News

Polish filmmaker Bartosz M. Kowalski, known for his works ‘Hellhole’ and ‘Nobody Sleeps in the Woods Tonight’, is gearing up to thrill audiences with his latest horror fantasy film, ‘Night Silence’.

The recently released teaser of the film takes viewers into the eerie confines of a nursing home where monsters begin to prowl, reminiscent of the haunting atmosphere in Guillermo del Toro’s ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’.

The plot revolves around Lucjan, a retired actor portrayed by the late Maciej Damiecki. Lucjan finds himself temporarily placed in a countryside nursing home by his son while his house undergoes renovations.

Initially hesitant, Lucjan’s apprehensions are soon put to rest by the warm reception from the home’s staff and residents.

However, peace is short-lived as a series of murders and terrifying nightmares plunge the nursing home into chaos, forcing Lucjan to confront a grotesque threat.

The film not only promises to deliver...

Up next from Hellhole and Nobody Sleeps in the Woods Tonight filmmaker Bartosz M. Kowalski is a new dark horror fantasy that sees a nursing home invaded by eerie monsters: Night Silence. The official Night Silence teaser gives glimpses of the creatures in a story and tone akin to Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth.

Kowalski co-wrote the screenplay with Pawel Maslona and Mirella Zaradkiewicz.

In Night Silence, “Lucjan, a retired actor, is placed in a nursing home in the middle of the countryside by his son. Nothing definitive, just for a few months while the house is being renovated. Reluctant at first, he is won over by the hospitality of the staff and residents. Soon, however, a wave of murders terrorizes the place. Tormented by terrifying nightmares, Lucjan must face a grotesque threat if he wants to get out of there alive.”

Maciej Damiecki, Zdzislaw Wardejn, and Wlodzimierz Press star.

Latido Films, a Spanish sales firm, is making waves in the worldwide film business by landing large distribution deals for a wide range of films. From dark comedies and thrillers to horror films, the studio is expertly navigating an industry still splintered in the aftermath of the pandemic.

Latido recently announced sales for five independent films, showing its ability to connect with viewers in diverse countries. Among these works is Carlos Marques-Marcet’s award-winning dark comedy musical They Will Be Dust. The film, which won the prestigious Platform Award at the Toronto Film Festival, chronicles the emotional journey of a terminally sick woman as she makes an end-of-life decision and the impact it has on her family. It has already been sold in Bulgaria, Taiwan, and Japan, and critics have praised its moving and relatable storytelling.

Another standout is A Whale, a supernatural thriller about Ingrid, a talented assassin with...

Leading Spanish sales agent Latido Films has closed a wide range of deals on several of the big indie titles in its catalog, including Carlos Marques-Marcet’s Spanish dark comedy musical “They Will Be Dust,” Pablo Hernando’s Sitges player “A Whale” and Bartosz M. Kowalski’s terrifying Polish thriller “Night Silence.”

Having recently won the Toronto Film Festival’s prestigious Platform Award, Marques-Marcet’s “They Will Be Dust” has sold in Bulgaria, Taiwan (Sky Digi) and Japan (M-Pictures).

In the film, Claudia is diagnosed with an incurable illness and decides to end her life on her own terms at a clinic in Switzerland. Her husband of more than 40 years cannot imagine life without her and it’s up to their adult daughter to mediate the situation. Despite the film’s heavy synopsis, “The only sadness that comes from ‘The End’ here is that the film itself has concluded,” reads its Variety review.

Poland’s Warsaw Film Festival is celebrating its 40th edition, placing its bets on emerging, often debuting Polish filmmakers.

“This event often acts like a springboard,” says programming director Gustaw Kolanowski. But making a feature debut in Poland is still challenging.

“For me, this road wasn’t easy. It was difficult to meet a producer who would believe in a film that’s quiet and intimate, but also impactful,” says Monika Majorek, behind “Where Do We Begin,” where three siblings and their mother rebuild their lives after the death of their father.

“I’ve made certain career choices to be able to tell this story and waited a long time for this opportunity. I was advised to look for some loud, controversial subject, but this film comes out of real emotions. Maybe there’s a lack of quiet voices [in Polish cinema]? Those that listen instead of speaking?”

Dominika Montean-Pańków, director of “The Crossroads,...

In horror “Night Silence,” Polish director Bartosz M. Kowalski follows retired Lucjan (Maciej Damięcki), moved into a nursing home by his son. The residence is hiding a secret, but the film took on another “terrifying dimension” after they wrapped the shoot.

“Maciej played a dying actor and unfortunately, this story turned out to be true,” Kowalski tells Variety. Damięcki passed away last November, before the premiere. He was posthumously awarded for his performance at the Polish Film Festival.

