This year sees the quarter-century anniversary of Edinburgh horror festival Dead by Dawn, running from Thursday, April 19th to Sunday, April 22nd in independent cinema bastion the Filmhouse.

Festival Director Adèle Hartley stated, “In 25 years we’ve introduced so many amazing directors to Scottish audiences – the likes of Peter Jackson, Neil Marshall, Jim Mickle, Jaume Balaguero, Mike Flanagan, the Spierig Brothers – and this year’s selection showcases yet more exceptional talent from all over the world. Dead by Dawn continues to treat fans to the very finest chills and thrills!”

There will be many films of note crammed into the intense long weekend, but first let us focus on the fact that the tireless Hartley has somehow landed a Guest of Honour in the shape of none other than John Landis! The genre legend will be hosting screenings of his 1992 vampire flick Innocent Blood and iconic An American Werewolf in London (with a Q&A after each), and will also introduce a double-bill of James Whale’s Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein. He has also graciously agreed to be inundated with DVDs and memorabilia to sign.

Other, not as squee-inducing but no less appealing attractions include a varied assortment of films collected from all over the globe, with no fewer than 17 countries represented by the various features and shorts.

In Knuckleball, 12-year-old Henry is left with his irascible grandfather while his parents attend a funeral, but the isolated farmhouse, padlocked doors and a creepy neighbour all add up to a sinister situation, and one that Henry has to figure out answers for himself.

Director Mike Peterson will be in attendance.

South African chiller Siembamba (aka The Lullaby) sees the pregnant Chloe return to her home town and fall into depression after her son is born. As the young mother attempts to adjust to a childrearing regime she becomes paranoid about any potential danger to her son, so when she begins seeing a dark figure stalking her child she must figure out if it really is all in her head or the entity poses some otherworldly threat to her baby.

Aj Zombies!, a Peruvian take on the surprisingly populous rom-zom-com subgenre, sees childhood friends Felipe and Claudia having grown apart due to class constraints; she the daughter of a rich family, he the son of their maid. But an undead outbreak in Lima provides Felipe’s moment to shine and save his first love from the encroaching horde, provided he can get her to stop updating her status long enough to notice. Producer Javier Salvador will be in attendance.

In Rabbit, university student Maude returns home to Australia after she comes to believe that recurring nightmares are telling her where to find her twin sister Cleo, missing for a year and presumed dead. Joining with her sister’s boyfriend and a police officer obsessing over the case, she embarks on a search for her sibling, while also determined to convince herself of her own sanity.

Taiwanese horror comedy Mon Mon Mon Monsters sees miserable high school student Shu-wei forced into community service with a trio of bullies who torment him on a daily basis. After he joins them in various misdeeds to gain acceptance, they encounter and abduct a flesh-eating ghoul, who the group torture for fun as Shu-wei empathises with her, all the while the creature’s sister hunts for the insolent humans who have taken her sibling.

In the surreal and inventive horror comedy Dave Made a Maze, the titular slacker artist constructs a cardboard maze in his living room, only for it to mysteriously transform into a vast labyrinth filled with traps and monsters. After he becomes lost, his long-suffering girlfriend ventures inside with several of their friends to get him out, where they all must navigate the deadly dangers if they hope to survive.

The intensely simple Downrange sees a group of twentysomethings become stranded by a flat tyre in the middle of nowhere, only to become targeted by a sniper who begins picking them off one by one in a relentless barrage of bullets and blood.

Documentary Spookers showcases the family-run scare park of the same name that operates on the site of former psychiatric asylum Kingseat Hospital outside Auckland, New Zealand. Telling stories of the attraction’s operators, performers and guests – while also accepting potential negative connotations that further stigmatise mental illness – the film celebrates the weird, freakish and outlandish instead of condemning it.

In Trench 11, a band of First World War soldiers are assigned to investigate an abandoned underground German bunker, only to unleash the biological weapon sealed beneath the Western Front, and must frantically attempt to escape the contagion and the death that follows with it.

Opening the festival is a special event of the original vampire movie FW Murnau’s expressionist Nosferatu, which will be screened with a live score accompaniment by pianist Forrester Pyke; and later on a ‘taste-along’ screening of Sam Raimi’s slapstick horror classic Evil Dead II is presented in collaboration with Conjurer’s Kitchen, a company who specialise in edible art and will be providing some sweet treats to accompany key scenes in the film.

A double bill of cult undead Euro-shenanigans will keep the late night lively; in Michael Soavi’s blackly humorous Dellamorte Dellamore (aka Cemetery Man) a loner graveyard caretaker awaits by the gravesides of the newly dead to slay them when they arise as zombies; while in Jorge Grau’s The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue (aka Let Sleeping Corpses Lie) the dead are awoken by a signal from an experimental ultrasonic pest-control device and menace the English countryside.

In between the feature offerings are the regular short film programmes 2D & Deranged (animation) and What You Make It (non-horror but with genre appeal), which along with two others, It’s Your Funeral and Not in Kansas Anymore, make up 33 shorts being screened. Also returning is the annual Shit Film Amnesty, where people are invited to donate the dregs of their movie collection, and the owner of the one deemed the worst ‘wins’ the lot.

All-inclusive festival passes are available to buy in person at the Filmhouse box office, over the phone on 0131 228 2688 or from their website, and individual tickets are available for each screening if the whole lineup doesn’t take your fancy.

More information and updates can be found on the festival’s website, Facebook page and Twitter feed.

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