Second Kathmandu Horror Film Fest Wraps Up at the Russian House

Kathmandu : The second Kathmandu Horror Film Fest (KHFF) concluded at the Russian House in Kathmandu on November 1. The festival ran from October 30 to November 1. It was organized by the Nepal Film & Cultural Academy with the support of the Russian House in Kathmandu, Cine Makers Nepal and IME Khalti.

For several days, the hall was filled with chills. During the most terrifying scenes, many viewers couldn’t take the tension and stepped out to catch their breath. But most stayed to the end: fear is exactly what they came for.

The closing ceremony brought together cultural figures, diplomats and filmmakers. The guests of honor were:

⦁ Brajesh Khanal – Chancellor Emeritus of the Nepal Academy of Music and Drama, chief guest of the ceremony;
⦁ Rinchen Rakshaev – Minister-Counsellor and Deputy Chief of Mission, Embassy of Russia in Nepal;
⦁ Ganesh Shah – former Minister of Environment, Science and Technology of Nepal;
⦁ Anastasia Khokhlova – Head of the Russian House in Kathmandu;
⦁ K.P. Pathak – Chairman of the Nepal Film & Cultural Academy.

Festival Director Rashik Pathak announced the results of KHFF 2026. The competition featured 18 short films and 6 feature-length films. The audience-vote winners were:
🏆 Best Short Film – “KNAR” (Nepal), directed by Akash Dhimal;
🏆 Best Feature Film – “In This Darkness I See You” (France, Lebanon, Qatar, Saudi Arabia), directed by Nadim Tabet.

A special event of the festival was the out-of-competition screening of the Russian film “The Wind”, directed by Sergei Chliyants from a screenplay by Pyotr Lutsik and Alexei Samoryadov. After the screening, viewers lingered for a long time to discuss the film.

Speaking at the ceremony, Anastasia Khokhlova thanked everyone who made the festival possible. She stressed how important it is to support horror filmmakers and the young people drawn to the genre:

“That atmosphere lets you test your limits and reveal your creativity from deep within. It is the kind of creativity that adults or the mainstream may not value or mark, but you do it from the depths of your heart, with no fear of not fitting into the values and traditions of the genre. To my mind, that means we have grown since the first, pilot festival we held last year. The second edition definitely shows development and progress. I believe the third one will be even better and brighter, bringing us more emotions and letting us look directly into the eyes of all our fears and feel superior to them.”

KHFF is Nepal’s first horror film festival, launched in 2025 with the support of the Russian House. It has already become an important platform for auteur horror cinema: each year’s program includes premieres acclaimed at major international festivals, and the top award is given by the audience itself.

In two years, the festival’s reach has grown noticeably. In 2026, audiences saw films from Egypt, France, Germany, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Lebanon and Qatar, Nepali works and the Russian “The Wind.” The festival’s themes are evolving from classic tales of fear toward cinema in which horror springs from social anxieties and the pain of the real world. The organizers hope KHFF will continue to bring filmmakers and audiences from around the world to Kathmandu every year.

Thank you to everyone who sat with us in the dark. See you at the third festival!