Jury #3
Johnny Vivash
Johnny Vivash is an Irish actor, based in London for the last 25 years. He has performed in features with award winning companies like Dark Rift Films (Book of Monsters, How to Kill Monsters) Crossroads Pictures (Walking Against the Rain), Dark Temple Motion Pictures (Freeze, Artic Edge, Lord of Wolves) amongst others and more recently the German based, Elite Film Group, (The Behemoth). These wonderful partnerships have taken him all over Europe and the United States.
He predominantly works on Independent horror / Sci-Fi shorts and features. Johnny has also been an Executive Producer across multiple projects pre and post filming. Enjoying script consulting and formulating festival circuit strategies for various projects. Recently he joined Black Sunday Film Festival in the United Kingdom as a selector and organiser.
In between working on film projects, Johnny can be found gorging like a ravenous zombie on all types of film genre and attending film festivals, nationally and internationally expanding his industry network. Horror films have played a major part of his film appreciation, genre knowledge and theoretical understanding. His particular preference falls in the realm of Folk/Folklore Horror.
Chiara Kamnik
Chiara Kamnik, born in Klagenfurt am Wörthersee, discovered her passion for horror films at the age of 13. Works like “Jaws” and “Cannibal Holocaust” sparked her enthusiasm for genre cinema. While she appreciates blood and mutilation, she also loves a gripping and innovative script. However, real fear comes over her with anything paranormal and ghost stories – jump scares usually end with a scream that startles the neighborhood.
The musicologist has room in her heart not only for horror, but also for music, gaming, step aerobics and amateur radio. In 2020, she took on the renowned “Fright Nights – the ultimate festival of fear” by founding father Heinz Olbrich – in a voluntary capacity as festival director together with Jennifer Brandner, Florian Schriebl and Mario Fuchs. The film festival, which takes place annually at the Hollywood Megaplex Pluscity in Upper Austria, focuses on horror in high-end, independent, trash and low budget productions.
PS: Call for Entries open from March 15th.
Dominik Balkow
Dominik Balkow studied film directing in his hometown Berlin. After graduating in 2012, he worked independently as a director on over 65 music videos. His third short film “O” was part of LAKFF in 2022 and won among other awards the renowned “Méliès d’Argent” as best European genre short. His independent feature film debut “Aphasie” (English: Aphasia) celebrated its world premiere at the 56th International Hof Film Festival and will finally be released online this spring.
