August 19, 2023
Pottstown, PA – It’s that time once again to announce the annual Skate or Die Film Fest at the historic Ringing Rocks Roller Rink. Our second annual event sees the festival expanding from 2 to 3 days, including feature films and short films from all over the globe, live music, a vendors market, good food and drink, tattoos from 4 amazing local artists, a family day, and – of course – roller skating.
Sponsored by Lehigh Valley Apparel Creations, High Voltage Barber Shop, Crew Me Up, MVD, and Harmony Wealth Management – The Farsighted and Rockstar Roller Derby present what promises to be a bigger and better event than even the last.
The event is a perfect way to get an early start to your spooky season with a full weekend of genre fare September 22nd through 24th.
Full weekend passes are now available at a discounted rate of $70 through the end of August. Day passes and skate session passes go on sale on September 1st. For individual skate sessions on Friday (with live music), Saturday (with DJ Jes and vendor’s market), and Sunday (with family friendly kindie band Rolie Polie Guacamole) will be $15. Daily passes will be $30 for Friday, $40 for Saturday, and $30 for Sunday. Full weekend passes will be $85 after the August pre-sale is up.
On Friday, September 22nd, we kick off the event with roller skating on the main rink and live music on the upper rink at 6, followed by our local film block, sponsored by Crew Me Up and featuring films from the greater Philadelphia area and beyond. The musical entertainment will be provided by Philadelphia psychobilly psychotics The Rectors and devilish NYC rockers Karabas Barabas.
Featuring films from NY, NJ, and PA, the local film block was one of our most talked about parts of last year’s festival. With newcomers to the fest like Kiel Orion Troisi and Sean Bayles and returning filmmakers Chad Repko and Rafael De Leon Jr, this film block is sure to be a blast. The local block will be hosted by Weird Pennsylvania tour guide Matt Lake, writer/editor/actor/jack-of-many-trades.
On Saturday, September 23rd, the rink will be open for skating from 12-3 while DJ Jes spins some spooky season tunes and our vendor’s market is open on the upper rink. This year’s market will include awesome shirts from sponsor Lehigh Valley Apparel Creations, a variety of fun swag from Face Monster, the handmade awesomeness of brookiellen designs, and more! With some musical surprises and costumes encouraged, it’ll be a great way to start the day.
Presented by High Voltage Barber Shop, we’ll begin our first of 2 film blocks for the day at 3:30, a post-apocalyptic cult film double feature including two criminally underseen films from Robert McGinley. This block of films will feature a few special surprises, as well as the premiere of a new director’s cut of McGinley’s female led futuristic punk musical Danger Diva and a special screening of his new high definition scan of skateboarder cult gem Shredder Orpheus.
After the cult film double feature, we roll into our Saturday night feature program, a group of weird, fun, and wild films headlined by mad scientist Joe Badon’s latest creation, The Wheel of Heaven. Flanked by short films from the likes of Philadelphia’s own Fern Poppy and wacky festival favorite Brian Lonano, The Wheel of Heaven is Badon’s feature follow up to one of last year’s favorite shorts, The Blood of the Dinosaurs, which had been described by festival director Justin Harlan as a “f****d up Mister Rogers” episode.
On Sunday, September 24th, we roll into the final day of the festival with our family day program at 11am, starting with an open family skate and live music from critically acclaimed kindie band Rolie Polie Guacamole. The family day continues after the skating with a special screening of the family friendly Ed Wood classic Plan 9 from Outer Space and a couple of family friendly short films.
After the family festivities wrap, we roll into our final block of the weekend, featuring a few short films and a rewind back to the year 2000 with the original Final Destination film, sponsored by the great Lehigh Valley Apparel Creations and hosted by Horror Movie Night podcast host Matt Kelly.
Full schedule, more market vendors, food vendors, tattoo artists and available flash, poster reveal (check out a sneak preview at The Farsighted’s Instagram account), and all info will be available in the coming weeks at skateordiefestival.com.
There is still more room for sponsorship and market vendors, so email festival director Justin Harlan at justincharlesharlan@gmail.com for info.