Nicolas Cage has played many roles in his storied career, including some famous horror roles. He’s been a guy who thinks he is a vampire (Vampire’s Kiss), to someone who definitely did not like bees (The Wicker Man). And, more recently, he starred in the cult film Mandy. Now, he’s finally playing a serial killer, in the upcoming film Longlegs. The upcoming film is from director Osgood Perkins, who comes from quite the horror pedigree himself. His father was Anthony Perkins, the iconic Norman Bates in the Psycho franchise. You can check out the trailers for the upcoming serial killer horror film from NEON Films right here.

The movie centers on Lee Harker (Maika Monroe) a fledgling FBI agent, who is attempting to crack a long-unsolved case of a serial killer. Eventually, the investigation becomes more complex, when they uncover some occult evidence. We glimpse a book about the Nine Circles of Hell in the trailer. Eventually, Harker discovers that he has a personal link to the killer (Nicolas Cage), and has to race against the clock in order to prevent another murder from happening.

Longlegs also stars Alicia Witt (The Walking Dead, Twin Peaks) and Dear White People’s Blair Underwood. Nicolas Cage is producing via his company Saturn Films.

Despite suggesting a horror film that connects to spiders, the tagline for the film says in a very cryptic way “You’ve got the teeth of the Hydra upon you.” So it looks like we’re seeing some Hydra ancient mythology that connects to this particular mystery.

We’re a sucker for a good cult-themed horror story like True Detective: Night Country. A story that has ties to some kind of mythological being.

The poster art for Longlegs says “The Man Downstairs is Coming.” It appears this mysterious man will arrive in theaters on July 12.

Originally published on February 5, 2024.

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Light spoilers ahead for MaXXXine.

MaXXXine is the climactic—or should I say anticlimactic—end to Ti West’s trilogy. Rather than a crescendo with a peak, it struggles to even race beside the previous two. Gore and violence are sparse with a plot that lacks focus. It’s more of a pick-your-poison “choose your own adventure” film. With Maxine Minx in Hollywood attempting to transition from porn star to movie star, her past rears up and puts an unnecessary kink in her plans. While audiences won’t walk away hating MaXXXine, it’s a lackluster film that drifts from the mind after viewing.

Directed and written by Ti West, MaXXXine marks the final chapter in the trilogy. Maxine, played by Mia Goth (Suspiria, Infinity Pool), is so close to breaking into Hollywood from the porn industry. But with a snoopy P.I. John Labat (Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F, Leave the World Behind) in the mix, deaths adding up around her, and cops sniffing at her heels, her career might be dead on arrival. However, Maxine is not someone anyone should cross. She still possesses her self-preservation edge. With all the promise built from the other films with Mia Goth’s star performance, it’s a wonder this final film falters so much. 

MaXXXine Takes Audiences From Say Something to Say Nothing

X was astounding because of its gore and how it subverts traditional horror. Rather than the stereotypical “pure” final girl, they have a woman who is literally shooting a porn film to survive. Religion and the restrictions women face play out underneath. There is plenty to draw from rewatching X.

The second film, Pearl, was a prequel focused on gender constraints through a warped Wizard of Oz tale. There’s also the nature versus nurture question of whether Pearl was always prone to violent outbursts or if her mother’s restrictive rearing led her down that path. By its climax, Dorothy does not ever leave Kansas. She remains trapped, building up her bitterness and resentment for a life never lived. 

Then there is MaXXXine, a less refined version of the two. MaXXXine lacks cohesion. It has too much happening, and few parts meld together. There are ideas that the movie wanted to explore, including gender and religion, the entertainment industry, and the thin line between entertainment and reality. However, it fails to nail any of them. 

Pointless Parts in MaXXXine Taint the Whole Picture

A familiar refrain will haunt viewers, and it’s one word; “why.” Unfortunately, too much feels unnecessary or designed for laughs. The in-universe film director, Elizabeth Bender (Elizabeth Debicki), feels jammed in without a purpose. Maxine has brief mental struggles with what happened at the farmhouse, but it never amounts to anything. So much hinders the film, like the inclusion of the ’80s real-life serial killer, the Nightstalker. 

At first, it seems as though the infamous murderer is stalking the streets and explicitly targeting those close to Maxine. But it takes little effort to realize who may resent Maxine and her “life of sin.” The movie tries to tease the threat, only showing the individual’s gloved hands, but it does not even take three guesses to identify her foe. So, while it tries to go the mystery route, it fails miserably. MaXXXine‘s uncertainty with what it wants to be. Is it a callout to the industry? Or is the film perhaps a mystery, Giallo horror, etc.? It is unclear.

Mia Goth Still Rocks as Maxine, But There’s Too Much Camp

In MaXXXine, religious zealotry and moments of bright, violent girl power run throughout its narrative. Mia still delivers a forceful and deadly performance. From nutcracker to face-keying, whenever Maxine unleashes her violence on the men around her, it’s always fun and deserved. Still, because of the breadth of what the film takes on, even Mia Goth feels underutilized in the final film. Too much attention goes to flat jokes and exaggerated religious zeal. You nearly forget that Maxine is trying to make a movie. 

Detective Williams (Michelle Monaghan) and Detective Torres (Bobby Cannavale) are excess baggage in an already bogged down film. Their whole schtick is Torres being an obnoxious man, talking down to Maxine, then Williams steps in, and Maxine leaves. Rinse and repeat. Many attempts at comedic moments with these two do not land. It’s more obnoxious and will likely leave audiences bewildered. They are not even essential to the final fight.

That Death Was Certainly a Choice

Another strike for MaXXXine, tying in with the gore, is how one death is handled. A Black person has one of the only gruesome deaths that takes place onscreen. Sure, it’s set in the ’80s, and few Black characters in predominantly white films survived. However, if we were going by the checklist of the time, Maxine herself would not have made it out of X intact. 

An argument can be made regarding the fact that the most gruesome deaths are men—although only one is her friend. But there was not enough done to cement that aspect. It’s ruddered in crudely. (If you’re a fan of Cardi B, you can insert her “what was the reason” GIF here.) Because choosing to have one of the most gruesome deaths be a Black person is a jarring disappointment.

MaXXXine had all the promise and goodwill engendered by the two preceding films. Unfortunately, it does not earn much beyond a shrug and “That’s it?” It would be fine if it weren’t part of a trilogy that rose beyond gore and violence while still delivering both. But the final act is “Yikes” in cinema form. MaXXXine forfeits it all, devolving into a messy puddle of obscurity, where whatever themes viewers say the movie explores is more of a wish than reality. The further you get from the theater, the less you’ll like or want to remember this film. 

MaXXXine ⭐ (2 of 5)

The film hits theaters on July 5.

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The finale of Interview with the Vampire season two had quite the twist, as a flash forward showed the audience that the Vampire Armand (Assad Zaman) had turned the reporter Daniel Molloy (Eric Bogosian) into a vampire, some time before or after published his interviews with Louis and Armand as a book. We don’t know exactly how and when this happened. It seems to be an act committed more out of spite towards Daniel than love. However, Armand making Daniel a vampire on Interview with the Vampire does have its origins in Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles series of novels.

In the novels, Daniel Molloy doesn’t even have a proper name until the third novel in Rice’s series, The Queen of the Damned. In the 1976 novel Interview with the Vampire, the young reporter was simply referred to as “the Boy.” At the end of that first novel, he ran off, with Louis’ tapes in tow, hoping to find Lestat. In book two, The Vampire Lestat, we find out that the boy had the recordings transcribed and published as the book Interview with the Vampire. A recently reemerged Lestat discovered that his name and much of his life was put on public display for mortals, passed off as fiction. Yet we never learned what became of the young reporter until Rice’s third novel.

“The Story of Daniel, the Devil’s Minion, or the Boy from Interview with the Vampire“ from Queen of the Damned

In 1988’s Queen of the Damned, we learned in Part 1, Chapter 4, a chapter called “The Story of Daniel, the Devil’s Minion, or the Boy from Interview with the Vampire” that the anonymous boy went searching for Lestat after his fateful interview with Louis in San Francisco in 1973. We also now had a proper name for him—Daniel Molloy. Lestat was slumbering at the time of Daniel’s search, and he didn’t find the undead French aristocrat. Instead, the Vampire Armand finds Daniel while he searches for Lestat, during a time when Armand made New Orleans his home. No other vampires lived there, as Lestat had long ago gone to sleep. Armand had “cleaned out” the city of any younger vampires. No one else dared to call New Orleans home at this time, as it was Armand’s territory.

Scanning Daniel’s thoughts upon encountering him, Armand discovered this young mortal boy knew his name, and his true vampiric nature, and became fascinated. He began stalking him, and no matter what city or country Daniel ran to, Armand would find him. At first, he casually threatened to kill him if he ever published his book. Yet he continued to allow him to live for his own amusement. Then something unexpected happened. After years of cat and mouse, Armand came to actually love the mortal Daniel. Even so, he constantly refused to give him the Dark Gift, no matter how much he begged.

Daniel, Armand, and the Night Island

Many years into their relationship, Armand decided to become “incalculably wealthy.” Using his knowledge of where old ships with treasure lay at the bottom of the ocean, he recruited Daniel, who now saw himself as “the Devil’s Minion,” to help him procure wealth. All while he was asleep during the day. With this fortune, Armand, with forged documents Daniel helped him create, purchased an island off the coast of Florida. Armand turned it into an entertainment and shopping paradise that came alive only after dark called The Night Island.

Armand and Daniel lived at Night Island for years in the Vampire Chronicles. Daniel had everything he wanted from Armand, the finest clothes, the newest cars, all except the one thing he wanted most—to become a vampire himself. However, when Daniel’s life was in danger, on one of the many instances when he would run away from Armand, the 500-year-old vampire gave him what he wanted at last, and turned him. As Armand feared, however, making Daniel a vampire would only serve to drive a bigger wedge between them.

Daniel and Armand in AMC’s Interview with the Vampire

All we know from the AMC Interview with the Vampire series is that sometime after Daniel reveals to Louis the truth about Armand, and how he planned to let his Paris coven execute him along with Claudia, he turns Daniel into a vampire out of spite. (Or so Louis says.) But when did this happen? We don’t know yet. Do Interview with the Vampire‘s Daniel and Armand engage in a relationship similar to the one they had in the books? There doesn’t seem enough time for that intense love/hate relationship to have happened offscreen. Unless there is one further wrinkle to Daniel and Armand’s story that Interview with the Vampire is waiting to spring on us.

We know from episode five of season two of the series, that Armand encountered Daniel back in 1973, interrupting Louis almost killing Daniel. Not only encountered him, but very nearly killed him, and erased his memories of the event. Yet he clearly had a fascination with Daniel, and Interview with the Vampire leaves space for the possibility that the pair had a relationship decades ago. One that Armand then wiped from Daniel’s mind. After all, there is a limited series AMC announced called The Night Island. Could this series, at least in part, involve Interview with the Vampire‘s Armand and Daniel and their relationship? There are lots of ways this story could go for Daniel and Armand, and we’re eager to see how Interview with the Vampire tackles this fan-favorite pairing going forward.

The post The Book Inspirations Behind the Armand/Daniel Vampiric Pairing in INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE (And What ‘Devil’s Minion’ Really Means) appeared first on Nerdist.

Fans of Anne Rice’s vampires are gleeful with anticipation with the official confirmation that Interview with the Vampire season three will showcase Lestat (Sam Reid) in full rock star mode. Since that confirmation, fans have wondered just what Lestat’s music will sound like in season three. Will it be 2000s-era Nu metal, like in the movie Queen of the Damned? Thankfully, that seems to not be the case. In a post-season two finale discussion with The Los Angeles Times, showrunner Rolin Jones dropped hints as to what musical stylings they are going for. And it’s a wee bit more glam. Here’s what he had to say:

Lestat becomes a rock star. Let’s start there. We’re going to do a lot with that and are excited about potentially working with Daniel Hart who’s done the music for the first two seasons. We’re going to try to beat Hedwig and the Angry Inch and Rocky Horror. We’re about to try to make a little pop masterpiece.

Hedwig and the Angry Inch and Rocky Horror are two musicals leaning heavily on glam rock, even though they came out decades apart. Yet both have a gender-bending quality, definitely rock, but leaning into humor and camp in their songs. That is perfect for Lestat, who is known as the “Brat Prince” by other vampires. The Nu metal sound of Jonathan Davis of Korn for Lestat’s band in 2002’s Queen of the Damned is very heavy and self-serious. Aggressive, but not seductive. Not how most readers imagined Lestat’s music would sound like in the books.

In Anne Rice’s second undead novel, 1985’s The Vampire Lestat, the titular vamp awakens from a decades-long slumber in New Orleans. Although many things awakened him, one final thing finally brought him out of the ground. This was the rock music of a local band who lived near the cemetery where he slept. This band, called Satan’s Night Out, enraptured Lestat. First, he revealed he was a vampire to these young mortals. Then, he agreed to fund their band with his considerable wealth, with himself as lead singer.

By forming a rock band, Lestat decided to outdo his fledgling vampire Louis’ revelations to the world about vampire existence in his confessions (now a mass market book called Interview with the Vampire) by one-upping his former paramour with his own revelations, via songs, music videos, and a nation-wide tour. This was in 1985, an era when someone could conceivably take over the world via MTV. His songs do more than enrage the vampire nation, they also awaken the very oldest vampires in existence. Hopefully, we’ll see all of that play out, glam rock style, in season three of Interview with the Vampire.

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Mike Mignola’s Hellboy and its myriad spinoffs are up there as my favorite comics of all time. The mix of Gothic, cosmic, and monster horror with a helping of gallows humor works for me so, so much. Guillermo del Toro famously made a couple of Hellboy movies with Ron Perlman. While good in their own GDT way, neither of them (especially the second one) truly felt like a proper adaptation of the source material. The 2019 Neil Marshall Hellboy movie with David Harbour adapted the source material directly, but the movie itself was very, very bad. Now we get Hellboy: The Crooked Man and…well, just take a look. Then we’ll talk.

First some context. The Crooked Man was a three-issue arc from Mignola and artist Richard Corben from 2008. It detailed one of Hellboy’s earlier missions for the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defense. In 1958 Appalachia, Hellboy encounters some witches and witch-adjacent people and eventually cross paths with the titular Crooked Man, a hanged war profiteer from the 18th Century who has returned from Hell to act as the region’s resident Devil. He’s pretty terrifying, especially as Corben illustrates him.

Hellboy: The Crooked Man looks to be a very faithful (and small) adaptation of that particular story. On its face this is a good thing. One of the major issues with the 2019 movie is that it adapted way, way, way too many stories, not least of which The Wild Hunt, the longest and most epic story in the Mignola canon. Focusing on a one-off adventure and maximizing the horror is a pretty good idea.

However, just looking at it, you can see the very low budget. You may have noticed the movie comes our way from Ketchup Entertainment. KETCHUP ENTERTAINMENT. Brian Taylor (of Crank franchise fame) is directing, with himself, Mignola, and Mignola’s Baltimore collaborator Christopher Golden on screenplay duties. Jack Kesy (who very briefly played Black Tom Cassidy in Deadpool 2) portrays Hellboy and he just kind of looks unfinished. If Harbour was TOO made up, Kesy looks like a decent amateur cosplay attempt.

So who knows! It may be good. It certainly seems focused more on the actual horror. Which is the proper direction to go following the dark fantasy mishmash of the last movie. But I’m not convinced after this wack first look. I would love it if one day any live-action outing properly snags the tone of the comics. Whether Hellboy: The Crooked Man can do that will have to wait until it comes out later this year.

Kyle Anderson is the Senior Editor for Nerdist. He hosts the weekly pop culture deep-dive podcast Laser Focus. You can find his film and TV reviews here. Follow him on Instagram and Letterboxd.

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Interview with the Vampire‘s second season is officially over. The AMC series now heads into Anne Rice’s second vampire novel, The Vampire Lestat for season three’s contents. This season of Interview with the Vampire gives us a finale makes a big change to the narrative of the book. And it is a change that some longtime fans might find themselves shocked by. It’s a fairly big alteration to a pivotal moment in the novel that alters the relationships of Lestat (Sam Reid), Louis (Jacob Anderson), and Arman (Assad Zaman) as we head into future seasons.

