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blog.indieflix.com is proud to partner with Cathie Horlick of CAT’S BLOG. Her first post as a guest blogger recounts her evening with friends and zombies with IndieFlix’s Film Festival in a Box: Zombies. 

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f there’s anything you should know about me, it’s that I love watching movies—all kinds of movies; horror, sci-fi, action, foreign, feature length and shorts, any chance that I get. I love storytelling with moving images as they take me places I’ve never been, make me cry, laugh, and indulge my imagination. In my quest to watch all the movies I can I’ve been known to average a movie a day, watching movies at home, on a big screen, solo and with friends.

Gathering friends together to watch movies only enhances a movie watching experience. Together we watch and save all the talking till the credits roll. At a regular movie night at home my fellow film-fanatic friends and I gather to watch something we’ve never seen, and enjoy a little conversation time. Now, the rule is to give the movie its deserved attention, but we can share some jokes and make comments now and again.

I recently got my hands on an IndieFlix Film Festival in a Box, a collection of short films: the best of the best from various festivals, all on one handy little disc. IndieFlix is a site that unites filmmakers and film watchers to share and discuss movies and movie making;their motto is: “Connecting people through movies.” For an avid movie watcher like me it’s been a cool resource on the Internet.

With Film Festival in a Box, the boxes are all themed, and I had the Zombie Edition at my disposal. As soon as I had a free evening I used it to gather together a couple of my favorite movie-night regulars for an impromptu Horror Film Festival night.

The evening’s Short Film Panelists included myself, an obsessive movie watcher; Julia, an all-around cool girl and actress who also works at an awesome local revival house movie theater; and Dave, my boyfriend who is almost—almost—as movie-obsessed as Julia and I. (To further add to our “cred” we are all self-proclaimed horror movie aficionados.) We popped on the disc, settled in, and let the zombies fill the screen to entertain us.

First up we saw “How I Survived the Zombie Apocalypse” (2009): A mother and son are in survival mode in a zombie-infested world, and they’ve made it a game to help each other stay alive.

Second was “Plague” (2009): As a man tries to make a change to his life as a gunrunner, the zombie plague strikes. With crushed hopes he still searches for meaning in order to survive.

Third came “I Love Sarah Jane” (2009): It’s the zombie apocalypse in Australia; we see the world from the perspective of a few neighborhood kids, particularly from one young boy who loves Sarah Jane.

And last, but not least, we watched “Zombie-American” (2005): A Zombie in America shares how he lives day to day in a society that’s usually not so kind to the undead.

IndieFlix’s Film Festival in a Box rules suggest deliberating to choose winners for the categories of Best Film, Best Performance and Best Original Story. At the end of the evening we unanimously all loved “I Love Sarah Jane.” It got all the votes for Best Film, Best Performance and Best Original Story, because it is that good.

When the zombie genre can takes a fresh and new direction it’s refreshing. These days zombies can get pretty boring with the “bite, transform, run and kill” scenario. “I Love Sarah Jane” has great production value and the kids are all believable. I really dug seeing things from their point of view.

During our post-movie discussion we gave “How I Survived the Zombie Apocalypse” some props. It got our votes for Best Zombie Make-Up, and we all liked its use of lighting. It also had a great ending, which wasn’t immediately expected considering how it began.

Also part of the game that is Film Festival in a Box, IndieFlix encourages you to visit the website to share the Best of the Best votes for the filmmakers to see. While there we also checked out the trivia questionnaire. Actually you can take the trivia test on the site or print it out for the group. It’s fun and helps encourage everyone watching to pay extra attention to the details within each film.

Watching the Zombie edition we all go to talking about our favorite Zombie movies and the tropes we like and dislike. We then shared what we’d do should the Zombie Apocalypse actually happen. Everyone should have a plan in effect for the sake of safety!

I highly recommend Indie Flix’s Film Festival In A Box. I’m already rounding up another round of panelists for another Film Festival night. Anytime is a good time to watch movies. In fact it’s all for the love of watching movies and watching them with friends.