“It was emotional for all of us,” admits the director.

“I quickly understood he had to play the main character. It was love at first sight. On set, I worried the subject we were tackling might be difficult for him and for most of our actors, who were over 80. But Maciej always joked a lot, sang and even danced between takes. He didn’t get to see it, which is very painful for me.

Baby-thwapers. Bukkake. Bratislava. Those aren't the three B's that The Office made famous; those are the three B's of Sander Maran's Estonian musical horror comedy Chainsaws Were Singing. The movie plays like a Mad Libs slasher satire of slasher by way of parody musicals, caught somewhere between Trey Parker and Matt Stone's Cannibal: The Musical and Troma's Poultrygeist (or any of the studio's earlier super-gory song-and-dance flicks). It's unapologetically low-budget, confidently goopy, and a ceremoniously silly take on "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre meets Dead & Breakfast." I'd say it can potentially be the next Hundreds of Beavers — an absurd smash-hit indie from out of nowhere — but some pacing issues prevent the film from achieving bulletproof greatness.

Everything starts like your standard Nicholas Sparks romance: just-broken-up-with Tom (Karl Ilves) falls in love at first sight with Maria (Laura Niils) before he throws himself off a bridge. The two...

The Netflix recommendation algorithm is a boundless and ineffable mystery. On any given day, it will reach randomly into the Netflix catalog and haul out a film many had kind of forgotten existed or perhaps never knew about, and get scads of subscribers to watch it. One might recall the time in April of 2023 when the not-particularly-beloved 2011 prequel-cum-remake of "The Thing" topped Netflix's popularity charts. More people saw it that month than perhaps watched it in theaters.

The latest popular surprise from Netflix comes in the form of Bartosz M. Kowalski's "Hellhole," a Polish horror movie that was released on the streaming service in October of 2022, but is only now coming to prominence. Don't feel bad if you hadn't heard of "Hellhole" prior to this; few have. It's only by the caprices of Netflix that it now arrives in the public eye.

"Hellhole" is an exorcism thriller set in...

Nine films and nine series among streamer’s latest Polish commissions.

Netflix has unveiled a slate of 18 titles that it has greenlit in Poland, spanning nine films and nine series.

See full list of titles below

News of the commissions comes just weeks after the streamer announced it is opening an office in the country’s capital of Warsaw later this year, which will function as a central hub for Netflix’s Central and Eastern Europe (Cee) productions.

Netflix has previously enjoyed success with Polish erotic thriller 365 Days, which was a top 10 hit for the streamer in over 90 countries.

Netflix has revealed a slate of nine films and nine series that it has commissioned in Poland. Scroll down for the full list.

The series include Detective Forst, from noted Polish writer Remigiusz Mroz, which revolves around a crime-solving journey across the Polish Tatra Mountains. Jakub Żulczyk’s novel Feedback is also being adapted for a series starring Arkadiusz Jakubik, which will be helmed by Leszek Dawid.

On the film side, Anna Szczypczyńska’s romance novel Tonight You Are Sleeping With Me will be adapted for a feature helmed by Robert Wichrowski, while the famed Polish novel Mr. Car & The Knights Templar is also getting the film treatment, with Rafał Skalski directing and Matylda damięcka, Lena Góra, and Aleksandra Domańska starring.

On the genre side, the film Hellhole, directed by Bartosz M. Kowalski, promises to be a play on horror, focusing on the nightmare of a monk who has lost...

Stars: Julia Wieniawa-Narkiewicz, Michal Lupa, Wiktoria Gasiewska, Stanislaw Cywka, Sebastian Dela, Gabriela Muskala, Michal Zbroja, Miroslaw Zbrojewicz, Piotr Cyrwus | Written by Bartosz M. Kowalski, Jan Kwiecinski, Mirella Zaradkiewicz | Directed by Bartosz M. Kowalski

Ever since Friday the 13th helped solidify the concept of the summer camp being a place to just massacre teenagers, we’ve never been short on the supply of new killers and people for them to kill. Nobody Sleeps in the Woods Tonight aka W lesie dzis nie zasnie nikt, is a new Polish addition to the list, but does it offer anything new?

When a group of technology-dependant teenagers are sent to offline camp they are forced to hand over all their phones and tablets to the councillors. Sent off on a hiking trip for a few days, they find themselves not only fending off nature, but a set of monstrous twins whose only aim seems...

India, Poland and some territories in the Middle East are the latest areas where movie theaters are rapidly being shuttered as the World Health Organization on Wednesday declared a global coronavirus pandemic.

