City's first ever horror and sci-fi film festival to showcase work of Portsmouth film-makers

Films from around the world, as well as those shot in the city, will be shown at the Pastel Wasteland Film Festival held at the Boathouse No. 6 cinema in the historic dockyards.

Headlining the event on November 16 will be the feature-length I Am an Addict, created by Portsmouth media company Pastel Wasteland.

For the film's producer Rob Ulitski, the festival was an opportunity to bring the city's film community together.

Rob, 27, who lives in North End said: 'This is the first Pastel Wasteland film festival but we hope there will be more.

'It is really nice that we can do this in Portsmouth because there's not a huge film community here, it's very much underground.'

I Am an Addict is a horror anthology made up of eight separate short films, including six filmed in Portsmouth locations such as the Hilsea Lines.

'They are all based on the theme of addiction,' Rob said. 'Six of the short films were shot in Portsmouth and the other two come from the US and Mexico.

'All of our crew were Portsmouth based, the university were really good and we had a lot of students helping us out.'

The film will appear before Portsmouth City Council's licensing team next week to determine its classification.

Councillor Claire Udy, who usually chairs city licensing meetings, will not be involved in the classification process due to a conflict of interest. However, she believed the festival was a good opportunity.

She said: 'What I love the most is it's getting people involved at a local level and a grassroots level and doing something amazing.

'We have got some amazing artists in Portsmouth who are really great at getting people involved but we need to push for more of that. It needs to go 10 times further and for the city to be a real cultural centre.'

The festival will take place at 1pm on Saturday, November 16. Tickets are available on the Boathouse No. 6 website.