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HAINT (USA)
SYNOPSIS: When gentrifiers begin to mysteriously die, a Gullah Geechee handywoman who recently lost her home, must decide whether to help them or leave the newcomers to their fate. NOTE: Film is partially spoken in Gullah
RATINGS GUIDE: Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Jahmil Eady
GENRE: Horror
PREMIERE STATUS: Utah Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Wednesday, Oct. 29th @ 11:00 AM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Jahmil Eady is a writer and director from Charleston, SC, and NYC who blends genre with social impact storytelling. Her films have been supported by Tribeca Film Institute, AFI DWW+, Princess Grace Foundation, Chanel, and Film Independent. She made HAINT short film in Indeed and Hillman Grad’s Rising Voices Season 5.
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HALFWAY HAUNTED (CANADA)
SYNOPSIS: A tenant in a haunted house teams up with a ghost to stop a real estate developer from demolishing the home they share.
RATINGS GUIDE: Mild Violence, Mild Language
GENRE: Horror, Comedy
PREMIERE STATUS: Regional Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Monday, Oct. 27th @ 10:30 AM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Sam Rudykoff is a Toronto-based writer-director. His previous short film Cruise (2022) was an official selection at over 75 festivals including Fantastic Fest, Fantasia, and Seattle International. It was awarded best Canadian Short at the Calgary Underground Film Festival in 2022, and selected as a Vimeo Staff pick.
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HAND (USA)
SYNOPSIS: A heart-broken college student ignores a grotesque infection as she develops an obsession with stains on her carpet.
RATINGS GUIDE: Mild Violence, Strong Language, Adult Content, Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Jennifer Winterbotham
GENRE: Horror, Comedy
PREMIERE STATUS: Regional Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Sunday, Oct. 26th @ 4:30 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Jennifer Winterbotham is an independent director, writer, and producer based in Brooklyn. In recent years she’s directed several music videos and docu-style projects, including the 2021 Gamer Days campaign for Intel and a TV pilot called FOOD BLISS. The short films she has produced have screened at film festivals across the US, as well as the Cannes Short Film Corner in France and the International Film Festival for Environmental, Health, and Culture in Indonesia. Most recently, she co-produced the 2024 Sundance-winning film, IN THE SUMMERS.
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HARD CASH (GERMANY)
SYNOPSIS: After a night shift in the factory, the man realizes that he is able to vomit coins. For two weeks, he collects huge amounts of coins in his apartment and drags himself into a luxury boutique with the last of his strength. The sales clerks are amazed by his unusual ability.
RATINGS GUIDE: Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: David Füsgen
GENRE: Horror, Fantasy, The Beyond, Fantastic
PREMIERE STATUS: USA Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Monday, Oct. 27th @ 2:00 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: David Füsgen was born in 1990 and graduated from Robert Schumann University of Music and Media in 2017 with a Bachelor of Music degree. He is working as a freelance film-producer since 2013. David Füsgen has been on many different productions as a director and dp, but also as a writer and editor. Hard Cash is the third part of the “”men on couches”” trilogy, which also includes the short films “”falling in love”” and “”the way we wake up””.
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HEIRLOOMS (CANADA/USA)
SYNOPSIS: Jaime’s quest for healing leads her to restore a family heirloom. But what begins as a therapeutic project, soon spirals into a battle against an ancient evil that has plagued her bloodline for generations.
RATINGS GUIDE: Violence
DIRECTOR: Dan Abramovici
GENRE: Horror
PREMIERE STATUS: Utah Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Tuesday, Oct. 28th @ 5:00 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Dan is a writer and director whose work often explores questions of identity through a surrealist lens. His films use unconventional storytelling to navigate complex human moments with honesty and imagination. He is in development on three features: PLAY IT AGAIN (acquired by Prideflix), SEARCHING FOR MARCEAU (Semifinalist Academy Nicholls Fellowship), and the horror feature UNMOTHERED.
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HELP (USA)
SYNOPSIS: An exhausted nurse is forced into a brutal fight for her life when a mangled and bloody monster invades her home. But as her fearful survival instincts take over, she unknowingly makes a choice that will haunt her forever.
