Every year, the Nightmares Film Festival brings #BetterHorror to the Gateway Film Center in Columbus, Ohio, and the 2019 selection of titles did not disappoint. With no shortage of great horror titles to choose from, many were up for one of the 26 official Night Mare awards, and we have the full list of winners compiled below.
From the press release:
Leading the 26 prizes awarded was the Film From Hell, recognizing the movie that most bravely pushes genre boundaries, given to Scott Philip Goergens’s harrowing psychosexual thriller 29 Needles. “The 2019 Nightmares program was full of extraordinary, surprising and shocking new genre films, and our Night Mare awards recognize the very best of that lineup,” said co-founder and programmer Jason Tostevin.
Other films taking leading prizes included Lisa Ovies’s Canadian horror comedy Puppet Killer, awarded best overall feature, and Andrea’s Corsin feral horror story Ferine, awarded best overall short. In the screenplay competition, Avishai Weinberger’s “Third Date” took best feature script, and Shayna Connelly’s “Love as Practice for Dying” won best short script.
Competition films and screenplays competed for the coveted Night Mare statuette, representing the dark horses of genre. The Night Mare is sculpted and hand painted each year by renowned toy and figure creator Tony Simione (Marvel, Star Wars, Godzilla, Alien). Nightmares Film Festival has been called one of the world’s best horror film festivals by every major genre outlet. It has maintained its position as the world’s top-rated genre festival on the submission platform FilmFreeway for 36 consecutive months.
Related: Check Out All of Our NFF 2019 Coverage Here
NFF 2019 AWARDS
The Film from Hell: 29 Needles
FEATURES
Best Overall Feature: Puppet Killer
Best Horror Feature: Z
Best Thriller Feature: Reckoning
Best Midnight Feature: The Obsessed
Best Director Feature: Beyond Horror – Jessie Seitz and Marcus Koch
Best Horror Comedy Feature: Scare Package
Best Cinematography Feature: To Your Last Death
Best Writing in a Feature: A Nun’s Curse
Best Actor Feature: Tim Loden – Making Monsters
Best Actress Feature: Nicole Brydon Bloom – 1BR
SHORTS
Best Overall Short: Fernie
Best Horror Short: Tick
Best Thriller Short: Gaslight
Best Midnight Short: VR Food
Best Recurring Nightmare: Let Me Play
Best Director Short: Imagine a World – Joanna Tsanis
Best Cinematography Short: Daughter of Dismay
Best Writing in a Short: Boo
Best Actor Short: Baker Chase Powell – We Die Alone
Best Actress Short: Synead Nichold – Sasquatch
Best Horror Comedy Short: Inflatio
SCREENPLAYS
Short Screenplay: Love as Practice for Dying
First Runner-Up: Gender Reveal Party
Second Runner-Up: Mary, Dispossessed
Best Feature Screenplay: Third Date
First Runner-Up: He Brings the Night
Second Runner-Up: No Overnight Parking
ADDITIONAL AWARDS
Best Ohio Film: Look Twice
First Runner-Up: Madness
Submissions for Nightmares Film Festival 2020 will open in November.
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