Grimmfest Announces 2021 Dates, Venue Partner, Special Guest, Awards Jury & the Return of Live Screenings!

Grimmfest is BACK.

And, to quote Colin Clive’s Baron Frankenstein, “It’s alive!”

After over a year of “home invasions” in the form of virtual screenings and online events, this October Grimmfest will be returning to the cinema. The festival team is delighted to announce that from 7th to 10th October, we will be teaming up with our regular venue partner, the Odeon Great Northern for a live event.

And we are even more delighted to reveal that we will be joined by a true icon of genre cinema; our guest of honour, the incomparable Dee Wallace, recipient of this year’s Grimmfest Lifetime Achievement Award. We’ll be celebrating a remarkable five decade career that ranges from such classics as THE STEPFORD WIVES, THE HILLS HAVE EYES, THE HOWLING, E.T., CUJO and CRITTERS, to equally boundary pushing recent films such as Rob Zombie’s THE LORDS OF SALEM and James Suttles’ THE NEST, which recently had its World Premiere at Grimmfest.

Right now, celebrating the genre, and those who have done so much to shape it, seems more important to us than ever before alongside highlighting new, exciting cutting edge genre movies from all over the world. With that in mind, we once again host our Grimmfest annual awards; from BEST FEATURE FILM to BEST SCARE, there will be twelve awards up for grabs and every selected film will be eligible and viewed by our Jury of industry professionals. This year’s Jury includes ‘Horror Channel’ head honcho Stewart Bridle and the multi-talented director, actress and screenwriter Brea Grant (12 HOUR SHIFT).

This year has been a tough one for festivals, and even more so for cinemas and exhibitors. Film festivals are by their very nature, social and public events, a celebration of cinema as a collective experience and a chance to meet up, watch films and discuss them with like-minded people. 

The Grimmfest Team has been genuinely honoured by the extent to which our audience has stuck with us, embraced the online format, and worked with us to maintain a collective experience throughout the pandemic. 

But now it’s time to finally embrace the cinema experience once more. Four whole days of movie premieres, Q&As, talks, parties and exclusive events. All taking place in a real cinema with the support of the Odeon.

And for those of you who have enjoyed Grimmfest online, we also plan to have an associated virtual festival reflecting the live event and enabling those who are unable to join us physically, to enjoy the show at home.

GRIMMFEST festival director Simeon Halligan said: 

“The response to our online festival during the pandemic was incredible and revealed that people will always find a way to discover and enjoy new cinematic voices, whatever the circumstances. As we venture back into cinemas, Grimmfest 2021 will also maintain its virtual presence for those who are unable to attend in person.”

ODEON events exec Bill Brock said: 

“At ODEON, we pride ourselves on being the destination of choice for film lovers – whether your passion is for blockbuster action films, family favourites or cult horror classics. We know film-lovers have been missing the big screen experience over the past year, so we’re very pleased to be supporting Grimmfest again. It has never been so important to come together and celebrate cinema with likeminded film fans, and we look forward to seeing more events like this take place in the near future”.

GRIMMFEST: 

International festival of horror, cult and fantastic cinema and UK Exhibitor. Grimmfest bring the very best in new independent genre cinema and classic genre films to cinema screens in Manchester UK and beyond. With regular screenings throughout the year and the main festival in early October at Odeon Manchester. Grimmfest is now in its 13th year and recently voted one of the best genre film festivals in the World by Movie Maker magazine.

For online content, Grimmfest offers DRM-protected, Geo-blocked movie premieres. Grimmfest also host exclusive livestream and recorded interviews, special events and press rooms, bringing filmmakers and stars to present and Q&A films, while also helping to create a complete virtual festival experience.

F RATING: Grimmfest subscribes to the “F Rating” system, designed to highlight women on screen and behind the camera, and developed at Bath Film Festival in 2014. The F-Rating is awarded to films directed by and/or written by women. If the film also stars significant women in their own right, the film is Triple F-Rated. 

ODEON:

With more than 120 cinemas, over 950 screens and 87 years of cinema experience, ODEON is the leading cinema exhibitor across the UK & Ireland.

ODEON prides itself in being the destination of choice for film lovers, with an ongoing commitment to investing in cutting edge technology and comfort which create the ultimate cinema experience – from luxury seats, to immersive IMAX and iSense screens with premium sight and sound, impeccable guest service and unique opportunities to watch screenings of 70mm prints at select sites.

With more than 5,700 colleagues employed across the UK & Ireland, ODEON has once again been placed number 25 in the Sunday Times Best Big Companies to Work For 2018 and named a Best Large Workplace in Ireland 2018.

ODEON is part of ODEON Cinemas Group, Europe’s largest cinema operator, which hosts over 115m guests each year in more than 360 cinemas across 13 European countries. In 2016, our Group was acquired by AMC Theatres, creating the largest movie exhibition company in the world with over 1,000 theatres and 11,000 screens globally.

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