Heather Kafka and Jonny Mars in the award-winning 'Black Metal'

Local director Kat Candler is picking up more national plaudits: Her highly-regarded ‘Black Metal‘ just won the award for best short at the deadCENTER film festival in Oklahoma City.

‘Black Metal’ explores the impact on a metal vocalist (Jonny Mars) when one of his fans takes his demonic lyrics a little too seriously. After debuting at Sundance and brutalizing audiences at SXSW, it picked up the award for best narrative short grand jury prize at the Dallas International Film Festival (Marr also picked up the award for best performance in May at the Hill Country Film Festival.)

This article appears in June 7 • 2013.

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The Chronicle's first Culture Desk editor, Richard has reported on Austin's growing film production and appreciation scene for over a decade. A graduate of the universities of York, Stirling, and UT-Austin, a Rotten Tomatoes certified critic, and eight-time Best of Austin winner, he's currently at work on two books and a play.