Interview with the Vampire the Novel’s Ending

In Rice’s original 1976 novel, vampires Claudia and Madeleine are executed by the Paris coven for the crime of killing Claudia and Louis’ maker, the Vampire Lestat. Or at least, for attempting to kill him. Louis is given a lighter sentence for the same crime, however. (Perhaps it is a worse sentence, depending on how you look at it.) Louis is imprisoned by the coven members inside a locked coffin. That coffin is placed within the walls of the catacombs under the Théâtre des Vampires. He’s meant to die excruciatingly slowly, perhaps over several years, all while going insane from his lack of blood sustenance.

However, in the climax of the novel (and the 1994 film), Paris coven leader Armand rescues him. He tells Louis he could not prevent the execution of Claudia because she’d broken too many laws. Yet he exerted his power over his coven enough to rescue his beloved Louis from eternal imprisonment. Louis then takes revenge on the entire Paris coven by setting fire to the Théâtre des Vampires. Later, he takes a scythe to vampire Santiago, the coven’s second in command, ending his undead rival for good.

Louis then leaves Paris with Armand, both now free of the machinations of the coven. The pair wander the world for decades. Louis eventually confronts Armand with the truth—he knows Armand allowed the Paris coven to murder Claudia. He denied the truth to himself for years, but now realized Armand orchestrated Claudia’s death and his rescue (and the subsequent revenge against the coven) as a way of securing Louis’ companionship.

The film tackles this in a slightly different manner. Louis (Brad Pitt) tells Armand (Antonio Banderas) that he knew he was behind it all immediately after the events took place. Louis then wanders the world alone, and we never discover what became of Armand afterward. Now, the Interview with the Vampire AMC series presents a third version of these events.

AMC’s Interview with the Vampire Season Finale Modifies the Original Ending of the Book

In the series, Louis is freed from his coffin prison, when Armand feeds him his blood, giving him the strength to break free. We never see who the vampire rescuer is, but Louis insists that it was Armand. Louis remains too starved and out of it to really care. The rest of the events transpire much like the book, as Louis takes his bloody revenge against the entire Paris coven, burning the theater to the ground. He then leaves with Armand, who takes credit for rescuing Louis.

Louis knows full well that Armand betrayed him, along with Claudia (Delainey Hayles), and Madeleine (Roxane Duran). But he believes they forced Armand to cooperate, thanks to a coup within the Paris coven masterminded by Santiago (Ben Daniels). Rescuing Louis was Armand’s way of making amends for letting the coven abduct them and force them into a public court spectacle. The two flee Paris together, apparently staying a couple for decades.

But Daniel Molloy (Eric Bogosian), via his Talamasca contacts, discovers the truth about what happened decades ago in Paris. Despite appearances, Armand was not an unwilling accomplice in what the coven did. He didn’t just write the kangaroo court/mock trial play. He absolutely directed it. He was perfectly willing to sacrifice Claudia, Madeleine, and Louis to death in order to save his own skin. His vampiric underlings were revolting against him and he needed to prove himself to them (again).

In fact, it was not Armand who saved Louis from death. It was his maker Lestat. Lestat used his telepathy to force the mortal audience to give Louis a different sentence than death. Louis always believed Armand did this. Once Louis took his revenge on the coven and slaughtered them all, Armand happily took credit for saving him. With the threat to his own life gone, he now had everything he wanted. But Louis’ true rescuer was none other than Lestat.

This revelation enrages Louis in the modern day, who beats Armand by throwing him around their Dubai home. He later goes to New Orleans, where he tells Lestat that he knows the truth now. This is all a pretty big change from the original narrative. We always knew Armand was willing to sacrifice Claudia to remove her as an obstacle to his being with Louis. But, in the series, we now know he was also willing to let his beloved Louis die to save his own life. Once the coven was no longer a threat, he took credit for Louis’ commuted death sentence. Louis introduced Armand as “the love of his life” in season one, but it is actually his maker, the Vampire Lestat.

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A Quiet Place: Day One is a haunting human look at mortality, connections, and little moments that make living worthwhile. Thanks to its premise, audiences experience most of the film sans dialogue. Yet it is such a profound, moving experience where terror and sorrow resonate in equal measure alongside exquisite compassionate moments plus comedic relief. While some directorial decisions raise a quizzical brow, A Quiet Place: Day One might be my favorite of the franchise’s trio, thanks to a phenomenal cast that delivers emotional peaks and valleys without speaking. And yes, that includes the wide-eyed, side-eyeing cat, Frodo, who is the MVP. 

Directed by Michael Sarnoski and written by Sarnoski, John Krasinski, and Bryan Woods, the film follows withdrawn Samira, played by Lupita Nyong’o (Black Panther, Us), as she shares her poetry that relays how much she hates everything to her fellow hospice members. Lupita gets tricked into attending a marionette show with the promise of pizza. Not just any pizza—but Patsy’s in Harlem. Before long, nixing any possibility of exquisite pizza, the creatures appear, falling from the sky, causing chaos, fires, accidents, and intentional soul-snatching from the ultra-hearing sensitivity of the monsters.

In A Quiet Place: Day One, the name of the game is survival, but for Samira, it’s more. Her life consists of a countdown of moments, regardless of the ill-timed arrival of monsters from the sky. 

Action Takes Twists That Channel Other Cinematic Gems

Of course, the emotional maelstrom has destructive, deadly chaos at its center. A Quiet Place: Day One builds tension as survivors quickly realize that silence is golden. But staying silent in a city with debris and shattered glass is challenging. Not to mention, the mental and psychological toll of knowing your world is entirely upended. So, naturally, people’s first response is to scream for help, look for loved ones, etc. As such, the body count is biblical. 

But Samira is also quick-thinking, anticipating problems before they arise, such as the mass exodus toward the ferries. Or, she really wants Patsy’s pizza, which is a fixation of hers throughout the movie. Some scenes similar to the 28 Days Later films, and there’s even one that screams Aliens. Besides similarities to other films, other aspects ground A Quiet Place: Day One in reality. Patsy’s in Harlem is real, as is Octavia E. Butler’s Dawn, a story about an alien invasion, that Samira finds. 

A Quiet Place: Day One Explores Humanity with Horror Beats

Where the first movie felt like a horror film with emotional beats, A Quiet Place: Day One is the reverse. It’s a touching production with horror beats—albeit unrelenting horror beats. However, the pain, terror, and sorrow are all visceral. As is the heartwarming emotional moments between Samira and Eric, played by Joseph Quinn (Stranger Things). Eric’s a kind human stray her cat brings to her. Those brief moments to grasp normalcy and unity elevate A Quiet Place: Day One above its previous films in the series. 

In a sense, Eric’s successful magic trick mirrors the surprise and sense of fulfillment he brings to Samira. Human connection is a type of magic that too many forget the wonder of. His kindness and soulful eyes showed her that it was okay to care, reminding Samira of the wonder of living. Her existence has value, and her magical cat agrees.  

There Are Spellbinding Performances From the Cast—Cat Included

Lupita Nyong’o already demonstrated via Us that she is a genius at relaying emotions through facial expressions. But here, she uses her entire body to convey exhaustion, stress, pain, frustration, and joy. Her raw performance leaves audiences catching their breath, especially with her precious cat in tow. Speaking of, the cat, Frodo, is another one who is acting with a capital “A.” Its divine intervention is what brings Eric and Samira together. 

She finds a perfect counterpoint with Joseph Quinn, who possesses that same talent of delivering a performance through his eyes. He stole hearts in Stranger Things. He, like Lupita, understood the assignment. The casting in A Quiet Place: Day One is top-notch.

A Quiet Place: Day One Has Some Pointless Additions and Baffling Decisions

It’s not all smooth sailing, as the film makes a couple of debatable choices. While Djimon Hounsou is an exceptional actor and deserves lead roles in films, his appearance feels pointless in the film as it lacks a thematic essentialness. The only possible parallel is how he deals with a man panicking on the rooftop compared to how Samira handles Eric’s panic attack. However, the former felt like an outburst based on circumstances, while Eric’s seemed like a condition. So it feels flimsy, even inconsequential. 

The other is the final scene. While the shot is stunning and impactful, the movie does not set up Eric’s panic attacks enough. Nor does A Quiet Place: Day One adequately set up or justify Samira’s choice. It’s as though the end shot was a concrete choice, and they forced a path that did not feel authentic to the character’s development, their relationship, or the plot. The climactic end lacks a logical course. 

A Quiet Place: Day One is an outstanding movie that emotionally guts you as much as it makes you jump in fright. It delivers a film that leaves audiences awash in a myriad of feelings, from terror to shock to laughter. Once it unleashes its torrent, the film swells and crests like a storm with little lulls of relief, but the feelings never cease. The monsters’ inescapable onslaught mirrors that; it’s irrepressible and unstoppable.

A Quiet Place: Day One is one of the best horror films—inarguably one of the best films—of 2024 so far. And Frodo is a wise savior who led bae to Samira! Wanna find a partner? Get yourself a Frodo!

A Quiet Place: Day One ⭐ (4.5 of 5)

A Quiet Place: Day One hits theaters on June 27.

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Most sequels to good films don’t live up to their predecessor’s legacy. The hit rate for the third installments in a franchise is even lower. And yet, the latest trailer for A Quiet Place: Day One has us thinking it could be one of the rare part three’s that actually end up being the best entry in the entire series. This intense, horrifying promo shows a swarm of alien invaders turning New York City into a silent, isolated wasteland. But that’s just the start of their fight for suvival.

Every war starts somewhere, and in this latest look at A Quiet Place: Day One that place is in the Big Apple. The prequel will take viewers back to when mankind’s desperate to stay alive began. The film opens with the monstrous beings who hunt by sound crash landing into The City That Never Sleeps. But as the trailer for A Quiet Place: Day One reveals, it’s not just the killer aliens New Yorkers will have to overcome.

The good citizens of NYC (and Frodo the cat!) are left stranded with seemingly no way out of the city, as the government opts to pin both humans and extraterrestrials alike inside the island. The effect is a story that looks like The War of the Worlds set inside the fantastic flashbacks from I Am Legend. That’s a movie we very much want to see.

A Quiet Place: Day One comes from writer-director Michael Sarnoski. He developed the story with franchise creator John Krasinski. It also stars some big-time horror film luminaries. The cast is led by Lupita Nyong’o (Us), Joseph Quinn (Stranger Things), and Alex Wolff (Hereditary). And A Quiet Place Part II star Djimon Hounsou is also back for more silent terror. Frodo the cat is played by true stars Nico and Schnitze.)

The prequel comes to theaters this summer on June 28, 2024. Tickets are now on sale. Try not to scream when you see it, though, even if it does end up being the best A Quiet Place movie yet. With these aliens, it’s best to keep it down.

Originally published on May 9, 2024.

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Finding new and interesting takes on vampire stories is a pretty tough row to hoe at this point. They’re among the oldest and most famous folklore monsters and the lore surrounding them, at least as laid out in Bram Stoker’s Dracula, feels mostly concrete. It’s strange, then, why more movies don’t explore the folklore in a different way, from a different part of the world. Adrien Beau’s debut feature The Vourdalak does this, exploring the Russian/Slavic vampire legend through its most popular written work. Oh, and it also makes the vampire a creepy puppet. That helps.

The Vourdalak adapts Aleksey K. Tolstoy’s 1839 novella, The Family of the Vourdalak, which predates both Le Fanu’s 1873 Carmilla and Stoker’s 1897 Dracula. Vourdalaks differ from our traditional understanding of vampires. They drink blood, sure, and they are undead, but the sun has little to no effect on them, and they tend to only feast on members of their family. That aspect forms the foundation of the story. It’s the breakdown of a family unit in a time and culture that values family, and respecting elders of the family, above all else.

The movie places the action in the late 1700s wherein French nobleman Marquis Jacques Antoine Saturnin d’Urfe (Kacey Mottet Klein) finds himself stranded in Eastern Europe, looking for a place to spend the night. The Turks had recently raided the village, but the villager tells the Marquis to seek shelter at the house of an elder named Gorcha. On the way, the Marquis meets Gorcha’s daughter Sdenka (Ariane Labed) and immediately becomes infatuated. Unfortunately for him, Sdenka—who desperately wants to leave for a better life—has other things on her mind.

The Gorcha household, we and the Marquis learn, consists of the aged Gorcha, Gorcha’s three children—eldest Jegor, Sdenka, and younger son Piotr—and Jegor’s wife and son. Jegor left to find the Turkish raiders and, returning after a month, discovers Gorcha himself went out after the Turks. Gorcha told his family if he does not return in six days, they should assume he’s dead. If he returns after the six days, they should assume he’s a vourdalak and refuse him entry. Jegor finds this absurd and the Marquis finds it peculiar.

However, after assuming the missing Gorcha had indeed died, the old man appears at the edge of the forest at exactly six days, to the minute. He looks like a corpse, clearly little more than a skeleton with skin, but he holds so much sway over his children, especially Jegor, they allow him to stay. Would you be surprised to hear he’s a vourdalak?

Beau makes a couple of really clever choices that set this movie apart from other adaptations. Famously, Mario Bava’s 1963 anthology film Black Sabbath adapts the story with Boris Karloff as Gorcha. Less famously, the 1972 Giorgio Ferroni film The Night of the Devils moved the action to the modern day. But Beau in fact moves it further back in time, so that our French nobleman is a ridiculous, white-makeup-faced fop. He’s a ridiculous sight to us, but it makes him especially ridiculous to the locals who know nothing of French courtiers. He’s an outsider.

The other major change, obviously, is that Gorcha himself when we see him is so inhuman, so far gone down the road of undead monster, that he’s not even a person. Gorcha is head to toe a full-size rod puppet, with Beau providing the voice. He has full scenes of dialogue, in full light—more than enough to make it clear, this ain’t a man. This is entirely the point! It’s easy to look at Boris Karloff and, even with some makeup, recognize he’s the man you used to know. It’s impossible to look at the thing in this movie and see anything but a grotesquery. And yet…

The Vourdalak uses its uncanny visuals to its benefit, heightening a story that certainly feels pretty familiar to horror fans. In addition to the puppetry, we have some lovely, gloomy dream sequences and bloody set pieces. The cast acquit themselves very nicely, perfectly playing the severity of the situation, even amid the unreality of the threat. Klein also manages a compelling protagonist who is at once compassionate and forthright, and a ridiculous buffoon who is a rich creep.

I think if The Vourdalak has any downside, it’s that none of it is particularly scary. Parts of it, especially later in the story involving Gorcha’s feeding, should be eerier than they are. Perhaps that isn’t the point, however the aforementioned Italian versions certainly slanted toward a growing creep factor I don’t think The Vourdalak ever comes close to. Doesn’t mean it’s a bad movie, and if grotesqueness is all you’re after, this French-language offering has plenty for you. The puppet alone is worth the 90 minute watch.

The Vourdalak ⭐ (3.5 of 5)

The Vourdalak opens exclusively in US cinemas on June 28th from Oscilloscope Laboratories.

Kyle Anderson is the Senior Editor for Nerdist. He hosts the weekly pop culture deep-dive podcast Laser Focus. You can find his film and TV reviews here. Follow him on Instagram and Letterboxd.

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Door-to-door evangelizing seems like a lot of hard work. You have to be out in the elements and spreading the word of your Lord and Savior, often to people who really don’t want to hear it. I’d imagine there are a ton of people who either ignore you, slam the door in your face, or curse you out. And, if you’re a woman, there’s always that extra risk of a guy doing or saying something to make you feel super uncomfortable. But I never thought that a missionary occupational hazard would be running into a lunatic who holds you hostage in their house for weird mental games. That’s what happens in Heretic, an A24 psychological thriller starring Hugh Grant, Yellowjackets’ star Sophie Thatcher, and Chloe East with a trailer that teases a house of horrors. 

In the clip, Thatcher and Chloe are two young missionaries trying to spread knowledge about Jesus Christ. Their somewhat meek demeanors mean they are dismissed by most people. Nevertheless, they continue to bike around town and try to save souls. They go to a random, secluded house (red flag #1) where Grant’s far-too-friendly Mr. Reed lives. He invites them inside (red flag #2) and insists that it’s okay because his wife is there (red flag #3).

Things soon go down a dark path when they realize they are locked in. Mr. Reed says they can go but they have to choose between two doorways: one for believers and one for those who do not believe. I’m pretty sure there are terrible things behind both doors. The Heretic trailer is a fun peek that doesn’t give away too much but gives us the gift of a diabolical Hugh Grant. We love when he plays a villain.

Here’s the synopsis for Heretic: 

Two young missionaries are forced to prove their faith when they knock on the wrong door and are greeted by a diabolical Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant), becoming ensnared in his deadly game of cat-and-mouse.

