As per usual these days, the in-person version of the Telluride Horror Show is canceled, much like the town’s famous film festival that would have happened the first week of September. However, unlike the less terrifying fest, the Horror Show is creeping its way onto the internet.
This year’s “Shelter-in-Place Edition” will be held 0ct. 15 to 18, with passes going on sale in mid-September. The festival is still coming together – it’s still accepting film submissions through Sept. 20, if you happen to have just finished one — but it’s already got some neat things going for it.
For one, it’s already planned advanced screenings for a couple of films before the festival even begins.
[video:1]“Alone” follows Jessica, a recent widow who leaves the city in an attempt to cope in a more rural environment, but naturally get kidnapped and imprisoned in a mysterious man’s cabin. You can watch it from your own cabin for $12 on Sept. 15, three days before its official release.
In “12 Hour Shift,” opiate-abusing nurse Mandy is trying to get through a shift at the clinic where she works for a black market organ-smuggling ring when her cousin misplaces some merchandise – forcing her to find a new kidney to replace it. It’s showing for $12 on Sept. 29, also three days before its official release. At noon the same day, viewers will be able to watch a live interview with director Brea Grant, who has also starred in a number of horror and thriller films. (The recorded conversation will also be available later as part of the digital film rental.)
[video:2]As for the festival itself, the three-day Horror Show typically includes at least 20 feature films and 50 short films, along with Creepy Campfire Tales (which involves a book signing with an established horror author), a Pig Roast, an I Scream Social, a Killer Karaoke Party, and a Dread Central Horror Trivia competition. Obviously, not all of those will translate well into an online format, but hopefully, we’ll at least get the films and maybe the campfire tales.
In some ways, the fact that the festival is now on the internet makes a few things easier. Sure … you no longer have to book it to Telluride, but it’s also eliminated the chance that once you get there, the best programs will be sold out.
“We’ve always had five, six, seven shorts programs at the Horror Show, and they’ve always been huge crowd favorites, we always have to run our shorts programs at least twice to accommodate the crowds,” festival organizer Ted Wilson told the Durango Herald. “There are films in there that are really actually – they’re a short film, but they’re pretty scary. People will still be able to get their jump-scare fixes and all that stuff. We’ll also have the wide range of horror-comedy to the just flat-out frightening.”
It also means that the festival might be able to expand its roster of guests, he said. After all, like you or me, it’s way easier for a celebrity to sit down at a computer for an hour than to make the trip here from Hollywood.
Three-day passes for the in-person Horror Show typically cost about $150, but the festival has yet to announce what the online festival will cost. They will go on sale, though, in mid-September and will be available at telluridehorrorshow.com.
Nick Gonzales
