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Talkhouse

Emily Bennett is an award-winning writer, director and actor. Her most recent film, <a href="https://darkstarpics.com/alone-with-you" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Alone with You</a>, which she stars in and wrote and directed with Justin Brooks, was released in 2022 by Dark Star Pictures. Her screenplay Ache placed as a quarter-finalist in the Academy Nicholl Fellowships in 2020. Bennett’s short film LVRS screened at Sitges and the Brooklyn Horror Film Festival, and won her best Director at the Horrible Imaginings Film Festival. Her short film Bed screened at Fantasia in 2021 and has already secured distribution on Gunpowder &amp; Sky’s horror platform prior to its ongoing festival run. In addition to her ongoing partnership with Justin Brooks and Untapped, Bennett has been hired to direct the upcoming horror film The Vineyard, with Daryl Freimark producing. (Photo by Keith Barraclough.)

Emily Bennett

Film

Imposter Syndrome or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Filmmaking

Elza Kephart writes and directs horror and fantasy films. Her latest feature, the horror film<a href="https://us.rljentertainment.com/franchise/240944/SLAXX" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Slaxx</a>, is out on VOD, Digital HD and DVD on September 7, 2021 through RLJE Films. Born and raised in Tiohtià:ke (Montreal), she holds a BFA from Emerson College (Boston) and the Canadian Film Center’s Director’s Lab. At 24, she wrote and directed her first feature, Graveyard Alive – A Zombie Nurse in Love. It played in over 20 international film festivals including Fantasia, Fantasporto and Sitges, winning the Kodak Cinematography Award at the Slamdance Film Festival. It was distributed on TMN, on DVD by Maple Pictures, and in theaters. Her second feature film, Go in the Wilderness, premiered at the Festival du Nouveau Cinema, played in various international film festivals, and is being distributed on various platforms, including itunes. Slaxx had its world premiere at the Fantasia International Film Festival and its International Premiere at the Sitges International Film Festival in 2020. She is one of the co-founders of the Montreal chapter of Film Fatales, and one of the co-founders of Extinction Rebellion Québec. (Photo by Marlène Gélineau Payette.)

Elza Kephart

How the Cabbage Patch Kids Got Me on the Road to Anti-Capitalist Activism!

Jonathan Cuartas was born and raised in Miami. He graduated film school in 2016 with his thesis film, Kuru, which screened at Palm Springs International Shortfest. His next short, The Horse and the Stag, screened at Indie Memphis, winning Best After Dark Short. Jonathan is a 2019 Sundance Knight Fellow. His feature debut, <a href="https://darkskyfilms.com/film/my-heart-cant-beat-unless-you-tell-it-to/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">My Heart Can’t Beat Unless You Tell It To</a>, starring Patrick Fugit, Owen Campbell and Ingrid Sophie Schram, is out now in select theaters and on VOD through Dark Sky Films. Jonathan won the Citizen Kane Award for Best Directorial Revelation at Sitges 2020, where My Heart Can’t Beat Unless You Tell It To also won Best Feature Film in the Noves Visions category.

Jonathan Cuartas

Blood and Movies

Jill Awbrey makes her feature film writing and acting debut with the horror-thriller <a href="https://www.heldmovie.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Held</a>, out April 9 through Magnet Releasing, in which she plays the lead role of Emma Barrett. Jill has also written, directed, produced, and starred in two short films. As an actress and writer, Jill is drawn to stories about intimate relationships between flawed and complicated characters. Her first film, Abby Undone, was shot in a 150 square-foot studio apartment in New York’s West Village with two actors and a four-person crew. She shot her second short film, All We Have Left, in her hometown in California’s San Joaquin Valley. On a fun note: during a visit to her hometown while walking her dog one evening she met producer Travis Cluff of Tremendum Pictures in the neighborhood. It was a chance encounter, that ultimately led to Held being made.

Jill Awbrey

Fight. Run. Scream: Writing My Way Out of My Silence with Held

Terrie Samundra is a writer-director who grew up between a rural village in India, a small farming town in Missouri, and along the coast of California; informing her work as a multi-cultural artist. Her debut feature, Kaali Khuhi, is a Netflix Original Film that premiered on the platform on October 30, 2020. She is an alumna of the Sundance Institute’s International Screenwriter&#8217;s Lab for her screenplay Betamax, co-written with David Walter Lech, and Kaali Khuhi was invited to the Sundance Women in Film Financing Lab in 2018.

Terrie Samundra

The Girls of Kaali Khuhi

Graham Swon is an American producer and director. He has worked with many independent filmmakers, including Matías Piñeiro, Ted Fendt, Joanna Arnow and Ricky D’Ambrose. In 2016, he was named one of Filmmaker Magazine’s “25 New Faces of Independent Film.” His first film as a writer-director, The World is Full of Secrets, played in BAMCinemaFest in 2019 and was released by Kino Lorber. In 2023 he won the Independent Spirit John Cassavetes Award for his production of The Cathedral, and in 2024 was nominated from the Independent Spirit Producers Award. An Evening Song (for three voices), his second film as writer-director, <a href="https://movingimage.org/event/evening-song/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">screens on Sunday March 17</a> at First Look 2024 at the Museum of the Moving Image. (Photo by Vincent Courtois / Belfort Entrevues Film Festival.)

