Brewce Longo showcases underground cinema at BloodSick Film Festival

Blood, sweat, and tears on film

Longo’s first film BloodSick Psychosis was shot in autumn 2021, but his filmmaking journey began fifteen years earlier. He was inspired to direct after seeing Chris Seaver’s Filthy McNastier (2002). “At the time I’d never seen anything like it. He shot it in his home with his friends.” After writing “four or five” scripts he asked his friends to star in a “gross-out comedy slasher called Jenkem,” he said with a wry smile. The shoot was a failure and the footage lost. Longo stepped away from filmmaking for years before producing a Gumby-inspired stop motion commercial for Tired Hands brewing. Friends-of-friends started asking Longo to make stop motion videos for their bands, he obliged and continued to receive commissions. Longo met future collaborators Josh Christensen and Mike DiFrancesco at Exhumed Films’ 24 Hour Horror-thon and wrote the script for BloodSick Psychosis during lockdown in 2020. “The difference between fifteen years ago and [2020] was that I had a group of friends that really cared about making movies.” Longo has expanded his circle by touring his films around the country, producing in California, Michigan, and Kentucky, and attending conventions like Dead Formats and the Mahoning Drive-In’s VHS Fest. Art Label/Vinegar Syndrome picked up Vick and Tarstar’s Scarecrow Factory for distribution in spring 2026.

BloodSick Psychosis premiered at PhilaMOCA. Longo programmed screenings for underground directors like David “the Rock” Nelson and J.R. Bookwalter. “I already had this correspondence with them because you had to talk to them to buy their movies.” PhilaMOCA offered Longo a monthly slot and BloodSick Underground Cinema was born. “I want it to be a place where you can find your new favorite indie nobody.” The March 2026 screening of the M. Sisters’ Divine Hammer (2026) sold out in four days, prompting a second showing. “People started coming to me asking for shows, but I only get twelve nights a year,” so Longo proposed a film festival to PhilaMOCA.

Longo, Christensen, Kasper Meltedhair, Ryan Petrillo, and Erin Caywood combed over 300 submissions to organize two days of underground cinema that span from transgressive shot-on-video horror to bizarro comedy and arthouse experiments. “It’s a very diverse lineup,” with a mix of features and shorts, live action, and animation, and a variety of formats. The inaugural BloodSick Film Festival will screen at PhilaMOCA on April 18 with directors in attendance and Ortlieb’s on April 19.

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