By Eric Ortiz
The Fantastic Pavilion presents a Weekly Recap with the most relevant news about the world of genre cinema.
News
Ken Russell fans rejoice! Warner Bros. Clockwork has shared the official trailer and a new poster for the highly anticipated director’s cut of The Devils (1971). This 4K restoration is heading to cinemas on October 16 (in the U.S.) and October 30 (in the UK and Ireland).
About the restoration: “The new 4K restoration of Ken Russell’s masterpiece was assembled from the original camera negative. The film’s sound has been remastered from original English Composite 35mm Mag Film, transferred at 96kHz, plus other original film elements in selected spots as needed.”
The trailer for Maya Annik Bedward’s Black Zombie (2026) leaves no doubt that this documentary is going to be a rich history lesson about the roots of the zombie, linked to colonial Haiti, slavery, and voodoo. Black Zombie opens theatrically in NYC and LA on September 11, via Kino Lorber.
Synopsis: “Black Zombie digs beneath the blood-soaked spectacle of modern horror to uncover the zombie’s buried and unsettling origins. Long before it became associated with flesh-eating ghouls, the zombie was a living metaphor for slavery: not a monster, but the ultimate victim of colonial power. A symbol of stolen agency was recast as an object of fear, while Black spiritual traditions were distorted, sensationalized, and erased.”
You can watch now the cool Gator Face (2026) trailer, ahead of its digital debut in the U.S. on September 15. Gator Face is set in Florida, features “real alligators,” and follows “a group of friends” who “are hunted through the swamps by a savage cult that feeds its victims to ravenous alligators in the name of an ancient reptilian god.”
Festivals
The Strasbourg European Fantastic Film Festival (September 25-October 4) announced their first wave of 2026 titles, which includes Joko Anwar’s Ghost in the Cell (2026), Nikias Chryssos’ Bloody Tennis (2026), and Adrian Chiarella’s Leviticus (2026).
A couple of Galician genre festivals recently presented their respective 2026 posters: the Galician Freaky Film Festival (GFFF) and the Curtas Festival do Imaxinario.
The 10th edition of the Galician Freaky Film Festival will take place in Vigo (September 17-26). A double bill of The Fly (1986) and The Toxic Avenger (1984) is set for opening night, while Big Trouble in Little China (1986) for closing night.
On the other hand, the 54th Curtas Festival do Imaxinario is happening from October 23 to November 1 in Vilagarcía de Arousa.
Home video
Rob Zombie’s Firefly Trilogy (House of 1000 Corpses, The Devil’s Rejects, 3 from Hell) is getting the deluxe edition treatment on October 13, as Lionsgate is releasing a massive eight-disc box set with the flicks on both 4K UHD and Blu-ray.