Grace Glowicki and Ben Petrie recently hauled their sublime Dead Lover right back to where it began: Toronto. The outrageous experimental arthouse horror-comedy served as the closing title for this year’s TIFF’s Midnight Madness program—a fittingly chaotic capstone not just for the festival, but for Dead Lover’s big, wild, stinky year.
And in proper Midnight Madness fashion, this wasn’t just another Toronto premiere. It was a full-blown theatrical event, complete with the cast and crew in tow. Billed as presented in STINK-O-VISION, Glowicki’s black-box horror-comedy was unleashed in true William Castle style: an immersive, scratch-and-sniff descent into smelly, vintage madness.
The TIFF premiere of Dead Lover
Glowicki, who shot the film entirely in-studio in Toronto, adopted a minimalist, German Expressionist–inspired aesthetic where spotlit characters emerge from walls of darkness. On its hometown premiere night, that vision extended beyond the screen.
“It was a delightfully wretched night debuting Dead Lover in glorious Stink-O-Vision for the very first time yesterday at TIFF, in front of 1200 audience members who gathered to defile their sense of smell,” Glowicki said. “It was high art meeting low art, scratching smell-cards scented like corpses and pussy at the historic Royal Alexandra Theatre.”
Co-creator Ben explained, “It was crucial to ensure the smells were commensurate to the movie’s taste. Which is to say, it was crucial they were f*cking disgusting.”
He added, “On Letterboxd, somebody wrote that the final smell on our scratch card was so wretched that it forged an instant community from all those who made it out the other side. I believe psychologists call it trauma bonding?”
Glowicki noted that not every smell was repulsive: “Opium, strawberry milkshake, and the scent of true love are all on the menu.”
Dead Lover follows a lonely, love-starved gravedigger whose grim life is disrupted when she finds the man of her dreams. Their heated romance briefly drags her from the muck—until tragedy strikes, and he seemingly drowns at sea. Desperate to bridge the divide between life and death, she embarks on grotesque, madcap experiments to resurrect him. The result is an absurd yet tender meditation on devotion, decay, and the limits of love.
Dead Lover is officially set as the inaugural release of the newly minted joint distribution venture, Cartuna x Dweck. The partnership marks its first all-rights acquisition after initially launching as a cult/DIY Blu-ray label, most notably for indie hit Hundreds of Beavers. It’s promised a proper theatrical release from the label.
The move calls back to MUBI’s gamble on The Substance, another Midnight Madness selection, which is itself a transgressive, gross, and brilliant film that reshaped the horror landscape. Dead Lover is following in its glorious, gross footsteps. TIFF audiences can now confirm: this one reeks of becoming a future cult classic.
A release date has not been announced just yet. Stay tuned to Dread Central, as we unearth Dead Lover updates as they become available.
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