Popcorn Frights Film Festival was established in 2015 by Miami locals Igor Shteyrenberg and Marc Ferman and has quickly grown into the leading international genre film festival in Southeast United States.

Popcorn Frights’ programming voice, unique among genre film festivals, has gained recognition for its numerous discoveries and prize winners. Annual attendance and media Impressions have grown exponentially with the Festival’s original audience increasing from 400 in 2015 to over 8,000 in 2021. The Festival has introduced a diverse group of filmmakers including renowned stars and directors such as Graham Skipper, Joe Lynch, Neil Marshall, Greg McLean, Colin Minihan, Lucky McKee, Justin Benson & Aaron Moorhead, Trent Haaga, Brad Michael Elmore, Mickey Keating, and Darren Lynn Bousman. Domestic US theatrical distributors participating in the Festival have included 20th Century Fox, Warner Bros., A24, Focus Features, Fox Searchlight, IFC, Gunpowder & Sky, and Oscilloscope, among many others.

Popcorn Frights has been declared one of “The World’s 50 Best Genre Festivals” by Moviemaker Magazine, recognized as one of the “The Best Horror Festivals in the World” by Dread Central, noted as one of the “Top 100 Best Reviewed Festivals” by FilmFreeway, and named “One of the Best Film Festival’s in Florida” by the Sun-Sentinel. It is also the largest genre film festival in the Southeast United States. In the last three years, the Festival has screened films from more than 20 countries, including over 100 World, International, North American, US and East Coast Premieres. Popcorn Frights special focus on discovering new talent and recognizing established filmmakers has made it a natural gateway for the best in genre films from around the world.

The Festival is hosted at the O Cinema South Beach, located just across the street from the world-famous Ocean Drive boulevard in the heart of Miami Beach, as well as the Savor Cinema in Fort Lauderdale, a historic theater that was originally built as a Methodist Church in the 1940’s after the first building was blown away by the monster hurricane of 1926.