| rdfs:comment | - Amy Lynn Best is an actress, producer and director of independent horror movies. Born on November 1, 1972 in Topeka, Kansas, her family moved to Pittsburgh a year later. She studied classical theater and dance growing up and attended the University of Pittsburgh for Civil Engineering. She found the career path not to her liking. She met her future husband, Mike Watt, a film student at Pittsburgh Filmmakers, through mutual friends and began assisting him on his student films. She produced and starred in his senior thesis film, "Tenants", which was later distributed internationally through Salt City Video (aka Sub Rosa Studios and SRS Studios).
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| abstract | - Amy Lynn Best is an actress, producer and director of independent horror movies. Born on November 1, 1972 in Topeka, Kansas, her family moved to Pittsburgh a year later. She studied classical theater and dance growing up and attended the University of Pittsburgh for Civil Engineering. She found the career path not to her liking. She met her future husband, Mike Watt, a film student at Pittsburgh Filmmakers, through mutual friends and began assisting him on his student films. She produced and starred in his senior thesis film, "Tenants", which was later distributed internationally through Salt City Video (aka Sub Rosa Studios and SRS Studios). She, Watt and a third partner, Bill Homan, formed Happy Cloud Pictures in 1997 and produced the 16mm feature film "The Resurrection Game". A "zombie-noir", according to their official website, the film is a cross between a zombie film and a detective story. In "The Resurrection Game", Best plays Sister Bliss, a dominatrix/zombie killer. The movie was never released officially, but played film festivals and won an award, "Best Film" at the Pittsburgh Film Workers Film Festival in 2005. Following "The Resurrection Game", Best directed the short film "Were-Grrl", about a woman who turns into a lesbian during the full moon. This satirical short suffered from technical drawbacks, notably the sound, but was the first movie she and Watt produced on digital video. Despite the drawbacks, the movie played in a number of film festivals, particularly gay and lesbian-oriented festivals. It was included as an extra on the DVD for their next film, "Severe Injuries". "Severe Injuries" was the first feature film Best directed. A horror/comedy, it tells the story "Melvin Hubble is the last in a long line of unsuccessful serial killers. Fulfilling his father's dying wish, Melvin sneaks into the Ro Ro Ro sorority house on the night of a big party and completely fails to strike fear into the hearts of the inhabitants. Unbeknownst to Melvin and the girls, there is another killer lurking in the house - one just as inept, but lacking in the courage of Melvin's convictions."[1] This movie was distributed internationally and online again through SRS Studios. At this point, Best started to focus on the independent, low-budget horror industry, particularly the roles available for actresses. She produced and directed a documentary called "The Spicy Sisters Slumber Party", with indie actresses like former soap opera star Robyn Griggs, Lilith Stabs, "Were-Grrl" star-turned-stuntwoman Jasi Cotton Lanier and Ryli Morgan. While the focus of the documentary is the ongoing "round-table"-style discussion of the industry, Best put the group in the context of a slumber party, with all of the women dressed in pajamas. "Guest Stars" [Linnea Quigley] and [Debbie Rochon] also appear in brief segments. Ironically, during the shooting of a section focusing on how horror is often perceived as pornography by "mainstream audiences", the group was ejected from a hotel hot tub when the staff suspected they were shooting a porn film, despite the fact that all women were completely clothed at the time. Continuing to be a fixture at horror conventions and film festivals, Best and Watt put on their own horror convention, Genghis Con, PA, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 2005 and 2006. During the "Genghis Con II: The Wrath of Con", Best co-ordinated a "blood wrestling" event with other actresses like April Monique Burril (of "Chainsaw Sally" fame). Like a Jell-O wrestling event, only with fake blood to go along with the horror theme, there were three matches held, with a free-for-all "Queen of the Ring" match as a finale. The event was recorded and released through their company as "Blood Bath: Blood Wrestling Vol. 1" (indicating that a second volume may be coming in the future. Also in 2006, Best produced and co-directed the vampire movie "Abattoir", released in 2007 by Bloody Earth Films under the title "A Feast of Flesh". It was decided that the original title was too difficult for audiences to remember or pronounce.[2] In "A Feast of Flesh", Best plays "Elizabet", the madame of a brothel of vampires. In addition to her film work, Best co-created the "Women in Horror" website Pretty-Scary.net, with actress/journalist Heidi Martinuzzi and designer Jen Whilden. She also writes a "Pretty-Scary" column for the print magazine, Sirens of Cinema.
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