Shock, look and listen

Film fans who prefer multimedia thrills to multiplex fodder have flocked to the Halloween Society's events since its 1992 inception.

Over the years, the Halloween Society has mutated through different guises, including collaborations with the hip 1990s big-screen club soirèe Kentra, its Full Length club nights with live bands and this annual short film festival.

The festival is now in its fourth year and extended to a ten-day event across the ICA, Curzon Soho and smart new bar/screening room the Roxy.

'I don't think there were any long-term plans behind Halloween,' explains founder Philip Ilson. 'Everything has grown out of trying something different. We don't want to be a festival that is purely cinema-based, so using these particular spaces works really well.'

Is it hard to keep Halloween edgy now it's an established event? No, according to Ilson: 'There's a constant influx of young film-makers with short works. We've always been quite hands-on and we like mixing it up - showing larger-budget, 35mm prints alongside something quirky that someone just shot in their back garden.'

Music has always been integral to the society. The 2007 festival paints the town red with its opening latenight horror bill (tonight, Curzon Soho, 11pm), featuring the Death By Dawn horror award and a suitably Gothic DJ set. On Monday (ICA, 8pm), Halloween teams up with Birmingham's 7 Inch Cinema to present live improvised soundtracks from experimental duo Black Galaxy (Simon Mabbutt and Nicholas Bullen, who co-founded the legendary Napalm Death in his early teens).

'Black Galaxy is based on electronics and rhythms,' explains Bullen. 'When we perform, I'd like people to focus on the images as well as our sounds because they lead to other ideas.' They're accompanying an intriguing bill here: Man Ray's 1928 surrealist film L'...toile De Mer alongside Watson and Webber's 1933 saga Lot In Sodom.'It's rather erotic for its time,' explains Bullen. 'Many people view it as the first openly homosexual film made in America.'

Highlights - too many to mention here - include a retrospective of music video/film-making siblings The Blaine Brothers (Thu, ICA, 6.15pm), while glammy punk rockers The Priscillas play live and judge Lo-Budget Mayhem's new film talent (Jan 12, ICA, 8pm). Whatever night you choose, Halloween remains an entertaining shock to the system.

Tonight until Jan 14, various times and prices. www.shortfilms.org.uk Curzon Soho, 93-107 Shaftesbury Avenue W1. Tel: 020 7734 2255. Tube: Tottenham Court Road ICA, The Mall SW1. Tel: 020 7930 3647. www.ica.org.uk Tube: Charing Cross/Piccadilly Circus Roxy Bar And Screen, 128-132 Borough High Street E1. Tel: 020 7407 4057. www.roxybarandscreen.com Tube: Borough/London Bridge