We’re getting ready to close the book on 2021, gods willing, and among the Gift Guides and Best Of lists, I’ve still got a whack of horror news to sort through for you folks. Check out some fresh trailers for a new Mickey Rourke action horror, a shark thriller starring my high school celebrity crush Alicia Silverstone, and a whole lot more. In the meantime, I’ll be over here trying to brush this dang tinsel out of my clothes.
Fans of World War II-set horror like Overlord will have something new to chew on in 2022 with a film called Warhunt from the good folks at Saban Films. Warhunt stars Mickey Rourke and Jason Rathbone, and it’s directed by Mauro Borrelli from a script by Reggie Keyohara III and Scott Svatos.
In Warhunt, “A US military cargo plane loses control and violently crashes behind enemy lines in the middle of the German black forest. Immediately ruthless Major Johnson (Rourke) sends a squad of his bravest soldiers on a rescue mission to retrieve the top secret material the plane was carrying. Led by Sergeant Brewer (Robert Knepper) and Walsh (Rathbone), the soldiers venture deep into the forest near the crash site. They soon discover hanged Nazi soldiers and other dead bodies bearing ancient, magical symbols. Suddenly their compasses fail, their perceptions twist and straying from the group leads to profound horror as they are attacked by a powerful, supernatural force. Fighting for their sanity and struggling to survive they must uncover the shocking truth behind the force before the Nazis and do everything they can to remove all evidence it ever existed, even at the cost of their own lives.”
The trailer’s a hell of a thing, features Mickey dang Rourke with a dang gold eyepatch, and is worth a watch to whet your appetite before Warhunt‘s release in theatres, On Demand, and Digital on January 21, 2022.
The HBO adaptation of The Last of Us by Craig Mazin (Chernobyl) and starring Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsay is currently rolling along in Calgary, and a familiar face is joining the cast. Murray Bartlett confirmed in a Guardian interview this week that Nick Offerman (DEVS, Parks and Recreation) is going to play fellow survivor Bill. This project already looks great and I can’t wait to see what Offerman brings to the table. Joining them on The Last of Us is Gabriel Luna, Merle Dandridge, Bartlett of course, and Anna Torv.
Talal Selhami’s Achoura will be unleashed this week, hitting DVD and Digital tomorrow (Dec 14). It’s been compared to Stephen King’s IT and tells the story of four friends whose childhood pal, thought to have disappeared 25 years ago, reemerges. They’ll have to band together to fight a child-eating demon who…wait a minute, do you really need me to sell this any harder than child eating demon?? Just watch the trailer ahead of the film’s release. It’s a nail-biter.
Dave Bautista continues to book top-tier roles in films like Blade Runner 2049, Skyfall, and most recently, Army of the Dead and DUNC. The former WWE star and one of my favourites looks to continue that trend with a starring role in M. Night Shyamalan’s new one, called A Knock at the Cabin. The film, set to release in theatres on February 3, 2023, is directed and written by Shyamalan, whose most recent project Old didn’t exactly earn rave reviews. Nonetheless, you can’t argue that old Shams is still getting this stuff made, so it’s worth keeping an eye on. Until then, expect to see Big Dave in a whole lot more places, including Rian Johnson’s Knives Out 2 and James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy 3.
Texas Chainsaw has a new trailer, and while I might give a little side-eye to the film’s beleaguered production and off-the wall premise, I can’t help but get goosebumps when ol’ Leatherface shows up on my screen. There are certainly echoes of the original 1974 film here, both in theme and aesthetic, and especially the subtext of youth culture which have been brought up-to-date in 2021. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, producer Fede Alvarez says that,
“I think the first movie really hit a nerve when portraying that culture clash between the countryside and the city. Back in the ’70s, the hippies were representing the youth of the city. This time, they’re more like millennial hipsters from Austin who are very entrepreneurial and have a dream of getting away from the city and back to the countryside. They’re trying to gentrify small-town America—and let’s just say they encounter some pushback.”
Texas Chainsaw buzzes into theatres in February, but here’s a little teaser of what we can expect.
In this week’s Mike Flana-news, the prolific director’s new eight-part Edgar Allen Poe miniseries, The Fall of the House of Usher, has announced it’s first casting news. Flanagan took to Twitter to reveal his lead players in the miniseries this week, and you can bet that some big names are on board:
If you don’t want to wade through the tweets, and who could blame you, the full list of announcements are right here:
Headlining this incredible ensemble, leading this extraordinary cast as Roderick Usher, the towering patriarch of the Usher dynasty… the legendary FRANK LANGELLA.
Also front and center, reuniting with Intrepid for our fourth project together, my dear friend and invaluable collaborator, the one and only… CARLA GUGINO.
As Madeline Usher, Roderick’s sister and the hidden hand of the Usher dynasty, we are thrilled to welcome the graceful, powerful, incomparable… MARY MCDONNELL.
As Poe’s legendary investigator C. Auguste Dupin, we are so honored to welcome back one of my favorite past collaborators, the extraordinary… CARL LUMBLY.
And a new addition to the dark worlds of Intrepid and of Edgar Allan Poe, playing a character surprisingly at home in the shadows, we are thrilled to welcome… the iconic MARK HAMILL.
In his second announcement, Flanagan unveiled that one of his mainstays, Henry Thomas ,would be joining The Fall of the House of Usher, along with Samantha Sloyan, T’Nia Miller, Rahul Kohli, Kate Siegel, Kyleigh Curran, Crystal Balint, Paula Nunez, Aya Furukawa, Matt Biedel, Daniel Jun, Ruth Codd, Robert Longstreet, and Annabeth Gish.
Finally, Alicia Silverstone is more known for animal rights activism than Aerosmith videos these days (though she still manages to find herself into a scary movie, like in her unforgettable turn in 2020’s The Lodge) so it was surprising to see that her next project, The Requin, will have her facing down a bloodthirsty shark. In the new thriller from writer-director Le-Van Kiet, Silverstone will play Jaelyn, who is vacationing with husband Kyle (James Tupper) in a villa on the Vietnam coastline. When a storm descends on the resort, the couple are swept out to see and right into, you guessed it, a school of great white sharks.
Take a look at the trailer ahead of The Requin‘s release in theatres and on VOD on January 28, 2022!
