Are rats cute, scary or a question of genre? That’s the kind of debate you’re having Brooklyn Horror Film Festival — a hot and crazy annual event in New York City that expanded rapidly for its 10Th edition.
Founded by creative director Justin Timms, this gonzo celebration began a decade ago as a quaint film club in the back room of a bar. Now it’s a 10-day multi-venue affair with an estimated 5,000 guests in attendance for 2025. That’s up 20 percent from last year and a testament to that buzz for Brooklyn Horror builds scary well.
“Rats, much like horror, are deeply misunderstood,” said Timms, who advocates plenty of weird art that you can describe that way. This year, Brooklyn Horror gave top honors to Mickey Reece“Every Heavy Thing,” Emilio Porte’s “Don’t Leave the Kids Alone,” and “Last Call,” a short film directed by Winnie Cheung. Read the exclusive Brooklyn Horror Film Festival winners announcement below.
“There really wasn’t a festival like this in New York,” Timms said. “There’s the New York City Horror Film Festival, but they show more strictly defined horror films—and Scary Movies at Lincoln Center is back, but it’s a much smaller program. So there are other horror festivals, but they just don’t program all the kinds of movies that we’re interested in.”
Brooklyn Horror recruited IndieWire to its panel of expert judges this year. That group — which also included voices from prominent genre brands like Vinegar Syndrome, Fangoria, MPI Media, Alter and more — toasted not only the scariest cinema but the most accessible media of all kind. That’s important to Joseph Hernandez, senior programmer and director of community development who has worked with Timms since the festival’s inception.
“The mainstream perception of horror goes back to the ’80s to that explosion of slasher sequels, and that’s what really helped form the image of what a horror movie is today,” Hernandez said. “Ever since then, true horror fans have tried to explain that the genre world is so much more than that.”
The three categories of competition at Brooklyn Horror 2025 included the annual shorts competition; the Dark Matter series, for features grounded in serious subject matter; and the Head Trip section, for features that expand your mind. The winners from the 10th anniversary year show how far you can stretch the definition of an affordable film – in best way.
“The thing that worries me the most is that people will stop taking big swings,” publicist Justin Cook said when asked about his hopes and fears for the genre landscape going forward. Cook just joined the Brooklyn Horror Film Festival a few years ago, but he knows what’s cutting edge. “There should always be movies out there that take big swings. Some work for me personally. Some don’t. But I will always respect a great swing.”
When asked about the best movie debate he’s had on Brooklyn Horror so far, Cook went off on a hot streak he heard earlier this week: Rob Zombie’s “Halloween” is… more entertaining than John Carpenter’s original?! Programmer Tori Potenza is a recent addition to the team as well, and it’s the kind of moment that’s transformed them from visiting film critic to annual organizer hungry for more.
“The community is what made me love this festival so much,” Potenza said, noting that many of them the most important conversations in the genre are towards dark matter. “When you look at the history of horror, there’s so much that’s either in the subtext or the actual text that deals with marginalized communities. We’re representing that history by honoring people who didn’t always have the chance to stand behind the camera and tell their own stories.”
“Horror is a very broad prism that can be so many things and we just constantly try to reflect that in our show every year,” agreed Hernandez. “We are a genre film festival and we are very proud of our ongoing mission to continue to stretch that definition.”
When Brooklyn Horror began, began infamous pizza rat video from 2015 had just gone viral. The rodent has served as the party’s unofficial mascot ever since, but it took a decade for Timms to finally stop by a Spirit Halloween and pick up the animatronic that steals the spotlight in all of the year’s pictures. The rat’s name is Pepperoni, and his agent “demands that he be credited by name,” Cook said.
But to quote the truest internet meme I’ve read new memory: “The worst person you know somewhere says, ‘I’m passionate about uplifting community.'” Not so at Brooklyn Horror, where Timms avoids taking credit and instead pays tribute to his organizers and volunteers…while waxing poetic about the rats’ redeeming quality. Pops sponsored Gushers in red wine (an off-menu secret you found here first!), the creative director shared his favorite conversation from this year’s Brooklyn Horror too.
Recalling a chat he had with Leviathan Award winner Ernest Dickerson, who was distracted on his way to the bathroom during a screening, Timms said, “He forgot he was waiting, and out of the blue he wanted to tell me about this Japanese horror movie he saw on YouTube. He said it’s so good I have to see it. So, you know I’m going to.”
Read on for all the winners (and some of their reactions!) at the 10th Brooklyn Horror Film Festival.
Dark Matter Jury Awards
Best Feature: “Don’t Leave the Kids Alone”
“On behalf of everyone at ‘Don’t Leave the Kids Alone’, we want to thank the jury for the Dark Matter section, Matt Barone and everyone who makes the Brooklyn Horror Film Festival possible and everyone who took the time to attend the screenings. Thank you for inviting the film, fighting for the theater experience, nurturing horror audiences, but not least banned international films and banned genres… ¡Viva Brooklyn Horror Fest and Cine de Terror!”
— Emilio Portes, director
Best Director: Paolo Strippoli, “The Holy Boy”
Best performance: Olivia Taylor Dudley, “Abigail Before Beatrice”
Best Screenplay: Aleksandar Radivojevic, “Karmadonna”
Best Film: Cristiano Di Nicola, “The Holy Boy”
Best Practical FX: Mio Chiba and Tokhiko Endo, “Incomplete Chairs”
Head Trip Jury Awards
Best Feature: “Every Heavy Thing”
“What an honor. It’s been my lifelong goal to pursue the formula for all kinds of movies so it’s fascinating to receive this award that celebrates just that.”
—Mickey Reece, director
Best Director: Yûta Shimotsu, “New Group”
Best Screenplay: Avalon Fast, “CAMP”
Best performance: Tipper Newton, “Every Heavy Thing”
Best Editing: Simon Glassman, “Buffet Infinity”
Best Film: Eily Sprungman, “CAMP”
Best Sound Design: Johnny Blerot, “Buffet Infinity”
Shorts Competition Jury Awards
Best Short Film: “Last Call”
“I am grateful to the festival, the jurors and everyone who embraced the shadows of this film. This credit belongs to the cast and crew, whose artistry and dedication brought to life the strange, the disturbing and the hauntingly beautiful metamorphosis of ‘becoming’.”
– Winnie Cheung, director
Best Director: Kylie Aoihann, “Dysphorin”
Best performance: Nicole Elliot, “Jeff”
Best Special FX: Sharp FX, The Dysphoria
Best Screenplay: Louise Flaherty & Neil Christopher, “The Gnawer of Rocks”
Best Sound Design: Jack Goodman, “Eonian”
Best Art Direction: Danny Christopher & Sarah Ball, “The Gnawer of Rocks”
Best Editing: Marcus Fahey, “Daddy’s a Hunter”
Home Invasion Award: “Rebrand” (dir. Ranabold Edoard)
Special Jury Mention for Filmmakers to Watch: Nathan Ginter, “Overgrown”
The Leviathan Prize
Brooklyn Horror’s first and only tribute award was created in 2023 to honor the luminaries of horror and recognize their monstrous contributions to the genre.
Leviathan Award 2025 goes to the multitalent Ernest Dickersonwhose prolific career as a cinematographer and director has given horror fans a surplus of greatness on both the big and small screens. With his groundbreaking set of feature films and TV series episodes dating back to the 1980s and extending into the present day, Ernest Dickerson has helped pave the way for the likes of Jordan Peele and Nia DaCosta by showing that horror knows no color lines or cultural barriers.
The 10th Brooklyn Horror Film Festival runs through October 25 in New York City. Check game times.
