Kevin Smith's film 'Killroy Was Here' is shocking. And as of now, you can't see it

Kevin Smith gets the importance of film festivals.

The Red Bank-born, Highlands-raised auteur unveiled his landmark debut feature, the Middletown-shot comedy “Clerks,” at New York City’s Independent Feature Film Market in October 1993 before the movie became a sensation at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, in January 1994. After a decade and a half of dalliances with the studio system, Smith announced a return to his DIY roots with the controversial independent horror drama “Red State” at Sundance in 2011.

So it’s only natural that Smith, the co-proprietor of the re-christened SModcastle Cinemas in downtown Atlantic Highlands, now has a festival to call his own.

The SModcastle Film Festival launched Wednesday and runs through Sunday, Dec. 4. Opening night festivities included the first public screening of “Killroy Was Here,” a horror anthology film directed by Smith and starring his daughter, Harley Quinn Smith — who has appeared in his shockers “Tusk” (2014) and “Yoga Hosers” (2016).

On Sunday, Dec. 4, at the SModcastle, 64 Leonard Ave. in the Leonardo section of Middletown, Smith will co-host free panel discussions with the Transgender Film Center at noon, Decentralized Pictures at 2 p.m. and MVD Entertainment Group at 4 p.m

Smith and “Killroy” made headlines in 2021 when he announced he’d be auctioning off the film online as a series of more than 5,000 NFTs, or non-fungible tokens, unique pieces of data that verifies ownership of a digital item.

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Filmed in New Orleans in 2018, it's a gleefully nasty piece of work, an uncompromisingly grisly installment in Smith’s run of darkly comedic horror pictures. Like “Red State,” it’s righteously violent.

Smith builds his story around a babysitter (Harley Quinn Smith), telling remarkably inappropriate tales to her young charge — all featuring a southern Florida boogeyman with summoning rules similar to those of Betelgeuse, Candyman or Bloody Mary.

Smith saves much of the bloody business for condemnations of ills, including child abuse and homophobia, tackled in rough-and-tumble grindhouse fashion.

“Killroy” co-stars Smith’s frequent cohort Jason Mewes, his “Hollywood Babble-On” podcasting partner Ralph Garman (who also appeared in “Wrong Reasons”) and All Elite Wrestling grappler Chris Jericho.

"I think people really give their best performances when Kevin is at the helm because he is … a very fun and positive type of guy," Jericho told the Absury Park Press in 2019. "I'm just honored. (It's) like a bucket list (item) to do a movie with him.”

Jericho, who plays one of the film’s more detestable characters with scenery-chewing glee, drew on years' worth of experience as a professional wrestling villain, known in the business as a heel.

"I always say (when people ask), 'How long have you been acting for?' (that) I've been acting since I was 19 because wrestling is show business and wrestling is acting and that's basically the most important skill that you need to learn about that business," Jericho said.

Speaking with the Asbury Park Press following the premiere screening, Smith teased the possibility of “Killroy” returning to SModcastle Cinemas as a midnight movie.

'Eventually young Kevin Smith got what he wanted'

The SModcastle Film Festival kicked off in grand fashion with the world premiere of the heartfelt drama “Shelter in Solitude,” written by and starring Siobhan Fallon Hogan of Rumson, a scene-stealer in everything from “Forrest Gump” and “Men in Black” to the work of Lars Von Trier.

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“Wrong Reasons,” a thriller directed by Josh Roush and executive-produced by Smith, screened Wednesday night, as did the emotionally raw dramatic short “Wasted Blind” from Monmouth County filmmaker Troy Burbank.

Ernie O’Donnell, a longtime friend of Smith’s who acted in “Clerks,” starred in “Wasted Blind” and appeared in “Killroy Was Here.” Smith revealed that O’Donnell is also the reason the SModcastle Film Festival exists at all.

O’Donnell and Smith are among the partners behind the SModcastle black box theater in the Leonardo section of Middletown, which opened in 2021. O’Donnell originally conceived of the festival as an event for that space. They then planned to partner with the movie theater that had been on First Avenue in Atlantic Highlands for a century or so, then operating as the Atlantic Moviehouse before they got the word that the building was for sale.

“Over the course of that (process, we) wound up buying the movie theater,” Smith said. “So it made doing the festival here even easier.”

Decades ago, Smith revealed, he wrote himself a five-year plan of sorts — and those dreams included launching his own film festival

“It took me 30 years and somebody else to say, ‘Hey, let’s do it,’ but eventually the young version of Kevin Smith got what he wanted, too,” he said on Wednesday night following the “Killroy” screening.

“Tonight, when we were bringing people in and swapping them out between screenings, it just felt right,” Smith said. “That’s a lot of people in a movie theater on a Wednesday night. When I was a kid, that’s what every Friday looked like here — you couldn’t get a seat. So it was nice to see that kind of energy again.”

Other New Jersey filmmakers will be screening their work at the festival. Frank Zarrillo will premiere “Gaspari,” his documentary about bodybuilder Rich Gaspari, at 5 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 1, followed by “Waimea” by Steve Herold, the director of the 2002 short “Asburied,” at 7:45 p.m., and the documentary “How I Killed My Mother” from comedian and podcaster Ed Larson at 9:30 p.m.

“I consider myself a local filmmaker but I’ve only but I’ve only made two films, technically, wholly in the area,” Smith said, referencing “Clerks” and this year’s “Clerks III.” “(I’ve filmed) pieces (of others here), of course, but there are a lot of people here who are, truly, local filmmakers. ... It’s nice to see a bunch of them come out tonight and support the idea of the film festival.”

It was revealed in August that Smith and his wife, Jen Schwalbach, were purchasing the theater alongside O’Donnell. fellow Bayshore native Jeff Swanton and Ashley DiGennaro, co-owner of memorabilia and collectible business Leeloo Multiprops. Crowds have already been turning out for events, including special film screenings and a November appearance by Bayonne “Game of Thrones” author George R.R. Martin.

“This place was the epicenter of activity and entertainment for me as a kid, so (it’s wonderful) to be able to come back and try to instill a little bit of that same magic that was instilled in me and Ernie when we were kids going to this theater,” Smith said.

Looking ahead, SModcastle Cinema plans to host appearances by superhero auteurs James Gunn, Zack Snyder and Joseph and Anthony Russo, as well as Jericho and others. Long-term, Smith said, he also plans to run a film school of his own out of the five-screen theater.

“I don’t know if this is the third act of my life or my career, but I did almost die a few years ago so I tend to think everything’s coming to a close,” Smith said, referencing his 2018 heart attack. “So let’s say I’m lucky, really lucky, and I’ve got 20 years left — I want this to be a part of every one of those 20 years.”

Go: The SModcastle Film Festival plays SModcastle Cinemas, 82 First Ave., Atlantic Highlands, through Sunday, Dec. 4; atlanticcinemas.com/smodcastlefilmfestival. Kevin Smith will also co-host free panel discussions on Sunday at the SModcastle, 64 Leonard Ave. in the Leonardo section of Middletown, with the Transgender Film Center at noon, Decentralized Pictures at 2 p.m. and MVD Entertainment Group at 4 p.m.

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Kevin Smith gave Killroy Was Here its first public screening