Landon Zakheim and Michael Lerman, co-founders of the four-day genre-focused Overlook Film Festival, together represent the duality of horror fans — Lerman is fluent in the sequels of every slasher franchise, while Zakheim has a more self-proclaimed “pretentious” taste, preferring giallo and experimental fare. Together they’ve created a fan-focused festival that is quickly becoming the hottest ticket in New Orleans.
“We often talked about the difference between the business of film and the chaos of a festival versus the actual definition of the word ‘festival,’ the celebration aspect of it,” Zakheim says of the just-wrapped event, which ran from April 3-6. “At the time, genre and horror films were not in the boom we are seeing now, which is wonderful. Yet this corner of the festival circuit is filled with the kindest filmmakers, the most supportive fans, and people who want to help each other out, and we had all of these ideas.”
Zakheim and Lerman are veterans of the festival circuit, with the former a short film programmer at Sundance, an associate programmer at Tribeca and a senior programmer for the Philadelphia Film Festival, while Lerman is the artistic director of the Philadelphia Film Society and has also programmed for the Toronto International Film Festival and Fantastic Fest.
In 2016, the pair got serious about the idea of a new festival and held the inaugural Overlook at the Timberline Lodge in Oregon in 2017. The space, which served as the exterior location of the Overlook Hotel in Stanley Kubrick’s “Shining” adaption, served them well at first, but tough weather conditions and limited interior space left them needing a new home. New Orleans was selected as the permanent locale and has housed the fest since 2018 — not including some digital editions held during the pandemic.
“It became clear we needed real movie theaters and a real city, and New Orleans came up pretty quickly,” Zakheim says. “We had some ties to New Orleans. We had some local staff who wanted to help out, and local partners who were interested in us coming here. We did not want to come to a place where we couldn’t be additive. We very much believe in not taking over an existing film culture — we want to be supportive. So we met with all the film organizations, and people were excited about us coming here.”
The city — well known for its haunted history — ended up being a perfect fit, and word is spreading each year about the fest. This year’s unlimited “Final Girl” badges — set at the cheeky price of $666 — sold out in one day, before the lineup was even announced.
“We have no premiere requirement,” Zakheim says. “We’re just trying to program the best movies in horror. That is why our audience typically books their trips before we announce the lineup. They have an expectation that they’ll see the stuff they’re excited about — and also stuff they don’t know they’re excited about yet. So we feel a great responsibility to scour everything.”
This year, outside of new films (like the world premiere of the “Dracula” sequel “Abraham’s Boys” and screenings of South by Southwest favorites like “Clown in a Cornfield” and “LifeHack”) and retrospectives (a 4K restoration of “Re-Animator” for its 40th anniversary), programming included many elements beyond the silver screen. There were several panels with horror authors, including Joe Hill, Grady Hendrix and Alex Jennings; a horror trivia competition; a pair of late-night dance parties held at the Toulouse Theater; and even a traditional New Orleans second line parade, given a spooky twist by festival sponsor Shudder, the horror streaming service which is celebrating its 10th anniversary.
Zakheim and Lerman consider these one-of-a-kind experiences to be the lifeblood of Overlook. One perfect blend was a Sunday afternoon screening of William Castle’s gimmicky 1960 film “13 Ghosts,” where audience members were given “Illusion-O” magic viewing glasses that matched the original release, with one side calibrated to let you see the film’s spirits, and the other color blocked in case you “don’t believe in ghosts.” The screening was preceded by Phantom Follies with Zabrecky, a magic exhibition that evoked the “spook show” séances that were popular during the Great Depression, complete with a lights-out ghost attack in the auditorium and ending with the magician frightened to death, sprawled on stage as “13 Ghosts” began screening.
Both founders agree that it’s amazing to see how far their passion project has come, despite its humble beginnings.
“Landon’s gotten incredibly good at raising money, which he did not know how to do when we started this,” Lerman says. “He just never had that job before. But all the capital was just us saying, ‘Let’s start this.’ We put in a little bit of money of our own and then we sold badges and used those badges to rent the theaters. It’s not like it’s not like we came in with some massive angel investor to build a business.”
Looking to the future and growth, Zakheim and Lerman always want to stretch the boundaries of what Overlook can deliver, but know they need to be realistic about keeping the quality control and intimacy of the festival intact, given that it’s entirely volunteer-run.
“There’s a tracking list, usually involving live events and immersive theater, of things that we want to do one day,” Zakheim says. “There are horror concerts we’ve discussed, but a lot of moving parts have to come together. There are projects n the festival this year that we talked about for years — the Shudder second line is a perfect example, and finally there was a path forward. There’s an endless amount of big concept ideas of how to make this a more experiential festival, but all of it depends on: What do we have the bandwidth for? What can we do without burning out? Can we get a good partner who will help with the fundraising, but also will be a good creative partner to make sure that it’s a good event?”
The duo knows that when they’re able to make all of the pieces connect, there’s a unique alchemy that lifts the whole audience. While reflecting on some of the festival’s biggest moments, Zakheim reminisced about a particularly engaged crowd during a 2023 screening of Castle’s film “The Tingler,” which was played according to the original roadshow instructions, including a staged moment where an “audience member” is removed on a stretcher because they’re too scared.
“It felt like this collective moment where everybody there was on the same page and loved horror for the same reasons,” he says. “It felt like we were all connected, and for that brief moment in the dark, that’s what we strive for.”