RATINGS GUIDE: Strong Violence, Mild Language, Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Collin Black
GENRE: Horror
PREMIERE STATUS: World Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Friday, Oct. 31st @ 3:30 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: As a director with years of experience in visual effects, Collin Black knows how to make independent horror hit hard. He uses his technical skills not for big spectacle, but to build suspense and create genuinely unnerving visuals. Based in LA and originally from Ohio, Collin is drawn to genre filmmaking, and his work has a cinematic polish that makes him an exciting new voice in horror.
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HELP, I’M ALIEN PREGNANT (NEW ZEALAND)
SYNOPSIS: Mary feels alien pregnant, the doctor thinks it’s probably allergies, only slime will tell.
RATINGS GUIDE: Mild Language, Brief Nudity
DIRECTOR: Thunderclips
GENRE: Horror, Sci-Fi, Comedy
PREMIERE STATUS: Regional Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Virtual Block #4 – Comedy Shorts
DIRECTOR’S BIO: THUNDERLIPS is an identity forged over a decade of creating ambitious music videos on tiny budgets – and winning a bunch of awards and Vimeo Staff Picks. They’ve also made ads for Te Whatu Ora (Health New Zealand) and other clients – but their true love has always been movies, they love being on set with their friends, making and sharing artwork, facilitating a safe and empowering environment for everyone in the cast and crew to shine. A collaborative friendship propels THUNDERLIPS to apply their doubled emotion and intellect to writing scripts that feature unforgettable characters, sublime narratives and joyfully bombastic climaxes, movies that humans want to watch again and again and again, preferably in the cinema. Their greatest writing achievement to date is making it to the second round of the Sundance Lab selection process with their previous screenplay Golden Years.
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HOUSEWIFE (USA)
SYNOPSIS: When a woman accidentally cuts herself on her forgotten dollhouse, she’ll unwittingly awaken Housewife, a primordial monster with strange ideas about how to care for her children. Based on the character created by Miranda Parkin.
RATINGS GUIDE: Violence, Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Greta Guthrie & Jacob Lazarow
GENRE: Horror, The Beyond, Fantastic
PREMIERE STATUS: Utah Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Friday, Oct. 24th @ 11:00 AM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: As an NYC-based screenwriting and directing duo, Jake and Greta have spent nearly a decade collaborating together in a partnership that dates back to their college years at Penn State, when Jake traded a trash bag full of movie theater popcorn for Greta to score his short film. Since then, they’ve directed three short films together. “Housewife” is their first time shooting on 35mm (and it won’t be their last if they have anything to say about it!) They’re currently in post on their next short while working with “Housewife” creator Miranda Parkin on a feature adaptation.
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HOUSTON, WE HAVE A CRUSH (USA)
SYNOPSIS: After finding a phone accidentally left behind by an astronaut, a lonely alien develops an all-consuming crush that tests his hold on reality.
RATINGS GUIDE: Mild Violence
DIRECTOR: Omer Ben-Shachar
GENRE: Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Comedy
PREMIERE STATUS: Regional Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Thursday, Oct. 30th @ 5:00 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Omer Ben-Shachar is an award-winning writer/director. His short ‘Tree #3’ won a Student Academy Award, Urbanworld’s Best Young Creator Award, and Palm Springs’ Audience Award, among others. His recent film ‘Single Residence Occupancy’ won first place at Imagine Entertainment & Adobe ShortFest and Atlanta Film Festival’s Academy Award-Qualifying Jury Award. An AFI Conservatory graduate, Omer participated in Film Independent’s Screenwriting Lab and Project Involve, Warner Bros. TV Directors’ Workshop, and Paramount’s Viewfinder Program. Omer also directed music videos featured in Rolling Stone, Billboard, and Nowness, earning multiple Vimeo Staff Picks, a Webby Award, and a Cannes Lions Young Directors Award nomination.
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HUMPTY DUMPTY’S LAST STAND (USA)
SYNOPSIS: A burned-out detective and his rookie partner crack open a decades-cold case tied to a slippery kingpin known only as Humpty Dumpty.
RATINGS GUIDE: Violence, Strong Language
DIRECTOR: Zack Hosseini
GENRE: Comedy
PREMIERE STATUS: World Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Friday, Oct. 24th @ 5:00 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Zack Hosseini tells stories that unfold like memories you can’t place. He’s written and directed a variety of shorts (including “”A Cotton Moon,”” FilmQuest 2023) spanning from psychological horror to absurdist comedy. He has a slate of genre features in development with his team at Chaos Theory. This is his third FilmQuest.
