See pictures of horror movie filmed in Hastings about to be released

The seaside slasher, called Punch and directed by Andy Edwards, sees its UK digital release on Monday (January 22), courtesy of Miracle Media.

The movie features a pulverising puppet relentlessly terrorising the town’s local youth.

Andy said: “We were scouting various seaside towns around the south coast, and it was another film director friend of mine, Airell Anthony Hayles, who suggested Hastings.

“He's from the town, and he's shot several films here, such as folk-horror film They're Outside. He showed me all the best spots and ticked all the boxes for locations we needed.

“That local connection definitely helped - Airell's brother also shot some of our drone shots, his sister helped with the catering, and another brother is in the film. I also liked the slight pagan/folk-horror vibe that Hastings has, with the Jack-in-the-Green festival, and that fitted our film very well.”

Andy added that the movie is not entirely shot in Hastings. He said due to logistics and permissions reasons, a few scenes were filmed in Brighton, Camber Sands, and Clacton-on-Sea in Essex.

He said: “So, the fictional town in the film is a hybrid of all of those places - but around 80 per cent Hastings.”

Andy said he now had an affinity with Hastings after spending several weeks here shooting the film.

He said: “It was a very intense experience on a tight schedule, and we had to pack in as much as we could every day. So, we were constantly on the move - one morning, we were in a chip shop, then on the pier in the afternoon, then on to the beach at night. I was constantly on the look-out for interesting angles and shots everywhere I went, so it feels like I got to know the location very well in a short space of time.

“Everyone in the town was very welcoming and accommodating to our cast and crew, so Hastings definitely has a place in all of our hearts now. And we want to do a sequel, so hopefully, we'll be back in the not-too-distant future.”

Main shooting of the movie took place in March 2022 and Andy and his crew were in Hastings for two weeks.

He said: “We then had various extra shots such as special effects and stunt scenes to do after that, which we did throughout 2022. Then, in 2023, it was in post-production, and it premiered at Frightfest in London's Leicester Square in August last year.

“The film came about primarily because I wanted to make a very ‘British’ slasher movie. The US has all those iconic masked killers - Michael Myers, Jason from Friday 13th, Ghostface from Scream etc - but we don't really have one.

“I was struggling to think what the character could be, but then I combined it with another idea I had, which was to set a film in a seaside town in winter. I love the melancholy, windswept vibe of a coastal town out of season, and when I thought of a masked killer in that environment, Mr Punch immediately popped out at me.

“Even in his kid's-entertainment puppet form, Mr Punch is a pretty horrible character - beating his wife and child, attacking the police etc. So it didn't take too much to turn him into a masked serial killer terrorising a small seaside town.”

Andy is an award-winning director, writer and producer from Birmingham. His first feature as a writer/director was the zombie-comedy Ibiza Undead and his most recent title, Punch, earned plaudits at its world premiere at FrightFest 2023.