Our Macabro Year: Macabro XIX

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqu2rHiA2xY (abre en nueva pestaña)

From August 25 to 30, the nineteenth edition of Macabro: Mexico City International Horror Film Festival took place, with a fully digital model, reinventing our approach to present it through different virtual venues and media outlets, putting the festival at the forefront and establishing it as a direct reference point for audiovisual exhibition projects.

Macabro XIX was a festival with a different format, one that in no way replaced the event's traditional structure, and one we worked hard on with the goal of offering a different experience — one that would let us build new audiences and reach an even greater scope, which after this juncture helped us grow into different windows and opportunities.

BY THE NUMBERS

Number of films: 90 films

Number of viewers: 610,727

International films: 73

Mexican films: 17

Digital venues: 7

Drive-in screenings: 2

Online guests: 35

Institutional support: 5

Sponsors: 23

Media partners: 4

Press mentions: 405

Total media equivalence:

9,946,610.

Facebook: +486,000 followers

Twitter: +28,200 followers

Instagram: +12,000 followers

YouTube: +2,000 followers

ATTENDANCE CALCULATED IN VIEWS, WEB VISITS, AND SOCIAL MEDIA

FilminLatino:

21,000 views in 6 days.

Canal 22:

187,000 views (Lo más macabro de Caostica)

257,000 views (El esqueleto de la Señora Morales)

Facebook Macabro:

129,811 minutes of video watched

between August 7 and 30.

Macabro.mx:

15,916 visitors between August 25 and 30.

OUR AUDIENCE

The Festival's target audience broadened through the activities that had the greatest impact on the internationalization of its programming:

1. Young and adult viewers: ages 18 to 50, residents of Mexico City and the metropolitan area, knowledgeable about film in general and interested in horror and related genres, users of new technologies, and collecting enthusiasts.
2. Young and adult viewers: ages 18 to 50, with reach in more than 50 countries, notably Colombia, the United States, Peru, Argentina, Ecuador, Chile, Bolivia, Guatemala, Brazil, Spain, and Venezuela, and in cities such as Guadalajara, Puebla, Monterrey, Bogotá (Colombia), Lima (Peru), Querétaro, Ecatepec, Toluca, León, Santiago de Chile, and San Luis Potosí, among the main ones.
3. Industry companies/sponsors: Production companies, distributors, schools, universities; directors and guests from sponsoring companies across various sectors, VIP guests.
4. Film industry members: Actors, actresses, journalists, national and international institutional figures from the film industry.

Age: 14 to 45

Education level: Elementary school, middle school, high school, and undergraduate

Occupation: Students and professionals

DIGITAL VENUES

The digital venues that hosted Macabro XIX's films and activities were: FilminLatino, Canal 22, TV UNAM, Radio UNAM, Procine's Facebook page, and the Macabro website, in addition to our social media.

Macabro's presence on these platforms helped expand its audience and reach different parts of the country and the world.

This year's programming was marked by special events, including special broadcasts and panel discussions on the 100th anniversary of German expressionism, the restoration of Dos Monjes, the 130th anniversary of H.P. Lovecraft's birth, and the presentation of the printed storyboard for the short film Cerulia by Sofía Carrillo, as well as tributes to “El esqueleto de la Señora Morales” and to the recently deceased writer Amparo Dávila

.

OPENING

This year, the opening protocol was changed and restructured into a video format to make it more compatible with the language of social media and online streaming. Instead of an opening film, we moved straight into streaming the festival's programming in full, which was shown in its entirety over 6 full days.

The opening video was watched by more than 1,000 users on Facebook and YouTube and had organic reach among more than 1,000,000 Facebook users from 15 different countries, notably Mexico, the United States, Argentina, and Colombia.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLuGwCnZMcM (abre en nueva pestaña)

CLOSING AND AWARDS CEREMONY

The stream where the winners of Macabro XIX were announced took place on Sunday, August 30, followed by a live musical score for the restored version of the foundational film of cinematic expressionism: THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI by Robert Wiene, performed by the Mexican gothic rock band EL CLAN. This was the band's second collaboration with the festival. This event was presented by Macabro and the German Film Week and could only be viewed via streaming at the scheduled time, through macabro.mx (785 hits) and Macabro's YouTube channel (438 hits).