What Is the Release Date for A24’s Heretic Movie Starring Hugh Grant? 

Heretic will hit theaters on November 15, 2024.

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When you think of iconic horror movie actors, you think of names like Boris Karloff, Christopher Lee,, Jamie Lee Curtis….and Robert Englund. The man responsible for bringing slasher icon Freddy Krueger into our nightmares will now share an honor with those other horror legends. Englund has announced via Twitter that he’s receiving a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at long last. The beloved actor will receive his star in a ceremony taking place sometime in 2025.

Robert Englund became a household name playing the dream stalker in Wes Craven’s original A Nightmare on Elm Street. A film that turns forty this year. Yet he has a long and storied career outside of Freddy. As he detailed in the documentary about his life, Hollywood Dreams and Nightmares, he was a working character actor for years. Long before his breakout role in the sci-fi mini-series V. A year after V, Craven cast him as deranged serial killer Fred Krueger. This was his career-defining role a part he would play in six sequels and the crossover Freddy vs. Jason. He also starred in films like Phantom of the Opera, Hatchet, and most recently, on season four of Stranger Things.

Will his Elm Street co-star Heather Langenkamp, who played Nancy Thompson, present him with the honor? We kind of hope she does. It would perhaps finally facilitate an on-screen legacy sequel reunion between the two. So many legacy sequels have come out for horror classics like Halloween, The Exorcist, and others over the past several years. Ever since, the fans have been clamoring for a “one more time” visit to Springwood for Robert Englund, especially after the less-than-beloved A Nightmare on Elm Street remake from 2009. In any event, we are just thrilled that Robert Englund is finally getting his flowers.

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Nosferatu. That one word causes a shiver to go down horror fans’ spines. We all know the story of the famed vampire Count Orlok, who is unofficially based on Bram Stoker’s Dracula vampire. And, no matter how many times it gets retold, we want to see it over and over again. Gothic vampire horror narratives will always reign supreme, and the original Nosferatu movie is legendary. The trailer for Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu hits the perfect notes, giving away none of its plot and simply leaning into disturbing imagery. We learn one thing throughout its narrative: He is coming. 

I don’t know the name of the casting director who brought on Bill Skarsgård as Count Orlok. I do know that they deserve every good thing in life. What a perfect choice. He’s opposite Lily-Rose Depp as Ellen Hutter, the object of this vampire’s affections. The Nosferatu teaser trailer promises a dark and twisted tale centering on these two characters. 

Here’s a quick synopsis to bring things into focus: 

Robert Eggers’ NOSFERATU is a gothic tale of obsession between a haunted young woman and the terrifying vampire infatuated with her, causing untold horror in its wake.

The remainder of Nosferatu’s cast is as follows: 

What Is the Release Date for Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu Movie? 

Nosferatu will hit theaters on December 25, 2024. What a haunting Christmas present.

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The tortured process of bringing a Blade reboot to life at Marvel Studios has been something to behold. Blade was first announced at Comic-Con in 2019, when Oscar winner Mahershala Ali stepped onto the stage to announce he would portray the Daywalker. Since then, it’s gone through multiple screenwriters, different production start dates, several release dates, and two directors. Yet Marvel has revealed very little about the film in all this time, aside from the basic info we already knew from comics and previous movies. Now, an article in The Hollywood Reporter has revealed a few key characters of the MCU Blade.

One of the main reveals is that the film would have featured two characters from the pages of Marvel Comics. The first was Blade’s daughter. We presume this is Bloodline, who first appeared last year in the comics. Named Brielle Brooks, she also has a thing for slaying the undead, just like dear old dad. Although a recent creation, the idea of Blade having a daughter goes back a few years. Marvel announced a series about Blade and his daughter in 2015, Back then, her name was Fallon Grey. That series never happened, and Bloodline came about seven years later instead.

Pearl and MaXXXine star Mia Goth was the other major comics character, the villain Lilith. In the comics, Lilith Drake is the daughter of Dracula, and has fought Marvel’s supernatural heroes many times. In the film, she would have wanted the blood of Blade’s daughter. Considering Blade began as a supporting character in Marvel’s Tomb of Dracula comics, it makes sense for him to fight someone related to the King of the Vampires in the MCU. In actual mythology, Lilith was the first wife of Adam, and the supposed source of many vampire mythology. Marvel Comics had their own take on the character, which likely inspired whatever Marvel Studios was working on.

It’s unknown if either of these characters will survive into the latest Blade draft from writer Eric Pearson. One of the first MCU Blade scripts took place in the 1920s, with the most recent one taking place in the modern day. Some characters from earlier scripts might not make the cut, if and when this movie goes before the cameras. Blade currently has no director attached, so it’s certainly not making its 2025 release date. In its article, The Hollywood Reporter notes, “The new plan [for Blade] calls for the script to be written over the summer and then go out to directors.” Hopefully, Marvel Studios can finally crack the code on Blade, and give us Mahershala Ali slicing and dicing the undead. This shouldn’t be the hardest movie in the world to get off the ground.

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Nearly a century ago, Universal Pictures invented Hollywood’s cinematic horror film genre with their classic monsters, Dracula, Frankenstein, the Wolf Man, the Mummy, and many more. And they all remain icons of horror cinema and Halloween to this day. Now, Universal Studios theme parks are finally giving these iconic classic monsters an immersive themed land of their own as part of the new Dark Universe, coming to Universal Epic Universe at the Universal Orlando Resort. We’re excited to share details and concept art for the attractions and themed areas of this creeptastic portion of the park, which debuts in 2025. Below you can see the “bat’s eye view” of the land in all its Transylvanian glory.

Universal Epic Universe’s Dark Universe Land Celebrates the Universal Monsters

Dark Universe is one of the five immersive worlds featured in Universal Epic Universe. This new land will envelop guests in monstrous adventures across various attractions, shops, restaurants, and character meet and greets. Dark Universe blends the iconic stories of Dracula, The Wolf Man, Frankenstein, and the Bride with a new generation of monsters. The new monsters coming to Dark Universe include Dr. Victoria Frankenstein – the great-great-granddaughter of Henry Frankenstein, who has continued his misguided experiments. As guests venture through the ravaged village of Darkmoor, they’ll encounter the characters and subjects of those experiments. All within a first-of-its-kind theme park environment. Concept art of the eerie Darkmoor village can be seen below, as well as the Universal Epic Universe’s Dark Universe attractions:

Click To View Gallery

Monsters Unchained: The Frankenstein Experiment

One of the rides we know is coming to Dark Universe celebrates the Universal Monster, Frankenstein. It’s titled Monsters Unchained: The Frankenstein Experiment. This state-of-the-art dark ride takes guests deep into the catacombs of Frankenstein Manor. There, Dr. Victoria Frankenstein conducts her twisted experiments. In a vain display of her genius, she invites guests into her laboratory to witness a demonstration of her ability to control monsters. Yet her plans go awry when her attempts to control the most dangerous of monsters, Dracula, fail. Dracula unleashes a horde of enraged monsters. Guests are then thrust into an intense ride through the darkness. There, they try to evade the grasp of The Wolf Man, The Mummy, The Creature from the Black Lagoon, the Brides of Dracula, and others.

Curse of the Werewolf

Deep in the woods that sit on the edge of Darkmoor, guests will find Curse of the Werewolf. This Universal Epic Universe Dark Universe ride is a spinning family coaster inspired by The Wolf Man. Guests will enter the encampment of The Guild of Mystics. Here, Maleva, the guild’s all-knowing seer and leader, will greet them. She warns them that they bear the mark of the werewolf. Guests then board a wagon and venture into the forest – racing to escape the werewolves before they become one themselves.

The Dark Universe’s Darkmoor Makeup Experience

Guests of all ages can become fashionably monstrous as they don elaborate face paint and temporary tattoos at Darkmoor Monster Makeup Experience. Here, monster makers have converted Dr. Pretorius’ infamous old lab into a parlor to continue the spirit of his demented experiments, and skilled artisans use their talents to transform guests’ outer appearances so they can showcase their fandom for the Universal Monsters as they traverse the Dark Universe land.

Meet the Universal Monsters at Epic Universe’s Dark Universe

There’s always someone…or something…looming in the shadows of Dark Universe – including Universal Monsters eager to meet and greet everyone, from kids to adults. Among them are Dr. Victoria Frankenstein’s Monster and the alluring Bride of Frankenstein. Guests will also encounter other unusual inhabitants roaming the eerie village, like Frankenstein’s servant, Ygor. In addition, The Invisible Man, an eccentric monster hunter, and a talented musician will regale guests with songs in this Universal Epic Universe land, not to mention tales of the classic Universal Monsters stories.

Dining and More at Universal Epic Universe’s Dark Universe

The Dark Universe will also feature Das Stakehaus, a vampire-themed dining hall, the Burning Blade tavern, inspired by the burning windmill from The Bride of Frankenstein, and Dr. Lacey’s Cottage, where the Frankenstein Monster once found a friend, and now is home to all sorts of treats. You can check out concept art images of those in the gallery above.

There’s already a link for merchandise from Dark Universe for monster fans who can’t wait to experience it for themselves. Dark Universe and the rest of Universal’s Epic Universe will open for business at the Universal Orlando Resort in 2025.

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Back in 1998, R&B singer and actress Brandy famously fought with Monica over a boy in “The Boy Is Mine,” a song that still rules karaoke nights to this day. Now, in 2024, Brandy is telling an evil, racist mother-in-law that the house and the child are mine in The Front Room, an upcoming A24 horror film. That’s right, Brandy, who famously played Karla Wilson in I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, is coming back to the genre! The first trailer for The Front Room shows Brandy battling against an old woman with a sinister agenda. 

Here’s a synopsis of The Front Room by A24: 

Everything goes to hell for newly-pregnant Belinda (Brandy) after her mother-in-law (Kathryn Hunter) moves in. As the diabolical guest tries to get her claws on the child, Belinda must draw the line somewhere…

The trailer for The Front Room certainly shows Belinda’s mother-in-law trying to do some weird ritual and being a real pain in general. She needs to give it up. Brandy has had about enough. It’s not hard to see…

We don’t know how things will end but we do know that Max and Sam Eggers are the writers and directors of this vehicle. Let’s see what these brothers will bring to the screen with Brandy leading the way alongside Andrew Burnap.

What Is the Release Date for Brandy’s Horror Movie The Front Room?

The Front Room will hit theaters on September 6.

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One of the best and most creative horror films in recent years is undoubtedly Smile. Everything from the film’s concepts to its characters and even its marketing blitz were pretty darn close to perfection. With Smile’s resounding success, it was inevitable that Paramount Pictures would order a sequel. The first teaser trailer for Smile 2 introduces us to a new set of characters and that familiar sinister smirking.

Ya know, I am not sure about this second venture. I will definitely check it out when it hits theaters. But I think that certain concepts are cooler when they aren’t stretched to their limits. I absolutely love Parker Finn’s Laura Hasn’t Slept and didn’t mind that concept getting stretched out to a full film with Smile. Now, it feels like it could be wearing the novelty thin, if you get what I mean. No shade to anyone involved because I totally hope this film rules. It’s good to see Parker Finn is writing and directing once again!

Here’s a synopsis for Smile 2 to bring the trailer into focus: 

About to embark on a new world tour, global pop sensation Skye Riley (Naomi Scott) begins experiencing increasingly terrifying and inexplicable events. Overwhelmed by the escalating horrors and the pressures of fame, Skye is forced to face her dark past to regain control of her life before it spirals out of control. 

The Smile 2 cast includes Rosemarie DeWitt, Kyle Gallner, Lukas Gage, Miles Gutierrez-Riley, Peter Jacobson, Raúl Castillo, Dylan Gelula, Ray Nicholson.

What Is the Release Date for Smile 2?

Smile 2 will hit theaters just in time for Halloween on October 18.

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Jordan Peele is not only a master of horror but also a master of enigma. The horror director and producer caught many fans attention with Us, Get Out, and Nope. And, he still has us in his hooks with Him, a football-centric film he’s producing starring Marlon Wayans. That film is set to hit theaters in September 2025 but it seems there’s yet another Jordan Peele project on the rise. We know absolutely nothing about it except one thing: It’s coming just in time for Halloween 2026. Jordan Peele posted a message on X (forever Twitter in our hearts) with a photo that has nothing but the date October 23, 2026. Maybe it will be called Her…

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the upcoming 2026 Jordan Peele film is on Universal Pictures upcoming slate. There is no title nor any details but fans are speculating quite a bit already. Is it Candyman 2? Maybe. He’s known for promoting all things under Monkeypaw Production’s umbrella, whether he is directing it or not.

Maybe it’s a quirky Marvel film or The People Under the Stairs remake that is supposed to be in early stages of development. Who knows. We will have to wait a long time and see what Jordan Peele has coming our way with this mysterious 2026 movie.

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Danny Boyle and Alex Garland are teaming up again. That might sound like dream come true, but it’s actually something even better: a nightmare. We know because the last time they worked together was 2002’s 28 Days Later. That popular horror film’s influence is still being felt more than two decades later. Now it’s going to be felt even longer. That’s exactly what is bringing them back together. They’re making a sequel to their modern zombie classic. Only it might be more than just a single new entry in the franchise. It could launch a new trilogy.

Cillian Murphy Will Return in 28 Years Later

When asked if Cillian Murphy would reprise his role in 28 Years Later, Sony Motion Pictures Group chairman Tom Rothman said yes. Cillian Murphy will return in 28 Years Later. But it’s more complex than that. Rothman shared:

Yes, but in a surprising way and in a way that grows, let me put it that way. This is Danny [Boyle] at his best, combined with a very commercial genre, like we had with Edgar Wright and Baby Driver. Sometimes when you put a real signature director into a commercial arena, it elevates it.

The Cast of 28 Years Later

According to Variety, in addition to Murphy, the cast of 28 Years Later is also coming together. The publication reports that Jodie Comer, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and Ralph Fiennes have joined the film. That’s a pretty star-studded opening play.

An interview with Elle teases Comer’s role in the fun. The publication notes, “The part means she’ll get to add another accent to her repertoire: Geordie. She has been watching clips of Cheryl on The X Factor with her dialect coach to prepare.” Comer notes, “I’m excited to get the first day done… Danny just seems like such a confident, intuitive and intelligent director. The original was so loved, so I’m trying not to think of that too hard. I’m not putting too much expectation on myself.”

28 Years Later‘s Release Date

The highly anticipated 28 Years Later movie has a release date: June 20, 2025. Hopefully, that means we’ll be seeing more from it very soon.

Danny Boyle and Alex Garland Re-Teaming for Sequel and Possible Trilogy

Danny Boyle, who directed 28 Days Later, is making his long-awaited return to the franchise. Even better he is bringing the original film’s writer, Garland, with him. Boyle will direct a new film, 28 Years Later, which will move the story decades past the original entry starring Cillian Murphy.

Rather than just one film, though, THR says the duo has plans to launch a trilogy. Garland would write all three scripts, with the Academy Award-winning Boyle directing the first at least. Variety recently reported that Nia DaCosta is in talks to direct the second part of the trilogy. Garland and Boyle will begin shopping the project to studios soon. The pitch will include giving each film its own $75 million budget. That would pay for a whole lot of very fast reanimated corpses.

While this movie would mark the return of Boyle and Garland as a creative team, their zombie film did get a sequel with 2007’s 28 Weeks Later. However, they only served as executive producers on the movie. (Which, for the record, was still very good!) That’s what makes this news so exciting for fans, especially those who remember what a cultural phenomenon 28 Days Later was.

It still is. The modern zombie renaissance owes a lot to Boyle and Garland. With their renewed partnership it is likely going to owe them even more in the future.

Originally published on January 11, 2024.

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The first hour of writer-director Ishana Night Shyamalan’s debut film The Watchers is instantly forgettable and totally uninteresting in almost every way. Despite being a horror movie there’s nothing—not one single moment—that qualifies as scary. It’s poorly edited, poorly paced, and poorly scored. Its characters are so shallow I couldn’t even muster energy to hope they’d get killed off. The film simply thinks eschewing basic plot elements and putting people in a literal mystery box is compelling enough on its own to make it good. It is not. But after the last 41 minutes of this disastrous, laughable script, I was longing for a return to the first hour. Its mind-numbing nothingness was far better than the absurdity that followed.

