The weekend, the Midsummer Scream Halloween and Horror Convention returned to the Long Beach convention center for the first time after a two-year pause. Along with came the 2022 edition of the Midsummer Scream’s Screaming Room Film Festival Presented by HorrorBuzz.
More than 250 films were submitted from countries around the globe, including the United States, Canada, Mexico, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, Spain, Iran, Australia, and many more. Every second of each submitted film was watched by the nine member of programming team, as the careful curated twelve themed blocks featuring a total of sixty selected films.
The weekend was amazing. All the blocks were very well received and attended with great interest shown by many of the convention’s attendees. Several who were returning fans and many who were discovering the Screaming Room for the first time.
We were very excited that so many of this year’s filmmakers were in attendance. More than have ever attended before. It was a great pleasure to meet them all and discuss their films with them. Included, among the filmmakers, were one who traveled to join us from South Korea and another arrived from Italy.
In addition to the usual festival content of submitted short films, we were also thrilled to be joined by our friends from Cinematic Void as they hosted a premiere screening of the Out There Halloween Mega Tape (aka The WNUF Halloween Special Sequel) on Friday night. Saturday Night saw the Screaming transform into a nightclub for the Screaming Room After Dark featuring some incredible music sets from DJ Anthony Call.
As always, the weekend was capped by our spectacular award ceremony hosted by the incomparable performance artist, Mr. He and comedian Remy Cashman. We were thrilled to have so many of the winning filmmakers on hand to accept their awards.
2022 Midsummer Scream Screaming Room Award Winners
Audience Awards – Films voted to be the best by the audiences that attended each block
Supernatural Scares – Visitant – Directors Brian Arsic, Tyler Jolley
Art House Horror – The Reunion – Director Kyungmin Cho
Drawn to Horror – In the Woods – Director Ilgın Saçan
Creatures of the Night – (TIE) Dryland – Director S. H. Stewart/ The Thing That Ate the Birds – Directors Sophie Mair, Dan Gitsham
WTF??? – Rewind on Tape No. 44 – Director Kyle Tague
Anthology of Terror – #NOFILTER – Director Nathan Crooker
Splattertown – Spanky’s Last Day – Director Anthony Fins
The Occult – The Hellish Family – Directors Toni O. Prats, Callahan Ruiz
Waking Nightmares – One Minute – Director Miguel Alcalde
Die Laughing – The Mill Creek Strangler – Director Aaron Egbert Allsop
Screaming Rainbow – (TIE) 1-888-5-BLUE-YOU – Directors Jake Mcclellan, Eric Griffin/ The Chapel in the Closet – Director Brian Reddy
Happy Halloween – Escalation – Director Christian Bachini
Jury Awards
– 20 of the programming team’s favorite films were sent to our six-member jury of industry professionals to be considered for each of our 3 annual jury Awards.
Palme d’Gore (Awarded to the film selected to be the best of the festival) – Eucaristia – Directors María Teresa García, Javier Salcedo
Jack-O-Lantern (Awarded to the film that exemplifies the spirit of Halloween) – Midnight Screams – Director Sean Menendez
Mary Shelley (Awarded the film that best showcases creativity/ingenuity in filmmaking) – One Minute – Director Miguel Alcalde
Congratulations to all this year’s winners and participants for making this year’s event another outstanding success.
If you are a filmmaker that would like to submit your, 20min or less, short film for next year’s event, visit our page at filmfreeway.com/MidsummerScreamHalloweenFestival. Submissions for 2023 will be accepted beginning October 31st, 2022.
