By MICHAEL GINGOLD

After winning widespread applause for his debut feature JUG FACE, writer/director Chad Crawford Kinkle returns with DEMENTER, which has its world premiere next month.

DEMENTER will see its debut screening Thursday, October 10 at 8:30 p.m. CST at the Nashville Film Festival; it will have a second showing Friday, October 11 at 12 p.m. Kinkle, who also produced with Ashleigh Snead, designed the project around his sister Stephanie, who has Down syndrome and plays one of the leads. Katie Groshong, Brandy Edmiston, Eller Hall and Larry Fessenden also star; the synopsis: Katie [Groshong], a young woman determined to do something positive with her life after fleeing from a backwoods cult, takes a job at a center for special needs adults. Desperately attempting to live a normal life, she is overwhelmed by signs that ‘the devils’ are after Stephanie [Stephanie Kinkle], a woman with Down syndrome that she now cares for. Using writings from a strange notebook, Katie creates rituals to ward away the evil while taking care of Stephanie at the center and in her home. But nothing seems to work, and Stephanie is becoming sicker with each passing day…”