The Watchers is a perfect case study in why things like exposition, plot, characterization, theme, and narrative structure are important in storytelling. It lacks all of those things. It actually seems to actively hate them, but not in a fun way. The film isn’t playing against expectations or convention. Instead it just doesn’t care about them. Vital information, which would have been wildly interesting to know at the start, is held back until the last 20 minutes of the movie.

As a result you don’t care what’s going on or why because the film never even hints at its actual story. It’s genuinely shocking when you find out what it’s really about. There’s a hidden premise here that is actually a good idea for a movie. But by the time you you’re told it, it’s not only far too late, it will make you actively hate it for trying to be so coy. This film is like getting served cake after getting force fed literal slop for 80 straight minutes. No cares about cake at that point! You’re sick from the slop!

Even when the movie does finally bother to provide us necessary exposition, it does so in the most ham-fisted way imaginable. My mostly full screening groaned during some info dumps. Characters deliver many of them during scenes while claiming they must keep moving at all costs. The rest of the dialogue isn’t much better, either. Characters speak in an uncanny valley manner that makes you think their off-ness might be intentional. Nope, it’s just really bad writing.

Who are these people, though? It doesn’t matter. What brought them here? It really doesn’t matter. Who are the titular “watchers” observing them at night? I was more worried about everyone having to watch this awful movie to care.

I know this all sounds harsh, but the truth is, it’s actually much worse. This is film is so inane that its big ending made me laugh out loud. That was definitely not the reaction the film was trying to get. I wasn’t alone, either. Many in the audience started laughing, too. It was the most/only cathartic moment of the entire evening. Laughing at this silliness was a physical release of the frustration-turned-disbelief we’d all obviously been feeling.

Thematically, The Watchers is just as bad as its plot and characters. It presents potentially engaging ideas in the first 10 minutes only to completely forget about them until the last ten. Meanwhile it abandons other themes are completely. It’s almost incomprehensible how bad this screenplay is. (There’s part of me that wants people to see it for that very reason.) It really lacks the most basic elements of a coherent story, let along a decent one.

Sometimes the cast can save a bad movie from itself, but that didn’t happen here. (In fairness, Daniel-Day Lewis and Meryl Streep couldn’t have saved this movie with a script this bad.) Star Dakota Fanning technically gives the best performance, but only technically. Her Mina is intentionally flat and emotionally broken, but it doesn’t work when everyone in this movie is flat. Mina is like Melatonin the character. All the other characters are Valium.

The only thing keeping this film from being an historic disaster is, strangely enough, the person most responsible for it. Shyamalan is unable to generate any kind of dread, interest, or sense of place, but the film does feature some nice shots. She clearly knows how to both light and frame a scene. And she knows where to put her camera. As long as she’s shooting someone else’s script, she clearly has potential as a director.

It’s going to be hard for many people to see that potential initially. Not because they can’t appreciate the only redeemable part of an awful movie, though. They’ll be too angry they actually watched The Watchers.

The Watchers ⭐ (1 of 5)

Mikey Walsh is a staff writer at Nerdist. You can follow him on Twitter and Bluesky at @burgermike. And also anywhere someone is ranking the Targaryen kings.

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On the surface, living in a rustic house nestled on green acres miles away from society seems like a vibe. You don’t have to worry about annoying neighbors and you can enjoy some sweet scenery. Life is good… unless you’re in a horror movie. Then there’s something sinister waiting to disturb your peace and tear your family apart, especially if you have a child. That’s what we get in Starve Acre, a folk horror film starring Matt Smith and Morfydd Clark with an unsettling yet intriguing trailer. 

The clip shows a couple beginning to splinter after their son Owen starts experiencing something strange. Richard believes everything is okay but his spouse is not so sure. And we totally agree with her, based on all the wild imagery we see in the Starve Acre trailer, including the recurring appearance of a not-so-friendly rabbit. In fact, this furry superstar is the face of Starve Acre‘s excellent poster. We love a legend!

We also love seeing two of our favorite stars, The Rings of Power‘s Morfydd Clark and House of the Dragon‘s Matt Smith, in one movie. Both series will be sharing their second seasons right around when Starve Acre releases. It will be fun to see these talented actors inhabiting such different roles. Starve Acre‘s trailer definitely gives us a taste of the excellent performances in store.

In addition to knowing Starve Acre‘s stars, you might also think this movie’s name sounds familiar. That’s because Starve Acre is based on the book by Andrew Michael Hurley. Here’s a synopsis to make things even clearer: 

When their son starts acting strangely, a couple unwittingly allow dark and sinister forces into their home, awakening a long-dormant ancient evil rooted deep in the countryside.

What Is the Release Date for Matt Smith and Morfydd Clark’s Starve Acre?

Who can resist a film with a creepy kid and an evil entity? We certainly can’t. This film is written and directed by Daniel Kokotajlo, with Tessa Ross, Juliette Howell, Derrin Schlesinger, and Emma Duffy as its producers. Starve Acre will release in theaters and on-demand on July 26.

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Maxine “F***ing” Minx is back for her third and final film. Only this time writer-director Ti West is bringing her out West. He’s wrapping up his X horror trilogy under the bright lights of Hollywood. But the newest trailer for MaXXXine shows that its young star so desperate for fame and glory won’t get the chance to build a new life for herself in Tinsletown. The Devil and her past will find her wherever she goes. And when they do it will mean even more blood and death.

The third and final X film is a star-studded affair. In addition to Mia Goth, MaXXXine also features Elizabeth Debicki, Moses Sumney, Michelle Monaghan, Bobby Cannavale, Halsey, Lily Collins, Giancarlo Esposito, and Kevin Bacon. …Damn. Now that’s a cast.

But, just as with the first two entries in the series, we’re most excited to see Goth play Maxine Minx once again. In just a couple of years she’s established her place in the annals of horror. Maxine is not the only one who will be in danger walking the streets of Hollywood Boulevard, though. Once again those closest to the wannabe actress will find themselves in mortal danger. Here’s the official synopsis for MaXXXine from A24 to accompany the trailer:

In 1980s Hollywood, adult film star and aspiring actress Maxine Minx finally gets her big break. But as a mysterious killer stalks the starlets of Hollywood, a trail of blood threatens to reveal her sinister past.

MaXXXine will turn up the heat and the bloodshed when it comes to theaters this summer on July 5, 2024. But fans hoping to get an early sneak preview won’t have to wait that long. A24 announced it’s bringing back 2022’s X, the first film in the franchise, to theaters for one night only on June 18. Those screenings will feature a special early look of MaXXXine during the movie’s post-credits.

That’s only fitting since the past isn’t done with Maxine just yet.

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Physical media is the only way to actually have ownership over the movies, TV shows, and music you love. FACT. Blu-rays and the like take up room, but they aren’t subject to the whims of a streaming service and its licensing agreements. How many of us have purchased a film or TV episode on Prime or Apple only to later learn it isn’t in your library? With Netflix, as we’ve seen with other services like Max, you never own the media. It can disappear without warning. That’s why we’re so thrilled to hear at least one of our favorite horror filmmakers’ film will get a physical release soon.

As we learned from Collider, Mike Flanagan spoke to SlashFilm recently about his 2016 Netflix-exclusive movie Hush. Starring Flanagan’s frequent collaborator and spouse Kate Siegel, the movie follows a deaf novelist who lives in a house in the woods unaware a home invader lurks. It’s a very straightforward thriller, but offers some great tension. But Netflix took the movie off the platform, and it’s nowhere to be find at the moment.

“We took it back because I really value physical media,” Flanagan said. “Netflix, by policy, it does not work in their business plan. So we took it back. We do have a new home for it. I can’t say where.” He went on to say that they’ve been working on a fancy schmancy physical release for a year. “There will be a lot of really awesome surprises that we’ve been working on for a year to make this release awesome. It’s something that will be really exciting.”

Kyle Anderson is the Senior Editor for Nerdist. He hosts the weekly pop culture deep-dive podcast Laser Focus. You can find his film and TV reviews here. Follow him on Instagram and Letterboxd.

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AMC is bringing back its Anne Rice Immortal Universe series in 2024, and has revealed new casting updates for its two flagship shows, Interview with the Vampire and Mayfair Witches. It’s possible a third series is coming, too. The news was announced at the TCA press tour, via The Hollywood Reporter.

Mayfair Witches Season 2 Shares First Teaser and Release Window

Mayfair Witches has now shared its first season two teaser. This is a very brief look at the new season, but it does confirm that Mayfair Witches season two will be heading our way in 2025. And it does bring the drama. Take a look below.

Mayfair Witches Season 2 Cast Additions

Mayfair Witches has already started production on an eight-episode second season in New Orleans, with the addition of Alyssa Jirrels as a series regular, playing Moira Mayfair. She’s lead character Rowan Fielding’s (Alexandra Daddario) cousin and a mind reader. She blames her family and the entity called Lasher (Jack Huston) for the death of her sister Tessa (Madison Wolfe). Ted Levine joins as recurring guest star Julien Mayfair, the father of Cortland Mayfair. Also coming on board is Thora Birch as Gifford Mayfair, a self-deprecating tarot card reader and bohemian.

In the original Witching Hour novel, Julien Mayfair is a major character in the Mayfair family tree. However, the description sounds like the series will reimagine him. Moira Mayfair might be a stand-in for Mona Mayfair, a major character introduced in Rice’s second Mayfair novel, Taltos. There is a Gifford Mayfair in the novels as well, but she’s barely referenced. This sounds like a totally new character with the same name.

Finally, Deadline reports that Ben Feldman has joined the cast of Mayfair Witches season two. Feldman will play Sam ‘Lark’ Larkin, a “successful CEO of a genetics startup and Rowan’s (Alexandra Daddario) former boyfriend, who has re-entered her life.”

Talamasca

AMC has also started work on a series about the Talamasca. John Lee Hancock (The Blind Side) is currently writing a script for this potential third series. The Talamasca is an ancient psychic order who were chroniclers of all things supernatural. Anne Rice introduced them in her third vampire novel The Queen of the Damned. She later greatly expanded upon the order in her Lives of the Mayfair Witches series, and their origins were finally revealed in the 2014 novel Prince Lestat.

Originally published on February 6, 2024.

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Stephen King’s IT has haunted us since 1986. But most recently, IT and IT: Chapter Two directed by Andy Muschietti really captivated popular imagination. The devious Pennywise and his red balloon caused a stir among die-hard horror fans and casual viewers. And now, we’re heading back to Derry for more of that specific world. The newly coined streamer Max (formerly HBO Max) has officially greenlit and ordered Welcome To Derry, an IT prequel series from Andy Muschietti, Barbara Muschietti, and Jason Fuchs. And now we know who will star in Welcome to Derry and when it will arrive on our screens. We even have our first look at the series via a Max sizzle reel for upcoming properties.

The footage of Welcome to Derry is brief, but it does tease us with an ominous red balloon. It also confirms that although the Pennywise series was slated for a Halloween 2024 release on Max, the series will officially be released in 2025.

So far, we know that Welcome to Derry‘s cast will include Taylour Paige, Jovan Adepo, Chris Chalk, and James Remar. According to Deadline, Madeleine Stowe and Stephen Rider have also come aboard in recurring guest and series regular roles, respectively.

According to TV Line, Andy Muschietti will also direct several episodes of the series, including its first. The publication reports the HBO IT series will be set in the ’60s. It will delve into the origins of Derry’s curse and, presumably, Pennywise the Clown. The HBO Max show will eventually lead to the first IT film.

It’s not clear whether we’d see Pennywise become the main character of the Welcome to Derry prequel show. But we are excited to see Bill Skarsgård step into the role once more.

We’ll just have to see what else lies in store for Pennywise and Derry.

Originally published on February 23, 2023.

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Horror comes in an array of subgenre flavors to satisfy the tastes of different audiences. Some viewers eschew copious amounts of blood and brutality, instead opting for lighter fare that infuses comedy into its narrative. Others seek a horror film that leans more into building a tense atmosphere that toys with the protagonist’s—and, by extension, the viewer’s—psychological stability. And some just want to see some good old fashion slicing and dicing in the fashion of classic slasher flicks.

In all of these cases, the vantage point almost exclusively comes from a killer’s target(s) versus the harbinger(s) of death. But, what if we got a story with a slice-of-deadly-life POV from a hulking mass in the vein of Jason Voorhees or Michael Myers? How does that shift the experience? Is it one that works better in concept versus execution? Chris Nash’s arthouse horror flick In a Violent Nature takes this brave swing with mixed results. 

The film’s main character and silent antagonist, Johnny, arises from under the brush of an absolutely gorgeous yet haunting Ontario woods after a couple of teens swipe an item that belongs to him. He gets up and goes on a mission to kill anyone who crosses his path, whether they have this item or not. He finds a strange old fireman’s mask and a few solid weapons, including an ax. (Love your look, Johnny.) That’s the overall gist of the film.

His awakening begins the first of several sequences of us walking a few steps behind him as he trudges through the woods in search of blood. It certainly gives third-person video game vibes. This is a recurring instance in the film and, except for the first time, it is not particularly thrilling. Those walks in the woods are brilliantly shot but they always go on for a touch too long. At a lean 94 minutes, In a Violent Nature still feels like it can shave off about half an hour or, better yet, just be a short film.

If you like a preponderance of exposition and a strong backstory, you won’t find it here. Johnny’s main targets are a roster of teens who gather together in the woods for a weekend of fun. Thanks to one guy’s love of spooky campfire tales, we learn the legend of Johnny in a brief plot dump. (Johnny hilariously lurks quietly behind them in the dark woods, even staying in place to join their selfie.) All of the characters in the story are forgettable, save for the person who takes the sole survivor throne. Much of their final moments buck the normal battle royale style of standard slasher affairs while maintaining the actual tension that fans crave. Their frazzled escape makes you scan every corner of the frame for danger. (Unfortunately, this fizzles into an underwhelming ending.)

The lack of character development is probably on purpose, as it is not the victims’ stories. This eliminates the typical emotional sting of seeing someone you’ve built some degree of connection with getting obliterated. So, instead of jump scares, standard slasher tension, and the anticipatory dread of when the killer will emerge, there’s the uncomfortable experience of communing with evil and knowing that each kill will offer sheer brutality. It has a strange way of drawing the viewer in but also not allowing them past an arm’s length. There are no human drama or true interpersonal relationships to grasp.

This stripping of the slasher elements could prove to be alienating for viewers. It is all a bit disconcerting at times, creating a disconnection makes it hard to stay engaged. As someone who experienced this film on my flat screen TV at home alone versus a film festival or general movie screening, I had to run a couple of scenes back thanks to wandering thoughts. So many elements are so quiet (almost hypnotic) that you get lost in the forest of your own mind. The spurts of action are often too sparse to reel you back in.

Now, if you’re all about the kills, you’ll get some thrills. In a Violent Nature doesn’t shy away from this element. Johnny hacks up and disfigures bodies in a couple of ways that I, a longtime horror aficionado, have never seen before. The film uses its modest budget effectively to create gratuitously violent murders, one of which will stick with you for a while. In nearly every moment, murderous or not, the sound design and cinematography reign supreme. Johnny’s sluggish steps, nature’s ambient noises, muffled voices/screams, and more replace a film score to create an unsettlingly grounded environment.

In a Violent Nature boasts an understated and artistic aura but doesn’t shy away from the inherent, well, violence of the wild and, by extension, Johnny’s killing machine persona. Cotton candy sunsets and rotting animal flesh, lush green foliage and decaying trees, peaceful waters and pools of blood are all a part of the experience, the cycle of life, death, and whatever stage Johnny is in.  Who knew that horror could have a soothing element?

In a Violent Nature takes some strong creative swings and performs an experiment with slasher horror. As a tighter film with a steadier pace, I could see this working. But, the sluggish crawls to get to the crux of the story (like, you know why we are here!), lack of foundational lore, and zero characters that etch a notch in your memory left me feeling cold. In a Violent Nature is a flick that avid horror fans will be exploring and discussing. So it’s your choice if you’ll allow Johnny to lead your deep into the abyss of the woods.

In a Violent Nature ⭐ (2.5 of 5)

In a Violent Nature hits theaters on May 31.

The post IN A VIOLENT NATURE Bucks Slasher Norms for a Slice-of-Life Look Into a Killer’s Day appeared first on Nerdist.

The Munsters are coming back once again. Just a year and change after Rob Zombie’s The Munsters movie, Universal is taking another crack at their iconic property. According to Deadline, horror master James Wan is producing a new series via his Atomic Monster production company. They describe it as “a darker take” on the classic show, which showcased lovable sitcom versions of the Universal Monsters. The title of this latest reboot is 1313, as in the Munsters’ home address, 1313 Mockingbird Lane. Whereas the Rob Zombie version of The Munsters was a movie, this is looking to go the television series route.

