Convention Report
Horror Realm 2010
by Tim Gross • MovieMassacre.com
Horror Realm now in its second year, breaking away from the former horror festival ‘Zombie Fest’ that was out in Monroeville, Pa., is now starting to make a place for themselves in the horror community as one of the must see conventions for horror movie fans. Yeah, it can be a hard hill to climb but Horror Realm seems to be making one hell of an effort of becoming one of those can’t miss conventions.
This year’s Horror Realm gave us Ken Foree, Debbie Rochon, Ashley C. Williams (the middle part of the ‘human centipede’), John Amplas, Greg Lamberson, Bill Cardille, NOTLD and DOTLD cast members (most anyway) and the Basket Case reunion. For most fans of the film “Martin”, John Amplas was a cool glass of awesome as he was up for talking just about anything. And from what I heard from Ed Demko the Q & A panel with Amplas was something you needed to witness! John introduces himself to me Friday morning like we were new neighbors and treated every fan that came through the door with respect. Ken, Debbie, Ashley, and Greg were great also and seem to really enjoy themselves, the films, their panels, etc.
The two big highlights of the weekend for everyone seem to be Bill Cardille who was there for four hours to sign things (I was 5th in line by the way) on Saturday which at one time had a line that consisted of 40 people wrapping around aisles of the convention. For those who might not know Bill Cardille, he is the reporter in 1968’s classic NOTLD out in the field doing a live shot near the end of the film and his daughter Lori starred in 1985’s DOTLD, but Bill has been a staple of Pittsburgh for nearly 50 years with his commentary of studio wrestling in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, but also hosting a late night show called “Chiller Theater” for 20 years from the early 60s till 1984! And how could we forget there was a Basket Case reunion?! With Frank Henenlotter and Kevin Van Hentenryck doing very few cons over the past two decades this was a delight for all horror movie fans from all over but for Pittsburgh’s own Horror Realm it was huge to be able to pull something like this off… They had fun with not only the fans but with other guests and at times I was told they were not charging for autographs half of the time, which is huge since most no matter what is going on at other cons some guest (names won’t be named) will charge up to $35 - $50 if they are approached at a bar to get a drink.
The Q & A panels went well once people knew they were going on. The first two panels didn’t do well Friday afternoon, but after I made some noise in the author panel reading of my “Leprechaun” article on the whole series from my latest book “Gross Movie Reviews Volume Five” it seem everybody was able to find the panel room the rest of the weekend.
The film rooms were hoping as Horror Realm had “The Pittsburgh Film Workers” awards in the main room Friday night which not only supports Pittsburgh Independent Filmmaking but has gotten their name out their as several states sent in submissions and this event got a lot of local media coverage for it. It was a great event if like me you are a fan of independent horror films. Of course the next night was the Bastards of Horror short film festival which was a party, celebration, and all around movie fun for everyone as after the films were shown we had two of the filmmakers who had their films play got about five minutes each answering questions about their projects, futures, and if anybody (festivals) else has accepted their films? It was a great time. At the same time was the costume ball they were having which I was greeted with who had to be the winners in my opinion a man and a woman dressed to the ‘T’ as ‘Frankenhooker’ and ‘Dr. Jersey Boy’!
Overall the Horror Realm convention had very little complaints, lots of fun, and more attendance than last year. Their new set up of the convention to make room for the paying attendees went over well as everybody did not feel like they were on top of each other. With all the other conventions out there like Horror Hound, Chiller, Wasteland, Horrorfind, I think Horror Realm has accomplished what they wanted: A fun horror convention not like most, with different guests, friendly atmosphere, and a horror movie convention put on by horror fans for the horror fans! Hell, what convention can say they have a VHS room (horror movies not yet released on DVD) that was a party in itself as 20 to 30 people were in the room all weekend watching great classics: The Abomination, New Year’s Evil, The Refrigerator, etc.!
Horror Realm will be back September 2011 same place and same weekend, keep checking back with www.horrorrealmcon.com for details!