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I’LL SLEEP WHEN I’M DEAD (USA)
SYNOPSIS: A dispirited woman in a nursing home receives an unexpected visitor.
RATINGS GUIDE: Intense & Scary Imagery, All Audiences
GENRE: Horror
PREMIERE STATUS: World Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Wednesday, Oct. 29th @ 2:00 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Alex Chew is a small town Kentucky nerd who fell in love with cinema watching Hitchcock and Wilder on Turner Classic Movies. After moving to Texas and teaching film history & theory for over a decade, she co-founded the writers-first production company SEQUENCE 8 and the Black Auteur Film Festival. Currently, she is adapting the supernatural Southern gothic novel Delta for the big screen and in development with several twisty genre features about badass Southern Black women.
His fiction has appeared in Cleaver Magazine, the Columbia Journal, Ghostwatch Zine, and The Los Angeles Press. He lives in LA with his three rescue dogs and his girlfriend, the writer CJ Leede. KEEP COMING BACK, which Kouri directed, co-wrote, and stars in, is Slashtag Cinema’s first film.
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TRAILER: Coming Soon!
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INHERITANCE (USA)
SYNOPSIS: Generational trauma drives this grounded psychological horror as a divorced father, mourning the death of his own mother, is haunted by the feeling he’s becoming the one thing he fears most.
RATINGS GUIDE: Violence, Strong Language, Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Anthony Misiano
GENRE: Horror
PREMIERE STATUS: Regional Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Friday, Oct. 31st @ 12:30 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Writer-Director Anthony Misiano is a multi-hyphenate living in New York City. His last three films, Red Menace, Wendy/Gigi & Part-Time have won multiple awards at festivals worldwide. He is very meticulous and decisive when it comes to filmmaking and takes his work very seriously, but feels if nobody’s laughing on set, something’s terribly wrong.
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INVENTING (USA)
SYNOPSIS: Alice lands a strange new job where she spends her days inventing lies for a mysterious AI guide. But when one of her “inventions” harms a new friend, she must risk her own sanity to make amends.
RATINGS GUIDE: Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Benjamin Myrick
GENRE: Sci-Fi, Comedy, The Beyond, Fantastic
PREMIERE STATUS: Regional Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Monday, Oct. 27th @ 10:30 AM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Coming from the loosely honest world of advertising, Benjamin is a visual director who makes films about distorted perception and social discordance. His work often combines absurdity with near-future design to illuminate the impact of technology on human relationships.
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IS THAT A MIME? (USA)
SYNOPSIS: A couple’s picnic is disrupted by what may or may not be a mime.
RATINGS GUIDE: Mild Language, Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Phil Cheney
GENRE: Horror, Comedy
PREMIERE STATUS: Regional Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Thursday, Oct. 30th @ 11:00 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Phil Cheney is a MA-born & Brooklyn-based filmmaker and photographer. His previous works include “”The Promotion”” (FIlmQuest, Chattanooga FF, Brooklyn Horror FF), “”Animals You Want to Eat,”” and “”The Owner is In.”” This is his second collaboration with Peepaw’s Basement.
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LURIMA: A TALE OF THREE FISHERMAN (FINLAND)
SYNOPSIS: Three starving fishermen encounter something unexpected on a remote island in the 1890’s. A mystery story with horror elements.
RATINGS GUIDE: Mild Violence, Brief Nudity, Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: PV Lehtinen
GENRE: Horror, Fantasy, The Beyond, Fantastic
PREMIERE STATUS: North American Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Wednesday, Oct. 29th @ 11:00 AM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: PV Lehtinen is acclaimed short film director. One way or another, many of his films involve the element of water, which he feels is an extremely interesting visual element. He is also an avid snorkelist and tea enthusiast. Currently he is developing his first feature.
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JACQUES THE GIANT SLAYER (USA)
SYNOPSIS: TBD
RATINGS GUIDE: TBD
DIRECTOR: TBD
GENRE: TBD
PREMIERE STATUS: TBD
SCREENING DATE: Saturday, Nov. 1st @ 11:00 AM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: TBD
IMAGES FROM THE FILM: Coming Soon!
