Knoxville Horror Film Fest

If you couldn’t make it to the Toronto After Dark Film Festival or Chicago’s Music Box Massacre, the first annual Knoxville Horror Film Fest is shaping up to be a formidable consolation prize. Hosted by Pilot Light and organized by local filmmaker and horror enthusiast William Mahaffey, the event will feature short films that span the breadth of horror’s ever-evolving spectrum of sub-genres, from traditional supernatural chillers to tongue-in-cheek deconstructionism. Regional works will share the spotlight with films from Ireland, Spain, and Germany. Among the several hours of films on the schedule, expect healthy doses of Appalachian gothic horror, nods to Italian giallo flicks and German expressionism, plenty of black comedy, and an adaptation of one of H.P. Lovecraft’s best-known tales.
Besides an open call for submissions, Mahaffey fleshed out his lineup with entries from some of the country’s highest-profile genre film festivals. He attended a couple of key horror events, where he made invaluable contacts and recruited help from a number of other filmmakers and horror aficionados.
“When I attended Fantastic Fest in Austin this year, I got the contacts for all of the short films’ directors there, and six or seven of their films are going to be screening here,” Mahaffey says. “Fright Night Film Fest in Louisville, Ky., helped me out by sending a couple of films and spreading the word. Screenfest in Gatlinburg helped spread the word. Besides that it was all e-mailing, MySpace, Facebook, and word of mouth.” (April Snellings)