This year’s Horror Realm gave us Ken Foree, Debbie Rochon, Ashley C. Williams (the middle part of the ‘human centipede’), John Amplas, Greg Lamberson, Bill Cardille, NOTLD and DOTLD cast members (most anyway) and the Basket Case reunion. For most fans of the film “Martin”, John Amplas was a cool glass of awesome as he was up for talking just about anything. And from what I heard from Ed Demko the Q & A panel with Amplas was something you needed to witness! John introduces himself to me Friday morning like we were new neighbors and treated every fan that came through the door with respect. Ken, Debbie, Ashley, and Greg were great also and seem to really enjoy themselves, the films, their panels, etc.
The two big highlights of the weekend for everyone seem to be Bill Cardille who was there for four hours to sign things (I was 5th in line by the way) on Saturday which at one time had a line that consisted of 40 people wrapping around aisles of the convention. For those who might not know Bill Cardille, he is the reporter in 1968’s classic NOTLD out in the field doing a live shot near the end of the film and his daughter Lori starred in 1985’s DOTLD, but Bill has been a staple of Pittsburgh for nearly 50 years with his commentary of studio wrestling in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, but also hosting a late night show called “Chiller Theater” for 20 years from the early 60s till 1984! And how could we forget there was a Basket Case reunion?! With Frank Henenlotter and Kevin Van Hentenryck doing very few cons over the past two decades this was a delight for all horror movie fans from all over but for Pittsburgh’s own Horror Realm it was huge to be able to pull something like this off… They had fun with not only the fans but with other guests and at times I was told they were not charging for autographs half of the time, which is huge since most no matter what is going on at other cons some guest (names won’t be named) will charge up to $35 - $50 if they are approached at a bar to get a drink.
The Q & A panels went well once people knew they were going on. The first two panels didn’t do well Friday afternoon, but after I made some noise in the author panel reading of my “Leprechaun” article on the whole series from my latest book “Gross Movie Reviews Volume Five” it seem everybody was able to find the panel room the rest of the weekend.
The film rooms were hoping as Horror Realm had “The Pittsburgh Film Workers” awards in the main room Friday night which not only supports Pittsburgh Independent Filmmaking but has gotten their name out their as several states sent in submissions and this event got a lot of local media coverage for it. It was a great event if like me you are a fan of independent horror films. Of course the next night was the Bastards of Horror short film festival which was a party, celebration, and all around movie fun for everyone as after the films were shown we had two of the filmmakers who had their films play got about five minutes each answering questions about their projects, futures, and if anybody (festivals) else has accepted their films? It was a great time. At the same time was the costume ball they were having which I was greeted with who had to be the winners in my opinion a man and a woman dressed to the ‘T’ as ‘Frankenhooker’ and ‘Dr. Jersey Boy’!
Overall the Horror Realm convention had very little complaints, lots of fun, and more attendance than last year. Their new set up of the convention to make room for the paying attendees went over well as everybody did not feel like they were on top of each other. With all the other conventions out there like Horror Hound, Chiller, Wasteland, Horrorfind, I think Horror Realm has accomplished what they wanted: A fun horror convention not like most, with different guests, friendly atmosphere, and a horror movie convention put on by horror fans for the horror fans! Hell, what convention can say they have a VHS room (horror movies not yet released on DVD) that was a party in itself as 20 to 30 people were in the room all weekend watching great classics: The Abomination, New Year’s Evil, The Refrigerator, etc.!
Horror Realm will be back September 2011 same place and same weekend, keep checking back with www.horrorrealmcon.com for details!
Horror Realm 2010
http://www.horrorrealmcon.com
September 17th-19th, 2010
Crowne Plaza, Pittsburgh South
164 Fort Couch Road
Pittsburgh, PA 15241
http://www.horrorrealmcon.com
September 17th-19th, 2010
Crowne Plaza, Pittsburgh South
164 Fort Couch Road
Pittsburgh, PA 15241
