The 24th annual Boston Underground Film Festival returns to Harvard Square’s arthouse hub The Brattle Theatre from March 20th through the 24th, 2024, with a lineup stacked with stone-cold killers, covetous cretins, nocturnal nuisances, and all manner of midnight madness.
BUFF will host the East Coast Premiere of Michael Mohan’s (2021’s The Voyeurs) convent-set horror Immaculate on Opening Night. Starring Sydney Sweeney (Euphoria, The White Lotus), Immaculate follows a newly minted nun who arrives at an idyllic Italian convent where devilish deeds lurk in the shadows of the sun-drenched countryside.
Bookending this year’s electric lineup is genre-bending fever dream Boy Kills World, the gleefully bombastic debut from Moritz Mohr, starring Bill Skarsgård and Famke Janssen, who must face off in a hyper-violent dystopian hellscape
BUFF will present a triple-threat of Francophone wonders, starting with the New England Premiere of Ariane Louis-Seize’s utterly charming Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person, which follows a young vampire who tries to creatively circumvent her ethical quandary with obtaining fresh blood. The festival will also host New England Premiere of Sébastien Vanicek’s eight-legged creature feature Infested, which follows the residents of a French social housing block in a battle of survival against legions of rapidly reproducing, murderous spiders. Come for the 1,000% nightmare fuel and discover why Vanicek has been tapped for the upcoming Evil Dead spinoff. Rounding out the trio is Belgium’s 2024 Oscar entry Omen, the visually stunning debut from Belgian Congolese rapper and visionary, Baloji. Deftly wielding magical realism, Baloji delves into an intersectional miasma of clashing identity, culture, and belief when a man returns to his Kinshasan homeland and experiences a nosebleed that triggers a communal schism.
On the thriller front, BUFF will host the New England Premiere of vengeance noir Femme from UK duo Sam H. Freeman and Ng Choon Ping. Nathan Stewart-Jarrett (2021’s Candyman sequel by Nia DaCosta) stars as a drag artist who, in the aftermath of a brutal attack, grapples with the complexities of trauma and urge towards revenge against his closeted attacker, played by George MacKay (2019’s 1917). Equally thrilling, with a dash of chilling, is South Korean filmmaker Jason Yu’s mysterious, haunting debut Sleep. Starring the late Lee Sun-kyun (2019 Oscar-sweeper, Parasite) and Jung Yu-mi (2016’s Train to Busan) as a pair of new parents beleaguered by the fatiguing pitfalls akin with this life stage, Sleep crafts a taut and tense atmosphere of dread that descends into madness. Speaking of dread and madness, BUFF is honored to celebrate hometown hero Joseph Mault and the World Premiere of his Cape Cod-set debut, Strange Kindness, a smoldering reckoning of the American dream that explores the outer limits of empathy against the backdrop of a tense manhunt.
Romance is in the air this spring with the New England Premieres of several-time BUFF alum Zach Clark’s (Little Sister) genre-mashing, body-snatching rom-com, The Becomers, narrated by Sparks frontman Russell Mael, and Kim Albright’s sci-fi exploration of love in a world where emotion is suppressed by literally removing one’s heart, With Love and a Major Organ starring Anna Maguire (2020’s Violation). Additional indie offerings include the East Coast Premiere of Nathan Tape’s wild Juggalo thrill ride, Off Ramp, and Amanda Nell Eu’s energetic Malaysian teen coming-of-age, lo-fi horror, Tiger Stripes.
BOSTON UNDERGROUND 2024 FEATURES LINEUP
BOY KILLS WORLD – Closing Night Film
Moritz Mohr | Germany, South Africa, USA | 2024
A dystopian fever dream action film that follows Boy, a deaf person with a vibrant imagination. When his family is murdered, he is trained by a mysterious shaman to repress his childish imagination and become an instrument of death.
FEMME – New England Premiere
Sam H. Freeman, Ng Choon Ping | UK | 2023
Follows Jules, who is targeted in a horrific homophobic attack, destroying his life and career. Some time after that event he encounters Preston, one of his attackers, in a gay sauna. He wants revenge.
HUMANIST VAMPIRE SEEKING CONSENTING SUICIDAL PERSON – New England Premiere
Ariane Louis-Seize | Canada | 2023
A young woman vampire is unable to kill to meet her need for blood, but may have found a solution in a young man with suicidal tendencies.
IMMACULATE – East Coast Premiere / Opening Night Film
Michael Mohan | USA | 2024
Cecilia, a woman of devout faith, is warmly welcomed to the picture-perfect Italian countryside where she is offered a new role at an illustrious convent. But it becomes clear to Cecilia that her new home harbors dark and horrifying secrets.
IN A VIOLENT NATURE – East Coast Premiere
Chris Nash | Canada | 2024
An ambient horror slasher that methodically depicts the enigmatic resurrection, rampage, and retribution of an undead monster in a remote wilderness.
INFESTED – New England Premiere
Sébastien Vaniček | France | 2023
Residents of a rundown French apartment building battle against an army of deadly, rapidly reproducing spiders.
OFF RAMP – East Coast Premiere
Nathan Tape | USA | 2023
A couple of lovable, degenerate Juggalos must sojourn through America’s hellish underbelly to The Gathering of the Juggalos, the one place on earth they feel accepted.
OMEN – New England Premiere
Baloji | Belgium, Congo | 2023
After spending years in Belgium, a young Congolese man returns to his birthplace of Kinshasa to confront the intricacies of his family and culture.
SLEEP – New England Premiere
Jason Yu | South Korea | 2023
A young, expectant wife must figure out how to stop her husband’s nightmarish sleepwalking habits before he harms himself or his family.
STRANGE KINDNESS – World Premiere
Joseph Mault | USA | 2024
Strange Kindness is a film about isolation, the shocking acts of violence that have come to punctuate our American dream, and what empathy might look like at its further limits. While the film’s content is political its treatment of themes is far more mythological in nature.
THE BECOMERS – New England Premiere
Zach Clark | USA | 2023
A body-snatching alien comes to Earth, reconnects with their partner, and tries to find their way in modern America.
TIGER STRIPES – Massachusetts Premiere
Amanda Nell Eu | Malaysia | 2023
An 11-year-old girl who is carefree until she starts to experience horrifying physical changes to her body.
WITH LOVE AND A MAJOR ORGAN – New England Premiere
Kim Albright | Canada | 2023
In an alternate world where hearts are made of objects and suppressing emotions is self-care, a lonely woman rips out her own heart for the man she loves, only to discover that he has run away with it.