New frights at the first vir­tu­al Salem Hor­ror Festival

Hor­ror is a genre which is con­tin­u­al­ly rein­vent­ing itself. From the alien invaders of the 1950s to the slash­ers of the 1970s and super­nat­ur­al hor­rors of the ear­ly 2000s, each time the mon­sters of one decade become over-famil­iar and clichéd, new ones are born to shock audi­ences. While the glob­al film indus­try has seen unprece­dent­ed dis­rup­tion this year due to COVID-19, no genre has adapt­ed to these cir­cum­stances bet­ter than horror.

Estab­lished direc­tors have released low-bud­get shorts about noc­tur­nal intrud­ers and being home alone – Rob Savage’s found footage hor­ror, Host, shot entire­ly on Zoom, became an overnight hit on the stream­ing plat­form Shud­der. Yet nec­es­sary cre­ativ­i­ty under lock­down is not lim­it­ed to the cin­e­ma screen. Amid a sum­mer film sea­son devoid of packed block­busters, savvy fes­ti­val organ­is­ers are ensur­ing that chill­ing treats can still be deliv­ered to hor­ror fans.

Salem Hor­ror Fes­ti­val is a case in point. Host­ed every Octo­ber in the his­toric Amer­i­can city known for its infa­mous witch tri­als, this year’s fes­ti­val offered a unique vir­tu­al expe­ri­ence, show­cas­ing top-tier inde­pen­dent tal­ent along­side pan­els and direc­tor Q&As which reflect­ed on new direc­tions in con­tem­po­rary horror.

Events were avail­able through three access pass lev­els. As one of the few vir­tu­al fes­ti­vals with­out a nation­al geo-lock, all films were avail­able for inter­na­tion­al audi­ences. Along­side new releas­es, Salem’s audi­ences rel­ished the dev­il­ish cock­tail of clas­sic mon­ster films, includ­ing The Howl­ing, and nos­tal­gic pod­casts revis­it­ing icon­ic ​’80s hor­ror (The Pur­ple Stuff Pod­cast on Gremlins).

Mean­while, Salem’s main slate showed what can be achieved with lim­it­ed resources. Those who pre­fer slow-burn psy­cho­log­i­cal ter­ror will rel­ish Bleed With Me, which offers a nov­el take on the vam­pire movie. Anoth­er high­light was Thresh­old, a pan­dem­ic-era film shot on two iPhones which fol­lows two estranged sib­lings on a road trip across the US, offer­ing view­ers a win­dow into con­tem­po­rary per­cep­tions of men­tal illness.

This year’s event also high­light­ed how con­tem­po­rary hor­ror isn’t afraid to delve deep into psy­cho­log­i­cal fear. Fed­eri­co Gianotti’s Leni was anoth­er stand-out, weav­ing the real­i­ties of domes­tic abuse into a fright­en­ing sto­ry of sup­pressed trau­ma. Among oth­er inde­pen­dent hor­rors, Josh Atkinson’s Dis­placed, filled with allu­sions to Rosemary’s Baby, fol­lows an African-Amer­i­can man who upon mov­ing into a white, gen­tri­fied neigh­bour­hood dis­cov­ers the res­i­dents to be emis­saries of the devil.

In the best of hor­ror tra­di­tions, Salem Hor­ror Fes­ti­val spot­lights low-bud­get works as well as first-time direc­tors. The result is an aston­ish­ing diver­si­ty of films which skew­er the para­noia and injus­tice of mod­ern Amer­i­ca, show­ing that inde­pen­dent film­mak­ers are tak­ing hor­ror aes­thet­ics in new direc­tions, rather than mere­ly pay­ing homage to genre touch­stones of old.