FrightFest 2025 Line-Up Promises A Weird, Wild and Wonderful Year
James DeMonaco’s Home starring Pete Davidson to open UK’s biggest genre film festival
The dark heart of cinema has has revealed it’s 2025 line up. Next month FrightFest will kick-off it’s 26th edition promising a weird, the wild and the wonderful year.
The UK’s No.1 horror & fantasy film festival, its annual five-day extravaganza in August. Running from 21st August until 25th Monday, taking over The Odeon LUXE cinemas in London’s Leicester Square.
The line-up will be a massive one that showcase sixty-nine features from across the world. Embracing twenty-five main screen premieres and forty-four Discovery Screen titles. These include the popular ‘First Blood’ strand, the latest genre documentaries, 4K restoration retrospectives . Plus, there’s the regular short-film strand, now extended to four showcases – to be announced later. This year there are nineteen world premieres, with fourteen countries represented, spanning four continents.
This years festival opens, with the UK premiere of The Home, directed by The Purge creator James DeMonaco. The suspense-filled terror stars Pete Davidson as Max; a rebellious twentysomething sentenced to community service at a quiet retirement home.
The closing night film is the UK premiere of Kurtis David Harder’s Influencers .All about a young woman obsessed with identity theft and murder who sent on unsettling journey into chaos.
The highlights for FrightFest 2025 include Simon Rumley returns with Crushed, his most raw and unflinching film yet, Joe Begos‘ Jimmy And The Stiggs, a wild and wonderful ride in the Evil Dead and Bad Taste tradition. The festival will premiere the 4K restoration of Neil Marshall’s The Descent, with some of the original cast also in attendance. The long awaited re-make of the cult Troma The Toxic Avenger will make it’s London premiere. Also making it’s London Premiere will be the McManus Brothers’ genre-bending sci-fi horror Redux Redux. All about a grieving mother searching for a reality where her murdered daughter is still alive.
There are also World premieres for Chris Marrs Piliero’s Appofeniacs, which horrifyingly portrays how easily deepfake technology can be weaponised, Jeffrey Primm’s slick and smart whodunnit horror 213 Bones, Vatanyu Ingkaviat’s eerily explosive Tomb Watcher and The Red Mask a twisted love letter to the stalk and slash genre. Oscar nominee Jackie Earle Haley returns to the horror genre, dressed-to-kill chiller The Mannequin. From director Tim Cruz, Pig Hill, a punk rock fever dream of a shocker, adapted from the Nancy Williams novel. Cronenberg-esque corporate satire Kombucha.
Then there are the Brit upstarts whose films comprise the ‘First Blood’ strand. This year there are four World premiere entries: He Kills At Night, Tom Pickering’s rollercoaster of a horror thriller, Luke Tedder‘s character-driven mystery thriller The Caretaker. Healing Andy , Villablanca’s horror comedy found footage film entirely shot on an iPhone, and Natasha Tosini and Stephen Staley’s The Haunting At Jack The Ripper’s House, a harrowing ghost-story as YouTubers are trapped in the renowned serial killer’s home. Viljar Bøe (Good Boy) returns with Above The Knee, with an equally provocative story about a man suffering from Body Integrity Identity Disorder (BIID). We mustn’t Korean animation Gill, from director Jae-huun Ahn.
Iconic personalities are the subject of this year’s documentaries. The Degenerate: The Life & Films Of Andy Milligan, a pioneer of avant-garde theatre a trailblazer of early Queer cinema, and one of the most divisive talents in exploitation/horror history. Captured Souls: In Conversation With Graham Humphreys, explores the life and legacy of the UK’s most iconic horror illustrator.
Co-director Alan Jones commented: “FrightFest in its 26th year remains the UK’s Number One destination for genre fans. The 2025 event will be epic in every sense, celebrating the inventive, transgressive and diverse. So, join us for an event that has consistently remained in the Top Ten of The World’s Best Fantasy Festivals list”.
For the full line-up for 2025 FrightFest, head over to the festivals official website. The full festival pass will go on sale from Saturday 12th July with day passes and single tickets on sale 19th July.
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