PollyGrind named to MovieMaker's 50 Film Festivals Worth the Entry Fee

LAS VEGAS - April 13, 2014 - PRLog -- For a third straight year, PollyGrind Film Festival of Las Vegas has made it into MovieMaker magazine, nabbing a slot in its 50 Film Festivals Worth the Entry Fee in 2014.

MovieMaker’s Activism in Film issue, featuring award-winning director of photography Jendra Jarnagin on the cover, is set to hit newsstands April 22. Advanced copies of the issue, which includes articles on promoting indie films on the cheap and exclusives with Oliver Stone and Errol Morris, were available at the recent National Association of Broadcasters Show.

“Unbelievable,” festival director Chad Clinton Freeman said. “This is just so very cool and really means a lot. PollyGrind is in its fifth year and many on this list have been around for several decades.”

Among the 50 Film Festivals Worth the Entry Fee are the Austin Film Festival (now in its 21^st year) the Atlanta Film Festival (38), Florida Film Festival (23), Los Angeles Film Festival (20), Raindance Film Festival (22), Vancouver Film Festival (33), Seattle International Film Festival (40) and more.

Currently accepting entries, the international film festival is steeped in artistic freedom and celebrates individuality, diversity, creativity, and empowerment by showcasing the work of filmmakers with defiantly independent visions.

The festival has been praised by the likes of Albert Pyun, Herschel Gordon Lewis, Eric Stanze, Greg Lamberson and Lloyd Kaufman. FearNet has called it “Boldly adventurous, audacious, and rebellious."

Previously, PollyGrind was named to MovieMaker’s Top 25 Film Festivals Worth the Entry Fee in 2012 and Top 5 Coolest Experimental/Underground Film Festivals of 2013.

In the current issue, MovieMaker says PollyGrind "Specializes in all things alternative, with a wide variety of films not shown elsewhere."

That it does as the event screens genre films alongside arthouse, documentaries, dramas and more.

PollyGrind, currently featured in a 42-page spread in Weng’s Chop, has seen more than 80 of its official selections earn distribution deals with the likes of Lions Gate, Showtime, IFC Midnight, Wild Eye Releasing, Whacked Movies and more.

Distribution contracts and consultations were awarded to winners in 2011, 2012 and 2013, along with several thousand dollars in prizes.

Feature film official selections at the festival are also looked at for distribution through its new label PollyGrind Presents, while short films are considered as special features and for compilation releases through a number of outlets.

As a member of the Film ExChange, an international network which includes seven film festivals such as Independent Film Awards Berlin, Art of Brooklyn Film Festival, and South Texas Underground Film Festival, PollyGrind also sends three films to the RxSM Self-Medicated Film Expo in Austin to compete for the Crossroads Award during SXSW.

PollyGrind’s fifth annual event is slated to run October 16-18.

The regular deadline for submissions is April 30, with a late deadline of May 13, a Last Minute Deadline of June 30, and a Withoutabox Extended Deadline of July 31. Filmmakers will be notified of their acceptance status by September 1.

Feature films, documentaries, shorts, medium films, trailers, music videos, promos and screenplays of all genres are welcome.

As one of the first festivals to screen, embrace, and award the underground gems Slime City Massacre, The Bunny Game, Dear God No!, Road to Hell, Hate Crime, Daddy’s Little Girl, Ratline, The Gruesome Death of Tommy Pistol, and Adam Chaplin: Violent Avenger, PollyGrind “lives to champion underdogs by turning them into beloved sensations,” Withoutabox wrote in the 2013 spotlight on the festival.

Before Jen and Sylvia Soska's American Mary success, their debut Dead Hooker in a Trunk won numerous awards at PollyGrind. Before Calvin Lee Reeder starred in the hit V/H/S or directed The Rambler feature, which premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, he won Best Director at PollyGrind.

Additionally, Randy Moore’s 2013 Sundance film Escape from Tomorrow was a 2012 official selection and Craig McIntyre’s L.A.Maniac (formerly The Los Angeles Ripper), slated to be released May 13 by Kaufman’s distribution company Troma, played the festival in 2011.

An IMDb qualifying event, PollyGrind has been said by Withoutabox.com to revel “in the bold, the exciting, and the avant garde” and “single-handedly redefined what to expect during the film festival experience.”

Past festivals have included concerts,burlesque and art shows, a social media contest, a live audio recording of the audience for a DVD audio commentary, as well as a zombie red carpet walk and cupcake eating contest, while still staying focused on celebrating good quality films.

For more information on PollyGrind, visit http://www.PollyGrind.com (http://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.PollyGrind...) or http://www.Facebook.com/PollyGrind.