EL CICLO

El Ciclo
Written & Directed by Victor Garcia
2003, Spain

Accomplished special effects technician turned director/screenwriter Garcia makes a very strong debut with this award-winning, mind-bending short film.

Chilean director Ernesto Diaz Espinoza’s 2012 ABCs of Death segment “C is for Cycle” and Dutch director Maarten Groen’s 2014 horror short film Rotor both tackle a narrative similar to Garcia’s but if you want to see the concept done right, look no further than El Ciclo.

The film industry attention Garcia received for this short film led to largely thankless jobs directing Return to House on Haunted Hill (2007), Mirrors 2 (2010), the Syfy Channel movie Frost Giant (2010) and Hellraiser: Revelations (2011).  His most recent feature is the 2013 supernatural horror film The Damned.

Garcia made another excellent short film T is for Tiles for the ABCs of Death competition in 2011.

DRAG

DRAG
Written & Directed by Mark Pavia
1993, USA

Much has been written about how Stephen King was very impressed by Pavia’s zombie short film which led to Pavia co-screenwriting and directing the film adaptation of King’s Kolchak: The Night Stalker-influenced short story The Night Flier (1997).

The talented Pavia has since had difficulty launching another feature film but that is not for lack of effort as the screenwriter/director has made it into various stages of development on horror projects including Slice, an adaptation of the acclaimed zombie comic book series Deadworld and a 1980s-style killer Santa Claus film Sick Nick to name a few.

Pavia has recently announced he’s working on an anthology film based on four Stephen King short stories called The Reaper’s Image and is currently in production on a new horror film called Fender Bender.