It’s that time of year, summer is upon us and the August Bank holiday creeps up, which for most means a nice relaxing weekend to venture out and enjoy the sunshine or go on a short holiday but not for horror fans. For horror fans the August bank holiday (the 21st to the 25th to be precise) marks five days of gore, laughter, alcohol and the latest of the best the genre has to offer.

Here, Sarah Cook writes about the good, the bad and the ugly from this years festival from the icons of horror in Robert Englund to the rising stars. From home brewed talent to worldwide premieres, it all happened for another succesful Frightfest which saw thousands of the undead rise upon the VUE in Leicester Square, London to shiver, scream, laugh and cry at the films that will be showing over the coming months.

As the excitement approached there were also nerves among the festival’s faithful audience as there had been a lot of hassle and reorganisation in the run up to the weekend. Unfortunately due to a host of problems the fantastic four behind the event: Ian, Allan, Paul and Gregg had to move it from the beloved Empire cinema in the heart of Leicester Square, to the Vue cinema just a few doors down.

This was bound to cause ripples and unrest but the team worked extremely hard and bought us three main screens that would run a few minutes apart as well as two discovery screens across the whole weekend. In total that meant they were showing a grand figure of 63 feature films as well as two short film showcases. With so much diversity and choice, we were sure to be in for a cracking few days and despite people’s apprehensions the festival ran more than smoothly with praise all round; both the guests and the films this year were incredible.

It was of course impossible for anyone to see everything so please forgive me for missing out some of the films but after viewing some 25 films and one of the short film instalments hopefully I can bring you an overall sense of what an exhilarating and enticing weekend of horror I endured. So, without further ado, let’s get on with my run down of this year’s Frightfest!