The unseasonably sunny landscape here in Manchester may seem at odds with the usual weather we contend with, but to an unknowing public there’s something much more unusual lurking around the corner.
The fifth annual Grimmfest is returning to the city this autumn showcasing all things gore, cult, and horror and sci-fi.
Festival goers will be in for a ghoulish treat with film premieres, special celebrity guests, Q&As and signings with some of the stars of the world of horror throughout the four-day festival.
Kicking off the celebrations with an off-colour homage to their illustrious namesakes, the Brothers Grimm, Grimmfest will be premiering Hansel and Gretel Get Baked.
The ghoulish tale of kids lost in the forest and gingerbread houses with sinister secrets gets updated to suburban America, where a cannibal pot dealer lures sibling stoners to their deaths with some super strong skunk weed.
Featuring an unsettlingly witchy lead turn from Twin Peaks; Lara Flynn Boyle, Twilight hunk Michael Welch as Hansel, and a supporting turn from the Witchblade herself, Yancy Butler, this mischievous and mean-spirited black comedy of horrors serves as a reminder that fairy tales aren’t just for kids.
Following the theme of forest-based tales, though of a very different kind, also showcasing at the festival is Chad Crawford Kinkle’s Jugface.
Featuring Lauren Ashley Carter and Sean Bridgers from McKee’s modern classic The Woman, genre legend Larry Fessenden, and with a spit-vicious turn from Sean Young as a monstrous matriarch, this is an altogether moodier affair than McKee’s celebrated collaboration with Jack Ketchum.
An unsettling tale of backwoods religion gone bad, blood sacrifice, incest, and frightening folk art, this sinister slice of Southern Gothic recalls such eerie, unsettling classics as Wiseblood and The Passion of Darkly Noon, and is guaranteed to haunt your dreams.
Earlybird tickets are on sale now, click here to get yours while you can.
Grimmfest will be held at the Dancehouse theatre from October 3-6.
Image courtesy of Grimm Up North via YouTube, with thanks.
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