Christopher R. Mihm is the writer, director, and producer of the films of the "Mihmiverse," a series of award-winning, loosely interlinked feature-length films which pay homage to 1950s-era "drive-in cinema."

Mr. Mihm's filmmaking career began in 2006 with the release of his first retro-styled film, "The Monster of Phantom Lake." Made on a nearly non-existent budget, the film went on to garner much critical acclaim, appear in numerous film festivals, win multiple awards and, to this day, continues to screen across the world.

Since his first film, Mr. Mihm has released one new as-authentic-as-possible 1950s-style feature a year, many of which have received numerous accolades, nominations, and awards. "Attack of the Moon Zombies" raked in the most 2011 Dead Letter Awards at mailorderzombie.com. "House of Ghosts" beat out several big budget films to win the coveted Rondo Hatton Classic Horror Award for Best Independent Feature in 2012. Mr. Mihm's ode to the "big bug" films of the 1950s, "The Giant Spider," won the Forrest J. Ackerman Film Award at the Famous Monsters of Filmland Film Festival and the Best Action/Horror Feature award at the Highway 61 Film Festival.

Christopher R. Mihm has been featured in many publications, both online and off, including SCI-FI Magazine, Screem, Famous Monsters of Filmland and Scary Monsters Magazine. Mr. Mihm was the recipient of the first-ever Roger & Julie Corman Intrepid Filmmaker award at the ninth annual Fargo Fantastic Film Festival, won the Best Director award from mailorderzombie.com and received the key to the city of Forest Lake, MN, where July 30th was officially declared "Christopher R. Mihm Day."



People often ask me, "Why are all your movies made in this 'cheesy' retro-1950s style?" Well, to really understand WHY I make these "new/old, good/bad" films, you must first attempt to understand a little something about my late father, George Mihm. My father would tell these great stories of spending cold, small-town Minnesota winters in the relative warmth of his local movie house, taking in double features of trashy, B-grade science fiction and horror flicks. For a quarter he'd see double bills with such classics as "Village of the Damned" ("The eyes..." he'd tell me.) and "Them!" ("Giant ants!" he would exclaim!)

When I was a kid, my dad would rent these movies repeatedly. I fondly remember watching them with him and thoroughly enjoying these sometimes rare bonding experiences. However, at the time, I could never quite figure out just what it was my dad saw in these (often) low-grade, barely frightening (by my standards) films.

In the year 2000, after fighting the disease for only a year, my father lost his battle with stomach cancer at the young age of 51. In the years since we lost him, I revisited many of these old movies and, sadly, realized they're just not the same without him there. I miss the stories... like the one about the time he went to the movies against his mother's wishes and saw something so scary he couldn't sleep for a week—AND got in trouble for it!

I have wanted to make a movie for as long as I can remember. Seeing those old movies again, I began to truly fall in love with them, not only for the memories of my dad but for how wonderful they really are in their own special way. I enjoyed their stiff dialogue, sometimes (but not always!) wooden acting, stilted camera work and marginal (though often charming and occasionally ground-breaking) special effects. It was during one of these marathon movie-watching sessions I had an epiphany: "What would happen if I stopped thinking about making a movie and actually MADE ONE—and not just ANY movie but THIS kind of movie, one that a ten year old version of my dad would approve of?"

That thought soon took over and my obsession began. I parked myself in front of my laptop and "The Monster of Phantom Lake" was born. With only an "experimenting-with-public-access-television's" amount of filmmaking experience, I did as much research as possible and enlisted the help of friends and family to make my first "real movie" a reality. After a whirlwind of insanity and months of hard work, my dream finally came true... I had made a movie!

Since then, I've continued to make and release a new cheesy movie every year and further expand the universe of my films, known collectively as the Mihmiverse, with every film being linked to all the others in small (and larger) ways. It's been my distinct pleasure to have been lucky enough to follow this dream, and I recognize it wouldn't have been possible without the fans, supporters, and contributors! Thank you!