Culture Shock: Festival of Fantastic Film returns to the Showroom Cinema from 1-3 May, bringing a mind-blowing selection of sci-fi, fantasy, horror and cult film to the big screen.
From the team behind Celluloid Screams, the annual horror film festival that has become a major event in the global film festival calendar attracting audiences from all over the world, Culture Shock shines a light on new and classic sci-fi, fantasy, action and cult films to truly celebrate the world of fantastic cinema.
The festival kicks off with the UK theatrical premiere of director Yerden Telemissov’s charming and hilarious sci-fi tale Stinker, in which an alcoholic with a death wish collides with officious bureaucrats when an extra-terrestrial crash lands on earth and ends up living in a filthy roadside outhouse. Other brand-new films in the programme include Japanese horror satire Mag Mag and Julie Pacino’s I Live Here Now, a mystery thriller that fans of David Lynch and Dario Argento are sure to enjoy.
The retrospectives in this year’s programme are equally exciting and include films from Estonia, Hong Kong, Italy and Mexico, as well as several from the USA. John Woo’s action spectacle A Better Tomorrow is one of a number of high-profile 4K restorations premiering at the festival, alongside Guillermo del Toro’s debut film Cronos and Estonian psychedelic sci-fi opus Dead Mountaineer’s Hotel. Elsewhere in the programme, fans can discover rare screenings of supernatural swordplay epic A Chinese Ghost Story, Terminator/Robocop-inspired cult actioner R.O.T.O.R. and Noel Marshall’s big cat saga Roar, often referred to as “the most dangerous film ever made” due to the large number of injuries sustained by cast and crew at the paws of their feline co-stars.
Alongside the main cinema programme, the festival is also set to host its very own Saturday Morning Cartoons and Cereal Party in the Showroom Bar, conjuring the spirit of childhood Saturday mornings of the ‘80s and' 90s with a combination of a handpicked selection of classic cartoons and a buffet of sugary cereals.
Tickets and passes for all films and events at Culture Shock: Festival of Fantastic Film are on sale now. Individual tickets are £12 (£10 concession), or just £6 with a free CINE26 membership. For the best value, get a weekend pass for £90 to see all fifteen feature films across the weekend. https://showroomcinema.org.uk/festivals/culture-shock-festival-of-fantastic-film
By Robert Nevitt, Festival Director, Culture Shock: Festival of Fantastic Film & Celluloid Screams Horror Film Festival
Paternoster Row, Sheffield City Centre, Sheffield S1 2BX
Bike racks, nearby tram parking, tram and bus access