This is actually not the first time Universal has produced a darker, edgier take on The Munsters for television. And the last one basically had the same naming convention too, centered on their home address. Over a decade ago, Bryan Fuller developed a series called Mockingbird Lane. It starred Jerry O’Connell as Herman Munster, Portia de Rossi as Lily, and Eddie Izzard as Grandpa. Controversial X-Men director Bryan Singer shot a rather expensive pilot. This The Munsters concept never went to a full series, but the episode aired as a Halloween special back in 2012. A new, more traditional The Munsters sitcom was announced in 2017, yet it never came to be either.

The original black-and-white sitcom ran for two seasons, from 1964-1966, on CBS. This was for the exact same amount of seasons, and during the very same years, as The Munster‘s rival show on ABC, The Addams Family. Both shows lived on for decades in reruns. However, The Addams Family came back to life for several successful theatrical movies and animated projects. Now, it currently has a very successful spin-off on Netflix with Wednesday. No doubt the success of that show made Universal reconsider The Munsters as something they could modernize. Maybe this time it will click at last.

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Life goes on, even for the only survivor of the world’s deadliest adult film production. But sometimes it doesn’t matter how much you want to move on, not even when you move across the country to to pursue your Hollywood dreams. Sometimes the past doesn’t let you go without a fight. That’s the battle that awaits Mia Goth from the third film in the writer-director Ti West’s X horror franchise. The first full trailer for MaXXXine promises the only starring role Maxine Minx can definitely count on is the same one as before. It’s the leading part in a real-life slasher flick.

A24’s ready to let the cameras roll on another installment in the popular X franchise. The third film will serve as a direct sequel to the franchise’s original entry from 2022. (Its follow-up Pearl was a prequel.) This time the series is headed to the bright lights of L.A. in 1985, as our young heroine pursues her lifelong ambition to be famous. But that’s also where big hair and big dreams will go up against a past she can’t escape. Here’s the official synopsis for MaXXXine from A24 to make the trailer clearer:

In 1980s Hollywood, adult film star and aspiring actress Maxine Minx finally gets her big break. But as a mysterious killer stalks the starlets of Hollywood, a trail of blood threatens to reveal her sinister past.

As you might have noticed from this fantastic trailer, the film boasts an absolutely stacked cast. In addition to Goth the movie also features: Elizabeth Debicki, Moses Sumney, Michelle Monaghan, Bobby Cannavale, Halsey, Lily Collins, Giancarlo Esposito, and Kevin Bacon.

Damn. Now that’s a cast. And this is also an incredible premise for a franchise that keeps finding ways to offer fresh new horrors without abandoning the spirit that makes these movies so good. That’s why even if Maxine never escapes her path, Mia Goth’s future looks brighter than ever.

MaXXXine will step into the Hollywood spotlight when the film comes to theaters this summer on July 5, 2024.

Originally published on April 8, 2024.

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The Insidious franchise will continue to bring The Further’s horror to the big screen with yet another sequel. Honestly, anyone who watched Insidious: The Red Door isn’t shocked after that post-credits scene with the light flickering over that door of terrors. The next Insidious installment will once again come from Blumhouse Productions and hit theaters on August 29, 2025. 

Of course, there are no other details at this time. We don’t know if we will see the Lambert family again or if the Insidious franchise will branch off in another direction. But, thanks to Variety, we do know that this sequel will not have any ties to Thread: An Insidious Tale, which is an in-universe spinoff series that will star Mandy Moore and Kumail Nanjiani. We will have to wait and see what The Further offers us next.

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In the ‘90s, Scream led to a swath of teen ensemble horror franchises like Final Destination and I Know What You Did Last Summer. It’s now officially back into the game with last year’s hit movie and another film coming soon. So, it is not surprising that the franchise is inspiring others to dust off their dormant universes and return back for more gore. Deadline reports that an I Know What You Did Last Summer sequel will release on July 18, 2025. Additionally, Jennifer Love Hewitt and Freddie Prinze, Jr. are expected to return. We will have to wait and see what this next terrible summer includes. 

If they do come back, the I Know What You Did Last Summer sequel will likely follow a format similar to what we saw in Scream (2022). Legacy characters like Julie James and Ray Bronson will return to help newer people get through a horrific antagonist is a win for longtime fans and new ones, too. It would be interesting, though, considering that the last time we saw these I Know What You Did Last Summer characters, it seemed that the hooked killer was about to murder them. Of course, this could have simply been Julie’s bad dream. Thankfully, a canceled fourth film with their confirmed deaths didn’t take place. If Julie James and Ray Bronson come back for an I Know What You Did Last Summer sequel, it will be interesting to see if they are still together and what their lives are like decades later.

Originally published on February 7, 2023.

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If there’s one thing horror fans love, it’s an icon they can root for. And root they have! Early and often. One of the first theatrical releases of 2023, Blumhouse and Atomic Monster’s M3GAN has made a whole heap of cash and its titular robotic moppet has marched into the hearts of fans everywhere. Kind of like a mix of the Terminator and Chucky in the guise of a little girl. Except M3GAN is way saltier and likable. (She did nothing wrong!) And those myriad successes have allowed the studios to announce a sequel. M3GAN 2.0 will now drop on June 27, 2025, slightly pushed out from its initially planned January release. And that means plenty of time to master that dance, friends.

We originally learned the info from The Wrap who report the whole band will be back together for M3GAN 2.0. Stars Allison Williams and Violet McGraw will return, with the original film’s screenwriter Akela Cooper penning the script. Williams will produce with Atomic Monster founder James Wan and Blumhouse founder/CEO Jason Blum. The movie has made over $91 million in its two weeks of release against a $12 million budget. That is a hefty win for both Blumhouse and Atomic Monster. Cooper and Wan co-wrote Wan’s 2021 nutso horror flick Malignant, so we hope this means we’ll get a sequel where M3GAN has to fight Gabriel, the back-of-the-head evil of twin. We can dream, can’t we?

Additionally, Deadline recently reported that Ahsoka‘s Ivanna Sakhno will play a “major role” in M3GAN 2.0. What that role entails exactly remains under wraps for now.

The first film followed Cady (McGraw) having to stay with her aunt Gemma (Williams) following the tragic death of her parents. Luckily for the young, grieving girl, her aunt is a robotics genius who has made a life-size robot toy prototype who learns from a child its paired with. That robot is, of course, M3GAN, who takes it upon herself to protect Cady, physically and violently if necessary. And it’s necessary a lot of times.

We look forward to M3GAN (2.0) and her new murderous exploits.

Originally published on January 18, 2023.

Kyle Anderson is the Senior Editor for Nerdist. You can find his film and TV reviews here. Follow him on Instagram and Letterboxd.

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In 2024 Ella Purnell survived ghouls, robots, cannibals, underground cults, giant cockroaches, and her own creepy father. Now she’ll have to fight survive something even stranger: killer squirrels. The Fallout star has joined the cast of the upcoming squirrel-centric horror-comedy movie, The Scurry.

Screen Daily reports Purnell (Yellowjackets) has signed on for a leading role in True Brit’s film about psychotic rodents. This squirrel horror-comedy movie comes from The Phantom of the Open‘s Craig Roberts and is currently filming in the UK. The film originally cast House of the Dragon‘s Olivia Cooke. She dropped out because of a reported scheduling conflict. As has Mia McKenna-Bruce.

Purnell is said to be taking on the role of “a park attendant who must use her unique skills and strength to survive a band of killer squirrels.” Yes, killer squirrels are in this movie, hence The Scurry. Here’s the film’s official synopsis from True Brit:

Two pest controllers are called to an eco-café in a country park to investigate what begins as a routine vermin problem – but as nightfall approaches an avalanche of deranged squirrels descend, wreaking revenge and mayhem on the staff and visitors in the park. With many fatalities the survivors take shelter in the café as a freak storm takes out the power and communications leaving them isolated and under attack. An eclectic mix of survivors include pest controllers, a sulky teenager, hypocritical vegans, and a drug dealer – there is only an outside chance of survival… 

If we had a nickel…

Despite Cooke dropping out House Hightower will still make their presence felt in the film. Rhys Ifans will carry the Hightower banner as a cast member in this squirrel movie. Paapa Essiedu (The Lazarus Project) and Antonia Thomas (The Good Doctor) will also get in on the horror film “with comedic undertones.”

If they need any help surviving this squirrel attack in this movie they know who to turn to. Ella Purnell knows how to survive just about anything at this point, especially an off-kilter world of killer monsters.

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Melissa Barrera can’t stop getting stabbed and drenched in blood. The Mexican actress’ transition to Hollywood has largely been in the horror genre. After gaining a new legion of fans as Sam Carpenter in Scream (2022) and Scream VI, Barrera is continuing her journey in the genre with Abigail. In it, she portrays Joey, a woman with a dark past who, along with a group of fellow criminals, kidnaps the daughter of a wealthy crime boss for money. But, she gets way more than she bargained for because, well, this kid is a ballerina vampire who is thirsty for blood. We caught up with Melissa Barrera to chat about her love for horror, getting physical in Abigail, and more. 

Nerdist: You’ve become quite the horror movie queen over the past couple of years. What is it about the genre that keeps you coming back to it as an actor?

Melissa Barrera: There’s so much about it that I love. I grew up loving horror movies. I love the thrill, love the adrenaline rush, I love being scared. I’m kind of a masochist in that way. And I learned that making horror movies is so much fun. It’s like being a child and playing in your living room with your siblings. It’s like that level of imagination and having to pretend to be scared and scream your heart out is kind of ridiculous if you want to be rational about it. So you really have to let go and let your inner child kind of come out and be fearless and do all these crazy things that horror requires. So I love that. And I also just love that it’s a genre that has a great fandom. The horror fans are the most loyal and the most dedicated.

We are indeed very loyal to what we love!

Barrera: Yeah, and I think there’s just so much room for expansion in the genre. It constantly surprises me where these new creatives are taking horror stories and getting wackier and crazier and more creative. And I think the most interesting stories come out of horror. But I love that they’re always metaphorical. There’s a way to talk about really deep and important issues in horror in a way that feels entertaining and not didactic. They’re not trying to teach you something. They’re just trying to make you think and entertain you. And if you grab onto the metaphor of it, then your mind is blown and then you want to talk about it and peel back all the layers.

There’s just so much of horror that I love, and I know that there’s a lot of incredible directors that have started in horror and a lot of incredible actors that also started in horror. And I also love that it’s a very noble genre in that people show up for it no matter what. You don’t need a big movie star for people to show up to the theaters to see a horror movie. And that’s always something that I’ve loved about it. It feels very generous, and I love that because I think we need to keep showing up to theaters. People show up to theaters for yes, big franchises and superheroes and the big movie star movies, but I think horror is keeping theaters alive.

Indeed, especially with so many inventive recent films. I think Abigail is such a fun take on the vampire genre. Just when you think that there’s not a new way to spin a vamp story, this movie does something totally cool. How did you find out about the film?

Barrera: I found out about the film through my team. They told me that [Scream directors] Matt [Bettinelli-Olpin] and Tyler [Gillett] had this new movie at Universal and that it was a vampire movie. And they were like, “Do you want us to pitch you for it?” I mean, I’ve been obsessed with vampires my whole life. I love all the monsters. Van Helsing, I was obsessed with that movie growing up. And I’ve always loved vampires and I always wanted to play a vampire. So when I found out that Joey was not a vampire, I was kind of disappointed. I’m not going to lie. [laughs]

But I was still like, “You know what? I just want to be a part of this. It sounds super fun working with Matt and Tyler again, if they’ll have me it would be a dream because I adore those guys and I think they’re brilliant.” So yeah, that was basically how I found out about it. It was right before Scream VI came out in theaters and then shortly after I got the role and I was so excited to stay in the genre, but to try something new and have more creative freedom with a character. 

For sure. What was it about Joey that drew you to her?

Barrera: I love complicated gray area women, as I call them, where you’re like, “You’re not all good. You’re not a good person, really. You’re a criminal, so you’re kidnapping a girl. What the hell?!” But you also have to root for her. I loved trying to find that humanity in her and play her with vulnerability. I always like to flip things a little bit on their head and allow for women to be complicated and to have a softer side, even though they’re supposed to be badasses. 

We get to see a soft maternal side to Joey as well. And I like the veteran aspect of her also because I’ve always been deeply heartbroken by the situation of so many veterans in the United States and how they live and how the government doesn’t really take care of them or follow up on the trauma that they experience. And a lot of them end up being homeless. They’re on the streets and losing their lives because they’re carrying so much pain. And so I really was interested in that aspect of Joey.

I love that. Now, Joey got super bloody and did some pretty physically challenging things too. Did you get a chance to do any of that stunt work or get physical? And what was that all over you?!

Barrera: I did. That final sequence, we rehearsed for that for two weeks, and then it was another two weeks of shooting it. I wanted to do all the stuff, but they wouldn’t let me because of insurance and stuff like that. They were throwing me through glass and stuff like that they don’t really let actors do. But I rehearsed all of it. I could do all of it. They were just like, “If you don’t have to do this, if you don’t have to be thrown from the first floor to the second and break the banister and crash into the wall and then fall to the floor, we’re not going to have you do it.”

Hannah and Ifa were my stunt doubles, and they were doing the hard stuff with falling on the bookcase and breaking it and flipping and all the very painful looking stuff. And I was just doing the final falls and I did all the punching and the stake through the chest, which was super fun.

The rehearsals are actually super fun because you get to do everything in the rehearsals. They teach you to do everything in the rehearsals, and then when you get to set, the directors are like, “Yeah, no, we’re not going to want you to do that. That feels dangerous.” So it was incredible. It was an amazing experience.

Totally makes sense to keep you all safe! But you did get to throw punches, which is awesome.

Barrera: Yeah! And the blood is like syrup, I guess. I know that it’s gooey and sticky. Actually I don’t know what the blood that they put on me and my clothes is. I know that it’s a syrupy blood because if it goes in your mouth, it tastes sweet. It’s a combination of a syrup or a gel and food coloring and all this good stuff that is so hard to get off afterwards because it stains you, it’ll stain. I kept finding blood even after we wrapped in places where I was like, “Oh, behind my knee. There we go.” And it goes through clothes. You’re just completely red. And the key to taking it off is shaving foam, shaving cream.

Ah yes, I remember Jack Quaid saying the same thing about getting rid of The Boys blood. 

Barrera: That’s the only way! You got to get in the shower with a bottle of shaving foam and put it on a wet towel and then just go in all your body. That’s the only way. I don’t know who figured that out, but thank God.

Sounds like a good time. If you could describe Abigail in three words, what three words would you use?

Barrera: I would describe it as bloody, funny, and surprising!

ABIGAIL is now available to watch at home exclusively on digital platforms from Universal Pictures Home Entertainment.

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Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, who are a major part of the Radio Silence creative collective, have become two maestros of horror. With titles like V/H/S 94, Ready or Not, Phobias, Scream (2022), and Scream VI under their belts, the duo continues to expand the genre with innovative (and deliciously bloody) takes on classic subgenres. Their latest foray, Abigail, is a wild blend of a heist movie and a horror comedy. It starts with the former as a group of kidnappers abduct a crime lord’s ballet-loving daughter for ransom. Quickly it transitions into the latter when they discover that she’s actually a vampire. Abigail is as wild, funny, and chaotic as you’d imagine, so we had to catch up with the Radio Silence co-founders to get all the behind-the-scenes details. 

Nerdist: Abigail is one of my favorite films that I’ve seen this year so far. 

Tyler Gillett: So glad you liked it. Thank you. That means so much.

You’re welcome! What was it about Abigail that made you two want to come on board and direct this film?

Matt Bettinelli-Olpin: I think it was a kind of a mixture of things, but we loved the simplicity and fun of being able to do a thriller that gets hijacked by a monster movie. That, to us, was just such an exciting movie to get into. And the characters all were really great on the page, and there was a lot of room to grow them with the actors. The possibility of [the film] was really exciting when we got the script, and then the chance to actually get to work with all those actors and get them to bring a lot to their characters. 

I’m glad that you mentioned that there are so many different characters and a genre mashup. There’s a lot going on in Abigail with that as well as tonal shifts. How do you all navigate it and keep things streamlined from a director’s standpoint?

