Audience give-aways include R5000 worth of tattoo vouchers from The Tattooer, bottles of Sailor Jerry rum, and specials at the bar, as well as horror DVDs from Ster Kinekor.
The annual X Fest Film Festival was created six years ago from parent event the South African HorrorFest, as a way to fill a long-standing cinematic cultural gap. By scouring the globe and receiving submissions of interesting, rare, classic and new movies, documentaries & short films that push the boundaries and divert from the norm (or will not find a place in mainstream South African cinemas), the X Fest made it a priority to reach a neglected audience who prefer their entertainment to be of a more alternative, challenging, intense, extreme, or out-of-the-ordinary nature. This can include experimental work, controversial or taboo subjects, underground and cult films, plus a wide and wild range of short films (with a sense of humour never far behind), yet still remains entertaining.
Besides giving the audience the chance to enjoy an off-centre programme of movies, the festival gives the filmmakers a platform to get their work exhibited in a South African cinema. At times a more mainstream incorporation is facilitated with cinema releases that are a bit more 'out there', with past events including special sneak previews (eg. Insidious) and the only event in the country (and probably the continent) that arranged an authorised Grindhouse double feature of the Tarantino and Rodriguez movies Death Proof and Planet Terror (with the Machete trailer in between).
For further festival information and trailers, go to www.xfest.org. For online bookings, go to www.quicket.co.za/xfest.