In India, individual states have begun closing moviegoing venues. On Tuesday, Pinarayi Vijayan, chief minister of the Southern Indian state of Kerala, which has a population of more than 35 million, called for cinemas to shut down, with the Kerala Film Producers’ Association immediately following suit.

Meanwhile, the release of big-budget multi-lingual epic “Marakkar: Lion of the Arabian Sea,” starring South Indian superstar Mohanlal, has been postponed. Some 20 movies are being shot in Kerala at the moment. These shoots are likely to be impacted as the number of confirmed cases in the state has risen to 17.

All movie theaters in the Northern Indian region of Jammu and Kashmir are also closed until March 31, it was announced on Wednesday by local officials.

Though Jan Komasa’s “Corpus Christi” was a dark horse in the best international feature film category at this year’s Academy Awards, it should have come as no surprise to see a Polish director walking the red carpet outside the Dolby Theatre on Feb. 9. “Corpus Christi” was the country’s third Oscar nomination in the past six years for what was formerly known as the foreign-language film, joining Paweł Pawlikowski’s 2019 nominee “Cold War” and Pawlikowski’s 2015 winner “Ida.”

If these are heady times for the Polish film industry, however, the international kudos only tell part of the story. Poland continued its torrid stretch at the box office in 2019, as Europe’s sixth-largest theatrical market broke records for the sixth year running, with total box office and admissions hitting all-time highs.

More tellingly, Polish films held their own against Hollywood mega-franchises, with four local productions appearing with the likes...

Keep up with the always-hopping film festival world with our weekly Film Festival Roundup column. Check out last week’s Roundup right here.

Lineup Announcements

– The Museum of the Moving Image (MoMI) and The India Center Foundation are launching India Kaleidoscope, an “exciting new festival that will present film lovers with a chance to immerse themselves in the unique sights and sounds that make up the Indian regional, independent film landscape.”

The inaugural India Kaleidoscope Festival, taking place December 8 – 11 at the Museum, will feature eight films, including seven new titles that will be making their U.S. or North American premieres and one special presentation of a classic Indian film. Most films will feature directors in person. The Opening Night film is “India in a Day,” an ambitious documentary project initiated by Google and comprised of images shot by thousands of people throughout India, artfully edited by director Richie Mehta...

Monster Fest, one of Australia's best genre fests, wrapped up this past weekend and with it some awards love to some of the many great films to grace our genre-loving screens this year. Raw, Julia Ducournau's debut feature and a big hit on the festival circuit, won both the top Golden Monster Award, and the award for Best FX. Australian film Safe Neigbourhood, also won two awards, for Best Australian film and Best Male Performance for Levi Miller; and A Dark Song won double, for Best Cinematography and Best Score. Other notable winners in the feature films catageory include The Autopsy of Jane Doe for Best International Feature; Prevenge won the Monster Innovation Award and Bartosz M. Kowalski won Best Director for his film Playground....

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

Australia’s premier genre festival – Monster Fest – has unveiled its final wave of films for the 2016 festival, which is set to take place November 24-27 at the Lido Cinemas in Melbourne.

The team of features programmers – which includes festival director Kier-La Janisse, Monster Pictures co-founder Neil Foley, Boston Underground Film Festival Director of Programming Nicole McControversy and writer/programmer/punk legend Chris D. – vetted over 600 features in selecting the 2016 Monster Fest lineup, which includes new crime films Dog Eat Dog and The Hollow Point from Paul Schrader and Gonzalo López-Gallego respectively, gory slasher throwback The Windmill Massacre (reviewed here), the hometown premiere of epic period western The Legend of Ben Hall with cast in person and acclaimed Tiff selections Prevenge and Interchange alongside Fantastic Fest faves such as the Aussie-made yuletide thriller Safe Neighbourhood and the devastating – and polarizing – Playground.

From the press release:

Select panels for the Swinburne University...

Edited by Hans-Åke Lilja, Shining in the Dark: Celebrating Twenty Years of Lilja's Library is exclusive to Cemetery Dance Publications and will feature a Stephen King story that hasn't been released since 1981. We also have updated release details for The Similars, the final wave of films announced at Monster Fest 2016, six photos / details for The Orphanage video game, and a new trailer for Gremlin.

Cemetery Dance Publications' Shining in the Dark Anthology: From Cemetery Dance: "Shining In the Dark: Celebrating Twenty Years of Lilja's Library edited by Hans-Åke Lilja.

About the Book:

Hans-Ake Lilja, the founder of Lilja's Library, has compiled a brand new anthology of horror stories to help celebrate twenty years of running the #1 Stephen King news website on the web!