Gillett: I think a lot of it is just getting really clear with the tone between the two of us, and making sure that what the actors are reading is really representative of that tone, even if things are going to change on the day and there’s going to be improv, and we maybe don’t fully have the scene 100% figured out in the script. At the very least, the tone is crystal clear.

And for us, at the end of the day, that’s really just placing characters, who feel really real and really nuanced and like they exist in the real world, in a situation that is just totally f*cking absurd and insane. For us, that means that then you get to have these incredibly tense, scary moments, but because it all exists under the umbrella of this crazy absurd concept, it also can be funny at the same time.

The same goes for Ready or Not and the two Scream movies that we made. That, for us, is really the hack in making that tone something that works. It never feels like you’re in a movie that’s too funny to be scary or too scary to be funny. You’re walking through the experience with the characters, and they’re as wacky and crazy as their point of view may be, but they’re also relatable to a certain extent. And you believe that their reaction is real and grounded in a reality that you and I, as an audience member, would understand.

Absolutely. You definitely had an excellent cast to be able to pull that off! You two got to work with Melissa Barrera again, and Scream fans are excited to see you all come together once more. How has your working relationship with her evolved over the years?

Bettinelli-Olpin: We’ve grown together a lot. I think Scream V was a really big step up for Tyler and I, and it was also a big step up for Melissa. The Scream V experience left all three of us in a place where we were really happy with what we had done, but we also had a lot of things we still wanted to do. So, we went into that next one together like, “All right, cool, we did that. Now, let’s go to another level with this.” So, we really were invigorated going into Scream VI.

But then for Abigail, we wanted to make sure that we weren’t doing the same stuff we had already done together. She really brought a lot to her character to make sure that Joey is not Sam Carpenter. And there’s still something quintessentially Melissa about it. I think her essence comes through in all three [films]. And I think a lot of that is her vulnerability and her just strength and her will. But going into this, we wanted to keep working together and we wanted to do it in a way that we could all grow. I think at the end of the day, that’s what we hope we’re doing with Abigail.

It’s a different type of playground. You went from an established and very popular franchise to this wholly unique film. You definitely got to play more.

Gillett: Totally.

Bettinelli-Olpin: Exactly.

Abigail is such an awesome vampire story with a twist. And a lot of what makes it work is the main location. I love the house! What was the scouting process like and what were the requirements that you had for the perfect location?

Gillett: We saw a bunch of different places… traveled out the November before we started shooting with the express task of finding a place that could hold all of the scene work that exists in the story. I think we probably saw half a dozen places. What we were really looking for is to not just find a place where you go, “Yeah, this could work. We could put this scene in this room. We could see this scene in that room.” 

[What we wanted was] to walk into a place that actually feels like it’s going to inspire new ideas. That it’s not just, oh, this is the box that we need to fit the script in. We need to find these specific things. But finding a place where you go, “Oh shit, it is much cooler to put this scene here!”

When we walked into the Glenmaroon House, it was just that. It was not only large enough to contain what was originally scripted, but there were so many interesting anachronistic, bizarre little corridors and rooms that made the house really feel like it existed through time and that it was maybe Abigail’s house for hundreds of years. It had this sense of a bizarre history to it. The layout of the house and the physical limitations and restrictions of it actually allowed us to look at the story and go, “Oh, what if we just choreographed this differently? And instead of building sets, [we can] use what we have available and retrofit the story and the action to fit.” That, for us, is always so exciting. There’s such an exciting opportunity to build something that feels really alive and really tactile because it exists in a real physical space.

That house had so many fun opportunities that existed within it. We’re so grateful. Then, of course, you have a great production designer and an amazing art department to come in and fill it with all of those textures, and it just comes alive.

I really love the way that the space was utilized, specifically in that final fight scene between Joey, Abigail, and Frank. I’m curious about the details behind shooting that scene because there were so many different moving parts. Joey’s getting thrown from one floor to the other and there’s just blood and stuff everywhere! 

Bettinelli-Olpin: That scene took two and a half weeks? Does that sound right, Tyler?

Gillett: Yeah. It was very technical.

Bettinelli-Olpin: And it was a giant scene on the page, too. There were no scene breaks… So with the ADs and everyone, we had to break it down. But it was a lot to shoot just technically. There were a ton of stunts, there was a ton of blood, and all of the effects work. Then we were also trying to keep the tone and the characters alive within that chaos. One of the things that was the weird silver lining of the [actor’s] strike for us was that we shot mostly everything up to that prior. Everything except the cellar where [Abigail is] locked up and the library, that end scene, we shot before the strike.

So, we got to watch the movie. We put together the movie and got to watch it. The studio got to watch it before we went back to shoot that scene. One of the things that Universal Pictures said was, “Hey, we really love this. Let’s really blow out the third act and make it awesome.” So we got Wade Allen, who’s incredible, to come in as a second unit director to help us with all of the stunts and the choreography. It really elevated that scene to something that throws you into this whirlwind where all of a sudden two characters who were trying to kill each other are now teaming up against Frank, who you’ve always known is an asshole.

Oh god, yes. He’s the worst. 

Bettinelli-Olpin: The whole combination of the movie takes place in that room. So we really had to make sure that we did it right.

Gillett: Yeah, and that we were using all of [the space]… I mean, for obvious reasons there are production challenges. When you want to do any stunt work with any form of verticality, you’re talking about stunt rigging and wire work and all of that. That stuff is so time-consuming and there’s obviously a safety component to it that you have to be really aware of. But as Matt said, to Universal’s credit, they were like, “Look, let’s just take the time and deliver on this big, fun blowout of a vampire fight.” There’s only one way to do that, right? And it is taking time and shooting a little bit every day. Eventually you realize, “Holy shit, we’re at 380 something setups and we finished this crazy scene!”

Well, you pulled it off and it’s brilliant, just like the two of you.

Bettinelli-Olpin: Thank you. That’s so kind!

ABIGAIL is now available to watch at home exclusively on digital platforms from Universal Pictures Home Entertainment.

The post Radio Silence on ABIGAIL’s Wild Final Scene, Sinister Location, and a Melissa Barrera Reunion appeared first on Nerdist.

Universal and Jordan Peele’s Monkeypaw Productions have announced the title for the next movie Peele will produce: Him. The title is news, but we knew about the film’s setting. The psychological horror will be set in the world of football. Yes, football. Justin Tipping will direct the film, which stars Marlon Wayans. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Wayans will play a legendary quarterback who must train a rising young athlete. Tyriq Withers plays the mentee, who trains at the aging athlete’s isolated compound.

Uh-oh. We can see where the psychological horror is coming in. Is it ever a good thing when a location is isolated in this context?

Julia Fox, Tim Heidecker, comedian Jim Jefferies, Guapdad 4000, and Tierra Whack also star in the film. Him comes from a Blacklist script by Zack Akers and Skip Bronkie. Peele will produce the movie alongside Ian Cooper, Win Rosenfeld, and Jamal Watson. Executive producers include David Kern and Kate Oh.

Him is scheduled to release on September 19, 2025.

The post Jordan Peele’s Next Movie Is a Psychological Horror Set in the World of Football appeared first on Nerdist.

Update May 8, 2024:

While it seems as through A24 is proceeding with Crystal Lake, it’s doing so without Bryan Fuller. Fuller confirmed his departure on social media. He shared on X, “For reasons beyond our control, A24 has elected to go a different way with the material. We hope the final product will be something Friday the 13th fans all over the world will enjoy.”

Original post:

It sounds like, we’re heading back to camp… Camp Crystal Lake, that is. Or, even if camp isn’t in session, although camp is often in session with Bryan Fuller, we’ll find ourselves soon splashing into the waters of Crystal Lake in some fashion. Peacock has officially ordered a direct-to-series expanded Friday the 13th prequel show titled Crystal Lake. This Friday the 13th show will be helmed by showrunner and writer Bryan Fuller. In a twist, A24 will act as the studio for the series.

There is a lot to unpack here. But we actually don’t know too much about the Friday the 13th series yet. Though, if you know Bryan Fuller, you might suspect it might have a good deal to do with the life and times of Pamela Voorhees.

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Fuller shares more about Crystal Lake, “I discovered Friday the 13th in the pages of Famous Monsters magazine when I was 10 years old and I have been thinking about this story ever since. When it comes to horror, A24 raises the bar and pushes the envelope and I’m thrilled to be exploring the campgrounds of Crystal Lake under their banner. And Susan Rovner is simply the best at what she does. It’s a pleasure and an honor to be working with her again.”

Meanwhile, Susan Rovner, Chairman, Entertainment Content, NBCUniversal Television and Streaming, notes about the series, “Friday the 13th is one of the most iconic horror franchises in movie history and we were dying to revisit this story with our upcoming drama series Crystal Lake… We can’t wait to get to work with Bryan Fuller, a gifted, visionary creator who I’ve had the pleasure of being a longtime friend and collaborator, along with our incredible partners at A24, in this updated version for Peacock that will thrill long-standing fans of the franchise.”   

Gifted and visionary are certainly words we’d use to describe anything Bryan Fuller touches. So we feel extra excited to entrust this beloved horror franchise into his capable and bloody hands and mind. Happily, Bryan Fuller will have access to anything and everything to do with Friday the 13th for this streaming show. Fuller notes to Fangoria, “I think over the course of the series, you will see many familiar manifestations of Jason!” and calls the series “pre-remake-uel.” He promises that if the show makes it ten seasons, he will take us to space.

Recently, Fuller also shared that Kevin Williamson would write an episode of the show. Additionally, Friday the 13‘s Final Girl Adrienne King will recur in the series, although it’s not clear what role she will play. Fuller also added, “We’re honestly going to be covering it all. The series is covering the life and times of these two characters.” We assume that means Pamela and Jason.

And so, we feel certain this show will feel and hit exactly the right murderous notes. And we’ll probably only side with any “villains” by the time the Friday the 13th prequel series ends. Just ask Hannibal Lecter if he agrees.

Originally published on January 18, 2023.

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We are officially halfway to Halloween, which means it’s time to start planning your spooky season decorations in earnest. So with that in mind, the folks at Spirit Halloween have revealed two of this year’s terrifying new animatronic offerings, set to freak out every kid in your neighborhood coming around looking for candy. (You’ll probably freak yourself out a little too). The first is their latest nightmare-inducing clown, named Clowning Around, and Rick Ratman, who is sure to disturb anyone with a serious case of musophobia. (That’s fear of rodents, don’t ya know). You can check out images of the new animatronics below, along with official descriptions for each one:

Rick Ratman (Animatronic)

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“Better hope your guests don’t have a rat phobia once you put Rick Ratman on display! Standing at 6.3 feet tall, this rat-infested zombie animatronic will give your guests the total creeps once he comes to life with his side-to-side moving torso. Be warned, stand too close and you could become a part of the little critters’ next snack this Halloween.”

Clowning Around (Animatronic)

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“No one thought calling the AAA Big Top Babysitting Service would end like this. Next time, if the kids ever will let you leave their sight again, make sure you tell them not to send a 7 FT tall diabolical clown even if he is just trying to make some extra money with a new side hustle. Either way, we bet your kids will have a whole new attitude about the circus! This Clowning Around Animatronic takes play time to a whole new level with his side to side turning waist and head, along with his light up eyes and moving mouth. Scream in terror as you watch him flail his victims up and down in each arm!”

More details can be found on the official Spirit Halloween site for each animatronic. The Rick Ratman animatronic is priced at $199.00. You can pre-order him by clicking here. Clowning Around is a little more, costing $319.99. You can pre-order this one by heading to this link.

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Russell Crowe has a thing for exorcisms. In 2023, we watched him be a very unserious person while he fought demons as the Pope’s personal exorcist. The Pope’s Exorcist didn’t hold back on the holy horror splatter at all. Now, Russell Crowe is once again battling malevolent forces in The Exorcism, which is a completely different story, as we see in its first trailer. 

This story actually highlights yet another common trope in horror films. Some group of people want to make a scary movie and somehow open themselves up to some legitimate hauntings and/or possession. Things are fine at first until strange stuff starts to happen. Usually one person starts unraveling mentally, leaving those around them wondering if they are just in need of help or if there’s truly something scary happening. The first trailer for The Exorcism doesn’t give away too many additional details, but there’s a chaotic and yelling Russell Crowe who ends up being possessed. That’s probably enough for many folks to check this movie out. 

Here’s a synopsis of the film:

Academy Award-winner Russell Crowe stars as Anthony Miller, a troubled actor who begins to unravel while shooting a supernatural horror film. His estranged daughter, Lee (Ryan Simpkins), wonders if he’s slipping back into his past addictions or if there’s something more sinister at play. The film also stars Sam Worthington, Chloe Bailey, Adam Goldberg and David Hyde Pierce. 

What Is the Release Date for Russell Crowe’s The Exorcism Movie?

I am totally here to see Chloe Bailey win. I know she’s super vulnerable to something bad happening because she’s portraying the possessed person in this movie-within-a-movie. But maybe she will be the last woman standing! We will have to see what happens when The Exorcism hits theaters this summer on June 7.

The post Russell Crowe Fights Demonic Possession in THE EXORCISM Trailer appeared first on Nerdist.

“A child ballerina vampire hunts her kidnappers inside a haunted house” sounds like an amazing concept for a movie, but it’s also the type of ridiculous premise that typically falls flat in execution. Far too often movies with funny loglines try to get by entirely on their outrageous idea. But a film needs a lot more than that to be legitimately good. It needs good writing, filmmaking, performances, production, and just the right tone to avoid feeling either too serious or too stupid. It needs everything Abigail has, because this horror-comedy not only lives up to its premise, it exceeds it. Abigail is an intense, creepy, funny, often weird ode to vampire stories that has the perfect amount of humor and a fantastic cast.

If someone walks into Abigail knowing nothing about it, they will spend the first half thinking they’re watching a traditional, tight, well-made heist film. It opens with a group of strangers hired to do a high-paying job. They steal a little girl to ransom back to her wealthy father. All they have to do to earn their millions is stay in a creepy old mansion with the child for 24 hours. The problems start (or so they think) when they find out her dad is a mythical underworld figure and they’re all in mortal danger. It’s a classic concept for a thriller and that version of the movie is incredibly well-done and gripping. That part of the film is claustrophobic and eerie, and the group is dynamic and interesting enough to add extra tension.

In some other universe that’s the story Abigail finishes telling, as Keyser Söze comes looking for his daughter. And in that world, my Variant is currently writing a review praising the movie for being a satisfying and entertaining entry in the heist-gone-wrong genre. But in this reality, the film goes in a dramatically different direction instead. Midway through the movie it becomes a vampire movie. And I am very sorry for my parallel self, because that genre switch is a whole lot of fun.

The film’s fantastic production design also adds needed weight to a movie that could have easily come across as too inane in lesser hands. The haunted old mansion feels like a real place, giving Abigail a needed sense of taking place in an authentic location. The movie is claustrophobic, but never feels limited by its setting.

Despite the trailers, Abigail is more horror than comedy, but it never forgets its comedic grounding. I laughed from start to finish. That pitch-perfect balance keeps things just light enough without ever undercutting the tension. This movie is as creepy as getting locked inside a house with a vampire sounds, though it is unsettling rather than straight up scary. Both the action and horror are also elevated by the deft camerawork of directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett. There are multiple sequences and moments that had me smiling throughout, and how they shot them is a big reason why.

That includes one memorable scene with Kathryn Newton and young Alisha Weir that is among my favorites of 2024. I won’t dare spoil it for you, but you’ll know it when you see it.

Both Newton and Weir are tremendous from start to finish. Newton is essentially the fourth lead, but she’s absolutely charming and magnetic every time she’s on screen. But the movie simply would not work if young Weir was not absolutely fantastic as the child vampire. She’s funny, charismatic, creepy, and has the acting chops of a 40-year-veteran. I genuinely can’t believe how good she is chewing up scenery and necks. Her blood-soaked smirk is somehow both angelic and devilish. If it were possible to buy stock in her acting career, I’d be banking on an early retirement on her.

They are far from the old standouts in the cast, though. Melissa Barrera anchors the film so it stays just grounded enough. She provides the right level of gravitas without feeling like she’s in a different movie. Barrera’s “Joey” (the kidnappers all use fake names, which is why the movie has a “Don Rickles”) is smart, capable, and dryly funny. She’s also the only one who seems to fully comprehend what’s going on and how to deal with the situation. That leads to some fantastic, hilarious, and sharp interactions with her fellow kidnappers/dinner options. (That includes some interactions where they talk vampire-lore. It’s the good kind of meta, referential, fun, and reverent without being obnoxious. This movie takes vampires seriously, but in the way people who love vampire stories do.)

