Fantastic Romford Horror Festival achieves record high numbers.
When it comes to Film Festivals, Romford has its fair share, but Romford Horror Festival is by far the biggest, growing year on year. This year’s festival was attended by nearly three thousand spectators who dropped in and out of the event that ran from 28th February until 3rd March.
Primarily a festival of films, screening over 80 hours of films in just four days, the event also has a “convention” feel, with over 1500 people turning up on the Saturday to buy from stalls and see the Horror icons of yesteryear Cinzia Monreale from The Beyond, Ian McCulloch from Zombie Flesh Eaters and BBC’s Survivors, Bond and Hammer actress Caroline Munro, Hammer and Carry On Star Pauline Peart and Marianne Morris from 70’s Vampire classic Vampyres. They were also joined by Ross Sambridge who was the physical embodiment of Snoke from the most recent Star Wars Trilogy. Others who attended as part of film screenings included 70s pink icon The Shend and Graham Cole OBE who is best known as PC Tony Stamp from The Bill.
The benefits were also felt throughout the town with eateries, pubs, coffee shops and hotels filled with Horror fanatics most of whom stayed in Romford for the full four days.
For those that attended the festival, local creative Hannah Davis turned the currently empty Choice store into a torture dungeon where she took horror photographs of both attendees and filmmakers alike. There was also a session entitled horror roulette where attendees walked blindly into a screen to be shown short films that were un-curated like the rest of the festival. The bar had movie inspire cocktails as well as selling local beers from The Brentwood Brewery.
Romford Horror Festival Director said: “Since we began the Romford Film Festival in 2017, horror has been a key part so in 2021 it made perfect sense to create a horror Festival, the results of which have grown exponentially each year leading to the mega event we had just last week. It’s a joy for all our wonderful volunteers and myself and co-director Natalie Bays to have created something that has become so loved in such a short period of time.”
Plans are already afoot to build on the success of this years Romford Horror Festival, by bringing more guests, vendors, and films for the 2025 edition. For those that attended and feel a void however Romford Film Festival returns in just two months, with a dedicated horror day and a selection of all genre films over 2 screens and five days. This includes the longest ever cut of Sergio Leone’s Once Upon A Time In America. Tickets are already on sale for the full festival pass over at www.romfordfilmfestival.com and the festival runs from 24th to the 28th May with a dedicated horror day on Saturday 25th May.
Photo credit: Hannah Davies.
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