the supernatural fate of his new lover.
6.10pm COLD WALLET (European Premiere)
Director: Cutter Hodierne. With: Raul Castillo, Josh Brener, Melonie Diaz, Tony Cavalero. USA 2024. 84 mins.
Based on a true story in the high stakes world of digital currency, this compelling heist journey follows a ragtag group of Redditors whose financial downfall leads them to hatching a plot to crack into the cold wallet of supposedly deceased crypto CEO Charles Hegel. So Billy, hacker extraordinaire Eva and martial arts instructor Dom kidnap Hegel to force him to give up his fortune and distribute that wealth like modern-day Robin Hoods to all the victims he swindled with his ‘Tulip’ coin scam.
8.30pm CLOSING FILM: THE SUBSTANCE (English Premiere)
Director: Coralie Fargeat. With: Demi Moore, Margaret Qualley, Dennis Quaid, Hugo Diego Garcia. USA/France/UK 2024. 140 mins.
Have you ever dreamt of a better version of yourself? You. Only better in every way. Seriously. You’ve got to try this new product. It’s called The Substance. IT CHANGED MY LIFE. It generates another you. A new, younger, more beautiful, more perfect, you. And there’s only one rule: You share time. One week for you. One week for the new you. Seven days each. A perfect balance. Easy. Right? If you respect the balance… What could possibly go wrong?
Drawing on stylish flamboyance and accessible visual extremes, Fargeat’s primal screamer highlights a perceptive filmmaker with something important to say. Helping her put that strong message across are two of the most extraordinary genre performances this year. Fearless Demi Moore rockets back into the probable Oscar limelight as fading celebrity Elizabeth Sparkle who uses a black market drug, a cell-replicating substance that temporarily creates a younger, better version of herself. And an incandescent Margaret Qualley (KINDS OF KINDNESS, ONCE UPON A TIME…IN HOLLYWOOD) is her rejuvenated alter-ego in this epic, and audacious masterpiece.