This anthology includes both original stories like the brand new novella by John Ajvide Lindqvist (Let the Right One In) very rare reprints like "The Blue Air...

Locarno premiere took home eight awards; meanwhile Ukraine greenlights cash rebate scheme.

Jan P. Matuszynski’s feature debut The Last Family swept the board at this year’s Gdynia Film Festival in Poland (19-24 September) with eight awards, including the Golden Lions Grand Prix as well as the awards for Best Actor and Actress and the Audience Award.

The tragicomic story also picked up the Journalists Award, the Onetu Award for the three lead actors Aleksandra Konieczna, Andrzej Seweryn and Dawid Ogrodnik, as well as the Elle Crystal Star and the Golden Kangaroo for director Matuszynski.

Handled internationally by New Europe Film Sales and distributed theatrically in Poland by Kino Swiat, The Last Family had its world premiere in competition at last month’s Locarno Film Festival where the Leopard for Best Actor was awarded to star Andrzej Seweryn for his performance.

Tomasz Wasilewski’s Berlinale competition title United States Of Love - also with New Film...

If you live near Austin and you feel the earth shifting beneath your feet, then you might want to throw on your sneakers and start running now, because the King of the Monsters is heading to Texas this week for the North American premiere of Shin Godzilla at Fantastic Fest 2016:

Press Release: Austin, TX - September 21, 2016 - Alamo Drafthouse's Fantastic Fest is excited to unveil last minute additions to the schedule, adding to one of the most highly diverse lineups in the festival's twelve-year history. And see who will go toe to toe in the fest's highly anticipated yearly event, the Fantastic Debates!

Godzilla returns to the big screen in 2016 with Shin Godzilla, the 32nd film in the legendary franchise and currently the 3rd highest grossing film in Japan this year. The King of the Monsters stomps into Fantastic Fest for its North American Premiere before smashing its way through the U.

The festival has revealed its line-up of Polish films and co-productions.

True Crimes, Alexandros Avranas’ crime thriller starring Jim Carrey and Charlotte Gainsbourg, will have its world premiere as a special screening at the upcoming Warsaw Film Festival (Oct 7-16).

The Us-Pol-uk co-production marks the English language debut of Greek director Avranas, whose previous feature Miss Violence won a Silver lion for best director at Venice Film Festival in 2013.

Based on a 2008 article in The New Yorker, the story follows a murder case that is reopened after a newly-published novel sheds light on the previously unsolved crime.

The 32nd edition of the Warsaw Film Festival has revealed the line-up of Polish films that will screen across its various strands.

True Crimes plays as a special screening. Also having its world premiere in that category is the Mex-Pol anthology film Tales Of Mexico (El Habitation), which features eight different stories from various directors, all of which...

Lee Sang-il, Bartosz M. Kowalski and Emiliano Torres also help complete competitive line-up.Scroll down for full list of titles

San Sebastian film festival (Sept 16-24) has added five titles to its competitive official selection, completing the line-up of films in line for the coveted Golden Shell.

The titles include The Oath (Eiðurinn) by Icelandic filmmaker Baltasar Kormákur, who competed at San Sebastian with The Sea in 2001.

In his latest feature, the director - who made last year’s Venice opener Everest - tells the story of a heart surgeon whose family begins to unravel when his daughter gets mixed up with a drug-dealing boyfriend.

Also in the running for the Golden Shell will be China’s Feng Xiaogang with contemporary fable I Am Not Madame Bovary (Wo Bu Shi Pan Jinlian), starring Fan Bingbing.

Feng’s The Banquet competed at Venice in 2006 while Aftershock was China’s submission for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar in 2011.

Other...

Selection includes the debut feature from the editor/Dop of The Tribe.

The ten titles selected for the 11th CentEast Market works-in-progress presentations.

Nine feature fiction films and one documentary are among selected projects that will be presented in Warsaw (Oct 16) before travelling to CentEast Moscow (Oct 19) and then the Beijing Film Market (April 2016), in the framework of China-Eastern Europe Film Promotion Project/CentEast in Beijing

Highlights include the untitled first feature of Valentyn Vasyanovych, the Ukrainian editor and director of photography on multi-award winner The Tribe.

Kazakh director Adilkhan Yerzhanov (The Owners) will present his latest project, The Plague at the Karatas Village, alongside producer Olga Khlasheva.

Romanian producer Dan Burlac (4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days) will present the second feature of Gabriel Achim (Adalbert’s Dream), dark comedy The Last Day.

The second feature directed by Slovak producer Michal Kollar of Fog’n’ Desire Films, The Red Captain is an adaptation of a bestselling Slovak novel, featuring...