Mark Polonia

Mark Polonia (born September 30, 1968) is an independent American B movie filmmaker from Wellsboro, Pennsylvania, United States, with over 100 director credits. He is married to actress Maria Davis.

Polonia shoots most of his films as shot-on-video films and works mostly in the horror and science fiction genres. In recent years, he has become somewhat of a low-budget and even no-budget cult icon for the likes of Cocaine Shark, Feeders, Splatter Farm and Sharkula.

Film Threat once stated that "Mark Polonia is best known (if he is at all) for his ridiculous, though insanely fun, output such as Shark Encounters Of The Third Kind and Deadly Playthings. These productions intentionally trade on their low-budget schtick with absurd premises that ask the viewer to laugh and have fun, as the movie is in on the joke." Horror and Sons once wrote that Polonia's films looked as if they were filmed for "less than a house."

Critics frequently cite his films as "gutter trash" or "so bad it's good," noting amateur acting, poor lighting, and padding.

Career

Polonia Brothers (1986–2009) Mark, along with his twin brother John (who were the youngest of five siblings) fell in love with film at an early age and decided to begin making movies together, founding Polonia Brothers Entertainment together in 1986. Their first commercial release was the cult classic film Splatter Farm which was released on VHS by Donna Michele Productions in 1987. Mark and John directed, wrote, starred in and filmed the entire feature themselves, with help from a teenage friend. The brothers were only 19 at the time.

In 2007, Splatter Farm was released on DVD as a new and improved cut by Camp Motion Pictures. Though this new version was missing many of the scenes that had made the film such a cult hit to begin with.

Mark and his brother continued making microbudget horrors together, with their 1996 alien film Feeders, starring fellow B-movie maker Jon McBride (Cannibal Campout) being picked up by Blockbuster in the aftermath of the commercial success of Independence Day, and later becoming Blockbuster's No. 1 independent-film rental for the year. McBride would soon begin working with the twins regularly on many of their projects.

The duo released around another 20 films following the success of Feeders before coming to a halt after the sudden death of John Polonia at the age of 39. In honour of John's memory, Mark and Cinegraphic Productions released Halloweenight, based on a screenplay by, and dedicated to the memory of, John, in October 2009. with films like Sharkenstein, Noah's Shark, Feeders 2, Cocaine Shark, Church of the Damned and Monster Movie. Perhaps his biggest success in recent years, has been the Camp Blood film series.

During this time Polonia's films would become a regular presence with multiple different distribution studios, including Camp Motion Pictures, Sterling Pictures and Eye Wide Releasing.

Teaching Polonia teaches audio/visual production at Commonwealth University.

Reception The majority of his films sit in the 2.0 star section on IMDb. Numerous independent aggregators and reviewers have been openly critical of his modern films, like Cocaine Werewolf, feature "wooden acting," "terrible visual effects," and scripts that "make no sense".

Some have compared his marketing style similar to The Asylum, using knock-off movie titles to capitalise on bigger films (for example the aforementioned Cocaine Shark was named so to ride the success of 2023's Cocaine Bear).

ScreenAnarchy described Polonia's "no budget brand of filmmaking" as "easy to ignore, hard to forget".

Filmography

Director

1985: Church of the Damned 1986: Hallucinations 1986: Splatter Farm 1991: Lethal Nightmare 1993: How to slay a Vampire 1994: Saurians 1996: Feeders 1996: Night Crawlers 1998: Terror House 1998: Feeders 2: Slay Bells 1998: Mad Magic 2000: The House That Screamed 2000: Blood Red Planet 2001: Dweller 2001: Hellgate: The House That Screamed 2 2002: Gorilla Warfare: Battle of the Apes 2002: Nighthirst 2003: Holla If I Kill You 2003: Hellspawn 2004: Among Us 2004: Peter Rottentail 2004: Dinosaur Chronicles (re-released 2004 in Galaxy of Terror 4-Pack) 2005: Razorteeth 2005: Black Mass 2007: Splatter Beach 2007: Wildcat 2008: Forest Primeval 2008: Monster Movie 2009: Halloweenight 2011: E.V.E of Destruction 2013: Empire of the Apes 2013: Chainsaw Killer 2014: Camp Blood First Slaughter 2015: Amityville Death House 2015: Channel 13 2015: Jurassic Prey 2015: Death Reel 2016: Bigfoot vs Zombies 2016: Sharkenstein 2017: Amityville Exorcism 2017: Nightmare Vacation 2017: Land Shark 2017: Revolt of the Empire of the Apes 2017: It Kills 2018: Battle Bots 2018: Ghost of Camp Blood 2018: War Raiders 2018: Frozen Sasquash 2018: Alien Surveillance 2019: Camp Blood Kills 2019: Deadly Playthings 2019: Bride of the Werewolf 2020: Amityville Island 2020: Shark Encounters of the Third Kind 2020: Return to Splatter Farm 2020: Children of Camp Blood 2021: Virus Shark 2021: Invasion of the Empire of the Apes 2021: Dune World 2021: Camp Murder 2021: Jurassic Shark 2: Aquapocalpyse 2021: Noah's Shark 2021: Hell on a Shelf 2021: Sister Krampus 2022: R.I.P Van Winkle 2022: Reel Monsters 2022: House Squash 2022: Feeders 3: The Final Meal 2022: Sharkula 2022: Amityville in Space 2022: Doll Shark 2023: Motorboat 2023: R.I.P Van Winkle Part 2 2023: R.I.P Van Winkle Part 3 2023: Cocaine Shark 2023: Snow Babes 2023: Jurassic Shark 3: Seavenge 2023: Yule Logs 2023: Revenge of the Empire of the Apes 2024: Cocaine Werewolf 2024: Teddiscare 2024: Pandasaurus 2024: The Last Chainsaw Massacre 2024: Once Upon a Time in Amityville 2024: Jurassic Exorist 2024: One Million Babes BC 2024: The Girl who wore Yellow Lace 2024: Camp Blood: Clown Shark 2024: Mummy Shark 2024: The Stalking 2025: Harvest of Eyes 2025: Trail Cam Sasquash 2025: The Final Possession 2025: Battle Beyond Mars 2025: Four Nights in Fear Forest 2025: Robocidal 2025: Cape Cod Cthulhu 2026: Your All Doomed 2026: Dummy 2026: Amityville Rex 2026: Shocktopus 2026: Camp Blood Legacy