‘Never After Dark’ Takes Top Prize as Grimmfest Reveals 2026 Award Winners

Grimmfest has closed the book on its 2026 in-person Manchester edition by revealing a wide-ranging slate of Grimm Reaper Award winners, with Japanese horror Never After Dark taking Best Feature Film, creature horror Crawlers winning over audiences and genre veterans Adrienne Barbeau and Steve Pink receiving major career honours.

The awards follow this year’s four-day festival at Odeon Great Northern, where an international programme of horror, fantasy and genre cinema screened from 8 to 11 October. The jury comprised filmmaker Jennifer Trudrung, Trinity Content Partners’ Tim Scaping, academic and author Dr Xavier Aldana Reyes and Love Horror’s (our own) Tom Atkinson.

Dave Boyle’s Never After Dark claimed the festival’s top prize, with the jury highlighting its old-school atmosphere, use of sound and shadow and lead performance from Moeka Hoshi. The film also shared Best Scare with The Whisper, while Crawlers and Under Your Feet received special mentions in the same category.

Crawlers went on to take the Audience Award after a tight public vote, with Marama finishing second and Never After Dark placing third. Marama also picked up a special mention for Best Feature Film.

Acting prizes were spread across several of the festival’s most prominent titles. Thierry Frémont won Best Actor for The Ones Who Grieve, while Best Actress was shared between Ariana Osborne for Marama and Margarita Zachariou for Motherwitch. Toby Stephens took Best Supporting Actor for Marama, with Adrienne Barbeau and Asia Argento sharing Best Supporting Actress for Oddities and Stronger Than the Devil respectively.

Aitore Zholdaskali won Best Director for Sicko, while Graham Guit received Best Screenplay for Stronger Than the Devil. That film also claimed Best Ensemble Cast, while practical effects honours went jointly to The Glorious Dead and Boxcutter.

Elsewhere, The Room Below won Best Creature Design, Crawlers took Best VFX and Alberto Torres received Best Score for Disforia. Ben Lee Allan and Damien Fannon won Best Editing for Ivan, while Nick William’s work on Marama earned Best Art Direction.

The festival’s debut and emerging talent categories also produced several notable winners. Harvest took Best Short, Qui Insieme won the Méliès Best European Short and They Always Come at Night received the Debut Feature Award.

Jacob Santana earned a Special Achievement Award for directing both Evil Dress and Reversion, while Boxcutter received its own Special Achievement recognition. The Glorious Dead and Ithaqua shared the Achievement in Production Award, with the latter having been shot in temperatures reported as low as -52°C.

Grind won Best Comedy, while Steve Pink received the Legacy Award for a career that includes Terrestrial, Grosse Pointe Blank, High Fidelity and Hot Tub Time Machine.

The festival’s Lifetime Achievement Award went to Adrienne Barbeau, recognising a horror career stretching from The Fog through to her recent appearance in Oddities.

With Grimmfest 2026 now concluded, the full list of Grimm Reaper Award winners is available through the festival, ahead of further Grimmfest screenings and activity across the year.

Grimmfest Online

Of course, Grimmfest’s 2026 programme is not quite finished yet. The festival will return online later this year with 16 feature film premieres and two short-film programmes available to watch from home, including one world premiere, five international premieres, six UK premieres and three Northern UK premieres. Among the highlights is the world premiere of Deadcast, giving audiences another chance to discover new genre work beyond the main Manchester event.

Looking further ahead, Grimmfest has also confirmed the dates for its 2027 edition. The festival will return to ODEON Great Northern in Manchester from 7 to 10 October 2027, with further programme details to be announced in due course. For now, horror fans can explore the upcoming online line-up and start planning for next year’s return.

For more information on those events and the awards, visit: grimmfest.com/festival/