Herefordshire gets its own horror festival!

Horrorford started as a conversation between Andy Black, Tourism Officer for Visit Herefordshire, and Rich Matthews, Development Manager for Rural Media in Hereford, about a shared passion for horror films and how it would be great to watch some spooky rural horror flicks in the county’s gorgeous countryside.

Building upon the fantastic work of Borderlines Film Festival in helping to establish Herefordshire as a rural centre for film fans, Horrorford themes films to the county’s locations, adding an evocative outdoor element to the scary events unfolding onscreen.

As Andy explains: ‘The raison d’être behind Horrorford is to offer exciting films themed to the many fantastic locations we have in the county, celebrating the rural experience and enhancing the film screenings. There’s been no shortage of willing venues stepping forward to offer screening space, and the support we’ve had both nationally and locally has been fantastic. Rich and I represent a private, not-for-profit company (Visit Herefordshire) and a charity (Rural Media) working together with great national support from the BFI (British Film Institute), together with local partners Celtic Marches Cider and Wye Valley Brewery. Tyrrells have also generously given us some of their amazing crisps to aid donations to our Herefordshire charity partner for this first event, The Ely Memorial Fund.’

Rich continues: ‘We’re starting small, deliberately walking before running, offering local screenings at Oakchurch Farm Shop in the West and Oldcastle in the East to begin with, but with ambitious plans to expand the festival in future years if it’s successful. Ultimately, we’d like to include a dark arts exhibition, dark literature, academic panel, performance theatre, as well as live music, and even more local food and drink. Initially, we’ll appeal mainly to Herefordshire audiences, but as the festival becomes established we hope to attract visitors from outside of the county to help boost the local economy as well. We see Horrorford becoming a centrepiece event to the county’s ever-growing events and festivals calendar.

October 31st - Halloween family film screening at 5pm (Poll vote on Facebook), followed by George A. Romero’s Day of the Dead at 7.30pm at Oakchurch Farm Shop www.oakchurch.net

Friday Nov 2nd & Saturday Nov 3rd - 2 nights of double bill screenings at Oldcastle, Colwall starting at 7.30 pm. www.oldcastleweddings.co.uk 2nd – Witchfinder General (50th anniversary) & The Evil Dead 3rd – The Devil Rides Out (50th anniversary) & Eden Lake

Tickets available via this link.