Rashik Pathak
Festival Director
Coordinates every team, the venue and the finances, and leads sponsorships and industry networking.
About
Nepal has always told horror stories. It just never had a festival for them.
KHFF exists to give horror, fantasy and folklore cinema a permanent address in Kathmandu — and to build the audience those films have been waiting for.
Origin
A sister event to Nepal’s international festival
KHFF is organised by the Nepal Film & Cultural Academy (NFCA) as a sister event to the Nepal International Film Festival (NIFF), aiming to promote horror, fantasy, and folklore films in Nepal and help develop audiences for these genres.
The first edition ran in 2025. The second runs across Halloween 2026, from 31 October to 02 November, in the Kathmandu Valley.
Position
Genre is treated as cinema, not novelty
Submissions are read by a selection committee rather than filtered by a form. Masked ritual, mountain folklore, domestic hauntings, dystopia, animation and micro-shorts under five minutes are all judged on their own terms, in their own categories.
Films from anywhere in the world are welcome, provided they carry at least Nepal Premiere status and were completed on or after 1 January 2023.
What the festival commits to
Three promises made to every filmmaker who submits.
These are the terms selected filmmakers work under, stated plainly rather than buried in the rules page.
01
A live audience
Selected films are screened to a live audience in the Kathmandu Valley, on a cinema screen, across the three nights of the festival.
02
A clear decision date
Finalists and selected films are announced on 05 October 2026. The selection committee and programmers hold final jurisdiction.
03
Nothing kept afterwards
No participating film is stored or archived. Every file is deleted from the cinema server and all festival storage after the festival.
Our team
The people who make the festival happen.
Programmers, producers, projectionists and the communications desk — a small permanent team, joined each autumn by the selection committee and festival volunteers.
Portrait
3:4
Atin Shrestha
Head of Programming
Plans the film lineup, supervises the review process, and signs off design, graphics and social.
Portrait
3:4
Upashna Maharjan
Head of Event Design
Designs venue art, props and vendor stalls, and builds the programme cue sheet and floor flow.
Portrait
3:4
Sophil Sthapit
Content Manager
Runs the content calendar and social channels, and cuts the trailers and promo films.
Portrait
3:4
Riwaj Shrestha
PR Manager
Sets the PR strategy, supports marketing, and manages guests and invitations.
Portrait
3:4
Yashaswi Rupani
Production Manager
Produces festival video, writes the scripts and storyboards, and runs the filmmaking contest.
Portrait
3:4
Aadhya Manandhar
Communications Coordinator
Corresponds with filmmakers, partners and audiences, and carries the research and outreach.
Portrait
3:4
Ronik Pathak
Technical Coordinator
Handles screeners, DCP ingest, downloads and storage, and editing.
The city
Why Kathmandu suits the genre.
A valley of masked festivals, living deities and shrines older than the cinema itself. Horror here is not an import.
Masked dances are performed in public squares on fixed dates, deities are carried through the streets, and shrines to the fierce forms of the gods stand at ordinary intersections. Folklore is not a period setting to be researched here, which is why KHFF treats it as part of horror rather than adjacent to it.
The festival is hosted in the Kathmandu Valley over three nights spanning Halloween.
Visiting
Festival office.
The festival is hosted in the Kathmandu Valley over three nights spanning Halloween. Filmmakers travelling to attend can reach the festival office directly for venue, accreditation and guest details.
Festival office
Rehdon Bridge, Samakhusi – 26, Kathmandu, Bagmati 44600, Nepal
Organiser
Nepal Film & Cultural Academy (NFCA)
Telephone
+977 9801131383
Primary contact
Talk to the programmers before you submit
Questions about eligibility, premiere status, subtitles or DCP delivery are answered directly by the KHFF programming desk in Kathmandu. Write once and a person replies.