WINNERS

(insert winners video from YouTube)

TALKS AND WEBINARS

Macabro offered 5 talks as part of its activities:

Macabrostica Vol. 5

Dos monjes in the context of the 100th anniversary of German expressionism.

Beyond the Tentacle: Celebrating 120 Years of H.P. Lovecraft.

Cerulia: A Storyboard by Sofía Carrillo

100 Years of German Expressionism

Total YouTube views: 1623

Total views on Facebook: 16,162

Macabro presented three webinars in collaboration with our partners and sponsors:

Terrifying Sequence, by Daniel Arreola, presented by Black Shark Films.

4,064 views on Facebook

132 views on YouTube

The Strange World of Infrared Photography, by Vero Ezqueda, presented by Nikon México

4,735 views on Facebook

229 views on YouTube

The Backbone of the Trailer, by Nacho Soto, presented by Fix Comunicación.

2,593 views on Facebook

145 views on YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BN2CFNeVubE (abre en nueva pestaña)

MACABRO LAB

In its 2020 edition, Macabro LAB presented two activities:

1. Screenwriting Workshop, lasting three days and taught by screenwriter and director Santiago Fernández Calvete.

Macabro LAB held a pitching session to present the projects developed in the screenwriting workshop. The winners will have the opportunity to present at some film markets and to get a promotional trailer for their project in order to seek funding for its production.

The winning projects were:

Réquiem by Melvin de Jesús Jiménez. Promotional trailer from FIX Comunicación, script and pitching consultancy, and a two-day film crew from CTT EXP & Rentals, and

Luces en el cielo by Cath Cuevas. Participation in Fantasmercado 2021 and script and pitching consultancy.

The jury was made up of Santiago Fernández Calvete, Roberto Trujillo, Ignacio Soto of FIX Comunicación, Rocío Rocha, and Tatiana Lechner of Tanu Distribución.

1. Second edition of the Horror Film Seminar for the creation of genre audiovisual works, in which its fundamental aspects were analyzed, thereby promoting the development of works that seek alternative production methods and film funding support. The sessions were taught over 3 consecutive days by renowned filmmakers and specialists such as Ezzio Avendaño, Abraham Sánchez, Carlos Meléndez, Roberto Trujillo, Juan Carlos Ayvar, Rocío Rocha, and Tatiana Lechner.

MACABRO COVEN

Starting in March of this year, Macabro FICH launched Macabro Coven, a new space within Macabro FICH to give visibility to the work of women directors, producers, screenwriters, actresses, technicians, promoters, managers, writers, and creatives working in horror cinema.

Among the first activities of this festival outreach program was the launch of the first call for entries for a horror short-film co-production directed by women, which received a number of project submissions and closed at the end of June this year. The winning project was La última cena by Mitzi Martínez.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rP36BpycD0 (abre en nueva pestaña)

Work began on building Macabro Coven's international directory of women in horror cinema.

Efforts are underway to promote projects or activities led by women that relate to Macabro Coven's focus (films, books, plays, presentations, musical projects, visual or audiovisual projects) through Macabro FICH's channels.

As part of Macabro Coven's activities, there was a presentation of Cerulia: A Storyboard by Sofía Carrillo, a publication that launches the Découpage collection with texts by Rocío Corona and Yolihuani Curiel. The Découpage collection is part of the project called Pequeña Galería de la Cinematografía, Galería de Ideas y Letras, supported by the 2019 Institutional Call for Scientific Research of the Directorate for Research and Graduate Studies Support at the Universidad de Guanajuato.

The presentation featured the participation of Sofía Carrillo, Alejandro Montes, director of Aurora, Guanajuato International Horror Film Festival; and Liliana García, coordinator of the Découpage collection.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hi0ifBVnYXM (abre en nueva pestaña)

WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT US

“Great experience — even though the times of COVID-19 made things difficult to run, the Macabro team managed to find an efficient way to show films online, and on top of that, the talks with directors and the promotion of events were very good.”

Alejandro G. Alegre, director.

“A fantastic festival with unmatched diversity and clear communication. It was a very well-rounded and thoughtful experience, adapting to all the difficulties caused by COVID.”

Isaac Zambra, director.

