Movieside Horror Fest 2006
by Gary Schultz
24 Hours of Horror at the 2nd Annual Movieside Music Box Massacre
For several years the Movieside Film Festival has been throwing some of the best Chicago based independent film festivals around. Rusty Nails is the front man for Movieside and a hell of a fun host. His past festivals have had different themes and some great guests including Jack Hill, George Romero and Lloyd Kaufman. Those were some damn good film fests; however this year’s festival the “2nd Annual Music Box Massacre” hosted by the Music Box Theatre was GREAT. Once again this year the Music Box Massacre featured twenty-four solid hours of horror movies, trailers and Q & A’s. On the slate were movies ranging from “Bride of Frankenstein”, to “The Thing”, to “Night of the Creeps”. Most films were screened from prints and there was an assortment of vintage movie trailers playing between the features that were a lot of fun.
The main event of the night was special guest Joe Dante and featured his films “Piranha”, “American Werewolf in London” and his Master’s of Horror Episode “Homecoming”. Dante did a Q & A after and was followed by the second special guest of the night director Jon Hancock who screened his 1971 film “Let’s Scare Jessica to Death” followed by a Q & A with him as well. Audiences were electric for both special guests. The theatre was packed and crowds that stayed long into the night for the 24-hour horror movie marathon that started on Saturday at 12 noon and ended on Sunday at 12 noon.
What’s great about Movieside is that even though the fests have costume contests, vendors selling lots of cool horror merch and all kinds of little extras like live bands and prizes it never loses focus on it’s purpose which is to expose rare cult and horror films with some traditional favorites to an audience that craves them. MBM was a fun night and another success for the Chicago Independent film scene. Rusty Nails continues to solidify himself as part of the backbone of the Chicago Independent film scene. Check out his feature film “Acne” and stay tuned because rumor is he’s been working intensely on a documentary about director George Romero that features some amazing interviews. The bottom line…it’s Halloween time, enjoy some horror movies. Check out the Movieside Film Festival at http://movieside.neweyefilms.com/index.html
Gary Schultz is an independent filmmaker living in Chicago.
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