(Toronto, ON) – Acclaimed cartoonist, charismatic filmmaker and 2D animator, Toronto-local, The Evil Dr. Minz, has thrown his iconic top hat into the CineCoup ring this year to vie for the highly competitive $1 million prize in Banff in June. If pronounced the winner, the potential top-select will produce and direct his speculative horror feature, HYPNOTICA: THE NIGHTMARIST. Watch trailer here.
HYPNOTICA: THE NIGHTMARIST explores the intersection of life and death when a writer obsessed with enlightenment experiments with self-hypnosis. Introduce The Nightmarist, an ancient demonic spirit that invades the writer’s consciousness, a la Freddy Kruger, and shapeshifts its way through outrageous dreamscapes in a crusade to exact evil on humanity. Part DR. SUESS, part THE THING and part THE CELL, HYPNOTICA: THE NIGHTMARIST fuses live action with animated gore and delivers a sinister villain who violently preys on spiritual delinquents. HYPNOTICA: THE NIGHTMARIST is destined to be a solid B-Film classic and prominently features the deviant music of electronic trance duo SQUID LID, currently on the first leg of their European tour.
ABOUT THE FILMMAKER
Chris Minz, a.k.a. The Evil Dr. Minz, is an institution in Toronto’s art and music scenes. Minz gained notoriety for his illustrated Keith Richards series satirizing the ROLLING STONES icon, as well as for his Facebook cartoons, which led him to publish his illustrated caffeine-driven book, THE SUBCONSCIOUS JUNGLE.
Formerly the lead singer/lead guitarist in DR. MINZ AND THE CHRONIC HARMONIC, a Tony Robbins/Frank Zappa-inspired ensemble, Minz and his band gained traction with their contribution to the soundtrack of Bruce McDonald’s cult-classic ROADKILL. Minz went on to direct music videos for legendary rock talent, KING CRIMSON alumni Trey Gunn and Adrian Belew, the BARENAKED LADIES and Kevin Hearn.
Influenced by the fantasy and fearlessness of directors/artists such as David Cronenberg, David Lynch and Hayao Miyazaki, Minz wrote/directed THE AMORPHOUS MIND POLICE FACTOR (feature), HI BUDGIE (short) and THE VERY IMAGINARY FRIEND (feature). His TV credits include BEETLEJUICE and THE NEVERENDING STORY.
Dr. Minz’s carnival of style makes this auteur an authentic original. His obsession with freedom of imagination motivates him to dream big and be bizarre.
HOW TO
Visit HYPNOTICA: THE NIGHTMARIST on CineCoup and submit your vote for this week’s mission. Voting is Monday-Friday each week until the end of May. *Each week there is a new mission that will need your vote, comment and/or rating.
Sign up in three easy steps:
- Enter your name and email on the CineCoup site
- Confirm your email
- Go to the Hypnotica page and vote!
WHAT IS CINECOUP?
CineCoup is a disruptive platform for indie filmmakers and their fans derived to develop, market and finance feature films. CineCoup challenges entrants to new tasks each week and each week voters login and choose their favourite outcome of that week’s challenge. There are 12 rounds over 12 weeks and at the end, the top five fan-favourites go on to pitch to a panel of financiers at the Banff World Media Festival in June 2015, competing in-person for the chance at $1 million to make their film and screen it in Cineplex theatres across Canada.