With just over a month to go before Mayhem’s 22nd edition takes place at Broadway, Nottingham (15-18 October), the team is excited to reveal this year’s full festival line-up. With a mix of previews, classics, and two shorts programmes, there is something for every fan of genre cinema in this year’s programme.
Mayhem Film Festival will open on Thursday 15 October with GRIND, an intertwining anthology exploring the chaos of gig work culture with a healthy serving of gore and directed by Ed Dougherty, Brea Grant and Chelsea Stardust. Our opening night will close with the UK Premiere of Mohamed Chabane & Théo Jourdain’s NO WAY DOWN, a tense action-horror set in a disused tower block where a group of friends find themselves chased by something who wants them dead.
Friday 15 October sees day 2 of the festival, which will open with the previously announced Careful, Guy Maddin’s early masterpiece from 1992. Next up will be YOU ARE THE FILM, the debut film from Makoto Ueda, who previously wrote Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes (Mayhem 2021) and River (Mayhem 2023). The film follows two people in parallel worlds who appear trapped in their own movies.
We’ll move into the evening with the previously announced IMPOSTERS from director Caleb Phillips, before rounding off Friday night with MARAMA, a stunning and unsettling Gothic horror about a young Māori woman who arrives from New Zealand to the Yorkshire estate of an entitled Englishman where dark secrets are soon exposed. Mayhem is proud to welcome director Taratoa Stappard to the festival for a post-screening Q&A.
We’ll open Saturday 17 October with Steve Pink’s TERRESTRIAL, a psychological thriller in which four friends meet up for a reunion weekend where paranoia soon creeps into every crack of their friendship. We’ll then head to Spain for Paul Urkijo Alijo’s Basque folk horror GAUA. Set in the 17th Century, the film follows a woman who poisons her husband and flees into the woods where she encounters three old women with stories and secrets to share. We’ll then settle into our first Short Film Showcase of this year’s festival.
Saturday evening will start with Joko Anwar’s GHOST IN THE CELL, an action-packed film by the director of Impetigore, that blends off-kilter comedy, martial arts, punchy politics, and a whole lot of gore. We will then close the day with a screening of John Carpenter’s 1995 IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS - a Lovecraftian masterpiece starring the late Sam Neill.
We’ll open the last day of the festival with the previously announced MUM, I'M ALIEN PREGNANT, an icky and hilarious film by directing duo Thunderlips. We’ll then head to Uruguay for Gustavo Hernández’s THE WHISPER in which two siblings escape from their father’s violent home only to be caught in a snuff film ring. Part folk horror, part supernatural tale, THE WHISPER is an always surprising disturbing horror. We’ll then settle in for our second Short Film Showcase of the festival.
We’ll start our last evening of the festival with Dave Boyle’s NEVER AFTER DARK - a chilling ghost story following a medium’s encounter with a particularly powerful and threatening spirit. We’ll close this year’s edition with Angel Gomez Hernandez’s CRAWLERS in which the residents of an apartment building find themselves fighting for their lives when their building becomes infested with deadly spiders.
A very limited amount of Full Festival Passes are still available for £110, giving you access to all films and events at this year’s festival. Individual tickets and Frankenstein ticket packages (where you can select any four films for the price of three), will be available from Thursday 17 September at 12PM. For more information, and to book tickets and passes, please visit www.mayhemfilmfestival.com. For Frankenstein ticket packages, please visit Broadway’s box office or contact them on 0115 952 6611.
Mayhem Film Festival takes place at Broadway, Nottingham on 15-18 October 2026.
