2023 Award Winners
BEST FEATURE
FACELESS AFTER DARK
DIRECTOR: Raymond Wood
BEST SHORT
THE LOOMING
DIRECTOR: Masha Ko
SCI-FI FEATURE
MY MOTHER’S EYES
DIRECTOR: Takeshi Kushida
SCI-FI SHORT
LOST IN THE SKY
DIRECTOR: Simon Öster
HORROR COMEDY FEATURE
EVIL SUBLET
DIRECTOR: Allan Piper
HORROR COMEDY SHORT
GNOMES!
DIRECTOR: Ruwan Suresh Heggelman
BEST DIRECTOR
MICHELLE IANNANTUONO
MOVIE: Livescreamers
BEST ACTRESS
JENNA KANELL
MOVIE: Faceless After Dark
BEST ACTOR
SCOTT CALLENBERGER
MOVIE: An Angry Boy
BEST SPECIAL EFFECTS
HOW TO KILL MONSTERS
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
MY MOTHER’S EYES
BEST SCREENPLAY
AN ANGRY BOY
AUDIENCE CHOICE
MYSTERIES OF THE DESERT
BEST UNPRODUCED FEATURE
“FINAL TABLE” by Robert Aiello & Joshua Saland
BEST UNPRODUCED SHORT
“THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL” by Shane Thompson
2023 Lifetime Achievement Award
Doug Bradley is known to audiences around the world for his performance as the iconic Lead Cenobite—universally known as Pinhead—in Clive Barker’s Hellraiser (1987) and seven sequels (1989-2002).
Born in Liverpool, England, in 1954, Doug has described as “the moment that changed my life” the day in 1969 when he reported for rehearsals for the school play at Quarry Bank High School and met his fellow cast members, which included Barker. The pair worked together, creating independent theater from musicals to mime through the 1970s in Liverpool and London, culminating in The Dog Company, performing original plays by Barker, with Doug appearing, among many others, as The Devil (The History of The Devil) and Dr. Frankenstein (Frankenstein in Love). The company disbanded in 1982, and Bradley went on to work in provincial repertory theater in England.
Doug recalls a comment to him by Clive in 1985: “I’m trying to put together an independent, low-budget British horror film, and I think there might be a part in there for you.” A year later, at Cricklewood Production Village in London, the cameras rolled on Hellraiser.
Among Doug’s more than 70 further credits are Nightbreed (1990), Prophecy: Uprising (2005), Pumpkinhead: Ashes to Ashes (2006), Book of Blood (2009), Wrong Turn 5: Bloodlines (2012), Thorns and The Exorcists (both 2023). As a voice actor, he has been heard in video games as the Sith Emperor in Star Wars: The Old Republic—Shadow of Revan (2014) and Legacy of the Sith (2022) and as Pinhead in Dead by Daylight (2022).
He has also been heard as Nyarlathotep in the Howard Lovecraft trilogy (2016-18) as well as in JJ Villard’s Fairy Tales (2020), Defense of the Ancients: Dragon’s Blood (2021-22) and Invincible (2023). On TV, he was seen earlier this year as Joe Chill in an episode of the Batman spin-off Gotham Knights.
Doug has recorded a number of audiobooks, including Mister B. Gone and Tonight, Again by Clive Barker; The Venus Complex by fellow Cenobite Barbie Wilde; and Morningstar by Peter Atkins. He also recorded Doug Bradley’s Spinechillers, a cycle of over 70 classic horror stories and poems hailed by Audible as “the world’s biggest and best classic horror collection” and by Guillermo del Toro as “remarkable.” He has been publishing further genre readings on his You Tube Channel.
In the 2000s, he performed his one-man show An Evening with Death, and is also the author of Behind the Mask of the Horror Actor (originally Sacred Monsters) published by Titan Books in 1996. Still in print and still selling!
Originally married to Lynne, with whom he had two children (his daughter made him a grandfather for the first time this year), Doug has been a resident of the United States for 10 years and now makes his home just outside Pittsburgh with his wife Steph, two step-children, a dog, a cat, a turtle and a fish named Barry.
It’s the perfect horror festival and it’s got the perfect NYC attitude (loud, abrasive and unapologetic). And that fits perfectly. They are well organized, welcoming and professional. They treat you like family and show you a good time, but above all, every film and filmmaker is treated with respect. Then when you mix it with that NYC attitude, it equals a fun time with great people that care about horror, the festival and you.
Ryan A.