Graham Swon

Horrors Far Beyond Mere Violence: On Schalcken the Painter

Julia Marchese is a filmmaker, actor, podcaster, cinephile and film programmer living in Hollywood, California. Her first film was the award-winning documentary Out of Print, about the importance of revival cinema and 35 mm exhibition to culture, and she is currently the co-host of the popular horror podcast Horror Movie Survival Guide. She recently crowdfunded on <a href="https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/i-know-what-you-need-a-stephen-king-adaptation" target="_blank" rel="noopener">IndieGoGo</a> for her forthcoming Dollar Baby short film I Know What You Need, based on Stephen King&#8217;s story of the same name from Night Shift. You can find her on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at @juliacmarchese.

Julia Marchese

Some Kids Dream of Being a Superhero – I Dreamt of Being a Loser

Romola Garai’s debut feature film as writer-director, the horror film Amulet, starring Alec Secareanu, Carla Juri and Imelda Staunton, is released by Magnolia Pictures on July 24. Garai is a multi-award-nominated actor whose extensive film, TV and stage resume includes work with some of the world’s finest writers and directors, including Sarah Gavron’s Suffragette, Joe Wright’s Atonement, Francois Ozon’s Angel, Lone Scherfig’s One Day and Stephen Poliakoff’s Glorious 39. She also has an extensive list of TV credits including playing the lead in Marc Munden’s TV mini series The Crimson Petal and the White. On stage, she has played major roles in plays for the Royal Court (The Village Bike), the Young Vic (Measure for Measure), the Almeida (The Writer) and the RSC (Queen ANNE and Lear/The Seagull). As well as her extensive performing credits, Romola is also known for her writing/directing work, including Sundance Best Short Film-nominated Scrubber. She has a feature film in development with UK top production company The Bureau and a number of TV projects.

Romola Garai

My Monster

Benjamin Shearn is a film editor and writer. His last feature, Ladyworld, premiered at BFI London, Fantastic Fest, TIFF: Next Wave and was presented as part of the Frontieres Showcase at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival. Shearn&#8217;s work in narrative and documentary films has also been exhibited at ComicCon San Diego, the Louisiana Museum of Art in Copenhagen, la Gaîté lyrique in Paris, as well as official selections of the CPH:DOX, Melbourne International, Planete+Doc, TIFF After Dark, Court Metrage du Clermont, Chicago and Boston Underground Film Festivals, amongst others. For more of his work, go to <a href="http://benjaminshearn.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://benjaminshearn.com/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1589644928427000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGAhMmnBbieO5wc9yW6NKlNmCLJeA">benjaminshearn.com</a> and/or follow his absurd Instagram account @<a href="https://www.instagram.com/actorsupset/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.instagram.com/actorsupset/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1589644928427000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGdDQxohBJ2mOVPaPV2yyYrXWa22g">actorsupset</a>.

Benjamin Shearn

Video Essay: Modern Horror

Video Essay: On the Importance of Exploding Heads [NSFW]

Carlo Mirabella-Davis’ debut feature film, <a href="http://extranet.ifcfilms.com/Swallow" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Swallow</a>, starring Haley Bennett, Austin Stowell, Elizabeth Marvel, David Rasche and Denis O’Hare, premiered at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival and is in theaters from March 6 through IFC Films. Davis has always been drawn to the mystique of psychological thrillers, subversive horror, and dark comedies. His Flannery O’Connor-esque thriller short, Knife Point, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, won Vimeo’s Short of the Week, screened on Arte-TV, and garnered him “Best New Director” at the Brooklyn International Film Festival. He went on to co-direct and produce the feature documentary The Swell Season starring Oscar-winners Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and earned a New York Times Critic’s Pick when it was released in theaters. Carlo is an alumnus of both of the Sundance Screenwriters Lab and the Sundance Directors Lab. He has spent over a decade teaching filmmaking to middle and high school students. Carlo’s passion for storytelling brought him to the Dungeons and Dragons community, where he has written and run numerous campaigns. He holds a MFA and a BFA in film production from NYU Tisch School of the Arts.

Carlo Mirabella-Davis

The Uplifting Grace of Horror

Richard Stanley is the director and co-writer of H.P. Lovecraft&rsquo;s Color Out of Space starring Nicolas Cage, Joely Richardson and Tommy Chong, currently playing on a screen somewhere near you. Stanley made his directorial debut with the apocalyptic sci-fi horror film, Hardware, and returned to his South African roots with his second feature film in 1992, the supernatural road movie romance Dust Devil, cementing his status as a cult director of genre cinema. The production of Stanley&rsquo;s third feature film, The Island of Dr. Moreau, starring Marlon Brando and Val Kilmer, was fraught with legendary challenges that eventually led to the director&rsquo;s ousting from his own dream project, to be replaced by John Frankenheimer. Stanley&rsquo;s experience on the film led to the award-winning documentary Lost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley&#8217;s Island of Dr. Moreau. For Stanley, bringing Color Out of Space to the screen represents the culmination of more than 20 years of preparation.

horror