TRAILER: Coming Soon!
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JAKE GOES ON A DATE (UK)
SYNOPSIS: A man undergoes a painful transformation before his big date in the city.
RATINGS GUIDE: Brief Nudity, Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Robert Harold
GENRE: Horror
PREMIERE STATUS: Regional Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Virtual Block #2 – Sci-Fi & Beyond Shorts
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Robert is a French/American writer and director specialising in narrative filmmaking. Originally from Toulouse, France, he moved to London for his MA in filmmaking at the London Film School and now works between London and Paris. He has written and directed over a dozen short films, a feature film, and a number of music videos and commercials, which have been selected for Oscar/BAFTA qualifying festivals.
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JUNK (USA)
SYNOPSIS: A surreal head trip following one man’s downward spiral in the wake of his child’s death.
RATINGS GUIDE: Mild Violence, Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Aidan Casey
GENRE: Horror, The Beyond, Fantastic
PREMIERE STATUS: Regional Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Friday, Oct. 31st @ 12:30 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Aidan is a Director, Writer, and Producer based in Brooklyn, NY. He’s drawn to genre filmmaking that feels personal and singular. Previous work includes “”Fucktoys”” (SXSW 2025 Narrative Feature Competition Special Jury Prize winner) – Co-Producer; “”Multiplicity”” – Director.
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JUST A GAME (USA)
SYNOPSIS: An uninvited guest wants to play a game of chess.
RATINGS GUIDE: Mild Violence, Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Brandon Mercer
GENRE: Horror, The Beyond, Fantastic
PREMIERE STATUS: World Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Friday, Oct. 24th @ 11:00 AM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Brandon Mercer began as a photographer before finding his voice in the expanse of narrative-driven filmmaking. He utilizes storytelling as an outlet to explore how unresolved trauma and fear run parallel. The characters and stories he creates are often apparitions of what gnaws, looms and lurks in the dark corners of unprocessed human experiences.
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JUST WAIT (USA)
SYNOPSIS: A young wife fights to be heard by her husband as a hurricane rages outside their house and danger lurks inside.
RATINGS GUIDE: Mild Violence, Mild Language, Intense & Scary Imagery
GENRE: Horror
PREMIERE STATUS: Regional Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Tuesday, Oct. 28th @ 2:00 PM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Blaine Morris is a queer Latina Columbia University graduate, USC MFA George Lucas Scholar, and 2024 Project Involve Director Fellow creating female-driven and queer genre films. Morris has directed, written, edited and produced short films that played Sundance, Slamdance, Sitges, Outfest, Overlook and won best horror short film at Nvision Film Festival. She wrote, produced and starred in the feature Dark Obsession, now on Tubi, assisted Oscar nominated writer/director Charles Shyer for Netflix’s The Noel Diary, produced Kelley Kali’s Speak Less, and co-produced Ritesh Gupta’s The Red Mask. She is a Rideback Rise Circle Member and wrote 8 episodes on the Ambie nominated IHeartRadio and Sonoro Latine horror anthology podcast “”Nocturno”” hosted by Danny Trejo.
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KUKERI (USA/BULGARIA)
SYNOPSIS: In a remote Bulgarian village, an ancient ritual meant to protect a newborn goes horribly wrong, unleashing a force rooted in centuries-old folklore.
RATINGS GUIDE: Intense & Scary Imagery
DIRECTOR: Kourosh Ahari
GENRE: Horror, Fantasy
PREMIERE STATUS: World Premiere
SCREENING DATE: Wednesday, Oct. 29th @ 11:00 AM
DIRECTOR’S BIO: Kourosh Ahari is an Iranian-American director and producer whose debut feature The Night, starring Cannes Best Actor winner Shahab Hosseini (A Separation), was released by IFC Films and became the first American film to premiere theatrically in Iran in decades. He followed The Night with Parallel, an English-language remake of the Chinese sci-fi thriller Parallel Forest, featuring Danielle Deadwyler (Till), Aldis Hodge (Black Adam), and Edwin Hodge (The Tomorrow War). He is currently developing Kukeri, a folkloric horror adaptation of an ancient Bulgarian tradition, which he will direct with Maria Bakalova (The Apprentice, Borat Subsequent Moviefilm) attached to star and produce.
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