FILM AND EVENT PROGRAMMING/CURATION
In 1999, I mounted the first CineMuerte Film Festival in Vancouver, an independent horror film festival that ran until 2005, first at microcinema The Blinding Light!! and moving to the Pacific Cinematheque after its first year. Special guests of the festival included Jean Rollin, Jorg Buttgereit, Udo Kier, Buddy Giovinazzo, John Saxon, Richard Blackburn, Jack Taylor, Jeff Lieberman, Jim Van Bebber, Edwin Neal and more.
I was Head Programmer for the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema from 2003-2007, an original programmer for Fantastic Fest (2005-2007, returning to oversee short film programming 2012-2014), and a co-founder of its MONDO collectible merchandising branch.
In 2003, I founded the Saturday Morning All-You-Can-Eat-Cereal Cartoon Party, a program of vintage cartoons, commercials, PSAs and Station IDs intended to replicate the Saturday morning experience in a theatrical environment, as well as the Bloodshots 48-Hour Filmmaking Challenge, an annual independent filmmaking contest in Vancouver that ran until 2012.
In 2010, I founded The Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies, an international organization that offers undergraduate-level history, theory and production-based masterclasses, and now has branches in London, New York and Los Angeles.
I co-founded Montreal microcinema Blue Sunshine in Montreal with fellow programmer David Bertrand in 2010. The microcinema ran from 2010-2012 and is documented as a case study in scholar Donna Deville’s 2014 thesis “The Microcinema and Montreal” as well as Incite Journal of Experimental Media 4: The Exhibition Issue.
I have also been creative director of many other film festivals and projects including Gimme Some Truth (Winnipeg), Film Pop (Montreal) and Monster Fest (Melbourne) as well as initiating a number of site-specific screenings and events.
Details on these initiatives and more can be found in the posts below.