Many of those take place with Dan Stevens, who once again proves why Dan Stevens should be cast in everything. I could not possibly love him in this movie anymore than I do. He plays the group’s de facto leader “Frank,” a dangerous, skilled asshole. Frank is also hilarious because Stevens elevates even his most basic dialogue into memorable and funny lines. He exemplifies why this movie is so successful. Stevens is super fun, but not overtly silly. He’s intense and intimidating, but not too serious. He gets right to the line of shlock without ever going over, because his Frank still comes across as an actual person. He is the embodiment of everything Abigail does well in finding the perfect tone for what it sets out to do.

As does Kevin Durand, who plays the big dumb muscle of the group, Peter. He’s lovable, funny, and nails everyone of his scenes. The late Angus Cloud is not nearly as lovable, but that’s a compliment. He plays Dean, an intentionally annoying character who Cloud imbues with just enough humanity to make him sympathetic and human. Without that element, Dean would stand out for all the wrong reasons. Instead he’s just another vital cog in a well-oiled machine working just as its engineer intended.

And Abigail works in almost all ways. It only falls short when it tries to hit some emotional beats that just don’t get there. Minus one genuinely touching scene with Barrera’s Joey, the film strains to add heart it doesn’t really need. And there’s also an underwhelming moment near the end that won’t be exactly what most people are hoping for, but that no one will care about during a second viewing.

This movie also gets really, wonderfully weird and outrageous at points in the best way. It also gets incredibly bloody. It’s not as gory as you might expect. But by the end of the film, you’ll feel as though you personally swam in a pool of blood.

The result is a thoroughly satisfying movie experience. I wanted to rewatch Abigail the second it ended, because while “a child ballerina vampire hunts her kidnappers inside a haunted house” is a great premise for a film, Abigail is even better than that.

Abigail ⭐ (4 of 5)

Mikey Walsh is a staff writer at Nerdist. He can’t wait to talk about a specific line of dialogue from Abigail. You can follow him on Twitter and Bluesky at @burgermike. And also anywhere someone is ranking the Targaryen kings.

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What’s best for fictional characters is not always what’s best for real people. For example, if you live in a futuristic sci-fi world capable of interstellar travel to other worlds, you should do everything you can to avoid Xenomorphs. That’s just good, solid, life-saving advice. But if you’re an actual human on this planet? Obviously you should run to see those space monsters every chance you get. And this month you’re going to get an incredible chance to see the original one. Alien, Ridley Scott’s 1979 masterpiece that launched the enduring horror franchise, is returning to the big screen ahead of Alien: Romulus‘ premiere.

This summer on August 16 director Fede Álvarez is going old school with a throwback Alien-style film. Romulus‘ first trailer evokes Scott’s original entry in the series in the best way. Álvarez’s story also takes place between the events of Alien and James Cameron’s sequel Aliens, so it’s only fitting 20th Century Studios is going to let fans both old and new see Alien in theaters before Romulus debuts.

Tickets for Alien‘s theatrical return are now sale. Ripley and the Nostromo will sail back to the big screen when Alien returns to theaters starting on April 26. The facehuggers will already be there. They’re always there.

This news is a great sign for fans. It likely indicates the studio believes they have a winner on its hands with Alien: Romulus and want to make sure as many people as possible see it. Re-releasing Alien before Romulus is the best way to do that. Even great legacy sequels, like Blade Runner 2049, sometimes disappoint at the box office because younger moviegoers never saw the original. Now they’ll have a chance to see Romulus‘ predecessor the best way possible: on the biggest screen.

And as real humans on this planet they should definitely take that opportunity. The only people who should avoid Xenomorphs are fictional.

Originally published on April 4, 2024.

The post Ridley Scott’s Original ALIEN Returning to Theaters This Month appeared first on Nerdist.

Would you like a solid piece of life advice? Sure you would. Do not go hang out with people in some random location unless you know them really, really well. If you just met a couple on vacation and they invite you to their not-so-humble abode in the middle of nowhere, think twice before you accept that invitation. This may seem like common sense, but if you look around, you’ll see that common sense is not so common. Speak No Evil unveils the very obvious dangers of not using your common sense in its creepy new trailer. 

If this film seems familiar, that’s because it already exists, basically. Speak No Evil is a remake of the (quite excellent) 2022 Danish film of the same name (also known as Gæsterne) where the general plot is very similar. Only this time, James McAvoy is playing an unsettling estate owner whose behavior gets increasingly more disturbing. And, there will probably be some cultural differences considering the couple that accepts the invitation is from America.

As we see in the Speak No Evil trailer, the Daltons (played by Mackenzie Davis and Scoot McNairy) connect with Paddy (McAvoy) and Ciara (Aisling Franciosi), a British couple, on vacation. They accept an invite to their abode and things get increasingly weird. I certainly won’t tell you what happens in the original Danish film for two reasons. First, I think it is worth watching. And, I get the feeling that this remake will travel down a similar (if not identical) road. There’s one scene with the Dalton daughter Agnes (Alix West Lefler) and Paddy’s son Ant (Daniel Hough) that really sets things in a dark direction. 

Here’s a synopsis of Speak No Evil: 

When an American family is invited to spend the weekend at the idyllic country estate of a charming British family they befriended on vacation, what begins as a dream holiday soon warps into a snarled psychological nightmare. 

From Blumhouse, the producer of The Black Phone, Get Out and The Invisible Man, comes an intense suspense thriller for our modern age, starring BAFTA award-winner James McAvoy (Split, Glass) in a riveting performance as the charismatic, alpha-male estate owner whose untrammeled hospitality masks an unspeakable darkness. 

What Is the Release Date for the Speak No Evil Remake?

If ever there were a person to play an unhinged yet charming man, it is James McAvoy. Speak No Evil will hit theaters on September 13.

The post James McAvoy Is Charming and Unhinged in SPEAK NO EVIL’s Unsettling Trailer appeared first on Nerdist.

Twenty-five years ago, The Blair Witch Project changed the face of horror forever . Shot on a minuscule budget, it pioneered not only the found footage genre, but also the use of the internet as a marketing tool for film. It captured the mainstream zeitgeist in a way few horror films outside The Exorcist or The Silence of the Lambs had. And now, according to Variety, the Blair Witch is returning for a new reboot, courtesy of Blumhouse Productions and Lionsgate. They made the announcement at this year’s CinemaCon. Jason Blum will team with producer Roy Lee, who previously produced the 2016 Blair Witch reboot.

The original film changed the game, landing young directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez on the cover of TIME Magazine. Yet none of its sequels have ever been able to capture that lightning in a bottle again. A more traditional horror sequel came out just a year later in 2000, Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2. It failed to make much of a splash, and many thought of it as a cash grab. Sixteen years later, after the found footage genre became hot again, we got a new installment, with 2016’s Blair Witch. Critics liked it overall, but it found little love at the box office. There have also been games. Can Blumhouse turn things around for this franchise?

The Blair Witch Project was about three college students who went into the Maryland woods to film a documentary on a local legend. They disappeared, and the terrifying footage they left behind became the basis for the film. Audiences in 1999 absolutely believed the movie was an actual documentary, leaving movie theaters totally shaken. Filmed on a budget of $200,000, it made micro-budget horror a trend, one which Blumhouse later capitalized on with Paranormal Activity. So in many ways, this partnership makes perfect sense. No word yet on who will write or direct this reboot. Hopefully, the movie will come out this year during the franchise’s 25th anniversary.

The post Blumhouse to Revive BLAIR WITCH Franchise With New Film appeared first on Nerdist.

Children can be absolutely terrifying, especially in horror films. I don’t know about you, but a creepy kid sends shivers down my spine every single time. There’s something truly sinister about twisting the assumed innocence of society’s most vulnerable population into something demonic. That’s what we’re getting with Abigail, an upcoming film about a vampire ballerina who kills her kidnappers in one wild trailer. Yes, you read that sentence correctly. A vampire kid will attack nefarious adults whilst performing some sweet dance moves. Please give it to us now. 

Here’s a quick plot synopsis for Abigail to bring the trailers into focus:

After a group of would-be criminals kidnap the 12-year-old ballerina daughter of a powerful underworld figure, all they have to do to collect a $50 million ransom is watch the girl overnight. In an isolated mansion, the captors start to dwindle, one by one, and they discover, to their mounting horror, that they’re locked inside with no normal little girl. 

As usual, I am rooting for the supposed villain. Abigail was busy minding her rich girl business, dancing during the day and feasting on blood at night until these blockheads tried to use her for ransom. Now she is doing what vampires do at night to survive: killing living beings for their warm blood. The kidnappers did this to themselves, honestly. And I am glad they did because it is fully entertaining for us. In an ideal world, Abigail and M3GAN would be besties.

It’s also lovely to see Melissa Barrera team up with directing duo Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett—better known as Radio Silence—for yet another horror film. Of course, they worked together on the most recent two Scream films. And they were set to come together for Scream VII before Spyglass Media Group made the shocking decision to fire her after she spoke out in support of Palestine in regards to the ongoing Israel-Gaza war. (That’s a whole other post for another time.) 

Abigail also stars the late Angus Cloud, Dan Stevens, Kathryn Newton, William Catlett, Giancarlo Eposito, and Kevin Durand alongside Alisha Weir as Abigail. Stephen Shields and Guy Busick penned the script with William Sherak, Paul Neinstein, and James Vanderbilt from Project X Entertainment producing. Additional producers include Tripp Vinson and Radio Silence’s Chad Vilella along with executive producers Ron Lynch and Macdara Kelleher. 

Abigail hits theaters on April 19.

Originally published on January 11, 2024.

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Admit it, the thought crossed your mind. When you saw the hit horror movie M3GAN last year, you thought to yourself “How long before they make a life-size version of that killer doll?” Well, as it turns out, it didn’t take very long at all. NECA has created a screen-accurate M3GAN replica of the loyal dolly/robotic murderbot, standing at over four feet tall. You can bring her out at Halloween, or just leave her to creep everyone out all year. You can check out images of the M3GAN replica doll, as well as read the official description, below.

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Own a fully posable, life-size replica of the robot doll from the hit film M3GAN. The Model 3 Generative Android (M3GAN) was designed to be a parent’s greatest ally and programmed to be a child’s best friend. But a self-aware doll with a life of its own can lead to sinister consequences. This 1:1 replica is based on M3GAN’s on-screen appearance, duplicated from actual film-used digital files to be the most screen-accurate representation available. It has an articulated inner-armature, movable eyes, and synthetic hair (matched to screen-used hair samples). Her clothing is made from film-used patterns and includes a dress with inner lining, two striped sleeves, a bowtie, underwear, tights, and shoes. The fabric material of her dress matches an exact swatch of the dress from the movie, and her shoes are customized with details from the screen-used shoes. This fantastically accurate replica doll stands approximately 55 inches tall and will be an excellent addition to any family!

Would the M3GAN replica doll actually be an excellent addition? Debatable. Fortunately, the doll will (probably) not come to life and do a little dance before starting a killing spree. It will just stare into your soul uncomfortably… forever. But hey, some people are into that. You can pre-order the life-size M3GAN replica doll now for $494 from NECA’s online store. It’s expected to ship in the latter half of this year.

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We all have hobbies that give us a purpose. That’s as true for scrapbookers, travelers, and toy collectors as it is for those who enjoy putting on a creepy mask and terrorizing innocent people who made the unfortunate mistake of stopping in the wrong town of violent psychopaths. Why does someone choose the latter way to pass their time? The unsettling The Strangers – Chapter 1 trailer provides the scariest answer of all.

The Strangers – Chapter 1 Trailer

The Strangers franchise, which began in 2008 and returned in 2018 with The Strangers: Prey at Night, is returning to theaters with its third film. This latest installment will also will kick off a new trilogy of home invasion nightmares. Once again a couple of outsiders will fight for their life against people who want them dead for reasons they don’t understand. Here’s the movie’s official synopsis from Lionsgate:

After their car breaks down in an eerie small town, a young couple are forced to spend the night in a remote cabin. Panic ensues as they are terrorized by three masked strangers who strike with no mercy and seemingly no motive in The Strangers – Chapter 1, the chilling first entry of this upcoming horror feature film series.

Meet the Strangers and Theirs Masks

Recently, The Strangers – Chapter 1 released a closer look at our creepy masked strangers. And we also learned a little bit more about the personality of each mask.

A release shares that the left-most Strangers is Dollface, who is said to be “Smiling through every slash.” In the middle there is Pin-Up Girl, “She’s got killer looks.” And finally, there’s Scarecrow… “He’s already at your door.”

Chilling.

The Strangers – Chapter 1 Release Date and More

Renny Harlin (Cliffhanger, Die Hard 2, The Exorcist: The Beginning) directs with a script from Alan R. Cohen & Alan Freedland. The film stars Madelaine Petsch, Froy Guitierrez, Gabriel Basso, Ema Horvath, and those damn masks.

The Strangers – Chapter 1 breaks into theaters nationwide this spring on May 17, 2024. Whether it’s destined to be both a box office hit and a cult classic like the original film remains to be seen. We do know one thing, though – we don’t like this trailer (in the good way). A creepy cabin in the woods combined with the creepiest people on the planet will always frighten us. And the more experience those killers have the scarier they are.

Originally published on March 1, 2024.

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Despite a slew of controversy over the past two years, the Scream franchise is moving forward with its seventh installment. The previous film left the Core Four and Gale Weathers (we assume, considering she didn’t die) in a relatively good place, with Sam finally moving towards healing and peace after killing Richie’s remaining family. (It’s wild but true.) Scream VI was the first film to not include Sidney Prescott due to actress Neve Campbell rightfully bowing out due to a salary dispute. Fans thought Sidney would finally get a happy ending but Ghostface just won’t leave our good sis alone. That’s right, Sidney is back and her once-enemy turned sorta-friend Gale Weathers is probably coming back, too. Variety reports that Courteney Cox is in talks to reprise her role in the next film.

The next film will be interesting, to say the least. Who will don that infamous mask next? Here’s what we know about Scream 7. 

Title

For now, we will call this film Scream 7. It’s likely this will be the title, which could be stylized as Scream VII. As seen on this script from Campbell’s Instagram post, the film does not have an official title yet. 

Scream 7’s Plot 

As stated above, Sam and Tara’s story came to a neat conclusion in Scream VI. And Sidney is living a happy life with her husband Mark and her daughters. It seems like there was no one else hiding in the shadows who would want to kill Sidney. Her story was complete and she found peace. So, the plot of Scream 7 is really up in the air. Maybe Sidney will swoop in to help some other unfortunate soul battle against a new Ghostface. There’s no confirmation she’s the definite lead for this film yet. Or, depending on this film’s release, someone from 30 years ago could decide to celebrate the events of Scream (1996) in a sinister way. We shall see. 

Behind-the-Scenes

Kevin Williamson, the writer of Scream (1996), will direct Scream 7. He is replacing Christopher Landon, who left the film after Melissa Barerra’s controversial (and very upsetting) firing and Jenna Ortega’s exit. Guy Busick and James Vanderbilt, who wrote the last two installments, will pen this sequel. The Radio Silence team will step back from directing duties to executive produce Scream 7. 

Scream 7’s Cast 

Right now, the only person we absolutely know will be in Scream 7 is Neve Campbell. It remains to be seen if the Meeks-Martin twins, played by Jasmin Savoy Brown and Mason Gooding, will be in this film. We’d love to see more of them.

However, their return isn’t likely considering their characters’ stories being so closely intertwined with the Carpenter sisters. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Savoy Brown hasn’t received a call from the studio Spyglass Media Group as of January 2024. Even more recently, Gooding affirmed he knew no solid details about the seventh Scream film. Sadness.

We assume Courteney Cox and Roger L. Jackson will return as Gale Weathers and the voice of Ghostface, respectively. Maybe we will see Patrick Dempsey reprise his role as Mark Kincaid, too. 

Scream 7 Release Date 

There is no release date for Scream 7 at this time. The script is at least partially in place, so perhaps we will see this film in late 2025 or maybe 2026 to celebrate Scream’s 30th anniversary.

Originally published on March 13, 2024.