“Macabro is one of the best film festivals in Mexico. They do everything they can to help audiences discover your film, and they communicate really well with filmmakers. I really appreciate that they gave us an honorable mention for Rendez-vous. I hope to present more films with them.”

Pablo Olmos, director.

“Even though the constraints brought on by 2020 made an in-person festival impossible, the organizers truly went out of their way to do something out of the ordinary and include us all the way from South Africa — we even got comments from fans who watched our film streaming. I definitely recommend this festival to horror fans and genre filmmakers.”

Beer Adriaanse, director.

SUPPORT AND SPONSORSHIPS

Secretaría de Cultura, Instituto Mexicano de Cinematografía, FilminLatino, Secretaría de Cultura de la CDMX, Procine CDMX, Cineteca Nacional, Filmoteca UNAM, Canal 22, TV UNAM, Radio UNAM, Instituto Goethe México, Nikon, Black Shark Films, Fix Comunicación, Facultad de Cine, CTT Exp&Rentals, Diablo Panzón Food Company, Tannhaüsser Film Tank, Cinextasis.com, Artec, Cervecería Concordia, UTA Bar, Pulquería Insurgentes, Caostica, Aurora, Guanajuato International Horror Film Festival, FantLatam, Red Mex Fest, En la noche de los tiempos, Tanu Distribución, Casa Caníbal, and Claro Video.

ACTIVITIES IN COLLABORATION WITH OTHER FESTIVALS

MACABRO COVEN AT AURORA 15 (Guanajuato, Guanajuato)

Every year, Macabro partners with Aurora de Guanajuato to present the macabre screenings, which over time have become firmly established with the clear goal of showcasing a small sample of our festival's activities. This year, our presence at Aurora's fifteenth anniversary took on a different tone, as one of our screenings was dedicated to the increasingly strong presence of women in horror cinema, in what was one of the few in-person activities held before the COVID-19 lockdown.

MACABRO COVEN AT CAOSTICA 18 (Bilbao, Spain)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zz6xr8MaqkM (abre en nueva pestaña)

This year, “Lo más Caostico de Macabro” focused on the work of women behind the camera, celebrating the increasingly important and strong presence in Mexico and Latin America of women who recognize and identify themselves within the horror genre as creators and re-creators of cinematic nightmares — women who have begun to carve out a path that finds, in darkness, fear, and blood, a means of expression. The result of this work makes up this short-film program, featuring a selection of the nightmares, dark fantasy, and vision of these macabre women, which was part of Macabro XVIII's line-up and is included as one of Macabro Coven's outreach activities — the Macabro extension program focused on promoting and supporting the work of women in horror cinema.

MACABRO XIX AT CINETEKTON (Puebla and Cholula, Puebla)

In our third collaboration with the Film and Architecture Festival, we present:

Macabro XIX as part of Cinetekton 2020

Rendez- Vous by Pablo Olmos

Monday, October 26 at Autocinema Cocodrilo in Cholula, Puebla

Tóxico by Ariel Herrrera

Monday, November 9 at Autocinema Cocodrilo in Cholula, Puebla

POST-FESTIVAL ACTIVITIES

Macabro at Cineteca Mexiquense

From October 27 to November 2 in Toluca, EdoMex.

Check the schedule at:

http://cineteca.edomex.gob.mx/ (abre en nueva pestaña)

Macabro XIX Shorts on Facebook IMACP

https://www.facebook.com/ (abre en nueva pestaña)IMACP/ (abre en nueva pestaña)

A short film every day. From October 29 to November 2.

Macabro Shorts on Facebook Procine and Capital 21 as part of the Day of the Dead celebration

https://www.facebook.com/ (abre en nueva pestaña)procineoficial/ (abre en nueva pestaña)

From October 31 to November 2, 8:00 p.m.

MACABRO AT THE FIRST SHOWCASE OF THE MEXICAN NETWORK OF FILM FESTIVALS AT THE IPN

In collaboration with Cultura del IPN, the Mexican Network of Film Festivals, Docs Mx, Cinetekton, Cinema Planeta, and 24 risas por segundo, a series of short films selected by Macabro was presented throughout the month of December.

SEE YOU IN 2021 TO CELEBRATE OUR TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY