Forbidden Worlds Film Festival, Bristol’s biggest repertory genre film festival returns with The Big Scream, its celebration of cult horror, with two nights of grindhouse and exploitation movies from Australia.
Forbidden Worlds Film Festival: The Big Scream returns to the biggest screen in the city, the Bristol Megascreen, over two days from 24-25 October 2025
This year, the festival will be celebrating the pulse-pounding, rough-as-guts world of Ozploitation – the grindhouse-style exploitation flicks that came out of Australia in the 70s and 80s
The line-up includes killer boar eco-thriller Razorback (1984), revenge thriller Fair Game (1986) and the suspense-laced man vs. nature cult classic Long Weekend (1978)
During the 70s and 80s, Australia saw an explosion in low-budget genre filmmaking, thanks to a change in national censorship laws and generous tax concessions for movie productions.
This led to a surge in production of local low-budget genre filmmaking, often packed with gratuitous gore, violence and nudity, and very uniquely Australian quirks and characteristics, that was soon dubbed ‘Ozploitation’.
Influential works from the Ozploitation canon included George Miller’s influential apocalyptic road movie Mad Max (1979) and Ted Kotcheff’s psychological thriller Wake in Fright (1971), both of which inspired generations of film-makers and continue to have global cult status.
“Long overlooked in histories of the country’s ’70s and ’80s film revival, Aussie genre cinema has been gaining more and more popularity across the world ever since Mark Hartley’s documentary Not Quite Hollywood popularised the phrase ‘Ozploitation’ back in 2008,” notes Dr Stephen Morgan, Lecturer in Film Studies at King’s College London and co-programmer of the London Australian Film Society & Festival, who will be introducing several screenings at this year’s Big Scream.
“To have Forbidden Worlds dedicate an entire Big Scream weekender to the wild and wonderful world of Ozploitation cinema is the blood-splattered icing on a cake of dubious origins.”
From 24-25 October, Forbidden Worlds Film Festival will showcase some of the most weird and wonderful horrors to come out of the Southern Hemisphere at Bristol’s former IMAX screen – now dubbed the Bristol Megascreen.
“I’ve always had a soft spot for Australian cinema, it has “indie” hardwired into its DNA. Ever since I’ve been at (video shop) 20th Century Flicks, the consistent popularity of films like The Castle, Flirting, Picnic At Hanging Rock and Walkabout (both among staff and customers) has meant that the nation’s cinema has always punched well above its weight on the international scene,” says Dave Taylor, festival co-director and owner of 20th Century Flicks.
“It’s only recently I’ve been brave enough to delve into the grimy, gritty heart of Ozploitation the past few years… and boy, have I been missing out! It’s exciting to bring a carefully curated selection from this undersung golden age of transgressive homespun horror to a bigger audience and even bigger screen.”
The line-up includes cult man vs nature thriller Long Weekend (1978); Thirst (1979), about a young woman kidnapped by a vampiric cult; eco-terror cult classic Razorback (1984) about a giant, maneating wild boar that wreaks havoc on citizens of the Outback; gory splatter fest Body Melt (1993) starring Neighbours’ Ian Smith (Harold Bishop); atmospheric gothic slasher Next of Kin (1982) and cult thriller Fair Game (1986) that sees a young conservationist become the target of three kangaroo poachers.
“For the past several years, we’ve found our audience are especially excited to see horrors they’ve never been able to see (or in some cases never even heard of), especially films that can’t be found on popular streaming sites,” says co-director Timon Singh.
“That is why this year, we’re really leaning into more culty and obscure horrors that we feel should be more widely seen and enjoyed with an audience on the biggest screen possible.”
