[Exclusive] ScareScore Launches at Screamfest, Letting Horror Fans Bodies Pick a Winner

How do you determine which horror movie actually scared an audience the most? At this year’s Screamfest, the answer may come directly from the audience’s bodies.

ScareScore is officially launching its app at Screamfest this week at the TCL Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. Alongside the festival’s established awards, ScareScore is introducing what the company describes as the first-everBiometrically Decided Best Featureaward—determined by the physical reactions of moviegoers watching the competing films.

Using the smartwatch a viewer already wears, ScareScore measures real-time reactions including heart rate, heart-rate variability, movement and other measurements. Its syncing technology recognizes the film playing on screen and connects those reactions to the specific moments that triggered them, ultimately creating a personalized score.

For ScareScore co-founder and horror film producer JP Ouellette, horror is the perfect genre for putting the technology to work.

“Horror is the perfect genre to focus on because your body doesn’t lie, and your opinion is not as good as cold hard facts,” Ouellette said. “You can try and brag that a movie didn’t scare you, but your biometrics tell a very different story.”

Filmmaker Jeffrey Scott Collins, whoseThe Cagedis among the competing features, is also looking forward to seeing what audiences reveal.

“Partnering with ScareScore technology is a very cool opportunity; I can’t wait to see the audience reactions,” Collins said.

Films Competing for the ScareScore Award

• The Night Driver
• Grow
• Processing Charlie
• Abandoned
• Postmortem
• The Caged
• Nervous
• Rinrada The Influencer
• NINE
• CHROMA Presents: The Exit State
• Crawlers
• Christmas at the Kringles

ScareScore also plans to extend the technology beyond the festival. As films move from theatrical screenings to streaming and home viewing, ScareScore says its technology can keep syncing with the same title, gathering and comparing audience scores throughout the film’s life.

At the end of Screamfest, one of the competing films will make horror history as the first winner of a festival feature-film award determined by biometric audience response.

So when someone insists a horror movie didn’t scare them, ScareScore may have something else to say.

Your body is the review.