Currently holding the traveling trophy for the Socorro Independent School District sisd Zombie Film Festival, the Spartan AV production club looks to hold their championship title.

The SISD sponsored film festival has since been modified to open for a broader range of genres and possibilities, now being refereed to as “Horror Fest.” This will prove to be a good or bad change.

The previous qualifications for any film to be submitted made judging and scoring easy across the board. All films had to revolve around zombies, a school rule had to be implemented or at least mentioned somewhere throughout the movie, and of course no profanity was allowed. All of these rules may appear to act as restrictions that hold back a film’s creative potential, but at the same time it gave every film an equal opportunity to showcase it’s ability to stick to the script. No one school in particular had a logistical advantage over another, truly evening the playing field.

However, now, with the new and updated rubric, films have a plethora of new options to eclipse over another if done properly. The plot can be anything you consider scary, the setting can be anywhere in El Paso, all shot types are allowed, and the rules limiting the amount of gore have been slightly pulled back. This news makes us cinematographers drool with anticipation. The simple fact that the genres are now virtually limitless has opened up a whole new can of worms to work with. There is undoubtedly going to be spooky ghost movies, paranormal thrillers, frightening slashers, and maybe even the classic and still acceptable action packed zombie flick.

Unfortunately, this change could end up backfiring. The new and very loose guidelines could lead filmmakers from all schools to stray in very different directions with their movies. This could in turn lead to the argument that two films which aren’t even in the same spectrum regarding plot, story, ect.. cannot fairly be compared, as they each are entirely in their own field. Nonetheless, the Spartans predict that their rival, El Dorado, is surely going to deliver, but the Spartans plan to once again out perform them and go home with the trophy.

The Spartans have begun planning and pre-production, and if everything goes according to schedule, shooting will commence during the Fall intersession.