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What would you do to save your job or be #1 in your career field? If you’re a late-night ‘70s talk show host, you create the most bizarre and sensationalist episode of television in existence. And during this time, nothing gets the people going more than talking about supernatural happenings and the Devil himself. That’s exactly what we witness in Late Night with the Devil, an absolutely stunning horror film by brothers Colin and Cameron Cairnes starring David Dastmalchian. He portrays Jack Delroy, a TV personality whose final effort to save his show turns into a live broadcast disaster. 

Nerdist caught up with Dastmalchian to talk about his immense love for the genre, Late Night with the Devil’s themes, and shaping his character’s persona. 

Nerdist: Before we start, David, I just want to tell you that I absolutely love Late Night with the Devil. Your performance is amazing. It makes my horror-loving heart super happy that this film exists in the world.

David Dastmalchian: Thank you. Yes. Yay! I am a monster kid, a horror nerd deep in my dark and twisted little heart. I was so excited when I first heard about and read this script. And I can’t tell you how much it makes my monster kid heart sing every time someone like yourself, who I know loves the genre and loves this space, responds so positively to it. It’s wild. It’s a great feeling.

I’m so glad you get to experience that joy! I recently learned the Cairnes brothers approached you about the role of Jack Delroy after reading a post you wrote for FANGORIA about TV horror hosts. What inspired you to write that post? 

Dastmalchian: So I’ve always been obsessed with horror hosts. I grew up in Kansas City in a very conservative and religious household where horror films were not something to be celebrated. My mother, who was so dear to my heart and who I love so much, didn’t like scary movies, so I’d have to sneak down away from her to watch Crematia Mortem, our local horror host of Creature Feature on Friday nights. I was smitten immediately with Oliver Reed in The Curse of the Werewolf, and Lon Chaney in The Phantom of the Opera, and Lon Chaney, Jr. in The Wolf Man, and Boris Karloff and Christopher Lee and all these people who became some of my biggest heroes. 

At the beginning of the pandemic, as we were all so riddled with fear and anxiety, I sadly lost my mom. And it was a devastating moment in my life because it happened so suddenly and so quickly, and I was so sad and scared. I thought about how much she had helped me through my life, through the scary moments, and how horror hosts had helped me entering into and then coming out of the scary moments of watching a scary movie. I saw the parallels between those relationships, finding those people in our lives that help safely transport us across scary things. 

And so I wrote this article, which Phil Nobile Jr., the editor of FANGORIA magazine, read and loved, and he published it in the magazine. The Cairnes brothers ended up being these horror nerds down in Australia who read the article and they said, “Oh, we like that guy’s acting, but this article and what he said here lets us know that we want him to be our Jack Delroy.”

That’s such an interesting and full circle journey. And I do extend my condolences for your loss. It’s one that I intimately understand. Right now, we’re in this really interesting space within the horror landscape. You’ve got sequels and reboots of long-running franchises along with really wild and inventive original offerings. Where does Late Night with the Devil fit into today’s horror landscape?

Dastmalchian: One of the things I’m most excited about with Late Night with the Devil is that it has its own specific place at the table. The table right now in the horror renaissance in which we are living is a buffet of great and awesome material. You’ve got the revolution that Jordan Peele has led in mainstream horror cinema, being able to get wide audiences to experience these incredible stories and films that are absolutely 100% genre stories.

You’ve got movies like Poor Things breaking the mold. Barbarian and Talk to Me completely shattered all expectations because they connect with audiences in such a specific way. And here’s a movie like Late Night with the Devil, a very small, independent, low-budget film that is about a character and his relationships with other people, and this pushing of the boundaries of ethics in the effort to try to save his career, the jobs of the people he loves, the legacy of the person he’s lost, his own mind, and in doing so, cracks open something that cannot be contained once it’s unleashed.

It is a very unique story. I think that also, in the film, there’s this parallel between the concept of possession and the grip that it has on the body, and the grip that sensationalism and watching proverbial train wrecks take place in entertainment has on us as a collective. How do you think this film addresses those concepts in a way that resonates with viewers?

Dastmalchian: We are collectively our own body as humanity. We are one being when you step back far enough. And when you think about the way in which we’ve allowed screens, projected images, videotaped and filmed moments to penetrate our consciousness, you see the power of media and not just over-shaping politics, culture, art, and society. On the deepest level, it has the potential to both connect and rupture the human psyche, the human spirit, if you will. 

So here’s this movie set in the—for all intents and purposes—innocuous, fun, silly world of late-night talk shows. These are springboards for musicians and entertainers to get on and yuk it up and hopefully have a little bit of fun. And yet at the center of it all is this very broken, very frayed man who has so many boulders of unprocessed trauma, grief, and unwellness brewing within him that in his effort to entertain people, to boost his ratings, to save his show, he makes some errors in judgment, and the horror that is unleashed is the consequence.

Yes. There’s also this level of desperation among some to be seen and gain attention through views and comments. And when you’re in desperate times, you’ll often resort to desperate measures. Late Night with the Devil takes this to the extreme.  

Dastmalchian: A whole ‘nother level. A hellish level.

Indeed. When it comes to Jack Delroy, there’s some obvious influence there from folks like Dick Cavett and Johnny Carson, but where else did you find inspiration to bring together the layers of this character?

Dastmalchian: There was a late night talk show host in Australia who was American. Don Lane was actually from Chicago and a big influence on me. He was this great interviewer, and he ruled late night in Australia during the same time that our movie takes place. But what I loved about Don Lane was he had this genuine and sincere interest in wanting to believe elements of the supernatural. And so he would bring on people who profess to have psychic or media, mystic powers, or spoon benders or whatever. And he did so with an open mind and always wanted to give them a chance, as opposed to maybe, say, making them the butt of a joke.

Wow, that is Jack Delroy to a degree for sure. I’m going to have to dig up YouTube videos now. Final question for you. If you could describe Late Night with the Devil in three words, which ones would you choose? 

Dastmalchian: Funny, shocking, and horrifying. But the horrifying part I think is on a level, hopefully after people see the film, that isn’t just splatter and shocks and jump scares. It’s a different kind of horrifying.

For sure. Even with the typical horror scares, the practical effects take them to a new level. They are excellent and capture horror from that time period so well. 

Dastmalchian: They are a great homage to John Carpenter, David Cronenberg, and the films of even Cassavetes with the way that violence gets pulled off on camera in our movie. I know it was a very conscious choice by Colin and Cameron.

Horror fans making horror films is special. Cronenberg was one of the first names who came to mind when I saw how the violence played out. Thanks so much for speaking with me! 

Dastmalchian: Yes, it was great to see you! I really appreciate it.

Tai Gooden is the Features Editor at Nerdist and a horror fan who fell in love with the genre as a kid literally living on Elm Street. She frequently writes about the Scream franchise, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th, The Walking Dead, Stranger Things, indie horror flicks, and Black-led horror TV shows and films.

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What do fictional characters in Alien movies have in common with moviegoers? That’s obvious: they both run when a Xenomorph shows up. The difference is those in the film run away from the iconic space monster while viewers run towards theaters. And the fantastic, intense first teaser trailer for Alien: Romulus shows why that will still be true for the franchise’s ninth big screen installment.

….Hell yeah. And to think, this was originally going to be a Hulu-only release. We certainly can’t imagine that would do it any justice after seeing ths Alien: Romulus trailer. Fortunately, Disney realized this deserves the biggest screen possible.

This new standalone entry, which the studio describes as a throwback that returns to the Alien franchise to its “roots,” stars Priscilla‘s Cailee Spaeny. It also features David Jonsson, Archie Renaux, Isabela Merced, Spike Fearn, and Aileen Wu. Alien: Romulus comes from director Fede Álvarez. He co-wrote the script with Rodo Sayagues, whose other credits also include Alvarez’s Don’t Breathe and 2013’s Evil Dead.

Ridley Scott, who serves as an executive producer on the film, more than gave Alien: Romulus his blessing. It probably wouldn’t have happened without him. Álvarez told Scott about his idea for the spinoff years ago. Scott later called him and asked if Álvarez was up for actually making it.

But what exactly is going on in this story, which is set in the time period between Alien and Aliens? The trailer gives us some idea, but here’s Alien: Romulus‘ official (but brief) synopsis from 20th Century Studios:

While scavenging the deep ends of a derelict space station, a group of young space colonizers come face to face with the most terrifying life form in the universe.

This Alien: Romulus trailer alone makes us very happy that Scott and Álvarez met and that Álvarez said yes, but we still want to see the whole movie. We’ll be able to do that when space’s greatest monster goes on the attack once more this summer. Alien: Romulus releases on August 16, 2024.

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I know for the rest of my life every time a beloved character enters the public domain someone will immediately turn them into a serial killer in a low-budget horror movie. Mickey Mouse didn’t even finish saying, “Oh boy, intellectual property laws!” before we got the trailer for his uninspired slasher flick. And yet, despite knowing the inevitability of these movies, I truly did not see the latest public domain film news coming. Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey‘s killer bear is teaming-up with other iconic characters in the free IP crossover horror movie Poohniverse: Monsters Assemble.

But Bambi, Peter Pan, and Pinocchio are getting their own standalone films first.

Variety first reported the burgeoning Blood and Honey cinematic universe already has its big event planned. Poohniverse: Monsters Assemble will see the murderous Winnie the Pooh partner Avengers-style with other famous free-to-use icons. He’s joining with Bambi, Tinkerbell, Pinocchio, Peter Pan, Tigger, Piglet, The Mad Hatter, and Sleeping Beauty. The group movie already has a poster, too. It shows Pooh swinging a bear trap atop a feral Bambi’s back.

If you’re concerned Jagged Edge Productions and ITN Studios are jumping the gun on a rushed crossover movie ala Batman v Superman DON’T WORRY! Some characters will get their own standalone horror movies first. They’re part of what is now being called the “Twisted Childhood Universe.” Those upcoming films include Bambi: The Reckoning, Peter Pan’s Neverland Nightmare, and Pinocchio Unstrung.

“It will be complete carnage,” said director Rhys Frake-Waterfield in a press release. “We are heavily influenced by Freddy Vs Jason and The Avengers. We would love to see a horror movie where the villains group together and are going after their survivors. We have some incredible set pieces in mind and some sequences I think will truly shock people. The movies we are working on now as standalones are all building towards Poohniverse: Monsters Assemble.”

Things won’t be entirely sweet as honey between the murderous beings, though. The movie will also see the creatures battling each other at various points. Cause why not at this point, right?

Poohniverse: Monsters Assemble will star Scott Chambers as Christopher Robin, Megan Plactio as Wendy Darling, Roxanne Mckee as Xana, and Lewis Santer as Tigger. More casting news will be shared later. The new slate of films will all arrive in 2025. This announcement comes right before Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2 comes to theaters, which debuts on March 26.

You can thank/blame public domain laws for that anytime you like.

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The expression “desperate times call for desperate measures” is common for good reason. Desperation often leads people to stretch the boundaries of their morals—or ignore those lines altogether—in an effort to acquire something they wish to obtain. That something could be as vital as food for sustenance, which is understandable in a sphere of scarcity. But oftentimes, it is far more trivial, like adoration from strangers who have parasocial attachments to them. They want the most viewers, the biggest platform, the unyielding attention.

People will lie, manipulate, kill, and exploit to satisfy those kinds of goals, sometimes at the expense of others. Exploring these sins is recurrent in horror narratives. But I’ve never seen anyone do what director/writer brothers Colin and Cameron Cairnes do in Late Night with the Devil. This found-footage flick, with a haunting and sensational leading performance by David Dastmalchian as Jack Delroy, takes us to Halloween night in 1977 to watch sensationalist efforts spiral into a demonic train wreck on a late-night television show. 

Late Night with the Devil honors films like The Exorcist and Rosemary’s Baby alongside the effervescent appeal of ‘70s-era late-night TV legends à la Johnny Carson and Dick Cavett. Its found footage narrative successfully blends humor, heartbreak, and dread, all of which are bolstered by the glorious style of gore that only Cronenbergian-style practical effects can offer. From its opening scene that puts the state of the world and the construction and crumbling of late-night host Jack Delroy’s life and career into focus to its absolutely batshit ending, Late Night with the Devil draws you in and refuses to release its grip. 

The film follows Delroy’s last-ditch effort to save his television show, which is rapidly falling out of favor with viewers. He’s grappling with a personal tragedy and just can’t seem to nab the #1 spot. His membership in a mysterious arcane organization and wacky on-air efforts still don’t move the rankings needle. With cancellation and Satanic panic creeping over the horizon, Delroy and his production staff pull one last stunt. They plan a Halloween episode with several strange guests who will both mesh together and hate each other. 

There’s Christou the medium (Fayssal Bazzi), Carmichael the former magician and supernatural skeptic (Ian Bliss), and Dr. June Ross-Mitchell (Laura Gordon), a parapsychologist and author. The latter is the true key to Delroy’s trick, thanks to her patient Lily (Ingrid Torelli). She’s a teenager with a harrowing backstory and an unsavory spirit living inside her. Jack pulls a fast one on the good doctor, coercing her in front of a live-audience to do something never seen before on live television: summon and commune with the Devil. This can’t go wrong in any way, right? Of course it can and it does in spectacular real-time fashion. We get a holistic and voyeuristic view of it all from two perspectives: in front of and behind the camera.

The film runs at a cool 93 minutes, which could have felt sluggish with a less captivating cast. David Dastmalchian is the foundation and master of this narrative. He brings Delroy’s smarmy and smug yet oddly endearing persona to life with every wide-eyed stare of disbelief and scathing remark. He’s a clear connoisseur of the genre, so much so that his Fangoria article about regional TV horror talk shows caught the eyes of the Cairnes brothers, leading to his casting. Anyone who’s seen Dastmalchian in, well, anything knows this leading role has been long overdue.

The new (to US audiences, anyway) standout in this film is undoubtedly Torelli as Lily. Her soulless stares and unsettling smirks into the camera will send chills down even the most fearless viewers’ spines… and that’s before the titular Devil takes over. Her quiet yet commanding screen presence slowly pushes an already eerie atmosphere over the edge of destruction. Torelli’s physicality and delivery play perfectly alongside Laura Gordon’s mounting perturbance and controlled panic. It is easily one of the best supporting horror performances in recent memory. 

Late Night with the Devil’s ending feels a bit rushed and convoluted. However, the big creative swings and pure chaos help soothe those issues. Questions are left unanswered, and that’s okay. Instead of tying up loose ends into a neat knot, things are delightfully unraveled and uncertain. Deliciously dark, frighteningly fun, super strange, and full of thoughtful thematic choices, Late Night with the Devil is poised for horror classic status.

Late Night with the Devil hits theaters on March 22 with a later release on Shudder on April 19.

Late Night with the Devil ⭐ (4.5 of 5)

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After the firing of Melissa Barerra, Jenna Ortega leaving the Scream franchise, and director Christopher Landon abandoning the project, it looked like Scream 7 was on ice. But now, the sequel is roaring back to life with arguably its biggest star involved once again. After controversially stepping away from Scream VI, actress Neve Campbell has revealed via an Instagram post that she is returning to the role of Sidney Prescott for Scream 7. Not only that, but so is original Scream writer Kevin Williamson, who will direct a Scream installment for the first time. Scream (2022) and Scream VI’s writer Gary Busick is taking over writing the script from James Vanderbilt, according to The Hollywood Reporter. You can see Campbell’s announcement below:

In her post in regards to Williamson’s involvement, Campbell said “This was his baby and it’s his brilliant mind that dreamt up this world. Kevin is not just an inspiration as an artist but has been a dear friend for many years. To the amazing Scream fans, I hope you are as excited as I am. See you on set.” The original Scream originated as a script called “Scary Movie,” which caught the eye of Wes Craven. Williamson would also write the second and fourth chapters. Not to mention other slashers like I Know What You Did Last Summer. His only feature directing credit is 1999’s Teaching Mrs. Tingle. Now, his second will take him back to where his career began, with Sidney Prescott.

Many believed that Neve Campbell would not return to the franchise after a salary dispute with Spyglass Entertainment. This conflict (allegedly) led her to not return for Scream VI. Since then, the goodwill for Spyglass among Scream fandom has been not so great. This only got worse after Melissa Barerra’s firing and Jenna Ortega’s decision to not return. Many also believed another Scream would never get off the ground. Now that it will, a lot of Scream fans will feel conflicted contributing to a franchise that treated its stars so shabbily. Can the return of Neve Campbell be enough to get the fans to un-boycott the franchise under Spyglass? We’ll find out when Scream 7 hits theaters probably in 2025 or 2026.

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