YNOT – The second annual PollyGrind Film Festival is slated to hit Las Vegas in October, offering filmmakers and fans more than a week’s worth of edgy, alternative movies. Billed as “Las Vegas’ premiere underground film festival,” PollyGrind’s first outing wowed fans and critics alike with its offbeat, juried collection of banned, censored and otherwise rejected content.

Even better? More than half of the 20-plus PollyGrind Award winners screened during the festival found distribution contracts. The number of awards to be presented this year—in categories including Best Use of Nudity/Sexuality, Best Use of Violence/Gore, Best Use of Music, Most Outrageous and Most Creative—is expected to rise.

“More than half of the features we screened last year received DVD distribution, and that list grows almost every day,” said PollyGrind promoter Chad Clinton Freeman (Killer Biker Chicks, Johnny Reaper, and Gingerdead Man 3-D: Saturday Night Cleaver), dubbed “the new champion of unabashed B-movie sleaze” by ArrowInTheHead.com. “This year, PollyGrind will feature even more films, and we’re going to help expose all of these great indie works to an even bigger audience than we were able to last year.”

The festival is accepting entries of features with running times of 70 minute or more, trailers and ad spots through July 13. Prizes include $10,000 worth of software from Sony Creative, Final Draft and Red Giant Software in addition to sub-distribution packages from Apprehensive Films, arthouse distribution contracts from venue host theatre7 and DVD distribution by Breaking Glass Pictures. Both the top jury award winner and the top audience award winner will receive a DVD contract with Vicious Circle Films, a specialty label belonging to Breaking Glass Pictures.

With a growing catalog of nearly 100 titles including Cropsey, Someone’s Knocking at the Door, Ticked Off Trannies with Knives, and Easter Bunny Kill! Kill!, Breaking Glass Pictures is an East Coast-based film distribution company formed in 2009. The company includes an international sales division.

“I’m super excited about this partnership,” Freeman said. “Like PollyGrind, Breaking Glass Pictures is about boldly going where others don’t. The same can be said for theatre7 and a number of our other sponsors.

“Aside from Breaking Glass Pictures and Apprehensive Films, Wild Eye Releasing has shown an interest in this year’s PollyGrind,” he added. “The company, known for releasing controversial and groundbreaking films such as Night of the Living Dead Reanimated, Gothkill, Blitzkrieg: The Escape from Stalag 69, and Bill Zebub’s Dolla Morte, has recently signed on as a sponsor.”

PollyGrind is an annual underground film festival that considers any and all independently produced and non-distributed movies that are slightly off kilter. The festival consists of programming in the tradition of grindhouse theaters, with double features bookended by trailers and music videos. The event welcomes, but is not limited to horror, gore, sci-fi, fantasy, exploitation, sexploitation, arthouse, cult, experimental, dark, creepy and campy features.

Set to take place at theatre7 Oct. 7-16, the PollyGrind Film Festival’s aim is to celebrate individuality, diversity, creativity and empowerment by showcasing the work of filmmakers with defiantly independent visions.

“PollyGrind is going to end up being the key festival for indie cult filmmakers to land distribution deals,” said Jonathan Morken of Apprehensive Films, which has adopted the slogan “we produce and distribute films of questionable taste.”

For more information about the festival and the competition, click here.